The recent 1.22 patch brought the return of 5 Malignant powers from Season 1 in the form of Unique rings. There's 1 ring for each class, heralding the return of iconic and much enjoyed Malignant powers. But what builds get the most use out of the new malignant rings?
Note: The items displayed do not reflect max values.
How to get them
If you want to obtain one of these Malignant rings for yourself gather your Malignant Bodyparts, and get ready to confront the Echo of Varshan beneath the Tree of Whispers.
The rings are available to players on the Eternal Realm and the Season of Blood.
If you want to brush up on the fight or learn Varshan's mechanics, take a look at our boss guide! The boss is available on both World tier 3, and World tier 4 but it's strongly advised that you fight the WT4 version when farming Uniques.
Barbarian
Ring of Red Furor
The ring is a solid alternative option for Hammer of the Ancients builds and provides them a way to deal guaranteed critical strikes. It has good stats including an unusually high Resource Generation roll.
When it comes to Upheaval and Death Blow the use case is a bit less clear. Upheaval doesn't spam skills the way HOTA does so you won't be proccing the ring as reliably. Instead the goal is to Overpower for a massive burst of damage with Furious Upheaval.
Our Barbarians are hard at work theorycrafting Death Blow combinations with Ring of Red Furor. But we'll need some hands on experience to know where the ring fits into our other endgame builds.
Maximizing damage from Death Blow requires Walking Arsenal or Unconstrained. But Unbridled Rage gives the best avenue to proc the Ring of Red Furor by cycling through Fury.
Druid
Airidah's Inexorable Will
For this build, aspect rolls are too competitive. We're talking about cutting a 40% or 45% (crit only) multiplier. With the Shockwave Aspect Pulverize doesn't need the pull to have great clear.
Tornado will likely use this ring, dropping the Nighthowler's Aspect. The pull is helpful for grouping enemies for even more Tornado madness.
Similar to Tornado, there's a good chance that both Shred builds drop less-impactful aspects to pick the ring up.
Has some very weak Legendary aspects and could drop one to work the ring in. Stormclaw is already utilizes some things to minimize Ultimate cooldown like (Hectic and Calm Before the Storm). We could see a variant with Anticipation and Flickerstep which spams Petrify. The pull will be amazing with Overcharged Aspect.
Generally Lightning Storm tries to avoid pulling and grouping enemies so this ring isn't worth giving up a Legendary aspect.
Support Druid has a spare slot for this and already uses the preferred ultimate, Petrify. The build can easily fit Flickerstep and Anticipation in addition to already having Hectic and Calm Before the Storm. The pull could be excellent for group play in December with the Abattoir of Zir event.
This build needs a bit more testing. If the pull places enemies within the circle of Boulders they'll stop taking damage. So the ring could be useful, or it could be something to avoid at all costs! Be sure to stay tuned as our druid pack gets some hands on experience testing Airidah's Inexorable Will .
Necromancer
Ring of the Sacrilegious Soul
If anyone manages to drop one of these during the early-mid game progression point on ANY necro build, it's an auto-include. For many builds it provides unparalleled quality of life even with best in slot gear.
Absolutely best in slot along with X'Fal's Corroded Signet. This may enable a Corpse Explosion Black River variant.
For this build it's an interesting enough addition to use as a swap for X'Fal's to automate Resource management and buff uptime.
Blood builds love automating Corpse Tendrils enough that this warrants a variant that uses the ring just to manage uptime on the Grasping Veins buff. Do not invest in Corpse Consumption synergies or the Flesh-eater Legendary Node, it's not worth it. The addition does require some fundamental changes to the Aspects normally included on the build.
Similar to Blood builds, we love to see automated Corpse Tendrils and it synergizes well with Aspect of the Umbral to help manage resources. Easily slots into the current build, due to a bit of sub-optimal choices that were our only options prior to this ring's existence.
A ring that plays our build for us? Yes please! Hard to pick between X'Fal's Corroded Signet for scaling the Necro's damage, and this ring, but the QoL it brings cannot be overstated.
Bone Spear LOVED the Malignant Heart in Season 1 since it allowed for the automation of the Corpse Consumption package and in Season 2, there's no exception. Slotting in this ring over an Offensive Aspect effectively makes the build Infinitely spammable without having to stop for Essence management.
Remember to check back with our Priests of Rathma after they get some hands on experience with the Ring of the Sacrilegious Soul.
Rogue
Writhing Band of Trickery
The Rogue Malignant Ring is pretty niche. You can use the Decoy Trap to taunt enemies adding a layer of safety in NM100 dungeons. The Taunt is useful for keeping dungeon bosses off of you while you burst them down, but most Rogue builds don't need this. It could be useful for luring enemies into a Smoke Grenade or Poison Trap. Writhing Band of Trickery may see some use on hardcore, or limited use in softcore builds. However, giving up a ring aspect is a big ask, and the ring's stats are pretty poor.
Keep an eye on the following Rogue Endgame Builds:
- Barrage (uses Smoke Grenade)
- Rapid Fire (uses Smoke Grenade)
- Death Trap (uses Poison Trap)
But with that said, keep an eye out for updates to all the endgame guides as our Rogues will be testing the ring with hands on experience to find the best use cases!
Sorcerer
Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop
Northwar's thoughts on the new Malignant ring are straight to the point.
It's the best Sorcerer ring by far and goes into every build, no exceptions.
Keep an eye out for the ring in our Endgame Sorcerer builds:
Get ready to blend your elements to maximize the damage bonus provided, dealing Fire, Cold, Lightning, Poison, and Shadow damage each applies a unique bonus. Most Sorcerer builds apply damage from 3 elements resulting in a 45% Multiplicative damage bonus.
Video
Maxroll Season 2 Content is Heating Up!
The Maxroll Diablo 4 Team will be hard at work theorycrafting for the new Malignant rings. Stay tuned for updates to our endgame build guides to include Ring of Red Furor, Airidah's Inexorable Will, Ring of the Sacrilegious Soul, Writhing Band of Trickery, and Tal Rasha's Iridescent Loop where appropriate. We'll also be covering the upcoming Abattoir of Zir and Midwinter blight events!
With that said, head over to our Discord and select the D4 role in #roles to stay up to date with our content development to make the most of your Season 2 experience!
Written by: Tenkiei