The Triggerclaw
Endgame LE Tools with recorded progression of skill & passive trees:
Intro
Hello lovely people, Thyworm here with a build guide for Last Epoch patch 0.9.2. The Triggerclaw, where i’m only using 2 skills, but triggering 3 more. Like most of my builds, it’s mostly fun, not even necessarily good, although I’m doing empowered timelines very comfortably at this stage. Which is good enough for me.
This is a new character, all the way to lvl 93. There’s timestamps available, so let’s dive in by looking at the pros and cons.
Pros
Here are the pros
⦁ It’s a fun build, with tons of frost spells popping off
⦁ It is a one button build, plus a movement ability
⦁ it’s capable of both mapping and bossing, but it doesn’t excel in any of those
⦁ it doesn’t require any uniques, although I’m using a few
Cons
Then the cons
⦁ it’s not very tanky. Once the enemies get damage modifiers in the monolith, there’s a decent chance you die in empowered timelines
⦁ it’s not a fast build. It’s not slow, just average, but definitely not a speed mapper.
Requirements
Let’s start with the build requirements
This build has no real requirements in terms of items you need. I will go over a few interesting uniques you could use. You can use the Bleeding Heart amulet, because the downside of bleed gets negated by frostclaw cleanse. The twisted heart of Uhkeiros is a great relic with amazing stats and health to ward conversion, but you can also get that conversion using other items, including the new experimental onces from rune mages. I’m using strands of Souls, just because I can honestly, but it does add a ton of ward. But once again, none of them are mandatory.
Build Philosophy
Then, the build philosophy
My build philosophy in general is just that I want to play fun builds. I don’t start theory crafting up front, I just start with a simple idea, usually an item I want to use, and then I start levelling a character. In this case, I saw frost claw as the new ability, and just wanted to try it out, after botching a runic invocation build. And of course, it’s a runemaster.
This build specifically, I wanted it to be an easy to play, fun build, and once I saw that frost claw can trigger both elemental nova and ice barrage, that’s what I wanted to do. The whole idea is that you use one skill, frost claw, which costs no mana and does decent damage, to trigger 2 more damage abilities. And then our movement ability flame rush, trigger runic invocation. Simple as that. Super fun to play.
Wish List
So, what do you need in terms of stats? Here’s the wish list.
In terms of defences, make sure to get res capped of course, and ideally get 100% crit avoidance. The blessings in the monolith can help a lot here too, as well as idols. Then, we don’t really scale health, but we use ward, pretty much as soon as we get access to it, so around level 30 or so. That means you get ward, ward on hit, ward generation, ward retention, all that stuff. Also intelligence helps here. Mana and mana regen are nice, because those triggered spells cost a lot of mana. We have some frailty on hit as well.
In terms of offence, we’re scaling cold damage, elemental damage, spell damage, crit chance and crit multiplier. Cold penetration is part of the build as well. Flat spell damage helps a lot too, of course.
Skills
Let’s look at the skill specialization and skills we’re using
I will not discuss each point invested, but instead focus on the most important nodes. You can see everything in the build planner yourself.
Frost Claw
it’s important we get the mana cost to 0. We do this by equipping a wand, for -3, and then frozen reign, for another -3, and then gift of winter, for another -6. Then we make our way to both triggered spells, meaning elemental nova with celestial conflux, and power word: hail, for Ice barrage. round out the tree with rending cascade, for that base crit chance. And take note of Brightfrost, as this cleanses any ailments on cast. This is amazing for an item like bleeding heart, negating the drawback. Or monolith modifiers that apply ailments.
Elemental Nova
Up next, Elemental Nova. Also here, we make the skill as cheap as we can with cryomantic fragility. We go with the cold elemental nova, of course, to leverage cold damage, and just pick half of the tree there. Quiite a lot of damage, and take note of shatter nova, 30% more damage against a bunch of status ailments. If at all possible, get these ailments on your gear or idols. Frozen and chilled will happen, but shocked and ignite you have to get somewhere else. I’m also taking freezing cascade, which is just a cool effect, a bunch of chaining damage across entire packs, which looks cool.
Ice Barrage
Then, Ice barrage. Normally, this skill is a bit of a pain to self-case, but a triggered version works beautifully, in my opinion. The tree mostly specs into damage, with sublimation in the top right, challenge the elements for rare and boss damage bottom right, and then we take the scenic route to cryogenesis, 80% more damage, Ice shield which is great for defences. The cooldown of 4 seconds is actually fine, because we don’t have the mana to trigger ice barrage every second, so this helps our build and doesn’t hurt it. ultimately, frost armor is just an amazing node, 60% more cold damage. We are all about cold damage, and it’s a big one.
Flame Rush
For a movement skill, I went flame rush. Primarily because it can trigger runic invocation, by taking the epilogue node. Make sure runic invocation is on your skill bar, or this won’t work. You make the skill cost less mana with Blazing Flux. Below that, runic eclipse is less damage taken. And then we turn the whole thing into an ice rush, with 3/3 lunar protection, energy equivalence, snowballing for cold conversion, and finally branding cold. Not sure this node is worth it, but it fits the theme. We top it off with smolder and burn, shredding cold resistance.
Runic Invocation
Finally, Runic Invocation. In this build, runic invocation is a support skill, with a specific setup. That setup comes from immutable order, which will cast runes based on your skillbar. Make sure you have any cold skill, any fire skill and then flame rush equipped on your skill bar, giving you a cold, fire and cold rune, guaranteed. This rune combination, called Reowyn’s Frostguard, gives a bunch of ward, and we get it every time we use flame rush. The rest of the skill tree is sort of up to you, honestly. Mana is still a thing, so i take attuned approach, and also elementalist’s call, for penetration on the next elemental spell. Inscribed patterns provide some mana regen, and that’s about it honestly.
Passives
Time to look at the passives. I’ve recorded, link below, the progression of the passives, so you can see that for yourself in the planner. I’ll just pick out a few nodes that I want to highlight. Arcanist is good for int and resistances. Mage flurry is amazing for attack speed. around level 95, can max out knowledge of destruction
In The Runemaster tree you want as much mana regen as you can, because this is a very mana hungry build. I’m also getting a bunch of bonuses, like 7/10 quitessence of triumph, because we will have more ward than the targets remaining health on regular enemies. 1 point in runeword cataclysm, for 15% more damahe against targets with 35% health or less. Good deal. Inscribed instruments, for the crit multi, as we’re using a wand. 8/8 decree of the burning wind, 16% more damage against bosses and rares, because we pretty much always have an active rah or fire rune. 8/8 sanguine runestones makes health regen apply to ward, which is really good. One point in runeword avalanche is enough, for +6 spell cold damage. Jagges veil, for ward and crit multi. And celestial doom, for flat spell damage and more damagge against branded bosses, and we do have a brand from time to time, using flame rush.
we also take 25 points in sorcerer, because we need ice barrage of course. the wisdom node is great for more mana regen, and chill to the bone is cold pen and leech, just excellent.
Gear
Then, also very important, Gear
I got decent gear, but nothing crazy, I think. I already talked about the uniques and other ways to convert health to ward. The rest of the gear is just resistance, intelligence, some health, damage, and a crystal skull for that base crit. Using that catalyst you can crit cap yourself rather easily, which you should aim for. You can see all the gear in the planner.
Idols
For idols, there are new ornate glass idols with mana efficiency and penetration for frost claw. I got 2 of those. The rest is just defensive, capping resistances, and some ward generation.
Blessings
For blessings, I’m taking mostly resistance blessings. I do however have the cold damage blessing, which ideally is cold res shred, but haven’t found that yet. I have spell dmaage leeched as health, quite useful to have somewhere in your build. And frailty on hit. 42% chance is more than enough. Good defensive blessing. I also have crit avoidance.
Loot Filter
I normally create loot filters, but I didn’t level this build from scratch with this in mind, meaning my loot filter is only for end game and super strict. But you can create a loot filter from the build planner, perhaps. Anyway, you know what you’re looking for, it shouldn’t be too hard to make one yourself, or tweak one you already have.
Play Style
Here’s the build in action.
It’s very easy really, you just spam your 0 mana cost frost claw, and everything else happens automatically. It’s quite smooth, I think it looks amazing. I’m sure, once again, this isn’t the most optimal minmaxed frostclaw build out there, but it is one of the more enjoyable ones I think. Don’t forget to use flame rush often for that extra ward, and you should be good to go, with a steady 2 to 4k ward all the time.
Levelling
Talking about Levelling for a bit. Normally, I have a build in mind from the start, but this time I reworked my initial runemaster into this. So I can’t say much about levelling. Using elemental nova and frost claw however should be completely fine. Just make sure you get the mana reduction before you start triggering other spells, because there’s no way you have enough mana otherwise.
Monolith
Let’s talk some Monolith modifiers
Don’t give them crit avoidance. And don’t give enemies too much damage, honestly. This build is not super tanky, and with too many damage multipliers, enemies cut right through that 4k ward.
We freeze most enemies, so stuff like enrage and frenzy is fine. Deadly is not. But deadly is never fine.
Nodes you can definitely take are all nodes that apply ailments to you, like chill, slow, marked for death, etc. Those are all cleansed by frostclaw, so they’re basically free nodes.
I spent a good chunk of time on these guides, which is why I don’t release many of them. If you appreciate the effort, consider liking or subscribing, it really helps me out. Thanks for watching. See you soon, love you all, bye bye.