Paladin Holy Explosion Warpath Endgame Build for Last Epoch (Patch 1.1)
Welcome to our Last Epoch Paladin Holy Explosion Warpath build guide for the Sentinel class. Here you will learn everything about the Paladin play style, passives, skills, strengths, and weaknesses to conquer the world of Eterra.
Build Introduction
Ever wanted to turn your character into a bomb? Now you can! This
build pulses periodically with holy fire explosions, dealing a tremendous amount of damage
to anything nearby. As you spin and hit enemies, you'll rain down fire in the form of
Smite, ripping apart Resistances and burning enemies to a crisp.
Strengths
Fully automated. Just spin and things die.
- Low level Uniques, easy to acquire and start playing.
- Built in sustain through Spell Damage Leech.
- Highly mobile. Always moving with
Warpath, access to 
Lunge.
Weaknesses
Absolutely requires Mana Regen and Mana cost reduction. Build is Mana hungry.
- While Uniques are easy to find, they require Legendary Potential to excel into Corruption.
- Forced to be within melee range to deal damage.
Skill Selection
While it doesn't do much damage on its own, 
Warpath is the vessel used to
automate many of the functions in this build. Hitting enemies with Warpath will proc two
important things; Smite and 
Flame Burst. Smite is generated off the Unique
sword, Palarus's Sacred Light, while Flame Burst comes from a node within 
Holy Aura.
In order to add more burst damage, 
Symbols of Hope will be changed to be a damage spell using
Divine Flare and automating the casts of Symbols through the Unique ring Orian's Sun Seal.
Healing Hands is our mobility skill, allowing us a moment of invincibility and healing us to full
upon reaching our destination.
Class and Skill Passive Trees
Our base class is Sentinel, which fills the role of a knight in
Last Epoch. Upon finishing Act 1in 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 Sentinel, you can choose between
Passive Trees for Paladin, Forge Guard, and Void Knight. Upon
selecting a Mastery and placing 20 Passive Points into the Sentinel Tree,
you'll then be able to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.
Paladin is the Advanced Class used for this build, and also where the majority of
our Passive Points will come from. The Paladin Tree will
focus around picking nodes that increase Fire Damage, provide increases in Strength and Attunement,
and give us access to 
Divine Bolt, a projectile granting us a bit more range. Forge Guard is
only used minimally for an increase to Attack Speed, while Void Knight is used for defenses and
a bit more range on Warpath, making it easier to hit enemies.
Sentinel Passive Points
- 8 points in Juggernaut: Strength base and Resistance gains.
- 7 points in Relentless: Increased damage and Stun defenses.
- 5 points in Armour Clad: Damage mitigation for enemies within melee range.
- 1 point in Gladiator: Allows you to dual wield.
Our base class is Sentinel, which fills the role of a knight in
Last Epoch. Upon finishing Act 1in 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 Sentinel, you can choose between
Passive Trees for Paladin, Forge Guard, and Void Knight. Upon
selecting a Mastery and placing 20 Passive Points into the Sentinel Tree,
you'll then be able to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.
Paladin is the Advanced Class used for this build, and also where the majority of
our Passive Points will come from. The Paladin Tree will
focus around picking nodes that increase Fire Damage, provide increases in Strength and Attunement,
and give us access to Divine Bolt, a projectile granting us a bit more range. Forge Guard is
only used minimally for an increase to Attack Speed, while Void Knight is used for defenses and
a bit more range on Warpath, making it easier to hit enemies.
Forge Guard Passive Points
- 5 points in Weapons Master: Strength base and a bonus to Attack Speed if using a sword.
Our base class is Sentinel, which fills the role of a knight in
Last Epoch. Upon finishing Act 1in 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 Sentinel, you can choose between
Passive Trees for Paladin, Forge Guard, and Void Knight. Upon
selecting a Mastery and placing 20 Passive Points into the Sentinel Tree,
you'll then be able to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.
Paladin is the Advanced Class used for this build, and also where the majority of
our Passive Points will come from. The Paladin Tree will
focus around picking nodes that increase Fire Damage, provide increases in Strength and Attunement,
and give us access to Divine Bolt, a projectile granting us a bit more range. Forge Guard is
only used minimally for an increase to Attack Speed, while Void Knight is used for defenses and
a bit more range on Warpath, making it easier to hit enemies.
Paladin Passive Points
- 8 points in Defiance: Attunement and Elemental Resistance.
- 8 points in Conviction: Increased Fire Damage and Fire Penetration.
- 3 points in Divine Bolt: Melee attacks will now trigger
Divine Bolts, dealing damage to enemies further away than what we can normally hit. - 10 points in Valor: Endurance, Health, and Healing Effectiveness.
- 1 point in Phoenix Strike: Pathing node.
- 6 points in Shared Divinity: You now cast more Divine Bolts, and they deal more damage.
- 4 points in Rahyeh's Strength: Strength base and a chance to Shred Fire Resistance on melee hit per Strength.
- 1 point in Faith Armour: Pathing node.
- 5 points in Holy Precision: Flat crit is a crucial stat for spell-based builds. This node also gives us Increased Crit Rate and Crit Multiplier.
- 5 points in Prayer Aegis: Super important node, raises our Endurance Threshold based on Attunement. This is necessary for getting
consistent
Divine Flare procs off. - 5 points in Righteous Firebrand: Melee Attack Speed, and Fire Penetration scaling off Healing Effectiveness.
- 5 points in Divine Essence: Some extra Attunement, and gain access to Divine Essences. These increase Armor and Healing Effectiveness, but also reduce DoT taken.
- 11 points in Reverence of Duality: Increased Health, Damage, Healing Effectiveness, and Mana.
- 5 points in Covenant of Light:
Holy Aura and 
Symbols of Hope scaling.
Our base class is Sentinel, which fills the role of a knight in
Last Epoch. Upon finishing Act 1in 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 Sentinel, you can choose between
Passive Trees for Paladin, Forge Guard, and Void Knight. Upon
selecting a Mastery and placing 20 Passive Points into the Sentinel Tree,
you'll then be able to place Passive Points into the Mastery Trees.
Paladin is the Advanced Class used for this build, and also where the majority of
our Passive Points will come from. The Paladin Tree will
focus around picking nodes that increase Fire Damage, provide increases in Strength and Attunement,
and give us access to Divine Bolt, a projectile granting us a bit more range. Forge Guard is
only used minimally for an increase to Attack Speed, while Void Knight is used for defenses and
a bit more range on Warpath, making it easier to hit enemies.
Forge Guard Passive Points
- 5 points in Abyssal Endurance: Health, Resistances, and less damage taken from Physical and Void type attacks.
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.
Warpath
Warpath is the conduit for everything this build is capable of. It's the only melee attack in the build, but it attacks
extremely fast, which is perfect for getting procs of Smite, Divine Bolt, and Flame Burst. Of equal importance
is the fact channeling Warpath will bolster our character with a global 50 Spell Damage, 10% base Critical Hit Chance and 75% Fire Penetration.
Keep in mind, Warpath is extremely Mana hungry. We solve this through Mana Regeneration and the Weaver's Will Relic, but if you're leveling
with this build concept in mind be aware that Mana consumption needs to be your main priority.
Order of Skill Points
- 3 points in Quicksilver Wind: Normally Warpath is pretty slow. This fixes that.
- 1 point in Gorebringer: Pathing node.
- 1 point in Earthscorcher: Converts Warpath into a Fire Skill.
- 5 points in Path of Heavens: +50 global Spell Damage.
- 3 points in Winds of Justice: Helps keep our damage up even when we can't hit enemies due to mechanics or dodging.
- 1 point in Iron Reach: 15% Increased Area for Warpath.
- 2 points in Whirling Steel: Pathing node.
- 5 points in Cyclone of War: This build uses a Sceptre and a Sword, meaning we gain, globally, 10% Critical Hit Chance and 75% Fire Penetration from this.
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.
Holy Aura
Holy Aura is used for one main purpose, and that is to force Flame Burst to proc off hits with Warpath.
This is why Attack Speed is so important. Each hit with a melee attack will place stacks on enemies, and when they reach 60 stacks, the
enemy will explode in AoE Fire Damage. When playing in a party, all players can activate this, however Flame Burst will scale off
the stats of the player that activates it, so we do not want other people setting this off unless they're also scaling Fire Spell Damage.
Activating Holy Aura will enable you to generate twice as many stacks until the effect ends.
Order of Skill Points
- 2 points in Rahyeh's Devotion: Pathing node.
- 3 points in Firestorm: Global Increased Fire Damage.
- 1 point in Flame Burst: Allows stacks of Fiery Inquisition to build on targets hit by melee attacks.
- 4 points in Improved Flame Burst:
Flame Burst now deals 200% more damage. - 2 points in Inner Flame: Melee hits now apply two extra stacks of Fiery Inquisition, and Flame Burst has 50% increased area.
- 2 points in Fanaticism: Increased Attack Speed.
- 4 points in True Strike: 40% Increased Crit Rate.
- 3 points in Extreme Zeal: 15% Crit Multiplier.
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.
Smite
Smite hits like a truck and activates fairly often, using Palarus's Sacred Light and Orian's Descent effects to proc.
The sword will require melee hits, however the belt will not; Divine Bolt and even Smite itself can proc more Smites. Smite will reduce our health
when used, however we have so much built in healing, this won't matter.
Order of Skill Points
- 2 points in Blinding Flash: Adds a chance to Blind enemies, and Blinded enemies will take more damage from Smite.
- 5 points in Sacrifice: Significantly increases the damage Smite deals, at the cost of our own Health.
- 2 points in Atonement: Cuts the Health cost down from the previous node.
- 4 points in Deep Impact: 100% Critical Hit Multiplier.
- 3 points in Holy Fire: Smite now has a chance to Ignite enemies.
- 5 points in Conflagration: Smite now deals a lot more damage to Ignited enemies.
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.
Symbols of Hope
Symbols of Hope is turned into an atomic bomb in this build. And even better, it's fully automated through using the
Orian's Sun Seal Unique Ring. This will force Divine Flare to activate when we take damage that pushes us
below our Endurance Threshold. This happens quite often due to the emphasis placed on our gearing and passive points we've selected.
Divine Flare scales off Symbols consumed, so at five Symbols, this is 500% more damage added onto the explosion.
Order of Skill Points
- 5 points in Iron Symbols: Adds a ton of Endurance Threshold to our character per Symbol.
- 1 point in Holy Revelation: 45% Symbol gain rate. Very important to ensure we gain our Symbols back in a timely manner.
- 1 point in Divine Flare: This is what turns your Sigil into a bomb.
- 4 points in Well of Light: Divine Flare deals more damage based on Symbols consumed.
- 1 points in Energized Flare: Chance to gain Symbols on kill.
- 2 points in Enduring Hope: Divine Flare has a reduced cooldown.
- 1 point in Tetragram: +1 Symbol.
- 2 points in Quiet Mind: Pathing node.
- 3 points in Invigorate: Increased Healing per Symbol.
- 1 point in Polygram: +1 Symbol.
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.
Healing Hands
In the past, this build used 
Lunge. This is still an option, and if taken can provide a way to get extra Smite casts
off. However, Healing Hands in general feels better to use and provides a longer time period of invincibility compared to
Lunge. On top of this, Healing Hands will heal us for a substantial amount, and still activates on the first hit of Warpath
per channel usage.
Order of Skill Points
- 4 points in Cleric's Hammer: 100% chance to proc Healing Hands on melee hit.
- 1 point in Rahyeh's Chariot: Healing Hands, when used manually, is a traversal skill now.
- 1 point in Sun Shroud: You are invincible while moving with Healing Hands.
- 1 point in Divine Barrier: Pathing node.
- 1 point in Homeward: Healing Hands is now centered on your character. This is important for larger enemies, as you may not be close enough to the middle of their hitbox to be healed.
- 1 point in Searing Light: Healing Hands now deals Spell Damage.
- 2 points in Bane of Evil: Healing Hands damage scales off Healing Effectiveness.
- 2 points in Cleric's Wrath: Healing Hands deals more damage based on the support skills you scale on your character.
- 2 points in Virtue of Patience: Healing Hands deals more damage, hits in a larger area, and heals more.
- 4 points in Prayer of the Fallen: Increased Healing for Healing Hands.
- 1 point in Halted Scourge: Void Damage deals less damage to us after hitting an enemy with Healing Hands.
- 1 point in Turn Undead: Necrotic Damage deals less damage to us after hitting an enemy with Healing Hands.
Build Mechanics and Playstyle
At it's core, the playstyle for this build is your basic Warpath gameplay. You spin, enemies die. We've added
several automated effects to the build to bolster the AoE damage it can deal and also to make a build that's visually pleasing.
While channeling Warpath and hitting enemies, your character will also be casting Divine Bolt (Paladin Passive Tree),
Flame Burst ( Holy Aura), and Smite (Unique Sword, Palarus's Sacred Light and Unique Belt, Orian's Descent), all creating
a light show as enemies fall over. To top off the automation, Divine Flare will be cast periodically, automated completely off
our Unique Ring, Orian's Sun Seal. This spell acts as an atomic bomb, obliterating nearby enemies. The goal was to create a build with minimal
inputs, perfect for controller players.
Mana Consumption
It may seem weird seeing the Warpath tree not taking and Mana reduction nodes. This is intentional.
Warpath will drain your Mana, slowly. This is done on purpose to enable Devotion scaling
Smite. The less Mana we have, the more Spell Damage that is added to Smite. From testing, the "safe"
place to be is around 50 - 100 Mana. This more than doubles Smite's damage, but still allows us to continue spinning.
If you begin to drop a bit too slow, just take your finger off Warpath for a few seconds. Mana will come back, and by the
time it does, your procs from Orian's Descent will have reset and you'll be ready to dump a large amount of damage
immediately.
Be mindful, depending on the rolls on your gear or the level you're at, Mana consumption on Warpath may vary slightly.
Do what you need to do in the Warpath passive tree to make the mana consumption comfortable. But it does need to be
net negative in order to make Devotion work.
Defensive Layering
The build revolves around three things.
- High Armor Rating
- High Endurance Threshold
- Burst Healing
Your Armor Rating, even with mediocre gear, should be above 70%, but it is possible to near-cap with the right endgame armor.
As for Endurance Threshold, this scales almost entirely from our Attunement. This means Attunement is one of the most valued
stats for this build, as it scales our damage and defenses at the same time. On average, without extremely late game gear, you
should easily have 65% or more of your health bar covered by Endurance. The higher this is, the more likely it is
that Divine Flare will activate, which in turn will heal us to full.
Equipment and Gear Affixes
For all suggested gear pieces, please see the planner provided below. Specific Unique item interactions will be listed further down the page.
It should be noted that the weapon types are non-negotiable. You will need a Sceptre and a Sword in order to take advantage of the scaling in Cyclone of War.
Uniques
This build requires several Uniques to even function, but then has a few that were included simply to boost performance. Explanations for each item have been included below.
- Palarus's Sacred Light: A low level item, however this is how we add
Smite into the usable spells
this build has access to. Not only that, it allows us to scale Strength. This Sword will convert Strength into Spell Damage,
but is also how we scale our Armor. Tier 7 Spell Damage is mandatory, any other affix is purely sprinkles on top. - Orian's Sun Seal: This ring has been changed with patch 1.2. It is now specifically an item to be used
with Divine Flare. You now also only need one now, which is great for taking pressure off gear slots. Any
time you drop below your Endurance Threshold and Symbols of Hope is off cooldown, Divine Flare will explode.
- Code of an Erased Sentinel: Typical Weaver's Will addition, but the main thing we want from this is the reduced Mana cost
on Melee attacks. This saves us Skill Points in Warpath and enables us to add more damage to the build, on top of also adding a Skill
Point to every skill we use. Try to get Crit Multiplier.
- Orian's Descent: This belt adds a ton of burst potential to the build. Due to the insane healing this build has built into it, we don't have much reason to ever use potions. Instead, this belt allows us to ready an onslaught of Smite casts when a potion is used. This is great for bosses where you need to deal a ton of damage in a short period of time. Get in melee range, get off your initial Smites, and pop a potion once you see the cast rate reduce. Not much to aim for on the belt as far as Legendary Potential goes. Increased Fire Damage stands out, but otherwise Health or Resistances are the go-to here.
Idols
Idol slots are gained through the campaign, unlocking small bonuses and unique affixes for the player to discover and augment their builds with. The Idol screen consists of a grid system for the player to fill out with different sized Idols, eventually filling in every part of the grid. As the Idol shape increases (1x1, 1x2, 1x3, 1x4, etc.) the stronger an affix you might find for your build.
Idols for this build are pretty free. There's Grand Solar Idols, that have useful mods like Increased Armor and Increased Area for Warpath, but any defensive Idol with Health or Armor Shred will also be a welcome addition. Ensure your Resistances are sorted as your first priority, then work on adding other things.
Blessing
Blessings are permanent buffs that are applied to your character. These come in two different powers, Standard and Grand. Grand blessings are significantly stronger than the Standard Blessings. In total, there are 10 Blessing Slots, one for each Monolith Timeline. When you complete a Monolith and defeat the final boss you will be awarded a choice of three blessing with a random value.
| Blessing Name | Affix | Timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Grand Emptiness of Ash | Crit Multiplier | The Black Sun |
| Grand Resolve of Humanity | All Resistances | Reign of Dragons |
| Grand Patience of Herkir | Armor While Channeling | Spirits of Fire |
| Grand Bulwark of the Tundra | Increased Armor | The Age of Winter |
| Grand Light of the Moon | Mana | Ending the Storm |
Changelog
- 08 Jul. 2024: Guide Added.
GhazzyTV is a professional content creator that knows all about theory crafting builds in Path of Exile and Last Epoch and has been teaching players how to build their characters for over 9 years. He is a huge Blizzard fan with thousands of hours invested into Diablo 3 and 4 and is a frequent World of Warcraft Classic player. His builds will be helpful content for new players and veterans alike. You can find his PoE Vault Guide Hub here and his LE Guide Hub here. You can follow him on Twitch, YouTube or Twitter.
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