Laevatain

Laevatain is a 6-star character in Arknights: Endfield (AKE). Laevatain wields a Sword and belongs to the Striker class. Laevatain also has access to the Heat element. This guide provides a comprehensive overview of Laevatain's best build, including recommended Weapons, Gear pieces, Stats, and the strongest team compositions and rotations that maximize their potential.

Main Field: Ultimate = Battle Skill > Basic Attack > Combo Skill

In this section we're showing the team setup used for the above calculations as well as the damage split for Laevatain based on where it comes from. The setup isn't always best in slot for each character and also please keep in mind that with different team members, Weapons, and Gear, the calculations will change.

Kit Intro

Laevatain is a limited 6-star, Heat, Sword, Hyper Carry, which requires team building around her in order to maximize her potential. Laevatain’s Ultimate is at the core of her kit and, on use, allows her to enhance her Basic Attacks and Battle Skill to deal more damage in a huge AoE for 15 seconds. This window is when most of her and her team's damage occurs. What balances this Ultimate is its incredibly high cost, which is 3–4 times as high as that of other characters. 

Generating so much energy naturally isn’t easy, but Laevatain’s Talent and Battle Skills solve this. When Basic Attacking, Laevatain converts Heat Infliction on all enemies into a special stacking resource. Upon reaching 4 stacks, she can enhance her Battle Skill to deal more damage and generate absurd amounts of energy. Because of this, Laevatain’s teams and playstyle focus on building and consuming Heat Infliction to enter Ultimate and maximizing damage during its duration.

Talents

Despite being an Ultimate-focused operator, Laevatain would never get to use her Ultimate if it weren’t for her Talents. Lae’s most important talent is Scorching Heart, which causes the controlled operator’s Final Strikes/Finishers to absorb Heat Infliction from nearby enemies, converting them into a stackable buff for Laevatain called Melting Flame. Melting Flame stacks up to 4 times and is both a buff that Amplifies Lae’s damage and a resource for her Battle Skill. Each stack of Melting Flame lasts 20 seconds and causes Laevatain to ignore a percentage of enemies' Heat resistance while active.

Note: Laevatain also absorbs Heat Infliction from enemies that are defeated, avoiding wastage.

Laevatain’s other talent is Re-Ignition, which grants her a massive Protection buff and heal over time for a short period after she drops below 40% HP, acting as a sort of cheat death. This talent has a long cooldown, but it will definitely save you at least once from death or a close call per encounter.

Battle Skill

Laevatain’s Battle Skill is the main way she generates enough energy to fuel her absurd Ultimate cost. Her skill comes in two different forms: a standard version and an enhanced version. The standard version deals underwhelming damage, generates very little energy, but does grant Lae a stack of Melting Flame. The enhanced version consumes 4 Melting Flame, deals far more damage, and generates a whopping 100 additional energy while also forcibly applying [Combustion] for 5 seconds, immediately enabling her Combo Skill trigger.

The Standard version is rarely worth using over other characters' Battle Skills, which apply Heat Infliction, as those can trigger other characters’ combos and enable other synergies, all while still getting the same Melting Flame stack. The enhanced version, on the other hand, is the backbone of Lae’s energy generation and should be the focus of your entire team composition, as reaching it more quickly means faster Ultimate access.

Last but not least, Lae’s enhanced Battle Skill also becomes further enhanced when using it during her Ultimate, something which may seem wasteful as Laevatain cannot generate energy during her Ultimate, but is actually fine to do. The reason is that even against a single target, Laevatain and her team can usually generate enough Melting Flame to reach 4 stacks twice during an Ultimate as long as there aren’t any interruptions. As her Ultimate makes it so that only heavy-hitting enemy attacks can stagger her, this isn’t too difficult to achieve. 

When cast during her Ultimate, it also has the added benefit of pausing its timer, meaning that it does not lead to Lae getting fewer enhanced Basic Attacks as a result. How many enhanced Battle Skills are used during Ultimate often boils down to the team rotation and whether or not Lae can be at or near 4 stacks by the end of it, so as to allow her to build energy back up quickly to cycle back up to another Ultimate quickly.

Note: In multi-target scenarios, you can easily apply and absorb Heat Infliction from many enemies at once, allowing for far more Melting Flame stacks and the possibilities of many more enhanced Battle Skills.

Combo

Laevatain’s combo is incredibly important to use whenever available. The reason is that it generates a Melting Flame stack and Grants 25–35 Ultimate Energy on use, both of which are pivotal in accessing her Ultimate in a timely manner. To trigger her combo, the team must inflict Combustion or Corrosion on an enemy, something Laevatain can achieve herself with her Enhanced Battle Skill, but which definitely isn’t reliable or frequent enough to match its short 9-second cooldown.

To get around this, Lae requires the help of her team, so you’ll either need to pair her with allies that force Corrosion/Combustion or trigger it naturally through Arts Reactions, typically at the cost of some Heat Infliction. This may sound like a negative, but is always worth it thanks to the high energy generation of this skill. Like with her Battle Skill, Lae’s Combo Skill will pause the Ultimate timer, meaning that it can be used freely during it.

Ultimate

Laevatain’s Ultimate, Twilight, is the heart of her kit. It costs 300 energy, and on use causes her to become the controlled operator (if she isn’t already) while also enhancing her Basic Attacks and Battle Skill for the next 15 seconds. During these 15 seconds, Laevatain’s basic attacks will be converted into a 4-part combo which becomes huge sweeping AoE attacks, deal substantially more Heat damage, and deal a Heat Infliction on the 3rd hit of each sequence. Assuming no interruptions, Lae can use 4 full enhanced basic sequences all back to back, yielding 4 potential Heat Inflictions! 

It’s important to be aware of how the 15-second timer functions, as getting as many attacks in during that period is critical. Skills that will briefly slow down or stop time (like Combo Skill activations, Perfect Dodge effects, and other Operators’ Ultimate cutscenes) will also slow or stop the Ultimate timer. As previously mentioned, Lae’s enhanced Battle Skill and Combo Skill will also pause this while they cast, making them great options to weave in between strings.

Even still, it’s worth trying to minimize unnecessary movement in order to fit as many basic attack sequences in as possible while in the Ultimate state.

**Note: **Laevatain cannot gain any energy while her Ultimate state is active. Also Laevatain cannot use Finishers on Staggered enemies while her Ultimate state is active, make sure to time its usage around this fact.

Gameplay

Laevatain’s gameplay is incredibly simple:

• Keep her combo on cooldown as often as you possibly can by taking advantage of her Battle Skill and spacing it out with allies’ abilities that can forcefully inflict Combust/Corrosion, or by triggering natural Combustion/Corrosion Arts Reactions.
• Generate as many Heat Inflictions as possible, then absorb them with Laevatain’s Basic Attacks to accumulate Melting Flame.
• Once at 4 Melting Flame, use enhanced Battle Skill to generate energy. Depending on the level of Ultimate energy gain, you’ll often have enough to use Ultimate after 2 casts.
• Align ally buffs and use Laevatain’s Ultimate at a period in the fight you expect to be able to deal damage uninterrupted.
• During Ult, don’t forget to spend SP on either keeping buffs active or to stack additional Heat Infliction to allow Laevatain to use mid-Ultimate enhanced Battle Skills. Be mindful to balance out in-Ultimate damage with having enough Melting Flame stacks to use a Battle Skill after it in order to re-enter the Ultimate state faster.

Depending on the team you’re playing, there will be even more optimizations. To learn more, check out our teams and synergies section.

Optimizations

Although Laevatain can only get 4 full enhanced Basic Attack sequences with her Ultimate, by Dodge cancelling out of her Basic 2 after the first hit, as well as after her Final Strike, it can be possible to fit in 5 full enhanced Basic Attack sequences instead. But be careful, as cancelling the Final Strike too quickly may result in it not absorbing Heat Infliction stacks!

Energy

Laevatain’s Ultimate Energy regen is critical to playing her effectively, so understanding how much you need in certain scenarios is incredibly important when considering what Gear Sets to use on her, specifically whether or not you can give up Ultimate Gain % for more damage and if that trade-off is worth it. The challenging thing about her energy though, is that it changes based on the amount of enemies you’re up against, the amount of Battle Skills your team uses and the amount of Combos per Ultimate you’re aiming for. Against single enemies, Laevatain generates less energy and may want some Ultimate Gain if your goal is the fastest possible Ults. Against multiple enemies though, she gains bonus energy and is less likely to need it unless you’re trying for large breakpoints that involve skipping Combos or Battle Skills.

Below is a collection of tables showing how much energy Lae gains at 0 Ultimate Gain % plus various other breakpoints, in order to show when energy may and may not be needed.

**Note: **Using additional or fewer team Battle Skills will grant more or less energy, potentially fixing or compromising certain rotations.

The charts below assume aiming for the minimal possible actions to highlight the cases when energy makes a difference. 

In practice, meeting such breakpoints may not always be an obvious improvement, as SP Recovery can be a limiting factor. It's important to balance out Laevatain’s Ultimate use with the application of teammate buffs/debuffs, which can slow down rotations. Players are recommended to evaluate whether meeting a breakpoint would meaningfully condense the rotation for a given team (e.g. if getting Ultimate in only 2 Combo Skills instead of 3 is a benefit).

Laevatain 1 Target Energy Breakpoints

Ability

Uses

Base Energy

Enhanced Battle

2

213

Combo Skill

2

50

Team Battle Skill

4

26

Total

289

Total (12.3% UG)

324.5

At 2 targets, a new breakpoint opens up for the energy build, which may be useful, as you no longer need 2 Combo Skills and can get away with 1 instead. In many cases, two Combos may still be used regardless, but there is a potential for optimization present.

Laevatain 2 Target Energy Breakpoints

Ability

Uses

Base Energy

Enhanced Battle

2

213

Combo Skill

2

60

Team Battle Skill

4

26

Total

299

Total (12.3% UG)

335.7

Laevatain 3 Target Energy Breakpoints

Ability

Uses

Base Energy

Enhanced Battle

2

213

Combo Skill

2

70

Team Battle Skill

4

26

Total

309

Total (12.3% UG)

347