Welcome to the Twisting Blades Rogue Endgame guide! This is an extraordinary speedfarming build that clears faster than almost anything else in the game. However, such power comes at a price: Your defenses are mediocre and it has a high skill ceiling. If you are looking for a fun & agile Rogue build, you've come to the right place!
Twisting Blades is a two-step melee attack: At first, you attack a single enemy for a moderate amount of damage, then the blades return to you from that enemy's position after a short delay. These returning blades are the core of the build and what you need to play around to succeed. On their path, they hit all enemies for high damage and combined with various mobility skills like Evade, Dash and Shadow Step you can annihilate entire packs at once during their flight.
There are different variations of this build, combining this Core Skill with varying Imbuements and other effects (see more in the Progression/Variants sections below). All in all, Twisting Blades is a very versatile skill that can do everything well, making this build a great allrounder choice. While it may be difficult to get the hang of it right away when you first play it, don't despair! With some practice and our guide, you too are able to succeed with the Twisting Blades Rogue in Diablo 4. Let's get started!
This build guide assumes you have a Level 50 Character and finished the Campaign. Level up with our Twisting Blades Leveling Guide. If you are looking for a different Rogue playstyle, check out all of our Rogue Guides.
Season 3 - Season of the Construct
In Season 3, you obtain the Seneschal Construct through the Season Questline, then collect Governing Stones or Tuning Stones to add attacks and augment them to support your build. Only certain Tuning Stones work with a particular Governing Stone. Look at the bottom of any Tuning Stone tooltip to see if it is compatible with your Construct's currently equipped Stones. Lastly, they can be leveled up by getting duplicates to max out their power. Check out our full Season 3 guide for more information.
Recommended Stones
- Tempest - This ability hits at a fast rate and can apply buffs at range reliably.
- Slowing Support - Helps us to trigger damage to crowd controlled enemies and the Wiles Paragon node.
- Efficiency Support - Critical Strike Chance is paramount.
- Safeguard Support - Provides free extra damage reduction.
- Flash of Adrenaline - A free damage buff to boost our character further.
- Duration Support - To improve the uptime of the buff.
- Tactical Support - To improve the uptime of the buff.
- Fortify Support - Rogues have no other access to Fortify so this adds free damage reduction.
Unique Stones
If you get the two Unique stones, make the following adjustments:
- Evernight: Replace Safeguard Support.
- Genesis: Replace Fortify Support.
Alternative Stones
Many other options are possible to support this build, including different Governing Stones to apply the effects. Feel free to experiment!
Governing Stones
- Autodefense - Great to increase survivability.
- Reconstruct - To recover health more reliably.
Tuning Stones
- Poison Support - Can be combined with Debilitating Toxins for additional defense.
- Frigid Support - Can be combined with Frigid Finesse for additional damage and stagger.
- Breaking Support - Helps to keep up Vulnerable and remove Barrier from enemies in Nightmare Dungeons or monsters like Knights and the Butcher.
- Resource Support - Helps to keep the setup smooth to play.
If you are lucky enough to get either Evernight or Genesis from Uber Malphas, you want to swap them in on your Construct for their powerful effects.
Eternal Realm
The build doesn't change in a significant way between Seasonal and Eternal game modes. You may be a bit weaker, slower, squishier or your Construct may not deal some additional damage, but the build is designed to work without it.
Skill Tree & Gameplay
- Twisting Blades is our main damage skill. In order to use it effectively against monster packs, you have to utilize the returning blades to hit as many targets as possible.
- Against multiple enemies, attack different targets 1-3 times, then run, Dash or Shadow Step away so that the returning blades can do their job.
- On short single target encounters, simply spam this skill as much as possible.
- On longer single target encounters, switch to a 1:1 or a 3:1 rotation between Puncture and Twisting Blades to build Combo Points for better resource efficiency.
- Dash and Shadow Step are our mobility skills. Dash can be used freely while Shadow Step requires a target, so it should be prioritized to engage new packs. It can also be used to teleport up or down cliffs in outdoor content. Avoid wasting Imbuement charges on either of these two skills.
- Shadow Imbuement blows up packs and helps us to restore Energy with Consuming Shadows. It also helps to spread the Vulnerable debuff more easily for a damage boost until the Exploit Glyphs comes online.
- Cold Imbuement is our second Imbuement skill that helps with single target damage against elites, makes fights more safe and helps to stagger bosses. Make sure to keep this skill ready when a boss is about to be fully staggered and go for a devastating nuke.
- Concealment provides extra Movement Speed, Energy, Unstoppable and Vulnerable all at once, triggering various effects such Tibault's Will, Ghostwalker and most importantly Nightstalker.
- Whenever Vulnerable falls off or you're low on Energy, use Puncture to solve both problems and to build Combo Points for more damage output.
Rogue Specialization
Combo Points - Use Basic Skills to boost your subsequent Core Skills.
Whenever you fight bigger enemies, use this effect to boost your Energy efficiency so you don't run out of resources. Against weaker foes, this may not be necessary. Combo Points are displayed above your XP bar near the bottom of the screen.
Building up Combo Points with your Basic Skill gives you more damage and added Movement Speed after using Twisting Blades. This allows for high damage output with low Energy consumption.
Learn more details and how to unlock this system in our full Rogue Specialization Guide.
Resource & Cooldown Management
Managing your Resources and Cooldowns is crucial to the success of this build.
Ravenous Aspect
This is a great resource tool and can be acquired early from the Codex of Power. Even the minimum roll has great value and smooths out the Energy recovery from the start.
Aspect of the Umbral
While this Aspect is usually better than Ravenous, it's a very rare find and thus not included in the standard setup as the Codex version has a low value. However, it allows us to generate tons of Energy with multiple ways to trigger it:
- Daze from Twisting Blades
- Slow from Puncture
- Slow from Lucky Hit: Chance to Slow stat on Gloves
- Knockdown from Trick Attacks
- Stun from Shadow Crash
- Chill/Freeze from Icy Alchemist's
All in all, this resource aspect is a big enabler for the build and almost single-handedly allows you to spam your Core Skill without downtime. If you happen to get a good roll of Umbral, you can replace Ravenous with it for even better Energy recovery (gamble Rings).
Tibault's Will
Once you acquire these Pants, you should no longer struggle with resources as long as you activate Unstoppable regularly (Concealment & Shadow Step) and can drop Ravenous or Umbral. Be aware that activating Unstoppable again while it's still up only prolongs the damage buff without recovering resources.
Energy Cost Reduction
Your amulet can roll a good amount of Energy Cost Reduction that helps with Energy management. Prioritize getting a good roll there.
Shadow Imbuement
Together with Consuming Shadows, you can recovery Energy by defeating enemies. When you run low on resources and see a large pack of monsters ahead, use this skill to fill up your entire bar. Especially early in the progression this is a great tool for resources but becomes less relevant with better gear.
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!
Twisting Blades Rogue Endgame Paragon
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
To Level 15
- Closer
- Exploit
- Nightstalker
- Turf
- Control
To Level 21
- Turf
- Closer
- Exploit
- Control
- Nightstalker
Glyphs for Level 100 Endgame Variants
After finishing your main setup, also level the following Glyphs for other build variants:
- Bane
- Canny
- Tracker
- Efficacy
There are a total of 225 Paragon Points. Starting with level 50 you gain 4 Paragon Points per level, including 20 from Renown, and 4 from Altars of Lilith. Also check out our dedicated in-depth guides to learn more about Paragon Boards and Glyphs.
Endgame Progression & Variants
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:
- Resistant Assailant's from the Season Journey
- Juggernaut's from the Season Journey (alternative: Disobedience from Halls of the Damned in Kehjistan)
- Bladedancer in Jalal's Vigil (Scosglen)
- Ravenous in Shifting City (Dry Steppes)
- Edgemaster’s in Oldstones (Scosglen)
- Might in Dark Ravine (Dry Steppes)
- Ghostwalker in Broken Bulwark (Scosglen)
- Corruption in Renegade's Retreat (Kehjistan)
- Shared Misery in Oblivion (Hawezar)
- Expectant in Underroot (Scosglen)
- Energizing in Sanguine Chapel (Fractured Peaks)
- Find the following Legendary Aspects either as a random drop or by gambling with Obols:
- Accelerating: Gamble Daggers. This aspect adds a lot of extra Attack Speed to smooth out the playstyle once you have enough resource recovery. This replaces Shared Misery.
- Icy Alchemist's: Gamble Daggers. Since we cast Shadow Imbuement very frequently, we can trigger more crowd controls and Frigid Finesse easily. This replaces Energizing.
- Elements: Gamble Daggers. Once you have the full setup completed including Tibault's Will, you should no longer struggle with Energy recovery. At this point we replace Ravenous or Umbral for another damage aspect.
- Acquire the following Unique items either as a random drop or by farming specific Boss drops. Note: You cannot gamble Unique items with obols!
- Tibault's Will: With Shadow Step + Ravager it's easy to trigger this effect for a huge damage boost and resource recovery. If you feel too squishy with this item, use a defensive legendary instead.
- Penitent Greaves: Together with Control and Frigid Finesse this pair of Boots becomes a powerful damage boost. In the lategame you have capped Movement Speed (200%) nearly all the time and we can replace Ghostwalker.
- Condemnation: This is an optional choice that allows us to replace an offensive aspect like Elements for the chance to proc extra Combo Points and deal more damage on full combos.
- Godslayer Crown: This item is used in the Pinnacle Boss variant of the build for massive burst damage.
- If you get lucky with Uber Unique drops, consider the following adjustments:
- Harlequin Crest or Andariel's Visage: Replace Uncanny Treachery but make sure you still have enough Armor from other sources (e.g. by also adding Disobedience on your Amulet).
- Doombringer: This sword is an incredible defensive boost in an offensive slot and can replace Elements or Edgemaster’s for better survivability in high-end content.
- Ring of Starless Skies: This ring grants an amazing damage and resource bonus that can replace Elements or Edgemaster’s.
- Melted Heart of Selig: This amulet can replace Ghostwalker for better survivability in high-end content.
Learn more details and how to farm Legendary Aspects and Uniques in our General Farming Guide.
Progression Steps
Codex
Endgame
Speedfarming
Dungeons
Bosses
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
- Unlock all the Codex Powers mentioned above and start imprinting your items. Some of them are used only temporarily as a filler.
- Instead of the weapon, Bladedancer is also great to put on the Amulet if you are low on resources because you can use Amulets for a long time.
- An important enabler for the build is Resistant Assailant's so prioritize imprinting this Aspect to synergize with Nightstalker.
- If you don't have Juggernaut's available, go with Disobedience.
- Resource aspects can only go on Rings,
- Focus on getting + Skill ranks, Close Damage, Core Skill Damage and Life on your items.
- Start working towards capping your Resistances and Armor.
Skills
- This is the starter version of the build and stays nearly the same throughout the progression steps.
- Replace Blended Shadow Imbuement with Mixed Shadow Imbuement as soon as you can activate the Exploit Glyph to apply Vulnerable.
- Replace Shadow Crash + Consuming Shadows with more ranks in Concealment once your resources start feeling better.
Gameplay
Follow the general skill rotation described in the section above. While you're still starting out with this build, you may be Energy starved occasionally until you unlock your final form. Play around Concealment and the Shadow Imbuement + Consuming Shadows combo to keep your resources high. Use your Basic Skill during downtime and to apply Vulnerable.
In this setup, you have access to all Legendary Aspects, 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
- With more Cooldown Reduction, you are able to spam your abilities more often while enjoying better Energy management from your Resource Generation on Rings.
- Weak Codex aspects are replaced with better drops and various other adjustments round out the build.
- If you don't have Juggernaut's available, go with Disobedience.
- At this point, try to gather weapons that have the Damage to Crowd Controlled Enemies stat to boost the Close Quarters Combat Key Passive.
- Start working on capping your resists up to 70% each and stack enough Armor (8000-9200) to progress through Torment difficulty.
Skills
- This is the endgame version of the build and stays nearly the same throughout the progression steps.
- Replace Blended Shadow Imbuement with Mixed Shadow Imbuement as soon as you can activate the Exploit Glyph to apply Vulnerable.
- Replace Shadow Crash + Consuming Shadows with more ranks in Concealment once your resources start feeling better.
Gameplay
Follow the general skill rotation described in the section above. At this point, you should start seeing the fruits of your labor with better Energy recovery. Depending on your drop luck you may need to pay more or less attention to your resources until you move to the final setup later.
In this setup, you have access to all Unique items and Legendary Aspects. 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
- Tibault's Will is our unique of choice for this build because we can trigger it easily for a massive damage boost. If you feel too squishy, you can run with a defensive legendary item instead.
- Penitent Greaves is a big damage improvement, allows us to run fast at nearly all times and helps with staggering bosses.
- Condemnation: This is an optional choice that allows us to replace an offensive aspect like Elements for the chance to proc extra Combo Points and deal more damage on full combos.
- If you haven't acquired any gloves with "Lucky Hit: Chance to Slow" yet, work on these as much as you can to help trigger the damage reduction from Paragon nodes we picked up on the Cheap Shot board.
- Be aware that equipping unique items may require to shift Resistances to other slots to stay capped.
- Ensure you reach at least 9200 Armor to be capped against level 100 enemies or more if you farm higher Tier NM Dungeons.
Gear with Uber Uniques
- We can equip Harlequin Crest instead. This lowers our Armor so we also include Disobedience.
- Ring of Starless Skies replaces either the Expectant, Elements or Edgemaster’s.
Skills
- At this point your resource generation should be in a good spot and you can consider a few adjustments to min/max depending on your exact setup.
- Innervation and Consuming Shadows may be unnecessary, these can be replaced by Stutter Step, Disciplined Dash or more ranks in Dash/Concealment.
Gameplay
- At this point you shouldn't have to use your Basic Skill almost at all anymore for Energy and its main purposes becomes triggering Vulnerable, Slow, Combo Points and Tricks of the Trade.
- Simply spam Twisting Blades to your heart's desire unless your need some resources or want to boost your damage or you're up against tough targets.
- A good middle-ground option between resource efficiency and DPS is playing a 1:1 cycle of your Basic Skill and Twisting Blades.
- Remember to Shadow Step regularly to activate Unstoppable for Tibault's Will.
The Nightmare Dungeon Push setup optimizes damage and survivability to allow you to dive much deeper into Nightmare Dungeons where the difficulty increases significantly. Instead of Physical and Shadow, this build heavily relies on Poison damage as it scales the best in prolonged combat.
AVOID THESE Nightmare Dungeon Affixes
Before we go into what you should change on your build, take a look at Nightmare Dungeon Affixes that you need to avoid for a successful push:
- Lightning Storm
- Stormbane's Wrath
- Poison Resist
- Melee Defenders
- Vulnerable Resist
To make it easier, you are looking for a Nightmare Dungeon that contains mostly easy melee enemies. It's recommended to use defensive consumables such as Iron Skin Elixir, Song of the Mountain and Reddamine Buzz to survive.
Disclaimer: There are various bugs that make this build weaker than intended under certain circumstances, which is why certain modifiers aren't chosen for this setup:
- Expectant, Edgemaster’s, Condemnation, Tricks of the Trade and Weapon Mastery don't work for Poison Imbuement.
- Poison Imbuement is not affected by Damage with Core (Basic, Ultimate) Skills and Damage with Cutthroat (Marksman) Skills stats, so avoid rolling these on your items.
Gear
- Against higher level monsters we need more Armor to survive (ideally ~13300 against lvl 154 monsters). This is achievable with high item power gear, Royal Skull socketed into Jewelry and some % Armor rolls. Alternatively, try to reach ~9000-1000 Armor and use Disobedience instead of Cheat's.
- If you haven't acquired any gloves with "Lucky Hit: Chance to Slow" yet, work on these as much as you can to help trigger the damage reduction from Paragon nodes we picked up on the Cheap Shot board.
- For more defense, Tibault's Will can be dropped for another defensive legendary pair of Pants.
- We include the full Poison combo of Bursting Venoms + Pestilent Points + Corruption to melt tanky elites and bosses.
- We also add X'Fal's Corroded Signet to go with the above (otherwise Rapid or Elements).
- Asheara's Khanjar has Lucky Hit Chance which is great to round out the setup with more consistent Bursting Venoms procs.
Gear with Uber Uniques
- Cheat's and Might both drop out to make room for Disobedience and Harlequin Crest.
- Ring of Starless Skies replaces X'Fal's Corroded Signet. This removes our Poison explosions but gives us overall a lot more damage and smoother resource management.
- Doombringer replaces Asheara's Khanjar for a lot more survivability.
Skill Tree
- This skill setup makes some adjustments compared to the standard variant.
- We focus only on Poison damage and include supporting passives.
- Without Shadow Imbuement + Nightstalker we no longer need Concealment, so we include Smoke Grenade to disable dangerous enemies before engaging and to boost our damage output.
Paragon
Since we lean more heavily into Poison damage, we adjust our setup by dropping Closer and Nightstalker for Efficacy and Tracker and pick up Eldritch Bounty along with extra Armor.
Gameplay
- You have to play a lot more defensively in a high tier Nightmare Dungeon. When necessary, fight only small packs or single targets and play around your crowd control tools in order to survive. Elite enemies become Unstoppable after 5 seconds of continuous crowd control, so you may have to kite them around until you can resume your attacks.
- For optimal damage output, build 3 Combo Points with Puncture before using Twisting Blades. This may not be necessary in short fights against small targets. While dealing with smaller targets, you can also do 1:1 instead of 3:1 rotations to speed up your damage output. Avoid using Twisting Blades back to back because you lose significant damage bonuses.
- Activate Poison Imbuement to apply more damage. With Bursting Venoms, you regularly see a Poison pool on the ground under your feet. Stand in it to gain permanent Poison Imbuement for your Twisting Blades. In this case, play a 1:1 rotation to apply Poison more quickly while it lasts and for higher chances of triggering the next pool (only if you have high Energy).
This setup is intended to defeat the biggest challenges in the game such as Uber Lilith. We add tons of damage and defense in order to beat these encounters. This setup focuses a lot more on scaling Poison damage for intense burst phases.
It's recommended to use defensive consumables such as Iron Skin Elixir, Song of the Mountain and Reddamine Buzz to survive. Alternatively, you can also play the build more like a glass cannon and simply try to avoid all incoming damage.
Disclaimer: There are various bugs that make this build weaker than intended under certain circumstances, which is why certain modifiers aren't chosen for this setup:
- Expectant, Edgemaster’s, Condemnation, Tricks of the Trade and Weapon Mastery don't work for Poison Imbuement.
- Poison Imbuement is not affected by Damage with Core (Basic, Ultimate) Skills and Damage with Cutthroat (Marksman) Skills stats, so avoid rolling these on your items.
Gear
- We include Bursting Venoms, Pestilent Points, Energizing and Rapid.
- Godslayer Crown gives us a massive nuke window regularly. Try to use its proc to deal most of your damage.
Gear with Uber Uniques
- Harlequin Crest replaces Godslayer Crown because it has better stats and more consistent damage bonuses.
- Ring of Starless Skies replaces Energizing for a massive damage boost. This makes Energy management a bit more difficult but the ring helps with that.
Skill Tree
- This skill setup is significantly different from the standard variant.
- We focus on dealing damage primarily with Poison Imbuement and pick up matching synergies like Poison Trap and various passives.
Gameplay
- Avoid getting hit by any big attacks.
- Make sure to always build 3 Combo Points with Puncture before using Twisting Blades.
- Use Poison Trap to raise the stagger bar, apply poison debuffs and trap effects and to reset your Imbuement with Countering Poison Trap.
- Activate Poison Imbuement to apply more damage. Whenever Bursting Venoms triggers (which can also happen from Pestilent Points), you see a Poison pool on the ground under your feet. Stand in it to gain permanent Poison Imbuement for your Twisting Blades. In this case, play a 1:1 rotation to apply Poison more quickly while it lasts and for higher chances of triggering the next pool.
- While dealing with smaller targets in the fight, you can also do 1:1 instead of 3:1 rotations to speed up your damage output. Avoid using Twisting Blades back to back because you lose significant damage bonuses.
- Dodge incoming one-shots with Evade and Dash. Don't waste your cooldowns on these skills.
Paragon Board
This setup is optimized for pinnacle bosses, including more defense and damage wherever possible.
This variant is optimized for the Gauntlet. It's very similar to the regular Endgame & Speedfarming variant as the content is relatively low end and maximizing speed is everything.
Gear
- Compared to the regular version, we include the new Hectic Aspect to reduce our cooldowns further.
- We don't focus heavily on Armor as monsters are only level 124 (T70 NMD). The cap to reach is 11.2k and this setup has less than that. If you struggle to survive, include more Armor from Paragons, % Armor rolls on your Gear or the Juggernaut's Aspect.
Gear with Uber Uniques
- Harlequin Crest replaces Expectant by moving Hectic to the Gloves.
- Ring of Starless Skies replaces Rapid.
Skills
- Compared to the regular setup, we drop Cold Imbuement to pick up Dash.
- Some other tweaks optimize the damage and speed of the build.
Gameplay
- At this point you shouldn't have to use your Basic Skill almost at all anymore for Energy and its main purposes becomes triggering Vulnerable, Slow, Combo Points and Tricks of the Trade.
- If your damage is too low you might lose too much time on bosses, so it may be worth to skip them and instead use this setup's fast pace to clear more regular monsters in the Gauntlet.
- Simply spam Twisting Blades to your heart's desire unless your need some resources or want to boost your damage or you're up against tough targets.
- A good middle-ground option between resource efficiency and DPS is playing a 1:1 cycle of your Basic Skill and Twisting Blades.
- Remember to Shadow Step regularly to activate Unstoppable for Tibault's Will.
Hardcore Adjustments
Hardcore requires you to build into more defenses. Here are some tips to be successful in this game mode:
- Focus more on your Chest & Pants while gearing up. Make sure to have only defensive stats on these two slots as they provide a ton of survivability.
- Tibault's Will is an optional unique that can be replaced with a defensive legendary item.
- Add extra Armor & Maximum Life instead of damage nodes on your Paragon Boards.
- For even more protection, include Eluding in your setup to get out of crowd controls.
- Be more conservative with Shadow Step and keep a charge ready when you engage enemies that can crowd control you, for example Cold Enchanted elites or Snakes mob types.
- Instead of Close Quarters Combat, you can also play with Momentum and include the powerful Stolen Vigor for a ton of damage reduction and healing.
Build Scaling & Stat Priorities
Read on to learn all you need about how to scale this build into endgame.
- Damage to Crowd Controlled Enemies: Thanks to Close Quarters Combat, this stat becomes a powerful damage multiplier, so we stack it on Paragon boards and some items.
- Combo Points: With the Combo Point Specialization you can use Puncture up to 3 times to boost your next Twisting Blades. Building Combo Points allows you to keep your Energy high for the Edgemaster’s Aspect.
- Energy: While continuous spamming of Twisting Blades all the time may not be possible, it gets better as we progress, especially through Resource Generation rolls on Rings, Energy Cost Reduction on Amulet and Tibault's Will.
- Critical Strikes: You boost your Critical Strike Chance in various ways including rolls on Gloves & Rings, Concussive and Intelligence.
- Vulnerable: We apply this debuff in various ways including Puncture, Blended Shadow Imbuement, Concealment and Exploit.
- Mobility: With more tools and higher Movement Speed, we are able to get more out of each individual Twisting Blades use because we can prolong their flight.
- Resistances: As we approach lategame, we focus on capping all of our elemental resists at 70% through rolls on Armor pieces, Paragon nodes and Jewelry sockets.
- Armor: Similar to resistances, we aim to hit the 85% damage reduction armor cap (~9200 vs. lvl 100 monsters, ~13300 vs. lvl 154 monsters) to be well protected against any damage type.
- Defensive Aspects: For challenging endgame content, Disobedience, Might and Cheat's are great defensive aspects to improve survivability. For leveling and speedfarming, we rely on Stealth instead to also gain other benefits.
- Crowd Controls: We Daze our main target with Twisting Blades and spread the effect with Shared Misery.
- Defensive Legendaries: Disobedience is one of the most powerful defensive aspects and has a high uptime in this build. This is improved further by Cheat's and Might.
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
Choosing the right stats for your gear can make or break your build. You won't always find perfect stats (also known as affixes or modifiers) though, and you may need to make a tough choice between two good pieces of equipment. Use the following list to compare your gear and pick the best (green = priority affixes).
- Helm: Juggernaut's
- Any Resistance
- % Total Armor
- Ranks to Shadow Imbuement
- Cooldown Reduction
- Maximum Life
- Chest Armor: Resistant Assailant's
- % Total Armor
- Damage Reduction
- Close Damage Reduction
- Distant Damage Reduction
- Maximum Life
- Gloves: Expectant
- Ranks to Twisting Blades
- Lucky Hit: Chance to Slow
- Critical Strike Chance
- Attack Speed
- All Stats
- Dexterity
- Pants: Tibault's Will, look for a high effect roll
- Otherwise Look For: Might
- % Total Armor
- Damage Reduction
- Close Damage Reduction
- Distant Damage Reduction
- Maximum Life
- Boots: Penitent Greaves, look for high Movement Speed
- Otherwise Look For: Ghostwalker
- Implicit: Maximum Evade Charges
- Movement Speed
- Any Resistance
- Any Resistance
- Any Resistance
- Movement Speed on Elite Kill
- Damage Reduction while Injured
- Amulet: Corruption
- Movement Speed
- Energy Cost Reduction
- Cooldown Reduction
- Ranks to Weapon Mastery*
- Ranks to Malice*
- Ranks to Exploit*
- Damage Reduction
- % Total Armor
- Close Damage Reduction
- Distant Damage Reduction
* Cannot appear on the same item together.
- Rings: Icy Alchemist's & Edgemaster’s
- Resource Generation
- Critical Strike Chance
- Maximum Life
- Damage to Close Enemies
- Damage to Crowd Controlled
- Vulnerable Damage
- Ranged (Crossbow): Bladedancer's
- All Stats
- Dexterity
- Damage to Crowd Controlled Enemies
- Damage to Close Enemies
- Core Skill Damage
- Vulnerable Damage
- Melee 1 (Dagger): Accelerating
- Melee 2 (Dagger): Condemnation, look for high DPS
- Otherwise Look For: Elements
- High DPS (Item Power)
- All Stats
- Dexterity
- Damage to Crowd Controlled Enemies
- Damage to Close Enemies
- Core Skill Damage
- Vulnerable Damage
Fill your item's sockets with the following:
- Royal Skull into Weapons for health recovery.
- Royal Ruby into Armor for more survivability.
- Any gem type of Resistances you are missing into Jewelry, prioritizing Fire and Lightning first. If you are capped on all of them, add Royal Skull for more Armor.
This build benefits the most from the following consumables:
- Elixirs: Elixir of Cruelty, Iron Skin Elixir, Heady Assault Elixir & Heady Precision Elixir
- Incenses: Song of the Mountain, Reddamine Buzz & Chorus of War
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.
What can I do to improve survivability?
How does this build compare to Twisting Blades with Death Trap?
How do Swords and Daggers compare?
Why Rubies instead of Topazes in Armor sockets?
How can I trigger Unstoppable?
Mechanics
Dark Shroud Scaling
Twisting Blades
Poison Imbuement Bugs
Penitent Greaves
X'Fal's Corroded Signet
Video Guide
Summary
The Twisting Blades Rogue is a super fun and mobile assassin that farms outdoor content and low Nightmare Dungeons better than almost anything else. While quite difficult to learn, it's a build that feels very rewarding once you have mastered its gameplay and is an excellent choice to start a fresh season with.
- Invest into Energy recovery as much as possible early on so you can spam Twisting Blades.
- Attack a few times, then start dancing around enemies to hit them with returning blades.
- Use Evade, Dash and Shadow Step to reposition constantly in combat and hit more targets.
- Play around Stealth and Concealment to activate Shadow Imbuement all the time and deal incredible AoE damage.
- Against bosses, use Combo Points to increase your damage output and don't run out of resources.
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Credits
Written by wudijo
Reviewed by DiEoxidE
Shoutout to Avarilyn for in-depth testing and insights on Poison damage mechanics