Low life

Example of Low life / Energy shield builds. Most of the Life has been reserved by auras.

Low life is a condition that applies when life falls below 50%. Linking auras or other mana-reserving skills to which converts them into Life-reserving skills is an easy way to trigger the low life condition.

Players that use low life will typically either use energy shields (~5-9k max ES) or Petrified Blood if they're not using energy shields..

• Such builds are commonly known as "LL/ES" builds, which stands for "Low life / Energy shield".
• Such builds also use very high energy shield regeneration, because they are unable to heal energy shield using either life flasks or mana flasks.
• This free ups the flask slot typically used for life/mana flasks so players can use an additional DPS or defensive flask.
• Such builds are also highly resistant to damage over time effects such as the Sirus storms, Shaper beams and Caustic ground.

Low life is not possible if maximum life is set to 1 due to Chaos Inoculation, with the exception of using , where the player may simultaneously be on low life and have Chaos Inoculation.

The low life state unlocks several interesting aspects for a character, but can be difficult to maintain efficiently. See maintaining low life for more information.

Common skills

The advantages to being low life:

• Ability to use Pain Attunement passive skill that grants more spell damage when on low life.
• Ability to use Bloodthirst Support for attack skills on life-based low life builds.
• Ability to use many more auras by using Life reservation in combination with Mana reservation
• Ability to use Chaos Inoculation passive skill to gain the benefits of both full life and low life effects. (only possible with belt)

Often used for low life builds:

• Zealot's Oath in order for life regeneration to apply to energy shield instead. Regen effects that are based on maximum life become based on maximum ES. Life flasks will still not apply to ES.
• Arcane Vision for light radius to be based on energy shield instead of life
• Ghost Reaver converts life gained from life leech into energy shield.
• Petrified Blood causes life recovery effects except life flasks to not recover past low life while turning a portion of damage taken past low life into damage over time. This skill is essential for life-based low life builds as it gives them the defenses required to survive big hits. Note that this effect is not the same as life reservation.

Common unique items

• is a very common choice for low-life ES builds, as it forces Chaos damage to affect energy shield instead of life. If it is not used, any Chaos damage can one-shot players if they have a very small amount of life.
  • is an alternative for builds that maintain high mana (i.e. ).
• is another common choice that converts a large part of life into useful energy shield.
• is often used in low-life builds to reserve auras using Life rather than Mana.

Related items

Essence modifiers

Essence of Hysteria adds the following suffix modifier to a helmet: Socketed gems deal 30% more damage while on low life

Unique items

The list below displays unique items related to Low Life:

Miscellaneous low life benefits

Flask prefixes and .

Upgraded Soul of Ryslatha Pantheon power.

Trivia

Since version 0.9.6, the player light changes to noticeably reddish over the 33% - 37% range^{[confirmation needed because of 3.14 change]} to make it easier to judge when the condition applies.

Version history

Version	Changes
3.14.0	The Low threshold for Life, Mana and Energy Shield is now 50% or below (previously below 35%). This means that a single 50% reservation will now put you into a Low state. Light radius has been adjusted accordingly.
0.9.6	The light radius reduction that occurs when on low life indoors has been changed so that it is more appropriate for players who care about the "when on low life" abilities.
Before 0.9.6	Introduced to the game.

See also

• Life reservation
• Mana reservation
• Guide to maintaining low life
• Low Mana
• Low Energy Shield