Choosing which of the four new Vault Hunters to play as in Borderlands 3 is just the first of many choices affecting how one can play the game. Series veterans know this already, but newcomers are going to be faced with a slew of ways to customize a character as they level up. With all of that, a helpful guide might be handy for figuring out how to make the most of it, especially for those who decide to play as the beefy Siren Amara.
Each of BL3’s Vault Hunters comes with three skill trees through which players can unlock dozens of Action Skills, Skill Augmentations, and Passive buffs over time. It’s even possible to equip upgrades across multiple skill trees, and players have taken advantage of this to devise a number of unique character builds designed to fully utilize Amara’s mix of physical might and Siren powers. Here are some of the builds Borderlands 3 players have come up with so far:
FOR SOLO PLAYERS
This build takes advantage of upgrades across all three of Amara’s skill trees, though it borrows most from the “Mystical Assault” tree. As such, players have the option to swap between multiple Action Skill Elements that change the elemental properties of damage dealt depending on the needs of any given situation. This ensures players should always be capable of damaging enemies in the way that hurts them most.
Rounding out this build are a few choice upgrades revolving around Amara’s “Deliverance” Action Skill, which sends an astral projection forward to damage enemies. The Skill Effect “Allure” causes an equipped Skill to create a singularity that pulls enemies close together. Combined with the Passive abilities “Avatar,” which allows for two uses of the Skill per cooldown, and “Laid Bare,” which briefly increases all damage to enemies hit by the Skill, players can be a force to reckon with even when going it alone.
FOR CLOSE-RANGE FIGHTERS
Here’s a build that makes solid use of the “Brawl” skill tree to enhance Amara’s melee capabilities. A lot of the upgrades in this tree embrace a more up-close and personal gameplay style, boosting things like max health, health regeneration, and, of course, melee damage, so players can run in and run out of battle without dying instantly.
Players need to max out the Brawl tree to take full advantage of this setup with late-game Passives. “Jab cross” increases Action Skill damage following a melee attack, while “Blitz” replaces Amara’s standard melee attack with a short-range dash attack that causes elemental damage (plus it resets the cooldown when it lands a kill). Buffing things further are a few choice upgrades from the “Fist of the Elements” tree, which lend extra melee damage as well as an elemental damage boost for Blitz.
FOR SNIPERS
Pulling heavily from the Fist of the Elements and Mystical Assault trees, this build emphasizes upgrades designed to improve weapon handling and make enemies easier to hit from a distance. Starting with the early-game accuracy-boosting “Steady Hands” Passive, players can later unlock “Indiscriminate,” an upgrade that gives shots a chance to ricochet and damage nearby enemies.
Another key component of the build is the Action Skill “Phasegrasp,” which creates a giant ethereal hand that briefly traps an enemy in place. Other abilities play off this, like the “Dread” Passive which increases gun damage after an enemy is caught and instantly reloads the gun after taking them out. Then there’s the “Stillness of Mind” Skill Effect which momentarily phaselocks any enemies near the one caught with Phasegrasp, freezing them all in place for easy sniping.
Of course, while these may be solid builds for many, BL3 has only been out for two days, so odds are players will figure out even better builds for Amara and the other Vault Hunters in the coming weeks or months. With all of the customization options for them to experiment with throughout Borderlands 3's campaign, who knows what the optimal Amara build is going to look like.
Borderlands 3 is out now for PC, PS4, and Xbox One.