Companion Druid Leveling Guide

Diablo 4 Season 1 introduces a new questline to hunt Malignant Monsters across Sanctuary. Defeating them drops Caged Hearts that are placed in Jewelry infested sockets to gain build-altering powers. Check out the full Season 1 The Malignant guide from Chewingnom to learn more!

The Heart needs to match the color of the socket in your Jewelry (Ring and Amulet) to be able to socket it.

With this in mind, let's look at the top 3 best Caged Hearts (and alternatives) for this build:

Use Lightning Storm until you can fully invest in Companions. It offers the necessary early game damage and a smooth transition into the Companions skill branch later in the skill tree. Maintain Lightning Storm's size by channeling it and attacking at least every 6 seconds!

Continue to increase your damage output by maxing out Lightning Storm.

Blood Howl is added as an extra option for healing rather than using potions to help top off your health.

Poison Creeper is the Druid's highest damage ability in the early game, Poisoning and Immobilizing enemies in a massive area of effect around you! With the addition of Subterranean Aspect, it also triggers multiple Landslides all around you, helping you get more resets with Packleader.

Wolves serve as both your single-target ability and meat shield from monsters. Attacking enemies already Immobilized by Poison Creeper enhances their damage due to Enhanced Wolf Pack.

Ravens boost your chance of landing Critical Strikes and provide a reliable method for applying the Vulnerable status. Engage with them to secure additional damage through the Vulnerable status.

Trample is your primary mobility Skill on the Druid. It also adds a solid amount of damage with Enhanced Trample. Respec from Lightning Storm and max out Storm Strike as well as Predatory Instinct. Finally, unlock Trample as your final Skill.

You now want to finalize upgrading all of your Skills to gain the maximum benefits from all of them. After this step, you should engage combat with Blood Howl, then Ravens for Vulnerable, followed by Poison Creeper and Trample for massive damage via Aspect of the Changeling's Debt. Send your Wolves onto any remaining target. Remember that Blood Howl also buffs and heals your Wolves via Nighthowler's Aspect!

At this point, you will maximize all three Companion skills and unlock your Key Passive, Ursine Strength. While the extra 20% Maximum Life won't apply to you, you will still get a 30% damage multiplier while Healthy.

In this section, we exhaust most of the remaining offensive options on this build until we find new Legendary Aspects. Prioritize the damage Passives first, then allocate points into Utility options.

After gathering all Renown in Diablo 4 you have 10 extra Skill Points to spend on every character. Your first priority is to spend them toward the leveling progression we've shown above. Once you've reached the end, put them into these nodes:

The Druid Spirit Boons allow you to select a total of 5 Boons from 4 Spirits that act as a Passive buff to your character. You can select 1 Boon per Spirit by default. The 5th Boon can be allocated once ALL Spirit Boons have been unlocked. This requires you to bond with one of the Spirits, choose one and interact with it in Túr Dúlra.

Once you reach level 15, you have to complete a short questline starting in Túr Dúlra, Scosglen. To gain access to the Priority Quest, you first have to defeat the Stronghold of evil forces that has overrun Túr Dúlra. You receive 25 Druidic Spirit Offerings to unlock your first Boon when you complete the questline.

Each Spirit has 4 Boons that are unlocked with 25 Druidic Spirit Offerings each. On 3 of the Spirits, they unlock in a specific order. The outlier is the Snake Spirit - You have to unlock all his Boons simultaneously, meaning you need to collect 100 Druidic Spirit Offerings to gain access to its Boons.

Leveling up in Diablo 4 is similar to most other ARPGs and MMOs - we're at the mercy of what drops. For the most part this means replacing Rares with better Rares all the way up to 50. If you're lucky enough to find some Legendaries or Uniques, they can provide a significant power boost (discussed in the next sections). Assuming you don't find any of those, let's look at some key stats to look for along the way:

Hint: Press SHIFT over an item to compare it to what you're wearing!

In general, use the weapon with the highest Damage per Second (DPS) available to you, whether it's a one-handed weapon with a totem or a two-handed weapon. For the Companion build, a one-handed weapon with a totem is better due to extra attack speed from the weapon and the ability to roll basic skill attack speed on the totem. This works well with Packleader. You also benefit from extra Cooldown Reduction on the totem. If you can, choose a one-handed weapon and totem setup. However, when leveling, focus on weapons with higher DPS, regardless of their specific stats.

Upgrade only your Weapon and Totem at the Blacksmith and fill their sockets with Emeralds.

Do not upgrade Armor or Jewelry while leveling. Socket Armor with Rubies and Jewelry with Skulls.

The Codex of Power is a collection of Legendary Aspects you can imprint onto Rare or Legendary items at the Occultist. They unlock after completing specific Dungeons located around Sanctuary. For leveling there are a few Aspects that can significantly help us if we have the funds to imprint them:

Before we end this leveling guide, let's look at some general tips and tricks to remember for all classes and specs!

Renown is your Friend. While exploring the different zones, take time to gather Renown along the way. It has long-term benefits for your entire account, including more Skill/Paragon points and Potion charges. Renown is gained by activating Waypoints, finding Altars of Lilith, completing Side Quests/Dungeons and rescuing Strongholds.

Be Careful with Gold. A lot of endgame processes, like extracting and imprinting Legendary Aspects, are extremely expensive for a brand-new character. Don't spend all of your Gold along the way!

Don't Imprint Your Weapon. The most critical piece of gear while leveling up is your weapon, which gets replaced constantly. This makes imprinting a Legendary Aspect on it a waste of resources. Instead, put your best offensive Aspect on your Amulet, which can be used for a long time.

Written by Binashole
Reviewed by IBoilerUp