Path of Exile: Legion introduces a number of new Melee attacks alongside new skills that enhance them. Among these are the Gladiator-themed Blood and Sand skills. These abilities change their behaviour based on your stance, letting you adapt your playstyle to the situations you find yourself in.



The new Bladestorm skill performs a spinning attack, damaging enemies around you. It also creates a spinning storm that hits nearby enemies for a portion of your weapon damage at a rate based on your attack time. You can have multiple storms active at once, letting you cover a small area in storms to continuously damage foes.



In Blood Stance, the storm created will be a bloodstorm that causes enemies it hits to bleed. Bladestorm will have more attack speed while you are in a bloodstorm. In Sand Stance, the storm created will blind enemies. You'll have increased movement speed while in the sandstorm. The sandstorm will also move forward, damaging enemies in its path.



Characters start in Blood Stance, but by using one of the new reservation skills, you'll be able to switch back and forth between Blood and Sand Stance instantly. A low level skill, Blood and Sand reserves 10% of your mana, and while you're in Blood Stance you will deal more area damage with melee skills but have less area of effect. Sand Stance grants more area of effect with melee skills but you will deal less area damage. Repeatedly using the skill instantly switches stances.



The second reservation skill, Flesh and Stone, reserves 25% of your mana to create a zone around you. In Blood Stance, nearby enemies are maimed, which also increases the Physical damage they take. In Sand Stance, nearby enemies are blinded, and you take less damage from enemies that aren't nearby. As with Blood and Sand, using the skill instantly switches between the stances. Both of these skills share a short cooldown.



Here is a video of these new skills in action!



