Bladedancer Mastery Leveling Build for Last Epoch (Patch 1.1)

Our base class is the Rogue, which acts as either a melee or ranged assassin, high damage and mobility. Our character will be offered an opportunity to select an Advanced Mastery once we have completed the first act of the campaign. Each base class has three possible masteries to choose from. For the Primalist, we have access to the Mastery Tree Passives for Bladedancer, Falconer and Marksman. Upon selecting a Mastery and placing at least 20 Passive Points into the Rogue, you'll then have the option to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.

For our initial 20 points into Rogue, we are focused on getting some damage, the ability to dual wield, and some on-hit life and mana gains. This is the suggested passives to take:

• 8 points into Swift Assassin: Attack Speed and flat Physical Damage.
• 1 point into Twin Blade: Allows you to dual wield, equipping a Sword or Dagger in your offhand.
• 1 point into Guile: Flat Dodge rating and Poison Resist.
• 5 points into Dodge and Parry: Flat Dodge and Chance to receive a Glancing Blow (take 35% less damage on the hit).
• 4 points into Sapping Strikes: Gain health and mana on hit when you use a skill costing 0 mana, which is  Puncture for us.
• 1 point into Evasion: Increased Dodge Rating and less Damage Taken while moving. This is our 20th point, to unlock the mastery tree.

Our base class is the Rogue, which acts as either a melee or ranged assassin, high damage and mobility. Our character will be offered an opportunity to select an Advanced Mastery once we have completed the first act of the campaign. Each base class has three possible masteries to choose from. For the Primalist, we have access to the Mastery Tree Passives for Bladedancer, Falconer and Marksman. Upon selecting a Mastery and placing at least 20 Passive Points into the Rogue, you'll then have the option to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.

Bladedancer is our chosen Mastery, and where we will spend the majority of our passive points. There are all kinds of great benefits for us in this tree, including some much needed defensive bonuses as well as lots of offensive ones. We will be trying to max out our Glancing Blows chance, as this helps to even out the damage you take. As opposed to maxing out Dodge, which can be great until it isn't, causing a big spike of damage. We still get a fair amount of Dodge, we're just trying to level it with other defensives to prevent random spikes of damage that could oneshot us.

The suggested passives are as follows:

• 8 points into Cloak of Shadows: Added Dexterity and Glancing Blow Chance.
• 5 points into Pursuit: Increased Melee/Throwing damage and 8% move speed from the 5 point bonus.
• 8 points into Once: Flat Melee/Throwing Physical Damage and added Dodge Rating if you've been hit recently.
• 8 points into Shroud of Dusk: Added Flat Health and a Chance to gain a Dusk Shroud if you've been hit recently. Each Dusk Shroud adds 50 dodge rating and 5% chance to receive a Glancing Blow.
• 5 point into Veil of Night: Increased Melee Attack Speed and 30% chance to gain a Dusk Shroud when you hit an enemy.
• 5 points into Blood Dance: Melee Damage Leeched as Health and increased Health Leech Rate.
• 1 point into Argent Veil: Grants a stack of Silver Shroud when you fall below 70% health, which gives a 100% chance to dodge next attack and gives 100 ward per stack when it's expended. 15 second cooldown.
• 5 points into Flash of Steel: Increased Damage while Dual Wielding as well as Increased Melee/Throwing Attack Speed from the 5 point bonus.
• 1 point into Asuvon's Pact: Flat Dodge Rating and Increased Damage while at Full Health.
• 3 points into Perfection: Grants stacks of Perfection when you hit an enemy, that fall off when you are hit, granting 10% increased damage per stack. We only spend 3 points, as it's hard to get more than 6 stacks consistently without being hit by something.
• 5 points into Confidence: Grants Armour and Dodge Rating per stack of Perfection (from previous node).
• 5 points into Critical Eye: Increased Critical Chance and grants a chance to inflict Critical Vulnerability on the enemy, increasing their chance to be crit by 5% and per stack .
• 1 point into Exuberance: Increased Damage at Full Health and Grants 2 stacks of Perfection per Melee Attack at Full Health.
• 5 points into Hooked Blades: Armour Shred Chance and Increased Armour Shred Effect.

Our base class is the Rogue, which acts as either a melee or ranged assassin, high damage and mobility. Our character will be offered an opportunity to select an Advanced Mastery once we have completed the first act of the campaign. Each base class has three possible masteries to choose from. For the Primalist, we have access to the Mastery Tree Passives for Bladedancer, Falconer and Marksman. Upon selecting a Mastery and placing at least 20 Passive Points into the Rogue, you'll then have the option to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.

We are only putting 5 points into the Marksman tree, mostly for quality of life with the Haste proc that we get from Focus Fire whenever we use Evade. The Dexterity and Dodge Rating Debuff are solid bonuses though. You can put these points into the tree whenever you want, but we'd recommend doing it somewhat early, before level 30, as it will speed up your leveling a bit with the extra movement speed.

• 5 points into Focus Fire

Our primary skill, the one that we will use the most often.  Puncture can be used from ranged or melee, and while we have chosen Melee for this build, it would not take much to do it as a Ranged build instead and it should work very similarly.

The Death's Imprint is the main node that makes  Puncture very strong for leveling, allowing you to apply 2 stacks of  Shadow Daggers on each direct use, which then causes the damage on every other hit (as it has to reach 4 stacks to 'explode'). We also eventually take Debilitation, but not until we have solid sources of various ailments on our other skills. Notably, bleed, poison, armor shred, slow and frailty. Here are the suggested nodes to take:

• 2 points into Splinter: Physical Resist Shred Chance.
• 2 points into Cross Forward: Increased Melee Range for  Puncture.
• 2 points into Shatter: Armour Shred Chance and increased Armour Shred Effect.
• 2 points into Death's Imprint: Gives a 200% chance (stacks per application) to apply  Shadow Daggers.
• 2 points into Perforate: Adds a 40% Bleed Chance.
• 2 points into Press The Attack: Grants Frenzy for 2 seconds on hitting at least one enemy.
• 3 points into Toxic Delivery: Grants a 60% chance to Poison.

 Shift is our Traversal skill that doubles as an offensive skill, with its ability to trigger  Shadow Cascade, which will proc more  Shadow Daggers effects. We also gain a Shadow which will cast  Shadow Cascade from its location, doubling the amount of  Shadow Daggers that are being applied. These are the suggested passives for the skill tree:

• 2 points into Shadow Recuperation: Heals you when you use  Shift.
• 3 points into Swift Recovery: Mana gain on use, that is tripled if below Half Health when used.
• 1 point into Shadowslip: Makes you Invulnerable while using  Shift. Great for avoiding high damage abilities if you can time it decently.
• 2 points into Momentum: Increased Movement speed for 1 second after use.
• 1 point into Lasting Presence: Leaves behind a Shadow.
• 1 point into Dancing Shadows: Automatically uses  Shadow Cascade when you use  Shift. This when the build really starts to feel fast, and when you should start using  Shift on cooldown with enemies around.
• 1 point into Unseen Strike: Causes  Shift to do damage to enemies along its path.
• 4 points into Consumed by Shadow: Adds a 16% Kill Threshold, instantly killing any enemies under that health. Great for finishing bosses off.
• 5 points into Sleight of Hand: Automatically casts  Shurikens on use.

While we won't directly cast this, and you could even put  Decoy on your bar instead of  Shadow Cascade, it does a lot of damage whenever we use  Shift. Once we have some points into the skill, it will throw daggers out in every direction, dealing damage and applying  Shadow Daggers to every enemy hit. For many packs of weaker enemies, a single  Shift may clear the whole screen by itself.

This is the suggested order for allocating the passives:

• 2 points into Shadow Torrent: Adds damage per active Shadow.
• 1 point into Battle Trance: Increased chance to Dodge during use.
• 1 point into Crushing Darkness: 30% more damage, but not longer scales with Attack Speed.
• 4 points into Dagger Dance:  Shadow Cascade now also throws 4 Daggers out on use.
• 1 point into Porcupine's Wrath: The daggers from previous node deal 90% more damage and throws 3 more daggers. No longer does a melee attack.
• 1 point into Shadow Elegance: The daggers now inflict  Shadow Daggers from your casts and have a 20% chance when used by Shadows. This node is when the damage will really amp up, especially in combination with the Shadow Daggers being procced from  Puncture.
• 1 point into Flow State: 15% more damage per Sword or Dagger you have equipped.
• 4 points into Incapacitate: Gives a 100% chance to apply Frailty.
• 2 points into Shadow Flourish: Gives 70% increased Physical Damage for 4 seconds when you hit at least 4 enemies.
• 3 points into Maiming: Applies a Slow for 3 seconds on hit. This and the frailty node are important for Debilitation to boost the Puncture damage on tougher enemies, as well as debuffing enemies as a defensive layer.

At base,  Smoke Bomb is already a decent defensive skill, as it Blinds enemies inside it. We double down on this and go 'full defense' for the ablity. You will want to use this on Bosses or any time you get a bit overwhelmed, as it will provide a lot of defense for you while you are in it.

This is the passives we have chosen:

• 1 point into Shrouded in Darkness: Gain stacks of Dusk Shroud for 2 seconds while you are in your  Smoke Bomb. Increasing the chance to dodge or receive a Glancing Blow.
• 4 points into Rapid Concealment: Increased the frequency you receive Dusk Shroud stacks inside the Smoke Bomb.
• 2 points into Generosity: Increased Area of Effect.
• 1 point into Concealed in Carnage: Gives you a stack of Crimson Shroud on kill while inside your Smoke Bomb, granting you increased Bleed Chance and less Damage Over Time Taken per stack.
• 4 points into Enfeeblement: The initial burst applies Frailty to enemies for 4 seconds.
• 2 points into Moonlight Bomb: Grants you a Silver Shroud, giving you a 100% chance to dodge the next hit, and also gain Ward per stack when the stack is expended.
• 1 point into Cleansing Steam: The initial burst Cleanses Negative Ailments off you.
• 1 point into Thick Smoke: Applies Slow to enemies inside each second.
• 4 points into Lingering Fumes: Increased Duration.

The last skill we specialize in, but it adds some defenses in the form of Armour once you get the Bladed Armor node, and some extra damage for any enemy that gets close. It also automatically casts whenever we use  Shift, once you have gotten the Sleight of Hand node.

These are the suggested passives:

• 3 points into Alacrity: Increased Attack Speed.
• 1 point into Fan of Blades: 2 additional Shurikens thrown.
• 1 point into Blade Shield: Shurikens are summoned around you, in a rotating shield for 3 seconds, instead of thrown out.
• 3 points into Bladed Armor: 30% Armor per Shuriken rotating you.
• 3 points into Floating Blades: Blade Shield lasts longer.
• 4 points into Ethereal Blades: 100% Pierce Chance for Shurikens. Combined with the rotating passives above, this will prevent the shurikens from disappearing when they hit something.
• 4 points into Toxic Tips: Grants a poison chance to your Shurikens.
• 1 point into Flip of a Coin: Chance to gain 4 additional Shurikens.