BORDERLANDS 3 AMARA Build

LEVEL 1 TO 72 MAYHEM 11

The Ultimate BUILD Guide

NVHM: Level 1 to 34
Skills
Progression route
Gears
Tips
MAYHEM: Level 35 to 72
Skills
Progression route
Gears
Tips
MORE AMARA BUILDS

This Borderlands 3 Amara build guide will help you get through Amara’s full progression from level 1 to 72, as well as how you can reach the highest Mayhem tier. You’ll also be provided with clear explanations on your skill choices, gear, and progression path.

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Normal Vault Hunter Mode – Level 1 to 34

Normal Vault Hunter Mode (NVHM) is the default game mode in Borderlands 3, and this is where you complete the main story for the first time. Upon completing it, you’ll unlock Mayhem mode, which allows you to increase the difficulty and add deadly modifiers to the game in exchange for better experience and loot.

I highly recommend ignoring True Vault Hunter Mode (TVHM) after your first campaign completion. For the most part, Mayhem is the true endgame and the only one that matters for power scaling. It’s the only way to get the best gear in the game, unless you really need specific quest rewards.

Recommended Skills

Action Skill: Ties that Bind (Once it’s unlocked)

Augment: Allure

Element: Shockra

Level 3-7: 5 Points on Infusion
Converts some of your gun damage into your attuned element.

Level 8-10: 3 Points on Steady Hand(s)
Increase your accuracy and weapon handling.

Level 11-15: 5 Points on Tempest
Amara deals increased elemental damage. Shock damage gets an additional bonus.

Level 16: 1 Point on Dread
Grasping enemies will give you a stack of bonus gun damage. Killing grasped enemies will refill your magazine.

Level 17: 1 Point on Wildfire
Status effects have a small chance to spread to nearby enemies.

Level 18: 1 Point on Deep Well
Increase your mag size with elemental weapons.

Level 19-21: 3 Points on Indiscriminate
Your bullets can now ricochet off enemies. Enemies affected by Phasegrasp have a higher chance of ricocheting.

Level 22: 1 Point on Catharsis
Killing enemies affected by your status effects will explode, dealing damage based on your attuned element.

Level 23-27: 5 Points on Conflux
Inflicting status effects has a chance of applying an extra fire, shock, or corrosive status to the target.

Level 28: 1 Point on Forceful Expression
Your gun, grenade, and shield damage now deals bonus damage based on your attuned element. Indiscriminate now deals more damage.

Level 29: 1 Point on Sustainment
Direct elemental damage now heals you.

Level 30-32: 1 Point on Fast Hand(s)
Gain increased reload speed, weapon swap speed, and mode switch speed.

Level 33: 1 Point on Violent Tapestry
Applying status effects gives you a stack of Rush. Activating your action skill will consume all stacks, granting bonus status effect chance.

Level 34: 1 Point on Do Harm
Killing enemies grants a stack of Rush.

Progression route

Goal: Throughout NVHM, you should focus on finishing the main campaign. Only do the side quests for experience if you’re really struggling with the enemies you’re encountering, as some of them might be over your level. The game is incredibly generous with legendary gear, so you’ll have an easy time finding decent weapons that work well with your element-based skills.

Here’s how your leveling path will look like::

Level 1 to 30: Doing the main questline

Compared to the others, Amara might feel a bit slower early on. Focus on using elemental weapons, especially ones that deal shock damage, to ramp up faster.
Swap your action skill to Ties that Bind once you get the necessary level to do so. It’ll help with your mobbing, as it makes Phasegrasp link and deal damage to nearby enemies.
The build we’re using is gun-based, which means we’ll be relying a lot on our weapons’ DPS. Because of this, make sure to update your gear every now and then. No point holding on to older weapons at this point of the playthrough.

Level 30 to 34: Starting the DLCs

The main story should be done by around the level 30 range, and this should unlock Mayhem mode. If you want, you can try to play in the lowest tiers to get a feel for the mode, but that’s not a priority at this level.
Start playing through the DLCs in release order. Moxxi’s Heist of the Handsome Jackpot is the perfect starting point for these because of the powerleveling method that will be described later in the guide.

Best gears

Slot 1: Crit
Slot 2: Any good Maliwan weapon with other elements
Shield: Re-Volter
Grenade: Any good grenade
Class Mod: Phasezerker
Artifact: Anything that increases your DPS or fire rate + magazine size

Gear is hardly an issue in NVHM due to how fast you’ll outlevel your current items at any given time. One thing you can easily update throughout the whole early game is Crit, as you just need to tip Moxxi repeatedly until she gives you one.

Crit works especially well with our main story setup due to it being a shock weapon, which synergizes with skills like Tempest and Deep Well. Paired with Re-Volter, you can proc its effect and deal even more shock damage. Keep a backup with different elements for enemies that are resistant to shock.

Tips for NVHM

Don’t spend too much time farming specific items. If items like the Re-Volter doesn’t drop after a few tries, just continue with the story. You can get better gear later on.
Crazy Earl can sell the base game’s quest rewards, but not the DLC ones.

MAYHEM MODE – Level 35 to 72

When you first finish the main questline, Mayhem mode will be unlocked for all current and future characters. This difficulty modifier will grant you much better EXP and drop rates in exchange for tougher enemies and various other debuffs. There are up to 11 tiers, though the only difference between 10 and 11 is that the latter has no extra modifiers.

Recommended Skills

Action Skill: Ties that Bind (Once it’s unlocked)

Augment: Soul Sap

Element: Blight Tiger

Level 35-39: 5 Points on Restless
Increases your skill cooldown rate.

Level 40-42: 3 Points on Transcend
Activating your action skill will grant a stack of bonus critical damage and accuracy.

Level 43-44: 2 Points on Alacrity
Increases your reload speed for each Rush stack.

Level 45-47: 3 Points on Wrath
Gain increased gun damage. Activating your action skill briefly doubles this bonus.

Level 48-50: 3 Points on Laid Bare
Dealing skill damage with your action skill will cause your target to take bonus damage from all sources for a few seconds.

Level 51-53: 3 Points on From Rest
Increase your fire rate and charge speed.

Level 54: 1 Point on Remnant
Killing enemies with guns or action skills create a homing orb that will explode on impact.

Level 55: 1 Point on Avatar
You can activate your action skill once while it’s on cooldown. Killing enemies with skill damage will refund half of your Rush stacks that were consumed.

Level 56-58: 3 Points on Personal Space
Deal bonus gun damage the closer you are to the target.

Level 59-60: 2 Points on Clarity
Gain passive health regeneration. Activating your action skill will temporarily increase this bonus.

Level 61-65: 5 Points on Arms Deal
Gain bonus area damage and area damage resistance.

Level 66-67: 2 Points on Vigor
Killing enemies will grant you a stack of temporary bonus movement speed. There is no stack limit.

Level 68-72: 5 Points on Heavy Rain
Gain bonus area damage and projectile speed.

Progression route

Goal: With Mayhem unlocked, you just continue through all of the DLCs until you are max level while periodically increasing the mode’s level whenever you feel comfortable doing so. Since all of the gear is scaled to the current Mayhem tier, you’re technically going to be undergeared every time you raise it.

To save you a bit of time, you can briefly skip straight to Mayhem 10 or 11 to get some overpowered gear before dropping it back down to a comfortable level where you don’t die often:

Get Mayhem 10/11 scaled gear by checking vending machines and using your golden keys.
Tip Moxxi for a new Crit scaled for Mayhem 10/11.
Use the Eridian Fabricator that you get from the main story while at Mayhem 10/11 to spawn a set of starting gear to use. This only costs 10 Eridium per use.

Even if you find a terrible gun at Mayhem 10, it will still destroy pretty much anything in lower tiers. By progressing through the Moxxi’s Heist of the Handsome Jackpot DLC first, you should have access to the Scraptrap Nest by the time your EXP gain from quests slows down a bit.

The Scraptrap Nest is a powerleveling spot that works well with the highest Mayhem tier you can comfortably play in. By clearing the area and ignoring the boss, you can leave and then re-enter the arena to restart the fight for faster EXP gains and even legendary drops. This makes updating your gear easier until it’s time to min-max your loadout.

Best gears

Slot 1: Rowan’s Call
Slot 2: Free Radical
Slot 3: Hellwalker
Slot 4: Kaoson
Shield: Re-Volter
Grenade: It’s Piss
Class Mod: Phasezerker
Artifact: The Pearl of Ineffable Knowledge

This loadout focuses a lot on gun damage and stacking up Rush. Combined with Avatar, you can repeatedly gain max Rush stacks, which further increases your damage output. The Pearl of Ineffable Knowledge takes our ramping damage up to even higher peaks, especially when paired with the Re-Volter’s effect.

Tempest synergizes well with our varying elemental weapons, especially when Re-Volter activates. It’s Piss is the “best” option for most cases as it amplifies all of the damage received by affected targets, especially if it has the Action Skill End anointment that briefly gives your weapons bonus elemental damage.

The weapons in the loadout above are merely suggestions, as alternatives like the Torrent, Sand Hawk, and even the humble Crit work well with this build. As long as they’re elemental, they’ll very likely perform well.

Tips for MAYHEM

Gear scaled for Mayhem 10 is usable on lower Mayhem levels. Getting a weak Mayhem 10 gun before dropping the difficulty lets you grind faster.
You can reroll anointments at Crazy Earl’s Reroll Machine for 250 Eridium per try.
The Eridian Fabricator scales with the current Mayhem level. You do not need to reacquire it.
If you’ve already completed the campaign, you can skip straight to the Mayhem grind with a new character.