Hey Folks! I’ve been down a rabbit trail for the last few days in Last Epoch where I started a brand new character. Initially, it started out as a “I lapped my friends, so I should start something new so I can play with them” which led me to start a Forge Guard character. Forge Guard is in the same Sentinel class that Void Knight is but in theory, its tree is all about minions and catching things on fire instead of purple damage. I thought it might be fun to play around with some of the minion options there as something a bit different from the Necromancers and Beastmasters that I have played before. However, while I do have a large lad that follows me around… I wound up going down a slightly different path. I should note this build is a sort of “yolo” from start to finish and I didn’t really set out with a clear plan in mind.
Yesterday I recorded a video because I was afraid this nonsense that I had created would not stay viable for long. It all started when I made the fateful decision to use a level one equippable unique called the Firestarter’s Torch. This essentially is a relatively mediocre item save for the percent chance to apply spreading flames. For anyone who has played Last Epoch, this is essentially ignite proliferation, and very rapidly I noticed that this could catch the entire screen on fire. So I leaned into this nonsense and before long I was wearing Calamity, 2 Sunwreaths, and a bunch of other random uniques and just dealing all the fire and ignite damage that I could. The above video shows some of the gameplay around level 29ish of me just setting the world on fire in a very Righteous Fire feeling manner.
The real “star player” of the build revolves around leaning upon Warpath once again to do spinning nonsense. I picked up the mandatory nodes to make the ability no longer cost mana, and then immediately dove into the path that causes Warpath to bleed… and then converts all bleeding damage to ignite chance and the base damage type of Warpath over to Fire instead of Physical. From there I made it so that every second I am casting Smite, and specced into the fire path of that ability as well so that I am constantly lighting everything on fire. Making it even more nonsensical I equipped Vortex Pennant that makes it so that while I am channeling Warpath I am throwing axes in random directions… and the axe hits themselves also ignite. For bonus nonsense, at some point, I am going to try and get some of the Idols that make it so that thrown axes cause Smite on hit.
The end result is this rolling inferno that ignites everything I touch, as well as a lot of things just off-screen through either the interaction with spreading flames, or when one of my axes makes contact with something and ignites it and everything it passes through. I’ve been building more and more into fire penetration which is making everything go so much faster. Like even one point of fire penetration chance was a noticeable difference and the next few points in Warpath are going to go for another fire penetration node as I am wielding a sceptre.
At the moment I am still running the same no-LP Firestarter’s Torch, but now that I am starting Monoliths I am going to be trying to farm one with at least Legendary Potential on it. I dropped one Sunwreath for a well-rolled exalted ring with some survival on it in addition to fire damage over time and fire damage. I am trying to find some All Resist on Channeling relics to try and create a Legendary out of Vortex Pennant because I am going to really need that affix to fix some of my resistance problems. Right now honestly the biggest thing that I need are some more levels. I have a pair of Fiery Dragon Shoes and a Rahyeh’s Light Shield that I plan on throwing on once I can equip them. I’ve also got a Solarum plate Exalted that I am going to throw on for some survival, +2 Warpath, and the implicit fire damage mod.
I can’t say this is the best bosser in the world, but I certainly ripped through Lagon without any issues. At this point I am in the Black Sun Monolith and am still Deathless, so that is at least something. My clear speed still feels pretty solid given that I am never running out of resources and can just keep rolling forward over top of things. I am kinda in a weird place ability-wise because right now… the only things that truly matter are Warpath and Smite. For the moment I am running Ring of Shields, because I thought it might be a nice damage booster with some survival baked in. The big problem there is that it just does not last long enough, and costs way the hell too much mana to cast. Since I am not regenerating mana at all while channeling… and I am always channeling… nothing has great synergy with Warpath. The proc at the end of the Forge Guard tree is only a 3% chance on hit and that just never seems to be up. The node is still worth it because it gives my minion a ton of health though but I plan on speccing out of Ring of Shields entirely and picking up Sigils of Hope at some point.
That leads me to Manifest Armor, the only minion available to a Forge Guard that I am actually using. Right now he is essentially a giant walking flamethrower. I am tanking for him and that is mostly working out fairly well. I’ve put points into inheriting stats from my Helm, Body Armor, and Shield and everything else has gone into the fire line making him ignite everything. He does a non-zero amount of damage because when I forget to summon him it is a noticeable difference. However, I am mostly playing a Warpath build that happens to have a DPS pet, and not necessarily playing a true Minions build. His survival is good enough to keep him up through almost everything, and it doesn’t cost a ton to summon him in the middle of combat if he happens to fall down. It honestly reminds me of the way that Beastmaster felt in Rift, where you mostly just had a pet following you as added damage and not necessarily a tanking scenario.
All told though I am really freaking happy with the current state of the build and am interested to see how it evolves as I get through the normal monoliths and move into empowered. At the moment with a mix of health, armor, block, leech, and middling resistances I seem to have really solid survival. That all may change once the damage and health pools increase significantly. I think I am going to take it pretty slow though on getting through monoliths. I say that… and then this is a character that I created late Sunday night and is now in Monoliths as of Tuesday evening. I may or may not know what “take it slow” means.
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