Last Epoch Officially Leaves Early Access For Full Release

The Story

Last Epoch, the time-traveling action RPG from Eleventh Hour Games, has finally emerged from Early Access. Set in the world of Eterra, players navigate through different historical periods, from the Ancient Era to the Ruined Era, each fraught with challenges. Eterra faces imminent destruction from The Void, a corrupting force. The game’s narrative thrusts players into a desperate struggle to save the world, forcing them to face escalating threats and powerful enemies across the diverse timelines.

Last Epoch Base Classes and Masteries

Last Epoch offers five core classes: Sentinel, Primalist, Rogue, Mage, and Acolyte. Each class begins with a distinct playstyle, but the real depth emerges with Masteries. For instance, the Sentinel class, traditionally melee-focused, can morph into a Paladin (support), Forge Guard (tank), or Void Knight (hybrid melee/caster). This means a player’s base class acts as a springboard, creating diverse characters through these Mastery specializations.

Players can further customize their characters by assigning skill points in the Mastery passive trees. Unlike other ARPGs, there’s no fixed skill point allocation. Each skill progresses independently from 1 to 20, making mastery progression organic. This allows for unparalleled flexibility in character building, empowering players to respec and adjust their playstyle on the fly.

How Does Combat Work?

Last Epoch’s combat system prioritizes adaptability. Each class’s skillset is built upon a core of four abilities bound to the hotbar (Q, W, E, R, and right mouse button). Beyond the core skills, each one features its own dedicated passive tree. These passives significantly alter the skill’s function and impact, opening up possibilities. Acolyte’s Rip Blood, for example, can be enhanced with passives that eliminate mana requirements and turn bleed damage into poison.

This branching system of skills and passives provides a dynamic combat experience. Respecing skills is easily accessible, granting players rapid adjustment options to stay relevant. The intricate interplay of skill trees ensures that no two players experience combat in precisely the same manner.

Item Crafting

Last Epoch’s crafting system offers considerable control over item attributes. Players directly manipulate prefixes and suffixes by using modifier shards. This eliminates the need to interact with NPCs for enchantment services, granting players greater freedom and flexibility. The crafting system is easily grasped by players, but offers greater depth for those seeking maximum optimization.

Item crafting involves Glyphs and Runes in addition to modifier shards. Glyphs modify existing prefixes and suffixes while Runes allow for item duplication, dismantling, or even transforming ordinary items into Unique or Set items. This tiered crafting system caters to casual and hardcore players alike, empowering everyone to shape their character’s equipment to their desired spec.

Endgame Activities

Once a player has mastered their preferred build, the endgame activities in Last Epoch are designed to provide substantial challenge and rewards. Three key endgame activities are currently available: The Monoliths of Fate, Endless Arena, and Dungeons.

• Dungeons: These provide the standard endgame dungeon experience, featuring challenging enemies and loot drops superior to overworld enemies. Each dungeon offers a unique challenge, and players face the risk of character death. However, these dungeons offer unique rewards.
• The Monoliths of Fate: This is a variable challenge mode. Players navigate across nodes in different timelines to complete objectives, unlocking benefits for themselves. Each run ends with a challenging boss, offering rewarding loot. Furthermore, players are granted a blessing to bolster their performance within and beyond the activity.
• Endless Arena: This is the competitive endgame activity. Players face escalating waves of increasingly challenging enemies, with the goal of surviving as many waves as possible. This area is where player skill and build optimization truly shine. This mode tracks and rewards the highest-performing players through a leaderboard.

These activities maintain a healthy balance between challenge and reward, making them appealing for players at all skill levels.