How to Access Primal Hunt by Completing & Solving in Last Epoch

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In Season 3 of Last Epoch, a new feature called the Primal Hunt was added. The Hunt Master, Skarven Bloodhorn, searches for Rift Beasts—powerful predators that tear through reality and invade our world. These Rift Beasts pull players into a cavern deep in the Ancient Era, where they face off against a Rift Beast and have the chance to spare one of its three offspring.

As players fight hordes of monsters and defeat these invading Beasts, they collect Ancient Bones and special materials. These materials can be traded for powerful gear and loot, such as Primordial Unique items and runes that enhance exalted gear.

What Is the Primal Hunt?

The Primal Hunt is a random encounter system similar to the game’s Nemesis system, introduced in Season 3. It offers a rewarding experience for late-game players. Starting from level ten during the campaign or in the Monolith of Fate, players might come across a Mysterious Rift. Stepping through this Rift transports them to a cave from the Ancient Era, where they meet Skarven Bloodhorn, the Hunt Master. The main goal is to track down and defeat a Rift Beast. After defeating it, players can choose to spare one of its three hatchlings, creating an evolving bloodline.

These Rift Beasts grow stronger each time they are defeated within a Mysterious Rift. Their offspring appear after interacting with Torn Rifts, spawning directly in zones or echoes as repeatable challenges. Every kill grants Primordial Materials, which can be exchanged with the Hunt Master for powerful loot and crafting resources.

How To Find The Hunt Master

Once inside a Mysterious Rift, players will meet Skarven Bloodhorn, who is ready to start the Primal Hunt. He trades Rift Beast trophies for various rewards, including Primordial Beast Parts, gear, Runes of Evolution, or loot bags containing Uniques and crafting items.

Some of the trade items include:

Bag of Amber: Requires one Crystallized Heart and ten Primordial Horns; rewards 5,000 Memory Amber (available only to Weaver faction members).
Bag of Glyphs: Ten Primordial Fangs; provides a random number of Glyphs.
Bag of Gold: Five Primordial Feathers; grants a random amount of gold.
Bag of Primordial Materials: Consists of 10,000 Ancient Bones; offers a variety of Primordial Fangs, Feathers, Horns, and Petals, with a small chance for a Crystallized Heart.
Bag of Shards: Ten Primordial Petals; gives a random number of Shards.
Bag of Uniques: Tenth Primordial Fangs and Feathers; yields random Unique items.
Crystallized Heart: Uses 20 Primordial Horns and 30 Primordial Petals; traded for Runes of Evolution or Primordial Items.
Rune of Evolution: One Crystallized Heart and 35 Primordial Feathers; upgrades an exalted item into a Primordial item.
Primordial Beast Parts: Various, like Fangs or Bones, used as currency.
Unique Primordial Gear: Specific gear only obtainable through the Hunt Master.

How To Access The Primal Hunt

Primal Hunts begin when a player steps through a Mysterious Rift during regular gameplay, either in the Campaign or Monoliths. These Rift portals usually appear around level ten zones. Mysterious Rifts are marked as yellow portals with claw-shaped symbols, while Torn Rifts show as green claw fractures. Torn Rifts summon Rift Beasts of your current bloodline, allowing you to farm lineage-specific drops and Ancient Bones without leaving your current zone or echo.

Rifts can appear early in the campaign and during Monolith runs, but Mysterious Rifts are less common than Torn Rifts. Continuously exploring zones and echoes increases the chances of encountering them.

Echoes

In Monolith gameplay, you may find Mysterious or Torn Rifts that lead to Primal Hunts. These Rifts do not spawn during Quest Echoes or Arena Echoes. While progressing through timeline echoes, you could encounter either Rift type. However, Tombs and Cemeteries cannot spawn alongside a Rift, as they are considered side areas, with only one exclusive area appearing per echo.

Weaver Support

The Weaver Faction adds depth to the Primal Hunt experience, offering new ways to enhance your lineage and boost loot through the Weaver Tree. By investing points earned from completing Woven Echoes or spending Memory Amber, players unlock nodes that increase Rift success rates and improve rewards.

Woven Echoes

New Woven Echoes, such as Bloodline Glade, Nesting Grove, and Rampart Coast, are now part of the system. These echoes can be obtained like standard Woven Echoes and incorporate Rift encounters and loot into your Monolith timeline.

Their effects include:

Bloodline Glade: Ideal for farming items with Primordial Exalted Champion modifiers, which don’t naturally occur with Runes of Evolution.
Nesting Grove: Adds Rift Beast encounters into nearby echoes, making it easier to gather Primordial materials.
Rampart Coast: Unlocks an extra Evolution slot for your Rift bloodline and often yields Crystallized Hearts.

Weaver Tree Nodes

The Weaver Tree features four specialized nodes on its left side, which directly influence the Primal Hunt system:

Age of Beasts: Increases how often Rift Beasts appear in echoes.
Crystal Growth: Makes Rift Beasts more likely to carry Crystallized Hearts, which are sturdier and deal more damage.
Primordial Ambush: Occasionally transforms echoes into ambush zones filled with evolved Rift Beasts, increasing the chance for rare Primordial Uniques.
Riven Gateway: When a Rift Beast appears, it also brings in Ancient Era mobs, dropping Ancient Bones upon defeat.

How To Hunt The Rift Beast

When you enter a Mysterious Rift, Skarven Bloodhorn joins your fight through the ancient caves, battling monsters until you reach the Rift Beast. Indicators like a three-egg symbol on the minimap or overhead map signal you’re close. After defeating the Rift Beast, you’ll see three unhatched eggs; interacting with them lets you select one hatchling to continue its lineage, granting the Rift Beast a unique Evolution and dropping special materials.

When a Rift Beast evolves fully, you earn the “Evolution’s End” unique amulet. Each lineage can hold up to four Evolutions, but completing certain Woven Echoes, like Rampant Coast, can raise this limit to seven. With over 60 Evolution options, each lineage can develop in many different ways.

Rift Beast Loot

Defeating Rift Beasts and monsters in their caves yields loot tradeable to Skarven Bloodhorn, including:

Ancient Bones: Main currency earned from Rift Beasts and their cohorts.
Evolution’s End Unique: Reward for fully evolving a Rift Beast lineage.
Primordial Materials: Drops like bones, fangs, feathers, petals, and crystallized hearts.
Primordial Uniques: Powerful versions of base Uniques obtained via Rift Beasts or trade.
Rune of Evolution: Rare tool to upgrade a Tier 7 affix on exalted gear to Tier 8.

What Are the New Primordial Items?

Season Three introduces Primordial Items, a new class of gear that includes weapons and armor with greatly enhanced stats and effects. These come in two varieties:

Exalted: Stronger versions of exalted gear, created by using Runes of Evolution.
Unique: Gear with unique effects specific to their equipment slot, obtainable through the Hunt Master or Rift Beasts.

Runes of Evolution

These rare crafting runes boost exalted items by randomly upgrading one of their Tier 7 affixes to Tier 8, increasing their strength significantly—often by 50-100%. They are used by slotting into the crafting panel alongside the exalted gear. The upgrade process is random and cannot be reversed, so many players experiment to get the perfect result.

Primordial Exalteds

Made by applying a Rune of Evolution to exalted gear with at least one Tier 7 affix, Primordial Exalteds gain a Tier 8 affix that generally makes the item 50-100% more powerful. They also gain an extra sealed slot, allowing gear to have up to six affixes, making it much more powerful.

Note: Only one Primordial Item can be equipped at a time.

Primordial Uniques

Primordial Uniques are upgraded versions of standard Uniques, obtained by trading Rift Beast materials with Skarven Bloodhorn. There are currently 25 Primordial Uniques: 22 purchased from the Hunt Master via materials, and 3 dropped by Rift Beasts. These Uniques can also be upgraded further using Legendary Potential, which is assigned when you buy the item, turning them into full Legendary gear.