RAID: Shadow Legends Masteries Guide

 

Farming at stage 13 is pretty doable and does not require a lot of work as farming in stage 11 or 12.

Here, I will give you my thoughts on the masteries you can get in the game.

Masteries always unlock in a specific order. When you unlock a mastery, it allows you to unlock the ones next to it.

For example, If you unlock Rejuvenation in tier 2, you can only unlock Shadow Heal, Resurgent and Bloodthirst in tier 3 but not Wisdom of Battle.

So, before choosing a specific mastery, do check the ones below it as well because you might want to have the next ones more than the current one. Make sure the path you are working on leads to the top tier mastery you want.

If you make any mistake, you still can reset the masteries for free once. It costs 150 Gems to reset in the future from the second reset.

Definitive Guide to All Masteries

Offense Masteries

Tier 1

Blade Disciple: +75 Attack

This mastery should be taken by Champions who have guaranteed critical hits or Champions who need pure attack damage (like bomb placing ability). Very limited uses.

Deadly Precision: +5% Critical Rate

This one should be chosen 99% of the time If the Champion is using offense mastery tree.

The reason is very simple, even If you don’t have any critical rate skill or gear, this mastery can still get paired up with Keen Strike in tier 2 to provide a 3% damage boost in general.

Just pick Deadly Precision if your champion is attack type.

Tier 2

Heart of Glory: Increases damage inflicted by 5% when attacking with full HP

This one is only useful in the arena since it can increase the initial burst, resulting in one-shot hits. In long battles, it doesn’t give any buff unless the champion can consistently get to full HP with healings.

Keen Strike: +10% Critical Damage

Keen Strike is literally the best mastery in tier 2 of the offense tree. Whatever build you are trying to get, just take it. When paring up with a decent crit rate, you will get a nice damage boost.

Shield Breaker: +25% damage to targets having [Shield] buff

This is another arena-based mastery because shields are very common in Arena. In high tiers, almost all arena teams have a Champion that buffs Shield. Shield Breaker is very useful in this case.

However, outside of the arena, it doesn’t offer too much usefulness. It may be useful against Magic Keep Dungeon Boss tho.

Grim Resolve: +5% damage when having 50% HP or less.

This mastery is okay in long battles. It works very well with life steal as it increases the damage when you are at low HP while giving you more healing.

Tier 3

Single Out: Targets having less than 40% HP will get 8% more damage

This is a great mastery for Clan Boss as he will be at below 40% HP for a very long time.

Life Drinker: When having 50% HP or less, heals self by 5% damage dealt

This mastery is nothing special before you get the Giant Slayer as it only heals a small amount of HP for most Champions in RAID: Shadow Legends. However, once you got Giant Slayer, Life Drinker is a super useful healing tool for your team while attacking the Clan Boss.

Strongly recommend!

Whirlwind of Death: For each enemy killed, increases Speed by 6

This mastery stacks throughout the battle and gets maxed at 18 bonus Speed.

It’s great in arena, great for solo farmers in the Campaign, okay in Dungeons. It’s useless for Clan Boss.

Use it based on your needs.

Ruthless Ambush: +8% damage inflicted for the first time hitting the enemy.

Best for use in Arena to increase the initial burst.

Tier 4

Burning It Down: +6% damage inflicted when attacking targets with higher max HP

This one is excellent for any kind of boss because all bosses in RAID: Shadow Legends always have more HP than you. This means you will get free 6% more damage against them.

This mastery is also great for glass cannon Champions, who have high damage but low HP.

Wrath of the Slain: When an ally gets killed, damage increased by 5%, max 10%

Very good for campaign solo farmers. It’s good for tank as well because tank is the last one standing when raiding boss.

Cycle of Violence: 30% chance of decreasing cooldown of a random ability by 1 turn once the skill damage exceeds 30% of the target’s max HP.

This only triggers once per turn. It’s good for arena battles and farming runs as you can speedup the cooldowns to farm faster.

It’s not useful against boss.

Opportunist: +12% damage dealt to targets having Stun, Freeze or Sleep debuffs.

This mastery is great in the arena but not that great in any other game-mode because all of the bosses in RAID are immune to these debuffs.

Also, only take this if you have Champions in your team who can place those effects.

Tier 5

Methodical: Default skill damage increased by 2% each time it is used. Max 10%.

This is a great mastery for any Champion who uses their default attack a lot.

It’s great in Clan Boss because the fights are very long and you can easily max out the bonus HP.

It’s great for solo farmers such as Relickeeper, who simply just increases the bonus damage, making the farm a lot faster.

It’s less useful in arena.

Kill Streak: Damage dealt +6% in arena & 3% in other places for each enemy killed by this champion. Max 12%.

This mastery is great for arena and campaign farming only.

Put it on your main farmer to farm faster and your Champions who can usually last hit the enemies with their burst.

Blood Shield: Gives the champion a Shield buff that lasts for 1 turn every time ths Champion kills an enemy.

The value of this Shield is 15% of the Champion’s max HP.

Great for Arena and farming only. Useless in other game modes.

Stokes to Fury: Damage dealt +4% for each debuff on the Champion. Max 12%.

Great mostly for arena battles. Decent for Clan Boss because Kill Streak and Blood Shield are useless against Clan Boss.

Clan Boss always place at least a debuff on you so you always can have extra damage.

Tier 6

Warmaster: 60% chance of dealing bonus damage when attacking, which equals 10% of target’s max HP (4% when attacking boss).

Bonus damage can only occur once for every skill and cannot count as an extra hit.

The damage is based on the enemy max HP.

Helmsmasher: Has a 50% chance to ignore 25% of the target’s DEF.

For the skills that ignore the DEF, this will add 25% extra to the DEF ignored by the skill.

This mastery is very limited and is not commonly picked because -25% is something still very small against tanky units.

Giant Slayer: 30% chance to deal extra damage, which is equal to 5% of the target’s max HP (2% against Boss).

The extra damage occurs on each hit of the skill but doesn’t count as an extra hit.

Flawless Execution: Critical Damage +20%

Great for any Champion who doesn’t get Giant Slayer.

Defense Tree

The Offense Tree has Giant Slayer, the Support Tree has Accuracy Help, alongside with many masteries that extend the usefulness of buffs/debuffs, the Defense Tree is generally pretty underpowered and is not being used on many Champions in RAID: Shadow Legends, including defensive Champions.

Basically, only get the Defense Tree for the Champions who don’t have any buff/debuff, or who don’t need accuracy.

Defensive Champions usually take the Offense and Support tree to increase their damage and buffs/debuffs.

Tier 1

Tough Skin: Defense +75

This is a great choice in general for defensive Champions.

Defiant: Resistance +10

Take this one if the Champion is not a defensive champ.

Tier 2

Blastproof: Decreases incoming AoE attack damage by 5%

This is great for Arena battles and good for almost all PvE runs since the Bosses usually have AoE attacks.

Rejuvenation: Increases the healing and value of Shield buffs this Champion receives by 5%

This is a great mastery if you have a healer or shield provider in your team.

This mastery works for self buffs too so it’s worth it.

Mighty Endurance: Decreases the amount of damage received by 10% when the Champion getting Stun, Sleep or Freeze debuffs.

This is a very situational mastery. Basically all other masteries in this tier are better than this one.

Improved Party: Decreases the damage received by 8% when the Champion gets hit by a critical hit.

This is good for Arena only because there are a lot of crits there. Not great in other modes.

Tier 3

Shadow Heal: Heals the Champion by 6% of their max HP every time an enemy is healed.

This occurs only once per turn. It’s great for tanky champions facing heal teams.

However, it’s a very situational mastery and cannot be used much in PvE.

Resurgent: Provides a 50% chance to remove 1 random debuff from the Champion every time they lose 25% of their max HP from a single skill.

This mastery is only useful in Arena. However, it’s still not a good one to choose.

Bloodthirst: Heals the Champion by 10% of their max HP for every time they kill an enemy.

This master has a cooldown of 1 turn. It’s good for solo farmers and some situations in the arena.

Wisdom of Battle: Provides a 30% chance of casting a Block Debuffs buff for the Champion, lasts for 1 turn, every time when Sleep, Stun or Freeze debuffs expire on this Champion.

This mastery is very situational and inconsistent. Not recommended.

Tier 4

Solidarity: Increases the ally Resist by 5 for each buff placed on them by this Champion.

This is not a bad mastery. Choose it If your Champion has many buffs to cast.

Delay Death: For every hit taken from a specific enemy, the damage received is reduced by 0.75%, max 6% for each enemy.

This one is great for tank Champions, who can survive in long battles.

It only requires 8 hits to max the mastery.

Harvest Despair: Has a 60% chance of placing a [Leech] debuff for 1 turn when placing [Stun], [Sleep], or [Freeze] debuffs.

The Leech debuff allows the Champion to take 10% of the damage they deal to heal themselves. It works similarly to the Lifesteal buff but only against a specific target.

This is actually a very good mastery If you can place any of those 3 debuffs on the enemies.

However, since you cannot place those debuffs on bosses, this one is only useful in arena.

Stubbornness: For each debuff on the Champion, RESIST increased by 10, max 30.

Very situational mastery and only useful in some rare cases.

Tier 5

Selfless Defender: Protects an ally by taking 20% of the damage dealt to them each round from the first enemy hit.

This mastery is great for tanky champions and only tanky champions.

Never use this on your squishy champions because it just makes them die faster.

Cycle of Revenge: Provides a 50% chance of increasing Turn Meter by 15% whenever an ally is attacked by a critical hit.

This is only good for arena battles to speed up the slow Champions. However, it’s useless outside of the arena where critical hits are very rare.

Retribution: Provides 50% chance to counterattack whenever this Champion loses 25% of the max HP from a single enemy skill

This is definitely the best skill in the Defense tree and it’s great for both arena and PvE battles. Works perfectly with life steal.

Deterrence: Has a 20% chance to counterattack the enemy whenever they casts a Stun, Sleep or Freeze debuff to an ally.

This is a very situational debuff. Not worth taking in general.

Tier 6

Iron Skin: DEF +200

Great for defense Champion who isn’t having Giant Slayer.

Bulwark: Decrease all damage incoming to allies by 5%. This Champion will receive those damage instead

This works very well with the Selfless Defender.

Fearsome Presence: Increases the chance of placing a [Stun], [Sleep], [Freeze] or [Provoke] debuff from Skills or Artifacts by 5%.

Great skill for arena if you have any of those debuffs. These debuffs typically a very low chance of being placed so this is a great boost to them.

Remember that these debuffs do not work against bosses.

Unshakeable: Resist + 50

Do not pick this.

Support Tree

Tier 1

Steadfast: Max HP +810

This is a very solid mastery however If you need to place debuffs more accuracy, pick Pinpoint Accuracy.

Pinpoint Accuracy: ACC +10

Choose this If you have debuffs.

Tier 2

Lay on Hands: Healing value of this Champion +5%

If you have a healing ability, get this mastery.

Do note that the Continuous Heal doesn’t get affected by this Mastery.

Shieldbearer: Shield Buff +5%

If you have a shield buff, don’t hesitate to get this mastery.

Exalt in Death: Heals self by 10% of the Max HP once when the enemy is killed in each round.

Great for solo farmers and great for arena battles.

Charged Focus: ACC +20 when the Champion doesn’t have any skill on Cooldown

Great at buffing your initial debuff. In general, great mastery to take!

Tier 3

Healing Savior: Healing & Shield buffs + 10% when the target ally has 40% HP or less

Great one If you have shield or healing abilities.

Rapid Response: Provides a 30% chance of increasing Turn Meter by 10% when a buff cast by this Champion is removed or expires

Great pick to get free Turn Meter increase! Take it for any buff-based Champ!

Swarm Smiter: ACC +4 for each enemy alive. Max 16

This one is great for Arena and it’s decent for other game modes.

Good one to use If you have debuffs.

Arcane Celerity: 30% chance of increasing Turn Meter by 10% whenever a debuff cast by this Champion gets expired or removed.

Totally worth getting If your Champions have more debuffs than buffs.

Tier 4:

Merciful Aid: +15% healing and value of Shield buffs cast by this Champion when the target ally has Sleep, Stun or Freeze debuffs.

Very limited and situational. These debuffs are limited in PvE.

Cycle of Magic: 5% chance of decreasing the cooldown a random skill by 1 turn at the start of every turn

5% seems small but this one could be very useful in a long battle. Definitely worth taking If your Champ has a long cooldown skill and you want to use her in long battles like Clan Boss etc.

Lore of Steel: Basic Artifact Sets Bonus +15%

Note that this increase is multiplicative, not additive. Pretty good one!

Basic Artifact Sets are the ones that boost your main stats: Offense, Life, Defense, Crit Rate, Crit Damage, Speed, Resist, Accuracy.

For example, If the set increases your bonus by 15%, you will get a bonus of 17.25% in total while using this mastery.

Evil Eye: Target’s Turn Meter -20% (single target skills) or -5% (AoE skills) when it gets hit for the first time by this Champion’s default skill.

This is kinda not that great because you usually don’t want to start the battle with the default skill. Also, this is a one-time effect.

This mastery can be easily outclassed by Cycle of Magic or Lore of Steel in PvE battles.

There are some specific strategies for this mastery in the arena. Viable but not that great.

Tier 5

Lasting Gifts: 30% chance of extending the duration of any buff cast from this Champion by 1 turn

This mastery doesn’t work with Block Damage, Unkillable and Revive on Death buffs.

This is one of the most fantastic RAID: Shadow Legends Masteries. Use it for any buff-based Champions you have.

Spirit Haste: SPD +8 for each dead ally. Max 24.

This one is good for tanky Champions who can survive till the end.

It’s also good for Champions like Gorgorab because he can get hits AoE to revive off quickly.

Sniper: Increases the chances of placing debuffs by 5%

This one doesn’t work with Stun, Sleep, Freeze or Provoke.

This is a good one for all debuffers but of course take note of the unsupported debuffs above. You should also check your Champion’s accuracy as this mastery is useless If your chance is 100%.

Master Hexer: 30% chance to extend the debuffs by 1 turn.

This one also doesn’t work with Stun, Sleep, Freeze and Provoke.

It’s essential for all debuffers but remember its limitations.

Tier 6

Elixir of Life: Champion’s Max HP + 3000

This is a decent buff for HP champions but of course there are better masteries

Timely Intervention: Champions’ Turn Meter +20% whenever an ally drops below 25% HP

This one is great at speeding up a healer to save the low HP allies.

Oppressor: Turn Meter fill rate +2.5% for each active debuff cast. Max 10%

This is great If you can cast a lot of debuffs consistently.

Eagle Eye: ACC +50

Better mastery for debuffers.

Best Masteries: Giant Slayer & Warmaster

I want to make a separate section for these two special masteries.

Giant Slayer and Warmaster are the best masteries in RAID: Shadow Legends, indeed.

They are the ones that divide the end-game contents from the previous phases. These two impact all of the other masteries in the entire game.

Especially If you are using the Champions in PvE, there is no other one that can compare to them.

Giant Slayer

• This mastery provides a 30% chance of getting bonus damage to the enemies when attacking.
• The amount of bonus damage is equal to 5% of the target’s max HP, or 2% of the Boss HP.
• The bonus damage occurs on each hit of a skill but cannot count as an extra hit.

Warmaster

• It provides 60% of getting bonus damage when attacking.
• Bonus damage is equal to 10% of the target’s max HP, or 4% of the Boss’s Max HP.
• The bonus damage occurs on each hit of a skill but cannot count as an extra hit.

Let’s do some math!

The easy Clan Boss has 30M HP. 2% of its max HP is 150k damage. However, Clan Boss passive Infernal Resilience decreases the damage based on its max HP, 75k, like Giant Slayer and Warmaster.

Depending on the boss debuffs, Giant Slayer can normally do 50-70k damage when occurs. Do note that the chance to activate it is based on hit. So, Champions who have multiple hits like Athel can have up to 30% chance of triggering the Giant Slayer, dealing extra 150-210k damage in total each turn.

Without Warmaster or Giant Slayer, it is extremely hard to get to beyond 5M damage mark. Normal teams even cannot get beyond 3M damage.

They can easily increase your damage by up to 500%+

Get these masteries in order to get a chest from top tier Clan Boss.

Warmaster and Giant Slayer are also effective at high levels Dungeon bosses since they also have loads of HP.

These 2 masteries cannot crit but you can increase the damage further with Weaken and Defense Down debuffs on the enemies.

Warmaster and Giant Slayer also work with life steal, meaning that when they occur, your Champions will be given 17-18k HP instantly. Technically your Champion can stay alive until the Boss gains enough damage to one-shot you.

In short, Warmaster and Giant Slayer play a huge impact on the meta-game. The Clan Boss is the best way to get top gears at the moment, and they are excellent at this.

Which one is better?

People usually think that Warmaster can do as twice damage as the Giant Slayer. This is only true outside of the Clan Boss. The Clan Boss can reduce both base damage to 75k.

Giant Slayer is better for Champions who can do multiple hits with the primary attack.

Warmaster is better for 1-hit Champions.

Conclusion

Hopefully you have found this RAID: Shadow Legends Masteries Guide helpful.

Please comment If you have any question want to ask us!