Crusader Thorns Bombardment Build

After the introduction of a 7th set piece, the already versatile Akkhan set expands its utility further with the ability to add more sets into the mix — in this case, the craftable Captain Crimson's Trimmings and Aughild's Authority sets. The build is designed with Greater Rift solo progression in mind. For more information about how this build performs on the ladder, please refer to our Solo push rankings.

This build also comes with its own speed farming variation, which features a build similar to the present one, but with alterations to fit a speedfarming playstyle.

The basic skill setup of the Akkhan Bombardment Crusader is displayed below. Read the dedicated Skills page for detailed information on choices, alternatives and build customization.

Active Skills
Punish Celerity Bombardment Barrels of Spikes 1 Phalanx Bowmen 2 Steed Charge Draw and Quarter 3 Iron Skin Reflective Skin 4 Akarat's Champion Prophet
Passive Skills
Heavenly Strength Iron Maiden Lord Commander Finery

The required gear setup for the Akkhan Bombardment Crusader is listed below. Check the Gear page for detailed information on choices, alternatives, gemming, Kanai's Cube and Paragon distribution.

• Helm: Helm of Akkhan
• Shoulders: Aughild's Power
• Gloves: Gauntlets of Akkhan
• Chest: Breastplate of Akkhan
• Belt: Captain Crimson's Silk Girdle
• Pants: Cuisses of Akkhan
• Boots: Captain Crimson's Waders
• Bracers: Aughild's Search
• Amulet: Talisman of Akkhan
• Ring 1: Convention of Elements
• Ring 2: Unity
• Weapon: Flail of the Charge
• Offhand: Shield of the Steed

With this Season's addition of a 4th slot in Kanai's Cube as a theme, your ideal setup will be:

• Kanai's Cube 4th Slot: Aquila Cuirass

The former Season 28 theme, the Altar of Rites, has been revised and re-added to Diablo 3 as a permanent character progression mechanic. — For virtually all builds and players of all skill levels — from casual to advanced — we recommend progressing through the Altar tree using the path outlined below. The suggested path is geared towards maximum quality of life first, then amplifying damage, and then mopping up the tree with defensive and edge case utility nodes.

Note that while they require reaching them with a Seal, Legendary Potion Powers are not part of the Seal cost system; Potions unlock with a separate resource called Primordial Ashes, obtained from salvaging Legendary or Set items of Primal (red bordered) quality. Upgrade them as soon as possible, and in the order shown below (courtesy of Caleko's Altar of Rites planner).

You can read more on the Altar of Rites, Seals and Legendary Potion Powers in our dedicated Altar of Rites Mechanics guide.

• Legendary Gem 1: Bane of the Trapped
• Legendary Gem 2: Boyarsky's Chip
• Legendary Gem 3: Bane of the Stricken

• Weapon Slot: The Mortal Drama
• Armor Slot: Belt of the Trove
• Jewelry Slot: Ring of Royal Grandeur
• 4th Slot (Season 33): Aquila Cuirass

In this section, we will briefly go over how to kickstart this build into reality; which items you should aim for with priority when farming and gambling, and what is their relative priority for the functioning of this spec. Note that these suggestions are exclusively aimed at getting you up and running into endgame farming, and might not reflect the gear you need to wear for high-end Greater Rift solo or group pushing. This section also assumes a fresh Season's start, which usually is the point where most players work on assembling their first build with a particular set.

If the Akkhan set is part of the Haedrig's Gift for the Season, your simplest and most straightforward path to assembling the build is to complete the Seasonal Journey chapters up to Chapter IV. The Seasonal Journey chapters will gradually give you a complete class-specific set, giving 2-3 pieces for Chapters II, III and IV.

From the pre-game menu, choose and do this week's Challenge Rift. When successfully completed, this weekly event will grant you 5,1 million Gold, 475 Blood Shards, 370 Reusable Parts, 350 Arcane Dust, 125 Veiled Crystals, 35 Death's Breaths, and 15 of each Bounty cache material: Khanduran Rune, Caldeum Nightshade, Arreat War Tapestry, Corrupted Angel Flesh, and Westmarch Holy Water. This will allow you some early Seasonal leeway to extract and reforge items in Kanai's Cube, speeding up the assembly of this build with the items recommended below.

Having some materials at your disposal, either from farming or the Challenge Rift, is particularly important when you get duplicate pieces of your desired set. When you do, you can use Kanai's Cube Skill of Nilfur recipe (10x Forgotten Souls, 10x Death's Breaths, 1x Set item) to convert into another item from the same set. You should never salvage duplicate pieces of a desired set before you have it assembled.

In order to assemble an Akkhan Thorns Crusader, you should do the following.

• Gather the full 6-piece Armor of Akkhan set using the advice above, or by spending Blood Shards at Kadala. In order of gamble chance, you should spend for: Shoulders, Boots, Gloves, Pants, Gloves, Helm, and Chest. Don't gamble on the Amulet; it is prohibitively expensive to gamble on jewelry early on. A trick you can also use is to gamble for duplicate pieces with an easier gamble chance (i.e., Shoulders) and convert them into another piece from the same set using the Skill of Nilfur recipe in Kanai's Cube.
• Upgrade rare (Hope of Cain recipe in Kanai's Cube) Two-Handed Flails to get The Mortal Drama and Flail of the Charge; these are build-defining weapons that increase the output of your main source of damage, Bombardment.
• Note that Flail of the Charge is part of the Norvald's Fervor set, along with Shield of the Steed. Gammble for the shield after getting the full Akkhan set.
• Craft yourself two pieces of the Aughild's Authority set and two pieces of the Captain Crimson's Trimming set. They are crafted at the Blacksmith, and their recipes can be found via completing Bounties, or slaying Treasure Goblins. The suggested split is Aughild's Power and Aughild's Search for the former, and Captain Crimson's Silk Girdle and Captain Crimson's Waders for the latter, but other combos are also viable — as long as you maintain the necessary 5 Akkhan - 2 Aughild - 2 Cpt. Crimson worn pieces split. You will complete the three sets' full powers by using a Ring of Royal Grandeur (see below).
• Upgrade rare One-handed Swords to get In-geom; doing this on a level 1 Demon Hunter alt will improve your chances due to their lowest loot pool of legendary swords. In-geom greatly benefits Thorns Crusaders, since they are an entirely cooldown-based build.
• Do Act I bounties to attain the act-specific Ring of Royal Grandeur from Bounty caches. This will be helpful either in completing the basic set bonus, or mixing other helpful legendaries in the build as described in the dedicated endgame Akkhan Bombardment guide. Bounties will net you craftable set recipes as well, so you will be killing two birds with one stone. Bounties will also net you Avarice Band (Act III), another farming-oriented staple for most builds and classes, this one included.
• While largely undesirable due to high costs, gambling or upgrading rare Jewelry is also possible; Convention of Elements and Unity will drastically improve this and other builds, with other standout pieces that can be helpful like Oculus Ring and The Flavor of Time for your Follower.