Lightning Swarmblade Druid Guide - Last Epoch Maxroll.gg (2024)

Swarmblade Form

This is a Swarmblade Form build. You proc multiple Tornadoes through Windfury Strikes. Viper's Call lets your Armblade Slash use the Serpent Strike tree. Endless Pressure and Grasshopper's Frenzy provide Rage sustain. Needle-Like Sting helps to cap your Critical Strike Chance. Water Strider provides multiple buffs thanks to Maelstrom.

Tornado

Tornado is your main Damage Skill. They cast Storm Bolt through Charged Storm. Frequent Lightning, Lasting Storm, Debris, and Eye of the Storm further increases your Damage. Eye of the Storm attaches Tornadoes on your character. Storm Dervish increases your proc rate by increasing your Attack Speed. Churning Orbs helps to apply Armour Shred and refill your Rage.

Maelstrom

This build benefits greatly from stacking as many Maelstroms as possible. Windswept and Windfury provide Frenzy and Haste. Sleet-Footed grants you Dodge Rating. Essence of Debris provides a significant amount of Stun Chance, enabling you to Stun Lock most ennemies. Power of the Storm provides another source for Storm Bolt. Thanks to Rending Vortex from Gathering Storm, Maelstroms is also a source of Base Critical Strike Chance.

Serpent Strike

Armblade Slash is your spammable Melee Attack and uses the Serpent Strike Tree. Slither and Shroud of Winter provide a huge amount of Dodge Rating. Culling Point acts like a Damage Multiplier by executing enemies below a certain Life Threshold, even Bosses. Hydra Strikes helps scale all your procs by increasing your Attack Speed. Corrosive Venom increases your Damage by granting you more Armor Shred.

Gathering Storm

Gathering Storm is used to increase the Damage of your Storm Bolts. Excited Bolts is essential, as it lets you scale Mana for Damage. Tempest Weapon gives great value to Tempest Maw. Additionally, Rending Vortex lets you reach 100% Critical Strike Chance easily.

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 Life Leech for your build early on.

Pick up these Normal Blessings on your way to Empowered:

• Echo of Solarum
• Hunger of the Void
• Bastion of Divinity
• Survival of Might
• Dream of Eterra
• Resolve of Humanity
• Persistance of Will
• Protection of Heorot
• Resolve of Grael
• Heart of the Caldera
• Embers of Immortality
• Body of Obsidian

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 Dream of Eterra for the Necrotic Resistance.
• Grab Grand Hunger of the Void to sustain your Health in combat.
• Farm Grand Mysteries of the Deep to significantly increase your Damage.
• Pick Grand Body of Obsidian for the huge amount of Flat Armour it provides.
• Finish up by getting Grand Bulwark of the Tundra for the huge % Armour it provides.

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 Nomad Idol with %Health Prefix and Elemental Resistance While Transformed or Critical Strike Avoidance for You and Your Minions Suffix. You can also use Grand Pride of Rebellion to find Grand Heorot Idols with Spell Damage While Transformed Prefix and Cold and Lightning Damage Suffix.
• Once you find all your Idols, you can switch to the Grand Winds of Fortune and focus on Uniques instead.
• Grand Savior of the North helps you find more Sceptres for Culnivar's Claim.
• Grand Embrace of Ice helps you find more Body Armours to get an Exalted Level of Tornado Affix.

• Lightning/Spell Flat Damage: You want to get as much Lightning or Spell Flat Damage as possible. Spell Damage and Rune Dagger or Culnivar's Claim are crucial to build it up.
• % Lightning/Spell Damage: Anything that increases Lightning or Spell Damage is welcomed.
• Melee Attack Speed: The faster you attack with Armblade Slash the more Tornadoes you proc and the more Dodge you can stack.
• Mana: Stacking Mana increases your Damage dramatically thanks to Excited Bolts in Gathering Storm.
• 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 16.6% increased Lightning Damage, while at -4000 Armour it takes 40.1%. With the amount of hits the build has, the stacks ramp up quickly. Aim for at least 100+ stacks.
• Grand Mysteries of the Deep: This Blessing plays a big role in increasing your Damage. With the amount of hits the build has, reaching the 10 stacks cap of Lightning Resistance Shred for 50% Lightning Penetration is easy.
• Attunement: Storm Bolt gains 1 Flat Damage per point of Attunement.
• Lightning/Spell Critical Strike Chance: Needle-Like Sting and Rending Vortex increases your base Critical Strike Chance dramatically. It is easy to cap it with Culnivar's Claim, Critical Strike Chance, Rageborn and Bush Stalker.
• Critical Strike Multiplier: Increases the Damage your Crits deal. Build as much as you can on your gear.
• Level of Tornado: Get this Prefix on your Body Armour for the Increased Damage it provides and to invest extra Points into its Tree.
• Level of Swarmblade Form: Get this Prefix on your Body Armour for the Increased Damage it provides and to invest extra Points into its Tree.
• Chance to Shock on Hit: Reduces Lightning Resistance and increases chance to be Stunned. Make sure to have at least 1 source of Chance to Shock on Hit on your gear.

• Ursine Strength: Grants 16% Damage Reduction against Nearby enemies.
• Aspect of the Boar: Combining Boar Heart with Porcine Constitution grants it 30% Damage Reduction.
• Melee Attack Speed/Dodge Rating: This build obtains insane Dodge with minimal investment. Sleet-Footed, Aura of Evasion, Locust Agility and Shroud of Winter provide Flat Dodge, while Slither multiplies it with the more Melee Attack Speed you have.
• Stun: Thanks to its Damage output, Essence of Debris and the Shock Ailmentyou are able to Stun most enemies, even Bosses.
• Armour Mitigation: This setup gets very high Armour. Combine the Armour from your Item Implicits, Grand Body of Obsidian and Grand Bulwark of the Tundra Blessings, along with your Passives to reach 60%+ Armour Mitigation.
• Health: This build has a good amount of Health. Health is very effective when combined with all the other defensive layers the Druid has access to. Primalist has access to Large Nomad Idols with %Health; not all Classes have access to these amazing Idols!
• Endurance: A defensive mechanic that allows you to take up to 60% less Damage while below a certain Health threshold. Your base Endurance Threshold is 20% of your total Health.
• Health Leech: Leech is crucial to your survivability. Bush Stalker and Grand Hunger of the Void are extremely important.
• Frailty: This Ailment reduces the Damage dealt by enemies by 6% for 4 seconds. Stacks 3 times. Make sure to include this affix in your gear setup.
• Cleanse: Available with Ward and Ailment Cleansing on Potion Use. Keep an eye out for dangerous Negative Ailments.
• Chill and Slow: Are Ailments that 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.