5 Builds I Recommend New Players Try For Patch 8.4

YouTube Video + Gameplay : Top 5 Builds I Recommend Starting For New Players In Patch 8.4 | Last Epoch Builds - YouTube

Hello, this is Dr3ad from Epoch Builds, and in today’s forum topic we will go over 5 builds I highly recommend for new players coming this patch cycle. Note that this will not include druid builds at all, because we have no idea what they actually are going to be. I will have a link to a video where i go over Druid builds I believe will be good next patch.

Druid Theory Craft Video : Top 5 Theory Transformation Builds for Patch 8.4, 4 Druids 1 Beastmaster, Last Epoch Build Guide - YouTube

So these builds are tailored towards the new player experience, and can work off of barely any gear in the beginning, but also have a lot of investment opportunity, so you can keep playing them and improving them.

Forged Minions Warpath Forge Guard :
Forged Minions Warpath Forge Guard 2.0 Tankiest Summoner In The Game Last Epoch Build Guide 8.4 - YouTube

So for minion builds, I will recommend this one, as Forged Minions performed insanely well this patch, and with legendary items coming into the fold, maybe ways to improveit even further. The addition of Void Cleave giving our minions almost 150 melee flat fire allowed us to change our strategy in terms of weapon choice. We are forced to run a 2h sword because of void cleave’s requirements, but we end up benefiting, since Void Cleave has the ability to apply critical strike vulnerability stacks on the enemy, making it so our mini swords can reach almost to 100% crit chance. This combined with the tankyness of going Hammer and Anvil, and the health regen setup, it means we don’t die often. We also use Manifest Armor for a little more single target, and Ring of Shields to help us protect our minions from stray projectiles, and is by far one of the tankiest summoners in the game.

Flurry Bladedancer :
Arborus's Poison AND Bleed Flurry Blade Dancer, A Double Feature and Last Epoch Builds Special - YouTube

So Flurry was slightly bugged last patch, but even after the fix Flurry Bladedancer will be one of the tankiest builds of the patch. Being able to down Orobyss in seconds, combined with the insane tankyness of Dodge, Glancing Blow and Block, and with the insane investment potential of uniques like the Corsair Set hood or Bastion of Honour, it means even when you reach endgame with this build you will have plenty of avenues to improve your character. This + being able to choose either Bleed or Poison damage, and being able to weapon swap from a tanky set to a damage set, makes it a very versatile choice for any new player, and easy for you to face tank almost anything in the game. If you like to play melee builds, this is the build for you!

Flame Burst Warpath :
Warpath Paladin Flame Burst, Best Warpath Build Wave 330 Patch 8.3e Last Epoch Build Guide - YouTube

Flame Burst Warpath was untouched going into 8.4, meaning that this broken build can stay for a bit longer unless a hot fix comes around. This build is built around Holy Aura’s ability to proc Flame Burst on enemies after a certain amount of melee hits. We then of course use Warpath to proc Flame Burst. It has a lot of strong interactions, including but not limited to each enemy proc’ing flame burst can shotgun making clear feel smooth as butter, the ridiculous 100% fire pen node inside warpath applying to flame bursts, and having a large enough amount of leech to keep topped off even in the scariest of encounters. This build is easily made in a paper thin budget, and has large amounts of growth, including being able to abuse Wings of Argentus. I can 100% recommend this to anybody that wants an easy time from the time they set up flame burst and until +300-400 corruption. This is also a good arena pusher, if you are so inclined.

Necrotic DoT Lich :
Arborus's Necrotic DoT Lich 572+ Corruption Meta Monolith Farmer, Last Epoch Build Guide Patch 8.3 - YouTube

So when Poison Lich was nerfed in patch 8.3, we thought the DoT lich archetype was dead, but with the buff to spirit plague, allowing it to scale flat necrotic damage per intelligence, it means we now have a build that can push far past 400 corruption smoothly, and to note this is the first patch in a long time where Lich wasn’t nerfed. This also uses skills like hungering souls cast from Dread Shade and Drain life for single target, and with the ability of Spirit Plague absolutely demolishing trash, means you can have a very easy time and relax, watch some YouTube videos while playing. This build also has a large amount of room for growth, as the more intelligence you stack the better. This also benefits heavily from the legendary system, as a legendary Marina’s Lost Soul can have insane potential to push this build even further.

Aspect of the Shark Beastmaster :
Aspect Of The Shark Beastmaster 2.0, Got Nerfed But Its Now Even Stronger, Last Epoch Build Guide - YouTube

The last build on this list, but not the least is Aspect of the Shark Beastmaster. Aspect of the Shark was nerfed in patch 8.3, but due to some changes it still dominates as a quick and easy monolith farmer, and with how it scales and how all your critical strike chance comes from skills and not gear, it means its very easy to get up and going from nothing. This is also a build that benefits heavily from the legendary system as having double legendary Undisputeds could in theory raise your DPS through the roof. We also made changes like adding in Earthquake to help assist on single target, and because of the large amount of mana gained back from Swipe it means we can almost spam EQ off cooldown on bosses. This is also a fun build thanks to the fact we get to run a solo wolf, so it fits the fantasy perfectly of a man and his dog against the world. Definitely a build I enjoyed and I bet you’ll enjoy too if you give it a chance.

Both Flurry and Warpath have had a bug that didn’t apply their reduced ailment chance affect them fixed, so they will be affected by 0.8.4.

Flame Burst from Holy Aura is not affected by reduced ailment chance, so all in all on the Warpath build you will just have less armor shred, which isn’t a huge problem. Flurry though even with the less ailment application rate will by be insane still, even if the 10 second Orobyss kills become 40 second orobyss kills.

It is as Flame Burst is coded as an ailment like Shadow Daggers.

https://lastepoch.tunklab.com/ailment/holyaurastackforflameburst

It says melee hit in the the description of Holy Aura. It doesn’t state % chance to apply flame burst on hit so they really do need to fix that. So they probably need to change that, but I doubt the build is effected barely by the changes considering of how insanely strong it already is. If that does get changed then thats a bug considering the wording.

I asked them ages ago about it and it’s functioning as intended (or will be when the bug is fixed). It’s identical to Shadow Daggers.

Then they need to spend more time fixing tooltips because the tooltip is completely wrong in what it actually does in reality. I would suggest them to change the wording instead to (% chance to apply a stack of holy flame burst ailment on hit) then that would make sense. But even then, 40% less damage overall still doesnt kill the build. All we have to do is spec into Smite more and do plenty of damage. Im just surprised at how confusing all these hidden stats are and I really really hope it gets tidied up by release.

Yes & no, IMO. It could probably do with some alt text to explain in a bit more detail how it works, or have an entry in the game guide (IMO, eventually everything will have an entry in the game guide, linked so you can move from topic to topic, like the civilopedia).

But the Flame Burst node is working how it’s supposed to, it applies 1 stack per melee hit & when it reaches X stacks on the target it explodes. Flame Burst doesn’t know what skill you’ll be using to apply it with & I’m not sure I’d personally want a list of melee skills in the alt text saying how they’re affected by it.

The Rogue’s Disembowel also uses that kind of terminology (which also confuses people), X stacks per (non-channelled) melee attack.

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Yeah I just think that in its current state, how warpath procs flame burst is fine. Its just some of the other nodes that break it. I dont think it should function like an ailment at all.

Maybe not, but how else could/would they code it?

I have no idea to really be honest, but it doesnt really matter in the end because you hit so many times with warpath it will proc enough anyways, especially since multiple on each enemy proc’ing, so the clear will still be as buttery smooth as it was. The single target will suffer slightly but that can be fixed by speccing into Smite more.

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