Solo Master Mode Moon Lord with pre-Moon Lord gear.

Strategy to defeat Moon Lord Solo in Master Mode with pre-Moon Lord gear with every class.

Welcome

ᵃʳᵗ ᵇʸ ᵇᵒʰʳᵒᵏᵏⁱ

Welcome to the guide "Solo Master Mode Moon Lord with pre-Moon Lord gear", in this guide, I will share with you how I did beat the Moon Lord in Master Mode using only pre-Moon Lord gear with every class, that means this guide is intended for people that will fight the Moon Lord in Master Mode without end game weapons.

This guide will cover the 4 main classes:

• Mage
  
• Melee
  
• Ranger
  
• Summoner
  
  From my personal experience, I will tell you in this section, about the difficulty and what I think of each class when fighting the Moon Lord. If you want to skip this section go ahead to the Arena setup section, then the class section etc.
  
  Below is just a summary and my personal experience and my opinions.
  
  First let me clarify that with each class, I start a new world and new playthrough, that is why it takes some time to update this guide, I love Terraria and I like to experience everything that the game has to offer.
  
  

• Melee:

  Difficulty: Easy to Medium.
  Experience: With Melee, I found that fighting the Moon Lord in Master Mode is easier than the other classes, because of higher armor level and very good DPS that Daybreak offers. Daybreak is a very good weapon for single targets, it can even be used by any class, as it doesn't consume ammo/mana. But Melee is the class that can master this weapon because the weapon damage is melee based.
  
  

• Summoner:

  Difficulty: Medium.
  Experience:Summoner in 1.4 was reworked, now is very powerful and fun to play with. Having a Whip and commanding all the minions, is lot of fun. In my opinion, Terraprisma is the best weapon in the game (Zenith is also good, but is not pre-Moon Lord gear), it is a must have weapon for any class. With the Summoner class you can cast up to 10 Terraprisma with pre-Moon Lord gear, having 10 Terraprisma following your command and melting all your enemies is the best feeling ever. Summoner is very weak in the armor department, and I must say it felt easy for me fighting bosses with the Summoner class, but because of the low armor, I consider this class Medium difficulty in the Moon Lord fight.
  
  

• Mage:

  Difficulty: Hard.
  Experience:Mage, good old mage, most difficult class for fighting the Moon Lord in my opinion. As always, it is fun to play as mage, specially with all the powerful spells, but always low armor, and keeping mana up to continuously keep that DPS going, it is tricky sometimes, but if you master the class, is super fun and a Mage is a mass destruction weapon against anything, specially in late game. Nebula Blaze is still the best DPS against the Moon Lord, but it can be tricky to hit because it fires inaccurately, on the other hand Razorblade Typhoon still great because is accurate but does 50% less damage than Nebula Blaze. I think, if Nebula Blaze was more accurate, it would be the only weapon needed in the fight against the Moon Lord.
  
  

• Ranger:

  Difficulty: Easy to Medium.
  Experience: As expected, Ranger is still a very powerful class. Vortex Beater + Chlorophyte bullets destroys the Moon Lord very quickly, so quick that I had to be careful to not damage the hands so fast in order to avoid having True Eye of Cthulhu spawning before even hitting for the first time the forehead's eye. Still, have lower armor than melee, so you need to be careful, the four pillars were more difficult than the Moon Lord fight lol, specially the Solar Pillar enemies, Corite and Selenian(can deflect your bullets and 1 hit kill you...)

Video of Strategy

Finally I recorded my gameplay of my Summoner build killing Moon Lord Master mode using only 1 potion (summoning potion) and killing him in under 3 minutes. In this video you can see how I do the strategy, basically this is the strategy to use with every class, of course you can use more potions, it is safer, but I am just showing you that a Summoner can perfectly kill the Moon Lord in Master Mode with only 1 potion, and also if you look at my arena, I have very few Heart statues and no Bast statues, also this proves that regen stations can be very basic and that you can perfectly do the strategy with just a couple of Heart statues and without Bast statues.

Arena

Important:

Never play on Small worlds because your arena will be closer to the Space biome, and possible spawning Wyverns during boss fights which can be deadly in Master mode. This is why I do not recommend playing Small worlds at all.

I recommend playing at least on Medium worlds

• Build a very long wooden platform arena to run and fight the Moon Lord. My Arenas most of the times have max 1000 wooden platform tiles, you can make it 2000 wooden platform tiles if you prefer just to be sure.
  
• Along the platforms, have Regen Stations, each Regen Station separated by a gap of 72 tiles. A Regen Station consist of: 1 Bast statue (optional) , 1 Bonfire,1 Heart Lantern, 1 Star in a bottle(optional if you are Mage), 3 Heart statues wired to 2 Pressure plates (Player activated) The idea is that when you run past the Regen stations, you will spawn 3 hearts. (see Example of the Arena picture)
  
• Have an Alchemy Table[terraria.gamepedia.com] to craft Super Healing Potions[terraria.gamepedia.com].
  
• Have a:
  
  • Bewitching Table (for all classes)[terraria.gamepedia.com]
    
  • Crystal Ball (if playing mage)[terraria.gamepedia.com]
    
  • Ammo Box (if playing ranger)[terraria.gamepedia.com]
    
  • Sharpening Station (if playing melee)[terraria.gamepedia.com]

Example of the Arena:

Arena for the Easy Cheesy way (Mine Cart track)

This works only in Large or Medium worlds.
If you are planning to do the Easy Cheesy way an arena is not required at all, instead, you need to build a mine track from end to end (crossing the whole world), with bumpers at the end of each track.

You can fast and easily create your mine track using the Builder Potion[terraria.gamepedia.com] and Brick Layer[terraria.gamepedia.com] or Gizmo Pack[terraria.gamepedia.com]

When you are on your mine cart, if you have the Builder Potion + Brick Layer (or Gizmo Pack), you can reach 20 mph(no more than 20 mph) and hold click to build your track and in a few minutes you can have your track done from one end to the other in a Medium world.

Crafting Super Healing potions

Craft Super Healing potions (heals 200 hp)[terraria.gamepedia.com] as many as possible before the fight, this can be done in three ways:

Important: Please always use an Alchemy Table[terraria.gamepedia.com], you will be able to spare Lunar Fragments!

• Option 1: Before destroying the 4th pillar, you can combine 3 different Lunar Fragments in a Ancient Manipulator[terraria.gamepedia.com] to create the 4th Lunar Fragment. This will allow you to craft the potions before destroying the last pillar, but you may waste Lunar Fragments needed to craft your weapons, I advice you to destroy first the pillar needed to craft your weapons, craft your weapons and then with what is left, craft the missing Lunar Fragment and the potions.
  
  
• Option 2: Remember to have your weapons crafted first, then, after destroying the last pillar (4th pillar), quickly teleport to your base and run to your Alchemy Table in the Arena and craft the potions asap before Moon Lord spawns.
  
  
• Option 3: After destroying the last pillar (4th pillar), you can quit your game, so the Moon Lord will not spawn so you can farm Lunar Fragments, like explained in the quote from the wiki below:
  

  Originally posted by https://terraria.gamepedia.com/:

  If the player leaves the world after the message "Impending doom approaches...", the Moon Lord will not spawn.
  This could be useful for players who aren't ready to fight the Moon Lord yet and/or if they don't have enough Lunar Fragments to use.

Mage

ᵃʳᵗ ᵇʸ ᵇᵒʰʳᵒᵏᵏⁱ

Preparing Mage

• Buff Potions[terraria.gamepedia.com]: You need these 10 potions: Ironskin, Regeneration, Endurance, Lifeforce, Wrath, Rage, Swiftness, Heartreach, Magic Power and Mana Regeneration.
  
  
• Plenty of Greater Mana Potions and you can upgrade them to Super Mana Potion[terraria.gamepedia.com].
  
  
• Food[terraria.gamepedia.com] for Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff. Please consume a Exquisitely Stuffed food, for example Golden Delight [terraria.gamepedia.com] if possible. Or easy to do Seafood Dinner[terraria.gamepedia.com]. Or any other food that can give you Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff.

Armor

Armor: Spectre armor[terraria.gamepedia.com] with Spectre Mask for max damage.

Accessories for Mage:

Hard way (all Warding prefix)
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Celestial Shell
  
• Fishron Wings
  
• Mana Cloak
  
• Master Ninja Gear
  
• Celestial Emblem
  
• Frozen Shield

Strategies

Spells

• Nebula Blaze (Demonic Prefix)
  
• Razorblade Typhoon (Mythical Prefix)
  
• Terraprisma (Ruthless Prefix)
  
• Rod of Discord (Optional, I did it without)

Strategy:

Difficulty: Hard, requires training.
*Remember you can watch the strategy video posted in the Video section.

Important: Fight him during the night because you will have your Werewolf buff (from your Celestial Shell accessory), that increase abilities! It is important to fly and dodge the Moon Lord's attacks, but it is also important to be on the platforms to hit the pressure plates to generate hearts from the heats statues, every time that you see a regen station, try to get the hearts, unless you are dodging the Moon Lord's Phantasmal Deathray attack, avoiding this attack is high priority.

Don't forget to have Terraprisma ready (2 summons if you have Bewitching Table's buff). Terraprisma will help with the DPS (Damage per Second). As soon as the Moon Lord spawns activate all your buffs and start running and flying bit, you will be using Razorblade Typhoon, keep running and flying a bit, damaging the Moon Lord hands and use your Master Ninja Gear to dodge the hands attacks. Do not stop running and flying.

When he opens his forehead's eye, switch to Nebula Blaze, aim and damage his forehead's eye as much as you can, you have a few seconds to damage his forehead's eye and then he will cast his Phantasmal Deathray attack, when this attack is coming, concentrate on flying over/around (180 degrees) the Moon Lord in order to avoid this attack, this takes some practice but is not that difficult once you learn the pattern and see it coming, this is an important part if you want to win the fight, if you get hit by this attack is most likely game over, difficult to recover if you don't get one shot. Optional: If you have the Rod of Discord you can use it to teleport and avoid the attack.

After you avoided his Phantasmal Deathray attack, repeat the process.

When True Eye of Cthulhu spawns (after defeating a hand) keep in mind that they cast smaller version of the Moon Lord's Phantasmal Deathray. Use you Master Ninja Gear to dodge the attacks. You can also jump and fly a bit to avoid their attacks.

Once the hands and the forehead's eye are defeated, keep the same strategy (keep running and flying a bit), The core (Moon Lord's heart) will be exposed, use Nebula Blaze to damage the core/heart to defeat the Moon Lord. Keep running, avoid and dodge attacks while damaging the core until he is defeated.

Screenshot:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2140660235
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2140660369

I do prefer Warding prefixes, I did beat the Moon Lord also with all Menacing, but the damage difference is too small, I found out that the extra armor from Warding helped me tanking some hits from the True Eye of Cthulhu's attacks in case of a dodge mistake. It is also maybe a good idea to drop Mana Cloak and add Worm Scarf (17% reduced damage) but I did not test this yet, if you do this, then don't forget to manually drink your Mana Potions when/if needed.

Melee

ᵃʳᵗ ᵇʸ ᵇᵒʰʳᵒᵏᵏⁱ

Preparing Melee

• You need Flask of Ichor[terraria.gamepedia.com]
  
  
• Buff Potions[terraria.gamepedia.com]: You need these 8 potions: Ironskin, Regeneration, Endurance, Wrath, Rage, Heartreach, Swiftness and Inferno.
  
  
  
• Food[terraria.gamepedia.com] for Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff. Please consume a Exquisitely Stuffed food, for example Golden Delight [terraria.gamepedia.com] if possible. Or easy to do Seafood Dinner[terraria.gamepedia.com]. Or any other food that can give you Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff.

Armor

Armor: Beetle Armor[terraria.gamepedia.com] with Beetle Scale Mail for max damage.

Accessories for Melee:

All Warding prefix
• Fishron Wings
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Celestial Shell
  
• Master Ninja Gear
  
• Stinger Necklace
  
• Fire Gauntlet
  
• Mechanical Glove

Strategies

Weapons

• Daybreak (Demonic Prefix)
  
• Terraprisma (Ruthless Prefix)

Strategy:

Difficulty: Easy/Medium but requires training.
*Remember you can watch the strategy video posted in the Video section.

Important: Fight him during the night because you will have your Werewolf buff (from your Celestial Shell accessory), that increase abilities! It is important to fly and dodge the Moon Lord's attacks, but it is also important to be on the platforms to hit the pressure plates to generate hearts from the heats statues, every time that you see a regen station, try to get the hearts, unless you are dodging the Moon Lord's Phantasmal Deathray attack, avoiding this attack is high priority.

Don't forget to have Terraprisma ready (2 summons if you have Bewitching Table's buff). Terraprisma will help with the DPS (Damage per Second). As soon as the Moon Lord spawns activate all your buffs and start running and flying bit, you will be using your weapon Daybreak, keep running and flying a bit, damaging the Moon Lord hands and use your Master Ninja Gear to dodge the hands attacks. Do not stop running and flying/dodging attacks.

When he opens his forehead's eye, aim and damage his forehead's eye as much as you can, you have a few seconds to damage his forehead's eye and then he will cast his Phantasmal Deathray attack, when this attack is coming, concentrate on flying over/around (180 degrees) the Moon Lord in order to avoid this attack, this takes some practice but is not that difficult once you learn the pattern and see it coming, this is an important part if you want to win the fight, if you get hit by this attack is most likely game over, difficult to recover.

After you avoided his Phantasmal Deathray attack, repeat the process.

When True Eye of Cthulhu spawns (after defeating a hand) keep in mind that they cast smaller version of the Moon Lord's Phantasmal Deathray. Use you Master Ninja Gear to dodge the attacks. You can also jump and fly a bit to avoid their attacks.

Once the hands and the forehead's eye are defeated, The core (Moon Lord's heart) will be exposed, keep the same strategy but now dashing a few times in a row until you out run the Moon lord a bit, but keeping the core (heart) on the edge of your screen, so you can hit the core with Daybreak, keep your distance and keep hitting the core until he is defeated.

And here are my screenshots with my melee build and strategy:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2181640922
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2181642138
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2181642912
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2181644940

Ranger

ᵃʳᵗ ᵇʸ ᵇᵒʰʳᵒᵏᵏⁱ

Preparing Ranger

Important: Bullet build have better DPS than an arrow build, so I will show here the bullet build.

• Buff Potions[terraria.gamepedia.com]: You need these 8 potions: Ironskin, Regeneration, Endurance, Wrath, Rage, Heartreach, Swiftness and Ammo reservation.
  
  
• Food[terraria.gamepedia.com] for Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff. Please consume a Exquisitely Stuffed food, for example Golden Delight [terraria.gamepedia.com] if possible. Or easy to do Seafood Dinner[terraria.gamepedia.com]. Or any other food that can give you Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff.

Armor

Armor: Shroomite Armor[terraria.gamepedia.com] with Shroomite Mask.

Accessories for Ranger:

All Warding prefix
• Fishron Wings
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Celestial Shell
  
• Master Ninja Gear
  
• Frozen Shield
  
• Sniper Scope
  
• Ranger Emblem

Strategies

Weapons

• Vortex Beater (Unreal Prefix) with Chlorophyte bullets.

Strategy:

Difficulty: Easy/Medium but requires training.
*Remember you can watch the strategy video posted in the Video section.

Important: Fight him during the night because you will have your Werewolf buff (from your Celestial Shell accessory), that increase abilities! It is important to fly and dodge the Moon Lord's attacks, but it is also important to be on the platforms to hit the pressure plates to generate hearts from the heats statues, every time that you see a regen station, try to get the hearts, unless you are dodging the Moon Lord's Phantasmal Deathray attack, avoiding this attack is high priority.

As soon as the Moon Lord spawns activate all your buffs and start running and flying bit, you will be using your weapon Vortex Beater, keep running and flying a bit, damaging the Moon Lord hands, but make sure you don't destroy the hand's eye yet, just keep it low hp. Use your Master Ninja Gear to dodge the hands attacks. Do not stop running and flying/dodging attacks.

When he opens his forehead's eye, stop damaging the hands and wait for the Phantasmal Deathray attack, when this attack is coming, concentrate on flying over/around (180 degrees) the Moon Lord in order to avoid this attack while aiming and firing at his forehead's eye, this takes some practice but is not that difficult once you learn the pattern and see it coming, this is an important part if you want to win the fight, if you get hit by this attack is most likely game over, difficult to recover.

After you avoided his Phantasmal Deathray attack, repeat the process and start damaging the other hand.

Destroy the forehead's eye first, and then the hands.

When a True Eye of Cthulhu spawns (after defeating a hand) keep in mind that they cast smaller version of the Moon Lord's Phantasmal Deathray. Use you Master Ninja Gear to dodge the attacks. You can also jump and fly a bit to avoid their attacks.

Once the hands and the forehead's eye are defeated, The core (Moon Lord's heart) will be exposed, keep the same strategy but now dashing a few times in a row until you out run the Moon lord a bit, but keeping the core (heart) on the edge of your screen, so you can hit the core with Vortex Beater, keep your distance and keep hitting the core until he is defeated.

Screenshots:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2189602128
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2189603347

Summoner

ᵃʳᵗ ᵇʸ ᵇᵒʰʳᵒᵏᵏⁱ

Preparing Summoner

• Buff Potions[terraria.gamepedia.com]: You need these 8 potions: Summoning Potion, Ironskin, Regeneration, Endurance, Wrath, Rage, Swiftness, Heartreach.
  
  
• Food[terraria.gamepedia.com] for Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff. Please consume a Exquisitely Stuffed food, for example Golden Delight [terraria.gamepedia.com] if possible. Or easy to do Seafood Dinner[terraria.gamepedia.com]. Or any other food that can give you Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff.

Armor

Armor: Spooky armor[terraria.gamepedia.com]

Accessories for Summoner:

All with Warding prefix
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Celestial Shell
  
• Fishron Wings
  
• Master Ninja Gear
  
• Pygmy Necklace
  
• Papyrus Scarab
  
• Necromantic Scroll

Strategies

Weapons

• Kaleidoscope (Sluggish Prefix, please don't use another prefix)
  
• Terraprisma (Ruthless Prefix)

Also, you can go as a Summoner Hybrid by adding melee and ranger weapons to your arsenal!
I recommend to have:

• Daybreak (Godly/Demonic Prefix)
  
• Vortex Beater (Unreal Prefix) with Chlorophyte Bullets.

If you are going to beat the Moon Lord as a Summoner Hybrid I recommend you to, hit the forehead's eye with Kaleidoscope once, then switch to Daybreak and hit the eye as many times as possible. Once the core(heart) is exposed, switch to Vortex Beater to finish him off. If you cannot or don't have the Vortex Beater or Chlorophyte Bullets, Daybreak can also do the job.

Strategy:

Difficulty: Medium, requires training.
Strategy video:

Easy cheesy way (Mine Cart)

For this one, you have to use Ranger gear. You can also do with Mage (Razorblade Typhoon), but is very slow comparing to Ranger.

Armor

Hallowed Armor[terraria.gamepedia.com] with Hallowed Helmet (for Range damage). The Hallowed armor's set bonus will help you survive.

For accessories you want to take anything that increase your damage and all with Menacing prefix:

• Stinger Necklace
  
• Ranger Emblem
  
• Avenger Emblem
  
• Destroyer Emblem
  
• Sniper Scope
  
• Recon Scope
  
• Celestial Shell

Buffs

• Buff Potions[terraria.gamepedia.com]: You need the following potions: Ironskin, Regeneration, Endurance, Wrath, Rage, and Ammo Reservation Potion.
  
• Food[terraria.gamepedia.com] for Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff. Please consume a Exquisitely Stuffed food, for example Golden Delight [terraria.gamepedia.com] if possible. Or easy to do Seafood Dinner[terraria.gamepedia.com]. Or any other food that can give you Exquisitely Stuffed (Major improvements) buff.

Strategy:

Weapons

• Vortex Beater (Unreal Prefix) with Chlorophyte bullets.

Difficulty: Very easy, too easy...

Extra requirements:

• Mechanical Cart
  
• Large/Medium size world. Medium world is good enough. Do not do this in Small worlds.

For the arena build guide, check the arena section.
Go to one of your ocean and use the Mechanical Cart on the track, also build some wooden platform to be able to put an Ammo Box close to you to interact. Before the Moon Lord spawn, use the Ammo Box to gain the buff, and start moving, reach maximum speed and keep going, never stop. This is important to make this method work, you have to be at full speed before the Moon Lord spawns.

As soon as the Moon Lord spawns activate all your buffs and use your Vortex Beater and the Scope (right click) to aim and hit him non stop until is defeated. Use Health potions only when needed, with the speed of the Mechanical Cart he will most of the time miss his attack, he will teleport closer to you just the moment the Phantasmal Deathray will hit you, making the attack miss because of the teleportation. He can also hit you when you reach the end of the world and you hit the bumper, so be ready to use your Health potion there if needed.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2140483095

Thanks to /Credits to:

Art by Bohrokki, visit him at Bohrokki[www.deviantart.com] . All graphics/art by Bohrokki, excluding screenshots and videos.

Youtuber Lrygdish for the video posted in the Mage section.

If it is a problem and you would like to remove your videos, pictures, art, graphics, etc from this guide, please contact me and I will remove it asap.

Thanks for all gamers supporting this guide by commenting, suggesting, adding to their favorites and ratings! The only reason I post and keep updating this guide is for you!

[Sammarok-GoodGaming]

@albanischerHS bandit.camp

Thanks :)

[fliessenleger bandit.gg]

this guide is cooking, got moonlord first try. very nice guide

[Sammarok-GoodGaming]

@cookie(fish)master, thanks for your input.

[cookie(fish)master]

after 10 minutes of testing the phantasmal death ray will hit you only if you get unlucky, doesnt happen much but still has a possibility of happening

[cookie(fish)master]

3 years later and the phantasmal death ray will hit you even if youre going at top speed using the "easy cheesy way"

[Sammarok-GoodGaming]

I tried the Black spot and failed all the time, only once it worked but it was just luck, I recommend to not use it.

[Sammarok-GoodGaming]

EDIT: PFF had to delete my comment twice now...typos...lol

@ça decoupe comme samuel paty.

Vortex Beater is the best ranged weapon pre-moon lord with Chlorophyte Bullet. Chlorophyte Bullets were nerfed last update but they still work.

If you want to do the Easy cheesy way (Mine Cart), you will need all accessories with Menacing prefix. If you are doing the normal method, use all Warding. However you can also use Menacing prefix in the normal method but you have to be very good at dodging damage.

You don't need the Rod of Discord, I never use it against the Moon Lord.


For the Easy cheesy way (Mine Cart) read the Easy cheesy way (Mine Cart) part of the guide and also the arena part.

For the normal method read the Ranger part of the guide.

Good luck !

[Sammarok-GoodGaming]

Hi, imo Warding is better for Master Mode.

[robine]

Hello is it better to have accessories warding or menacing in master mode ?

[Sammarok-GoodGaming]

So, Terraria 1.4.1 is here, OMG that balance/changes list, lot of buffs and nerfs. Need to test it all !! Any excuse is valid to play Terraria again.