Hammer of the Ancients Barbarian Endgame Build Guide
The build described in this guide is intended to be played as a "pure" Hammer of the Ancients build that focuses on maximizing its damage via Overpower scaling. We have a dedicated guide for the Earthquake-themed setup for Season 8. Check it out here!
Welcome to the Diablo 4 Hammer of the Ancients (HotA) Barbarian Endgame Build Guide! This is a fan-favorite skill that returns to the franchise for Barbarians. While it naturally has a very small area of effect, we solve this by using Tempered Hammer of the Ancients Size and the Aspect of Ancestral Force (which, conveniently, can always be imprinted via the Codex of Power). These drastically increase the radius of the impact, allowing us to obliterate almost full screens of enemies.
To support Hammer of the Ancients, we take a lot of the standard tools for the endgame. Our main generator, Combat Bash, is used to keep our Fury levels high and strengthen our bonks with its inherent utility in granting guaranteed Overpower hits.
To help keep things comfy, we also pick up two powerful shouts: Challenging Shout for a massive chunk of damage reduction and increased Maximum Life, and Rallying Cry for Unstoppable status and Fortify generation. We also have Call of the Ancients as an Ultimate to fall back on for a multiplicative damage boost, Fury generation, and a very generous Attack Speed buff.
With all of this at our disposal, nothing can withstand the pure power that Hammer of the Ancients can deliver. And with that... let's start smashing!
Requirements for this build
- Tec (our only source of Earthquakes to activate Mantle of Mountain's Fury).
- Non-Expansion users can improvise with Executioner's Aspect.
This build guide assumes you have a Level 60 Character and unlocked Torment 1. To get there, level up with one of our Barbarian Leveling Guides. See how this Build compares against others with our various Build Tier Lists.
Boss Powers
Season 8 is the Season of Belial's Return. It allows you to tap into Boss Powers obtained from World, Event, and Lair Bosses throughout Sanctuary. The new seasonal mechanic, Apparition Incursions, is available at any difficulty level and gives you the opportunity to unlock a subset of these powers very early on. Various Apparition Monsters appear in these special timed events throughout Sanctuary. Defeating these monsters spawns 1 of 10 Apparition Bosses to hunt you down and defeating them grants you their Boss Power. After defeating the first Boss, continue the event for a chance to fight a second Apparition Boss, after which Belial himself joins the fray.
There are 24 Boss Powers available and the first time you defeat one of these Bosses, you claim their power for yourself. Boss Powers each have Main and Modifier effects to boost your build. 13 are available in all difficulties (from Apparition Incursions and World Bosses), while 11 can only be acquired in Torment 1 difficulty or higher from Lair Bosses and Lilith. You can equip 1 Main Power and 3 Modifiers, and all powers can be upgraded up to Rank 20, increasing the potency of both the Main and Modifier effect. You use Spectral Ash to upgrade these powers, dropped from Apparition Incursions and by defeating any Bosses. Boss Powers also scale with your Paragon Level, growing stronger as you progress.
Best-in-Slot Boss Powers
Main Power
- Grigoire's Lightning Square - A Lightning-themed Power; it's only really needed as a way to activate our other supporting Powers, which is easily accomplished by just using Hammer of the Ancients.
Modifiers
- Torusk's Rage - Gives a decent Attack Speed boost and helps the build feel smooth. It only requires a single Damage to Crowd Controlled Enemies roll on gear to function.
- Belial's Eye Beams - This is the Overpower... power... so it's naturally a great fit for the build, as that is the type of damage that we prioritize.
- Lilith's Wind of Hate - This is used mainly as a tool against Bosses. Since we rely on the Bash Cleaves temper to get quick Overpowers, having multiple targets to hit helps speed up fights.
Alternate Boss Powers
- Flesh Reaper's Disruption - A good damage multiplier that relies on Crowd Control Duration to function. Decent option in the early game before the build is fully geared.
- Blackmailer's Sabotage - Great defensive option that can be combined with Conceited to give it some offensive utility as well.
Learn more details about the season theme in our full Season Guide.
Skills & Gameplay
- Bash is our Fury generator of choice; it is taken to utilize the guaranteed Overpower hits provided by its upgraded version, Combat Bash.
- Hammer of the Ancients is a heavy-hitting Core skill with a moderately high Fury cost. It shines most when it becomes Furious Hammer of the Ancients, which grants it a multiplicative Fury-based Critical Strike Damage boost (and some Critical Strike Chance as well). Ancestral Force Aspect further transforms this skill into an omni-directional shockwave that blasts most of the room to pieces.
- Rallying Cry gives us the ability to become Unstoppable and is also our primary way of generating Fortify. Additionally, it provides us some extra Movement Speed and increases the rate at which we recoup Fury.
- War Cry is a buff that grants us Berserking and acts as a generic damage multiplier. Even though this isn't on our active skill bar, we can activate it frequently with the Ohm Rune.
- Challenging Shout bolsters our defenses. The bonus to Maximum Life that it provides is also a damage increase for us, since it is factored into the equation for Overpower damage.
- Charge occupies our flexible utility slot; it's a great choice for closing distances or escaping dangerous situations. Steel Grasp for grouping or Leap for terrain traversal are also solid choices here.
- Call of the Ancients is a skill we fall back on when we need a bit of extra damage during tougher encounters. The Ancients themselves don't do much damage in this setup, but the buffs provided while they are active are quite substantial.
Skill Rotation
- Ensure that any Shout buffs are active whenever possible. With Rakanoth's Wake and the high Cooldown Reduction provided by Bold Chieftain's, uptime in most cases is generally not an issue.
- Starting with Bash, alternate between casting Bash and Hammer of the Ancients with a 1:1 ratio. As long as Bash Critically Strikes 4 enemies, the following Hammer of the Ancients cast is a guaranteed Overpower.
- Note that this is only possible if the "Bash Cleaves" affix is tempered on a weapon, as this allows Combat Bash to activate per enemy hit, instead of per cast.
- Use Call of the Ancients whenever it is off cooldown, especially during longer fights, for more damage and Fury generation.
- Against Bosses: Since these are typically single-target fights, Bash needs to score 4 Critical Strikes before it grants its guaranteed Overpower. In most cases, this means the ratio of Bash to Hammer of the Ancients casts becomes 4:1. Take care not to let the Ring of Starless Skies buff drop if attempting this with low Attack Speed.
Arsenal System
The Arsenal System allows us to use a specific weapon for every attack skill, with each weapon granting different bonuses. We also have what is called the Technique Slot. With this, we can use any weapon of our choosing to always reap the benefit from, regardless of which weapon we have equipped.
The Two-Handed Mace is our main (and only) weapon of choice, since Hammer of the Ancients requires a Two-Handed Bludgeoning Weapon. It has a great secondary effect that increases our Critical Strike Damage multiplier, and since we are built to cap our Critical Strike Chance, we are benefitting from this essentially always.
In the Technique Slot, the Two-Handed Axe allows us to deal 10% more damage to Vulnerable enemies, which we obtain by tempering the "Lucky Hit: Chance to Make Enemies Vulnerable" affix. Unfortunately, its secondary effect does not apply here - the limitation of the Technique Slot is that it does not allow us to benefit from the second bonus that is normally gained from reaching rank 10 with any weapon expertise.
Learn more details and how to unlock this system in our full Barbarian Class Overview.
Paragon & Glyphs
Carefully check your Paragon Boards to ensure correct board rotation. Glyphs go from a radius of 3 to 4 at level 15 and from 4 to 5 at level 46. Some of them cannot be activated before reaching these thresholds! Progress through The Pit to rank up your Glyphs.
Use the slider to see the progression steps. At around Paragon 200, leveling slows down significantly and all important Rare clusters, Legendary nodes and Glyph sockets should be unlocked. Afterwards, you can min/max your build with minor tweaks and by picking up additional smaller nodes.
Some Glyph position swaps, board changes and other pathing adjustments may occur as you unlock your full potential. The setup displayed by default is the final version of the build before spending additional points that do not significantly impact your character's power.
Placeholder Glyphs
- Territorial
- Changes to Wrath later in progression.
- Revenge
- Used in Pit Pushing variant.
Glyph Leveling Priorities
Level 15
- Territorial
- Ire
- Dominate
- Challenger
- Crusher
Level 21
- Challenger
- Ire
- Dominate
- Wrath
- Crusher
Learn more details about the Paragon System in our in-depth Paragon Boards and Glyphs guide.
Runes
You can have up to two Runewords in your setup, each consisting of one Ritual and one Invocation Rune. Socket them in Two-Handed Weapons if your build calls for them, otherwise place them into your Armor pieces to replace normal gems. The Hammer of the Ancients Barbarian focuses on the following combos:
Best in Slot
- Lith + Tec - While in combat, this Runeword casts Earthquakes for us. This allows us to utilize the damage bonus implicit from Mantle of Mountain's Fury.
- Igni + Ohm - Gives us a way to cast War Cry without having it on our skill bar. For Barbarians, this Rune scales with any additional ranks we have in the skill tree or on gear.
Alternative choices
If you haven't unlocked the final setup or found the top runes, you can also benefit from these options:
- Poc- A good alternative/substitution for Lith.
- Vex - The extra skill ranks help with Shout buff effects and skill damage, as well as reduce some of our cooldowns.
- Gar - Helps cover gear options when trying to reach 100% Critical Strike Chance.
Learn more about Runes and how they work in our dedicated Runewords Overview and Runewords Tier List.
Mercenaries
Mercenaries are unlocked during the Vessel of Hatred campaign and assist you in battle. There are 4 separate Mercenaries to choose from, each with their own skill trees and abilities. You can have one hired (permanent) mercenary during solo play and a reinforcement who assists you from time to time in certain situations.
Hired: Subo
He's mainly used for his Seeker ability, which is just incredibly useful in all content since it reveals enemies on the mini-map; the value this has can not be understated. Aside from that, he just kinda shoots stuff and occasionally applies Stuns. His Iconic Skill, Cover Fire, gives us a pretty decent 25% damage multiplier as well when linked with Opening Fire.
Reinforcement: Raheir
He uses the Crater skill, which helps keep enemies grouped up. This can act as an extra defensive layer as well since it has the ability to inflict Stun.
Learn more about Mercenaries and how they work in our dedicated Mercenaries Overview.
Stat Priorities & Item Progression
To enable the Earthquake Barbarian to perform optimally, hunt for these stats on your gear with good rolls and aim to Temper ⚒️ & Masterwork Crit ↑ them accordingly. The green arrow ↑ indicates which affix is most impactful to Masterwork Crit, and it does not indicate how many Masterwork Crits you need on that particular affix. Keep in mind that certain stats, such as Armor, Resistances, Extra Size Tempers, Attack Speed, and more, have caps that may affect your priorities according to the items and Paragon points available at that moment.
Recommended Endgame Stat Thresholds
- 90%+ Critical Strike Chance
- 70%+ Chance for HotA to Deal Double Damage
- 50%+ Hammer of the Ancients Size
- 60%+ Attack Speed
- 450%+ Damage while Berserking (Blood Rage)
- 4500%+ Overpower Damage
- 3500+ Strength
- Armor Capped 1,000
- Resistance Capped 70%
- 30,000+ Life
- 160%+ Movement Speed
- 50%+ Ultimate Cooldown Reduction
Item Progression Goals
Before you dive into the Endgame with the Hammer of the Ancients Barbarian, take a look at this overview of the items used in the build. See below for further details about the different progression steps and variants. Some of your Skill Tree choices depend on what Legendary Aspects and Unique items are available to you. Keep in mind that while we can guarantee that everyone has access to the same Codex of Power Aspects, the exact progression is different for everyone.
Learn more details and how to farm Legendary Aspects and Uniques in our General Farming Guide.
Build Variants
This section is designed to guide your Hammer of the Ancients Barbarian from a fresh level 60 into the very late endgame using the three variants Starter, Ancestral and Mythic. At the final step, you should be fully decked out with a great all-rounder build. From there, follow the other min/max variants if you want to optimize around certain activities such as Pit Pushing, Speedfarming and more.
If you are fresh in Torment 1 coming from a leveling guide, this is where you begin. Since only some Aspects can be guaranteed from Dungeon unlocks for the Codex of Power, focus on acquiring the additional Aspects via gambling with Murmuring Obols.
Gear & Skills
- Note: If you have arrived here after following the Hammer of the Ancients Barbarian Leveling Guide, it's perfectly fine to continue using the Starter variant described in that guide if there are no issues. There is often more than one way to play a build successfully; feel free to choose or even combine ideas from both to customize the experience!
- During early progression, Armor & Resistances should be prioritized in order to survive. Each Torment difficulty adds a penalty of -250 Armor and -25% to all Resistances and it's recommended to keep both capped at all times; this means having a value of 1,000 for Armor and 70% for each Resistance. As masterworking levels and Paragon points are unlocked, character power naturally scales into the higher difficulties. As this happens, most of these stats can start being replaced with utility or offensive-oriented ones.
- Ancestral Force should be the first priority, since it gives Hammer of the Ancients some much needed area of effect and boosts its damage significantly.
- Juggernaut's, Steadfast Berserker's, and Anger Management are all extremely important, especially at this progression point. The former is very helpful for reaching Armor cap, while the latter two enable worry-free Berserking and Fortify uptime.
- Bold Chieftain's helps keep our Shouts off cooldown so we can benefit from them as much as possible.
- The combination of Ancestral Charge and Brawler's is helpful for clearing early on, and is a great way to supplement our damage while staying mobile.
- Edgemaster's, Limitless Rage, and Inner Calm are all generic multipliers that increase our damage.
- Ghostwalker is the best way to keep our Movement Speed high; we activate it by using both Charge and Rallying Cry.
The goal here is to progress through the Torment difficulties as you unlock Ancestrals, Paragon points, all Legendary Aspects, Temper mods and the most important Uniques to pilot this build. Some Legendary Aspects are used temporarily to fill slots that may be replaced with more Unique items later on.
Gear & Skills
- As gear is upgraded to Ancestral and more masterworking levels and Paragon points are unlocked, we can focus on replacing Armor and Resistance rolls with more desirable stats; however, staying capped at 1,000 Armor and 70% for all Resistances should always remain a priority for the current difficulty level.
- Ugly Bastard Helm is an incredibly strong item that gives a ton of damage reduction from ranks of Aggressive Resistance, as well as a hefty damage multiplier via its Unique effect. The Wrath of the Berserker Cooldown Reduction can be completely ignored; even though this is a wasted stat, everything else is too good to pass up.
- Tibault's Will works in combination with Rallying Cry to provide a decent damage boost, as well as a fairly high amount of damage reduction while Unstoppable.
- Rakanoth's Wake is a solid choice for patching up Resistances, but its main draw is the large amount of Cooldown Reduction it gives. This stat should be the priority, since we have a number of skills that we want to stay off cooldown as much as possible.
- We don't have room for the Charge Aspects in this setup, so we pick up Accelerating for some more Attack Speed.
- Ancients' Oath is another solid item that comes with a ton of Cooldown Reduction. Alongside well-rolled Rakanoth's Wake and Bold Chieftain's, we can achieve permanent Shout uptime, even on Bosses.
This is the final version of the build's progression, including all regular Unique items, Mythic Uniques, Legendary Aspects, Temper mods and Masterworking, leaving you with a great all-rounder build for all content in the game. Additional variants use this as a baseline to optimize around certain activities.
Gear & Skills
- Heir of Perdition is loaded with great stats for this build and is pretty much a no-brainer. It easily lets us hit Critical Strike Chance cap, gives a ton of ranks to Hammer of the Ancients, and comes with a built-in 60% damage multiplier.
- Doombringer is amazing for Overpower builds since Maximum Life naturally scales Overpower damage. Aside from that, it gives an incredible amount of extra damage mitigation and helps us face-tank.
- The The Grandfather is used in this setup to help maximize damage. The massive boost to our Maximum life substantially increases our Overpower damage, and its Unique effect serves as a permanent 2x damage multiplier since we have 100% Critical Strike Chance.
- Ring of Starless Skies is another no-brainer; it gives a bunch of Critical Strike Chance, Attack Speed, Hammer of the Ancients ranks, and a large damage multiplier that is very simple to keep active.
This setup optimizes the build to push the highest possible Tiers in The Pit after you have finished the Mythic variant and reached a plateau in your progression.
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Gear & Skills
- Elixirs and Incenses:
- Elixir of Fortitude II.
- Reddamine Buzz.
- Ancient Times.
- Outburst and Tough as Nails are taken so that we have a way of activating Revenge. This Glyph has two separate damage multipliers and is a strong choice for longer fights, and is especially good against most Bosses.
- When all relevant paragon nodes below are taken, allocate any remaining points into Strength.
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.
This paragon node has two parts:
- Killing a Bleeding enemy has 10% to grant Berserking for 5 seconds.
- This build can ignore this line. We don't need more sources of Berserking because once we have it, we keep it up very often because of Relentless Berserker's Aspect's ability to continually extend it.
- Your damage is increased by 45%[x] of your Damage while Berserking bonus.
- This is the part we care about, and it is the biggest reason why any build takes this node. Even builds that don't have a Bleed source benefit from this line, and it is the sole reason we prioritize Damage while Berserking on gear and paragon.
You may notice that some Bleed-related nodes are also taken on the Blood Rage board. This is for pathing purposes only; the most efficient way to unlock and boost the Glyph slot in this area is through these nodes.
- Bring up your active skills (default keybind: [s]).
- Hover over the skill you wish to assign a weapon to.
- Cycle through the available weapons to choose which to assign to the skill (default keybind: MOUSE3).
To see which weapons for each skill are used in this build, hover over the skill bar in the introduction of this guide.
Mechanics
Learn about the mechanical details which makes the build tick.
Summary
The Hammer of the Ancients Barbarian is an absolute beast in pretty much all content. Here's why it is a great build:
- High damage output from its guaranteed Overpowers provided by Bash.
- High defense from Doombringer and additional Maximum Life scaling.
- High utility in being able to group enemies via Steel Grasp.
- High uptime on Shouts and other cooldowns with help from Rakanoth's Wake, Ancients' Oath, and Bold Chieftain's.
- Low Fury maintenance; both Bash and Call of the Ancients keep it maxed out at pretty much all times.
Credits
Written by snail