Last Epoch Damage & Ailment Modifiers Glossary

Last Epoch tooltips are full of short stat lines: ailment durations, chances above 100%, conditions such as "while channelling" or "while dual wielding", and crowd control that runs on its own formula. This page explains thirteen of those lines that players look up, with the base numbers behind each ailment and the rule that decides when a conditional bonus counts. Some of the names are exact tooltip text, others are shorthand players use for a family of stats; each entry says which is which and points to the stats that actually exist in the game.

Status on 2 November 2026: Last Epoch is in Season 5, Rage of the Frostborn, which launched with patch 1.5 on 1 October 2026. Its seasonal mechanic is Rage of Morditas, a series of Morditas encounters in the campaign and the Monolith of Fate. Patches 1.5.2 and 1.5.3 followed in October. Ailment numbers below come from the Tunklab database for game version 1.5.2 and from Maxroll's ailment guide (updated April 2026); where the two agree, the value is shown without comment.

Ailment	Type	Base damage	Duration	Max stacks	Extra effect
Bleed	Physical damage over time	53	3 s	Unlimited	None
Ignite	Fire damage over time	40	2.5 s	Unlimited	None
Electrify	Lightning damage over time	44	2.5 s	Unlimited	None
Poison	Poison damage over time	28 in 1.5.2 data	3 s	Unlimited	-5% poison resistance per stack, first 30 stacks
Doom	Void damage over time	400	4 s	4	+4% melee damage taken
Frostbite	Cold damage over time	50 in 1.5.2 data	3 s	Unlimited	+20% chance to be frozen, first 30 stacks
Chill	Debuff	None	4 s	3	-12% movement, attack and cast speed per stack
Shock	Debuff	None	4 s	10	-5% lightning resistance and +20% stun chance per stack

Base damage is the total over the full duration before your modifiers. Every stack is a separate instance with its own timer.

Ailments over time

Bleed Duration %

Bleed is the physical damage-over-time ailment: 53 base physical damage over 3 seconds per stack, with no stack limit. Every hit that applies bleed adds a new stack with its own timer, so a longer duration does two things at once. Maxroll's ailment guide notes that increased duration raises the total damage of an ailment (each stack ticks for longer), and because stacks overlap for longer, the number of stacks you hold on a target also rises at the same attack speed.

Bleed damage scales with increased damage, increased physical damage and increased damage over time. Duration bonuses mostly come from skill nodes rather than gear. For example, the patch 1.2 notes (Season 2, April 2025) reworked the Massacre node of the Sentinel skill Rive to give 25% bleed chance per point and 10% increased bleed duration for the third strike per point. Since patch 1.1 (Harbingers of Ruin, July 2024), the bleeds inflicted by Spirit Plague's Hemorrhage and Laceration nodes respect ailment conversion, so they can turn into another damage type.

Duration only pays off while you keep applying stacks. On a boss you stop hitting, longer bleeds just finish later; the damage per second stays the same. Bleed chance is usually the first stat to raise, duration the second.

Ignite Duration %

Ignite is the fire damage-over-time ailment: 40 base fire damage over 2.5 seconds, no stack limit. Some older guides and the community wiki still list 3 seconds; the current data (Tunklab 1.5.2, Maxroll) says 2.5.

What scales ignite, according to the community wiki: increased damage, fire damage, elemental damage, damage over time and ignite effect. Spell damage does not affect it, which surprises many fire casters, and ignite ticks are not hits, so they cannot crit or trigger on-hit effects.

Increased ignite duration comes from skill nodes and passives. The patch 1.2 notes, for instance, added 5% increased ignite duration per point to Burning Crusade, a node of the Sentinel skill Shield Throw. As with bleed, a longer duration raises both the damage of each stack and the number of stacks you keep up at a given rate of application. Chance to ignite usually comes first: with no stack cap, more applications per second is the most direct way to more damage.

Poison Duration %

Poison lasts 3 seconds per stack and has no stack limit. Its special trait is resistance shred: each stack lowers the target's poison resistance by 5%, and only the first 30 stacks do this (Maxroll). The community wiki adds that the shred is 2% per stack against bosses and players.

The base damage depends on the source you read. Tunklab's datamined values for version 1.5.2 list 28 poison damage over 3 seconds, while Maxroll's guide and the community wiki give 20. The in-game ailment tooltip shows the value for your current patch. Poison scales with increased damage, increased poison damage and increased damage over time.

Longer poison duration lets the same application rate hold more stacks at once. That helps twice: more stacks tick together, and it is easier to keep the 30 shred stacks up on a target. Chance to poison above 100% applies more than one stack per hit (see below), so chance and duration multiply each other.

Poison Stacks Limit

There is no hard cap on poison stacks. Maxroll states that poison can stack infinitely, while only the first 30 stacks lower poison resistance. The number of stacks you reach in practice is simple arithmetic: applications per second times duration. Doubling either one doubles the steady stack count.

Chance above 100% works the same way for every ailment. A 350% chance to poison means each hit applies 3 stacks for sure and has a 50% chance to apply a fourth. Maxroll describes this as the chance to apply multiple stacks at once.

Not every ailment is uncapped:

Ailment	Stack cap
Bleed, ignite, electrify, poison, frostbite, damned	None
Doom	4
Chill, slow, frailty	3
Shock, critical vulnerability	10
Time Rot	12

Some skills also put their own limit on stacks they apply, so check the skill tooltip if a number seems to stop growing.

Hybrid ailments and crowd control

Doom Effectiveness

Doom is a hybrid ailment: it deals void damage over time and also weakens the target. Base values are 400 void damage over 4 seconds, up to 4 stacks, and a Doomed enemy takes 4% more melee damage (Maxroll). Doom comes from skill nodes, for example on the Acolyte skill Chaos Bolts, whose tree includes a node named Doom's Vindication.

"Doom effectiveness" is shorthand for stats that make each stack stronger. Last Epoch uses "effect" stats for ailments; the community wiki lists ignite effect among the scalers of ignite, and a Doom effect bonus works the same way. It raises what each Doom stack does. It does not raise the cap of 4 stacks, so once you hold 4 stacks, more application chance adds nothing and stronger stacks are the only way up. Because the cap is so low, increased damage over time and void damage are also worth more on a Doom build than extra Doom chance past the point where you keep 4 stacks up.

Patch 1.2 changed how Doom, Time Rot and Abyssal Decay are replaced when they are reapplied, so older guides about refreshing Doom stacks may not match current behaviour.

Experimental Chill Avoidance

"Experimental" is an affix category, not a stat, and chill avoidance is about not being slowed by enemy cold effects.

Experimental affixes are special affixes that only roll on boots, gloves and belts, and an item can carry only one. They cannot be found as affix shards. Since patch 1.2 (Season 2, April 2025) they are crafted only at the Thaumaturgy Device in the Rune Prison Complex: it turns one prefix of a boot, glove or belt into an experimental affix, the item needs two prefixes and no experimental affix yet, and the best possible result is tier 5. The same patch removed the Glyph of Insight and the Rune of Research, which older guides still mention, and experimental affixes can no longer be sealed.

Chill itself reduces movement, attack and cast speed by 12% per stack, up to 3 stacks, for 4 seconds. On a player at 3 stacks that is 36% slower everything. The cleanest answer in the current item data is the affix "Cannot be Chilled and Reduced Fire Resistance", a full immunity with a fire resistance cost you have to cover elsewhere (resistances cap at 75%). Check the exact wording of any chill line on your boots, gloves or belt: a reduced chance to be chilled is weaker than immunity.

Freeze Rate Added

Freeze stops an enemy from moving or acting for 1.2 seconds. Whether a hit freezes is not a flat chance: it is decided by freeze rate. In the official Last Epoch support article, a skill needs a base freeze rate (most cold skills show it in their tooltip), chill stacks on the target raise that base, and the result is multiplied by your freeze rate multiplier, which starts at 100%. The total is then compared with the target's maximum health and ward. The article's example, 40 freeze rate with a 500% multiplier against an enemy with 10,000 health, gives a 2.4% chance per hit.

"Freeze rate added" means flat freeze rate added to a skill. That is what makes a skill able to freeze in the first place: a skill with no base freeze rate cannot freeze at all, and a multiplier has nothing to scale. Added freeze rate is therefore most valuable on skills with a low or zero base. The patch 1.1 notes, for example, made the Call of Morditas node of Chaos Bolts show its base freeze rate of 20.

The formula explains why bosses are hard to freeze: their large health pool divides your rate down. Frostbite helps here, since each of its first 30 stacks raises the chance to be frozen by 20%. Unique items also convert freeze rate into other stats; the patch 1.2 notes set Reowyn's Veil to grant 1 ward per 60% freeze rate multiplier.

Conditional damage

Damage while Dual Wielding Daggers

Dual wielding needs a class passive, and only one class can hold daggers in the off hand:

Class	Passive	Off-hand weapons allowed
Rogue	Twin Blade	Daggers or one-handed swords
Primalist	Harmony of Blades	Axes or swords
Sentinel	Gladiator	Swords
Mage (Spellblade)	Mastery passive	Swords
Acolyte	None	Cannot dual wield

So a "while dual wielding daggers" bonus is in practice a Rogue bonus, and it counts only when both the main hand and the off hand hold daggers. General "while dual wielding" lines work with any legal pair. Examples in the current item data include the affix Added Physical Throwing Damage while Dual Wielding, and the patch 1.2 notes gave the unique Gladiator's Oath +20% to 45% critical strike multiplier while dual wielding.

Two-handed weapons take both slots, so a dual wield bonus is dead weight on a two-hander build.

Damage while Channeling

A channelled skill is one you hold down, such as the Sentinel's Warpath or the Mage's Focus and Disintegrate. A "while channelling" bonus applies only while the button is held, so it is wasted on a build that taps skills.

Channelling has its own cost rules. Since patch 1.1 (July 2024), channelled skills no longer stop mana regeneration, but 8 mana was added to their channel cost. Since patch 1.2, using an instant skill no longer interrupts a channel. Channel costs often rise the longer you hold the skill; Maxroll's Season 5 Warpath guide notes that Warpath costs more mana every second.

Examples of "while channelling" lines in the game:

• the affix All Resistances while Channelling, a defensive version of the same condition;
• the unique Ignivar's Head, which since patch 1.2 casts Fire Aura every second while channelling;
• Focus itself, which gives 100% increased mana regen and 10 ward per second while channelled.

Damage while Moving

"Damage while moving" is a condition that rewards building around motion: a bonus that counts only during the hits you land while your character is moving. In Last Epoch this condition lives on specific skill nodes and items, not on a common affix, and movement speed itself is the stat that scales it.

Current examples:

• the affix Added Spell Damage and Increased Spell Damage per Increased Movement Speed, which turns movement speed into spell damage;
• the Echo Knight node of Warpath, which in Maxroll's Season 5 guide creates echoes only if you moved at least 4 metres in the past 2 seconds;
• Warpath itself, which hits while you spin and move.

The general rule for every conditional line: it counts if the condition is true at the moment of the hit. A conditional increased-damage bonus joins the same increased damage pool as your other bonuses, which is added up before it multiplies your damage, so it does not stack multiplicatively.

Damage while Unarmed

Last Epoch has no core system for unarmed combat. The developers said so directly in their February 2024 item reveal: there are no core unarmed mechanics, but their earlier unarmed unique had been popular, so they added another one for the Falconer.

That item is Falcon Fists, a unique built for Falconer Rogues that works with Cinder Strike and the falcon, letting you fight with empty hands. Unarmed damage bonuses therefore come from items like this one rather than from a passive tree or a regular affix. If you plan an unarmed build, start from the unique that enables it and read its tooltip for the exact bonuses. Weapon-based modifiers such as "added damage with axes" or dual wield lines do nothing while unarmed.

Hybrid Spell Damage %

"Hybrid" in Last Epoch means an affix that modifies more than one stat at once. The community wiki describes hybrid affixes as those that change two or more stats, and they include "+X to skill" lines and many shards for specific slots. Hybrid Health, which gives added and increased health in one line, is the best known example.

There is no single "Hybrid Spell Damage" stat. The phrase covers hybrid affixes that include spell damage, for example these lines in the current item data:

• Added Melee Damage from Weapons gained as Added Spell Damage (a Spellblade-style line that turns weapon damage into spell damage);
• Added Melee and Spell Necrotic Damage;
• Added Spell Damage and Increased Spell Damage per Increased Movement Speed.

Read the two halves separately. Spell damage boosts the hit of a spell, but it does not scale ignite or other ailments, so a fire damage-over-time build gets little from the spell half. A hybrid line is worth its slot when both halves help your build.

Minion Damage per Intelligence

Minion damage per Intelligence describes how minion skills scale with your Intelligence attribute. Each Last Epoch skill lists the attribute it scales with; Acolyte summons such as Summon Skeleton are tagged Intelligence, so every point of Intelligence on your character raises the damage of those minions. The community wiki lists Summon Skeleton at 4% increased damage per point of Intelligence, plus 5 minion health per point. Check the current tooltip, since skill values change between seasons.

Intelligence also gives you ward retention. Patch 1.2 (April 2025) reduced this from 4% to 2% per point, and many older guides still quote the old 4%. Minion damage also comes from separate affixes such as Increased Minion Damage and +1 Skeleton and Increased Skeleton Damage.

To estimate the gain, read your total Intelligence on the character sheet and multiply it by the per-point value on the minion skill. Intelligence on gear therefore does double work for a minion Acolyte: more minion damage and more ward retention.

Guides and services

For crafting and affix questions, read the detailed crafting guide and the passive point system guide. For builds that use these ailments, see the best builds guide, and for what Season 5 changed, the Season 4 and 5 roadmap breakdown. Onlyfarms also offers Last Epoch builds and powerleveling.

Related terms

• Last Epoch defence, resources and skill node glossary
• RPG progression and loot glossary
• Game economy and cosmetics glossary

FAQ

Does poison have a stack limit in Last Epoch?

No. Poison stacks without limit, but only the first 30 stacks lower the target's poison resistance, at 5% per stack. Doom is capped at 4 stacks, chill at 3 and shock at 10.

How long do bleed and ignite last?

Bleed lasts 3 seconds and ignite 2.5 seconds in the current data (version 1.5.2). Both stack without a limit, so a longer duration raises both the damage of each stack and how many stacks you hold at once.

How does freezing work?

A skill needs a base freeze rate. Chill stacks raise it, your freeze rate multiplier scales it, and the result is compared with the target's health and ward. A freeze lasts 1.2 seconds, and bosses are hard to freeze because of their large health pools.

How much ward retention does Intelligence give?

2% per point since patch 1.2 (April 2025). Guides written for patch 1.0 and 1.1 list 4%, which is no longer correct.

Can every class dual wield daggers?

No. Only the Rogue can hold a dagger in the off hand, through the Twin Blade passive. Primalists, Sentinels and Spellblades can dual wield other one-handed weapons, and Acolytes cannot dual wield.