Paladin Leveling Guide

Last Updated: November 8th 2023

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This Paladin leveling build melts foes by launching a blazingly hot javelin. Javelin paired with the Holy Trail node is used both for clearing and single targets thanks to its huge AoE and dps. We also throw Volatile Reversal into the mix and achieve amazing burst damage against bosses.

The Paladin is not afraid of fighting in melee range and take a few hits thanks to his large panel of recovery skills. In this build we take advantage of Holy Trail scaling both it's damage and recovery with Healing Effectiveness through Path of Judgement. Holy Aura is also an incredible defensive tool which provides a lot of resistances as well as endurance.

Overall, the Holy Trail Paladin is an amazing leveling build, as it provides both insane damage and recovery. It also scales really well into the end-game as you gain access to more Healing Effectiveness. This combination makes Paladin leveling a breeze.

Early Campaign Gear Planner
Javelin
Holy Aura
Volatile Reversal
Sigils Of Hope
Shield Rush

Check out the Campaign Guide for an in depth breakdown of the campaign.

Immortal
Insane Damage

Clear all content with 1 button
Scale Damage and Recovery Together

❌ Requires Aiming
Has to Respec 1 Skill
Heavy Buff Management

Can't Spam Damaging skill

Paladin Passives

Passives provide powerful effects that dictate the playstyle of a Class and its Masteries. Remember that you can allocate Passives in the first half of any Mastery regardless of the one you chose. Powerful skills and nodes are usually found in the masteries tree.

Click the Nodes at the bottom to see Passive Tree Progression

Skills

Hammer Throw

Hammer Throw is your first specialized skill. It is your main Damage Skill until you spec into Holy Trail from Javelin. It has insane Damage and AoE by getting as many hits as possible to apply DoTs with high damage early in the campaign.

Click the Nodes at the bottom to see Skill Tree Progression

Gameplay

As we level the power of skills shift, with some becoming stronger while others get weaker. To account for this, we transition from a setup that is optimized for early game to one that is more suited to tackling endgame content.

Early Setup

  • At level 4 spec Hammer Throw and use it as your main damage skill until you spec into Holy Trail from Javelin.
  • At level 18 spec into Javelin. Don't use it until you spec into Holy Trail.
  • Use Lunge to move quickly through the chapters.

Final Setup

  • Use Javelin as your main damage skill.
  • At level 20 spec into Holy Aura. It provide passive buffs to your damage and defence.
  • At level 35 spec into Sigils Of Hope. Use it to boost your damage and defence.
  • At level 35 respec Hammer Throw for Volatile Reversal. Use it on high health enemies to more than double your damage.
  • At level 50 spec into Shield Rush. Use it to move quickly in areas.

Paladin Gear Progression

While we make recommendations for all items make sure you pay special attention to your weapon. Weapons are a core part of your character's power and getting a higher level base weapon increases your damage significantly. A good way to get better weapon bases is to buy them at the Gambler NPC in the Council Chamber town and in the End of Time town. Upgrade or buy your next weapon each time you reach the appropriate level.

If you are lucky you might get a Rune of Ascendance while leveling. Use this first on boots to get unique boots such as Eterra's Path or Suloron's Step.

You might also drop useful uniques for this build such as Devotion, Bastion of Honour and Arboreal Circuit.

Gear Stats Priorities

Prefixes

  • Vitality to bump your health up. Getting your health pool as high as possible is very important.
  • Chance to Bleed on Hit, Chance to Poison on Hit and Chance to Ignite on Hit makes up most of your damage before unlocking your Mastery. Once you transition from Hammer Throw, they lose all their value.
  • Increased Healing Effectiveness is essential to Holy Trail as it increases both its Damage and Healing.
  • Increased Cooldown Recovery Speed makes your experience way smoother as it makes Javelin, Shield Rush and Volatile Reversal available more often.
  • Throwing Attack Speed is a nice Quality of Life stat to get as it makes Javelin faster to use.
  • Spell Damage and Damage Over Time are incredible for improving your Holy Trail damage.
  • Lightning Damage and Fire Damage are also great at improving your Holy Trail damage, but they cover only half of its damage.
  • Level of Hammer Throw, Level of Javelin, Level of Holy Aura, Level of Volatile Reversal, Level of Sigils Of Hope and Level of Shield Rush are very important as skill tree nodes provides a substantial boost to your character power.
  • Strength scale both Hammer Throw and Javelin damage as well as giving increased Armor.

Suffixes

  • Health, Health and Hybrid Health to bump your health up. Getting your health pool as high as possible is very important.
  • Fire Resistance, Lightning Resistance, Cold Resistance, Physical Resistance, Necrotic Resistance and Void Resistance to get your resistances to 75%. This is your second layer of defense, getting it capped to 75% is not vital.
  • Dodge Rating and Armour are less important than health and resistances. This is your third layer of defense, getting some is useful, as you get 15% Dodge and Armour with little amount.
  • Health Regen Per Second is a very effective way to regen health early, but it quickly falls off once you get other ways to regen.
  • Chance to Chill on Hit, Chance to Slow on Hit and Chance to Apply Frailty on Hit are great secondary defensive stats.

Idols

  • Health, Health, Vitality and resistances for extra defences.
  • Seconds to Sigils of Hope Duration, Shared Fire Damage, Shared Lightning Damage, Increased Healing Effectiveness, Fire Damage Over Time and Damage Over Time for big damage boosts.
  • Chance to Bleed on Hit, Chance to Ignite on Hit and Chance to Poison on Hit for extra damage in the first 20 levels.

Gearing Step by Step

Early Campaign
Mid to Late Campaign
Early Monolith
  • Level 29: Imperial Staff.
  • Level 30: Brigandine Boots.
  • Level 38: Spine Rod.
  • Level 42: Noble Plate.
  • Level 44: Bronze Belt.
  • Level 45: Engraved Gauntlets and Heoborean Boots with the +(10-40)% Cold Resistance implicit as high as possible.
  • Level 46: Shamanic Staff.
  • Level 48: Two Coral Ring.
  • Level 50: Moon Staff.
  • Level 58: Bone Amulet and Argent Crest.
  • Level 58: Crystal Staff.
Items at level 55

Campaign Leveling

Key Leveling Notes

  • Keep your character at the area level by killing monsters. You need to maintain at most a 5 level difference with the area. Press C to open the character sheet to find your level and TAB to find the area level.
  • If your inventory is full, stick extra gear in your stash. Don't sell your extra gear that have affixes to a vendor. Instead, keep it to use later or destroy it with a Rune of Shattering or Rune of Removal.
  • Crafting is powerful and important for enhancing your gear. Press F and place your item in the crafting interface to level up the affixes and craft new ones! Adding health or vitality on a few empty affix slots can increase your HP by a significant amount!
  • Always get the best weapon you can. Weapons are a core part of your character's power and getting a higher level base weapon increases your damage significantly. You can buy them at the Gambler NPC in the Council Chamber town and in the End of Time town.
  • Wait until the end (or near the end) of the campaign to dive into the Monolith of Fate.

If you need help with crafting, check the Beginner Crafting Guide.

Campaign Step by Step

Chapter 1 - Divine Era

Chapter 1 (level 1 to 8)

Skills

Hammer Throw is your main damaging ability until you spec into Javelin and unlock Holy Trail.

Spam Lunge to move quickly through the chapters.

  • At level 4 open your skill panel by pressing "S" and specialize Hammer Throw.
Passive Tree
  • At level 3 open your passive tree, by pressing "P" and begin placing points.
Step 1
  • In the first area kill every monster and pick up all the loot.
  • In the second area focus on getting to level 3 and kill the Forged Soldier.
  • Advance to the Keepers' Camp then loot the chest on the right side.
  • Talk to the Shop NPC, sell your items, and look for a two handed weapon. After that look for Jade Ring and Boots with Movement Speed.
    • The Shop NPC has this icon above his head and is located in the center of the area.

Step 2

  • Continue forward to The Fortress Gardens, then to The Fortress Walls and kill Sturiax The Burning Sky.
  • Continue West to The Storeroom, kill the Forged Soldier and click on the stored armor.
  • Now teleport back to The Fortress Walls and talk to the Heoborean Soldier to finish Storeroom Sabotuers and get an extra Passive point, then continue East towards The Keepers' Vault.
  • In The Keepers' Vault, kill the Forged Soldier and defend Keeper Balthas.
  • Now continue to The Northern Road, watch Keeper Balthas getting abducted, then talk to the Keeper Guard and teleport back to the Keepers' Camp.

Step 3

  • Go East to the Ulatri Highlands, then continue Northeast to The Osprix Warcamp.
  • Now continue your journey North to reach The Summit.
  • Kill Haruspex Orian and deliver Keeper Balthas from his prison.
  • Teleport back to the Keepers' Camp and talk to Keeper Leena and Keeper Balthas.

Monolith of Fate

You are now done with the campaign and are ready to conquer the endgame, the Monolith of Fate. It has 2 difficulties, Normal and Empowered. In the Empowered Monolith all Timelines are at level 100 and have 100 base corruption, which scales item rarity making farming end game items much easier.

Although this article guides you up to your 3rd Timeline called the Ending the Storm Timeline, your longer term goal is to unlock Empowered Monoliths. This is achieved by completing the Spirits of Fire, The Age of Winter and The Last Ruin Timelines and then activating the beacon in the center.

Timelines are represented as big islands on the world map in the End of Time era.

Check the Monolith Beginner Guide for more details.

Early Monolith Strategies

As you want to gain stability fast, you need to rush the echo objective while killing monsters on your way. Until you unlock Empowered Monoliths, prioritize Exalted items and Uniques as completion reward when choosing echoes. If you die in an echo, you lose the completion bonus of that echo, so try not to. Also in your first Timeline prioritize the experience as it gives you a big boost in character power.

In the Fall of the Outcasts Timeline after killing Abomination, choose the level 66 Timeline. As a general rule when selecting Timelines, always choose the highest leveled one. This keeps you on the right-hand-side of the Monolith progression and provides more immediately relevant blessings as you progress through.

Echo Modifiers

If you feel like you are taking too much damage, avoid the following echo modifiers:

  • Increased damage of all types
  • Enemies have increased critical strike chance

Remember that you can farm items in the previous Timeline, if the current one is too hard.

Monolith's Gearing

In the Monolith of Fate you have more opportunities to acquire better gear. Max your resistances quickly and have as much health as possible before investing into damage on your gear (except for your weapon, which is exclusively for damage). At the very least, max your physical, necrotic and void resistances for the first Timeline.

Here are the recommended items and affixes for each slot:

  • Weapon: Temple Staff and Horned Staff
  • Helmet: Augury Helm.
  • Body Armour: Augury Plate and Solarum Plate.
  • Belt: Bronze Belt
  • Boots: Heoborean Boots and Solarum Greaves
  • Gloves: Engraved Gauntlets
  • Amulet: Bone Amulet
  • Rings: Coral Ring
  • Relic: Argent Crest

Prefixes

  1. Vitality
  2. Healing Effectiveness
  3. Level of Javelin, Level of Holy Aura, Level of Volatile Reversal, Level of Sigils Of Hope and Level of Shield Rush
  4. Increased Cooldown Recovery Speed
  5. Elemental Damage Over Time
  6. Spell Damage and Damage Over Time
  7. Lightning Penetration and Fire Penetration
  8. Lightning Damage and Fire Damage
  9. Throwing Attack Speed
  10. Strength

Suffixes

  1. Health
  2. Hybrid Health
  3. Health
  4. Fire Resistance, Lightning Resistance, Cold Resistance, Elemental Resistance, Physical Resistance, Necrotic Resistance and Void Resistance
  5. Chance to Apply Frailty on Hit
  6. Chance to Chill on Hit
  7. Chance to Slow on Hit

Loot Filter

Loot Filters are critical in Last Epoch. Highlighting all the related valuable Item Bases, Affixes, Uniques and Idols is crucial to your character's progression. As your gear gets better, remember to hide the rules that are no longer useful to avoid screen clutter.

Link :

Learn how to load and make Filters with our Loot Filter Guide.

Summary

This Paladin leveling build shines in its offensive and recovery capabilities. It kills bosses in seconds and makes you straight up immortal, establishing it as one of the smoothest mastery to play during the campaign.

  • Use Hammer Throw before switching to Javelin.
  • Aim properly with Javelin or kite monsters in the Holy Trail.
  • Refresh Sigils Of Hope up to your maximum.
  • Use Volatile Reversal as much as possible on bosses and high hp rares.
  • Use Holy Aura to cleanse debuffs.
  • Use Shield Rush as much as possible once you spec into Dark Rush.
  • Always change your staff to the best base possible after switching to Javelin.
  • Cap your Physical Resistance early to make the campaign look easy.

What's Next?

Congratulations, you completed the campaign and your first 3 Monoliths Timelines! What awaits you is unlocking Empowered Monolith after pushing through The Reign of Dragons, Spirits of Fire, The Age of Winter and The Last Ruin Timelines and activating the beacon in the middle of them. Then you can dive into dungeons, empower your character further and test your limits at the Arena leaderboard.

Check out our Paladin Guides and find the perfect Paladin Endgame build for you.

Please visit our Monolith Beginner Guide for more information on how the Monolith of Fate system works.

Find out more about dungeons in our Dungeon Guide.

Credits

Written by Terek.
Reviewed by Aristotelian and Lizard_IRL.

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