Sentinel Leveling Build for Last Epoch (Patch 1.2)

 Warpath won't become Mana sustainable without a few points allocated into it. For this reason, it is suggested that players instead start with  Hammer Throw when reaching Level 4 and selecting their first skill to specialize in. You won't keep this forever; plan to drop Hammer Throw around Level 16 or 17 when you unlock Paladin. Until then, Hammer Throw will be your main source of damage. Make your way towards Iron Spiral and Hammer Vortex to start, then expend any additional points into Rapid Throw.

At Level 8, specialize into  Warpath. This will ensure that by the time you're ready to drop  Hammer Throw, you will have access to a properly leveled Warpath that won't absolutely destroy your Mana reserves when used. Your priority here will be to max out your points in Unchained, reducing the channel cost by 10. This effectively makes it come to a cost of 0 Mana to channel, as you naturally regenerate 8 Mana per second without any gear equipped. From here, start moving towards Earthscorcher, converting Warpath into a Fire-based skill.

Don't forget, you can use skills you don't specialize it! This is important for things like  Lunge, where adding this onto your skill bar will give you access to mobility and faster mapping without any investment. Gear largely does not matter at this point; equipping somewhat relevant Magic (blue) and Rare (yellow) will be more than enough to make you feel strong. Be on the lookout for Silver Rings, as they provide a boost to your Movement Speed. Worst case, there's a vendor at The Keepers' Camp that will be selling random gear, allowing you to fill in any empty gear slots you may have due to poor luck.  Hammer Throw does not have any weapon requirements, so feel free to equip a shield if you want. Health on Hit is also a valuable early affix to find on weapons.

Below is the list for Passive Point allocation for the Sentinel Passive Tree. Don't bother spending more than the necessary 20 here, you'll want as many in Paladin as you can get beyond this.

• (Sentinel) 8 points in Juggernaut: Strength will increase the damage your Hammers deal while also increasing your Armor Rating. Fire and Void Resistance is also very useful for the first few maps, as most enemies will deal this damage type, alongside Physical.
• (Sentinel) 10 points in Relentless: General increase to your damage, agnostic of what main hand/off hand you're using. If using a shield, feel free to path towards Stalwart, however the extra damage is a much better option for where you're at in gameplay.
• (Sentinel) 2 points in Armour Clad: A powerful node that will typically get more investment in late game builds for the much needed survival it provides. For now, it's a small amount of damage reduction and a pathway into the Paladin Tree.

Unlocking Paladin, which usually happens around Level 16, allows you to specialize into  Holy Aura. De-specialize in  Hammer Throw here, opting to attack with  Warpath going forward. Holy Aura is a powerful passive and active spell, specific to the Paladin Mastery. Immediately head towards Rahyeh's Fury, take both points here, and then begin to path towards Fanaticism, giving you a much needed boost to Attack Speed.

Reaching Level 20, you should have just enough points to place the following Passive Points into the Paladin Tree.

• (Paladin) 5 points in Conviction: Extremely useful increases to damage (both Physical and Fire, depending on if you have the Fire conversion in  Warpath) and Penetration.

This is just enough points in Paladin to give you access to  Healing Hands! Specialize this skill and begin pathing towards Sun Shroud, making sure to path through Cleric's Hammer. This will remove the need to use  Lunge and give you access to powerful healing on traversal. While Healing Hands will proc on  Warpath hit, it will only do so once per channel. Using Healing Hands to glide into melee range of an enemy and immediately using Warpath will proc Healing Hands twice. This becomes a powerful way to damage mobs and quickly move through campaign maps once the skill is converted to a melee attack, but for now just enjoy the immunity while traversing and crucial self healing this skill provides.

With your newly acquired skills, the rest of the campaign should be a breeze. Holding down  Warpath and just spinning from one objective to the next is all that's required, making this build extremely accessible to all players, including those who use controller or opt to use a Steamdeck. For a bit of extra speed,  Healing Hands can be used to quickly bypass a full screen.

With a more specific setup, this build will prefer to start having two-handed weapons. If you've been using a shield up to this point, it's time to ditch it. There are some nodes within  Warpath that really prefer a two-hander; specifically, a two-handed sword. If you can't immediately get a decent two-handed sword, that's perfectly fine! Maces and Axes will also work for now, just keep an eye open for a better sword as you continue working through maps. Be sure to be on the look out for Nemesis, as this will be your best chance at getting over-powered gear early in the campaign, potentially even rewarding you with Exalted (purple) gear before Level 25.

As far as stats are concerned, focus on finding gear with increases to Fire Damage, added Fire Melee Damage, Attack Speed, and Movement Speed. Strength is by far the most important main attribute you'll want, so be sure to swap gear out as you come across it!

Node allocation to Level 35 should be as follows. This assumes you have 12 points in the skill. If you happen to have more due to additional skill levels on gear, just look ahead on this page to see where the next points are spent!

• 5 points in Unchained: Mitigates the channel cost of Warpath entirely.
• 1 point in Quicksilver Wind: More points will go into this eventually, as Movement Speed is necessary for Warpath to truly shine, but for now more importance is placed on increasing damage scaling.
• 1 point in Gorebringer: Small amount of Bleed Chance, however this is mainly taken because it's forced for pathing, and will also be converted to Ignite.
• 1 point in Earthscorcher: Converts Warpath to scale with Fire Damage.
• 3 points in Arsenal of Flame: This provides 45% more Melee Damage dealt to Ignited enemies.
• 1 point in Iron Reach: Slight increase to the area Warpath deals damage in. This will begin the pathing for future point allocation, and isn't taken to necessarily boost the damage this build does. The area increase is purely incidental, even if it does provide some quality of life.

• 2 points in Rahyeh's Devotion: Forced node for pathing.
• 2 points in Rahyeh's Fury: 10% Fire Penetration, big for Warpath damage.
• 3 points in Fanaticism: 9% Movement Speed increase. May not seem like much, but it's essentially a passive 9% boost to your output for free, and 18% when Holy Aura is active.
• 5 points in Firestorm: Global increases to Fire Damage.

• 4 points in Cleric's Hammer: Activates Healing Hands on melee hit. For us, this happens once per channel of Warpath.
• 1 point in Rahyeh's Chariot: Converts Healing Hands into a traversal skill. This does not apply to automated hits from the previous node, meaning Warpath won't put Healing Hands on cooldown.
• 1 point in Sun Shroud: Makes you immune to damage while Healing Hands is being used to move.
• 1 point in Searing Light: Adds a damage hit to Healing Hands.
• 1 point in Purity of Thought: Kills a large chunk of the Mana cost.
• 2 points in Cleric's Wrath: Healing Hands deals more damage per buff skill level. This means skills such as  Symbols of Hope grant more damage to Healing Hands if specialized.
• 1 point in Virtue of Patience: Drastic buffs for Healing Hands, including damage and area increases. The Cast Speed reduction does not matter for how this build is played.
• 1 point in Seraph Blade: Converts Healing Hands into a melee attack! This allows it to deal a real amount of damage, complimentary to Warpath, while still healing us.

At minimum, upon reaching Level 35, you should have another 15 Passive Points to spend since the previous level tier. However, it's likely you have more due to quest rewards. Thus, the following list will assume you have access to 20 extra points. If you have less, it isn't a big deal. You can always go back and finish optional quests after the campaign is finished.

• (Paladin) 8 points in Conviction: We already had 5 points in this; finish it out and place the last 3.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Valor: Large boost to Health, Endurance, and Healing Effectiveness. This will help the build retain a feeling of tankiness through out the leveling process.
• (Paladin) 2 points in Phoenix Strike: Helps upkeep Ignite to maximize Warpath damage.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Rahyeh's Strength: This grants extremely early access to Fire Resistance Shred. So long as you prioritize and/or craft gear with Strength, this will keep max stacks on enemies consistantly as long as you maintain uptime.

 Symbols of Hope is another passive increase for us. This keeps with the theme of minimal button presses and allows you to continue on with the pure spin-to-win playstyle, while providing substantial buffs to your character. For those of you who are used to the old iteration, Sigils of Hope, Symbols auto generate themselves and act as permanent increases rather than something that is needed to be maintained. This is a huge change made in Patch 1.2, and really makes the skill shine. You will be able to specialize in this immediately upon hitting Level 35, as point allocation for your Passive Points has been solely in Paladin up to this point, satisfying unlock requirements.

While  Symbols of Hope will start out at a lower level than your other skills, we'll still list out the first 12 points to place into the skill.

• 3 points in Empowering Symbols: Increases damage per Symbol.
• 4 points in Celestial Concentration: Passive increase to Mana Regen. Very useful in ensuring the build is more than sustainable even with constant skill usage.
• 3 points in Decree of Flame: Adds flat Fire Damage to all skills, boosting baseline damage of the build per Symbol.
• 2 points in Iron Symbols: Endurance Threshold, boosting survivability of the build, and sets up pathing moving into the next level bracket.

The campaign through these levels should feel extremely fast and smooth. If you haven't yet, it is highly suggested to craft on the gear you have equipped. Within this level range you'll fight Lagon, and the fight will vary in difficulty depending on where your resistances stand. A decent goal is to have most, if not all of your resistances at a minimum of 45% before killing Lagon. This is not a hard requirement, and the necessity depends entirely on how comfortable you are with dodging enemy attacks.

As a side not, do not forget to join your first faction if this is your first character of the season! Both the Merchant's Guild and Circle of Fortune provide players two unique ways of obtaining loot, and it is entirely up to you on which you prefer. The choice of which one to join can be made as soon as players reach Majelka in the Divine Timeline.

Node allocation to Level 50 should be as follows. This assumes you have 16 points in the skill. If you happen to have more due to additional skill levels on gear, just look ahead on this page to see where the next points are spent!

• 5 points in Unchained: Mitigates the channel cost of Warpath entirely.
• 1 point in Quicksilver Wind: More points will go into this eventually, as Movement Speed is necessary for Warpath to truly shine, but for now more importance is placed on increasing damage scaling.
• 1 point in Gorebringer: Small amount of Bleed Chance, however this is mainly taken because it's forced for pathing, and will also be converted to Ignite.
• 1 point in Earthscorcher: Converts Warpath to scale with Fire Damage.
• 3 points in Arsenal of Flame: This provides 45% more Melee Damage dealt to Ignited enemies.
• 1 point in Iron Reach: Slight increase to the area Warpath deals damage in. This will begin the pathing for future point allocation, and isn't taken to necessarily boost the damage this build does. The area increase is purely incidental, even if it does provide some quality of life.
• 2 points in Whirling Steel: Warpath deals more damage, and this bonus is doubled if you're using a two-handed weapon.
• 2 points in Cyclone of War: This is the node that makes a two-handed sword so important. The bonus from this node adds flat Critical Hit Chance to the build as long as we're channeling Warpath. This effect applies to hits from Healing Hands when activated through Warpath.

• 2 points in Rahyeh's Devotion: Forced node for pathing.
• 2 points in Rahyeh's Fury: 10% Fire Penetration, big for Warpath damage.
• 3 points in Fanaticism: 9% Movement Speed increase. May not seem like much, but it's essentially a passive 9% boost to your output for free, and 18% when Holy Aura is active.
• 5 points in Firestorm: Global increases to Fire Damage.
• 4 points in True Strike: Adds passive Increased Critical Strike Chance.

• 4 points in Cleric's Hammer: Activates Healing Hands on melee hit. For us, this happens once per channel of Warpath.
• 1 point in Rahyeh's Chariot: Converts Healing Hands into a traversal skill. This does not apply to automated hits from the previous node, meaning Warpath won't put Healing Hands on cooldown.
• 1 point in Sun Shroud: Makes you immune to damage while Healing Hands is being used to move.
• 1 point in Searing Light: Adds a damage hit to Healing Hands.
• 1 point in Purity of Thought: Kills a large chunk of the Mana cost.
• 2 points in Cleric's Wrath: Healing Hands deals more damage per buff skill level. This means skills such as  Symbols of Hope grant more damage to Healing Hands if specialized.
• 2 points in Virtue of Patience: Drastic buffs for Healing Hands, including damage and area increases. The Cast Speed reduction does not matter for how this build is played.
• 1 point in Seraph Blade: Converts Healing Hands into a melee attack! This allows it to deal a real amount of damage, complimentary to Warpath, while still healing us.
• 3 points in Blessed Parish: Reduces Mana cost and increases the area in which Healing Hands hits.

• 3 points in Empowering Symbols: Increases damage per Symbol.
• 4 points in Celestial Concentration: Passive increase to Mana Regen. Very useful in ensuring the build is more than sustainable even with constant skill usage.
• 3 points in Decree of Flame: Adds flat Fire Damage to all skills, boosting baseline damage of the build per Symbol.
• 3 points in Iron Symbols: Endurance Threshold, boosting survivability of the build, and sets up pathing moving into the next level bracket.
• 2 points in Enduring Hope: Pathing node.
• 1 point in Tetragram: Allows for the summoning of a fourth Symbol.

At minimum, upon reaching Level 50, you should have another 15 Passive Points to spend in since the previous level tier. However, it's likely you have more due to quest rewards. Thus, the following list will assume you have access to 20 extra points. If you have less, it isn't a big deal. You can always go back and finish optional quests after the campaign is finished.

• (Paladin) 10 points in Valor: Cap this node out for the Health and Endurance it provides, and to get us deeper into the Paladin tree.
• (Paladin) 8 points in Rahyeh's Strength: More Strength, and better upkeep on Fire Shred.
• (Paladin) 4 points in Phoenix Strike: Just enough to push us to unlock access to  Judgement for now.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Holy Precision: A major boost to our damage, increasing Critical Chance and Critical Multiplier.
• (Void Knight) 5 points in Abyssal Endurance: This is a major defensive node, assisting our early game resistances and reducing damage taken from both Physical and Void attacks.

At Level 50, your rotation changes and becomes a bit more exciting.  Judgement is added into the build, giving you access to a hard hitting nuke when you need to deal a ton of damage in a single hit.  Warpath can still be channeled for long periods of time if you want to be lazy, however it's main purpose will be to "flash" momentarily, activating the channel and allowing  Healing Hands to proc, gaining the added flat Critical Hit Chance Warpath offers, as long as you're using a sword. This flash of Warpath will Ignite enemies, leaving them open to the damage from Judgement and aiding you in clearing both large packs of enemies and bosses.

While  Judgement will start out at a lower level than your other skills, we'll still list out the first 16 points to place into the skill.

• 2 point in Sacred Sword: More of a pathing node, though the Ignite works in our favor.
• 2 points in Purifying Flame: Multiplicative scaling against Ignited enemies.
• 4 points in Fervent Impact: Additional Critical Chance for Judgement against Ignited enemies.
• 4 points in Punish: 100% Critical Multiplier.
• 2 points in Swift Verdict: Pathing node.
• 1 point in Ensuing Fervour: A short burst of Frenzy, but mostly for pathing.
• 1 point in Ascendant Liturgy: 40% Physical and Fire Penetration, but Conescrated Ground is removed.

Finishing up the campaign and moving into the Monolith of Fate should be easy, given you've followed the guide up until this point. Your rotation going forward should consist of using  Lunge to go from one mob group to the next, flashing  Warpath to ignite enemies and proc  Healing Hands, and if necessary using  Judgement to get rid of any tankier mobs that ends up in your path. This build can easily make it beyond level 70, so if you're having fun with it, continue to use it. However, most people just want an effective way to level into endgame to swap into their goal build, and that's also perfectly fine. The gear requirement is quite lax on this leveling build, thus allowing you to set up a loot filter for your endgame build as soon as you start spamming maps.

This build was tested without twink gear, and was capable of entering and completing Empowered Echoes at level 70. For your first character, you may not even be able to get through the normal Monolith at this level, simply because there's forced Monolith Islands you must complete.

Congratulations on getting this far. Below, you'll find the remainder of the skill point and node allocations that you will need through to Character Level 70 and Skill Level 20.

• (Sentinel) 8 points in Juggernaut: Strength will increase the damage your Hammers deal while also increasing your Armor Rating. Fire and Void Resistance is also very useful for the first few maps, as most enemies will deal this damage type, alongside Physical.
• (Sentinel) 10 points in Relentless: General increase to your damage, agnostic of what main hand/off hand you're using. If using a shield, feel free to path towards Stalwart, however the extra damage is a much better option for where you're at in gameplay.
• (Sentinel) 2 points in Armour Clad: A powerful node that will typically get more investment in late game builds for the much needed survival it provides. For now, it's a small amount of damage reduction and a pathway into the Paladin Tree.
• (Paladin) 8 points in Conviction: Extremely useful increases to damage (both Physical and Fire, depending on if you have the Fire conversion in  Warpath) and Penetration.
• (Paladin) 10 points in Valor: Cap this node out for the Health and Endurance it provides, and to get us deeper into the Paladin tree.
• (Paladin) 8 points in Rahyeh's Strength: More Strength, and better upkeep on Fire Shred.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Phoenix Strike: Boosts Ignite damage through Penetration.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Holy Precision: A major boost to our damage, increasing Critical Chance and Critical Multiplier.
• (Void Knight) 5 points in Abyssal Endurance: This is a major defensive node, assisting our early game resistances and reducing damage taken from both Physical and Void attacks.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Righteous Firebrand: Increased Melee Attack Speed, and additional Fire Penetration scaling off Healing Effectiveness.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Covenant of Light: Increases the effect of both  Symbols of Hope and  Holy Aura.
• (Paladin) 5 points in Covenant of Dominion: Increased Fire Damage, Movement Speed, and extra Mana Regen off Holy Aura.
• (Paladin) 7 points in Covenant of Protection: Large increase for Armor, and allows Armor to cover a portion of DoT dealt to us.

• 5 points in Unchained: Mitigates the channel cost of Warpath entirely.
• 2 points in Quicksilver Wind: More Movement Speed while channeling.
• 1 point in Gorebringer: Small amount of Bleed Chance, however this is mainly taken because it's forced for pathing, and will also be converted to Ignite.
• 1 point in Earthscorcher: Converts Warpath to scale with Fire Damage.
• 3 points in Arsenal of Flame: This provides 45% more Melee Damage dealt to Ignited enemies.
• 1 point in Iron Reach: Slight increase to the area Warpath deals damage in. This will begin the pathing for future point allocation, and isn't taken to necessarily boost the damage this build does. The area increase is purely incidental, even if it does provide some quality of life.
• 2 points in Whirling Steel: Warpath deals more damage, and this bonus is doubled if you're using a two-handed weapon.
• 5 points in Cyclone of War: This is the node that makes a two-handed sword so important. The bonus from this node adds flat Critical Hit Chance to the build as long as we're channeling Warpath. This effect applies to hits from Healing Hands when activated through Warpath.

• 2 points in Rahyeh's Devotion: Forced node for pathing.
• 2 points in Rahyeh's Fury: 10% Fire Penetration, big for Warpath damage.
• 3 points in Fanaticism: 9% Movement Speed increase. May not seem like much, but it's essentially a passive 9% boost to your output for free, and 18% when Holy Aura is active.
• 5 points in Firestorm: Global increases to Fire Damage.
• 4 points in True Strike: Adds passive Increased Critical Strike Chance.
• 3 points in Extreme Zeal: Passive 15% Critical Multiplier.
• 1 point in Concentration: This allows you to use Holy Aura more actively. Great for burst damage on Champions and Bosses, but it will render Holy Aura useless for a few seconds once it's active phase is finished.

• 4 points in Cleric's Hammer: Activates Healing Hands on melee hit. For us, this happens once per channel of  Warpath and again on  Judgement hits.
• 1 point in Rahyeh's Chariot: Converts Healing Hands into a traversal skill. This does not apply to automated hits from the previous node, meaning Warpath won't put Healing Hands on cooldown.
• 1 point in Sun Shroud: Makes you immune to damage while Healing Hands is being used to move.
• 1 point in Searing Light: Adds a damage hit to Healing Hands.
• 1 point in Purity of Thought: Kills a large chunk of the Mana cost.
• 2 points in Cleric's Wrath: Healing Hands deals more damage per buff skill level. This means skills such as  Symbols of Hope grant more damage to Healing Hands if specialized.
• 2 points in Virtue of Patience: Drastic buffs for Healing Hands, including damage and area increases. The Cast Speed reduction does not matter for how this build is played.
• 1 point in Seraph Blade: Converts Healing Hands into a melee attack! This allows it to deal a real amount of damage, complimentary to Warpath, while still healing us.
• 3 points in Blessed Parish: Reduces Mana cost and increases the area in which Healing Hands hits.
• 4 points in Prayer of the Fallen: Increases the healing done by Healing Hands. If you feel like this is not needed, you can instead path towards Bane of Evil, Halted Scourge, and Turn Undead for bigger damage increases.

• 5 points in Empowering Symbols: Increases damage per Symbol.
• 4 points in Celestial Concentration: Passive increase to Mana Regen. Very useful in ensuring the build is more than sustainable even with constant skill usage.
• 3 points in Decree of Flame: Adds flat Fire Damage to all skills, boosting baseline damage of the build per Symbol.
• 5 points in Iron Symbols: Endurance Threshold, boosting survivability of the build.
• 2 points in Enduring Hope: Pathing node.
• 1 point in Tetragram: Allows for the summoning of a fourth Symbol.

• 2 point in Sacred Sword: More of a pathing node, though the Ignite works in our favor.
• 2 points in Purifying Flame: Multiplicative scaling against Ignited enemies.
• 4 points in Fervent Impact: Additional Critical Chance for Judgement against Ignited enemies.
• 4 points in Punish: 100% Critical Multiplier.
• 2 points in Swift Verdict: Pathing node.
• 1 point in Ensuing Fervour: A short burst of Frenzy, but mostly for pathing.
• 1 point in Ascendant Liturgy: 40% Physical and Fire Penetration, but Conescrated Ground is removed.
• 1 point in Pious Offering: Judgement damage scales off the amount of Mana spent to use it. This is why the build takes Mana Regen where it can. The aim here is to boost Mana cost to bolster damage.
• 2 points in Deliverance: Using Judgement grants us a buff for 2 seconds that increases both Mana and Health Regen.
• 1 point in Urgent Inquisition: Cooldown for Judgement is removed. Instead, it costs more Mana to use, which directly relates to a damage gain for the skill.