Shred Druid Leveling Guide

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.

Leveling Boss Powers

Alternate Boss Powers

• Sinerat's Flames - If you can't track down Ashava's Poison Breath , this power is a decent second choice as a Main. It activates with every cast of Shred!

Spirit Boons

At this stage, you gain access to Spirit Boons - the Druid's unique class mechanic. Check out the Spirit Boon Progression below!

Ultimate and Key Passive

Fully allocate a few important passives in Ancestral Fortitude, Vigilance, and Envenom, as well as a single point in Toxic Claws. From here, invest in Petrify and drop Earthen Bulwark for amplified Critical Strike Damage, Stun, and Spirit. Use it as a reliable way to set up big hits and tear down Elites and Bosses alike.

After your Ultimate, take the Lupine Ferocity Key Passive, which is a good choice early on for Werewolf builds, providing a guaranteed Critical Strike every 3 attacks and Increased Damage. This synergizes perfectly with Shred, turning it into a high-damage finisher.

Damage Reduction

Focus on survivability by picking up key damage reduction passives. Start with Quickshift to gain a brief but powerful damage boost when shapeshifting, followed by Heightened Senses for further movement while in Werewolf form. Once these are maxed, grab Natural Fortitude to boost your Fortify while Shapeshifting, and round out your defenses with Defensive Posture to increase the effectiveness of your Fortify, ensuring you're more resilient in tough encounters.

Damage Passives

This is where your build really starts to shine and ramp up your damage output. First, take Wild Impulses to boost your Core skill's damage at the cost of more Spirit. Next, grab Backlash to increase your Damage, followed with Feral Aptitude . After that, pick up Clarity and finally, invest in Catastrophe to round out your damage passives, giving you a strong boost to overall damage.

Final Journey to 60

At this point, most of the key synergies are unlocked and the gameplay loop is almost complete. As you level up, you unlock a lot of extra points that go into various offensive and defensive passives or max out certain skills. Check out the skills progression above to see where to put your points as you go, but feel free to deviate from the order displayed as necessary.

Druid Spirit Boons

Unlocking Specializations

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 Druidic Spirit Offerings to unlock your first Boon when you complete the questline.

Each Spirit has 4 Boons that are unlocked with 15 Druidic Spirit Offerings each. On 3 of the Spirits, they unlock in a specific order (from left to right as displayed above). The outlier is the Snake Spirit - You have to unlock all his Boons simultaneously, meaning you need to collect 60 Druidic Spirit Offerings to gain access to its Boons. Once all Spirits have been completely unlocked, you can choose one to Bond with and select an additional Boon from that Spirit.

To get started as a Shred Druid, always equip your highest DPS melee weapon for maximum damage, preferring Two Handers when possible for their high damage range. Follow the priority list below to optimize your gear as you progress. While you may not have access to all the ideal affixes early on, focus on any useful stats that boost your damage output. Prioritize modifiers like Attack Speed, Willpower, and Critical Strike Chance.

Additionally, don’t overlook defensive stats to improve your survivability. Consider tempering your gear with Resistances, Maximum Life, and Armor to fill any defensive gaps. Upgrading and tempering low-level gear is relatively cheap, and the improvements can be highly effective early on.

Tip: For the early game, Elemental Surge Weapon Tempers are very powerful due to their high base damage, especially if you are twinking. If you find these, you may want to keep imprinting them on your weapons for an easy time.

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 or salvaging items with these powers. Check out our Map Tool to locate these Dungeons.

For leveling, there are a few powers that can significantly help us if we have the funds to imprint them. In addition, keep an eye out for powerful Unique items you may find for this or other builds.

Must-have Dungeon unlocks

1. Stormclaw's (Anica's Claim - Fractured Peaks)
2. Retaliation (Sea Descent - Dry Steppes)
3. Unsatiated (Tormented Ruins - Fractured Peak)

Nice-to-have Dungeon unlocks

1. Calm Breeze (Grinning Labyrinth - Dry Steppes)
2. Changeling's Debt (Conclave - Kehjistan)
3. Might (Dark Ravine - Dry Steppes)
4. Vigorous (Steadfast Barracks - Hawezar)
5. Disobedience (Halls of the Damned - Kehjistan)
6. Wind Striker (Shivta Ruins - Kehjistan)

Great Uniques for this build

1. Mad Wolf's Glee
2. Wildheart Hunger
3. Waxing Gibbous

Jackpot Drops

As you level up, you may get lucky and find some great random drops. Some of these can massively amplify your power and speed up the leveling by switching to another build. Keep in mind that there are many more Aspects and Uniques that can be useful to multiple builds; this just lists some of the most impactful ones. While we usually recommend starting with Endgame Builds at level 60, you often can make them work earlier with these drops:

Build-defining Aspects

1. Shockwave (enables the Pulverize Druid)
2. Aftershock / Subterranean (enhances the Landslide Druid)
3. Stampede (enhances the Companion Druid)
4. Anticline Burst (enhances the Stone Burst Druid)

Build-defining Uniques

1. Dolmen Stone (enables the Boulder Druid)
2. Tempest Roar (enables the Tornado, Hurricane, and Lighting Storm Druids)
3. Unsung Ascetic's Wraps (enhances the Lightning Storm Druid)
4. Earthbreaker (enhances the Landslide Druid)
5. Storm's Companion (enhances the Companion Druid)
6. Stone of Vehemen (enhances the Stone Burst Druid)

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 Shred Druid focuses on the following combos:

Best in Slot

• Tam + Kry - The pull effect of Vortex is amazing for grouping mobs and improving clear with Stormclaw's!
• Moni + Xan - Overpowers are, well, overpowered, and getting an extra source of them is very potent.

Alternative choices

As long as you haven't unlocked the final setup or found the top Runes, you can also benefit from these options:

• Wat - Decrepify helps with stagger, defense and allows an execute at 10% HP. If combined with Xol in your other Runeword to generate large amounts of offering.
• Ohm - Though heavily nerfed, War Cry remains a popular choice.
• Gar - The Crit Chance bonus is great, especially early on.
• Bac - Since this is one of the most mobile builds in the game, Bac is great for generating Offering.
• Lith - A surprisingly strong Invocation, provided you can afford to stand still. Note that dashing with Shred does not count as moving!
• Cem - As a Magic Rune, it's a reasonable choice that you're more likely to find.

In Diablo 4, you can level by completing the Campaign, collecting Grim Favors for the Tree of Whispers, completing Helltide activities, grinding Dungeons, clearing Strongholds, fighting in the Undercity of Kurast or interacting with the Seasonal Mechanics. While there are many ways to level up in Diablo 4, not all of them are equal.

Paragon & Glyphs

Use the slider to see 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.

Glyph Leveling Priorities

Coming soon.

• The Shred Druid is a super fast, fun to play leveling build that scales well into the late game.
• Unlock the three must-have Codex Powers and start blasting!
• Poison Creeper enemies to Crowd Control and increase you Damage with Poison synergies.
• Gather Critical Strike Chance, Attack speed & Willpower on your gear.
• Shred through your enemies like paper!

Written by IBoilerUp

Reviewed by Danger