The First Descendant: Esiemo Build & Best Loadout – Season 3 E2

Welcome to The First Descendant Esiemo Build Guide for Season 3 Episode 2 Assemble.

In this guide, we will explain how to create a powerful build for the Esiemo Descendant. We’ll cover how the skills work and which weapons, stats and modules you need to create the most powerful build for Esiemo.

Table of Contents:

1. How to play Esiemo
2. Esiemo Builds Overview – Modules
   1. Esiemo Mobbing Build
3. Trigger & Ancestor Modules
4. Arche Tuning for Esiemo
5. Esiemo Equipment Overview
   1. Best Weapons for Esiemo
   2. Best Reactor for Esiemo
   3. Best External Components for Esiemo
   4. Inversion Reinforcements
   5. Esiemo Trigger Modules
6. Esiemo Basics
   1. How to unlock Esiemo
   2. Skills Explanation – Master Esiemo’s Abilities
   3. Module Basics Explained!
   4. Best Grapple Hook for Esiemo
7. Esiemo’s Story

For builds on other Descendants, visit our The First Descendant Builds Database, or check out the Character Tier List or the Weapon Tier List. 

TFD Wiki: We have expanded Alcasthq with tfd.alcasthq.com, a Wiki & Database for anything related to The First Descendant. Use the Character Editor or the Weapon Editor to theorycraft and create builds yourself. Browse Descendants, Weapons, Leaderboard Loadouts or use the Compare Tool. There are plenty of other features you can check out, too!

Here is a quick list of the strengths and weaknesses of the Esiemo Build for The First Descendant.

How to Play Esiemo in the First Descendant

Esiemo is most commonly played as a mobbing character because of all his AOE damage. While you can play him as a bossing setup to fight against Colossus, there are just better Descendants out there that do that. Therefore, I recommend playing Esiemo as a Mobbing Build.

Our mobbing build focuses on our ultimate, where we repeatedly blow everything up around us!

Esiemo’s Equipment: Make Or Break It!

To unlock Esiemo’s full potential, you need the right Weapons, Reactors, and External Components:

• Weapons: Esiemo is a skill-based Descendant, therefore weapons aren’t that important. However, there are certain weapons that we can use as a “stat stick” to enhance Esiemo’s power and mobility even further. Please view the Best Weapons for Esiemo section of the build.
• Reactors: Selecting the right reactor can drastically boost your damage. Check out the Best Reactors for Esiemo section.
• External Components: These are critical for survivability. Properly configured, they double or triple your HP and DEF. Learn more in the Best External Components for Esiemo section.

Building a top-tier The First Descendant Esiemo Build requires not only the right modules but also optimized weapons, reactors, and components.

Best Esiemo Builds Overview for The First Descendant

All Esiemo build setups require an Energy Activator to increase the Module Capacity. We also have an in-depth guide on how to farm Energy Activators in The First Descendant. Additionally, you will need plenty of Kuiper Shards and Gold to increase Module Levels. Here are the Top 3 Kuiper Shard farm spots!

Equipment: I will cover Weapons, Reactors, and External Components in the Esiemo Equipment section. To maximize the power of any build, you must get the correct items!

• How to get Modules: Read the Module Farming section.
• 85 Module Capacity How? Read the basics Module section.

Esiemo Mobbing Build

• Mobbing Build Type: 100%-400% Dungeons, Void Vessel, Disrupt Invasions, farming, anything with hard difficulty.
• Mobbing Build Focus: Optimized for speed, high damage, max range, and good survivability.

The purpose of this Esiemo Mobbing Build for The First Descendant is to clear dungeon content like 100%-400% dungeons, Void Vessel or Invasions on hard difficulty.

Trigger and Ancestor Modules for the Esiemo Build

Trigger and Ancestor Modules are also part of the module category, but they are a special type of module that are harder to unlock and acquire.

• Trigger Modules: Go into a special slot. Unlock special buffs and unique effects.
• Ancestor Modules: Go into a normal module slot. Enhance the build by adding additional stats.

Esiemo Trigger Modules

You need to first unlock the trigger module slot for each character. Learn how to unlock Trigger Modules in The First Descendant.

For our The First Descendant Esiemo Build, you always want to use the Power Beyond trigger module. This gives us a flat 15% Skill Power Increase to all our damage, which is very powerful.

• Trigger Module: Power Beyond

Esiemo Ancestor Module

Ancestor Modules can be slotted once you have acquired them. However, they are only worth it once you have an Ancestor module with good stat rolls on them.

Esiemo Ancestor Module: Explosive Master’s Resolution

It is only worth slotting an Ancestor Module if you have good rolls on it; otherwise, it isn’t worth it.

• Ideal Positive Rolls
  • Fire
  • Tech or Fusion
  • Range
• Ideal Negative Rolls
  • Max Shield
  • DEF

Arche Tuning for Esiemo

The Arche Tuning System in The First Descendant is important for every Character; it buffs your stats by a good amount. For The First Descendant Esiemo, we are focusing on the right and upper right section.

You level up Arche Tuning in the Sigma Sector Dropoff Operation. Mutant Cells also drop there with a small chance.

• Mutant Cell:
  • Mobbing: Fire Cohesion

Esiemo Equipment Overview in The First Descendant

Equipment is the cornerstone of any successful The First Descendant Build. For Esiemo, having the right setup can mean the difference between dominating a dungeon and falling short. This section breaks down the essential equipment types—Weapons, Reactors, and External Components—and explains how they maximize his power.

Esiemo Equipment Guide

Equipment Type	Importance	Key Benefits
Weapons	Not very important because Esiemo is a skill-based Descendant. Used as a “stat stick” to get Sprint Speed and Grapple Hook Recharge or other weapon effect buffs!	Increases overall DPS. Amplifies the effectiveness of skills.
Reactors	Essential for boosting skill damage. Incorrect reactors severely reduce effectiveness.	Enhances skill potency. Ensures Esiemo’s abilities perform at peak levels.
External Components	Arguably the most impactful equipment. Dramatically improves survivability and utility. Set Buffs with 2/4 pieces.	Quadruples stats like HP or DEF. Adds utility like MP recovery. Enables effective performance in high-difficulty content. Core System Enhancements.
Inversion Reinforcements	Adds further buffs to your build.	Perks that can make a difference in build power.

Best Weapon for the Esiemo Build in The First Descendant

Generally, you can use whatever you want for this build. Because we only focus on our fourth skill to blow stuff up, you don’t really need the Secret Garden weapon. However, if you use other skills too then Secret Garden is till nice to have because it buffs tech skills and has good movement buffs on top of that.

Top 2 Skill-based Stat Sticks for Esiemo

Depending on which setup you run, you want to either have Blue Beetle or Secret Garden equipped.

Top Weapons for Esiemo

Weapon	Category	Key Features	Why It’s Great for Esiemo
Secret Garden	Tactical Rifle	Tech Skills activate Pest Control Effect (+Firearm ATK, + Skill ATK) of Secret Garden. Boosts the damage of your tech skills tremendously!	Synegizes perfectly with Esiemo’s Tech skills. Sprint Speed core for faster movement.
Albion Cavalry Gun	Machine Gun	Insane AoE & ST damage. Stuns enemies.	Insane AoE damage and stuns nearby enemies. Fast Fire Rate Overall High DPS Weapon
Malevolent	Hand Cannon	Max AoE Damage	One of the most powerful AoE weapons.

Other Useful Weapons

Other Useful Weapon Options for Esiemo

Weapon	Category	Key Features	Why It’s Great for Esiemo
Voltia	Beam Rifle	Instantly destroys Anti-Void Shields and Arch Barriers. Electrocutes nearby enemies.	Best weapon to instantly destroy Anti-Void Shields and Arche Barriers, nothing even comes close to it. A must-have in your group if you are doing Void Vessel Operation runs!
Thunder Cage	Submachine Gun	Everyone has this weapon from the main story (easily accessible) “Newbies Best Friend” Electric Shockwaves	While this isn’t the best weapon out there, it is easily accessible. Deals great AoE damage.

Best Reactor for Esiemo in The First Descendant

Selecting the best reactor for Esiemo in The First Descendant can significantly enhance his abilities, allowing you to maximize his effectiveness in various scenarios. Not only does the reactor determine your skill damage, but it also gives additional secondary benefits through modifiers. These are often hard to get and take time to grind out!

It is hard to get a Reactor with two best in-slot specs. However, you should be able to get a Reactor with at least one good spec. I will highlight the more important spec in bold in the table below.

How to find the Location of Reactors

Reactor drop locations change every day. Not many players are aware of this and become confused. Now, there is a reactor search function in-game. Go to the map and press on Difficulty Level Rewards. In here, you can see where all the reactors currently drop.

Note: It is possible that not all reactor types are currently dropping. You have to come back and recheck every day.

If your specified reactor drops in an area, you go there and farm any missions and monsters (Preferably missions with lots of monster spawns). There will be plenty of reactors dropping from monsters all over the place, any monster works. It will take a while to get a good reactor!

Best External Components for the Esiemo Build

I will show you two good options. The first option is 2x Hunter and 2x Ascending to get extra cooldown and cost reduction, also you will have a lot of HP because you get 3x HP based and 1x DEF based component base stats. The second option is 4x Slayer set. This will drastically reduce your HP (if you are too squishy, add a HP module), but increase your damage the most and also give you unlimited MP because of the sets effect.

Additionally, External Components now also have core slots; it is recommended to slot Max HP and DEF cores.

2x Hunter Set and 2x Ascending Armory External Components Setup

This is the safest setup because it allows us to stack three HP-based and one DEF-based components and still get good bonuses out of it. This also allows us to not use a HP Module in our setup, freeing up a slot for other mods.

• 2 Hunter Set:
  • Skill Cooldown -4%.
• 2 Ascending Armory Set:
  • Skill Cost -6.5%

Esiemo Build Hunter and Ascending Armory External Components Setup 

External Component Part	Base Stats	Selective Best Stats	Cores
Ascending Armory Auxiliary Power	Max HP	Max HP MP Recovery Out of Combat	Max HP DEF
Hunter Sensor	DEF	Max MP MP Recovery in Combat	Max HP DEF
Ascending Armory Memory	Max HP	MP Recovery Modifier DEF	Max HP DEF
Hunter Processor	Max HP	Max Shield Shield Recovery Modifier	Max HP DEF

Inversion Reinforcements Setup for Esiemo

You can find the Inversion Reinforcements in the inventory, located on the bottom left side. This changes with every new season and needs to be leveled up again. You level up Inversion Reinforcements by doing any activity. However, the fastest way to advance it is by completing Disrupt Invasion (max 4 daily) in the dungeon terminal with the red dungeons.

At max level, you have unlocked everything. While the last perk is always active in each row, you can only slot three additional perks at the bottom. Here is what you want to prioritize:

• Hunt: Arche Circulation Tactic.
• Attribute: None.
• Recovery: Selective Neurostimulation.
• Survival: Deploy Hardened Shell.
• Season: None.

Esiemo Basics in The First Descendant

If it is your first time playing Esiemo in The First Descendant, here are some useful things you should know.

1. How to unlock Esiemo
2. Skills Explanation – Master Esiemo’s Abilities
3. Module Basics Explained!
4. Best Grapple Hook for Esiemo

Let’s look at how to unlock Esiemo in the First Descendant. To unlock Esiemo, you have to purchase him from the store, or research him. You need the following items to research Esiemo:

• 1x Esiemo Enhanced Cells
  • 292x Flectorite
  • 462x Shape Memory Alloy
  • 76x Deformed Biometal
  • 1x Esiemo Enhanced Cells Blueprint
• 1x Esiemo Stabilizer
  • 408x Ceramic Composite
  • 455x Reverse Charging Coil
  • 26x Organic Biogel
  • 1x Esiemo Stabilizer Blueprint
• 1x Esiemo Spiral Catalyst
  • 290x Semi-permanent Plasma
  • 363 Nanopolymers
  • 46x Specialized Biometal
  • 1x Esiemo Spiral Catalyst Blueprint
• 1x Esiemo Code
  • Location 1: Vespers Hard – Abyssal Void Fusion Reactor – Vepsers Moonlight Lake
  • Location 2: Kingston Hard – Abyssal Void Fusion Reactor – Kingston Grand Square
  • Location 3: Agna Desert Hard – Abyssal Void Fusion Reactor – Agna Desert The Storage
  • Location 4: Hagios Hard – Abyssal Void Fusion Reactor – Hagios Corrupted Zone
• 400k Credits

When you visit Magisters Anais at the Research Institute you can hover over each item. Then click on Acquisition Info and it will tell you where this specific item drops. You can view an in-depth guide here on How to unlock Esiemo in The First Descendant.

The First Descendant Esiemo Skills Explained

In this section, we are going to explain the skills available to our Esiemo Build in the First Descendant, how each skill works and the best ways for you to use them.

Icon	Skill Name	Description
	Time Bomb	Launches a Sticky Bomb forward. The Sticky Bomb attaches to an enemy or terrain feature on contact.
	Blast	Instantly detonates attached bombs. Bomb damage increases with the number of attached bombs.
	Guided Landmine	Places a Guided Landmine at current location. Once placed, the Guided Landmine will fly to an enemy within its detection range and attach to it.
	Arche Explosion	Starts moving forward fast. On collision with an enemy while charging, inflicts Knockback. When the movement ends, deals damage to nearby enemies and removes buffs from them. After the skill ends, Esiemo enters Madness state.
	Adventitious Habit (Passive)	Drops a bomb on the ground when the shield is completely depleted.

Time Bomb

Fires a Sticky Bomb forward. The Sticky Bomb attaches to an enemy or terrain on contact.

Time Bomb Skill Description:

• Fire – Tech
• Fires a Sticky Bomb forward. The Sticky Bomb attaches to an enemy or terrain on contact.

How to use Time Bomb:

Time Bomb is best placed on bigger targets since it sticks to enemies. That way, when they blow up, it will easily take out smaller enemies with one hit, too. Additionally, you can also place them on the ground, forming a protection field that blows up when enemies get too close to you.

Blast

Instantly detonates attached bombs. Bomb damage increases with the number of attached bombs.

Blast Skill Description:

• Fire – Fusion
• Detonate the attached bombs.
• Damage dealt increases with the number of attached bombs.

How to use Blast:

Blast simply detonates the deployed Sticky Bombs of skill 1. Like mentioned above, try to blow up as many targets as you can timing this correctly.

Guided Landmine

Places a Guided Landmine at current location. Once placed, the Guided Landmine will fly to an enemy within its detection range and attach to it.

Guided Landmine Skill Description:

• Fire – Tech
• Places a Guided Landmine.
• once placed, the Guided Landmine flies to an enemy within its detection range and attaches to it.
• If there are obstacles in its path, it attaches to the terrain.

How to use Guided Landmine:

The Guided Landmine is best place infront of enemy spawn points. That way you can take care of spawning enemies without having to bother with them. If possible, try to time it so it hits bigger targets because the small enemies usually die too fast anyway.

It is important to not place it between obstacles, otherwise it will attach to those.

Arche Explosion

Starts moving forward fast. On collision with an enemy while charging, inflicts Knockback. When the movement ends, deals damage to nearby enemies and removes buffs from them. After the skill ends, Esiemo enters Madness state.

Arche Explosion Skill Description:

• Fire – Fusion
• Dashes forward to deal damage and inflict Knockback on colliding targets during movement.
• Interacting with the skill button again or ending movement deals Burst damage to nearby enemies.
• Enemies hit by the explosion lose their buffs.
• When the skill ends, grants self Madness.

How to use Arche Explosion:

Arche Explosion is one of the most powerful Ultimate Skills in the game. The only downside to it is that it has a long cooldown. Therefore, only use this if absolutely needed. After the skill ends you get Madness for 10+ seconds, increasing your Firearm ATK by a lot, make it count!

Adventitious Habit (Passive)

Drops a bomb on the ground when the shield is completely depleted.

Adventitious Habit Passive Description:

• Drops a bomb on the ground when the shield is completely depleted.

How to use Adventitious Habit:

This passive is very lackluster, basically all it does is drop a bomb on the ground when your shield is depleted and it has a fairly long cooldown on top of that.

How Modules Work in The First Descendant

Modules in The First Descendant are the bread and butter of all Descendant Builds. There are a few important things to remember about modules. This is for both Descendant and Weapon Modules.

While most builds require you to increase Module Capacity with an Energy Activator (you get two for free), they won’t require you to reduce the Module cost with Crystallization Catalyst. However, if you want to truly min-max a build, you will need plenty.

1. How to increase your Module Capacity
2. Module Levels and Cost
   1. Kuiper Shards & best way to farm!
3. Reduce the cost of Modules
4. How to farm Modules

How to Increase Module Capacity

You get a base of 45 Modules for every Descendant character. And you can increase this up to 85 currently. First off, always slot a Sub Attack Module (Slot 7). When you increase this to the max level you will get an additional 10 Module Capacity. if you use a Crystallization Catalyst on the Sub Attack Module, you even get 15 extra slots. You will see this in the setup below.

Additionally, you can use an Energy Activator to increase your Module Capacity by another 20. However, these are fairly hard to farm, only use them on your best Descendants.

Lastly, increasing your Mastery Rank will also increase Module Capacity. Rank 1 gives you 25 Module Capacity, Rank 20 gives you 50 Module Capacity. That is how we reach the 80 Module Capacity that you see on most builds.

1. Slot a Sub Attack Module (and max it out to get +10 capacity, crystallize it for +15)
2. Use an Energy Activator (2o extra capacity)
3. Increase Mastery Rank (25 base capacity, max 50)

Weapons: The same, but because you don’t have Subattack Modules, the Energy Activator gives you 30 instead of just 20 extra capacity.

You can also read my in-depth guide on how to increase Module Capacity in The First Descendant if you need more information. Or my Best Energy Activator Farm Spots and our Best Crystallization Catalyst Farm Spots. I tested all of the grind spots by myself and have already farmed plenty of these items with this method.

Module Levels and Cost

Modules can be enhanced (leveled up) with Kuiper Shards in The First Descendant. Enhancing Modules increases their power. At higher levels, the power will increase way more than at lower levels. Therefore it is always recommended to max out the most important Module first.

Here is an example of a must-have Module called Increased HP for our Descendant. You will notice that we start at 22%, but at the max level, we get a whopping 218.5% increase in health!

Transcendent Modules are the exception; they decrease Capacity Cost with higher levels!

For an in-depth overview, please visit our How to Level Up Modules in The First Descendant guide.

How to Farm Kuiper Shards

Kuiper Shards are used to level up Modules. We have a guide on the Top 3 Kuiper Shard Farming Locations in the First Descendant. We explain how to most efficiently farm Kuiper Shards (300-500k/hour) and show the amount you need to level up mods. As a summary, to max out a Module you need:

• Normal Modules: 103’100 Kuiper Shards
• Rare Modules: 206’200 Kuiper Shards
• Ultimate Modules: 309’300 Kuiper Shards
• Transcendent Modules: 515’500 Kuiper Shards

Always max out the most important Modules first, we will showcase the order below.

How to Reduce the Cost of Modules

To reduce the cost of Modules you need Crystallization Catalysts in The First Descendant. These require a lot of time investment, most builds won’t require you to get many if any at all (Budget Setup). But if you want to completely min-max you need to get plenty of them as technically, every slot can have a specific socket type to half the cost.

Modules have Socket Types. Our Increased HP Module has the Cerulean Socket Type.

• Module: Increased HP
• Socket Type: Cerulean

This is important because if we place our Increased HP Module in the fitting Socket Type, it will half the cost of the Module!

How to farm Modules

Most Modules can be acquired fairly easily, but the higher-quality ones (Ultimate, Transcendent) are more tedious to obtain. Here is the easiest process to farm Modules quickly.

Open Map > Swap to Access Info > Select Modules

Here, you can find all Modules and their drop locations. If a module drops from several locations, it is recommended to select drop locations with higher drop chances.

There isn’t really much more to this. Simply check the location and go farm. Normal and Rare quality Modules have 30-50% drop chances in most cases. Ultimate ones range around the 5% mark and Transcendent ones can be a tough cookie with around 2% drop chance.

We will list the best farming location of modules in the next step of the guide.

Smooth Grapple Hook for your Esiemo Build

Using the standard Grapple Hook in The First Descendant can be a pain, and it feels kinda frustrating at times. Don’t worry, there is a way better alternative that will make it a joy to use the grappling hook!

It is called the Mid-Air Maneuvering Sub Module. I use this on all my The First Descendant Builds because it improves grappling by so much.

With this Module, you can attach your Grapple Hook to anything, even air! That means you can simply aim towards the sky and Hook up your grapple hook there for guaranteed fast movement!

Here is a guide on how to get the Mid-Air Maneuvering Sub Module in The First Descendant. It won’t take a lot of effort, but it will definitely improve your build and overall gameplay in The First Descendant.

Esiemo’s Story in The First Descendant

The First Descendant Esiemo was enlisted to become a Descendant, his parents said these parting words as they embraced him: “Be proud of your Arche. No more tears. This officer here also needs to get back to work, okay?

No sooner had those words left their lips, the Bomb Squad in blast suits carefully collected Esiemo’s tears. Due to his unique Arche, even a single teardrop from Esiemo is a dangerous explosive.

Ever since he was a child, Esiemo was bullied by other children because his body would smell like gunpowder. Without the warm love of his parents, it would have been difficult for him to withstand the torment. Although his parents loved him immensely, once his sneezes started to cause actual explosions, as loving parents, they understood that they had no other choice.

At this rate, not only would they be unable to hide the suspiciously frequent explosions that were occurring in the Albion residential area, but their beloved neighbors, who they cared for as much as they did their child, would have to deal with the disruption in their daily lives. In the end, Esiemo’s parents reported his potential Arche ability to HQ, and the Magisters succeeded in uncovering Esiemo’s Arche though corresponding tests. The distinctive scent and excretions produced from his body were actually explosive Arche substances.

It was a miracle that no major incident had occurred so far. Now, not only was Esiemo isolated from the residential area, but as a Descendant candidate, he had no other choice but to leave his parents’ side. However, his parents embraced him tightly; they were proud of their son.

Esiemo, who had decided to accept his destiny, made a promise to his parents. Not only would he become an outstanding Descendant and the best son to them, but he would grow up and become someone who could love even those who had bullied him in the past.

Esiemo was confident. Exploding enemies, growing fame, and burning love. Is there anything better than explosions to achieve all of these at the same time?

Related Guides for The First Descendant

• The First Descendant Builds Database
• The First Descendant Bunny Build
• The First Descendant Sharen Build

You can also check out our Ultimate Weapons Database for The First Descendant or the Builds Database for The First Descendant.