Last Epoch joins the dodge-roll ARPG club with Harbingers of Ruin

A dodge-roll maneuver is in vogue for up-and-coming ARPGs, and Last Epoch is buying into the trend too. A middle-ground between Diablo 4 and Path of Exile, Last Epoch came out earlier this year as one of the top contenders of the genre. It will have its first seasonal Cycle patch out next week, and a dodge-roll is among one of the highlighted features.

A stat-based "Dodge" mechanic was already present in Last Epoch, so the developers are opting to call it an "Evade." But how will Evade work in this game, and is it the same as Path of Exile 2? Read on to find out.

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Dodge-rolls are the latest ARPG trend, and Last Epoch is not missing out

Evade will be more active late game as the recovery time decreases (Image via Eleventh Hour Games)

Dodge rolls are a definitive staple in the Souls-like genre, and their entire combat blueprint tends to be based on making good use of it. Traditionally, ARPGs have espoused more of a stat-based static approach in legacy titles like Diablo (up till Diablo 4) or Grim Dawn.

In the ARPGs of old, you trade hits, chug potions, and cast barrier abilities where necessary. When that won't cut it, simply mouse-click to manually pathfind your way around enemy projectiles and boss death rays.

It would be wrong to say these games were completely feet-in-the-mud. Gap-closers were still a thing in Diablo 2 (released in 2000); the Barbarian's Leap and the Assassin's Dragon Flight are good examples.

The latest generation of ARPGs, however, wants to take these instantaneous maneuver skills and standardize them into a class-agnostic manual evade move. Path of Exile has a lot of these mobility skills you can spec into, but Path of Exile 2 is bringing a proper dodge move you get from Level 1.

Path of Exile 2 will be balanced around this dance of dodges and telegraphed enemy attacks from the ground up, though. Last Epoch wasn't, so it has a more band-aid approach to dodge rolls. Evade in Last Epoch does not give you i-frames, and you can't just phase through enemy attacks Dark Souls-style.

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How does Evade work in Last Epoch?

Evade will be an innate mobility skill you can use on any class from the start of the game. Evade has two charges, and each charge has a recovery period to disincentivize spamming. However, as you level up, the recovery time decreases, which means it will have much better uptime late game.

Evade will add some more mobility options at your disposal, but it's far less reliable than dodging in No Rest For The Wicked. This is because the developers didn't want this move to be a freeget-out-of-jail card in every situation. If you want that, many of Last Epoch's masteries still have more specialized mobility skills you can put to use.

Evade will be available in Last Epoch on July 9, 2024, with the release of Harbingers of Ruin (patch 1.1). You can check out the Last Epoch Cycle roadmap to learn more.