Marauder Cluster Arrow Demon Hunter Skills and Runes

Active Skills
Evasive Fire Focus Cluster Arrow Loaded for Bear 1 Vengeance Seethe 2 Vault Tumble 3 Companion Wolf Companion 4 Sentry Polar Station
Passive Skills
Steady Aim Custom Engineering Cull the Weak Ambush

Sentries are a key part of the build, shooting out your equipped spenders automatically on top of mimicking your own shots. Currently active sentries also directly reflect your damage delivery, adding more damage to your skills per Sentry dropped. Your basic goal in this playstyle is to drop your initial three charges of Sentry in key positions to cover the battlefield and proc the chill effect, and then start kiting with devastating Cluster Arrow shots, dropping the additional two Sentries from Bombardier's Rucksack as the cooldown comes up. You will maintain Hatred through a combination of Vengeance Seethe, assisted by regular Evasive Fire shots and pops of the Companion active. If there is anything left standing after the initial barrage, reposition smartly with Vault and begin the cycle anew.

Similarly to all Marauder-based builds, this variant relies heavily on Sentry, since each turret results in more damage to your chosen Hatred spenders and another autonomous damage dealer on the battlefield. Thus, to extend their maximum number, you will have to use both Custom Engineering and Bombardier's Rucksack. You should use the cold rune Polar Station, whose chilling effect will guarantee the procs of both Cull the Weak and Bane of the Trapped. Try to drop one of the turrets directly on top of the enemy, and spread the other two of the initial charges to cover the battlefield in the chilling effect. If the fight is prolonged, continue the strategy with your Bombardier's Rucksack charges, but always strive to have one turret on top of the biggest threat.

One of the strongest skills supported by the Marauder set is Cluster Arrow, with multiple viable runes that can shine during leaderboard pushing. In this guide, we recommend Loaded for Bear as the basic choice; a concentrated volley of firepower at a targeted location.

With its troublesome cost of 40 hatred per shot, Cluster Arrow is an expensive beast to maintain. Two resource-related skills are incorporated into the build to aid in the struggles of Hatred management.

• Vengeance is a near-irreplaceable tool in the Demon Hunter endgame, due to its base damage multiplier and additional damage reduction properties coming from the Dark Heart rune. You can consider altering this rune to Seethe when you grow confident in handling the build. Note that this Cluster Arrow variant does not run Dawn due to item slot constraints, so perma- Vengeance is impossible and you will need to treat the skill as a strategic cooldown. There are gear adjustments you can make for the inclusion of Dawn however, and they will be discussed in the Gear page.
• The second option is to pop the active effect of the Companion skill, which triggers the Hatred restoration of the Bat Companion. Keep in mind however, that the Marauder set puts all the companions at your side for the small price of the skill slot. The active pop also nets you the Spider Companion slow, the Boar Companion taunt, the Ferret Companion health globe grab and the Wolf Companion multiplicative damage increase. Thus, treat your Companion activation not only as a source of Hatred, but also a damage and safety spike.

While the protection of the Boar Companion taunt is nice, it is also temporary. Occupying the enemy for merely five seconds, and only those in a 20-yard radius around you, it will not be enough to keep you in one piece. For emergency situations, you will be taking a repositioning tool in the form of Vault — a reliable displacement skill that can take you great distances cheaply with the Tumble rune.

With or without Seethe on Vengeance, you will need to take a strong Hatred-generating skill in your selection. Your own survival is another powerful incentive, as the Wraps of Clarity need frequent Hatred generation in order to function. Convenient with its broad conal reach, Evasive Fire also offers the high regen option Focus, solidifying it as the preferred generator for the slot. Another interesting option for the slot is to run Entangling Shot Justice is Served, wielding the Manticore in your hand and dropping Yang's Recurve from the build altogether for the additive damage buff from Odyssey's End. Note that while the damage potential of this alteration is higher, it demands much more precise gameplay both in terms of resource management and timing the bow's damage buff just prior to your CoE cycle. This is not a variation to try out casually!

Custom Engineering is the dream passive of the Marauder playstyle, doubling the duration of your Sentries and increasing their maximum number and initial charges to three. While their numbers will swell even further with the Bombardier's Rucksack, the ability to skyrocket your damage at the start of every major battle is too good to pass up — especially since transitioning between Rift levels resets your Sentry count, opening up a temporary weakness window in the build.

Working in unison with your Dead Man's Legacy, the Ambush passive will deliver during the first 25% of the enemy health pool, and the quiver will pick up the carnage from 60% and below. The 40% damage increase is multiplicative in nature, emphasizing its superiority over other options.

Cull the Weak is a DPS-oriented Demon Hunter staple, amplifying your damage against Slowed or Chilled enemies by 20%. This potent multiplicative passive gets triggered by the Sentry Polar Station and the Spider Companion, so make sure to always have one turret covering the enemy in its Chill radius.

You have a decision making point for your final passive slot. As arguably the safest of the Demon Hunter sets, Marauder can get away with using a fourth offensive passive in the form of Steady Aim, boosting your damage with a 20% multiplicative increase (a change as of Patch 2.4.1) as long as you maintain the generously low requirement of 10 yards between yourself and the enemy. Another option is to make use of Numbing Traps, as its damage reduction and enemy slow will be reliably triggered with your Sentries. If you like having a cheat death at your disposal, Awareness is a free life on a decent 60-second cooldown, coupled with a brief window of safety and life regeneration when triggered.