Endgame build guide
Level 2000 · High-Wave Woodshed
Build for damage you can survive
My first choice is the Fusion Prismatic Encore Guitarist. Its key advantage is that Prismatic Cadenza converts its own damage into a persistent shield, while the finale reuses accumulated damage. In dense Woodshed encounters, offense directly supports survival. The Metal/Fusion Iron Parade Drummer is the strongest alternative when you value a large, reliable Soul pool and capped dodge before any shield ramps up.
Ranking
| Rank | Build | Why choose it |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Prismatic Encore Guitarist | Highest combined damage/shield ceiling in dense encounters; requires careful shield timing. |
| 2 | Iron Parade Drummer | Most dependable baseline toughness; Heavy Hands scaling, Pocket Control, sustained waves and percent-HP damage. |
| 3 | Closed Feedback Tube Guitarist | Continuous lightning pressure, grid control and beam mitigation; stronger when enemies remain in the grid. |
| 4 | Ricochet Inferno Drummer | Excellent fast pack clearing and sustain; explosions lose value when kills stop. |
| 5 | Downstroke Anarchy Guitarist | Strong charged burst and clone pressure; positioning and beam downtime make it less consistent. |
How to use this guide
- Read the rules and crafting pages first. Each build has combat, player-equipment and follower sections.
- Apply the common Legacy core plus that build's pool column.
- The remaining sections cover follower mechanics, progression, Amp selection, poker, pinball, materials and source references.
Revised 13 September 2026; repository main rechecked and unchanged from commit 4d188cf1a0e1e0a712cb2f9249fd8dfddf6f0b10. Assumes level 2000, best possible rolls on the named items, maximum sockets and +5 branch stones, and legal Acclivity outcomes. A deployed game on another commit may behave differently.
The rules that decide the ranking
| Rule | Practical consequence |
|---|---|
| 69 class points + 1,930 Legacy points | Level 2000 does not provide 1,999 class points. Class progression caps at 69; Legacy begins after level 70. |
| Hard points unlock; gear extends | Every class node used here receives at least one hard point. +All Skills and branch stones then extend eligible skills beyond rank 20. Ultimates remain rank 1. |
| Album is the build anchor | Perfect Platinum Album: +10 All Skills, +10 All Legacy Skills, +3 Additional Legacy Trees, +50% Max Soul, +40% Ability Damage. It activates all four CD modes together. |
| Three ultimates require Skull Collector | Equip Death Metal Skull Collector or borrow its unique effect. The extra ultimate bindings use skill slots 5 and 6. |
| Crit chance has diminishing returns | At level 2000, base Rhythm already supplies very high raw critical chance. Favor crit damage and useful damage scaling over additional crit chance. |
| Caps still matter | Dodge caps at 50%; Legacy damage reduction at 90%; many extra projectiles, targets and proc cadences also cap. High effective rank is not infinite projectile count. |
A shared survival foundation
With +10 All Legacy Skills, Thick Skin 20 becomes rank 30 for 22.5% damage reduction. Iron Curtain adds 40%. Merch Table: Armor 925 becomes effective rank 935 and adds about 27.5075 percentage points through its diminishing formula. The sum reaches the 90% cap. Armor 924 falls just short — this is the exact breakpoint used in every reference build.
For the Guitarists, fully charged Sustain Beam protection can then reduce the remaining damage by another 70%: 90% Legacy reduction and 70% beam reduction leave 3% of incoming damage before other defenses. During Anarchy's higher beam cap, 75% leaves 2.5%. These are mitigation calculations, not a 97–97.5% chance of surviving — channeling, ramp time and applicable hit types still matter.
Iron Curtain also imposes a 25% outgoing-damage penalty. Its lethal-hit protection has a 3-second cooldown and requires Soul above 1; multiple rapid hits can still kill you. Phoenix Encore is an alternative keystone, not something you can equip alongside Iron Curtain. The reference builds deliberately pay the damage penalty for high-wave pushing.
All five also borrow Diamond Studded Gloves of the King. Its aura removes 10% of current Soul from ordinary enemies and 1% from bosses every 0.3 seconds. This scales with enemy health, but it cannot crit or trigger on-hit effects, and the damage shrinks as the target weakens. Ten pulses do not kill a full-health enemy outright.
Perfect gear: what to chase and what to keep
The named loadouts are complete, legal reference configurations optimized around strong mechanics. They are not proof that every slot defeats every possible Epic raffle or fused affix combination. Keep a rare crafted item if its actual damage, Soul or skill-rank gain wins after accounting for the unique effect and socket opportunity it displaces.
| Slots | Maximum sockets | Reference use |
|---|---|---|
| Instrument / Body | 6 each | Preserve these high-capacity slots for branch stones. |
| Offhand / Head / Legs / Gloves / Boots | 4 each | Usually socket; build 3 infuses its head instead. |
| Belt | 2 | Usually worth sacrificing for two required borrowed effects. |
| Necklace / each Accessory / CD | 1 each | Infuse jewelry; keep the actual Album and socket it. |
33 sockets for builds 1, 2, 4 and 5; build 3 uses 29 to fit its set bonuses and ten borrowed effects. An item assigned infusion is not also assigned a socket outcome.
- First secure the Album's +3 trees and high Legacy roll, the required unique effects, and +3 All Skills on ordinary relics. A +1-tree Album cannot support the six-branch plan.
- For damage, preserve a high weapon damage range, Bonus Damage, useful class ranks and crit damage. Power is already large at level 2000, so an Ability Damage line is not automatically a separate final multiplier.
- For survival, prioritize Max Soul, reliable shield mechanics, sustain and mitigation uptime. Dodge above its cap gives no additional avoidance. Movement still prevents hits that numerical defenses cannot absorb.
- Premium raffle Epic items can carry exceptional affixes. Compare them as replacements, retaining the required set count and borrowed effects; recompute effective ranks after each swap. Do not salvage them just because their name is absent here.