Welcome to our ultimate Marius build guide for Avowed, which has been updated for the Anniversary Update. The guide covers the best abilities, companion skill selections, and strategies for effectively using Marius in your party.
Related Guides
The Avowed Anniversary Update (Patch 2.0) has completely reshaped how builds and companions function, making older guides outdated. With major additions like New Game Plus, expanded build scaling, customizable difficulty, and improved progression systems, companions are now more impactful than ever in both early and late-game strategies.
In this guide, we break down the best Marius companion build in Avowed, including skills, combat roles, and how to maximize their effectiveness after the latest update. Whether you’re playing on a fresh character or NG+, this updated setup ensures your companion performs at peak efficiency in every encounter.
Avowed Marius Build Summary
- Role: Ranged DPS
- Best Ability: Heart Seeker
- Key Synergy: Pairs best with Fighter Envoy
- Anniversary Change: Companions now get 11 skill points
Marius Features & Mechanics
Marius is your high DPS Ranger type companion who mainly deals single target damage. He’s best used at range, focusing on Heart Seeker, which hits extremely hard, but with a longer cooldown than most abilities. His unique skill, Hunter’s Sense helps identify nearby loot, enemies, and plants. This is helpful while traversing new areas and making sure you miss nothing at all.
Another strength of Marius is his Binding Root ability which immobilizes enemies. This is helpful for crowd control, and eventually can lead to Bleed DOT damage once leveled up. Marius is great at crowd control and slowing down enemies, which is a good combination when you are playing an Envoy caster and using Kai as a tank.
The major downsides to be aware of with Marius is his lack of AOE. He has some ways to increase skills to attack multiple targets, but if you’re missing cleave damage in your party, he won’t be a good choice. Moreover, his survivability is low and he has no self-heal, shield, and very few defensive options. Therefore, he’s a good choice if you’re using another companion like Giatta for healing and need single target damage, vs. AOE.
How to Unlock Marius in Avowed
To unlock Marius in Avowed, follow the main quest to the city of Paradis. After finishing the Message from Afar quest, you can locate an Ambassador near the Underbelly store inside Grinning Balarok tavern. Recruit him by helping him identify assassins. You should look to unlock Marius immediately once you unlock this area to add another companion to your party and much more power.
Marius’s Permanent Bonuses
When you unlock training from Marius, you must choose one of the following three options. Once selected, it cannot be changed:
| Dialogue Choice | Permanent Bonus |
| “Tell me how to be quicker, quieter, and more agile.” | +2 Dexterity |
| “Show me how to survive conditions that would cripple the unprepared.” | +2 Constitution |
| “I trust your instincts. How about a little of everything?” | +1 Dexterity, +1 Constitution |
Pick Dexterity for the extra attack and cast speed, Constitution if you need survivability, or +1 to DEX and CON if you want a balanced selection. Overall, more DEX is the best choice.
Marius Best Abilities and Passives
Marius’ best abilities are Binding Roots and Heart Seeker. Binding Roots is a ranged immobilization, perfect for keeping enemies at a distance. Meanwhile, Heart Seeker is your ranged single-target burst damage. Focus on the most deadly enemy first, then rotate to weaker targets as combat progresses. Below are the abilities, and upgrade recommendations:
Binding Roots: this skill acts as a range mobilization. It should be used to lock a target in place, especially if it’s attacking Marius or another range companion. The best upgrades for Binding Roots are Thorny Roots and Constricting Roots.
- Thorny Roots: this skill upgrade deals bleed damage to trap target. It’s a great upgrade to deal increased DOT damage while holding a target in place.
- Constricting Roots: another upgrade that adds stun to the target. You can combo this with Shadow Step/Assassinate skill that automatically kills most stunned targets.
Heart Seeker: Your main DPS skill that has a long cooldown but massive burst damage, firing off a shot at range. The best upgrades for Heart Seeker are Quick Draw, Sharpshooter and Twinned Shot.
- Quick Draw: The most important skill upgrade because the 60-second cooldown is long. This reduces the cooldown by 33%, giving you much more frequent use of Heart Seeker.
- Sharpshooter: The next upgrade deals increased damage to sub 50% health enemies. Acting as a near execute, making Marius always wanting to target low HP enemies.
- Twinned Shot: An important upgrade to hit another target, giving you some AOE.
Shadow Step: This skill has Marius go invisible, to reappear in melee range and attack enemies. We don’t invest into this heavily, because Marius performs better at longer ranges. The best upgrade for Shadow Step is Assassinate.
- Assassinate: Worth investing in because it nearly always kills stunned enemies. You want to Binding Roots a target, stun them, and burst with Assassinate.
Wounding Shots (Passive): Your passive that deals bleed accumulation and can lead to increased DOT damage. Combine with Binding Root and Thorny Roots upgrade. The best upgrades for Wounding Shots is Impending Shots and Exposing Shots.
- Impending Shots: slows enemies hit which is great for keeping them at range.
- Exposing Shots: Reduces enemies damage reduction (armor) increasing overall DPS passively.
Putting all of these skills and upgrades together, we give you a step-by-step leveling and skill progression for Marius below.
Best Marius Skill Progression Guide & Leveling Guide
| Skill Point | Skill Chosen | Effect | Why Take It |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting | Binding Root | (Auto) | Given Automatically |
| 1 | Heart Seeker | Hits single target passing through objects | High single target damage |
| 2 | Shadow Step | Marius goes invisible striking enemies | Another burst damage ability |
| 3 | Wounding Shots | Attacks do bleeding damage | Adds DOT damage |
| 4 | Quick Draw (Heart Seeker Upgrade) | Reduces cooldown 33% | Increases DPS with more frequent usage |
| 5 | Thorny Roots (Binding Roots Upgrade) | Adds Bleed Damage to trapped enemies | More DOT damage |
| 6 | Impending Shots (Wounding Shots Upgrade) | Slows any enemy hit | Helps keep enemies at range |
| 7 | Sharpshooter (Heart Seeker Upgrade) | Adds more damage below 50% health | Burst damage to weak enemies |
| 8 | Twinned Shot (Heart Seeker Upgrade) | Hits next closest enemy | Gives multiple target damage |
| 9 | Assassinate (Shadow Step Upgrade) | Stunned enemies can instantly die | Acts as an execute for stunned enemies |
| 10 | Constricting Roots (Binding Roots Upgrade) | Deals Stun to trapped enemies | Helps CC enemies |
| 11 | Exposing Shots (Wounding Shots Upgrade) | Reduces enemy damage reduction | Helps increase overall DPS |
How to Play Marius with All Classes
The goal with Marius in combat is to keep enemies at a distance and pound them with Heart Seeker range attacks. Your opening attack should be Heart Seeker for burst, then immobilize the target with Binding Root. If you have a tank like Kai, have him target the boss or enemies and taunt them to prevent them from reaching you.
Once your skills are upgrade, your attacks trigger bleed accumulation, and weaken the targets defenses. Therefore, it’s important to manually focus Marius to the primary most threatening target to stack these effects. Once the target is stunned (full grey bar), use the Assassinate Shadow Step ability to try and instantly kill the target. Heart Seeker too has a increased DPS component once upgraded. Look at the HP and use it when below 50% for even more damage.
Survivability is the weakest part of Marius as he doesn’t have much to deal with it. This is where you need a taunt on your Envoy character or Kai to help peel off targets. Stuns, Immobilizes, and Slows are you best bet to keep him safe. If you find yourself dying a lot, swap in Giatta to heal as she increases everyone’s survivability dramatically. Speaking of best companions, that’s next below and we recommend Yatzli.
Best Companion to Combine with Marius
Yatzli is a great companion to complement Marius’ lack of area or multi-target damage. The main combination you want to use is immobilizing a target for a huge nuke. Use Binding Roots with Marius and follow it up with Essence Explosion. This ensures the target doesn’t move out of the radius and is blasted with massive damage. The Fire Aspect upgrade can grant fire accumulation and eventually you can stack multiple status effects on one target and see their health bar vanish.
Another benefit of Yatzli is her Arduous Delay of Motion skill. This acts as a slow for 10 seconds. With upgrades, you can use this to AOE slow targets along with increase status effects. This is best to use in combination with Binding Root. As soon as a boss or group of enemies escapes the Binding Root CC, immediately follow it up with Delay of Motion to keep them in place.
Alternatively, if you struggle with survival, swap in Giatta for Yatzli. Upgrade her skills to include damage reduction like Purification and Essence Shielding. Use Acceleration to increase movement speed so Marius can escape. You will have lower DPS, but you can’t do damage when you’re dead!
Marius Companion With Envoy
Fighter
Your main goal with the Fighter Envoy is to ensure you can taunt or stun enemies who are attacking your spellcasters. Assuming you’re not using Kai, make sure you can close the gap with skills and clear out adds for more AOE damage and aggro. Below are the suggested skills:
- Ability 1: Intro the Fray (a taunt and gap closer when Marius is being attacked)
- Ability 2: Clear Out (AOE damage skill)
- Ability 3: Bear Ally (ranger skill to add another offensive ally)
- Passive 1: Retribution (increases damage back to attacker)
Check our Fighter Build for Avowed.
Ranger
The Ranger Envoy will be the weakest pairing with Marius. You want to avoid redundant roles (range DPS), therefore make sure to have some melee capabilities with burst skills like Fan of Daggers. Bear Ally can be swapped out for another active skill if you find it not useful. Below are the skill recommendations:
- Ability 1: Shadowing Beyond (mobility and stealth)
- Ability 2: Fan of Daggers (AOE damage)
- Ability 3: Bear Ally (helpful companion ally)
- Passive 1: Evasion (helps with dodge roll cost)
Check our Ranger Build for Avowed.
Wizard
The Wizard wants to play the role as glass cannon AOE machine. You compliment Marius single target burst and immobilization. Make sure to stay mobily and keep up your Arcane Veil when you expect incoming damage and use Kai as your second companion. Below are skill choices:
- Ability 1: Arcane Veil (survival tool)
- Ability 2: Fireball (AOE damage)
- Ability 3: Minor Missiles (low cooldown spell)
- Passive 1: Blood Magic (can heal HP back for essence)
Check our Wizard Build for Avowed.
How the Anniversary Update Changed Companions
The Anniversary Update introduced several key systems that directly impact companions:
- New Game Plus scaling allows companions to remain viable in extended playthroughs
- Expanded build scaling and customization makes companion builds more flexible
- Custom difficulty settings allow players to fine-tune companion effectiveness
- Improved progression systems and gear scaling make companions stronger in late game
- Increased skill points from 8 to 11
To help you build out the FAQ section for your Marius guide, I’ve compiled the most common questions players are asking in 2026, especially following the Anniversary Update. These are designed to address specific pain points like recruitment, “missing” bonuses, and romance.
Avowed Marius Companion FAQ
1. Where do I find Marius to recruit him?
You can recruit Marius in the city of Paradis during the main quest “An Untimely End.” Look for him in the Underbelly at a tavern called the Grinning Balarok. You’ll need to help him deal with some local thugs before he agrees to join your party.
2. Why isn’t Marius’s training (permanent bonus) appearing at camp?
Marius’ training only appears once you’ve engaged with him at various region locations. Therefore, try to trigger a conversation at each location using the “Tell me about this region” dialogue option (Dawnshore, Emerald Stair, Shatterscarp, etc.). If you’ve reached the endgame and still don’t see the training, backtrack to an earlier region, set up camp, and talk to him there.
3. Can I romance Marius?
No. While you can build a relationship with Marius through his personal quest, Kai is currently the only companion with a full romance path.
4. What is Marius’s “Hunter’s Sense” and how do I use it?
Marius’s exploration ability, Hunter’s Sense, allows you to highlight nearby plants, loot, and caches. In the Anniversary Update, this sense was buffed to also highlight traps and secret doors with a distinct golden pulse.
5. Should I kill or spare Razvan in the “Chorus of the Lost” quest?
If you spare him, Marius feels a sense of relief. If you kill him, Marius will feel hollow but admits the threat is gone for good. Neither choice impacts Marius’s combat or stats, so sparing him is often considered the “good” choice.
6. Is Marius better for Melee or Ranged players?
Marius is best played at range because of his Binding Roots immobilization and lack of a survivability skill. While melee builds seem appealing, you can struggle to survive when he has to flee and enemies attack him at close range.
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