Last Updated:July 7, 2024|Change Log
Introduction
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The Whirlwind (WW) Barbarian uses the Wrath of the Wastes set and has become one of the strongest builds in the game after having Rend added to its bonus. The core concept is that Whirlwind applies the Damage over Time (DoT) effect from Rend using Ambo's Pride. You spin and move through the monster while DoTing and killing them quickly.
Some people call this build "Rend Barb" while others call it "Whirlwind Barb", however the build's main damage comes from Rend as Whirlwind just applies the Rend to do all the damage.
This build excels many other builds in Diablo at Speed farming content as it is lighting quick and deals a tremendous amount of damage while constantly moving.
During Season 24, Ethereals were very beneficial to the build, especially in solo push due to the iconic The Grandfather being a great replacement for Istvan's Paired Blades.
This is an Area Damage (AD) build, since selfcast Rend can proc it. However, any Rend cast by Ambo's Pride does not have this property (see Mechanics), requiring you to weave in Rends manually while spinning around with Whirlwind. Due to the pulling power of Ancient Spear Rage Flip and Ground Stomp Wrenching Smash this build is excellent for high solo push on the leaderboards. So let's get started!
Very Mobile ✔
Easy Gameplay ✔
One of the Strongest Builds ✔
Deals Damage while Moving ✔
❌ Cooldown Dependency
❌ Band of Might Dependency
❌ No Full Area Damage Benefit
❌ Easy to Play Difficult to Master
Core Setup
Items
- We use the Wrath of the Wastes set for the crazy damage increase and toughness while channeling Whirlwind and for three seconds after.
- Lamentation provides a Rend damage buff and makes Rend stack twice on the same target.
- Ambo's Pride lets us apply the damage over time from Rend in just 1 second.
- On Jewelry slots you can choose between:
Squirt's Necklace, Focus & Restraint, Convention of Elements for multiplicative damage or Band of Might for an insane toughness boost. - Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac can be a nice alternative for Cooldown Reduction but you have to lose a damage multiplier to equip it.
- In the Weapon slot we can use Messerschmidt's Reaver or In-geom for Cooldown Reduction as well as Echoing Fury for the Movement Speed.
Season 32 Ethereals
Ethereals are powerful rare weapons that can only be found during Season 32. They were initially the Season 24 Theme. They have incredible stats, a random Legendary power, and a free passive for your class. Read our Ethereal Mechanics Guide for full details on how they work and our Ethereal Farming Guide to learn how to acquire them. What you should prioritize on them is the following:
- The Legendary Power
This build requires Ambo's Pride to be functional. On top of that The Furnace is a good pushing Legendary power. We need our Ethereal to roll one of these powers so we can cube the other. We also want a good roll on our Legendary power if it has a range. For speed content it is always helpful to have Ethereals with Echoing Fury, In-geom or Messerschmidt's Reaver powers, so keep those if you find them. - The Ethereal Itself
There are 3 different weapons available to us, each with its own benefits:- The Grandfather - This is the best Ethereal for pushing with its high Two-Handed Weapon average damage and its high Attack Speed complemented by Cooldown Reduction!
- Gimmershred - This is the best choice for speed content and boss killing as it is a One-Handed Weapon with decent Attack Speed, Cooldown Reduction, Elite Damage and a Movement Speed buff!
- Doombringer - This is the back-up option. It has regular Attack Speed and no Cooldown Reduction but applies a 25% damage reduction debuff on hit.
- The Ethereal Stat Rolls
Each Ethereal comes with its own fixed set of powerful affixes. While some have a static value, many have a wide stat range. This means the difference between good and bad rolls is significant and something you should look for. - A Useful Passive
This is just icing on the cake because a fifth passive is not going to make or break your build. You're better off hunting for the things above. Check out the Passives section down below to see which ones you're looking for.
Global Stat Priorities
Aim for around 45-50% Cooldown Reduction to ensure permanent Wrath of the Berserker, use Boon of Bul-kathos and complementary Cooldown Reduction items like Messerschmidt's Reaver or In-geom.
Rend damage does not scale with Attack Speed so we do not need to reach any Breakpoints here!
Assembling the Build
Item Stat Priorities
Gems
Skills
Passives
Paragon Points
Altar of Rites
Follower
Gameplay
Hardcore
Variants
I never would have believed that we would see a Barbarian that could rival the Monk's Wave of Light speed build, but it happened with Patch 2.6.7!
Concept
The idea here is to stack loads of Movement Speed while still being able to kill all enemies within seconds by just passing through them. We keep Rend with Bloodbath on the skill bar to spread the Rend to more enemies as our Whirlwind skill applies the rune automatically.
Gameplay
Overall easy gameplay, crazy damage & awesome speed, all you need for a god tier Torment build! Keep up damage & toughness buffs and spin to win!
Setups
For group Torment farming we take Nemesis Bracers, Avarice Band and The Flavor of Time back into the setup. You can also add Wreath of Lightning instead of Bane of the Trapped if you have enough damage and want more Movement Speed.
Furthermore you can drop Band of Might to equip Stone of Jordan and switch Furious Charge to Battle Rage Ferocity on your skill bar for even more Movement Speed. Combine that with Bul-Kathos's Solemn Vow and Bul-Kathos's Warrior Blood as weapons for insane Fury generation and you got the perfect chill farming build!
For all the people interested here is a Gameplay Video.
Concept
Just like in the Nephalem Rifts we stack plenty of movement speed buffs together with decent toughness buffs. We do not need Nemesis Bracers here as we can ignore most shrines, just finish the bounties as fast as possible! The added toughness and damage from Mantle of Channeling helps out nicely instead!
Gameplay
The Gameplay here is very similar to Nephalem Rifts. Use Wrath of the Berserker and Ignore Pain to gain crowd control immunity when you teleport from bounty to bounty and trigger clickables! Keep up your buffs and spin around until the bounty is done!
Setups
You can drop Messerschmidt's Reaver and take In-geom to keep Wrath of the Berserker up more constantly if you prefer. Feel free to cube Ambo's Pride and add Bul-Kathos's Solemn Vow as well as Bul-Kathos's Warrior Blood as weapons for insane Fury generation and Movement Speed.
The Whirlwind Rend Barb is one of the strongest builds for solo farming of any kind and shines especially in experience farming as the build can run mid tier Rift levels very effectively due to its somewhat unique mechanic:
Concept
Moving while doing crazy amounts of damage!
You can run around Greater Rift Level 105 and even all the way up to 120 with above 10k Paragons for crazy amounts of experience and loot.
Gameplay
Keep up Band of Might at all times and go from elite to elite. The majority of trash monsters should die on the way as you spin trough. You need to Furious Charge at least once every 5 seconds for the full Focus & Restraint buff and so that Band of Might stays up. The shield provided by Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard should protect your double damage buff from Squirt's Necklace most of the time. Cast Wrath of the Berserker on cooldown and keep up the buffs from Sprint and Ignore Pain to blast around like crazy.
Setups
At high Paragon (around 5,000) you can drop Band of Might, equip Captain Crimson's Thrust & Captain Crimson's Silk Girdle, cube Ring of Royal Grandeur & Lamentation. This version is slightly stronger but a lot more squishy.
Concept
Below under Rend mechanics we talk about how only self casts proc Rend Area Damage. This is exactly what we need do here:
Gameplay
1. Try to find an open map for your first floor where you can comfortably drag elites along with Ancient Spear Rage Flip.
2. Create a huge group of monsters using your Rage Flip, while channeling Whirlwind to stay alive.
3. Once everything is grouped up nicely with a pixel Ground Stomp start doing manual Rends. Focus on your Physical Convention of Elements rotation to deal most damage. Alternate between doing a tick of Whirlwind and casting 2 Rends manually to benefit from Area Damage. Keep the defensives buffs from Mantle of Channeling and Wrath of the Wastes (4) Bonus.
4. Try to stand in Oculus Ring from your follower as often as possible.
5. Drag elite packs along and always fight them with trash around to gain rift progression and utilize Area Damage.
6. Pray for a Conduit Pylon to finish off most elite packs with The Flavor of Time.
7. For the Rift Guardian we use the tremendous power of Bane of the Stricken stacking with our Whirlwind skill. Rift Guardians that summon minions later on like Saxtris and Binder are ideal as we can get additional Rend procs from Bloodbath and nice value from our Area Damage, which is further enhanced by Ruthless for crazy damage output in the final stage.
Setups
At super high Paragon levels (8,000+) you can try the Captain Crimson Trimmings set Setup without Band of Might. Take in Boon of Bul-Kathos instead of Nerves of Steel if you have problem to maintain Wrath of the Berserker.
Here is a Gameplay Video.
Concept & Group Synergy
The WW Rend Barb as trash killer has awesome AOE possibilities with Rend Bloodbath. This rune together with Lamentation allows you to stack up to 4 Rends on the target (2 normal ones and 2 bloodbath procs). We usually add an Impale Demon Hunter or a Heaven's Fury Crusader because they provide very high single target damage to kill Elites and the Rift Guardian, while providing awesome buffs to the group such as Companion and Marked for Death. Add a zMonk to maintain our buff from Squirt's Necklace as much as possible.
You can basically say a Monk is like a 2nd Rend Barb as you gain double damage from Squirt's Necklace alone, while zMonk still provides massive toughness and damage buffs by himself. zBarb is the other standard support in this kind of speed runs as it provides the full package of toughness, damage buffs and pulling abilities. A zNec is not very useful because Rend, as all other damage over time skills, does not work with any critical hit chance debuffs on enemies. That means Iceblink does not work with DoT skills either, it is just used to buff the Demon Hunter or Crusader Rift Guardian Killer.
Setups
The planner on the right side starts off with the high base damage 2h build using Messerschmidt's Reaver to keep a nice up time on Wrath of the Berserker. In this setup we use Band of Might to gain 5 times our toughness and we want to proc our Focus & Restraint rings with Furious Charge every 5 seconds anyways our up time should be 100%. Bane of the Powerful is used here to gain some more damage to Elites as well as damage reduction from the elites. For our passive skills we take a full offensive approach. Feel free to add a defensive passive like Nerves of Steel or Superstition, if you feel you are dying too much.
On the left planner we switch from a 2h to a dual wield setup. We take Sun Keeper to make use of the higher base average damage as well as the elite damage. We add Ambo's Pride to free up the cube slot for Messerschmidt's Reaver again. As this is the low paragon setup we also stay with Band of Might for 5 times more toughness, but if you are high Paragon (3000+), switch the cube to Convention of Elements for the extra damage.
This build is good for this game mode. This Build uor more information, check out our full Echoing Nightmare Guide and take a look at our Echoing Nightmare Build Tier List and our META post for the best builds and strategies! This build is good for this game mode. This Build utilize the Speed Greater Rift setup with a few tweaks.
Changes
- Switch Ignore Pain to Threatening Shout Falter to increase DPS.
- Reroll Area Damage to Average Damage as we do not need to make huge pulls.
Gameplay
- Click Speed Pylon instantly to boost your mobility and dodge Green Meteors.
- Around Wave 90, click Channeling Pylon and Power Pylon.
- After Wave 100, use Conduit Pylon.
- At Wave 122, stop attacking and run to the corner to let the timer run out.
Keep up Band of Might at all times. The majority of trash monsters should die on the way as you spin trough. You need to Furious Charge at least once every 5 seconds for the full Focus & Restraint buff and so that Band of Might stays up. Cast Wrath of the Berserker on cooldown and keep up your Sprint buff to blast around like crazy.
Video
Mechanics
Rend
Ambo's Pride
2-Hand vs. Dual Wield Comparison
Summary
- Put together the core items and acquire the full Wrath of the Wastes set.
- Overall very powerful build that can be used to farm anything in the game without changing gear too much!
- Very tanky and hardcore friendly especially with the Band of Might setup!
- The strongest solo push build Barb currently has!
- Easy to play the base version but difficult to master in Solo Pushes!
Credits
Written by Rob.
Reviewed by Northwar & Raxxanterax.
Updated by Chewingnom.