Necromancer Minion Autobomber Endgame Build for Last Epoch (Patch 1.0)

Our base class is Acolyte, which fills the role of mixed spell caster and minion summoner in Last Epoch. Upon finishing Act 1 in the campaign, your character will be offered an opportunity to select an Advanced Mastery. Each base class has three possible Masteries to choose from. For Acolyte, you can choose between Passive Trees for Lich, Necromancer, and Warlock. Upon selecting a Mastery and placing 20 Passive Points into the Mage Tree, you'll then be able to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.

Necromancer is the Advanced Class used for this build, and also where the majority of our Passive Points will come from. The Necromancer Tree will focus around picking nodes that increase our Minion's survivability through Health and Resistances, as well as increases to Minion Cast Speed, Critical Hit Rate, Critical Multiplier, and Necrotic Damage. Passive Trees for both Warlock and Lich will not be used for this build.

• 8 points into Forbidden Knowledge: Boost to Necrotic Resistance and Intelligence.
• 5 points into Dark Rituals: Taken specifically for Minion Cast Speed.
• 1 points into Stolen Vitality: Taken to proceed into the Passive Tree.
• 1 point into Mania of Mortality: Taken to proceed into the Passive Tree.
• 5 points into Unnatural Preservation: Taken for Ward Retention, but also supplies important Resistances.
• 1 point into Soul Aegis: Minion Armor scaling off our own character's level.

Our base class is Acolyte, which fills the role of mixed spell caster and minion summoner in Last Epoch. Upon finishing Act 1 in the campaign, your character will be offered an opportunity to select an Advanced Mastery. Each base class has three possible Masteries to choose from. For Acolyte, you can choose between Passive Trees for Lich, Necromancer, and Warlock. Upon selecting a Mastery and placing 20 Passive Points into the Mage Tree, you'll then be able to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.

Necromancer is the Advanced Class used for this build, and also where the majority of our Passive Points will come from. The Necromancer Tree will focus around picking nodes that increase our Minion's survivability through Health and Resistances, as well as increases to Minion Cast Speed, Critical Hit Rate, Critical Multiplier, and Necrotic Damage. Passive Trees for both Warlock and Lich will not be used for this build.

• 8 points into Risen Army: Minion Damage and Cast Speed.
• 5 points into Grave Thorns: Increased Minion health and Armor.
• 4 points into Cursed Blood: Increases Minion Necrotic Damage.
• 1 point into Blood Armour: Traversal node.
• 5 points into Reclamation of Souls: Taken for Ward Retention and the Ward gain on Minion death.
• 8 points into Mortal Tether: Significant boost Minion Health.
• 4 point into Aegisfall: Provides 100% Chance to Shred Armor on Minion Hit.
• 5 points into Frantic Summons: Minion Cast Speed boost.
• 8 points into Tyrant: 24% increased Health, converted into Ward.
• 8 points into Cling To Life: Vitality, used for Ward, and extra Resistances for Minions.
• 10 points into Moonlight Pyre: Adds flat Necrotic to your Minions.
• 5 points into River of Bones: Provides Minions with a source of Leech and Critical Hit Rate.
• 10 points into Rite of Undeath: Major increases to Resistances and Necrotic Damage for minions.
• 10 points into Blades of the Forlorn: Crit Multipler for Minions.
• 1 point into Disciples of Necromancy: Adds an additional Skeletal Mage to our summon pool.

In this section, we will break down each skill and highlight the key passives we have selected to make the skill shine in the build. While some of these skills do allow for some variation to exist depending on your own custom choices, we recommend utilizing the skill trees as presented until you have a strong understanding of the build itself.

 Summon Bone Golem is used purely as a defensive tool in this build. Every node taken for this tanky brutes focuses on either on defensive scaling or Movement Speed in order to allow them to keep up. Their AI is a little jank, so the added Movement Speed acts as a bit of a work around for this.

• 5 points into Amalgam of Sentinels: Adds a massive amount of Health and Armor to your Golem.
• 4 points into Tower of Bones: Increases the Golem's size and increases its Threat Generation.
• 1 point into Fragments of the Fallen: Boosts your Golems Size and Damage output. If your Golem dies, resummoning it will provide it an even bigger buff for 15 seconds upon summon.
• 5 points into Amalgam of Primalists: Provides an Armor boost for the Golem and all nearby Minions.
• 4 points into Unnatural Speed: Increases Movement Speed for itself and all nearby Minions.
• 2 points into Amalgam of Rogues: Increased Attack Speed and Movement Speed.

In this section, we will break down each skill and highlight the key passives we have selected to make the skill shine in the build. While some of these skills do allow for some variation to exist depending on your own custom choices, we recommend utilizing the skill trees as presented until you have a strong understanding of the build itself.

 Summon Skeleton is taken in order to use Warriors as fodder for our Skeletal Mages to explode using Profane Oblation. Each time they die, they have a chance to both resummon themselves as well as summon a Volatile Zombie. On top of this, each time a Skeleton dies, you gain a large portion of your Mana back, helping to sustain the Zombies you create. Skeleton Warriors play a huge part in creating the "autobomber" aspect of the build, and at the end of the day their sole purpose is to be used as ammo.

• 2 points into Necrotic Conviction: Purely used for traversing the Skill Tree.
• 1 point into Hollow Walkers: Adds an extra Skeleton to your summon pool.
• 1 point into Shambling Steel: Removes Archers. This is important, as we need the Skeletons to be in melee range in order to be sacrificed. This forces Warriors only, who will run into melee range for you.
• 4 points into Unbound Necromancy: Skeletons cost significantly less Mana to summon.
• 4 points into Immortal: When a Skeleton dies, it has a 40% chance to reanimate itself.
• 3 points into Soul Catcher: Ward gain when a Skeleton dies.
• 3 points into Mind Catcher: When a Skeleton dies, you gain 15 Mana.

In this section, we will break down each skill and highlight the key passives we have selected to make the skill shine in the build. While some of these skills do allow for some variation to exist depending on your own custom choices, we recommend utilizing the skill trees as presented until you have a strong understanding of the build itself.

 Summon Volatile Zombie will act as a permanently regenerating source of damage for this build. Zombies will resummon from any Minion that dies, as well as from the Unique Ring,  Cycle of Putrescence. Upon dying, Zombies will apply Marked For Death, provide you with Ward, and kill any enemy that is at 16% Health or lower. They also force a summon of a Skeleton Vanguard, creating a near-never ending cycle of Minions.

Volatile Zombies will never be manually summoned. If you need to start your cycle of minion explosions, either use a potion and take advantage of the affix we recommend that will summon them on potion use or wait for your Skeleton Warriors to start dying to automate summoning a single Zombie.

• 4 points into Forceful Commander: Reduces the Mana cost significantly.
• 1 point into Daunting Blast:Taken to proceed through the Passive Tree.
• 1 point into Ravenous : Increases damage to Boss monsters.
• 2 points into Pull of the Grave: Zombies now have a 16% Kill Threshold.
• 1 point into Horrific Vessels: The Zombies no longer deal Physical or Fire Damage and are converted to necrotic.
• 1 point into Corpse Bane: Zombies now apply the Curse, Marked for Death.
• 2 points into Fervor: Increased Damage and Movement Speed.
• 1 point into Ferocious Horde: Zombies now move faster the lower their Health is.
• 1 point into Shepherd of Thralls: Increases the explosion radius and summons a Skeletal Vanguard when the Zombie dies.
• 1 point into Path of Destruction: Increased explosion area.
• 2 points into Necromantic Fervor: Adds Healing when a Zombie explodes, which will be converted into Ward.
• 3 points into Awakening Presence: Volatile Zombies have a chance to resummon any time another Minion dies.
• 1 point into Vital Ward: The Healing from Necromantic Fervor is converted into Ward.

In this section, we will break down each skill and highlight the key passives we have selected to make the skill shine in the build. While some of these skills do allow for some variation to exist depending on your own custom choices, we recommend utilizing the skill trees as presented until you have a strong understanding of the build itself.

If Skeleton Warriors are the ammo for the build, your Skeletal Mages are the firing squad.  Summon Skeletal Mage is used alongside  Summon Volatile Zombie to deal damage and force the automation portion of the build. Your Mages will cast Profane Oblation on Skeleton Warriors and Skeleton Vanguards when they're close to enemies, dealing a ton of Necrotic Damage. When there is no Skeletons to rip apart, your Mages will still attack enemies themselves, providing a bit of extra damage to the build.

• 5 points into Celer Mortis: Adds Base Critical Hit Rate and Movement Speed to Mages.
• 3 points into Grey Merchant: Adds Critical Multiplier to Mage attacks and Mages will now heal themselves when they land a crit.
• 1 point into Order of Death: Adds an extra Mage to your summon pool.
• 5 points into Gravetide: Adds 15 Spell Damage.
• 1 point into Underlings: Mages will now cast Profane Oblation on Warriors and Vanguards, killing them in the process.
• 1 point into Splintered Dominion: Adds a small chance for extra projectiles to be cast.
• 4 points into Argonautic Speed: Increases the Cast Speed of your Mages.
• 1 point into Ossein Frenzy: Adds a small chance for Mages to Frenzy when they hit an enemy.

In this section, we will break down each skill and highlight the key passives we have selected to make the skill shine in the build. While some of these skills do allow for some variation to exist depending on your own custom choices, we recommend utilizing the skill trees as presented until you have a strong understanding of the build itself.

 Dread Shade is used specifically to boost your Skeletal Mages' damage. Through the Passive Tree, we've killed the Health Decay this skill normally places onto the afflicted Minion. Instead, you can now only have a single Dread Shade active at once. This should be placed onto one of your Skeletal Mages, which will in turn buff all three of them through the aura coming off the one it is attached to.

• 3 points into Spectral Presence: Increases the area of Dread Shade's aura.
• 1 point into Lone Watcher: Dread Shade no longer drains Health, but only one can be active at a time.
• 3 points into Dying Coven: Increased Cast Speed granted by Dread Shade.
• 4 points into Grim Fate: Dread Shade now covers an even larger area and Minions effected by it deal more damage.
• 1 point into Symbiotic Apparition: Dread Shade's aura now effects the player.
• 4 points into Lingering Doom: Adds falt Necrotic Damage to your Minions.
• 3 points into Flesh Harvest: Increases Dread Shade's buffs, scaling off missing Health of the Minion.
• 1 point into Wisdom of the Dead: Taken in order to reach the next node.
• 1 point into Martyrdom: Grants Armor per Vitality for your Minions.