Just got your Witch Doctor to Level 70 Witch Doctor? Now what? Look no further. In this guide, you’ll learn exactly what to do for each step for Seasonal Jounery, Haedrigs Gift, Builds & Items,and ultimately leading to the end-game as your Fresh 70 Witch Doctor.

In Season 24, the Witch Doctor free set is: Spirit of Arachyr.

Season 24 and YOU. How does it affect?

S24’s (Ethereal Memory) unique mechanic is the Ethereal Item system. Let me provide you a quick TLDR right here.

Ethereal items QUICK FAQ AND INFO

  • Each class has THREE Ethereal weapons. They’re MONSTROUSLY POWERFUL.
  • Ethereals roll with a random LEGENDARY POWER from an item of that class.
  • Ethereals roll with a random CLASS PASSIVE from that class. (like Hellfire)
  • Ethereals have their own “special stat rolls” which are incredibly powerful. Example of such is +100% (up to 300% for some) to all skill damage. Not only are they strong, but there are LOTS OF ROLLS. Wall of text level. Some of them are pretty unique like the DH “increase damage per paragon level”.
  • Their drop rate is “rarer than ancients, less rare than primals”.
  • Ethereals will vanish after S24.
  • In case you missed it, Ethereals WILL vanish after Season 24. Ok?

For the purposes of this guide (a focus on Fresh 70), picking up an Ethereal will almost always be great for you. But, as your build gets more specific, obviously, the randomly rolled Legendary power will dictate its usefulness to your build.

Obviously, a well rolled Ethereal with a Legendary power you can use is a
giga-tier god-level world-shattering item.

Without further ado, let’s get into it.

Fresh 70: The first step – setting up!

The very first step of your journey! Here, I discuss items, rerolls, and basic advice to keep in mind during your ascent.

Early Reaper’s Wraps? WD Doesn’t really benefit much from this since it’s kind of easy to manage mana. But, it’s essentially free and it’s easy to get (Plans from any Torment Malthael). So, it’s an option but not a critical one.

Witch Doctor typically SMASHES the early seasonal journey so, while you don’t need to tryhard, keeping the below notes in the back of your mind is something.

Yellow items - stats - rerolls - gems

REROLLING YELLOW ITEMS IS SUPER LEGIT, CHEAP, AND UNDERRATED.
Nicely rerolled yellows will carry you for a LONG TIME.

WEAPON: Craft or find a 2H Mace. The stats you want are INT VIT LpH or Socket (Purple gem for LpH, Red for DMG+, Green for CHD+). Avoid any other stat for now. LPH IS VERY IMPORANT -I’ll explain more on later.


GET ARMOR INSTEAD OF ALL RESISTS!

Witch Doctor is an INT Class – meaning you get free ALL RESISTS from all the INT on your gear. This results in a huge lack of ARMOR. So, in your reroll strategy REMOVE ALL RESISTS from the top half of your gear stats as they’re pretty much USELESS – and replace them with ARMOR. Armor is your best defensive stats BY A SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT. Socketing Rubies or Emeralds also give you Armor. VIT is your other main defensive stat.


Self-healing , specifically Life per Hit is an insane god tier stat for early game WD. It’s used in tandem with Zombie Dogs – Leeching Beasts, essentially giving you up to 4x the value for each LpH roll! It’s an absurd survivability tool.

Belt: Is a huge source of defense. INT > VIT > ARMOR > Life%. You’ll be surprised how a single item can give you a whole load of toughness on.

Rings and Amulet: You NEED sockets to prep for legendary gems. Get any stat on these that you feel you’re missing. Feeling soft? Get defenses. Need DPS? Crit and INT. Feel free to roll “random helpful stats” on these for now, instead of the usual endgame CHC/CHD/INT.

GEMS: For body pieces you’ll want Emeralds or Rubies for Armor. Helm may vary (Amethyst for Life%, Topaz for resource cost reduction, Diamond for Cooldown Reduction) depending on your needs. Considering Witch Doctor and this season… hmm… Amethyst in Helm (Until you need the CDR for Hex).

Helm, Gloves, Shoulders, Boots? I wouldn’t bother too much with these since we will get them from the Haedrig’s Gift bags pretty easily. Just try to reroll off the terrible stats.

Chest / Legs: You want INT VIT ALLRES Sockets (3/2). Life% isn’t bad either. Even if you do get this from your free set – you want decent fillers here since they give such huge defenses.

Elemental% can be found on Bracers and Amulets. The element you want is ELEM%.

Skill% (Skill%) can be found on Helm and Boots. Typically it’s safer to roll on boots but if you’re removing trash stats for it you can take it on helm too. Having it on both is great, at a cost to defensive stats.

Skill% (Skill%) can be found on Chest and Shoulder. Typically it’s safer to roll on shoulder but if you’re removing trash stats for it you can take it on chest too. Having it on both is great, at a cost to defensive stats.

Skill% (Skill%) can be found on Legs and Belt. Typically it’s safer to roll on belt but if you’re removing trash stats for it you can take it on legs too. Having it on both is great, at a cost to defensive stats.

Equip a pet! (Default F1 for “cosmetics menu”). They pick up gold for you!

Getting the “correct” stats beats getting the “perfect” stats for now. REMOVE USELESS STATS and get any USEFUL STAT for massive gains in power.

Remove useless stats

  • Life Regeneration – garbage.
  • 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”.
  • All Resists – Useless for us, take Armor and VIT instead.

Take better stats

  • INT VIT – can’t go wrong with these. Your core stats!
  • ARMOR Life% – Great defensive stats.
  • Life per Hit – Great early game sustainability. Especially for WD.
  • CRIT Stats (CHC / CHD) – More for endgame, but I’d take this over garbage stats.

You have to ALWAYS BE AWARE of how your FOLLOWER can greatly affect farming speed! S23 introduced the “full build” and emanate system – keeping items important for your Follower Farming Build is high priority!


0pc Arachyr free set – getting the 2pc

Getting 1st Haedrigs Gift

For clarity this box contains info and builds if you currently have 0 pcs of the Arachyr free set, going for 2 (you don’t have any Haedrigs gift bag, going for the first).

Season 24 WD Fresh Level 70 No Set Build
Skills Rune
Haunt
Resentful Spirits (Any)
Locust Swarm (Open)
Cloud of Insects (Searing Locusts)
Soul Harvest
Languish (Soul to Waste)
Spirit Walk
Severance (Jaunt)
Summon Zombie Dogs
Leeching Beasts
Gargantuan Humongoid
Passives
Fierce Loyalty (Fetish Sycophants)
Rush of Essence
Pierce the Veil Midnight Feast

The usual GODLY “no set” WD build. You can go without a generator (but slot one in if you want, in place of Locust Swarm). DoT’s, Pets, infinite Haunts. You get the picture.

If you have a powerful legendary – edit the build to accommodate it if needed.

*Pressing Shift+J (PC) opens up your Seasonal Journey tracker!*

The entries in these early chapters are dead easy. The build above gives you a good balance of offense, defense and speed built in to help you breeze through this as mindlessly as possible.

Hard Mode on for Chapters 1 & 2. Clear through all the entries on Hard. Just up the difficulty to complete one Neph on Expert.

Don’t forget to level up all the NPCs in town. Completing your weekly Challenge Rift will help you get resources to do this easily, if you haven’t already.

When you’re done here, get your first free set from your mail, and proceed onward.


2pc Arachyr free set – getting the 4pc

Getting 2nd Haedrigs Gift

For clarity this box contains builds and info if you currently have 2 pcs of the Arachyr free set, going for 4 (you have the first Haedrigs gift bag, going for the second).

S24 Fresh 70 WD Arachyr Free Set 2pc Build
Skills Runes
Haunt
Consuming Spirit (Any)
Corpse Spiders (Locust Swarm)
Leaping Spiders (Cloud of Insects)
Spirit Walk
Severance (Jaunt)
Soul Harvest
Languish (Soul to Waste)
Zombie Dogs
Leeching Beasts
Gargantuan Humongoid
Passives
Fierce Loyalty (Fetish Sycophants)
Rush of Essence
Pierce the Veil Midnight Feast

The Arachyr 2pc bonus isn’t a big deal, but you can try it out (replacing Locust Swarm). It’s additional free DPS. Try it with and without the spider skill, to see if you need it.

If you have a powerful legendary – edit the build to accomodate it if needed.

*Pressing Shift+J (PC) opens up your Seasonal Journey tracker!*

Difficulty: Although there are entries here that need to be finished on Master, you can still complete the bounty cache, if you haven’t already, on Hard. For the bounty, try to do the whole five acts as you’ll need to do this down the line anyway.

These entries are still on the easy side, so we can be a little lax with our build making as little sacrifices as possible to retain good DPS, Speed and some thought to defense. When you’re done with this chapter, collect your 2nd set of free set and let’s finish the next chapter for the remaining free gear!


4pc Arachyr free set – getting the 6pc

For clarity the next boxes contains builds and info if you currently have 4pcs of the Arachyr free set, going for 6 (you have the first+second Haedrigs gift bag, going for the third). This segment is further divided into three parts – Torment II, Torment IV, and GR20.

Torment II seasonal journey entries

Torment I-II and general stuff

For the Torment I, II and random entries, the previous build (no changes) should be enough. If you need a more tryhard variant, check out the Torment IV or GR20 tab for advice.

S24 Fresh 70 WD Arachyr Free Set 4pc Build (T2)
Skills Runes
Haunt
Consuming Spirit (Any)
Hex Jinx
Spirit Walk Severance
Soul Harvest
Languish (Soul to Waste)
Zombie Dogs
Leeching Beasts
Gargantuan Humongoid
Passives
Fierce Loyalty (Fetish Sycophants)
Rush of Essence
Pierce the Veil Midnight Feast

Now, we need to slot in Hex for Arachyr 4pc. This build is pretty tight… but if you want to swap out a skill… oh boy… They all feel pretty necessary but it’s up to you. Personally I cannot in good faith recommend an open skill.

*Pressing Shift+J (PC) opens up your Seasonal Journey tracker!*

This build will be the baseline for all entries in this tier (Torment II, IV, and GR20) While this build may seem overkill for the Torment II entries, you may as well prep up for the harder parts of this tier.

Upgrade a Rare to Legendary w/ Kanai’s Cube: 1h Ceremonial Knives for a bunch of possibilities, hopefully you get Manajuma’s, but there’s a ton of knives you can use.

Complete a Torment I Rift: This will be the minimum level you should be farming at should you need to do it. Increase if you can easily obliterate a rift. There’s also a “Kill a Torment II Boss” entry here which should be easy.

Complete any other odds and ends that you can, before proceeding to Torment IV.

Torment IV seasonal journey entries

Torment IV stuff
S24 Fresh 70 WD Arachyr Free Set 4pc Build (T4 & GR20)
Skills Runes
Haunt
Consuming Spirit (Any)
Hex
Hedge Magic (Jinx)
Spirit Walk
Jaunt (Severance)
Soul Harvest
Languish (Soul to Waste)
Zombie Dogs
Leeching Beasts
Gargantuan Humongoid
Passives
Fetish Sycophants
Rush of Essence
Pierce the Veil Midnight Feast

This is basically the same build but adding more defensive utility.

*Pressing Shift+J (PC) opens up your Seasonal Journey tracker!*

In Torment IV things get real. For many of the free sets, this place is the breakpoint whether your build needs help or not. And for S24 and Arachyr, isn’t too bad. WD builds excel in the early seasonal journey.

  • Kill Odeg – Keywarden in ACT I, Fields of Misery.
  • Kill Sokahr – Keywarden in ACT II, Dahlgur Oasis.
  • Kill Xah’Rith – Keywarden in ACT III, Stonefort.
  • Kill Nekarat – Keywarden in ACT IV, Gardens of Hope 2nd Tier.
  • Kill Specific Boss Check your journal to see who it is this season.
  • Keywardens maps have a key icon next to the waypoint. Purple arrows point you to their location after a short while once you’re in their respective map.

For the boss and all Keywardens – STRAIGHT UP RUSH TO THEM!
Ignore ALL TRASH and just beeline! Get it done ASAP!

You’ll really notice the if you’ve neglected your temporary yellow gear and rerolls. Hopefully you have powerful legendary to carry you (and even if you do), you will notice if you’ve neglected your gear. Refer to the very top setting up tab if you need help.

Either way, this is a good time to take a closer look at your items and get as many powerups and rerolls stated in the setting up tab above.

4pc Arachyr free set GR20

Spoiler title

USE THE SAME BUILD AS THE TORMENT IV TAB!

Arachyr GR20 is not bad. You have MORE THAN ENOUGH DPS, with HAUNT and PETS. Survival is your only issue, as repeated and constant dying is your only risk of failure. Seriously, this shouldn’t be an issue at all unless you’re EXTREMELY WEAK.

You should have an idea of how strong you are given the tasks leading up to this. Be practical and don’t be afraid if your build needs a little help. If you’re weak – Quickly get FOUR GR keys, then complete lower level GR’s. Socket the best Legendary Gems you get (avoiding Legacy of Dreams, obviously).

The “ultimate” challenge gating you to getting your full six piece free set! The difficulty varies wildly on your class and seasonal set. As someone who has cleared GR20 with EVERY SINGLE SET AND CLASS WITHOUT ANY OTHER LEGENDARY – let me tell you, they’re not all created equal.


S24 Fresh 70 Witch Doctor 6pc Arachyr Build

What's our semi future goal here?

GRATS ON SIX PIECE! I’m going to push you towards a “Sane and Balanced ANGRY CHICKEN BUILD ™”. Yeah, you read that correctly. It will rocket you into speedfarming territory, but it’s a terrible tryhard GR build. Which is ok, since you want to speedfarm and bounty ASAP – and transition into whatever build you wanna try. Check the final build preview in the lower tabs of this guide.

Why not Firebats?

hy not Firebats? I actually love the build, but the same playstyle is better pulled off by Mundunugu (Although I LOVE ARCHYR BATS, dat Life per Hit doe). So instead of doing a subpar copy of another WD build, at least Angry Chicken does something unique, and I daresay useful.

S24 Fresh 70 WD Arachyr Free Set 6pc Build
Skills Runes
Corpse Spiders (Open) Blazing Spiders
Locust Swarm (Firebats) Pestilence (Dire Bats, Cloud)
Spirit Walk
Severance (Jaunt)
Soul Harvest
Languish (Soul to Waste)
Hex
Angry Chicken (Open)
Zombie Dogs
Leeching Beasts
Passives
Grave Injustice
Fierce Loyalty (Open)
Blood Ritual (Open)
Jungle Fortitude (Open)

Choose between Locust Swarm and Firebats as your primary DPS skill for now. Corpse Spiders, if you can survive without a “generator”, do it (It does decent damage and restores mana). Hex can be anything, but Angry Chicken is actually a decent nuke.

Jungle Fortitude can be switched to Spiritual Attunement if you want more mana. Fierce Loyalty is purely for speed, so you can sub that out too if you like.

FROM HERE OUR GOAL IS TO GAIN POWER FAST. The next logical steps are Legendary Gems, and being mindful of the good items you need to find.

Important notes right now:

  • Crafted Reapers Wraps can help you now that you’re not spamming Haunt with Rush of Essence. It’s not a huge deal for WD’s, but it’s an easy non-rng upgrade.
  • Rubies and/or Emeralds on chest/legs, Topaz/Diamond/Amethyst on Helm. Topaz might not be a bad idea early on, as your spells can be resource heavy.
  • Low effort rerolls – remove trash stats and get decent ones. No need to tryhard, but a little care goes a long way.
  • Follower build and items – MASSIVE Farming speed gains for almost no effort.

Okay, congrats on the 6pc, but your journey has just begun! Keep in mind the important rerolls I mentioned at the start of this guide!


Powering Up: Legendary Gems

Your next step after getting your 6pc is Legendary Gems. Why? LGems are a huge power spike relying on very little RNG. Simply spam Neph -> GR until you get the three gems you need and power them up to 25.

Arachyr Main useful gemsOther useful gems

Bane of the Powerful is just plain good for what we want to do. At level 25 it maxes out, and it will give you good value for a LONG TIME.

You need a defensive gem – either Molten Wildebeest Gizzard (to help with Squirts later on), or Moratorium. You need an extra defensive gem this early on. Trust me on this. You can toss them in augments later on.

Boon of the Hoarder… Since this is strictly a speedfarming build you will want to use this alongside the follower farming build.

Check the next tab for more “normal” gem recommendations.

Bane of the Trapped is the usual DPS gem, never sad to own one. This should “always” replace Powerful at higher levels.

Bane of the Stricken – is the go to LATE GAME DPS Gem of choice. Its main use is shortening your Rift Guardian time (and helping out vs yellow elites).

Esoteric Alteration – is probably the best defensive gem in the game, and is worth having a strong one around.

Boon of the Hoarder – is used in many speedfarming builds alongside Avarice Band.

Again, Legendary Gems are a massive priority given their NON-RNG powerspike. Just having three useful gems at 25 will allow you farm a few torment levels higher.


Powering Up: Important Items & how to get them

Of course, any build will need a couple (or more than a couple) items to round out. Here, I list down what items you’re looking for, and how best to get them using various currencies and means.

Keep in mind Captain Crimson items are crafted (but you need RoRG to use ’em).

Core items preview - look out for these!

Very roughly ordered vertically by priority.

Name Slot / Type Notes
Manajuma’s Carver Ceremonial Knife Core tio angry chicken build.
Manajuma’s Gory Fetch Mojo Core tio angry chicken build.
Goldwrap Belt Invincibility (needs Boon of the Hoarder)
Ring of Royal Grandeur Ring Needed for Cpt Crimson.
Captain Crimson BELT Belt Crafted. CDR, toughness, damage! Need RoRG.
Captain Crimson LEGS Legs Crafted. CDR, toughness, damage! Need RoRG.
Krelms Buff Bracer Optional anti-cc QoL.
Squirts Necklace Necklace Need M.W. Gizzard LGEM to work.
Unity Ring Just to help you when Goldwrap is off.
Ring of Emptiness Ring Not good without Wormwood. DPS Boost.
Wormwood 2H Staff Automatically triggers RoE.

As implied, these are the items that are core, or important, to your build. I talk more about how to obtain these later on – remember to keep these in mind always.

At the very bottom of this guide, you can preview what a good base template build is for items / skills / passives to get an idea what you’re going for.

Bounties? Do them early for your follower!

While looked down on for many seasons, Bounties are actually amazing in the early game these days – why?

Great items and recipes for your follower to improve farming! Recipes for Sage’s Bounty and Cain’s Destiny. As well as bounty specific value items like Gloves of Worship.

Ring of Royal Grandeur is an ACT I only bounty item, and is CORE to UE’s build to accommodate the Crimson 3pc set bonus.

Avarice Band is always welcome for speedfarming. Its an ACT III bounty item.

While some builds may not need RoRG, everyone would definitely want Sage to help out with Deaths Breath so doing a few bounties are a good idea.

Spending currencies (Blood Shards & Deaths Breath):

Blood ShardsDeaths BreathRings and AmuletsThe Classics

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

Belt for Goldwrap – this is only useful if you have a Boon of the Hoarder, and Avarice Band. The “Trifecta”, the “Holy Trinity” of gold-centric builds. See Follower Build.

Bracer for Nemesis Bracer, and fillers like Krelms Buff or Lakumba’s Ornament. Nemesis can go on your follower. For the “final build” the

Mojo for Manajuma’s Gory Fetch. The other half of the angry chicken weapon set.

Past this, there’s nothing else you NEED.

You can try to get your rings with shards too, but it’s a long shot. You can also try to get items for other builds you wanna try out. Accessories in general are EXPENSIVE to fish for with shards.

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 Ceremonial Knife for Manajuma’s Carving Knife. One half of your Angry Chicken weapon set!

2h Staff for Wormwood. This is only used to trigger Ring of Emptiness for free. So don’t try to get this until you get RoE.

1h Sword for In-Geom. This is an option for certain Angry Chicken setups, and the final weapon I would want for this build (BUT I REALLY WOULDNT SPEND DB ON THIS, and just wait for it to drop).

If you’ve got the above, you got two options. Use DB’s for RINGS and Squirt’s Necklace (Accessories are long shots), or try for weapons used in other builds.

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.

Ring of Emptiness is a generic DPS increase, but requires some work. Luckily, the Wormwood method is how we wanna achieve it.

Hellfire Amulet is crafted – so it’s a non-RNG boost.

Squirt’s Necklace is your “final piece”, you only want to use this in conjuction with your full build, alongside Molten Wildebeests Gizzard.

2x Unity. You need two for it to work, and it’s certainly an option. However, with the typical Follower farming build you might not have space for Unity on your follower. It’s an option. Wouldn’t waste resources trying to get this, but just let it come.

There’s lots of other rings you can use…

Typically you’ll just find these as you grind, as they can be difficult to obtain with currency…

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.

^- you’ll need both of ’em.

This is just a list of your “all-around” items that may or may not be mentioned previously. While I do not take set-specifics in this tab, it serves as a seasonal reminder (and helpful general list for newbies) on what’s “generally good”.

Reapers Wraps: A Crafted legendary whose plans drop from any Torment Malthael (and is oft mentioned in our Fresh 70 guides), any NON-RNG boost to power (in this case, resource generation) is welcome. MOST builds can benefit from an early reapers.

Nemesis Bracers: An absolute monster for increasing rift clear speed (and a little extra deaths breaths!), newer players might not value this as highly – try it out and you’ll be surprised.

Unity: Used alongside another Unity on your follower (Plus their unique “Cannot Die” relic) essentially halving all damage you take for one ring slot, that’s usable for any character. Not bad.

Obisidian Ring of the Zodiac: Core on many builds, but usable for any build that spends resource. It’s a unique source of “in-combat” CDR that would give you 100% uptime on skills you couldn’t otherwise achieve. It’s pretty crazy.

Focus+Restraint: If you can trigger both halves of the set bonus, and don’t mind losing defenses from rings – this is will “more than double” your DPS.

Travellers Pledge + Compass Rose: Another accessory set, this one is more suited for “elite killer” builds that like to travel in between packs, and face-tanking builds that tend to stay still while DPSing. It’s not very universal, but it can reasonably benefit any character.

Convention of Elements: Literally any character can use this ring. It’s a titanic boost in DPS (especially for builds that have tons of short-duration buffs… LINE THEM UP!).

Ring of Royal Grandeur: -1 set item requirements to help you fit random core or filler legendaries to help your build out. While absolutely necessary on some builds, most builds can benefit from this using “generic” legendaries for a temporary power boost (IE Aquilla Cuirass).

Avarice Band + Boon of the Hoarder (+Goldwrap) the gold farming speedy holy trinity. While you don’t really need all three all the time, this combo allows you to speed through and survive ANY difficulty (careful, this doesn’t improve DPS!).

You also need specific items for the farming follower build, which again, has a huge impact on your farming speed.


Arachyr Full Build Template Preview

This is the aforementioned “Sane and Balanced ANGRY CHICKEN BUILD ™“. It’s a goldwrap build (but you can easily adjust it). This is purely built for speedfarming, and not tryharding. But it does what it’s meant to do WELL.

S24 WD Fresh 70 Arachyr 6pc Build Template / Preview SPEEDFARMING
Head Arachyr Skill Rune
Shoulder Arachyr (Open) Spirit Walk Severance
Chest Arachyr Locust Swarm Pestilence
Arms Arachyr Horrify
Frightening Aspect
Legs Arachyr Soul Harvest Languish
Boots Captain Crimson Hex Angry Chicken
Belt Captain Crimson Zombie Dogs
Leeching Beasts
Bracer
Krelms Buff Bracers (Open)
Passives
Amulet Squirts Necklace (Hellfire) Grave Injustice (Needed)
Ring Ring of Emptiness Jungle Fortitude (Open)
Ring Unity Fierce Loyalty
Weapon Manajuma’s Carver Tribal Rites (Open)
Offhand Manajuma’s Gory Fetch
Kanai’s Cube Legendary Gems
Wormwood (In-Geom) Boon of the Hoarder
Goldwrap Bane of the Powerful (Trapped)
Ring of Royal Grandeur Molten Wildebeests Gizzard (If Squirts)

The above is the baseline template for a fully functional 6pc Arachyr. It’s not heavily optimized for pushing GR, but more of a speedy farming slant. It’s a great place to be in, as you adjust the build to your needs!


Season 24: Ethereals and YOU? What do!?

I can’t go through every detail given the focus of this guide (Fresh 70). Best general advice? If it has a legendary power you want – then it’s “ALWAYS” AN UPGRADE. Does it convert your 2H into a 1H? GODLY UPGRADE. Rolling a good passive is simply icing on the cake!

Sadly, ETHEREALS ARE NOT COMPATIBLE WITH ANY WEAPON SETS.
And in our case, that includes Manajuma’s.

But, of course, keep your Ethereals for any other “tryhard” “more serious” builds you want to try. Angry Chicken is a godly farming build that sadly has a lower “cap” than most, so it’s serves perfectly as a transitionary build.


Bridging to the End-game

So you skipped a whole chunk of the powering up phase with the free set. Now what? Like I always say, “Speedfarming first before pushing GR’s”. So, convert what you have NOW to be as speedfarmy as possible, first.

It’s highly likely you’ll transition into a PURE speedfarming build. If so, check out:
Witch Doctor Best Speedfarming Build (Still being updated for S21)

(I should be adding an Angry Chicken page to the above!)

Other Witch Doctor Guides:

Check out our D3 Guide Directory for more D3 info.

Some of these links are not updated for S24
But will serve as a data point in the meantime

Well, good luck with your Fresh 70 Witch Doctor! Arachyr Angry chicken (as long as it’s a “sane” variant) can be quite good. It gets a bad rap from people trying to overly optimize it for speed, but at least it’s a unique angle of attacking a season start. Honestly a fun and refreshing free set to have. Hopefully our guide helped you gain power quickly. HF out there!

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32 COMMENTS

  1. Also when is a good time to start replacing the season set? Like how much of an increase should the item be before I swap it in to replace a piece of the seasonal set?

  2. What are your thoughts on the ancient legendary pig sticker? I got one with cdr skills 6%/reaource cost 10%/dmg to beasts 19%/dmg to humans 26%.

    • Pig sticker isn’t typically used by Witch Doctor. Sacred Harvester is a better all-purpose 1hander. It gets pretty insane once you augment it. But if you feel like it’s well rolled, save it.

      • Right after I posted about pig sticker I got the wormwood lol. That staff is so good I HAD to unequip it to complete the set dungeon. It would kill everything before I could do anything lol. Its gonna be hard to let this staff go.

  3. Brilliant guide! Perfect and exactly what I needed for the new ladder.
    Only suggestion would be advice to slowly transition into what looks like the most powerful build this season, which seems to be Jade Harvester.

  4. I am using Z6 and have tried to follow this guide as closely as possible but I just can’t seem to get my fetishes up past 8. I am using haunt and I spam it liberally and move around and stuff. I tried acid rain but it just doesn’t work for me that well because it is not fire and forget like haunt (targeting issues) and I run out of mana so quickly and then stand there twiddling my thumbs. So not sure what I am missing because I am trying different things but since my gems got to 25 I can’t get past GR40 (T7) in time and that feels like I am behind the curve.

    Advice? Suggestions? Appreciation in advance and thanx for the bitchin’ guide 🙂

  5. last time I played diablo 3 was at the auction house disaster.Now I am back,taking a break from overwatch and the game completely change,without thinking about my build its already enormous,You helped me a lot and I really appreciate the time and effort you put on this.
    Thank you very much

  6. Am I using acid cloud wrong if I am not getting Fetishes up to the passive max? I can do it easily with haunt but that is also much easier to spam.
    Love yalls guides btw, third season using them and it is always great.

    • You’re absolutely correct and that’s why I mentioned both of those skills. Fetishes are much easier to gather with Haunt compared to Acid Rain. But alas, the Haunt coverage is pretty bad. Honestly there’s no way around suffering usability issues of Z6 early on.

    • Yes, you get them up faster. Also, in the eventual Darts build keep in mind that the belt only triggers off SPENDERS. The Passive works with all attacks. It can be suboptimal to have them both, but in the early game – them working in tandem can be a load off your mind.

  7. Ok nervermind, i send a post before but because I didnt know how the Kunai’s Cube works. Now I do (didnt play for a long time).

  8. I have a doubt.
    I just got the set of 6 free pc, but, before completing the set, I got the Quetzalcoatl, so it’s worth losing the 6 bonus level?

  9. Thank you so much for this guidea. It helped me out a ton. I am new to seasonal and Diablo 3. I am confused when you say ‘GR 38 is enough to 25 a gem.’ Does that mean I need to get to GR38 to get a gem up to 25? Thanks again.

    • hi! its just the basic paragon priorities.
      Core – Primary stat > Vit > Move speed (depends, 25 points at most) > Max Resource (optional). all other points will be placed in primary
      Offense – CHC > CHD > CDR > Attack Speed
      Defense – Res All > Life > Armor > Life Regen
      Utility – Area Damage > RCR > LoH > Gold Find

  10. Which gems should you level ASAP? You list Zei’s, Powerful, and Trapped but only talk about Trapped and Enforcer which isn’t listed.

  11. So what do I do once Ive followed the above? Unless im missing something here all you do is talk about build and playstyle?

    • You can now start farming for items (getting ancient legendaries, death’s breath, materials for kanai-ing). Long term goals are up to you really. You can aim to climb the WD leaderboard, complete the season journey (shift+J) to get stash tab/s or just complete achievements (Y). It depends on you.

      This guide is to help you somehow beef up your fresh 70 witch doctor, with or without the free set, so you could go clear higher torments asap. Once you’ve completed the above, you can even try other Witch doctor set builds or classes.

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