Dive Bomb Falconer
Last Updated:July 19, 2024|Changelog
Welcome to the Dive Bomb Falconer! Call down your Falcon from the skies for huge burst Damage with amazing AoE. The Falcon's Talons are very sharp and ready to eviscerate your foes. Combine Dive Bomb and Falcon Strikes to pulverize enemies instantly. This bird is looking for pray.
Use Bow Explosive Trap to buff the Falcon's Damage dramatically. Smoke Bomb is the main source of Shadows to proc On Wings of Shadow reliably when extra burst is needed. Thanks to all the Cooldown Recovery Speed from Nodes like Free Lofting Bird, United Assault and Side by Side you can spam Dive Bomb and Falcon Strikes very often. Use Shift to generate a Shadow while moving through the battlefield quickly.
While the build does not require any Uniques to function. However, Talons of Valor truly unlocks its potential. Rain down Explosive Traps allowing you to stack the +25 Melee Falcon Damage multiple times as you deal Critical Strikes. Additionally, Siphon of Anguish allows you to apply Doom, an Ailment that boosts the Melee Damage enemies take from Dive Bomb and Falcon Strikes.
Overall, Dive Bomb Falconer is a great build for any type of content. It excels at clearing Monolith Echoes fast and has great single target Damage for Bossing. If you are looking for a Minion build with a fast and active playstyle, this setup is perfect for you!
This build guide assumes you have a Level 70 Character.
Reach Level 70 with our Falconer Leveling Guide.
If you are looking for a different playstyle, check all our Build Guides!
Skills
Explosive Trap
Blast Rain transforms Explosive Trap into a Bow Skill allowing you to rain Traps down from the skies. Boost your Falcon's Damage through Sky Signal and reduce the Cooldown of Dive Bomb and Falcon Strikes with Free Lofting Bird. Get as many Traps as possible to easily stack buffs and to proc Smoke Traps more often.
- Make sure you have enough Mana Regeneration to sustain spamming Explosive Trap. Don't spec Automated Bombardment if you are struggling with Mana sustain, it gets better once you have enough Attributes thanks to the Hunter's Spoils Node inside Falconry.
- Unfortunately, Exposed Weakness does not work with Talons of Valor, as your Falcon only deals Melee Damage.
- Swap Shift for Aerial Assault if you're more comfortable with it. We recommend Shift as it's far better defensively. If you prefer Aerial Assault, get the Healing Gust, Refreshing Resolve and Coordinated Assault Nodes.
Passives
Passives provide powerful effects that dictate the playstyle of a Class and its Masteries. Remember that you can allocate Passives on the first half of all Masteries regardless of the one you chose.
- Grab Dexterity related Nodes to further scale the Multipliers associated with it.
- Evasion is amazing defensively. Combine it with Tailwind for even more Damage Reduction.
- The Haste buff from Agility has amazing synergy with the build, as most of the time it surpases 100% Movement Speed, making the Damage buff from this Node quite strong.
- Easily reach 100% Critical Strike Avoidance by combining Finesse Them and Grand Survival of Might Blessing.
- Ranger's Mark is a great DPS boost for your Falcon.
- You need 116% Melee Critical Strike Chance on your Stat Sheet to cap your Falcon's Crit. Take Critical Precision if needed.
- If you lack sustain early on, consider grabbing Draining Arrows over one of the Dexterity Nodes.
Make sure to complete the Campaign to get all your Passive Points.
Gameplay
This Falconer uses Explosive Trap to buff Dive Bomb and Falcon Strikes for huge damage! Make sure you are familiar with enemy mechanics to know when to use your Support Skills to stay alive. Pay attention to their telegraphed attacks!
Skill Usage/Rotation
- Use Explosive Trap against enemies to stack its offensive buffs.
- Cast Falcon Strikes to stack Avian Arsenal.
- Use Dive Bomb for amazing Burst Damage.
- Generate Shadows with Smoke Bomb and Shift for On Wings of Shadow for extra burst Damage or AoE.
Mapping
- Shift on Cooldown to generate a Shadow before using Dive Bomb to strike two times.
- Save Falcon Strikes for high density packs.
Bossing
- Make sure all the Shadows generated with Smoke Bomb are next to the Boss so the AoE's of all your Shadow Falcons from On Wings of Shadow overlap. With proper timing, you greatly increase your DPS thanks to Dancing Shadows.
- Spam Explosive Trap on the Boss to stack off your buffs before using Falcon Strikes and Dive Bomb.
- Aerial Assault around to dodge boss mechanics.
- Make sure you always have at least one Silver Shroud active. Time Smoke Bomb and Coordinated Fade apart to make sure you always have one Silver Shroud active. If you do this properly you can always have this protection against hits that can be Dodged, including some major Boss mechanics.
- Smoke Bomb's Escape Tactics Backflip allows you to clip over certain small obstacles, walls and doors. This backflip has to be aimed at the opposite direction you want to dash towards if you want to move forward with them. Learn this to maximize your mobility and kitting potential.
- Shift can also cross small terrain gaps and fences. An expert player can benefit immensely from this to gain distance and keep kitting.
- Standing in Smoke Bomb can boost your defense tremendously, so try to stay in it as much as possible while continue to move to get the Damage Reduction from Evasion and Tailwind.
Learn more about how to maximize your gameplay in the Build Scaling section of this guide.
Gear
Gearing in Last Epoch revolves around finding Items and then using the powerful Crafting System to enhance them. As long as an Item has Forging Potential left, players can upgrade or modify their Affixes up to Tier 5. However, the powerful Exalted Tier Affixes are drop only and can't be modified by players.
Using the correct Item Bases allows you to make use of their amazing Implicits, this is fundamental for gearing efficiently. Combine Implicits, Passives, Idols and Blessings to cap your Resistances and other defensive layers, while fitting as much Health related Affixes into your gear as possible. Plan ahead for your next upgrades and consider the final Empowered Blessings of your build while gearing. Finish up by farming Uniques with Legendary Potential and Sealing Affixes into Exalted Items to unleash all of your build's power!
Here are the Stat Goals for this build:
- Capped Resistances
- Capped Critical Strike Avoidance
- Capped Endurance
- 3000 - 5000+ Health
- 40%+ Armor Mitigation
- 40% - 60%+ Dodge Chance
- 100+ Dexterity
- 25% - 100% Glancing Blow
- 100% Falcon Critical Strike Chance
- 100%+ Movement Speed
Gear Progression
Milestone 1
Aim for good Item Bases with valuable T5 Affixes. The Defensive rolls on T5 Suffixes are very important at this stage as they can easily cap all your Resistances when combined with Item Implicits, Idols, Blessings or Passives.
Milestone 2
Make sure your Critical Strike Avoidance is capped. Remember that Woven Flesh is always an option early on. Farm it by killing the Abomination in the Fall of the Outcast Monolith Timeline.
Milestone 3
Get a good pair of boots with Movement Speed. Fit as much Health into your gear as possible. Hybrid Health and Increased Health are extremely valuable, but can be hard to find early on. Use regular flat Health until you find them.
Milestone 4
When all your core Defenses are covered, start stacking Dexterity to boost your Falcon's DPS drastically thanks to Falconer's Journey.
Milestone 5
Farm Talons of Valor to unlocks this build's true potential as soon as possible. Peak of the Mountain is another great addition to the build, as it provides amazing stats and tons of % Increased Critical Strike Chance. Siphon of Anguish allows you to apply Doom to boost the Melee Damage enemies take from Dive Bomb and Falcon Strikes.
Milestone 6
Fit any Increased Minion Damage you can into open Prefix slots. Your Falcon is a Minion, but it can't be targeted or killed so defensive Minion stats like Increased Minion Health or Minion Dodge Rating are useless.
Milestone 1
Upgrade your T20 set up with Exalted items, high value Sealed Affixes or ideally both. Obtain the Affixes included in the Planner, but prioritize the indicated Item Bases for their Implicits. Make sure to Seal highly efficient low tier Affixes.
Milestone 2
When all of your core Defenses are covered, start working on your Damage. Remember, your Falcon gets your %Increased Damage and %Increased Critical Strike Chance through Trained to Hunt and Go For the Eyes!. This setup needs 116% Increased Melee Critical Strike Chance on your Stat Sheet to cap your Falcon's Crit, as it has 13% Flat Minion Critical Strike Chance.
Milestone 3
Make sure you have enough Mana Regeneration to sustain spamming Explosive Trap. Don't spec Automated Bombardment if you are struggling with Mana sustain, it gets better once you have enough Attributes thanks to the Hunter's Spoils Node inside Falconry.
Milestone 4
Start farming for Talons of Valor, Peak of the Mountain and Siphon of Anguish with Legendary Potential. Farm the bow by targeting Unique Bow Echo Rewards in the Fall of the Outcast Monolith Timeline or using Runes of Ascendance and aim to slam Exalted Bow Critical Strike Chance on it.
Milestone 5
Stack Dexterity everywhere you can and get Exalted Level of Dive Bomb as soon as possible.
Milestone 6
As you finish up your Empowered Blessings keep a decent Health pool, capped Resistances and Critical Strike Avoidance. Keep an eye out for valuable Idols like Large Shadow Idols with %Health Prefix.
Milestone 1
Continue upgrading your gear with T7 Exalted Items and keep farming all your Uniques with Legendary Potential.
Milestone 2
Keep farming Talons of Valor, Peak of the Mountain and Siphon of Anguish with the maximum Legendary Potential you can find.
Milestone 3
Focus on getting a GG Belt with Experimental Traversal Cooldown Recovery on Potion Use. This powerful Affix allows you to speed up your farming significantly if used properly.
Milestone 4
Focus on finishing your Idol set up. Get an Adorned Majasan Idol with Shared Critical Strike Multiplier Prefix and Poison Resistance Suffix and Large Shadow Idols with %Health Prefix and Increased Damage while wielding a Bow or Elemental Resistance Suffix.
Milestone 5
With enough Legendary Potential, Death Rattle is amazing for the Minion Critical Strike Multiplier it provides. Look for Nemesis encounters in Echoes to add Legendary Potential or Affixes to any Unique with the Egg of the Forgotten.
Milestone 1
Keep upgrading your gear with Exalted Items with high tier Sealed Affixes. Get every stat in the right place and on the correct Item Base. Min/Maxing your gear in Last Epoch can be pushed to the extreme as Items with multiple Exalted Affixes and Legendary Potential are technically possible.
Milestone 2
Get as close to perfect rolls for all of your Empowered Blessings and find all of your desired Idols with the best in slot Prefixes and Suffixes.
Milestone 3
With enough Legendary Potential, Phantom Grip is amazing for the +Minion Skills and Minion Flat Critical Strike Chance it provides.
Milestone 4
Keep looking for Talons of Valor, Peak of the Mountain, Phantom Grip and Siphon of Anguish with the maximum Legendary Potential possible. Remember, some of these Items are extremely hard to get with high Legendary Potential.
Milestone 5
Feel free to experiment with any crazy Unique, Legendary or Experimental Items that you might craft, trade or find! The possibilities are endless, so be open to explore new options. Good luck with the chase!
Learn the basics for crafting gear with our Beginner Crafting Guide.
Check our Unique Item & Set Farming Guide and learn how to get them!
Want to know more about Legendary Items? Check our Legendary Guide!
Blessings
Completing a Timeline in the Monolith of Fate lets you choose one of several randomized Blessings from its unique pool. Their benefits are permanent and persist even outside of the Monolith of Fate.
Empowered Blessings are a fundamental part of all builds, so getting the correct ones for each is key.
The sooner you reach Empowered Monolith, the faster you can start farming your desired Blessings!
Normal Blessings are not important as they are eventually replaced by Empowered Blessings. However, they can still be a great source of Resistances, Critical Strike Avoidance or Damage for your build early on.
Pick up these Normal Blessings on your way to Empowered:
- Echo of Solarum
- Light of the Moon
- Survival of Might
- Resolve of Humanity
- Protection of Heorot
- Resolve of Grael
- Heart of the Caldera
- Embers of Immortality
Note: Don't target farm Normal Blessings. Get to Empowered Monolith as fast as you can.
Reaching Empowered Monolith unlocks all the level 100 Timelines and the ability to farm Empowered Blessings. Unlike Normal Blessings, these need to be farmed until you get the desired ones for your build. It is extremely important to get this set up as fast as possible to free up affix slots on your gear. Remember, the more value you get from your Blessings, the easier it is to craft efficient gear!
These are the core Combat Empowered Blessings for this build:
- Start with Grand Survival of Might to cap your Critical Strike Avoidance.
- Grab Grand Echo of Solarum for the Void Resistance.
- Get Grand Bastion of Divinity for the Lightning Resistance.
- Finally, Grand Body of Obsidian and Grand Bulwark of the Tundra provide a huge amount of Armor that helps increase the survivability of the build.
These Empowered Blessings are flexible and depend on your current needs and goals.
These are valuable Empowered Drop Rate Blessings for this build:
- Grand Sight of the Outcasts is valuable to help you find Large Shadow Idol with %Health.
- Once you find all your Idols, you can switch to the Grand Winds of Fortune to focus on Uniques, or Grand Scales of Greed for Gold.
- Grand Vigilance of the Damned helps you find more Talons of Valor.
- Take Grand Talon of Granduer to find more Rings.
Learn how to farm Blessings fast with our Advanced Monolith Strategies.
Idols
Idols grant your character bonuses when equipped in the dedicated Idol Container. Unlock all the slots of your Idol Container by completing the Campaign and some of its Side Quests. Remember that some Idols are Class specific and you won't be able to equip them with other non-compatible Classes.
These are the Idols recommended for this build:
- Get 1 Adorned Majasan Idol with Shared Critical Strike Multiplier Prefix and Poison Resistance Suffix.
- Obtain 3 Large Shadow Idol with %Health Prefix and Increased Damage while wielding a Bow or Elemental Resistance Suffix.
- Find 3 Stout Lagonian Idol with %Health Prefix and Health or Elemental Resistance Suffix.
- Finally, farm 1 Stout Lagonian Idol with Dodge Rating Prefix and Void Resistance Suffix.
- Health
- %Health
- Increased Armour Shred Effect
- Dodge Rating if Hit Recently
- Vitality
- Armour
- Physical Resistance
- Cold Resistance
- Lightning Resistance
- Necrotic Resistance
Make sure to complete the Campaign to get all your Idol Slots.
Learn how to be efficient with Idols with our Advanced Idols Setups Guide.
Build Scaling
This build is focused around consistent and fast paced movement with lots of large Dive Bomb hits clearing everything in your path. You want to ensure that we're taking the right stats to scale Falconry and Dive Bomb so Flat Damage, Crit Multi, and Critical Strike Chance are what you aim for.
- Dexterity: Grants %Increased Damage to your Falcon. It also gives it %More Damage thanks to Falconer's Journey.
- Minion Flat Damage: You want to get as much Flat Damage as possible. Tactician, Talons of Valor, and Added Falcon Melee Damage on Helm/Chest implicits are your main sources.
- Bow Flat Damage: It applies to Falconry and Dive Bomb thanks to Avian Arsenal.
- % Minion Damage: Any increase to Minion Damage is welcomed.
- Increased Mana Regeneration: Explosive Trap can be Mana intensive and you want to be able to spam it consistantly. Get as much as you need to make the build feel good.
- Critical Strike Chance: Your Falcon gets your %Increased Critical Strike Chance and Critical Strike Multiplier through Trained to Hunt, Go For the Eyes!. This setup needs 116% Increased Melee Critical Strike Chance on your Stat Sheet to cap your Falcon's Crit, as this set up already has 13% Flat Minion Critical Strike Chance.
- Minion Critical Strike Multiplier: Increases the Damage your Minion's Crits deal. Finesse Them, Needle Like Precision, Shared Critical Strike Multiplier on Idols and Death Rattle provide a lot of it.
- Siphon of Anguish: This Unique allows you to apply Doom on Hit, an Ailment that boosts the Melee Damage enemies take from Dive Bomb and Falcon Strikes.
- Penetration: Obtained mainly from Sky Signal.
- Chance To Shred Armour on Hit: Each stack of this Ailment reduces enemy Armour by 100 for 4 seconds and stacks infinitely. Enemies have 0 Armour by default and it can go into the negatives. At -1000 Armour a target takes 23.7% increased Physical Damage, while at -4000 Armour it takes 57.2%. With the amount of hits the build has from spamming Explosive Trap, the stacks ramp up quickly.
- Evasion and Tailwind: You're moving constantly and only stopping when it's safe, so these two sources provide a tremendous amount of reliable Damage Reduction.
- Dodge: Dexterity, Dodge and %Dodge allows you to reach between 40% to 60%+ Dodge.
- Glancing Blows: You take 35% less damage from Hits with Glancing Blows.
- Health: This build stacks a decent Health pool of 3000 to 5000+, depending on gear.
- Health Regen: Scale Health Regen Per Second and Health Regeneration on Helm, Boots, and Gloves to give yourself good Health Sustain.
- Critical Strike Avoidance: Getting crit means you take double damage, so avoiding that is a must. You cap this through the blessing Grand Survival of Might and Finesse Them.
- Endurance: A defensive mechanic that allows you to take up to 60% less Damage while below a certain Health threshold.
- Movement Speed: Reduces the reaction time needed to avoid attacks. The faster you move, the faster you can get out of danger!
- Dusk Shrouds: Each grants 5% Glancing Blow Chance and 50 Dodge Rating.
- Crimson Shroud: Stacks up to 3 times, providing less Damage Over Time Taken.
- Armour Mitigation: Just with the implicit Armour from your gear, the Grand Body of Obsidian Blessing and Stymphalian Feathers, your Armour reaches 40%+ Mitigation.
- Health on Hit/Crit: Relentless Talons and Finesse Them are your main way of sustaining your Health pool. Your Falcon can deal an absurd amount of Hits, refilling your Health pool easily.
- Slow/Chill: Greatly reduce the Action and Movement Speed of your enemies. They are must haves on most builds, especially once you reach hard content with insane speed modifiers.
- Frailty: This Ailment reduces the Damage dealt by enemies by 6% for 4 seconds. Stacks 3 times.
Our Damage Explained Article covers all you need to know to scale Damage.
Learn all you need to know to scale Defense with our Defense Explained Article.
Loot Filter
Loot Filters are critical in Last Epoch. Making sure you highlight all the related valuable Item Bases, Affixes, Uniques and Idols is crucial to ensure your character's progression. As your gear gets better, remember to hide the rules that are no longer useful to avoid screen clutter.
Here is the Endgame Loot Filter for this build:
Learn how to load and make Filters with our Loot Filter Guide.
Video Guide
Coming soon.
Summary
Overall Dive Bomb Falconer is an agile powerhouse capable of defeating all the content in the game. It has amazing AoE clear, insane single target Burst and decent survivability thanks to its multiple defensive layers.
- Your Falcon's stats scale with your own through Trained to Hunt and Go For the Eyes!, allowing you to unlock your Falcon's true potential!
- Spam Explosive Trap is another core part of the build, as it buffs the Falcon's Damage dramatically. With every Trap that explodes your Falcon gains a 2% Penetration buff that stacks up to 15 times with the Sky Signal Node.
- Use Smoke Bomb to generate Shadows for On Wings of Shadow when extra burst Damage is needed.
- Assassinate your enemies without having to be close! Target Dive Bomb from afar and kill most enemies in a single hit.
- While they are not mandatory, Uniques like Talons of Valor and Siphon of Anguish can raise this builds Offense amazingly.
Credits
Written by Lizard_IRL.
Reviewed by Tenkiei, Volca.