While this comic may make Path of Exile looks scary if you only want to finish all the acts you can pretty much do whatever and be able to «beat» the game.

However, if you want to be optimized to do post-endgame stuff you really want an app like Path of Building or at least a site like Poe Planner to plan your build and probably sacrifice your first character to the Path of Exile gods. God, did my first witch sucked…

However, Path of Building really does the heavy lifting showing you how much extra damage and life you get with this or that talent so it's more a matter of knowing a specific juicy talent exist instead of if you should pick it or not.

And if you end up with a shitty build (like me) just let the game rest for some months and come back on a new season after they reset the talents. It's not free respect like I'd wish but it's enough for me to yolo some builds and not regret I'd lose my time if it won't work.

p.s. For those curious, I'm currently running a Rain of Arrow Ranger focusing on Frenzy, Health and Evasion with Phase Acrobatics.