So, in case you did not know what the Architect does, it's very simple. You get all around better construct stats, but you can only control one construct. If you, for whatever silly reason (foreshadowing) deploy another construct of any type while you have one out, it explodes! You can still store the normal amount of constructs, but you won't get any increased caps like you would with Engineer. The Architect also has rather high hull, which is pretty relevant if you want to go for a Shielded Construct build but can also just be used for Rapid Reconstruction rather well. Either way, I'm most interested in that main restriction, since locking you to only one construct can actually be a massive benefit rather than a hindrance in the right build. I'll go over what you can do with every single construct (minus swarmers) when paired with Architect, and I might add some screenshots of strong late-game builds at a later point (though to be honest, I spend more time sandboxing in draft mode than actually playing late game at this point!) I've done a decent bit of testing but this is far from an exhaustive breakdown, and you can feel free to let me know if there's something you'd add or something I might have missed!

Allies are a very simple build to make for Architect! It is great at doing Ally builds, but they'll rarely be the main source of damage for your build. Allies are just a nice way to get extra damage - I recommend Wingman Interceptors with Overclock. They give a bit of extra hull damage resistance if you take Tactical Link, and essentially act as a secondary gun firing with you! It's pretty fun, though very simple and can kind of be built however you want, so I won't go too in depth. I also think they have the lowest ceiling of any Architect build - including Drones and Bastion.

Have you ever wanted to do whatever this is? Yeah? Well Architect Bastion is pretty bad, but it does have one hilarious use. Architect with Bastion and the right upgrades has I believe the highest shield HP in the entire game, along with very fast recharge. So you can use it to charge Rancor. Is this a good build? Probably not. Bastion is extremely hard to pilot effectively. However, it is probably the silliest build in this entire guide and it's quite a spectacle if you build it in Draft Mode. Just pick Vortex or something similarly fun to scale and prioritize hull power and the super mod Rancor.

For a more serious build, I've had some success with Thermal Lance/Bastion. It's pretty fun to pilot and ends up being a fun hybrid of a crash damage and weapon damage build. Bastion has a unique mechanic where damage it absorbs is converted into hull damage resistance, and then when you later take hull damage it explodes in a blast in front of it! This is pretty useful for ramming into enemies with a lance, since it'll give you plenty of hull damage resistance to escape and occasionally just explode whatever you're attacking. For this build I still recommend prioritizing hull resistance and more hull HP since you will inevitably take hull damage with Bastion. You can take whatever super mods you like, but this might be another good application for Rancor later on. Also make sure to take Tactical Link, as the Bastion counts as an advanced construct and it will give a nice bit of hull damage resistance as long as it's up.

A final bit, I didn't think I'd have so much to talk about with Architect Bastion, but I found a bit of success in sandboxing with a Tempest Break Burnout Reactors build. You can get some pretty ludicrous self destruct damage since Self Destruct/Burnout scales with max hull, and you can even throw in some crazy stuff like Dying Star to make a full on crash and burn build. Prioritize hull as usual and probably go for Hidden Power ASAP to maximize your damage, since Bastion is the only construct that you can build with Hidden Power and you should take full advantage of that!

Mines are for some reason a part of Architect that a lot of people I've talked to don't seem to get at first glance. However, they're quite possibly the strongest thing that you can do with Architect and the best body to build Mines on. They get a massive damage buff, and while you can't set up minefields, you can take advantage of the one construct limit to basically remote detonate your mines by deploying another. Plus, you can always just spam mines for burst damage, and this single mine per button press gives Architect a much greater degree of control than the usual loaded minefields. Architect can run Loaded or normal mines very well, though I personally prefer to avoid Minefield. It can be good if you just care about getting more mines out but I usually end up stockpiling the max amount anyway and I don't like the hit to damage.

My favorite build for Architect mines is Pulse loaded mines. Admittedly that's mostly just because I think it looks cool, but it's gotten me well past wave 200 without too much difficulty. For Pulse generally I just go maximum burst and take every Double Tap I can find. This increases the firepower of your mines, which you'll mostly be using for group and sustained damage, while your main fire is used for massive single target burst. You can take Charged Shot or even Charged Shields if you want to, Charged Halo shield in particular can be pretty effective for AOE damage, since you'll usually want to take Concentrated Blast with Pulse mines and that can make them a lot less effective for groups. If you don't want to do Pulse mines, any other weapon should work fairly well - Architect is just the best body bar none for Loaded Mines and mines in general. You can run them as your main source of damage or just a very powerful way to get through the early game and supplement your damage later on.

I'll be honest - I don't think I've ever seriously thought about Blade Architect before sandboxing for this guide. I just did not think it was very good! What are you going to use that extra health for that you couldn't do with any other build better? Well, I'm pleased to say that I have found a very funny Blade Architect combo. Blade Architect fires one big projectile, with a lot of HP. What can you do to bump up one big projectile? Well, you can Infuse it. Using the super mod Infuse makes an electrified death boomerang that will fire off burning lightning every single tick of damage it deals when it hits something, and due to the sheer HP of Architect Blades, it can stick to big enemies for a while with enough velocity. Whatever you do though, don't take Burst with any Blade Architect build, since it will instantly destroy your first blade and lead to a very awkward firing system. I think you could also potentially do some funny things with Tempest Break, but I won't go into much further about Blade since Architect doesn't do a lot of things with it better than other builds with other bodies can do it.

Addendum: Infuse Blade Architect is utterly absurd. Take Ataraxia and stockpile 10 levels, and the boost to body gear stats gives the blade effectively infinite stats. It ends up sticking to enemies and one shotting any boss with a single blade at a certain point since it just fires off so many discharge bolts! Highly recommend!

Ah, the humble turret. I think most people (perhaps rightfully) see it as just a support construct to build along with your other stuff on Engineer builds. It has only one upgrade path, though it does actually scale rather well in both hull and damage output. The main downside of running mono-turret is that it takes constant self damage, so without a specific build you can really struggle early game. I have a few interesting builds to run with it despite that, and late game the self-damage should be negligible or easy enough to counteract with upgrades. For all of these, I recommend disabling auto-deploy for the early game, since you will want to save your turret during those early rounds when you can't have full uptime.

The first build for the turret is ironically a Burnout Reactor build. However, we're not going to leave our turret to burn to death - instead, I run Vital Bond and Rapid Reconstruction to help our turret outheal the damage. With this pairing, the turret has possibly the highest potential DPS and turns into an absolute bullet hose while you're Overclocking it. You shouldn't have to worry even if your turret ends up destroyed, as well, since Burnout Reactors gives quite a nice buff to construction speed. You can run whatever primary you like with this, though with all Turret builds I like Salvo or a bursty Flak build to complement the solid sustained damage of your turret.

My second build uses a turret more as just a backup damage source while using the powerful Charged Shields + Temporal shield combo to create an enormous slowing field. Alternatively, you can use Shielded Constructs to take advantage of Point Defense's +30% shield effect power and radius while your shield is on your turret. This version of the build is great if you want to use any weapon other than Salvo, since Charged Shields + Temporal requires you to be constantly charged for max effect. With either version, the main idea is just to slow down everything to a crawl while Counter Artillery shoots down any projectile that doesn't decay before it reaches you. Make absolutely sure to invest in some form of mobility though, since if you get lax a hitscan enemy will ruin your entire day. You can eventually just scale enough turret build speed with this to ignore the downside, though it's especially rough early since a lot of its upgrades don't give you the dps you need to punch through early bosses.

Finally, as mentioned earlier you can use Shielded Constructs to make your turrets do all sorts of funny things! Charged Shields and Apex Machinery on a turret make for the highest shield power of any build in the game to my knowledge, even stronger than Sentinel, so you can just stick a Halo on your turret and watch it melt anything that comes near. Anything you'd build on Sentinel is a pretty decent option here, and while I doubt it's going to carry you to some insane high rounder it's certainly a fun little gimmick to try out. Plus, anything that can boast the highest Halo DPS in the game is nothing to scoff at, even if it's a stationary turret!

Drones are obviously awful with Architect. I mean, why would you ever want to run the swarmy, already rather weak and support-focused drones on a body that can only have one construct! Clearly, you should just pick a stronger construct to power up with Architect, and save Drones for the Engineer. Or should you? Today, I stumbled across a build that restored my love for the Architect and inspired me to create this guide. I was trying out some things in sandbox, and thought "Hm, I wonder if you can do anything funny with Architect Drones". I want to draw your attention to a tiny little upgrade called Terminal Directive. "When a drone would be destroyed, it instead accelerates towards the nearest enemy on a collision course and explodes, dealing damage proportional to its maximum hull." On any other build, this is probably the least interesting thing you can do with Assault Drones. They just deal some extra damage. But on Architect...

There's a build on my scoreboard very helpfully labeled ARCHIDRONES in all caps. In second place. You see, when you combine Burnout Reactors, Architect, and Terminal Directive Assault Drones, you get something truly beautiful. An endless stream of kamikaze drones, each dealing upwards of 6000 damage on impact alone and then providing you with plenty of burn for Deflagration if you want it, or anything else you can put your sick and twisted mind to. I also ran Mortar mines on my build, since you don't care about the drones surviving at all. Their only purpose is to kamikaze, and this leaves you nice and open for whatever crazy mine build you can concoct while also having an insane, hands-off passive source of damage. Believe me, I was pretty shocked at how well it works, but it's probably one of the best builds I've ever played. You have it all - Subsumption allows you to easily throw out extra drones when needed, and you can run Rapid Reconstruction to allow you to pump out an insane amount of subsumption drones for a load of burst damage. Mines and passive damage provide a crazy amount of sustained damage, and you can load your mines with your choice of weapons for AOE. Make sure to max out blast damage with Concentrated Blast, and go all the way to Purification, since Burnout Reactors ignites every enemy these drones hit. This is a truly insane build, and the only build I can firmly say that you can only build on Architect. Please, try it. It's a blast. Here's my 'ideal' draft mode version that I topped my scoreboard with! I'll be playing this build more in the normal gamemode for sure, since I'm excited to see how it can work and how high I can score going through normally.