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Shock Wave Druid Guide

Season 8

Last Updated:August 10, 2024|Change Log

Are you a fan of having over 13,000 Life with maximum Resistances, maximum Chance to Block and Damage Reduction? You are in for a treat with the Shock Wave Druid who can achieve this.

Combined with his ability to Stun everything in a cone-shaped area in front of him, this makes the Shock Wave Druid arguably the tankiest build to roam Sanctuary.

While this build’s damage output is seriously lacking, it makes up for it by being among the top 2 of Support options! Parties you join love you for your Crowd Control (CC) and the incredible Life boost provided by Oak Sage.

The Shock Wave Druid is mainly played at the start of a Ladder. With increased damage outputs from everyone, the ability to Stun gets less relevant. Druid builds that deal damage and provide an Oak Sage are then preferred.

Ideal Standard Setup
Ideal Standard Setup

Shock Wave

Werebear

Oak Sage

Summon Grizzly

This build guide assumes you have a Character at Level 75 before transitioning to it. It follows the progression of our Druid Leveling Guide and our General Leveling Strategies to reach Level 75.

Very Tanky ✔
Beginner Friendly ✔
Easy to Understand ✔
Top Tier Support Build ✔
Team Oriented Gameplay ✔

❌ Only Viable In Groups
❌ Close To Zero Damage
❌ Extremely Low Mobility

❌ Relies On Team To Deal Damage
❌ Needs Rejuvenation Potions For Sustain

Sunder Charm Setup

This build does not benefit from the new Sunder Charm because it is a pure Support Character with almost no damage output.

Terror Zones

This build does not successfully farm in Terror Zones because it is a pure Support Character with almost no damage output.

Skills

Put 1 Point into the following Skill:
1. Summon Grizzly

Max out the following Skills in the following order:
1. Shock Wave
2. Oak Sage
3. Lycanthropy
4. Maul
5. Werebear

Remaining Skill Points from Level 94 onwards are put into Summon Dire Wolf.

Use the Scroll Bar to see Skill Point Progression
Use the Scroll Bar to see Skill Point Progression

Damage

Utility

Attributes

Note: This section provides you with the standard Stat Point allocation. Build Variants can require a different allocation!

Strength

Allocate enough Stat Points into Strength to equip all of your gear. Take into account how much Strength your gear provides when equipped.

Dexterity

Allocate enough Stat Points into Dexterity to equip all of your gear. Take into account how much Dexterity your gear provides when equipped.

Vitality

Allocate any remaining Stat Points into Vitality after meeting Strength, Dexterity and Energy requirements.

Energy

Don't allocate any Stat Points into Energy. This build gets enough Mana from gear, buffs, Charms, and Mana Potions.

Essentials

Gear Options

Farming Spots

Mercenary

Playstyle

Breakpoints

Hardcore

Build Variants

Starter
Standard
Hardcore

Setup

Early on, the goal is to cap your Resistances. Use all item slots to achieve this purpose. Items that grant +x to All Skills are a secondary objective as they provide you and your party members with additional Life through Oak Sage. Faster Cast Rate is another objective to have an easier time to stun your enemies, however, with a Stun duration of 10 seconds, this shouldn't be a big problem.

Mercenary

Equip Insight on your Mercenary. The Shock Wave Druid has a very low Mana Cost that are easily be covered with it. Equip him with gear that provides Resistances, Life stolen per hit, and Life. Smoke and Undead Crown are examples of easily obtained sources.

Skills

Put 1 Point into each of the following Skills:
1. Summon Grizzly

Max out the following Skills in this order:
1. Shock Wave
2. Oak Sage
3. Lycanthropy
4. Maul

Attributes

Add enough Stat Points into Strength to wear your gear. Put remaining points into Vitality.

Setup

In this variant we achieve the maximum damage on Shock Wave. While it has almost no impact on any group dynamic, it can allow you to farm low Life bosses like Eldritch the Rectifier and Shenk the Overseer.
Note: This Character is NOT designed to farm anything by itself. The mentioned bosses are options when you don't have other Characters to farm with while your friends are offline.
99% Faster Cast Rate allows us to comfortably stun everything that comes within range. This allows us to focus purely on increasing our Life pool as long as our Resistances are capped.

Mercenary

With Holy Freeze as well as Insight, the Mercenary brings a lot of utility to our party. With the addition of a Fortitude and Anariel's Visage he is capable of killing individual monsters with ease, while you are stunning them.

Skills

Put 1 Point into each of the following Skills:
1. Summon Grizzly

Max out the following Skills in this order:
1. Shock Wave
2. Oak Sage
3. Lycanthropy
4. Maul
5. Werebear

Remaining Skill Points from Level 94 onwards are put into Summon Dire Wolf.

Use the Scroll Bar to see Skill Point Progression
Use the Scroll Bar to see Skill Point Progression

Attributes

Add enough Stat Points into Strength to wear your gear. Put remaining points into Vitality.

Setup

The gear changes made for Hardcore are limited to equipping a Stormshield, socketed with an Eld Rune and a Skin of the Vipermagi, socketed with a Jah Rune. This combination of items allow you to reach the maximum Chance to Block, maximum Reduced Damage by x%, while keeping 99% Faster Cast Rate. With these 2 additional layers of Defense as well as 12,000+ Life, this build basically becomes immortal as long as you have Full Rejuvenation Potions in your Belt.

Mercenary

With Holy Freeze as well as Insight, the Mercenary brings a lot of utility to our party. With the addition of a Fortitude and Anariel's Visage he is capable of killing individual monsters with ease, while you are stunning them.

Skills

Put 1 Point into each of the following Skills:
1. Summon Grizzly

Max out the following Skills in this order:
1. Shock Wave
2. Oak Sage
3. Lycanthropy
4. Maul
5. Werebear

Remaining Skill Points from Level 94 onwards are put into Summon Dire Wolf.

Use the Scroll Bar to see Skill Point Progression
Use the Scroll Bar to see Skill Point Progression

Attributes

Allocate enough Stat Points into Strength to wear your gear and Dexterity to reach 75% Chance to Block. Put remaining points into Vitality.

Summary

  • Stay in the front lines and stun as much as possible, while your party is destroying the monsters that you rendered harmless.
  • Keep your Oak Sage up at all times to buff your team!
  • This build is not really viable for solo gameplay. Even with maxed out gear the damage is negligible.
  • One of the best Support builds in the game.

Support builds in Diablo 2 are rather rare. This build mostly aims at the very start of a Ladder Reset, when nobody has any gear, providing everyone with a massive boost in their survivability! We hope you enjoy stunning everything that comes into your path!

Good luck!

Credits

Written by Teo1904
Reviewed by MacroBioBoi

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