This Stormclaw Druid build uses Greatstaff of the Crone to attack with Claw and Storm Strike at the same time. It offers a true melee playstyle with exceptional tankiness that keeps it competitive even in high Nightmare Dungeons. For other content, this build is an absolute tank that's practically unkillable while still offering a surprising amount of speed and damage. This build needs Greatstaff of the Crone to function. It cannot be played without it!
This build is very easy to play. The main damage comes from two Basic Skills, which means we don't have to worry about Spirit generation at all. The most challenging part is managing our uptime on Petrify, but even that isn't punishing outside of Nightmare Dungeon pushing.
The build also benefits from several other Skills and Passives. Cyclone Armor provides considerable damage reduction and a knockback for when we get in trouble. Blood Howl is a large Heal and Attack Speed Increase. Hurricane provides Damage Reduction and Slow. Petrify is a very strong Crowd Control that also provides a huge amount of damage, especially on bosses.
In this guide we teach you all you need to know to be successful with the Stormclaw Druid in Diablo 4. Let's dive into it!
This build guide assumes you have a Level 50 Character and finished the Campaign. Level up with one of our Druid Leveling Guides. If you are looking for a different Druid playstyle, check out all of our Druid Guides.
High Mobility ✔
Excellent Healing ✔
No Resource Management ✔
High Damage and Tankiness ✔
❌ Lower Clear Area
❌ Requires a Unique
❌ Cooldown Dependent
❌ Melee Playstyle Is Dangerous
Season 2 - Season of Blood
Diablo 4 Season 2 introduces a new questline to hunt down the Shadow Vampire forces of Lord Zir across Sanctuary. With Lilith's blood still residing within our bodies, the infliction put upon us is harnessed throughout our leveling, granting access to new Vampiric Powers. Completing the seasonal questline, partaking in the seasonal Blood Harvest event and collecting Potent Blood are the main ways of obtaining and empowering these abilities. Check out the full Season 2 Guide from Chewingnom to learn more!
How it works
- There are 22 Vampiric Powers, separated into 2 different types:
- 15 Minor Vampiric Powers - Require 1 to 3 Pacts to be activated.
- 7 Major Vampiric Powers - Require 6 Pacts to be activated.
- There are 3 different types of Pacts:
- Ferocity Pact
have a Crown icon. - Divinity Pacts
have a Chalice icon. - Eternity Pacts
have a Skull icon.
- Ferocity Pact
- Pacts can roll only on Armor pieces (Helm, Chest Armor, Gloves, Pants, Boots).
- Helms & Boots can have up to 3 Pacts, Pants can have up to 4, Chests & Gloves can have up to 5. This gives you 20 Pacts max!
- You can use Cleansing Acid - All to remove all Pacts from a piece of Armor and place new Standalone Pacts to meet your Powers requirements to activate. Cleansing Acid can be altered at the Alchemists to target 1 of the 3 Pacts only.
- Once you have equipped the right Pact Armor pieces, you can activate Vampiric Powers in the Sanguine Circle through the character screen. Powers require varying amounts of different types of Pacts, pay attention.
- You can use Potent Blood acquired from Blood Seekers to upgrade your Vampiric Powers from Level 1 to Level 3.
With this in mind, let's look at the top 5 best Vampiric Powers and how they impact this build:
Best-in-Slot Vampiric Powers
- Ravenous (Minor) - The amount of Attack Speed we get from this is incredible. We don't quite reach Movement cap in this build, but we get very close. So the value here is nearly maximized.
- Moonrise (Major) - Seemingly tailor made for this build, the Attack Speed, Damage and Movement Speed are all big boosts and we can easily maintain 100% uptime on all the buffs.
- Hectic (Minor) - Since we only regularly use three cooldowns and two are short, this will mostly target Petrify, which is a huge boost to its uptime. It also makes it even easier to keep Fortify capped with Blood Howl.
- Undying (Minor) - This provides a ton of healing and our very high Attack Speed means we get even more out of it than other builds. Possibly the best Heal in the game right now.
- Metamorphosis (Major) - While not necessary in lower tier content, the permanent Unstoppable this provides is tremendous at higher tier Nightmare Dungeons.
Alternative Vampiric Powers
- Anticipation (Minor) - Another boost to Petrify's uptime.
- Domination (Minor) - A large damage increase to any enemies who are stunned or Immobilized, which will be most of them thanks to Enhanced Storm Strike and Petrify. On top of that, it executes all non elites at 35% health. Replace Anticipation with this is you want more consistent general damage and don't mind having less uptime on Petrify.
- Resilience (Minor) - The best available defensive option. Use this if you find yourself needing more survivability.
- Prey on the Weak (Minor) - A solid damage buff with almost 100% uptime. However, the damage is weaker than other Vampiric Powers, so it doesn't make the cut.
- Sanguine Brace (Minor) - A nice boost to our fortify and some decent Critical Strike Chance. Unfortunately, the Fortify part has no effect in single target situations.
Skill Tree
Active Skills
- Claw is our primary damage skill. Greatstaff of the Crone allows it to also cast Storm Strike
- Shred is used for mobility with Primal Shred.
- Petrify provides a huge CC and tons of multiplicative damage. Prime Petrify increases its duration, making it easier to kill enemies before they release from their Stun.
- Blood Howl is a solid Heal with very high uptime that also provides Attack speed through Preserving Blood Howl and Fortify through Bolster.
- Cyclone Armor provides multiple sources of Damage Reduction plus a Knockback.
- Hurricane gives Damage Reduction as well as a source of Slow.
Passives
- Toxic Claws is how we apply Poison for the 'While Poisoned' effects throughout the build.
- Envenom is a damage multiplier that's numerically higher than most, making it exceptionally powerful.
- Earthen Might is our Keystone Passive of choice, giving us access to much more Critical Strike Chance, which several of our damage multipliers rely on.
Spirit Boons
Druids can choose 5 out of 16 Passive bonuses (Boons) from 4 different spirits. You have to bond with one of the Spirits in Túr Dúlra to activate two of its Boons. The remaining Spirits can only have one Boon each. Use the following Boons:
- Overload provides additional damage that procs often.
- Calm Before the Storm substantially increases the uptime of Petrify
- Scythe Talons provides additional Critical Strike Chance
- Bolster single handedly allows us to maintain high levels of Fortify.
- Wariness for additional Bossing Damage Reduction.
We bond with the Snake to activate its Overload and Calm Before the Storm.
Learn more details and how to unlock this class specification in our full Druid Spirit Boons Guide.
Paragon Board
Level the Paragon Board by scrolling. Each step optimizes progression.
Stormclaw's Paragon Board almost completely avoids respeccing, with only a small change of three nodes at the very end.
Glyphs
We need to level up our Glyphs to activate their Additional Bonus with surrounding nodes. For some Glyphs, we max our bonuses by allocating every relevant node in range, while on others we take the minimum required for the Additional Bonus only. Because Glyphs at level 15 increase their radius, we need to prioritize leveling them by completing Nightmare Dungeons. After that, we prioritize leveling our strongest glyphs to level 21.
Glyph Leveling Priorities
Level 15
- ElectrocutionFang and Claw
- Earth and Sky
- Territorial
- Spirit
- Werewolf
Level 21
- Territorial
- Fang and Claw
- Earth and Sky
- Werewolf
- Spirit
- Electrocution
There are a total of 225 Paragon Points. Starting with level 50 you gain 4 Paragon Points per level, plus 20 from Renown, and 4 from Altars of Lilith.
Gameplay
- Activate Blood Howl, Hurricane and Cyclone Armor (for Fortify) just before entering the fight.
- Close the gap with Shred and use Petrify if off Cooldown
- Spam Claw, prioritizing Rare/high damage targets.
- During the fight, use Blood Howl on Cooldown to Fortify and keep Vigilance and Preserving Blood Howl up.
- Use Hurricane on Cooldown in a fight or right before engaging high density packs.
- Maintain maximum uptime on Petrify by staying in combat and spamming Claw as much as possible to get more procs of Calm Before the Storm and your Vampiric Power Hectic.
- If you find yourself in a tough situation with too many enemies nearby and you can't Evade or Shred your way out, use Cyclone Armor to Knockback and Slow the enemies, buying yourself an escape route.
- Advanced: If an enemy hits hard, use Blood Howl to recover from large hits.
Resource & Cooldown Management
This build uses Resource Generators as its main damage. This means we never have to worry about managing resources, so we don't have to build for it in our gear or Paragon Board.
Cooldown Management is primarily around Petrify. Maintaining maximum uptime of this skill is paramount to getting the most out of the build. To push the cooldown of this skill lower, we need to proc Calm Before the Storm and the Vampiric Power Hectic as much as possible. The best way to do this is to stay in fights as much as possible and fight enemies in larger packs instead of individually. Use Shred to jump from pack to pack quickly and then spam Claw as much as possible.
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
Many of your Skill 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 progression might be different for everyone!
- Minimum Requirements (Legendary Aspects & Unique items)
- Greatstaff of the Crone
- Unlock the following Aspects in your Codex of Power:
- Rapid in Buried Halls (Dry Steppes)
- Vigorous in Steadfast Barracks (Hawezar)
- Disobedience in Halls of the Damned (Kehjistan)
- Might in Dark Ravine (Dry Steppes)
- Ghostwalker in Broken Bulwark (Scosglen)
- Overcharged in Mariner's Refuge (Scosglen)
- Edgemaster’s in Oldstones (Scosglen)
- Eluding in Caldera Gate (Fractured Peaks)
- Find the following Legendary Aspects by farming in Dungeons, Nightmare Dungeons, Helltides, through the Tree of Whispers, or gambling with Obols:
- Mighty Storm's
Learn more details and how to farm Legendary Aspects and Uniques in our General Farming Guide.
Progression Setups
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.
Gear
Most of our core aspects come from the Codex of Power, so we can start the build with them.
- Rapid is a substantial DPS and healing improvement for the build. Place this in the Amulet slot to get extra value.
- Edgemaster’s provides a damage boost that is almost always maxed out in this build.
- Movement Speed on your boots will significantly increase your leveling and farming speed, while also providing more Attack Speed through Hectic.
- Upgrade your weapon when you have the resources. Any other gear can wait until you find better items.
There are no changes to Passives, Boons, or the Paragon Board.
Build Scaling & Stat Priorities
The answer to many questions can be found in the following section.
Build Scaling
Learn all you need to know about how to scale this build in the endgame.
- Critical Strikes: Thanks to our Gear and Passives we have consistently high Critical Strike Chance in this build.
- Critical Strike Damage: This stat used to be very important due to being multiplicative, but since Season two it is now additive and generally weaker than other options. We instead scale Critical Strike damage through multiplicative sources like Envenom and Petrify.
- Vulnerable: Storm Strike allows us to consistently apply Vulnerable to targets thanks to Fierce Storm Strike. This status effect is a damage 20 percent multiplier, but any additional damage we get from gear and Paragon nodes are additive, so we generally don't scale this further.
- Attack Speed: Since our primary damage is from Basic Attacks that don't use Spirit, we don't need to worry about resource management. This means we can spam Claw as fast as possible, making Attack Speed an excellent stat that not only gives us better damage, but also healing through more procs of Undying and better uptime on Petrify from Calm Before the Storm and the Vampiric Power Hectic. Our attack speed comes from Gloves, the Paragon Board, Rapid Aspect and multiple Vampiric Powers.
- Envenom/Festering: We're able to take advantage of both of these large sources of damage thanks to Toxic Claws, which Poisons enemies whenever we deal Critical Strike Damage to them.
Stat Priorities
There are many stats and status effects that generate on gear, but many are not important for your build. Some stats may block others from rolling or only appear on certain gear slots. See below for a general breakdown as well as a per slot priority list in the list.
Put in the following Gems into your gear:
- Helmet / Body Armor / Pants: Royal Ruby
- Weapon / Off-Hand: Royal Topaz
- Jewelry: Use 1 Royal Topaz and then 2 of whatever Resistance you haven't capped with your gear affixes.
This build benefits a lot from the following Consumables:
- Elixirs: Elixir of Magic Resist, Assault Elixir,Elixir of Cruelty, Elixir of Fortitude, Heady Precision Elixir, Elixir of Combatant Fortune
- Incense: Reddamine Buzz, Song of the Mountain (if not capped), Chorus of War, Soothing Spices
Refer to the table below to see the best rolls for every slot ranked in order of importance:
| SLOT | ASPECT | STAT PRIORITY |
| Weapon (2-Handed-Staff) | Greatstaff of the Crone | Implicit: Damage To Crowd Controlled 1. Damage To Close 2. Damage To Crowd Controlled 3. Non-Physical Damage 4. Ranks of Claw Sockets Royal Topaz |
| Helm (Best in Slot) | Vigorous | 1. One of Fire, Cold, Shadow, Poison Resistance 2. Cooldown Reduction 3. Maximum Life 4. Basic Skill Attack Speed Socket Royal Ruby |
| Chest | Might or Disobedience | 1. Damage Reduction From Poisoned 2.Damage Reduction From Close 3. Damage Reduction From Distant 4. Damage Reduction While Fortified 5. Damage Reduction 6. Willpower 7. Maximum Life Sockets Royal Ruby |
| Gloves | Mighty Storm's Aspect or Overcharged or Edgemaster’s | 1. Lucky Hit 2. Critical Strike Chance 3. Attack Speed 4. Willpower 5. Storm Skill Cooldown Reduction 6. All Stats |
| Pants | Might or Disobedience | 1. Damage Reduction From Poisoned 2. Damage Reduction From Close 3. Damage Reduction From Distant 4. Damage Reduction While Fortified 5. Damage Reduction While Injured 6. Damage Reduction 7. Maximum Life Sockets Royal Ruby |
| Boots | Ghostwalker | Implicit: Max Evade Charges 1. Movement Speed 2/3: Two of: Fire, Cold, Shadow, Poison Resistance 4. Total Armor while in Werewolf Form 5. Damage Reduction While Injured 6. Willpower 7. Dodge Chance |
| Amulet | Rapid | 1.Movement Speed 2. Ranks of the Envenom Passive 3. Cooldown Reduction 4. Damage Reduction From Poisoned 5. Damage Reduction From Close 7. Armor in Werewolf Form 8. Damage Reduction from Distant 9. Damage Reduction while Fortified Socket Single Resistance |
| Ring 1 | Mighty Storm's Aspect or Overcharged or Edgemaster’s | 1. Damage To Close Enemies 2. Lucky Hit Chance 3. Maximum Life 4. Critical Strike Chance 5. Damage To Distant Enemies 6. Critical Strike Damage 7. Damage to Poisoned Enemies Socket Single Resistance |
| Ring 2 | Mighty Storm's Aspect or Overcharged or Edgemaster’s | 1. Damage To Close Enemies 2. Lucky Hit Chance 3. Maximum Life 4. Critical Strike Chance 5. Damage To Distant Enemies 6. Critical Strike Damage 7. Damage to Poisoned Enemies Socket Single Resistance |
Hardcore Adjustments
Hardcore requires you to build into more defenses. Here are some tips to successfully navigate this build through potentially dangerous situations:
- Due to the nature of this build it's already well suited for Hardcore. The exceptionally high Damage Reduction along with healing from Undying make this build nearly impossible to kill even on low to mid tier Nightmare Dungeons.
Check out our dedicated in-depth guide to learn more survival tricks in Hardcore.
Level 100 Endgame Variants
You can optimize your build further for certain endgame activities, such as Speedfarming, Nightmare Dungeon Pushing, etc. Let's take a look at the changes you need to make to achieve the best results in them.
The Speedfarming setup makes you more efficient in farming the Open World, Helltide zones, Tree of Whispers, regular Dungeons, and Nightmare Dungeons below Tier 45. Since all Bosses in the game are not dangerous, this high damage variant is perfect for them as well.
Gear
- We add Tibault's Will, Godslayer Crown and Mad Wolf's Glee for the extra Damage and Movement Speed and they provide. If you find that this is too drastic a reduction in damage, remove Mad Wolf's Glee for your standard Chest .
Skill Tree
- The only change here is we switch Fierce Storm Strike with Wild Storm Strike and Savage Hurricane with Natural Hurricane to shift our Vulnerable procs and open up more clear.
There are no changes to Spirit Boons, Gameplay or Paragon Boards in this setup.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
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.
Why not Mad Wolf's Glee?
Why not Temerity?
Why not Melted Heart of Selig?
Why not Low Life?
Mechanics
Learn all you need to know about how to scale this build in the endgame.
Damage Reduction Vs. Life
Video Guide
Hungry for more Guides?
Druid Guides
General Guides
Summary
The Stormclaw Druid is a true tank in every sense of the word, with a level of defense that can rival every other build in the game. The build is one of the easiest to play thanks to a simple rotation and no resource management. It is strongest when pushing Nightmare Dungeons, but does well on all types of content due to its high mobility and solid, if unspectacular, damage.
Credits
Written by McFluffin
Reviewed by IBoilerUp
