Whirlwind – Barbarian Build for Diablo 4 (Season 7)

Build Introduction

Welcome to the build guide for one of the most iconic Barbarian builds across multiple Diablo titles, the Whirlwind Barbarian! Beloved by many, this simple playstyle will have you moving with ease through hordes of demons across the open world and nightmare dungeons, slicing through anything in your way as you become an unstoppable hurricane of steel. Thanks to the updates to some aspects in Patch 1.4.0, we will also be spawning some mighty tornadoes to help us mow down demons even faster. If you like simple but fun playstyles and tons of screen-clearing potential, this may be the build for you.

Strengths and Weaknesses

To see how this build compares to the other builds on our site, you can check out our build tier lists.

Build Requirements

Optional Uniques

Rage of Harrogath

Arreat’s Bearing

Fists of Fate

Ugly Bastard Helm

Ramaladni’s Magnum Opus

Required Aspects (Non-codex)

Aspect of Earthquakes

Dust Devil’s Aspect

Aspect of Fierce Winds

Skill Bar and Skill Tree Points

Skill Bar Setup for the Whirlwind Build (Order does not matter)

Whirlwind Iron Skin Call of the Ancients Rallying Cry War Cry Challenging Shout

Follow the points allocated in the image above for the complete 71 point build. The additional 12 skill points are completed using the Renown system.

Arsenal System and Weapon Selection

For the Whirlwind build, we will be focused on using the expertise of Two-Handed Axe for the bonus damage against Vulnerable Damage.

We will want to assign our Whirlwind skill to use our Dual-Wield Weapons to benefit from Ramaladni’s Magnum Opus. As a reminder, we want our non-Ramaladni’s weapon to be a one-handed mace to benefit from Wallop.

Mercenaries

As you play through the campaign in Vessel of Hatred, you will unlock various NPC Mercenaries who can join you on your quest to slay demons. Each Mercenary has their own small talent tree that will give them bonuses and skills to help you. Additionally, you can assign a Mercenary that you don’t take with you as a reinforcement to jump in when you activate certain skills. Let’s take a look at how we want to set this up for this build.

We hire Raheir, the Shieldbearer:

• Core Skill: Ground Slam
• Core Skill Passive: Raheir’s Aegis
• Iconic Skill: Bastion
• Iconic Skill Passive: Inspiration

Our Reinforcement Mercenary will be Varyana, The Berserker Crone:

• Opportunity Skill: War Cry
• Reinforcement Skill: Bloodthirst

Gear, Gems, Elixirs, and Stats

Below you will find sections detailing how best to utilize your character’s gear and equipment. With many layers of power from Tempering and Masterworking, to Legendary Aspects, Gems, and the new Runewords we’ve got you covered on what you will need to make this build work. Let’s dive in!

Legendary Aspects

Below you will find all of the best-in-slot Aspects found on Legendary items that are important for this build. Remember that with Patch 1.4.0 all Legendary powers can be added into your Codex once you salvage or extract the item. You can still find some aspects through dungeons as you could in previous seasons but now you have the option to upgrade these affixes if you find a higher roll of that affix. Let us go over what aspects you will need.

Gear Slot	Gems	Aspect / Unique	Aspect / Unique Power
Helm	Grand Ruby	Ugly Bastard Helm	– Explode when activating Wrath of the Berserker, dealing [X] Fire damage to enemies. While Berserking, damage you would deal is converted into Fire damage and you deal x[80-100%] increased Fire damage
Chest	Grand Ruby	Rage of Harrogath	– Lucky Hit: Inflicting Bleeding on an enemy has up to a [20-40%] chance to reduce the Cooldowns of your Skills by 1 second
Gloves	N/A	Fists of Fate	– Your attacks randomly deal 1% to [200-300%] of their normal damage
Pants	Grand Ruby	Arreat’s Bearing	– Ancients you summon are empowered. Korlic creates an Earthquake dealing [X] Physical damage over 4 seconds when he leaps. Talic leaves behind Dust Devils that deal [X] damage when he whirlwinds. Mawdac ignites the ground burning enemies for an additional [X] damage over 4 seconds when he upheavals the ground
Boots	N/A	Wind Striker Aspect	– Critical Strikes grant [8.5-19%] Movement Speed for 1 second, up to 6 seconds.
Amulets	Grand Diamond	Aspect of Fierce Winds	– Your Shout Skills create 3 Dust Devils that deal [X] damage to enemies along their path. Your Dust Devils are [5-25%] bigger and deal x1% increased damage for each 1% their size is increased.
Ring 1	Grand Diamond	Bold Chieftain’s Aspect	– Whenever you cast a Shout Skill, its active Cooldown is reduced by [10-30%] per nearby enemy, up to a maximum of 50%
Ring 2	Grand Diamond	Starlight Aspect	– Gain [25-40] of your Primary Resource for every 20% of life that you heal
Two-Handed Bludgeoning Weapon	Bac and Tec Runes OR Grand Emerald	Dust Devil’s Aspect	– Whirlwind leaves behind Dust Devils that deal [X] damage to enemies in their path
Two-Handed Slashing Weapon	Igni and Wat Runes OR Grand Emerald	Aspect of Earthquakes	– Ground Stomp creates an Earthquake that deals [X] Physical damage over 4 seconds. (We do not care about this part of the aspect) While standing in Earthquakes and for 4 seconds afterwards, you deal x[10-25%] increased damage. Your Earthquakes deal x[10-25%] increased damage.
Dual-Wield Weapon 1	Grand Emerald	Aspect of Anger Management	– While above [55-40] Fury, you are Berserk but you lose 2 Fury Per Second.
Dual-Wield Weapon 2	Grand Emerald	Ramaladni’s Magnum Opus	– Skills using this weapon deal [0.2-0.5%] increased damage per point of Fury you have, but you lose 10 Fury Per Second.

Gems

Listed below are the best gems to socket into gear for each slot type.

Weapon Gems	Armor Gems	Jewelry Gems
Grand Emerald for increased Critical Strike Damage	Grand Ruby for increased Strength	Grand Diamond for increased All Resistance

For your jewelry, it may be necessary to change the Grand Diamond for another gem of a specific type such as Grand Sapphire or Grand Skull to ensure all of your resistances are capped at 70% and your Armor is at 1000. Due to Season 7’s new Occult Gems, it is recommended for Jewelry to use these new Occult Gems instead of Grand Diamonds and/or Grand Skulls. See the Season 7 section for more details regarding these Occult Gems!

Runes

Runewords return from Diablo 2 in Vessel of Hatred! You are limited to two Runewords across your gear and it requires two sockets in the same item. So this limits creating Runewords by combining two Runes to either Helm, Chest, Pants, or Two-Handed Weapons. We generally recommend them in both of your Two-Handed Weapons for Barbarian. Let’s jump in.

Runes	Rune Effects
Bac	Gain 50 Offering: Travel 5 Meters
Tec	Requires 50 Offering: Cooldown 1 second. Invoke the Barbarian’s Earthquake, dealing damage to enemies within
Igni	Gain 25 Offering: Stores offering every 0.3 seconds. Cast a Non-Basic Skill to gain the stored offering
Wat	Requires 100 Offering: Cooldown 1 seconds, Evoke the Necromancer’s Horrid Decrepify, slowing enemies and reducing their damage, letting you Execute them

Which Elixir Should You Use?

Visit the Alchemist in any main town to craft helpful Elixirs that increase stats, and experience gain for 30 minutes. Make sure to forage plants and pick up the necessary crafting materials during your adventures; they randomly spawn around the world. Use an Elixir providing any Resistance you need most, or the new Elixir of Resource (Resource cost reduced by 10-20%). Maximum resource increased by 10-25) for more efficient spins!

Return to the Alchemist again every 5 to 10 levels to upgrade your potion. The extra healing is essential to survival.

Stats, Tempering, and Masterworking

Below are the affixes to prioritize on gear. Each line of affixes is listed in order of importance. Tempering Manuals and their recommended affixes are provided in the second column, and the bolded yellow affixes are the most important targets for Masterworking upgrades. Be sure to check our Tempering guide and Masterworking guides for more details about these topics.

Slot	Gear Affixes	Tempering Affixes
Helm	1. Cooldown Reduction 2. Maximum Resource 3. Strength	1. Dust Devil Size Wasteland Innovation 2. Iron Skin Cooldown Reduction Barbarian Strategy
Chest	1. Strength 2. Maximum Life 3. Needed Resistance	1. Dust Devil Size Wasteland Innovation 2. Iron Skin Cooldown Reduction Barbarian Strategy
Gloves	1. Critical Strike Chance 2. Strength 3. Lucky Hit: Chance to make Enemies Vulnerable for 2 Seconds	1. Damage While Berserking Berserking Finesse 2. Dust Devil Size Wasteland Innovation
Pants	1. Strength 2. Maximum Life 3. Needed Resistance	1. Dust Devil Size Wasteland Innovation 2. Iron Skin Cooldown Reduction Barbarian Strategy
Boots	1. Strength 2. +Ranks to War Cry 3. Movement Speed	1. Movement Speed Natural Motion 2. Dust Devil Size Wasteland Innovation
Amulet	1. +Ranks to Counteroffensive 2. Critical Strike Chance 3. Strength	1. Dust Devil Size Wasteland Innovation 2. War Cry Cooldown Reduction Brawling Efficiency
Rings	1. Critical Strike Chance 2. Lucky Hit: Chance to make Enemies Vulnerable for 2 seconds 3. Critical Strike Damage	1. Damage While Berserking Berserking Finesse 2. War Cry Cooldown Reduction Brawling Efficiency
Two-Handed Bludgeoning Weapon	1. Strength 2. Critical Strike Damage 3. Maximum Life	1. Chance for Earthquakes to Cast Twice Wasteland Augments 2. Damage While Berserking Berserking Finesse
Two-Handed Slashing Weapon	1. Strength 2. Critical Strike Damage 3. Maximum Life	1. Earthquake Duration Wasteland Augments 2. Critical Strike Damage Worldly Finesse
Dual-Wield Weapons	1. Strength 2. Maximum Life 3. Critical Strike Damage	1. Chance for Dust Devils to Cast Twice Wasteland Augments 2. Damage While Berserking Berserking Finesse

Rotation and Playstyle

The extremely popular Spin2Win playstyle remains intact in Diablo 4 for the Barbarian class. Let’s do a quick pass over our skills and how we use them in this straight forward but powerful build.

• Use War Cry and Rallying Cry to generate resources and for their buffs.
• Hold down Whirlwind and carve through enemies in your way. If possible, never let go of this skill while fighting.
• Cast Iron Skin and Challenging Shout for defense whenever you’re in a tough spot.
• Use Call of the Ancients whenever you run into elites and bosses to call the squad for big damage and resource generation to help your single target sustain.

Uniques and Mythic Uniques

Below you will find information on Uniques and Mythic Uniques that are useful for this build. Moreover, if you are interested in target farming Mythic Uniques, check out our How to Farm Mythic Uniques guide.

Uniques

Below you will find the useful uniques for this build. Let’s dive in.

• Rage of Harrogath – With its update in Patch 1.4.0 this will help us provide a substantial amount of cooldown resets for our shouts and defensive options as well as our ultimate.Call of the Ancients We will be inflicting Bleed through various methods near constantly to get the most out of it.
• Ugly Bastard Helm – A new unique from the Vessel of Hatred launch, this helm went largely underrated in the previous season but has received a substantial boost to its power in Season 7 and fits nicely into our build, turning us into a burning whirlwind of destruction. We don’t actually need Wrath of the Berserker to benefit from this helm’s effects and missing out on a bit of explosion damage is well worth the 100% multiplier to our damage as long as we’re Berserking through any other means such as Aspect of Anger Management or War Cry
• Ramaladni’s Magnum Opus – This sword has been strong since the game’s release and is no less powerful in Vessel of Hatred. A cornerstone of this whirlwind setup, definitely don’t skip on this item. The downside might seem harsh but it can be largely ignored thanks to our gear setup and we get nothing but upsides.
• Arreat’s Bearing – The actual powers on this item are largely non-impactful but the all resistance and the cooldown reduction to Call of the Ancients can’t be beat for this slot. This item if rolled well allows us nearly 100% uptime on our ancient friends who deliver damage and resource to us constantly
• Fists of Fate – An item that was long seen as a joke or meme. However, the unique updates in season 5 drastically shifted this item’s power. Now in Vessel of Hatred with a massive 51% lucky hit chance or more if you get a Greater Affix on it, this item has a lot of power. The math works out such that it’s almost always a 50% damage if you get one to roll 300% on the Unique Power, it may seem scary or like it’s nerfing you but it is only bringing you huge upsides and tons of power. A must have for any build that attacks rapidly like Whirlwind.

Mythic Uniques

• Ring of Starless Skies – This Mythic Unique ring provides an amazing source of damage and resource management and will skyrocket the build even further. If you are lucky enough to acquire one replace the ring with Starlight Aspect with it.
• Harlequin Crest – The most powerful helm and most coveted item in Diablo 4. It provides us with substantial damage reduction and cooldown reduction as well as plenty of ranks to our skills. If you’re lucky enough to acquire one it’s definitely worth the equip.
• The Grandfather – An infamous two-handed sword that provides a massive critical strike damage multiplier sending your damage into the stratosphere. The rework in Season 5 also adds a flat 300% increased damage which makes it even more massive. If you get one, replace your Slashing Weapon with it, dropping Devilish Aspect entirely.
• Tyrael’s Might – A new Mythic Unique introduced in Season 4, it was buffed midway through that season and proved to be quite strong. The Season 5 rework makes it just as powerful as it was before with movement speed, maximum max resistances, an incredible amount of all resistances and an innate damage reduction which stacks with Harlequin Crest‘s damage reduction if you have both.

Paragon Board

We recommend using the following Legendary nodes and Glyphs to truly take this build into the endgame. Note that each Glyph’s information and radius listed below is for the Level 100 version. Note that glyph’s reach their maximum radius and legendary bonuses at level 46. Let’s take a look!

Season 7: Season of Witchcraft

Season 7 brings a slew of new powers similar to Season 2’s vampiric powers. You can equip 5 Witchcraft powers and one Unique power. The best powers for this build are listed below.

• Slot 1: Soul Harvest
• Slot 2: Aura of Lament
• Slot 3: Hex Specialization
• Slot 4: Poison Frog Servant
• Slot 5: Hex of Whispers
• Unique Power (Red Slot): Vengeful Spirit

Beyond these Witchcraft Powers, Season 7 brings another new item to further enhance your character. Occult Gems! You may equip a total of 3 of these. One in your Amulet, and one in each Ring. Each Occult Gem provides 160 Armor and 8% to All Resistances in addition to its unique effects. For this build we recommend the following three gems.

• Moonlight Ward
• Friend of the Bog
• Dust Stone

Advanced Information

Build Mechanics

This is perhaps the most iconic playstyle for Barbarians. Get your shouts up, pop Wrath of the Berserker and hold down Whirlwind and spin2win. Be sure to hold Challenging Shout and Iron Skin for nasty elites and bosses to provide solid damage reduction so you can just keep spinning and chop them up into bits.

This build does struggle against some higher level single target bosses but should mop up any large groups with the greatest of ease. A truly old-fashioned and iconic playstyle from all the way back in Diablo 2 now here in Diablo 4 with whirlwinds the size of the screen!

Paragon

We recommend these Legendary Nodes and Glyphs to truly take this build into the endgame and further into The Pit. Note that each Glyph listed below is a max Level version.

Rare Glyphs and Legendary Nodes	Effect
Exploit	– For every 5 Dexterity purchased within range, you deal + [2%] increased damage to Vulnerable targets. Additional bonus when 25 Dexterity points are purchased within the Glyph’s radius: When an enemy is damaged by you, they become Vulnerable for 3 seconds. This cannot happen more than once every 20 seconds per enemy. Legendary Bonus: Increases your damage to Vulnerable targets by [X%]
Ambidextrous	– Grants + [25%] bonus to all magic nodes within range Additional bonus when 40 Strength points are purchased within the Glyph’s radius: You deal x8% increased damage while wielding One-Handed Weapons Legendary Bonus: Increases your damage by [X%]
Ambidextrous	– Grants + [25%] bonus to all Magic Nodes within range Additional bonus when 40 Strength points are purchased within the Glyph’s radius: You deal x8% increased damage while wielding One-Handed Weapons Legendary Bonus: Increases your damage by [X%]
Twister	– For every 5 Strength purchased within range, your Dust Devils deal [13.2%] increased damage Additional bonus when 40 Strength points are purchased within the Glyph’s radius: You deal 13% increased damage for 4 seconds after creating a Dust Devil Legendary Bonus: Increases your Dust Devil damage by [X%]
Challenger	– Grants + [30%] bonus to all Normal Nodes within range Additional bonus when 40 Strength points are purchased within the Glyph’s radius: You deal x8% increased damage while wielding One-Handed Weapons Legendary Bonus: Increases your damage to Elites by [X%]
Warbringer	– For every 75 Fury you spend, gain 15% of your Maximum Life as Fortify
Force of Nature	– Your Earthquakes have a 75% chance to spawn a Dust Devil every second that deals [X] damage. Earthquake damage is increased by 30% of your Damage VS Close enemies, up to a maximum of 150%
Blood Rage	– Killing a Bleeding enemy has a 10% chance to grant Berserking for 5 seconds. Your damage is increased by 10% of your Damage While Berserking bonus, up to a maximum of 30%
Decimator	– Each time you make an enemy Vulnerable, your damage is increased by 10% for 5 seconds. Overpowering a Vulnerable enemy grants an additional x10% bonus for 5 seconds.

Let’s break down each of these beneficial nodes and where our Paragon Points are positioned in each of the Paragon Boards we use. This part of the build is presented in order of importance. If you do not have enough Paragon Points for use in your Paragon Tree, just slowly work towards each step.

Important Notes

• Make sure you select the correct Legendary Boards and rotate them into the correct orientation to match the images shown above.
• Attach the boards in the order shown as bonus requirements of Rare Nodes increase with their placement order.
• Additional bonuses on Glyphs may not be obtainable until they gain the increased radius at level 15 and again at level 46.

Starting Board

1. Start by heading right and grabbing Brawn and the surrounding magic nodes.
2. Next go left and path to the socket through Tenacity and slot in Twister.
3. Pick up a ton of Dexterity nodes near the socket as well as both rare nodes Iron Strength and Raw Power.
4. Exit the board by marching north on the right side path and connect the Blood Rage board to it.

Blood Rage

1. Start by heading up right to the glyph slot. Slot in Challenger
2. Turn east and pick up Wrath and the surrounding magic nodes and continue east
3. Grab Restorative and some life increasing nodes and then turn north
4. From the previous rare node, we make our way to the board’s legendary node Blood Rage
5. Lastly exit the board to the east and connect the Warbringer board.

Warbringer

1. Begin by heading east and taking a small detour north to grab Hungering Fury and some magic nodes nearby for some nice Fury sustain
2. Next head south to the glyph socket and slot in Exploit which help our Vulnerable application and damage
3. Continue south and connect the Force of Nature board at the southern gate.

Force of Nature

1. Head down and then left to hook around to Alloyed and the surrounding nodes
2. Continue from Alloyed down south and unlock the glyph socket, slot in Rumble which will help our damage immensely
3. Grab the rare node Squall and the surrounding magic nodes for some extra dust devil damage
4. We take a detour to the west to make our way to the board’s legendary node Force of Nature and scoop it up to make our quakes shoot dust devils out benfitting our build even further.
5. Lastly head east and connect the Decimator board

Decimator

1. Head in and take a sharp turn south to pick up Brawn and its surrounding rare nodes for more damage and life
2. Continue east and make your way to the glyph socket, slot in Ambidextrous
3. Grab the nearby rare nodes Destroyer and Demolish. While Whirlwind can’t overpower, we want the Strength from destroyer to buff our glyph.
4. Head south and grab the board’s legendary node Decimator
5. From the glyph socket, path south east and grab Pillage and its surrounding nodes for more defensive and vulnerable damage
6. And from here you’re done!…Kind of.

Concluding

At this point, you should have most of your paragon points spend, all 5 boards unlocked, and all of your Glyph’s empowered with their bonuses. You will have anywhere from 50 to 80 points remaining to spend. Getting to the maximum paragon level in Vessel of Hatred is a truly arduous task that requires many many hours. If you are truly one of those few who are hardcore enough to max out your Paragon, we suggest spending these extra points to grab any Rare Nodes and magic clusters nearby the paths we took on your boards that we didn’t take in our initial journey or any normal nodes for stats you might be lacking to gain bonuses for your various rare nodes. Congratulations on making it this far!

Obol Gambling

A final point on acquiring gear is using your Obols to target farm specific slots instead of randomly spending them on random drops. Similar to Kadala in Diablo 3, you can use Obol vendors in town to try and get what you’re missing. With the expansion when a level 60 Character spends Obols, all gear from that vendor will be 750 item power, the highest non-ancestral power allowing you to fill out gear with the affixes or Legendary Aspects you need while also having a small chance to grant Ancestral item power 800 gear.

Check out our Obol Gambling Tool Guide HERE.

Changelog

• January 19th 2025: Tooltips and Seasonal section updated for Season 7
• January 16th 2025: Updated for Season 7.
• November 27th 2024: Aspects and Mythic Unique section updated for mid-season patch.
• October 24th 2024: Paragon section updated for post-launch boards.
• October 3rd 2024: Guide updated for Season 6 and Vessel of Hatred.
• August 2nd 2024: Guide updated for Season 5 and Patch 1.5.0.
• June 13th 2024: Updated stat priority.
• May 4th 2024: Updated guide format and added Season 4 information.
• May 2nd 2024: Updated for Season 4 and Patch 1.4.0, ownership of page transferred, guide restructured.
• March 5th 2024: Updates for Patch 1.3.3.
• February 5th 2024: Marshal Glyph changed to Seething.
• January 30th 2024: Marshal Glyph changes.
• January 21st 2024: Season 3 speculative changes.
• October 23rd 2023: Build revamped for Season 2.
• October 13th 2023: Build Adjusted to prepare for Season 2 launch.
• September 6th, 2023: New format and updates.
• August 2nd, 2023: Patch 1.1.1 section added with build specific changes.
• July 20, 2023: Guide updated for Season 1.