Anthem loot - Getting Anthem's best loot, endgame loot farming

Obtaining Anthem's best stuff is a massive challenge that only the bravest Javelins should undertake. You won't be able to get the best items until you reach the endgame, and even then you need to ensure that you are sufficiently prepared to take on some of the toughest challenges, repeatedly, just to get a whiff of the loot. This guide will go over what loot tables are, some loot farming strategies, and more.

Anthem loot guide

Looking for help with missions, or how to get to grips with navigation in Anthem? Be sure to check out our Anthem guide for everything you need to know about Bioware's latest space adventure. You can also look at the Anthem Masterwork items, Anthem Masterwork gears, and Anthem Masterwork components guides for what you should be looking for.

Loot Tables

How it essentially works is that the loot you will obtain is dependent on two factors. Pilot Level and which difficulty you are currently running a mission on. As you progress through Anthem, you'll start seeing more and more specialised loot. By the time you get to Pilot Level 30, you should begin to see far more Epic loot, as well as occasional Masterwork and Legendary items.

To bolster your chances further though, you need to start upping the difficulty to at the very least Grandmaster Level 1. This will shift you up to the better loot tables that will give you a significantly better chance to obtain Masterwork and Legendary items. That said, there are some more guaranteed ways to obtain certain types of loot.

Endgame Loot farming

Firstly, let's talk about the endgame loot farming and what tasks you should do for each of the masterwork items. Note that I'll be splitting and summarising these tips into four groups, thanks to Reddit user "VSParagon".

New Weapons/Support Gear

Getting the absolute best weapons and the Masterwork support gear in the game can be a bit tricky, there's no way to guarantee the drop unlike the other two. Your best way to do this is to group up using the Anthem Discord, before jumping into Freeplay mode at Grandmaster Level 1 (Grandmaster difficulties abbreviated onward as GM1, GM2, and GM3) until you are killing enemies in one hit. When it gets to this stage, put on those grown-up pants and advance to GM2. You'll find that loot drops at a more reliable rate in GM2 compared to GM1. Once you've obtained a copy of each of the weapons, make sure you at least go around for a short time as a Colossus to nab their exclusive weapons, before moving on.

New Masterwork gear 

The best way to get these is to run Tyrant Mine at GM1 difficulty or above. This is because the boss always drops a Masterwork gear, without fail. If you run through the mines enough times, you should end up with close to all the Masterwork gear. Don't bother going through GM2 or GM3 as the loot obtained for killing the boss is the same regardless of which Grandmaster difficulty you go through the mine.

New Masterwork components

With the components, you can get these by completing Legendary Contracts. However, there is a bit of a trick to this according to the Reddit post. First and foremost, don't accept the legendary quests when they appear. To maximise the efficiency, sign up to the Anthem Discord and find a squad. Once you've found a group, try to ensure that only the squad leader accepts the contracts and be aware that if multiple people accept the same contract, completing it will clear that contract for everyone who accepted it.

Therefore you should have it so that the first person (squad leader) accepts all their legendary contracts and takes their group through all three available. Then the second player accepts their three, and so on until all four squad members have completed their maximum legendary contracts for that given day. You could in theory have 12 done instead of three, but you could potentially do more than 20 in a day - if you have the patience. Once you've obtained all the Masterwork components you wish, it's recommended that you stop doing these as they're fiddly and time consuming.

Masterwork items that have already dropped

For the most efficient way to farm Masterwork embers, it's highly recommended that you at least unlock either Defender or Elemental Rage. Make sure that you stop using those methods once you've obtained at least one copy of the weapon, gear, or component you want. This is because the way to go from this point onward is to work towards unlocking blueprints for each Masterwork item.

Head into Freeplay and check out the requirements by looking at your challenges. You'll see that among them there are challenges to kill legendary enemies with those weapons equipped, or complete World Events with your gears equipped. Remember when I mentioned that Defender and Elemental Rage should be farmed before starting this step? Try to unlock the blueprint for either one of these, or both, as they come complete with a boost for "its hidden +1 ember bonus". Having the +Harvest inscription also helps a ton.

For Masterwork items, you'll also need Masterwork embers. Luckily, Reddit user "Kenithal" has posted a rather convenient map with a route to gathering embers in the most efficient route. You'll likely be getting three or four embers of Masterwork quality per 30 notes triggered. Once you've gathered enough, you can then begin crafting. If you get a Masterwork item you don't like the look of, recycle it at the Vault to get a Masterwork ember back, leaving you with only another 14 more needed to try again.

Legendary farming

Once you've gotten the most out of Masterwork gear for what you want, it's time to jump into GM3 and go for the Legendary loot. Once again, it's recommended to jump into Freeplay mode at this difficulty and just keep going through World Events and killing enemies until they drop. You will still be kept on your toes, but it's good to get through it as best as you can and to do it in a group.

Other tips for getting loot in Anthem

Crafting is decent way of getting good equipment early on, more on that in our Anthem Crafting guide. You're showered with materials as you progress through the game and it's worth just upgrading your rarity as soon as possible. You'll not be getting the really good stuff for quite a while, so concentrate on just building things that complement your gears and weapons, while at the same time increasing your Javelin level and pilot level - our guide to Anthem Pilot and Javelin levels goes into this in more detail. Note that if you bought the Legion of Dawn edition of Anthem, it contains a Level 18 legendary weapon that has a nice ability, but its power is pants and trumped by just about every Legendary weapon in the game.

• Level 10 - You should have a full set of uncommon (green) items equipped.
• Level 15 - You should have a full set of rare (blue) items equipped.
• Level 20-25 - This is where Epic (purple) gear becomes more readily available.
• Level 30 - By this point, you should be farming for Masterwork (orange) or Legendary (yellowish green) gear.

You can also look for chests in Freeplay mode to find some gear, and while completing World Events and the like is better, you can also look for chests. Some areas have a good amount of chest that can spawn, so ensure you're checking these places before moving on:

• From the Free Play spawn point, head to the turret to the east.
• Dive into the waterfall to the north west.
• Get out of the water and head north-east, looking for a tent on a ledge.
• This one's on the rocky area by another tent to the west across the water.
• Head north-east a short distance and fly down, looking towards the nearby cliff.
• Go north-west and look behind the rock at the summit of the cliff.
• Head west to the camp area in the Watchtower of Arath region.
• Keep heading due west and climb high up. It's behind the bridge, in a leafy area.
• Turn back and head to the northern part of the canyon and look inside the ruined tower.
•  Cross the cliff into the centre of the Great Falls Canyon region. It's close to a bunch of bridges.
• Head north slightly from the last chest. You'll find this one underwater.
• Swim into a cave behind you. Where you can emerge, you'll find another chest.
• Head to the end of the cave for another chest.
• Get out of the water and head south. This is in the Valley of Tarsis, against the wall to the west of the region. Look to where there are hanging rocks.
• Head east to where the cliff on the south-side of the region in the map sticks out. You'll see a bridge, with some fighting going on. Head north of that to find a cave that contains treasure.
• Back to the bridge, there's some water, so dive in to find another chest at the bottom.
• Out of the water, there is a cave nearby that has another one.
• Follow the lake towards the south and dive in as you get close to the word "Tarsis" on the map.
• Head back up north a fair distance. You'll come across a gigantic rock in the Great Falls Canyon region. Check the other side of this rock.
• Go south west from the last chest and you'll find a blue tinted cave you can enter through. At the end, look to the left to find a smaller  cave containing the treasure.
• Head east to the edge of the Valley of Tarsis region. You'll find this in the cave behind a tower, near the wall on the east.
• Head to the blue tinted cave higher on the hill to the south of the previous chest.

Those are the tips for getting the best items in the game, though recent patches may improve/hinder your progress. We will of course be keeping this up-to-date as more strategies keep emerging. Until then, it's also worth checking out more about the four types of Freelancer in our various guides. You can step into our Anthem Javelins guide respectively to learn more about each one's skills, and their place in the team.