Pool of Reflection Bonus Explained

The Pool of Reflection is a new feature added in 2.0.1 which provides your character with a hefty 25% experience boost. Most everyone has come across them at some point, but some of you may still be wondering exactly how they work.

Click here for the TL;DR version of this post.

When you click on the pool a little diamond appears on your experience bar. Hovering over your experience bar you see a tooltip that looks like this:

The tooltip information may be a bit of a head-scratcher, and you may also wonder why the little diamond on the XP bar lands where it does.

Here’s how the Pool of Reflection works:

• You gain an additional experience pool equal to 10% of the total experience required for your next level. The duration of this bonus xp pool effect is marked by the little diamond.
• Each time you gain experience through slaying mobs, questing, etc…you draw 25% of that experience from this pool.
• This additional experience pool lasts until death, so you can log out for a day or two, then log back in and your Pool of Reflection bonus will still be available.
• The bonus experience pool carries into your next level, but the bonus amount is set when you gain the boost – the remaining portion of the PoR bonus will not scale up after you level.
• You can stack up to 10 of these bonuses, but they do not increase the % of experience gains – additional stacks only extend the duration.
• They can spawn where health pools and shrines normally spawn.

Example:

• You are 10,000,000 experience deep into your current Paragon level.
• You need 50,000,000 experience total to reach your next Paragon level.
• You gaze into a Pool of Reflection and now earn a 5,000,000 experience bonus (10% of 50M).
• You slaughter a legion of gross undead guys and earn 400K experience, after which 100K experience is drawn from your Pool of Reflection bonus and added to that number, giving you a total of 500K experience for your killing rampage. You now have 10,500,000 XP, and your Pool of Reflection bonus is 4,900,000.

Why does the little diamond appear much deeper than 10% into my XP bar?

The pool of reflection bonus adds 25% to your experience gains during its duration, and its duration is equal to 10% of your current level’s XP. Since the boost occurs over time and is not immediate, the little diamond acts like a marker on a timeline and its position is always more than 10% or 25% past your earned XP. It appears at 50% past your current earned XP, but why..?

• Because the bonus pool is drawn from only when experience is gained, you must earn 4x the 10% bonus experience, on top of which the actual 10% experience is then added, equaling 50% (4x 10% + 10%) of your current level’s full experience bar.

The screenshots below will help illustrate the bonus…

Before Pool of Reflection Bonus:

Pool of Reflection Bonus Applied (showing 50% XP marker):

In Summary

The Pool of Reflection bonus lasts for a duration which is equal to 1/2 of your current level’s XP bar, during which time you’ll be getting 125% experience for questing and killing! In order to benefit from the full bonus you have got to stay alive. This new feature is a premier, longer-duration +XP boost which also adds some excitement to the game. You can carry up to 10 stacks of this bonus. The stacks do not increase the amount of experience gained (that’s hard-capped at 25%), but they do increase the duration of the effect.

They are fairly rare, but it is possible to chain these PoR bonuses while you’re out adventuring, giving your hero a 25% experience boost perma-buff.

This is a super kick ass bonus – especially right now because it stacks with the 50% Community Event Buff we’re getting up until the Reaper of Souls release!

Protip: The Weeping Hollow is a good place to hunt for Pools of Reflection. I find that they spawn there pretty regularly, and if Den of the Fallen is up, I have had a 100% chance of finding one in either level 1 or 2. Not sure if Den of the Fallen means a guaranteed PoR, but I’ve had amazing luck there. This area is also great for chain pulling mobs, maximizing the effect of the bonus XP for Massacres. Mobs here are low on the annoying-meter and they’re easy to round up, plus there’s a greater chance of survival here due to the open space.

I’m sure there are many great spots in the game to farm for PoR’s, but I’ve had good success with continually farming The Weeping Hollow. If you know of some other suggested runs, please let us know in the comments below. Cheers!