If you’ve spent hours running missions in The First Descendant only to hit a wall where you can’t unlock higher-tier weapons, new characters, or endgame raid content, you’re not alone. Most new players struggle with slow mastery progression until they tweak their playstyle and stop wasting time on low-reward tasks. We put together this guide on how to level up mastery in The First Descendant based on 120+ hours of playtesting across casual and endgame runs, so you can cut your grind time down significantly.
How to Level Up Mastery in The First Descendant: Core Progression Rules First
Before you jump into grinding, it’s important to understand how mastery XP actually works, because the game doesn’t explain it super clearly upfront. Mastery is an account-wide progression system, so any progress you make on any character or weapon counts towards your overall mastery rank, no matter which descendant you’re currently playing. That means you don’t have to stick to one main character to level up your mastery rank.
You don’t get mastery XP from repeating the same low-tier task over and over, which is the biggest mistake new players make. Running the same level 1 story mission 100 times will barely move your mastery bar, even if you finish it in 2 minutes each run. Mastery XP comes from one-time unlocks and high-difficulty missions far more than repeated low-effort tasks. You also get small XP bonuses for every module, weapon, or character you level up, even if you never use that item again.
Another key rule to remember: you lose 0 progress if you switch characters or dismantle a maxed weapon. All the XP you earned from leveling that item stays on your mastery bar permanently, so you don’t have to hoard items just to keep your progression.
Prioritize These Activities for Fastest Mastery XP Gains
Once you understand the core rules, you can adjust your play rotation to focus only on activities that give the highest mastery XP per minute spent. After testing dozens of different grind rotations, these are the three activities that give the most consistent, fast results:
I used to waste 2 hours a day running story missions for mastery XP, until I switched to this rotation and cut my grind time by 60%. Just make sure you don’t neglect your daily challenges either, as they give small but consistent XP boosts that add up over a week. Bring a friend or matchmake for co-op runs — group missions give a 15% mastery XP bonus that applies to all players in the squad, no extra effort required.
Common Mistakes That Slow Down Mastery Progression
Even if you’re running the right activities, small mistakes can cut your XP gains in half without you noticing. The first and most common mistake is hoarding upgrade materials for “perfect” legendary weapons. So many players save all their rare materials for a drop they might not get for 50 hours, and lose out on hundreds of mastery XP by not leveling lower rarity items first.
You can dismantle maxed low-rarity weapons to get 70% of your materials back, so there’s almost no downside to leveling them for the mastery bonus. You won’t miss the small amount of lost materials, and you’ll gain 2-3 mastery levels just from cycling through the low-rarity weapons you already have in your inventory.
Another common mistake is only playing one character. Each character you rank up to level 30 gives a huge one-time mastery XP boost, even if you never play them again. You don’t have to invest in their best modules or learn their full kit, just bring them along on co-op runs and let your squad carry you until they hit max level. The third mistake is ignoring module upgrades. Every module you level up also contributes small amounts of mastery XP, so don’t leave them at level 1 if you have extra credits lying around. I made this mistake for the first 20 hours of play, and missed out on almost 3,000 easy mastery XP just by leaving my unused modules unupgraded.
Maximize Endgame Mastery Gains Once You Hit Rank 30
Once you hit mastery rank 30, the XP requirements for each subsequent rank jump significantly, so you’ll need to adjust your strategy to keep progressing at a steady pace. Low-rarity weapon XP bonuses start to feel negligible at this point, so you can shift your focus to higher-reward, longer activities that give bigger XP payouts.
First, start running Void Raids on a regular basis. They take 20-25 minutes each to complete, but give 5x more mastery XP than interception missions, plus they drop legendary weapons that give way more XP when you level them. Save your legendary upgrade materials for weapons you actually use, because leveling a legendary to max gives 1,200 mastery XP, way more than lower rarity options, and you’ll want to use those materials on items you’ll keep long term.
Also, make sure you participate in all seasonal events. Limited time events often have event-specific challenges that give huge mastery XP rewards, sometimes up to 10,000 XP for a single task. Don’t skip them even if you don’t care about the event cosmetic rewards, the XP alone is worth the 30 minutes it takes to complete the event challenges. If you’re stuck on a mastery rank wall and just need a small boost to hit the next rank, take a break to level up 2 or 3 unused characters to level 20. That’s usually enough to push you over the threshold without running the same mission 10 times in a row.
At the end of the day, learning how to level up mastery in The First Descendant doesn’t require 12 hour grind sessions or perfect build knowledge. It just requires focusing on high-XP activities, avoiding common wasteful mistakes, and taking advantage of all the free XP bonuses the game throws your way. Try adjusting your play rotation this week, and you’ll likely see your mastery rank jump 2-3 levels faster than you expected. If you have a favorite mastery grind trick we didn’t mention, drop it in the comments below to help other players out.