Path of Exile 3.2 Bestiary League Faq

This post only focuses on the Bestiary League itself. Poe is not trying to cover other questions about Content Update 3.2.0 in this post. Also, almost everything here is liable to change as Poe continue to iterate and tweak the league in the last week of playtesting.

• How do nets work? Are they items?
• What stops me having to carry around ten different types of nets?
• What kinds of Beasts can I encounter?
• How do I capture a Beast when I do so much damage that I just kill them instantly?
• Can Beasts be traded?
• Will there be a minimap icon for Legendary Beasts?
• Can I visit other people's Menageries?
• Is there a /menagerie command?
• Are your Beasts league-wide or specific for each character?
• How do I remember what Beasts I have and what Recipes are available? Do I have to keep going back to the Menagerie?
• How many Beasts can the Menagerie hold? What happens if a cage gets full?
• What happens if I die in or leave the Blood Altar fight?
• Will I have to farm many white monsters for high-level recipes?
• What will happen to my Beasts when the league ends?
• Will there be a challenge to catch all of the Beasts?
• Exactly how does the core gameplay loop of this league work?
• How difficult are the Best crafting fights?
• What types of things can be Best crafted?
• How is capture success calculated? What affects it?
• Exactly how does the core gameplay loop of this league work?

NO.1 How do nets work? Are they items?
Nets are stackable items that can be used for one monster capture each. Early on, you're given some by Einhar, and you can either buy more from him or find them in the world as drops. There are ten tiers of nets, which are introduced in a staggered way between the start of the game and the highest-tier maps.
In any particular place, you find only two types of nets: the current appropriate ones, and occasionally, the next tier. These higher ones are good to use for awkward encounters.
Also, please check out this development manifesto article about Nets that Poe posted after this FAQ!

NO.2 What stops me having to carry around ten different types of nets?
It is unlikely that you'll need to carry around more than two types of nets at a time. The ones lower than the current appropriate tier won't drop, so you'll either run out of them or discard them. You'll carry the current proper nets and ones from one Tier up that drop occasionally. They also stack 100 in the inventory, and to 5000 in the Currency Stash.

NO.3 What kinds of Beasts can I encounter?
In addition to the hundreds of regular Beasts in Path of Exile that can be captured, there are several tiers of new Beasts you'll encounter as you play in the Bestiary League:
Rare beasts with a Bestiary mod. These occur relatively often (every area or so) and are harder than regular rare monsters. You'll want to capture these if you see them because these Beasts are often needed in crafting recipes.
Legendary Beasts, which are exotic variants of other Beasts you may recognize. These occur periodically and are substantially rarer and harder fights. They're worth attempting to capture because most of the robust Best crafting recipes require one or more of them.
Spirit Beasts. There are four of these, and they're available in the end-game by Best crafting a portal to access them. They drop guaranteed unique items and can be captured to craft properties that synergize with those uniques.

NO.4 How do I capture a Beast when I do so much damage that I just kill them instantly?
While a creature is in a net, it can not die, so if you're worried about killing it too quickly, throw a loss first and attack second. Legendary Beasts are signaled on the minimap before you encounter them, and they're quite tight noticeable fights. They have substantially more life than a regular rare monster, so they're hard to kill by accident.

NO.5 Can Beasts be traded?
Yes. Once captured, they can be transferred into an item that can be traded with other players using existing safe trading methods.

NO.6 Will there be a minimap icon for Legendary Beasts?
Yes. They're easy to spot from a distance away, like Breaches and Abysses.

NO.7 Can I visit other people's Menageries?
Yes. You can party up, enter someone's Menagerie and engage in Best crafting or end-game Spirit Beast encounters together.

NO.8 Is there a /menagerie command?
Yes.

NO.9 Are your Beasts league-wide or specific for each character?
They're league-wide. Like the Atlas and your Masters, you share them between all your characters in the league.

NO.10 How do I remember what Beasts I have and what Recipes are available? Do I have to keep going back to the Menagerie?
The Bestiary Book that you carry with you has pages that record all of this. You can press H to check it out anywhere or press the Menu button if you're on Xbox One.

NO.11 How many Beasts can the Menagerie hold? What happens if a cage gets full?
The Menagerie is quite big - it's spread over several game zones. There's a different cage per type of Beast, and they can hold a limited number. If a pen is full and you capture another Beast of that type, then your worst current one is overwritten with the most recent. Poe is still balancing the number of each kind of Beast you can store.

NO.12 What happens if I die in or leave the Blood Altar fight?
If you die or leave the fight, the Beasts you were fighting are lost (they escape). If you want to have another shot at that Best crafting recipe, you'll need to find replacement Beasts. Any item you put on the Altar for crafting will still be there, unmodified.
In Hardcore modes, if you die in the crafting fight, your character moves back to the parent Standard league, as expected.

NO.13 Will I have to farm many white monsters for high-level recipes?
Poe intends that the most laborious recipes require hard beasts to find and capture, rather than busy-work of finding easy monsters that will die quickly.

NO.14 What will happen to my Beasts when the league ends?
They are merged back into the appropriate Standard league, available for the future if Poe continues to have Bestiary content in the game in some form. The decision of whether Poe rolls it into core game content after this league will be made later in the league.

NO.15 Will there be a challenge to catch all of the Beasts?
Yes, one of the 40 challenges is to complete your Bestiary. 

NO.16 Exactly how does the core gameplay loop of this league work?
Einhar Frey teaches you to capture the Beasts of Wraeclast and gives you some nets. You can win any Beast you encounter, by throwing a loss at it. Once captured, Einhar transports it to your Menagerie (which is like a zoo) for storage. You can visit your Menagerie to see your Beasts in their cages, and to fight them to craft items at the Blood Altar. The Best crafting recipes require specific combinations of Beasts and can create some fascinating results.
Your progress in the league is tracked in your Bestiary, which is a book that can be accessed by pressing H on PC (the same screen with the challenges on it) or pressing the Menu button on Xbox One. It shows which beasts you've captured, how many of them are in your Menagerie, and which Best crafting recipes you have available with these Beasts.

N0.17 How difficult are the Best crafting fights?
They can be challenging once you start to craft the higher outcomes. Fighting many rare Beast at once, especially ones with Bestiary mods can be quite scary.

N0.18 What types of things can be Best crafted?
There are many different categories of crafting results that you will find useful, including both twinking items as you play through the story, and compelling end-game crafting options. You can see some already-posted examples here and here. Poe is going to make a full news post about Best crafting results next week!

N0.19 How is capture success calculated? What affects it?
There's a random chance of capturing a Beast with a net, and it's slowly influenced by how much life the monster is on and how strong the monster is. Expect rare or unique bosses to be harder to capture. Better nets help!

N0.20 What happens if a capture fails?
The net you used is lost, and the monster enrages. You can attempt to capture a single Beast as many times as you want, though it's probably dangerous to anger the monsters.