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There are many minion-focused subclasses inLast Epoch, but none of them make you feel quite as much like a Disney princess as the Beastmaster. As a Beastmaster, you’ll travel the ages with a retinue of woodland creatures, from the toothsome sabertooth to the highly venomous scorpion.
Maybe your average Disney princess doesn’t have quite as many claws and venom sacs associated with their woodland friends, but the Beastmaster cares not for the cute and cuddly. This Primalist subclass is out for blood with their furry bestie’s help; with this guide, you’ll find out just how deadly the Beastmaster can be.
Beastmaster Strategy
It’s best to think of your minion (or minions) as helpful allies than your main source of damage.You’ll still be the main damage dealerfighting in the thick of things alongside your chosen animal companion. Your animal friend(s) can offer damage buffs and supplemental damage but don’t expect them to do all the work for you.
That said,your animal companions can provide some potent support. Your Wolves' Howl, for example, provides a 25 percent damage boost, a 20 percent attack speed boost, and heals you too. For this reason, Wolves are the most popular choice of companion for Beastmasters, even though you start the game with Wolves unlocked.
Supplementing your pack will beFury Jump,Swipe, andWarcry. Fury Jump not only helps you leap from engagement to engagement but also offers additional buffs every time you do. Swipe synergizes with Wolves to summon even more Spirit Wolves, and Warcry offers both buffs to your pack and debuffs to the enemy in equal measure. The only skill taken from the actual Beastmaster line in the recommended leveling build is Frenzy Totem for yet more stacking damage buffs.
This build is intended for leveling onlyand will only discuss skills, passives, and items until level 60 or so (about when most people will beat the main campaign). Although each skill is described to level 20, you almost certainly won’t get all of them that high before the end of the campaign.
Beastmaster Skills And Passives
The best part of this build is that you’ll start the game with one of your skills already unlocked.Summon Wolf provides a helpful companionthat willeventually grow into an entire packof friends which multiply their damage with each new canine that joins.
Your next skill will be your bread-and-butter attack:Swipe. It’ll synergize with Summon Wolf to summon Spirit Wolves later on, but in the early game, it’ll mostly just kill whatever is in front of you. At level 10, you’ll start skillingFury Leapto not only deal more damage but also buff you and your team.
You’ll unlockWarcryat Primalist level 10, but you won’t be able to start skilling it until level 25. And finally,Summon Frenzy Totemarrives in the late game to help further boost your damage.
BecauseFury Totem doesn’t arrive until latein the campaign, feel free toreplace it with Summon Raptor or Summon Bear until then. Just make sure it’s something that scales off of Strength.
Summon Wolf Skills
The objective with Summon Wolf is to eventually unlock both thePack HuntersandSafety in Numbersnodes. This will eventually allow you to summon a pack of five wolves when combined with your Beastmaster passive skills.
Start by heading to the right side of the skill tree, with four points intoOn the Hunt,Howl of Might, and finally, the covetedSafety in Numbers. Now able to summon three wolves, you can head to the left node with two points intoLupine Endurance,Wolfen Recovery, and one point intoEarthbornbefore unlockingPack Hunters. With the Beastmaster passiveNature’s Embrace, that’s five wolves to do your bidding.
To give your doggos a little extra bite, finish their skill tree withSavage HuntersandLegendary Bite.
Swipe
While Summon Wolf will follow a pretty standard path, how you unlock skills with Swipe will depend on how you feel. If you feel you need more damage, put more points intoWay of the HuntandWengarian Reach. If you feel your damage is killing enemies just fine, then it’s time to put points intoAspect of the PantherandWild Calling.
Wild Callingis what synergizes Swipe with your wolves. Each time you hit at least one enemy, there’s a chance you’ll summon a Spirit Wolf to deal even more damage. With some increased attack speed from Fury Leap and Warcry, you’ll find yourself summoning Spirit Wolves fairly often.
After you max our Spirit Wolves, focus on theAspect of the Panthernodes and eventuallyCullingfor a big damage boost.
Fury Leap
Fury Leap makes this build feel far more dynamic.Warriors EntranceandFrenzied Onslaughtgives you a big damage buff every time you leap, whilePanther StrikeandRegain Staminawill have you jumping almost as often as you’d like. A single point intoWindhammermakes longer leaps especially damaging.
The beauty of this skill is that itcan be used both offensively and defensively. Leap into combat, kill and stun on impact, and then leap away when you need to.
Unlock Regain Stamina firstif you want to have a shorter cooldown. Then you can focus on Warrior’s Entrance and Frenzied Onslaught for more damage.
Warcry
Warcry will start as just a temporary stun and knockback to keep from being overwhelmed, but once you unlock theBerserkernode, it’ll become a buff you’ll want to activate before combat. It becomes a game of trying to get as many Berserker stacks as possible to improve your damage, withBrutalityincreasing the duration and number of stacks possible.
Once you’ve unlocked those nodes, unlockDeep Roar,Battle Cry, andFerocityfor additional crit damage, andFrailtyto remove your enemies' damage potential.
Juggernaut is a mandatory grabthat allows you to Warcry while surrounded without taking any damage.
Frenzy Totem
Once you’ve reached skill level 15 or so with Summon Wolf, you can summon wolves up to your companion maximum. This means there’s no reason to have Summon Raptor or Bear around. Thankfully,Summon Frenzy Totem doesn’t count towards your companion maximumsince it’s a totem.
Start heading down the right side of the Frenzy Totem tree with two points inRabidityandBestial Frenzy, then grabFurious CryandLead The Pack. This will improve your wolves' damage and refresh Howl’s cooldown every time you cast Frenzy Totem, allowing you to double cast Howl for double the healing when necessary.
Once done, head down the left side of the tree withGroundedandDig In. The tether mechanic added to Frenzy Totem is worth it for the massive damage boost, and eventually, you’ll max outTotemic Reachto make the tether as long as possible.
Primalist Passives
We’re going to stick with the minimum number of Primalist passive skills to help your summons (and yourself). The main skills here arePrimal Strength, which increases your primary stat (Strength), andSurvival of the Pack, which provides health leech and a boost to both your and your minions' damage.
Hunter’s RestorationunlocksHunter’s Emanation, which provides yet more damage andPrimal Medicineis there for a little bit more damage and some healing for your minions.
If you find you’re a little higher level than 20before unlocking your Beastmaster subclass, just put a few more points intoHunter’s EmanationorPrimal Medicine.
Beastmaster Passives
The party starts withUrsine Strengthas it improves your Strength stat. With all eight skill points placed there, next put eight points intoSavageryfor yet more damage for both yourself and your minions. Now at 16 levels into Beastmaster, put one point intoLamprey Teethfor a little extra health leech, two points intoThe Chasefor increased minion move and attack speed, and one point intoAmbushto unlock theAspect Of The Sharkbuff, which we’ll return to a bit later.
Next comesBoar Heartfor five levels, and thenAxe and Clawfor the next five levels. This improves your Strength and base melee attack damage, which will serve as a solid damage base for the rest of the game.
Remember: Strength is your primary statthat increases both your damage and both the health and damage of all your minions.
Now, head back to the bottom row of passives to unlockRending Mawand four points ofHunters of the Deep. This allows you to keep Aspect of the Shark up almost constantly while in combat, providing a 75 percent melee damage boost and 10 percent melee attack speed.
A 60-percent increasein Aspect of the Shark’s three-second durationamounts to about 4.8 seconds, which means there should only be a 0.2-second downtime between activations.
And since Aspect of the Shark’s 75% damage boost is way more than any of these nodes can provide with more skill points, we’re choosing tomaximize this passive’s durationrather than point more points into Ambush.
From here, put another point intoRending Mawfor a little additional armor shred, and then one point intoThe Circle Of Life, and then eight points intoOcean Maw. This will improve your Aspect Of The Shark buff to have constant up-time during combat and also improve its damage by 120 percent.
Once you unlockAncient Might, keep putting points into it until you roll credits.
Beastmaster Items And Affixes
With your skills settled,it’s time to talk equipment. Lost Epoch’s extensive crafting system allows you to customize your character’s gear with exactly the stat boosts you need.
For more on how to craft items in Last Epoch, check outour crafting guide here.
When you’re hunting for equipment,these are the affixes you should focus on finding the most.
Strength and Melee Physical Damage should be at the top of your list. Strength improves every aspect of your character and should be as high as possible. It’s not a bad idea to have a Strength affix on every piece of gear you’re wearing.
Melee Physical Damage adds to your base damage value. Because the Beastmaster has a lot of percentage increases but relatively few hard numerical increases, adding to your base damage can drastically improve your overall damage output once all your percentage-based skills are added on.
If this is your first playthrough, you’ll have to use whatever you may find. You’ll do just fine if you craft the above affixes onto the right items, though.Here are some items to keep an eye out for.
+18 Armor
+1 to 4 Strength
This is going to be your standard helm for the early game. Added Strength and armor values are great to have for a Primalist Beastmaster.
+32% to 64% increased Physical Damage
+32% to 64% increased Minion Physical Damage
Even better than the Wolf Pelt is the Darkwolf Pelt, with way more armor and percentage increases to your physical and minion damage.
+2 to 6 Attunement
+36% to 60% increased Minion Damage
Attunement isn’t all that important, but it’s nice to have alongside a lot of armor and increased minion damage.
+42 Melee Damage
+24% to 50% increased Minion Damage
This two-handed axe is the best way to vastly boost your minion damage. Too had it only starts dropping around level 20.
+50% to 100% increased Physical Damage
+50% to 100% increased Minion Physical Damage
You won’t find this two-handed axe until the late game, but by level 50, this will be your preferred choppy-choppy implement.
+8% to 19% increased Physical Damage
+8% to 19% increased Minion Physical Damage
Of all the relics a Beastmaster can have, this one increases damage, so prioritize it over things like the Dreamcatcher or Living Seed.
Description
Artor’s Legacy
The cold damage doesn’t help much, but an extra wolf and added minion skills are too good to pass up. If you do find this, consider altering your Summon Wolf skills to include the Tundra Stalkers node.
Howl of the West Wind
This build doesn’t use lightning-based attacks, but if you find How of the West Wind early enough, you can swap out Swipe for Gathering Tempest to get even more lightning damage out of your wolf pack.
Urzil’s Pride
A big Strength, armor, and mana bonus. It’s simple, but quite useful.
Keeper’s Gloves
All of your minion-focused passives work on those bees these gloves can summon, making them far more powerful than they’d otherwise appear.
Stormhide Paws
Added lightning damage to Swipe is fine, but the real bonus here is the additional Swipe level, +1 to all attributes, and the enormous health and cold resistance bonuses.
Swaddling of the Erased
More melee damage, increased attack and cast speed, and a buff to all attributes. No complaints here.
Thorn Slinger
Increased movement speed and +1 to all skills is a big deal for a simple belt.
Jung Queen’s Chaps of Holding
The Dexterity bonus is mostly irrelevant, but the increased physical minion damage is grand.
Cleaver Solution
+1 to all skills, a big bonus to Strength, and a massive physical melee bonus makes this a great weapon for any physical class. Bonus points for letting you also hold a shield too.
Beast King
You won’t b e able to find this until later in the game, but if you do, it’s a great one-handed axe with a ton of minion modifiers.
Harthenon’s Vow
Big Strength and damage modifiers alongside some companion boosts make this a great early-game two-handed axe.
Dedication of an Erased Primalist
+1 to all skills makes this worth using over most rare Dreamcatchers.
Arboreal Circuit
Giving your minions more armor than you’ll ever wear is pretty great, but what really makes this ring is the amount of movement speed you’ll gain from it.
Singularity
Since this build doesn’t care to boost its critical hit chance, you may use Singularity to benefit from a constant increase in damage.
AlthoughHerald of the Scurrydoesn’t drop until level 70 or so (after you’ve already completed the game), it’s worth mentioning here as it will double your wolves by turning them into squirrels, and a pack of 10 squirrels is absolutely capable of handling Last Epoch’s endgame.
Idol Affixes
Obviously, you’ll be using whatever Idols you’re able to find, but here aresome affix effects to look out for.
How To Play Your Beastmaster
Playing the Beastmaster is very simple. First,summon your wolves, and then it’s time to go on the offensive. Mosttrash mobs can be dealt with by simply using your Swipeability. Fortougher enemies and bosses,throw down your Frenzy Totem,give a little Warcry, and then just keep Swiping until they die.
Your health regen and health leech should allow you to tank through most damage (so long as you keep attacking), but if you find yourself using up your potions,use Fury Leap to disengage.
