Path of Exile 2 is known for huge battles, complicated builds, and moments when the screen becomes almost impossible to read. Most players eventually settle into a comfortable routine of clearing maps, upgrading equipment, and experimenting with different character setups. However, one streamer decided that ordinary minion gameplay was nowhere near extreme enough. By investing enormous amounts of Path of Exile 2 Currency into an absurd summoner experiment, he and several friends attempted to create an army of skeletons large enough to overwhelm the game's technical limits.

Turning Minions Into A Massive Experiment

The idea began with Empyriangaming, a Path of Exile 2 streamer who wanted to discover just how far the game's minion mechanics could be pushed. Instead of creating a practical build for normal mapping, he focused entirely on maximizing the number of creatures that could exist at the same time.

A typical minion-focused character might have roughly 10 to 15 skeletons following them during ordinary gameplay. That is already enough to create an entertaining battlefield, especially when other skills and effects are active. Empyriangaming, however, wanted a dramatically larger army.

The project required an enormous investment in equipment. Rather than building one optimized character, the group prepared six complete gear setups designed specifically to increase the number of minions they could summon. The amount of in-game wealth involved was far beyond what most players would normally spend on a single build.

Reducing The Cost Of Every Summon

The key to the experiment was resource management. The group calculated how to reduce the cost of summoning individual minions to single-digit levels. Once the cost was minimized, they could stack enough of the relevant resource to maintain a much larger army.

This approach demonstrates how deeply players can explore Path of Exile 2's buildcrafting systems. Instead of simply increasing damage or survivability, the group treated minion capacity like an engineering problem.

There was, however, an important restriction. The game would not allow one player to maintain an unlimited number of the same minion type. Once the character reached 255 creatures of a particular type, the game would remove the summons and reset the counter.

Friends Became Part Of The Build

That limitation did not stop the experiment. It simply meant that Empyriangaming needed help from other players.

Several friends brought their own specialized characters and summoned additional skeleton armies. In theory, combining multiple players should have allowed the group to move beyond the individual 255-minion ceiling and create an enormous combined army.

The result was exactly as chaotic as expected. Instead of producing a smooth demonstration of high-level summoning, the experiment quickly became a test of how much visual and computational activity Path of Exile 2 could process.

The Frame Rate Became The Real Enemy

Performance became the biggest problem almost immediately. When Empyriangaming summoned 255 Skeletal Priests by himself, the game slowed dramatically. Movements became delayed, animations appeared in bursts, and the battlefield began to resemble a stop-motion presentation rather than an action RPG.

The problem was not simply the number of characters on screen. Every minion also has animations, movement calculations, attacks, effects, and interactions with the surrounding environment. Multiplying those calculations hundreds of times created a situation that ordinary gameplay was never designed to handle.

Even with the game barely keeping up, the group decided to continue pushing the experiment. Adding more players meant adding more skeletons, creating an even more ridiculous battlefield.

A Build Designed For Chaos

The experiment is a perfect example of the freedom that Path of Exile 2 can give players who enjoy unconventional challenges. Most builds are designed around efficient clearing, boss damage, survivability, or progression. This one had a completely different goal: summon as many creatures as possible and find the game's breaking point.

For players who enjoy collecting resources for unusual builds, Path of Exile 2 Orbs for sale may appear attractive when preparing an expensive experiment. However, the real value of this story comes from the creativity behind the build rather than simply the amount of currency invested.

The skeleton experiment also shows why build optimization can be so entertaining. Whether someone is interested in efficient progression or ridiculous challenges, Path of Exile 2 offers plenty of systems to explore. Empyriangaming's army may not be practical, but it certainly demonstrates how far players are willing to go when testing the game's limits.