Acolytes use eldritch powers to manipulate necrotic energies, razing their enemies with unholy flames, gruesome magic, and armies of undead. This class is Last Epoch's representative for the dark magician character archetype, making it the perfect choice for fans of forbidden arts.

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This guide is a melee Acolyte leveling build with a heavy emphasis on minions, optimized for characters at around the level 20 mark. It is one of the fastest-clearing leveling builds in Last Epoch, and it can smoothly transition into the late game stage as well. Here's how to set it up

Last Epoch Leveling Build Skills

This build relies on Skeleton Archers as its main source of damage, with a Bone Golem acting as the vanguard. Players themselves will also be able to deal respectable DPS by themselves using Harvest and Bone Curse. You can expect this build to carry you well into the late game with very few tweaks necessary. The skills and specializations you'll need to use are as follows:

Harvest (Specialized)

• Finality: Harvest instantly kills targets below a certain HP threshold.
• Spirit Shards: Gain Spirit Shards with each Harvest hit. When you have 13 Spirit Shards, your next Harvest hit consumes them, making it deal increased damage, restore mana, and buff the damage of minions.
• Blood Sculptor: Harvest has a chance to spawn Blood Spectres after killing an enemy. Spectres have a base HP pool of 100 that decays over time.

Harvest's damage is relatively weak, but with your minions by your side, you'll be able to execute low-health targets and potentially spawn even more minions with a swing of your spectral scythe. Out of all the weapon types in Last Epoch, Harvest works best with two-handers thanks to their high base damage values.

Summon Skeleton (Specialized)

• Unholy Rage: Skeletons have increased attack speed, movement speed, and cast speed.
• Marrow Walkers: Increases your maximum number of skeletons.
• Lone Guardian: Skeletons gain increased critical hit chance, but you can only summon one Skeleton Warrior.
• Mightier Than The Sword: Removes Skeleton Warriors from the summon pool.
• Fire Arrow: Skeleton Archers can use Fire Arrow every 6 seconds.

Early on, a single Skeleton Archer can outpace even your own DPS. Having four of them at the same time means monsters will likely be dead before they can even get close to you. Skeleton Archers are amazing against elites and bosses, but make sure to re-summon them in case they get destroyed.

Summon Bone Golem (Specialized)

• Amalgam of Sentinels: Your Golem gains additional health and armor.
• Tower of Bones: Bone Golem generates more threat and becomes physically larger.
• Fragments of the Fallen: Golems are larger and deal more damage if no other Golems are alive. If summoned near the corpse of a dead Golem, your new Golem gains more armor for 15 seconds.

These three specialization passives will make your ordinary Bone Golem incredibly difficult to kill. Most enemies will focus on it too, giving you and your skeletons free rein to deal damage.

Bone Curse (Specialize at level 35)

• Iron Maiden: Bone Curse procs deal more damage.
• Brittle Bones: Bone Curse executes affected enemies when they fall below a health threshold.
• Entreat the Damned: Killing enemies with Bone Curse has a chance to spawn a Skeleton Vanguard.

Bone Curse empowers the damage dealt by Harvest and minions. With the Entreat the Damned passive, you'll be able to get even more skeletons on the field.

Fourth Skill Slot

This last slot is for a flex pick. You're free to use whichever skill you want here, though you may want to save this for a Mastery class' signature ability. Summon Wraith from the Necromancer tree is a great pick here, though you can also get away with Cthnonic Fissure from Warlock. If you find yourself dying too often, get Transplant so you have a way to reposition yourself.

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Passive Skills

• Blood Aura (8/8): You and your minions deal more damage.
• Stolen Vitality (8/8): You and your minions gain health.
• Mania of Mortality (3/10): Every time an ally, minion, or enemy dies nearby, you have a chance to gain Ward.
• Forbidden Knowledge (1/8): Gain bonus Intellgence and Necrotic Resistance.

The Acolyte's passive tree is fairly simplistic. Spend your first 20 points on passives that increase your damage and survivability. Stolen Vitality can be replaced by Bone Aura if you feel like you need Armor more than Health. Mania of Mortality can outshine both of these passives, but it won't proc when things around you aren't dying.

As a rule of thumb, you should invest your skill points on whatever your build currently needs. If you're dying too much, get passives that boost Health, Vitality, Armor, or Resistances. If your damage is lacking, then invest in offensive stats or nodes that grant attack-related bonuses. You can easily respec passive points in Last Epoch by visiting Chronomancers in major hub areas like the End of Time.

Gear and Priority Stats

Intelligence and Necrotic Damage will buff Harvest's damage, while Physical Damage will affect Bone Curse. If you want to buff your minions, wear Turquoise Rings and Amulets. These come with implicit minion stats that give them increased health, damage, and critical strike chance. Don't forget to find gear with defensive stats like Vitality, extra Health, Armor, and Resistances so you don't get one-shot by bosses or elites.

You can make this build work without any unique items, though the following are very helpful (numbers may vary between rolls):

Which Mastery Class Should You Choose?

This build naturally flows into a mid-late game Necromancer build with all the minion-related stats. If you do choose to go this route, you'll want to replace Harvest with Volatile Zombie and add Summon Wraith or Skeletal Mages onto your skill bar.

You can also make a MinionWarlock build using this setup as a base. Everything will remain largely the same, though you'll gain access to more direct damage spells like Chthonic Fissure, Chaos Bolts, and Ghostflame. Itemization may become an issue, however, especially once you start entering Last Epoch's late game content like Empowered Monoliths and dungeons.

Last Epoch

Platform(s)

PC

Released

February 21, 2024

Developer(s)

Eleventh Hour Games

Genre(s)

Action RPG