If you've been looking for a Multishot style build on Rogue, here it is! The Barrage Rogue is a very versatile skill that fires multiple arrows which fan out starting from the center. It leaves a really cool shadowy after effect which looks even cooler when stepping away after an attack.
Barrage Rogue is a jack-of-all-trades/master-of-none build, as you pick which distance is right for the situation, making it a true hybrid build. Cast the skill at mid range to spread your arrows out for massive AoE, or Dash towards the elite left over to shotgun all arrows into a single target for great damage. Branching Volleys and High Velocity crank up the AoE madness and allows for insane pack clearing potential.
This build uses Umbrous Aspect to add a 7th skill for free. You still take points into Dark Shroud for the extra movement speed as the Umbrous Aspect picks up all perks you put into the skill.
This is a straight forward build that's super fun to play and this guide teaches you the best way to tackle end game with Barrage Rogue!
This build guide assumes you have a Level 50 Character and finished the Campaign. Level up with our Barrage Leveling Guide. If you are looking for a different Rogue playstyle, check out all of our Rogue Guides.
Season 5 - Infernal Hordes
In Season 5, the Season Theme brings your hero back into the bowels of Hell, in the Infernal Hordes endgame activity. You're first introduced to Hellbreach Dungeons, miniature Horde-like micro-dungeons that teach you the new mechanics and rewards systems. As you slay more powerful Demons and Bosses, you're rewarded with the new Reputation progression that comes with amazing rewards. These include Crafting Materials, unlocking Season's Journey tiers and even the coveted Resplendent Spark, needed to craft an uber unique.
Follow the seasonal questline until you unlock the Reputation system, check which rewards suit you most and then follow your regular leveling path. To learn more, check out our full Season 5 guide for more information.
Skill Tree & Gameplay
- Barrage is your main ability. This Core Skill fires a cone of arrows that expand outwards.
- Dash gives you incredible mobility to fly across the battlefield and an easy way to get out of tough situations.
- Caltrops makes keeping positioning easier while providing some nice damage buffs and chill/freeze.
- Shadow Step is for additional mobility and a way to get out of crowd control.
- Smoke Grenade gives us quite a bit of utility from more damage to disabling enemies so that they cannot attack.
- Rain of Arrows Is our ultimate that gives additional buffs and provide utility to help us continue to spam Barrage.
Passives
- Precision is the Key Passive of choice, granting you a guaranteed critical strike upon consuming max precision stacks that gets exponentially stronger the more critical strike damage you have on your gear.
Gameplay
Since Barrage is a versatile skill, you start off at mid range to maximize arrow spread and then you move close to cluster all of your arrows into any single target that is left. Blasting all of your arrows into one target is known as shotgunning. On tough affixes like Suppressor and Damage Resistance, you want to switch the order and take them out first and shotgun it down.
- Spam Barrage as often as possible for maximum output.
- Use Caltrops to keep monsters in position and apply chill and freeze.
- Use Shadow Step to stay close and shotgun more difficult targets. It gives you Tricks of the Trade Legendary node buff.
- Use Dash to get around the battlefield for better positioning for Barrage and to generally travel around the world and through dungeons quickly.
- Use Smoke Grenade for more damage and to keep enemies, especially elites from attacking you.
- Use Rain of Arrows For No Witness legendary node buff and to proc Retribution aspect. It can also cast twice due to the Skyhunter Marksman projectile effect.
Rogue Specialization - Preparation
Rogues choose one out of three special passives that enhance their playstyle. Barrage can be played with any of the specializations, but for this setup we're choosing Preparation for some ultimate skill benefits! This Specialization allows you to have a much higher uptime on an Ultimate skill while giving you additional damage reduction.
Learn more details and how to unlock this class specification in our full Rogue Specialization Guide.
Resource & Cooldown Management
Resource management is a big deal in this setup as we're attempting to spam Barrage as often as possible. Passives like Innervation help immensely. Top it off eventually with a Ring of Starless Skies and you have energy for days or Starlight aspect until then.
As for cooldown, this build doesn't rely heavily on it. Preparation handles the things you want cooldown for just fine.
Mobility
Feel free to use Dash on an enemy whenever necessary to go faster. Rogues naturally have a lot of movement speed, so getting around the open world and the battlefield is never an issue.
Paragon Board
Carefully check your Paragon Boards to ensure correct board rotation. Glyphs go from a radius of 3 to 4 when they reach level 15!
Level the Paragon Board by scrolling. Each step optimizes progression.
Glyphs
We need to level up our Glyphs to increase their power and activate their Additional Bonus with surrounding nodes. Glyphs have a radius of 3 by default, this increases to 4 at Glyph level 15. Complete Nightmare Dungeons to obtain Glyph experience.
Note that there are some Glyph position swaps and a few adjustments to surrounding Paragon nodes once they reach level 15. See the last two steps in the Paragon progression above for details. The setup displayed by default is the final version of the build.
Glyph Leveling Priorities
Level 15
- Combat
- Control
- Pride
- Fluidity
- Ambush
- Chip
Level 21
- Combat
- Control
- Fluidity
- Pride
- Ambush
- Chip
Also check out our dedicated in-depth guides to learn more about Paragon Boards and Glyphs.
Endgame Gear & Skill Progression
When you start diving into the Endgame, you don't have all the tools available to achieve the final build versions. Let us guide you through different progression points to give you a smooth transition from our Leveling Guides to the final build version.
Progression Goals
Some of your Skill Tree choices depend on what Legendary Aspects and Unique items are available to you. While we can guarantee that everyone has access to the same Codex of Power Aspects, the exact progression is different for everyone.
- Unlock the following Aspects in your Codex of Power:
- Rapid Aspect in Buried Halls (Dry Stepps)
- Eluding Aspect in Caldera (Fractured Peaks)
- Disobedience in Halls of the Damned (Kehjistan)
- Edgemaster’s in Oldstones (Scosglen)
- Might in Dark Ravine (Dry Steppes)
- Cheat's in Luban's Rest (Scosglen)
- Aspect of the Expectant in Underroot (Scosglen)
- Corruption in Renegade's Retreat (Kehjistan)
- Retribution in Abandoned Mineworks (Kehjistan)
- Branching Volleys in shadowed-plunge (Hawezar)
- Find the following Legendary Aspects by farming in Dungeons, Nightmare Dungeons, Helltides, through the Tree of Whispers, or gambling with Obols:
- Aspect of Repeating
- Umbrous Aspect
- Concussive Strikes
- Moonrise
- Accelerating
- Frostbitten
- High Velocity
- Conceited
- Retribution
- Acquire the following Unique items either as a random drop or by farming specific Boss drops.
- Cowl of the Nameless
- Crown of Lucion (Optional)
- Skyhunter
- Shroud of Khanduras (optional)
- If you're lucky enough to obtain the following Mythic Uniques, they're useful for the build.
- Tyrael's Might
- Ring of Starless Skies
Learn more details and how to farm Legendary Aspects and Uniques in our General Farming Guide.
Progression Steps
to 100
Inferno Hordes
Cold Barrage
Once you have completed the leveling guide, only the Codex of Power Aspects are guaranteed. With this setup, you can farm the Legendary Aspects and Unique items you need for the next progression point.
The starter is a continuation of the leveling guide. This will have Combo Points to make it easier to transition to the "leveling to 100" as you will not have the amount of resources available to freely spam Barrage just yet.
Gear
- Edgemaster’s Aspect, Rapid Aspect, Branching Volleys and Aspect of the Expectant in the Codex of Power.
- Continue using Dark Shroud on skill bar, following the Barrage Leveling Guide until you find Umbrous. Once acquired, use Caltrops and drop Dark Shroud as shown in the original skills section of the guide.
- We are still in Combo Points specialization from the leveling guide
Skills
- Starter Skills
In this setup, you have access to all Legendary Aspects and Temper mods, allowing you to pilot a much stronger version of this build. Additional Legendary Aspects are used to fill slots that may be replaced with Unique items later on.
Gear
- Work on getting the tempers mentioned to further progress the build.
- Work on acquiring Umbrous Aspect as much as possible by gambling Chest or Pants with Obols. A good roll gives you nice uptime on Dark Shroud shadows which essentially gives you a free skill.
- Acquire High Velocity for more AoE with Barrage
- Acquire Skyhunter for maximum output, energy gain and synergy with Precision key passive.
- Acquire Conceited aspect for more damage while your barrier is up, which should be always.
- Acquire Cowl of the Nameless insane damage from the trick attacks and unstable elixir passives
- Look for better rolls from Aspects that you may have used in the Codex.
Skills
- Here we closely follow the original skill tree.
In this setup, you have access to all Unique items, Legendary Aspects, Temper mods and Masterworking. This allows you to pilot this build at its peak efficiency. Let's take a look at the changes you need to make to implement them.
Gear
- Here we are in the realm of min-maxing what we already have. Look for Greater Affixes for key stats to continue to scale your damage.
- Make sure to reach at least 9230 Armor to be capped against all enemies in the game and boost your Resistances to 70%. The planner is designed to help you reach cap easily. There's a little bit of headroom in case you get lowballed on some rolls.
Mythic Uniques
When acquiring the following Mythic Uniques, adjustments to gear is necessary. Make sure to comb over planner carefully.
Tyrael's Might is a god tier Mythic unique that should be slotted whenever you find one. Not only does this thing give incredible damage reduction across the board, but the insane amount of resistances it gives allows you to cap resistances as well as armor very easily.
Ring of Starless Skies is another great item can be directly slotted in place of the legendary ring. While the stacking effect and upkeep takes some time getting use to, it's a big buff if you get your hands on one.
Skills
- No changes to Skills
We updated out of the previous version of the guide, but for those that enjoyed the older version, here's the planner and the skills for you to follow. Click on the planner itself to look for cold variations of the build.
Gear
- Gear for Combo Points Cold Barrage
Skills
- Here we closely follow the tree.
Hardcore Adjustments
- You can replace Dexterity and Dodge with Maximum Life on gear.
- Focus on acquiring Doombringer and include it instead of an offensive aspect.
- Take more defensive minded aspects in place of utility aspects on Chest and Pants.
Build Scaling
Learn about the important build scaling mechanics and stat weights.
- Damage Per Dark Shroud: Tempering these on all slots increases your damage output. We take this over Critical Strike Damage tempers to make our damage more consistent when the Precision Key Passive isn't active (Precision is only active 1 out of every 3 shots). This will lead to better clearing and boss damage overall.
- Critical Strike Damage: The key passive Precision scales well with Critical Strike Damage. Get as much of this stat on gear and paragon.
- Don't get hit: Snipe enemies from a distance and use Evade to stay out of danger.
- Defensive Legendaries: Aspect of Might and Cheat's Aspect are both great defensive aspects as you're always attacking and have access to a Crowd Control. Aspect of Disobedience is good too after you pick up a bit of attack speed. Umbrous Aspect is excellent as it gives you free Dark Shroud shadows just for attacking. The best defense however is not to get hit.
- Movement Speed: One of the most important stats you can get for defense. The faster you are, the easier it is to dodge and not get hit. Stack as much of this as you can with Haste, Subverting Dark Shroud, and movement speed stats on boots and amulet.
- Stack Defense on Chest and Pants: These 2 gear slots provide the most protection for your character, stats that are difficult to get elsewhere. If you feel squishy, it is probably because you're lacking defensive stats on these slots.
Our Damage Explained article explains how to scale your Offense.
Learn all you need to know to scale Defense with our Defense Explained Article.
Stat Priorities & Gear Options
To enable your build to perform optimally, you need to reach certain Stat "Breakpoints". Some examples are reaching 100% to Critically Strike, or 20 Resource per second. Since there are many values of these stats on different pieces of gear, read the checklist below and refer to the recommended Tempered Affixes and Masterwork Crits ↑. Desirable Greater Affixes will always be the top three recommended Affixes.
Recommended Stat Thresholds
- 6+ Innervation Ranks
- 9+ total Barrage Ranks
- 5+ total Dark Shroud Ranks
- 1000+ Dexterity
- 30% Attack Speed Bonus
- 1200%+ Critical Strike Damage
- 1000%+ Damage Per Dark Shroud (5 shadows. See build scaling above on why we take this temper on gear).
- Armor Capped 9,230
- Resistance Capped 70%
- 30,000+ Life
- 20%+ Dodge Chance
- 150%+ Movement Speed
- 15%+ Chance to Freeze/Stun
- Helm: Cowl of the Nameless
- Trick Attacks ↑
- Unstable Elixirs ↑
- Rapid Gambits
- Crowd Control Duration
- Chest Armor: Cheat's
- If you find a Tyrael's Might, wear this instead.
- Dark Shroud Ranks ↑
- Armor
- Maximum Life
- Dexterity
- ⚒️ Armor %
- ⚒️ Chance to Freeze/Stun/Daze
- Gloves: Concussive Strikes
- Ranks to Barrage ↑
- Critical Strike Damage
- Attack Speed
- Dexterity
- ⚒️ Damage Per Dark Shroud
- ⚒️ Chance to Freeze/Stun/Daze
- Pants: Umbrous
- (Stats changes in the Mythic Unique Variation)
- All resistance
- Maximum Life ↑
- Dexterity ↑
- Dodge
- ⚒️ Ranks to Second Wind
- ⚒️ Freeze/Stun/Daze
- Boots: Frostbitten
- Movement Speed ↑
- Maximum Life
- Dexterity ↑
- Dodge
- ⚒️ Movement Speed
- ⚒️ Barrier Generation
- Amulet: Branching Volleys
- 1. Ranks to Frigid Finesse ↑
- 2. Ranks to Unstable Elixirs ↑
- 3. Ranks to Malicey
- 4. Ranks to Weapon Mastery
- 5. % Dexterity
- 6. Ranks to Exploit
- 7. Maximum Life
- 8. Cooldown Reduction
- 9. Lucky Hit Chance
- ⚒️ Damage Per Dark Shroud
- ⚒️ +3 Innervation
- Rings: Starlight & High Velocity.
- Critical Strike Damage ↑
- Attack Speed
- Dexterity
- Maximum Life
- ⚒️ Damage Per Dark Shroud ↑
- ⚒️ +3 Innervation
- Bow: Skyhunter
- Critical Strike Damage ↑
- Attack Speed
- % Chance for Marksman Projectiles to Cast Twice ↑
- Ranks to Stutter Step
- Main Hand: Conceited
- Dexterity
- Critical Strike Damage ↑
- Maximum Health
- Resource Cost Reduction
- ⚒️ Barrage Projectiles
- ⚒️ Damage Per Dark Shroud
- Off-Hand: Retribution
- Dexterity
- Critical Strike Damage ↑
- Maximum Health
- Resource Cost Reduction
- ⚒️ Caltrops Duration
- ⚒️ Damage Per Dark Shroud
Fill your item's sockets with the following:
- Royal Diamond into Weapons to scale the No Witness Legendary node.
- Royal Ruby into Armor for more survivability.
- Royal Emerald/Royal Topaz/Royal Ruby or Royal Skull in rings depending on what you need capped/variation you are playing.
FAQ & Mechanics
Once a guide is released, many players have questions on why and how we are approaching certain choices. In this section you can find the answers to the questions that have been asked the most.
WTF, why are we taking Damage Per Dark Shroud Tempers?
I was following the old guide. What gives?
No more Umbracrux?
Preparation instead of Combo Points?
I feel squishy, how can I increase survivability?
How are Dark Shroud stacks generated in this build?
Mechanics
Dark Shroud Scaling
Attack Speed Caps
Video Guide
Summary
The Barrage Rogue is a versatile hybrid capable of tackling all situations. It takes some time to get use to knowing when to stay back and when to go in for the kill, but overall it's a really fun build to play and brings back the glory of Multishot!
- Pick your positions wisely. Know when to spray AoE and when to shotgun single targets
- Use Agility Skills cleverly to gain advantages in combat, rather it be positioning or keeping distant.
- Spam Rain of Arrows when it's off cooldown to maintain buffs and utility.
- Use Caltrops and Smoke Grenade to keep control and scale your damage on harder targets such as elites and bosses.
Credits
Written by: DiEoxidE
Reviewed by: Tenkiei, Wudijo