Loyal Companion Sharpshooter Build Guide

Welcome to the Loyal Companion Sharpshooter Build Guide! This build revolves around your Hawk, it provides massive buffs and even contributes to a significant portion of your damage. A simple playstyle of trying to dish out as much damage as possible and sniping the boss.

Outside of that, Loyal Companion enjoys a comfortable playstyle, has decent mobility, and is non-positional, meaning the class can attack from anywhere and at a range. The only downside of this playstyle is that he is relatively simple and has long skill cooldowns.

Want a more burst focused and intense playstyle? Check out our Death Strike guide.

Builds

Raids

Chaos Dungeons

Need some tips for general content? Check out our Guardian Raids and Abyssal Dungeons guides.

• Snipe is the highest damaging skill and highest priority to land.
• Hawk Shot, Charged Shot, Sharpshooter, and Arrow Wave are all filler bonus damage skills.
• Charged Shot additionally has Destruction.
• Atomic Arrow is our primary way of applying your Synergy from Damage Amplification.
• Deadly Slash is our Counter and meter generation.
• Moving Slash is our primary mobility.
• Fenrir's Messenger is your Awakening, we use it due to it providing us with full meter at the start of the fight.

Alternative Skill, Tripod, and Rune Options

Hawk Shot

• Swift Fingers - Once you are comfortable with the class you can use Deadly Slash as a solo meter generation.

Sharpshooter

• Overwhelm can be used if you are struggling for Stagger.

Moving Slash

• Quick Prep Can be used if you prefer a lower cooldown.
• Rage, Quick Recharge, Galewind These are all fine options, feel free to use what fits your playstyle.

Check the Rune Guide for more details on Runes and how to obtain them.

This build is optimized and meant to be used only in Chaos Dungeons. For Ebony Cube please use a Raid build.

• Snipe, Hawk Shot, and Arrow Wave are your best skills for clearing elites.
• Arrow Shower, Claymore Mine, Blade Storm, and Charged Shot are your best mob clearing skills.
• Moving Slash is your mobility skill.
• Fenrir's Messenger is your Awakening. It can do a lot of damage but is mainly used for meter generation.

Recommended Engraving Setup

While you can freely experiment with any engravings you want for this content, here's a recommended setup, based on the Engraving Support system:

• Preemptive Strike causes your attacks to deal immense amounts of damage to monsters that you haven't attacked yet, making it ideal for Chaos Dungeons.
• Contender is a stacking Attack Power effect that increases in strength once you kill a monster, making it ideal for Chaos Dungeons.
• Raid Captain provides damage based on your Bonus Movement Speed, synergizing well with the Buff Nodes scattered throughout Chaos Dungeons.
• Cursed Doll increases your damage with essentially no drawback in Chaos Dungeons.
• Loyal Companion will increase your Hawk's power as well as your own allowing for a smooth Chaos Dungeon experience.

Gameplay & Skill Rotation

Loyal Companion revolves around his Hawk. This is because it does significant damage itself as well as increasing your damage. We can always have this up by instantly filling our meter using Fenrir's Messenger then maintaining the drain with meter generation skills like Hawk Shot and Deadly Slash.

Having the hawk Summoned will have these effects:

• 8% Increased Party Movement Speed
• 12% Damage Increase to the boss, only for yourself.
• 10% Attack Power increase to yourself.
• Additionally, the Hawk has its own natural 40% Crit Rate

Once we have full meter we can use Summon Silverhawk (Z) to summon our Hawk.

The identity has two skills Wings of Storm (Z) and Last Rush (X).

• Wings of Storm (Z) should be used off of cooldown this is just a straight damage increase and can be cast during any animation.
• Last Rush (X) sends in our Hawk sacrificing it and losing our buffs. This should rarely be used but you can throw one if you plan to instantly use Fenrir's Messenger to refill your meter completely.

Sharpshooter Identity

This build is incredibly simple, try to deal as much damage as possible. We mainly want to follow a priority list of the highest damage skills and focus on survival. As long as you are using your skills off cooldown you will have great performance.

Basic Rotations

Standard Damage Rotation

• This is a simple rotation but it functions more as a priority list as we do not have a true rotation. Try to use your skills off of cooldown to maximize your damage potential.
• Wings of Storm (Z) can be cast during any animation so your goal is to use it as much as possible whenever it is available.
• Charged Shot can be tapped to instantly cast, holding it down only increases the range so keep that in mind.
• Try your best to maintain your Synergy using Atomic Arrow, even if you aren't planning to attack immediately after.

Stagger Check Rotation

• This is a very simple priority list on what to use during any time you need to maximize stagger. Remember you can also use a Whirlwind Grenade if you have one equipped!

Tripods and Gems

Tripod Levelling

Increasing the level of Tripods greatly enhances their effectiveness. You may only increase the level of 18 tripods at a time. Some of them cannot be leveled at all, or are left at level 1 - these tripods are omitted from the table, even if they are used. Here are the main tripods you should look out for in order to maximize this build's potential.

Tripods written in bold text are your highest priority, make sure to level them first!

For more information on where to obtain Tripod Amulets and how to use them, check out our Skill Tree System Guide.

Gems

Gems are another significant aspect of your build, as they directly impact the damage and cooldowns of your skills. You can equip up to 11 gems at a time. Here are the ones you should focus on in order to maximize this build's potential, listed according to their priority.

For more information on where to obtain gems and how to use them, check out our Gem System Guide.

Stat Priority

This build utilizes Crit and Specialization.

• Crit is the primary stat. It gives the highest raw damage out of any stat and is the most important.
• Specialization is a secondary stat. It scales the damage of our Hawk and our skills. At a certain amount of Crit we will be at 100% due to Tripods, so we move the rest of our stats to Specialization, we call this a Breakpoint. Think of this as a goal to aim for, it is ok if you do not have the exact amount.
• Make sure your Pet is always set to Crit!

Gear Set

Salvation Set

This set is optimal due to it providing the highest raw damage of any other set we can use.

Hallucination Set

This set is an alternative option that changes how you build forcing you to go for full Specialization accessories, this is a minor damage loss and also loses 10% attack speed that Salvation provides, viable but not recommended.

The name of your set will change every time you acquire a higher tier of gear, but the set effect will remain the same. Look for your set's keyword when recrafting it to find it more easily (e.g Entropy, Hallucination etc).

Check out the Gear Progression Guide for step by step instructions and early game gearing.

If you are interested in Sidereal Weapons, click here for more details.

Engravings

Engravings are a core part of your build. Typically, most engravings will be used at level 3, but some can be used at level 1 or 2 in addition to the others, after reaching item level 1540 and unlocking Ancient Accessories.

Engraving Explanations

Core Engravings

• Loyal Companion this heavily buffs our Hawk and must be run at level 3 as it greatly increases damage output as well as making the Hawk survive for a significantly longer time.
• Grudge increases damage done while also increasing damage received. The engraving is a highly effective damage increase without needing specific positioning, making it worthwhile even with the penalty.
• Keen Blunt Weapon is used due to our high natural Crit Rate which makes this engraving very efficient, giving us roughly a 20% damage increase.

Add-on Engravings

• Cursed Doll is a significant Attack Power increase at the cost of 25% healing. The healing penalty can be punishing for inexperienced players who are not familiar with boss mechanics, but it becomes easy to overcome with time.
• Hit Master is great since nearly all of our damage is Non-Positional making this engraving very efficient with no downsides.

Level 1 and 2 Engravings

• Adrenaline provides an additional source of Crit Rate and Attack Power. It is fairly easy to upkeep.

Check out the Engraving Guide for more details.

Bracelet

Bracelets provide beneficial effects to yourself or to your party members depending on the rolls they have.

The primary goal is to get the main stats used by this build Crit and Specialization. After that you should be aiming for Special Rolls to get more damage. Please note that this system is heavily reliant on RNG, and you should not expect to get much more beyond your main stats early on.

Check out the Bracelet Guide for more details.

Elixir

The recommended Elixir Set for this build is Critical.

Check out the Elixir Guide for more details and general stat recommendations.

Card Sets

Cards are an endgame system that helps maximize your character's damage. Here are the recommended card sets for this build.

• Deep Dive is used early on as it is fairly easy to obtain.
• Light of Salvation is the standard endgame option, but it can take a long time to acquire 30-piece Awakening.
• Kazeros's Legion Commanders is used as an alternative to Light of Salvation, in content where enemies have a weakness to Dark Damage.

Check out the Card Guide for more details on how to obtain cards and interact with them.

End Game Damage Card Set