Victimize – Rogue Build for Diablo 4

Build Introduction

The Dance of Knives Victimize Rogue is a spin-to-win build featuring explosive damage that excels in the late endgame of Diablo 4. Auto-targeting projectiles fill the screen and explode with Victimize procs while you are on the move, making this build perfect for Helltides, Nightmare Dungeons, and The Pit.

The Victimize variant build is an advanced version of the Dance of Knives Rogue. Victimize requires a high amount of Lucky Hit Chance and Vulnerable damage to scale its explosion. Make sure you have some gear with proper affixes and tempering before switching to a Victimize setup. For characters recently reaching Level 60, use The Pure Dance of Knives Rogue Build that focuses on damage dealt by the skill itself and Momentum as a better starter setup.

If your character has not reached Level 60, follow the Leveling Guide for the Dance of Knives Rogue.

Multiple bugs from the review build involving Inner Sight and Shadow Clone, among others, will most likely be present in the live version of the game. This guide will be updated with any changes made during Season 6.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Check the build tier lists to see how this build compares to others on Icy Veins.

Skill Tree Points and Skill Bar

Skill Bar Setup for the Dance of Knives Rogue (order does not matter)

Dance of KnivesCaltropsSmoke GrenadeShadow CloneDark ShroudShadow Step

The Skill Tree above shows the full allocation of 71 Skill Points for the Dance of Knives Victimize Rogue build. Make sure you obtain the 12 Skill Points available from Renown.

Puncture is not equipped on the Skill Bar. 2 Skill Points are allocated into the Basic Skill cluster only as a prerequisite to proceed in the Skill Tree.

Frigid Finesse is always activated against Staggered Bosses or activated by a Lucky Hit Chance to Freeze temper.

Methodical Dash can replace Caltrops for extra mobility while clearing easy content.

Alchemical Advantage is activated by a Lucky Hit Chance to Deal Poison Damage temper.

Rogue Specialization

Inner Sight is the preferred Specialization for the Victimize Dance of Knives Rogue due to a bug causing it to grant Dance of Knives infinite charges and a massively increased knife-throwing rate with Shadow Clone. The Inner Sight Duration temper is utilized to improve the effectiveness of this bug.

Paragon

The Paragon setup on this page will be updated before Season 6 starts on October 7th, 2024.

Gear, Gems, Elixirs, and Stats

The following sections cover the important systems that are essential to improving the power of your character in the endgame of Diablo 4.

Legendary Aspects

Listed below are all the best-in-slot Aspects for the Dance of Knives Rogue build. Salvage Legendary Items with higher Aspect values to unlock them in the Codex of Power, and then imprint them onto Legendary Items with the preferred affixes.

Gear Slot	Name	Effect
Ranged Weapon (+100% bonus effect)	Aspect of Retribution	Distant enemies have a 10% chance to be Stunned for 2 seconds when they hit you. You deal x [15 – 35%] increased damage to Stunned and Knocked Down enemies.
Amulet (+50 bonus effect)	Frostbitten Aspect	Enemies hit by your Grenade Skills have a chance equal to your Critical Strike Chance to be Frozen for 2 seconds. You deal x [10 – 30%] increased Critical Strike Damage against Frozen or Stunned enemies. Note: only used for the damage increase, not Grenade Skills
Dual-Wielded Weapon #1 (replaced by The Umbracrux)	Aspect of Inner Calm	Deal x [5 – 13%] increased damage. Triple this bonus after standing still for 3 seconds.
Dual-Wielded Weapon #2 or Rings	Aspect of Star Shards	Knives from Dance of Knives have a 50% chance to shatter into 6 shards of metal on hit, dealing [X Physical damage. Dance of Knives now spends Combo Points, granting up to 3 additional Charges that can exceed the Maximum.
Dual-Wielded Weapon #2 or Rings	Coldclip Aspect	Your Basic Skills are always Cold Imbued. You deal x [5 – 20%] increased damage to enemies who are Chilled or Frozen.
Dual-Wielded Weapon #2 or Rings	Aspect of True Sight	You deal [70 – 100%] Critical Strike Damage to enemies marked by Inner Sight. While Inner Sight is full, you gain x [21 – 30%] increased damage.
Gloves (replaced by Fists of Fate)	Aspect of Elements	Gain x [15 – 35%] increased damage to a set of damage types for 7 seconds. This effect alternates between 2 sets: • Fire, Lightning, and Physical. • Cold, Poison, and Shadow.
Helm (replaced by Heir of Perdition)	Enshrouding Aspect	Using a Healing Potion makes a free Dark Shroud shadow. Each shadow grants [2.5 – 4.5%] increased Damage Reduction.
Chest (replaced by Shroud of Khanduras or Tyrael’s Might)	Juggernaut’s Aspect	Gain [X] Armor, but your Evade has 100% increased Cooldown.
Pants	Aspect of Concussive Strikes	Lucky Hit: Damaging an enemy has up to a 20% chance to Daze them for 2 seconds. You deal x [5 – 25%] increased damage to Dazed enemies.
Boots (replaced by Flickerstep)	Wildbolt Aspect	Every [3.5.2.0] seconds, Distant enemies are Pulled in to you and take 10% increased damage for 3 seconds.

Gems and Runewords

Listed below are the best Gems to socket into gear for each item type.

Weapon Gems	Armor Gems	Jewelry Gems
Grand Diamond for increased Ultimate Damage to scale No Witnesses.	Grand Emerald for Dexterity.	Any Resistance Gems needed or Grand Skull for Armor (up to the 1,000 Armor cap).

Insert one of the following Runewords, consisting of a Rune of Offering and a Rune of Invocation, into your equipped Ranged Weapon. The other Runeword can be inserted into any equipped Helm, Chest, or Pants item. Add sockets to your equipment at the Jeweler if necessary.

Runewords	Effects
Xol Ohm	Gain: 150 Offering — Evoke power from another Class. Requires: 600 Offering, Cooldown: 2 Seconds — Evoke the Barbarian’s Enhanced War Cry, increasing your Movement Speed and damage dealt.
Bac Wat	Gain: 50 Offering — Travel 5 meters. Requires: 100 Offering, Cooldown: 1 Second — Evoke the Necromancer’s Horrid Decrepify, Slowing enemies, reducing their damage, and letting you Execute them.

Elixirs

Visit the Alchemist in any main town to craft helpful Elixirs, or find Elixirs by killing enemies or opening chests during various activities in Diablo 4. Listed below are the best Elixirs to consume for the Dance of Knives Rogue, ranked by importance.

1. Elixir of Precision provides the highest damage output increase.
2. Elixir of Fortitude is the best general-purpose option for survivability.

Stat Priority and Tempering Affixes

Listed below are the affixes to prioritize on gear for Dance of Knives Rogues. Each line of affixes are listed in order of importance. Affixes on the same line are considered to be equally important, but their benefits may vary depending on how much is stacked compared to other character stats. Attempt to obtain all affixes in each line before moving to the next line. Yellow affixes are the most important targets for Masterworking upgrades, while blue affixes are secondary options.

The choice of Dual-Wielded Weapon types does not make a big difference in overall performance for this build. Daggers offer a higher weapon speed to proc Victimize more rapidly, while Swords provide a higher damage per hit. Although there are no Ranged Weapon attacks, Crossbows are selected for the Vulnerable damage implicit stat to scale Victimize.

Ensure that you have a Lucky Hit Chance to Make Enemies Vulnerable affix on a Ring to activate Victimize!

Attack Speed is not beneficial to the Victimize version of the Dance of the Knives Rogue, as it only increases the damage of Dance of Knives hits.

The priority order of Resistances is Lightning > Poison > Fire > Cold > Shadow. Maximum Resistance is 70% by default for each element and can be increased to 85% by various sources.

Armor is only needed until capped at 1,000.

Check the Tempering Guide for more details on Blacksmith upgrading.

Slot	Gear Affixes	Tempering Affixes
Ranged Weapon	1. Vulnerable Damage 2. Maximum Life, Dexterity	1. Worldly Finesse (Offensive): Vulnerable Damage 2. Agile Augments (Weapon): Chance for Dance of Knives Projectiles to Cast Twice
Dual-Wielded Weapons	1. Vulnerable Damage 2. Maximum Life, Dexterity	1. Elemental Surge — Night (Weapon): Lucky Hit Chance to Deal Poison Damage 2. Worldly Finesse (Offensive): Vulnerable Damage
Helm	1. Cooldown Reduction, Lucky Hit Chance 2. Any uncapped Resistances or Armor 3. Maximum Life, Dexterity	1. Worldly Endurance (Defensive): Armor up to 1,000 cap, otherwise Dodge Chance 2. Worldly Fortune (Utility): Lucky Hit Chance to Slow
Chest	1. Ranks to Dark Shroud 2. Any uncapped Resistances or Armor 3. Maximum Life, Dexterity	1. Worldly Endurance (Defensive): Armor up to 1,000 cap, otherwise Dodge Chance 2. Worldly Fortune (Utility): Lucky Hit Chance to Immobilize
Gloves	1. Critical Strike Chance, Lucky Hit Chance 2. Any uncapped Resistances or Armor 3. Maximum Life, Dexterity	1. Worldly Finesse (Offensive): Vulnerable Damage 2. Daze Control (Utility): Lucky Hit Chance to Daze
Pants	1. Any uncapped Resistances or Armor 2. Maximum Life, Dexterity	1. Worldly Endurance (Defensive): Total Armor up to 1,000 cap, otherwise Dodge Chance 2. Worldly Fortune (Utility): Lucky Hit Chance to Freeze
Boots	Implicit Stat: Maximum Evade Charges 1. Movement Speed 2. Any uncapped Resistances or Armor 3. Maximum Life, Dexterity	1. Natural Motion (Mobility): Movement Speed 2. Worldly Fortune (Utility): Lucky Hit Chance to Stun
Amulet	1. Ranks to Malice, Frigid Finesse, Unstable Elixirs, and/or Exploit 2. Critical Strike Chance, Cooldown Reduction, Lucky Hit Chance	1. Trap Expertise (Offensive): Caltrops Duration 2. Subterfuge Expertise (Resource): Dark Shroud Cooldown Reduction
Rings	1. Lucky Hit Chance to Make Enemies Vulnerable (required on 1 Ring) 2. Critical Strike Chance, Lucky Hit Chance 3. Any uncapped Resistances	1. Specialist Evolution (Offensive): Inner Sight Duration 2. Subterfuge Expertise (Resource): Dark Shroud Cooldown Reduction

Unique and Mythic Items

Listed below are the recommended and optional Unique Items for the Dance of Knives Rogue build. Each item description includes the most important affix to target for Masterworking upgrades.

• Heir of Perdition (highly recommended) is a Mythic Unique Item that provides the highest damage increase for the slot.
  • Masterworking Priority: Critical Strike Chance up to 100% cap and Lucky Hit Chance
• Fists of Fate (highly recommended) provides up to a 50% overall damage increase in the unique effect. The Lucky Hit Chance to Apply a Random Crowd Control Effect affix is useful to quickly Stagger Bosses.
  • Masterworking Priority: Lucky Hit Chance
• Shroud of Khanduras (recommended) allows Victimize explosions to efficiently clear groups of enemies by pulling them together.
  • Masterworking Priority: Ranks to Dark Shroud
• Tyrael’s Might (optional) is the best defensive option for a Chest Armor. The divine barrage does not contribute a significant portion of the total damage in this build.
  • Masterworking Priority: Damage Reduction or Maximum Resistance to All Elements
• Shroud of False Death (optional) provides the highest damage increase in the slot due to the +1 Ranks to All Passives inherent affix.
  • Masterworking Priority: All Stats or Maximum Life
• Doombringer (optional) is a defensive option for Maximum Life and Damage Reduction. Remove Coldclip Aspect for this setup.
  • Masterworking Priority: Maximum Life or Damage Reduction

Mercenaries

Once the Den is unlocked during the main questline in the Vessel of Hatred expansion for Diablo 4, complete Mercenary key quests to acquire them. Hire a Mercenary and enlist a Reinforcement in the following setup.

• Hired Mercenary: Subo
  • Skills: Molotov, Share a Drink, Snipe, and Ambusher
• Reinforcement: Raheir
  • Skill: Bastion
  • Opportunity: Cast when the player becomes Injured

Gameplay Footage

Advanced Information

Additional details are provided in the following sections for a more in-depth explanation of the Dance of Knives Rogue. Read this advanced information after understanding the basic overview of the build in the previous sections.

Build Mechanics

The Dance of Knives Victimize Rogue is the advanced version of the spin-to-win build for the late endgame of Diablo 4. Compared to the Pure Dance of Knives Rogue Build that focuses on its own hit damage, the Victimize setup has more strict build requirements. Lucky Hit Chance is required to proc explosions, while a high amount of Vulnerable damage is necessary to scale its damage. Additional Ranks to Dance of Knives are not beneficial, as the skill is only utilized to activate Victimize for damage output.

Vulnerable Damage is important due to its double dipping, meaning the benefits are gained twice, by scaling the base damage of Victimize procs and then applying a second time when hitting Vulnerable enemies. Multiplicative sources of Vulnerable Damage (denoted by “[x]”) from Malice and the Legendary Bonus on Exploit also double dip.

Ensure that you have a Lucky Hit Chance to Make Enemies Vulnerable affix on a Ring to activate Victimize!

Why Is There No Imbuement Utilized?

A bug is causing Dance of Knives to throw projectiles at a massively increased rate when Inner Sight and Shadow Clone are active at the same time. While this bug is utilized for an advantage, it also causes imbuement stacks to be consumed at the same rate to deplete them almost instantly. A Physical-based setup is not affected by this downside.

A setup involving Poison Imbuement combined with Mixed Poison Imbuement, Aspect of Bursting Venoms, and the Additional Casts of Poison Imbuement temper is an alternative option. However, both Physical and Poison setups have similar damage output.

Crowd Controls and Boss Stagger

Damage multipliers activated by a variety of different Crowd Controls contribute to a significant portion of damage output for a Rogue. These damage bonuses can be applied to normal and elite enemies immediately, but they do not apply to bosses unless they are Staggered. Repeated Crowd Controls from the same source in a short duration apply less Stagger to bosses, so separate sources of Crowd Controls are utilized within the build. Stagger Bosses to deal maximum damage!

This build applies Crowd Controls from the following sources:

• Fists of Fate
• Daze from Smoke Grenade
• Daze from Enhanced Shadow Step
• Slow from Caltrops and Disciplined Dance of Knives
• Daze from Aspect of Concussive Strikes
• Freeze from Frostbitten Aspect
• Lucky Hit Chance to Freeze/Stun/Immobilize/Slow/Daze tempers

Crowd-Controlled enemies take additional damage through multipliers from the following sources:

• 1.30x from Frigid Finesse
• 1.30x from Aspect of Retribution
• 1.25x from Cheap Shot
• 1.20x from Coldclip Aspect
• 1.20x from Frostbitten Aspect
• 1.20x from Aspect of Concussive Strikes
• 1.20x from Control

Damage Rotation

Use the following rotation to optimize damage output.

1. If Shroud of Khanduras is equipped, Evade to group enemies together.
2. Activate the following optional damage bonuses depending on the toughness of your opponent:
   • Drink a Potion to activate Unstable Elixirs.
   • Cast Caltrops to ramp up Enhanced Caltrops.
   • Cast Smoke Grenade to activate Enhanced Smoke Grenade.
   • Cast Shadow Clone to activate No Witnesses.
3. Channel Dance of Knives.

Obol Gambling

Obol gambling is a great way to potentially find item upgrades or items missing from your build. Use Obols on your target equipment for a chance to receive Greater Affixes. Check out the tool from Icy Veins for gambling Obols in the link below.

Changelog

• October 2nd, 2024: Guide created for Season 6 (Patch 2.0.2).