Bleed Stack Economy: Why Beast Wild Swipes Wins - Guides

The exact math behind Beast's Wild Swipes damage scaling on Bleed stacks, and why it out-scales every standard single-hit ability in the game.

Wild Swipes is the canonical example of how the game's scaling formulas reward multi-hit + debuff-stacking rotations.

The Formula

Each of Wild Swipes' 5 hits deals (1% target MaxHP) + (base_damage + 0.15 * bleed_stacks) damage. The +0.15 is added to base damage BEFORE the multiplier pass.

The Multi-Hit Multiplier

5 hits, each rolling Crit independently. Each Crit has the same probability. The expected value is 5x the per-hit EV. But the variance is much higher — Wild Swipes is the textbook multi-hit build.

Why Bleed Catalyzes

At 0 Bleed stacks, each hit is 1% target MaxHP + 11. At 10 Bleed stacks, each hit is 1% target MaxHP + 12.5. That doesn't sound like much — but add Crit Chance scaling.

Crit Multiplier at 50% Crit

Per-hit EV at 50% Crit, 200 LCK (+150% Crit Damage = 3.5x Crit mult), 10 Bleed stacks, target with 200 MaxHP: 0.5 * 3.5 * (2 + 12.5) + 0.5 * (2 + 12.5) = 27.13 per hit. Times 5 hits: 135.6 per Wild Swipes cast.

Compare to a Single-Hit Ability

Overpowering Slash (Rampager) at 200 STR, 50% Crit: 0.5 * 2.5 * (17 + 3) + 0.5 * (17 + 3) = 27.5 per cast. Single hit, no scaling hooks. Beast pulls ahead even without Reckless stacks.

The Full Math at Berserk + Bleed

Rampager with Berserk 4 stacks (+35% outgoing, +20% incoming): 27.5 * 1.35 = 37.1 per Overpowering. Beast with 10 Bleed + Unleash + Lunaeia lifesteal: 135.6 per Wild Swipes cast, recovered ~20 HP via lifesteal. The Beast is the meta at full gear.