Whirlwind

The bar

One damage skill and five buttons that keep it running. Nothing here is a generator: once the gear is on, Rallying Cry and Tibault's Will refill your Fury. There is no Key Passive and no passive points to spend.

Arsenal and Technique

You carry four weapons and each skill is tied to one of them. Assign Whirlwind to your strongest two-hander. That is normally the Two-Handed Bludgeoning weapon, though either two-hander works. In the Technique slot, take the Polearm. Its Expertise is Lucky Hit Chance, and once the Expertise reaches rank 10 it adds 15% more damage while you are Healthy, which means above 80% Life. Your Barrier and Fortify keep you there most of the time, so the bonus is nearly always on.

What to wear

The starter version uses no uniques at all, so you can play this the moment you hit 70. The finished version is built on four uniques, two rune-crafted uniques and a Mythic amulet.

Uniques

Legendary aspects

Stats, gems and paragon

Roll and masterwork toward these, in this order.

Tempering & masterworking

Temper Armour or Maximum Life on helm, chest and pants, Critical Strike Damage on gloves, Movement Speed on boots, Cooldown Reduction on amulet and rings, and Critical Strike Chance on every weapon. Masterwork toward Cooldown Reduction on the helm, Life on chest and pants, Attack Speed on gloves, Movement Speed on boots, Critical Strike Chance on jewellery and Weapon Damage on Whirlwind's weapon. When you transfigure, look for Physical Damage, Cooldown Reduction, Strength, Maximum Fury, Skill Ranks and All Stats. If Fury still runs dry, add Resource Regeneration on chest, pants and boots, Fury on Kill on weapons and rings, and the Lucky Hit temper that restores Fury on jewellery.

Gems, runewords & Splinters

• Skulls in weapons, Rubies in armour. Jewellery holds your Soul Splinters; until you have them, use Diamonds or Skulls depending on what is killing you.
• Runewords: Bac + Que and Igni + Gar. Bac and Que give you a constant Barrier, and Gar gives Critical Strike Chance. Early on use Cir + Qua for movement speed and Moni + Gar. For speed farming, swap Que for Kel.
• Soul Splinters: Anguish, then Pain, then the Black Soulstone. Pain gives 40% damage reduction for 30% less movement speed. The Black Soulstone adds 5% damage per soul for 15 seconds.
• There are two ways to think about Hellfire. It doubles your damage but removes all your Critical Strike Chance. This build is tuned to reach 100% crit and leans on Locran's Talisman, so Hellfire costs more than it gives. Leave it out, and leave out Sin too, because it lowers your Maximum Fury and weakens Ramaladni's.
• Charms: five pieces of Sescheron's Fury on a Legendary seal with +1 Charm Slot. At or above 100 Fury you become Colossal: 50% slower casts, bigger skills and, with all five pieces, +50 Maximum Fury and 600% damage. Berserker's Crucible is the other option. It is smoother early, with 30% damage reduction while Berserking and a free random Shout every 5 seconds, so wear it until your Fury can hold 100.
• Sixth charm: Fists of Fate for more damage. Your attacks then deal a random share of their normal damage, which averages out ahead. Emblem of Staalbreak is the alternative if you want a steady bonus while Berserking.

Paragon

Below roughly 200 Paragon points, rush the legendary nodes: Start board with Marshal, then Blood Rage with Twister, then Carnage, Force of Nature and Flawless Technique. Respec once you pass 200. The final layout is Start (Challenger), Warbringer (Wrath), Force of Nature (Marshal), Carnage (Twister) and Flawless Technique (Exploit). Level the glyphs in this order: Twister, Exploit, Wrath, Challenger, Marshal. Glyphs reach full radius and their legendary bonus at level 50; aim for level 100 at around 300 points and level 150 when all 346 are spent. There is one choice among the glyphs. Exploit is the default on Flawless Technique. Imbiber is the pushing option, and if you take it, only press Iron Skin when you need to use potions.

Mercenary

Hire Raheir with Ground Slam, Raheir's Aegis, Bastion and Inspiration. He is strong defensively and Inspiration adds a decent damage multiplier. There are two ways to fill the reinforcement slot. Aldkin with Field of Languish slows enemies by 40% and makes them deal 20% less damage for 6 seconds. Varyana with Bloodthirst, triggered by War Cry, is the damage option. Take Aldkin: this build already kills packs, and the damage reduction is what it lacks.

From fresh 70 to finished

You can spin from the first minute at 70. The uniques arrive in a fixed order because each one fixes the Fury problem the next one creates.

The rotation

Strengths, weaknesses, mistakes

What it's good at

• Extremely relaxed to play: one held button and a few buffs.
• Very fast, with screen-wide clear from the Dust Devils.
• Playable at 70 with no uniques at all.
• Good defensive layers: Barrier, Fortify, Heavenly Strength and permanent Unstoppable.

Where it struggles

• Fury upkeep. If the bar empties you stop spinning and your biggest multipliers switch off.
• Needs a lot of Cooldown Reduction before the Shouts and Wrath stay up.
• Single-target damage is well behind its area damage.
• The finished version leans heavily on Mythics and rune-crafted uniques.

Mistakes that ruin it

• Equipping Ramaladni's before Insight. The Fury drain is more than an unfinished build can refill.
• Letting Rallying Cry or Wrath of the Berserker drop. They are what stop you running out of Fury, not just damage buffs.
• Spamming Rallying Cry. It costs Fury now. Pressing it early empties the bar and weakens Ramaladni's.
• Using the Hellfire or Sin Splinter. Hellfire removes the crit the build is tuned around, and Sin takes away Maximum Fury.
• Chasing the old Melted Heart of Selig setup. It still works, but it is now both weaker and more fragile than the Life version, and it needs gear with no Life on it at all.

Not for you? The other Barbarian builds: Hammer of the Ancients · Charge.