Demon Hunter Gears of Dreadlands Fresh 70 Starter Build (Patch 2.7.6 / Season 29)

Active Skills
Hungering Arrow Devouring Arrow Strafe Drifting Shadow 1 Companion Wolf Companion 2 Smoke Screen Special Recipe 3 Preparation Focused Mind 4 Vengeance Dark Heart
Passive Skills
Tactical Advantage Blood Vengeance Archery Ambush

The beginner Gears of Dreadlands setup puts an almost immediate emphasis on Primary skills use, scaling the damage of your basic attacks as early as the 2-piece set bonus. As soon as the 4-piece bonus is equipped, you get introduced to the second part of the GoD rotation, Strafe — so it is best to acquaint yourself with the playstyle as early as possible. To that end, we will be taking Hungering Arrow Devouring Arrow (although you can adapt to other synergistic primary attacks, such as Bolas) and Strafe with the movement speed-oriented Drifting Shadow rune. This will enforce a rotation of Strafe channeling to keep up your damage reduction, interspersed with manual shots of your Primary skill to keep the damage-boosting Momentum stacks up.

You have a utility-packed skill in the form of Companion, which you can adapt according to the situation. If you are new to the playstyle and have issues with Hatred management, take Bat Companion; for survivability issues, consider Boar Companion; and lastly, our default recommendation, Wolf Companion for the damage boost.

Your obligatory mobility skill will come in the form of Smoke Screen — opening a brief window of invulnerability and disengagement from enemies, along with a movement speed boost proc from the passive Tactical Advantage.

The remainder of your skillset will be dedicated to utility. Preparation will be taken with the restoration-over-time effect of Focused Mind, which produces the highest Discipline gain overall. Vengeance will cut incoming damage in half with the rune Dark Heart, but early on you will have lackluster uptime, so make note to use the skill in tougher engagements.

Passive-wise, Tactical Advantage will bring excellent mobility to the build during the early farming stages; Blood Vengeance is a resource management powerhouse that only requires that you track globe drops on the battlefield; and Archery plus Ambush will work in tandem to bolster your damage numbers.

The build above is specifically created not to require any additional sets or legendary items. In order to transition to a late game-oriented spec using the same set, we have a rough list of high priority items to obtain, as well as a link to the build they pertain to.

• GoD Hungering Arrow Endgame Build — Dawn and Valla's Bequest (1h Crossbows); The Ninth Cirri Satchel (Quiver); Depth Diggers (Pants); Elusive Ring (ring).