Grats on your newly minted Fresh 70 Barbarian! If you’re wondering where to go from here, “Look no further“. Get your Haedrigs Gift free set ASAP, builds for each step, and items you need. Get to endgame with your barb NOW! (Not 70 yet? See Barb Leveling guide instead)

Curious? We’re going LoD Whirlwind -> Wastes 6 WW

In Season 27, the Barbarian free set is: Horde of the Ninety Savages.

D3 Season 28 Rites of Sanctuary and YOU. How does it affect?

S28’s unique mechanic is the Altar of Rites. I made a separate Altar of Rites guide because it’s there’s a few choices and timings you want to know about. A basic rundown, though:

The Altar of Rites is unlocked from the get-go. For each node (“seal”) you want to unlock, you need to sacrifice a specific set of items to unlock a seal. These increase in difficulty for each step of the way, regardless of which path you choose. IE, Unlock 5 will cost the same no matter if you went down one path or the other.

In return, each specific node grants you a passive power corresponding to the seal you unlocked. It’s kind of like a passive skill tree from other games. These range from the wildly exciting “Pets can pick up and salvage white, blue, and yellow gear”, to basic stat increases like 15% dodge.

While it may seem unexciting at first, the bonuses all pile up to become wildly out of hand.

While this notably changes the leveling pattern quite a bit, we won’t be talking about it here. Instead, check out the leveling guides if you’re not 70 yet and somehow found yourself here.

For this guide we have a few couple overarching steps that dictate our plan.
– Gear up our LoD Whirlwind basic build, which shares alot of its pieces with our next build.
– Gather more items for this build which transitions into Wrath of the Wastes 6.
– Refine it to be your basic Wastes 6 /Whirlwind speedfarming build.


Step 1) Initial Build & Getting Legacy of Dreams

Don’t get stressed out, yes, LoD builds might seem a little daunting but let me tell you that it’s a fun and exciting process. Ultimately you need two things right now: The actual LoD gem, and a basic build to get you going.

Generic Starter build (slightly related to our ‘final build’)

Barb Basic L70 Starter Build
Skills Rune
Rend Bloodbath
Whirlwind Wind Shear
Frenzy Sidearm
Furious Charge
Merciless Assault
War Cry
Veteran’s Warning
Battle Rage Ferocity
Passives
Rampage
Weapons Master
Unforgiving (Open)
Relentless (Open)

The above build is meant to be in the middle of two things:

  • Easy to edit – that hopefully game-changing legendaries can fit in no matter what.
  • Related to our ‘final build’ – it’s a rough basic version of our “goal”, so it feels more natural as you transition towards it. Have a look down there for the final build preview to see what we’re going for.

This basic Barb build is actually pretty godlike even without items.


Getting Legacy of Dreams ASAP

The first three gems will always be Bane of the Powerful, Legacy of Dreams, and one random one. So thankfully, there’s no RNG there.

Get 3 rift keys → Run 3 rifts → Wear three gemstones on your gear. That’s about as simple as it gets. DO NOT try to “tryhard” the nephs and GR’s. SPEED is the key here. Get your keys on Easy if you must!

Step 2) Easy power-ups. Huge gains for little effort.

You can go all of these things “simultaneously”, basically small tasks here and there that you should keep in mind right now that will greatly increase your power for little to no effort.

Sounds cliche but here’s the “three easy steps!”:
A) Obtain and L25 your three (LoD+2) Legendary Gems most useful to you.
B) Power up Legacy of Dreams with ANY Legendary Items in all slots.
C) Fix your gear with Basic Rerolls and normal gems, remove trash stats.

Of course, if you have a resource hungry build you can also:

  • Make a Reaper’s Wraps: Speaking of no effort to big returns. Make this ASAP. Plans drop from any Torment Malthael. This build might need is early on.
  • Socket Topaz on Helmet similarly helps out with your resources too.

For experienced barbs are gonna need these, but they certainly don’t hurt.

3x LGems to 25Power up LoDEZ Rerolls & Gems

What three Legendary gems?

Your next goal should be getting at least L25 on your three most important gems. Just get rift keys and spam GR’s until you get them, and do the absolute minimum level you need to level them up. Get them and level them quickly – do not feel pressured to “maximize” your rift keys by inflating the difficulty.

Legacy of Dreams is mandatory, as mentioned in the basics segment! Level this up as much as you can.

Taeguk is godlike. It’s an extremely powerful gem that’s nearly mandatory on Channeling builds. Offense and defense piled into one. This is only good once you’ve transitioned into “whirlwinding only” – which you need Ambo’s Pride for. If you want more power for low investment, go for L25 Powerful, which doesn’t need the constant Whirlwinding.

Moratorium is something I heavily recommend early on as it covers your defenses. Esoteric Alteration is also an option that scales to the lategame..

Can’t ever go wrong with leveling up a Boon of the Hoarder for speedfarming.

Legendary Items in ALL SLOTS

LoD gets stronger with each legendary item you have equipped – so get to it! You should aim to get this done “passively” by natural item drops, but you can also craft items if you’re desperate.

Simply wear whatever junk you find eventually
replacing them with useful pieces as you get them!

Spending Blood Shards is “OK”, but only use Death’s Breath to fill up the slots if you’re absolutely desperate. You’ll get an item for each slot in no time (you can even craft them). Save your resources for finding SPECIFIC items that will greatly boost your power. We talk more about this in the next segment, refinement.

Ancients DOUBLE this bonus, and they’re a welcome boost to consider.

Defense Type & Gems

Barbs / Crusaders are STRENGTH classes (they get free Armor from STR). So, in the face of all this free armor, your prime defensive stats are ALL RESISTS > VIT.So try to reroll ALLRES on your gear if you need defense, and REMOVE AS MUCH ARMOR (it’s pretty useless as a rolled-in stat).

Slot in your best Diamonds on body and legs, as they give ALLRES.

Basic Rerolls

Since legendaries are a little expensive to reroll EARLY ON, try to make the most by REMOVING GARBAGE STATS, and getting anything “remotely usable”.

STR and VIT are your primary stats and are welcome everywhere, also, as mentioned above, ALL RESISTS are also very welcome.

First of all Barbarian has a special stat, Life Per Fury Spent, found in mighty belts and mighty weapons. This stat is pretty damn good and ideally you would want one of it rolled somewhere. Life per Hit is also okay if you find it here and there.

Rend% is found in Shoulders and Chest. Ignore Whirlwind%, it does nothing meaningful for us.

The Element% you want is PHYSICAL, found typically in Bracers and Amulet.

Remove useless stats

  • Life Regeneration – garbage for any build.
  • Attack Speed – it usually an endgame tune-up stat.
  • Excess Resource Cost Reduction – Is a crutch, and only niche builds need it.
  • Excess Cooldown Reduction – Only useful for an endgame “need”.
  • Unused skill% – literally USELESS.
  • Armor– Useless for us, take ALLRES or VIT instead.

Take better stats

  • STR VIT – can’t go wrong with these. Your core stats!
  • ALLRES Life% Great defensive stats.
  • Sockets are essentially MANDATORY.
  • Life per Hit – Great early game sustainability.
  • CRIT Stats (CHC / CHD) – More for endgame, but I’d take this over garbage stats.
  • Skill and Elemental% – that you use.

FOLLOWER GEAR!

Do not forget to fully equip your follower for farming. You can start by crafting Sage or Cain’s NOW and worry about the rest later. This is a “sidequest” you should forever be aware of as it’s pretty impactful…

Step 3) Refining, Using Resources -> ‘Full Build’

So you can easily see what items you’ll need, and you can get an idea of what we’re trying to do here. You can adjust these builds to use Goldwrap + Boon of the Hoarder if you’re into that.

Full Build Preview: LoD Whirlwind

A basic anti-rng, safe build that will get you slaughtering and farming asap. Ambo’s Pride and Lamentation are pretty much the absolute heart of your build, everything else is optional.

S28 Fresh 70 Barb: early game LoD Whirlwind speedfarming
Head Any Skill Rune
Shoulder Mantle of Channeling Rend Bloodbath
Chest Aquila Cuirass Whirlwind Wind Shear
Arms Archews / Worship / Stone Ground Stomp Wrenching Smash
Legs Hexing Pants / Blackthorne Battle Rage Ferocity (Open)
Boots Ice Climbers War Cry Veteran’s Warning
Belt Lamentation (Core) Wrath of the Berserker Insanity / Striding Giant
Bracer Mortick’s Brace Passives
Amulet Hellfire Amulet Rampage
Ring Band of Might (Core) Weapons Master
Ring Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac Relentless
Weapon Ambo’s Pride (Core) Boon of Bul-Kathos (Open)
Offhand Sun Keeper (Low Prio)
Kanai’s Cube Legendary Gems
Messerschmidt’s Reaver / Furnace Legacy of Dreams
Krelm’s Buff Bracers / Goldwrap Taeguk
BoM / Zodiac / CoE / Unity Powerful / Esoteric / Hoarder

There’s a whole lot of options in this build as you really only need Lamentation and Ambo’s Pride.


Full Build Preview: Basic Wastes Speedfarming

As your build progresses, work towards this. Once you have Wastes 6, consider a transition, then you can further refine it once you get an RoRG.

S28 Fresh 70 Barb: basic Wastes speedfarm template
Head Wastes Skill Rune
Shoulder Mantle of Channeling Rend Bloodbath
Chest Wastes Whirlwind Wind Shear
Arms Wastes Ground Stomp
Wrenching Smash
Legs Wastes Battle Rage Ferocity (Open)
Boots Wastes War Cry
Veteran’s Warning
Belt Guardians Wrath of the Berserker
Insanity / Striding Giant
Bracer Guardians Passives
Amulet Squirts / Hellfire Rampage
Ring Band of Might Weapons Master (Depends)
Ring
Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac
Relentless
Weapon Bul’Kathos set Boon of Bul-Kathos (Open)
Offhand Bul’Kathos set
Kanai’s Cube Legendary Gems
Ambo’s Pride Legacy of Dreams
Lamentation Taeguk
Ring of Royal Grandeur Powerful / Esoteric / Hoarder

So basically you’re gonna need RoRG to fit the 2x Guardian set, and the channeling shoulders. You can also use Captain Crimson and massage the build around a bit (Morticks Bracer can be used too) – it will be easier to keep Wrath of the Berserker up

There are many others setups like crimson, but starting out with Guardians isn’t bad as it gives pretty good toughness.


Get CORE ITEMS asap. The heart of your build

Items are obviously very important for you build!
Here’s a couple of the best way on how to get your best ones.

The absolute core of your build are these: Ambo’s Pride (Rend on hit with Whirlwind) – use Death’s Breath. Lamentation (Double Rend stacks) – use Blood Shards. To a lesser extent, Bulkathos Weapon set, and Band of Might (Giga defense for Barb) – It’s a ring, so, not easy to craft.

Spending Blood Shards and Death’s Breath

All other items will be loosely prioritized here depending on resource. Again, check the build above to get an idea of the full picture.

Blood ShardsDeaths BreathRings, amulets

Here’s advice on how to spend your blood shards with Kadala, roughly in order of importance:

Lamentation – Belt: Improves rend by a lot. Nothing else to say.

Mantle of Channeling – Shoulder: Gives both offense and defense while channeling!

Goldwrap – Belt: Godlike defenses for Nephalem Rifts with Boon of the Hoarder. Great for farming.

Mortick’s Brace / Nemesis – Bracer: Great bracers overall. Morticks is a huge power spike in many aspects. Nemesis is an ultra farming helper for your follower.

Got some better fillers here like Aquila Cuirass – Chest, for some defense, and Hexing Pants – Legs for DPS and fury. There aren’t that important though.

Every piece of Wastes 6 can be found via
Blood Shards if you’re missing any. 

You can look for the other ‘unimportant’ things in the build preview after these (IE Ice Climbers, Gloves etc)

Here’s advice on how to get your weapons from Deaths Breath rare item upgrades (Kanai’s Cube Recipe: 25x Deaths Breath convert a rare into random legendary of same type), roughly in order of importance:

1h Mighty Weapon for Ambo’s Pride – as you can imagine, is the absolute most important item in the build. Rending on WW hit and shortening its DoT time is, in essence, cheating.

2h Axe for Messerschmidt’s Reaver – If you plan on using Wrath of the Berserker alot, this is an early game crutch that can greatly help with that. Used in tandem or in place of Zodiac. You can keep WoTB up without reaver later on, if you’re wondering…

Bul’Kathos Weapon Set is for when you need to transition into wastes set. You get them both from gambling on 1h Mighty Weapons as well.

You can reroll set items to another slot (example, Helm to Shoulders)
using DB’s FS’s in the cube. Just a reminder, if you want your Wastes 6.

Nothing else is really WORTH spending DB’s for, and would rather spend to try and get jewelry you might not have yet.

Rings and Amulets are tough to get from either BS or DB’s (due to the large amount of possible outcomes), but if you’re done getting your core items from these currencies – and you haven’t got your core accessories, it’s a viable way to spend them. Typically you’ll just find these as you grind – then use currency if you’re desperate. Anyway, if I had to rank the importance of your rings and ammys…

Band of Might is pseudo-core to the build simply because it shores up so much of our defense with a single item. It’s a huge boost to toughness.

Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac to start inching towards “100% Wrath of the Berserker uptime”.

Unity is a decent defensive option, but you need the follower immortality relic, and another Unity for the follower!

SKULL GRASP IS TRASH FOR THIS BUILD! We don’t actually do WW damage, it’s REND!

As an aside – Ring of Royal Grandeur and Avarice Band are BOUNTY ONLY rings (respectively ACT I and III), which DO NOT APPEAR FROM any other source. They, like any other bounty item, DO NOT DROP from monsters, gambling, upgrades or any other source outside of their respective BOUNTY CACHE.

As a reminder, the Guardian set is CRAFTED, and is used in your transition to wastes build.

Follower Gear odds and ends

More of a reminder than anything, once you start farming you will be running into those little bonuses for your follower farming build. Keep an eye out!


Summary & Outro

Welp, that’s about it. I’m liking these seasonal bonuses that remove the augmentation grind – makes the game a lot more humane. From here, you can easily do the Seasonal Journey if that’s your thing, or transition into literally any other build you like – the it’s exactly what the S28 fresh 70 LoD builds for each class are made for.

GL out there and check out our D3 Guide Directory if you need anything else!

15 COMMENTS

  1. I am new to Diablo 3. I have been playing Wow since it started, some 16 or 17 years ago. I decided I had played it long enough. At 76 years old, I am kind of “Long in the Tooth” for that game. I opened up Diablo 3 and lo and behold, I already have one of each class of characters, although one, a Barbarian, was named Logan which one of my Grandsons names. Getting the “Savages” set is why I am leaving this message. Apparently, getting to 70 is not the only requirement for this as Haedrig doesn’t tell me anything about it. Is this a Seasonal thing. If so, apparently the current Season is supposed to end on March 28, 2021. So, I guess I will have to wait till next Season to get it. Is there some sort of overall guide for Diablo 3 that I could use? Thanks in Advance(TIA in my day).

    • It’s highly likely that your current barbarian isn’t a seasonal character! Every season, you get to “start anew” with a seasonal character, which gets turned into a non-seasonal / normal one once the season is over. I’m almost certain that your barbarian is a non-seasonal character if you cannot seem to access the seasonal journey (Shift+J in-game). Or it might have been claimed already for this season on that account?

    • It really depends, either of those setups can be legit – do what’s most practical for you in the early game. Later on, I’d imagine Ambo’s on cube is the more “flexible” choice. Although if you want to use weapons master you’d have to stick w ambos.

  2. the season 13 barbarian build is overpowered.I suggest pairing MOTE with a good rolled Fury of the Vanquished Peak + seismic slam % on items you can get it.Fun times and makes Seismic slam fun to play with plus all the earthquakes.

  3. I found a different 4-piece skill setup, personal preference of course:
    LMB – Cleave – Reaping Swing
    RMB – Whirlwind – Wind Shear
    A – Furious Charge – Stamina
    S – Rend – Bloodbath
    D – Battle Rage – Ferocity
    F – War Cry – Invigorate
    P1 – Weapons Master
    P2 – Unforgiving
    P3 – Inspiring Presence
    P4 – Rampage

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