Frenzy HotNS Barbarian Greater Rift Speed Farming Variation

Last updated on Jan 08, 2024 at 09:00 by Deadset 33 comments
1.

Horde of the Ninety Savages Frenzy Barbarian GR Speed Farming Variation

The HotNS Frenzy Barbarian is a capable build for Greater Rift Speed Farming, lagging only slightly behind the more dominant Whirlwind/Rend Build. The build variation suffers from the minor inconvenience of being a predominantly single target build, but with the correct playstyle (mostly ignoring trash and focusing down elite after elite), it handles the task with ease.

During lower tier Greater Rift farming, the balance between defense, damage and utility can be shifted to favor the latter two aspects of character building.

Active Skills
Left Mouse Button Frenzy Icon Frenzy Berserk Berserk Right Mouse Button Furious Charge Icon Furious Charge Cold Rush Cold Rush 1 War Cry Icon War Cry Veteran's Warning Veteran's Warning 2 Threatening Shout Icon Threatening Shout Falter Falter 3 Battle Rage Icon Battle Rage Bloodshed Bloodshed 4 Wrath of the Berserker Icon Wrath of the Berserker Insanity Insanity
Passive Skills
2.

Adapting Rotation

When you are Speed Farming Greater Rifts, your playstyle should at least partially reflect the circumstances by focusing on massive pulls, generic bonuses against enemies and chaining pylon effects.

During speed farming, you are allowed much more liberal use of Wrath of the Berserker Wrath of the Berserker; you can pop it as soon as you enter the Rift and keep it up pretty much indefinitely thanks to the powers of In-geom In-geom. Aside from WotB, keep up your usual build rotation of War Cry War Cry, Threatening Shout Threatening Shout and Battle Rage Battle Rage up at all times as your staple buffs and debuffs over the enemy hordes. The remainder of the core rotation executes identically to the progression build; you will be using Furious Charge Furious Charge to jump from pack to pack (with some notable rune alterations — see below), and quickly whittling down priority targets with Frenzy Frenzy. Due to the single target nature and In-geom In-geom proc dependency of this build, always keep in mind to focus on elites and very dense trash packs, largely ignoring stragglers on your way as they will only slow down your runs.

3.

Adapting Skills and Passives

Parts of the skill and passive selection will overlap with the base Greater Rift progression build, but others will have to change according to the task at hand. Ability to cross over great distances faster and more efficiently take precedence.

  • Frenzy Frenzy is still your main damage dealer, but since you will be dropping progression-oriented weaponry like Azurewrath Azurewrath (and losing the elemental damage bonus as consequence) for In-geom In-geom (see gearing section below) you can change from the Cold rune Berserk Berserk to any one you like. For the sake of consistency, we have kept to the Cold rune Berserk Berserk and have specced out the build for Cold damage, though it should be noted that you receive all rune effects regardless, due to The Undisputed Champion The Undisputed Champion.
  • Furious Charge Furious Charge retains its role as a movement skill. You have some freedom of choice when it comes to the rune; if you do not trust your dominance over the current content to ensure an uninterrupted streak of In-geom In-geom procs, you can stick to the self-sufficient cooldown-resetting powers of the rune Merciless Assault Merciless Assault. Otherwise, we suggest that you alter to the rune Cold Rush Cold Rush for an instant proc of the Savages 2-piece set bonus, so you immediately deal the full damage of your Frenzy Frenzy slashes; In-geom In-geom should cover for your reliably available mobility.
  • Battle Rage Battle Rage Bloodshed Bloodshed, Threatening Shout Threatening Shout Falter Falter and War Cry War Cry Impunity Impunity are all kept as valuable and consistent buffs to your damage and survivability.
  • Wrath of the Berserker Wrath of the Berserker Insanity Insanity is still part of your skill lineup, and will have much higher uptime due to In-geom In-geom. Of course, that depends on the gear setup — there are speed farming variants for relatively higher GRs that omit In-geom In-geom and play around the WotB downtime.
  • You will retain the vast majority of your passive lineup from the solo GR progression build.Boon of Bul-Kathos Boon of Bul-Kathos is still quite useful for WotB uptime even with In-geom In-geom present, while Rampage Rampage and Berserker Rage Berserker Rage are consistent and straightforward damage buffs for a generator build in speed farming.
  • You will maintain a large part of your progression passive lineup, with Rampage Rampage providing a massive damage and toughness multiplicative increase (due to Strength scaling), Berserker Rage Berserker Rage providing consistent DPS boost because of your full Fury reserve, and Boon of Bul-Kathos Boon of Bul-Kathos cutting your ever so valuable Wrath of the Berserker Wrath of the Berserker cooldown shorter. Since you will not be running a setup with an axe in your main-hand, you should alter the Weapons Master Weapons Master passive to Brawler Brawler for a better damage bonus.
4.

Adapting Gear

Most of the gear from the Greater Rift progression build will still make sense for speed farming, but a few variations will be necessary in order to maximize your productivity and momentum during regular Rift clears.

The Horde of the Ninety Savages set is still worn almost in its entirety, and it is recommended that you use 2 pieces of the craftable Aughild's Authority set, in order to capitalize on your elite fighting prowess and snowball your performance throughout the rift; the loss of life sustain items should be negligible during speed GR farming. Of course, this necessitates the use of Ring of Royal Grandeur Ring of Royal Grandeur in your jewelry Cube slot to complete the 6-piece HotNS bonus.

During Greater Rift speed farming, the timing and positioning-reliant bonuses of the Endless Walk set are greatly diminished in usefulness. You can still use this jewelry split, but will be slower and only suitable when you explore the upper GR limits of your speed farming. In their place, we suggest wearing a combination of Squirt's Necklace Squirt's Necklace, Convention of Elements Convention of Elements and a Band of Might Band of Might. Squirt's Necklace Squirt's Necklace is a glass cannon staple which doubles your damage with a separate multiplier, but has considerable drawbacks — requirement not to get hit and a penalty of increased damage taken if you do. You will offset these drawbacks with the shield of Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard lvl 25 bonus, and the combination of control you apply to the enemies plus your tremendous kill speed in GRs. Convention of Elements Convention of Elements rotates through the elemental damage bonuses available to your class and dictates your playstyle around the spike of damage during your chosen element, where you should ideally pop the Wrath of the Berserker Wrath of the Berserker activation. Band of Might Band of Might is a massive source of damage reduction with the trivial requirement of using Furious Charge Furious Charge on a regular (sub-8 seconds) basis.

In order to ensure very high uptime of Wrath of the Berserker Wrath of the Berserker during speed farming, you should drop the usual suspects for solo GR progression — Azurewrath Azurewrath or The Burning Axe of Sankis The Burning Axe of Sankis — and use an In-geom In-geom. The cooldown reduction upon elite kill powers of this legendary sword directly correspond to the elite hunting playstyle of the build. Note that if you decide to test the upper GR speed farming limits of the build, you can drop In-geom In-geom and play around the WotB downtime, switching to the Endless Walk set and arming yourself with an Echoing Fury Echoing FuryOathkeeper Oathkeeper combo.

Slot Pieces Stat Priority
Head
  1. Strength
  2. Socket
  3. Crit Chance
  4. Vitality
  5. Crowd Control Reduction (Secondary Stat)
  6. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
Shoulders
  1. Strength
  2. Cooldown Reduction
  3. Area Damage
  4. Vitality
  5. Health Globe Healing Bonus (Secondary Stat)
  6. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
Torso
  1. Strength
  2. 3 Sockets
  3. All Resistance
  4. Elite Damage Reduction
  5. Physical or Lightning Resistance (Secondary Stat)
  6. Melee or Missile Damage Reduction (Secondary Stat)
Wrists
  1. Strength
  2. Critical Hit Chance
  3. Elemental Damage acc. to Frenzy rune
  4. Vitality or Life per Hit
  5. Melee or Missile Damage Reduction (Secondary Stat)
Hands
  1. Strength (or Area Damage at high Paragon)
  2. Critical Hit Chance
  3. Critical Hit Damage
  4. Cooldown Reduction
  5. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
  6. Stun on Hit % (Secondary Stat)
Waist
  1. Strength
  2. Frenzy Skill %
  3. Vitality
  4. All Resistance
  5. Freeze on Hit % (Secondary Stat)
Legs
  1. Strength
  2. 2 Sockets
  3. Frenzy Skill %
  4. Vitality
  5. Life per Kill (Secondary Stat)
  6. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
Feet
  1. Strength
  2. Vitality
  3. All Resistance
  4. Armor
  5. Pickup Radius (Secondary Stat)
  6. Health Globe Healing Bonus (Secondary Stat)
Amulet
  1. Socket
  2. Critical Hit Damage
  3. Critical Hit Chance
  4. Elemental Damage acc. to Frenzy rune
  5. Physical or Lightning Resistance (Secondary Stat)
  6. Melee or Missile Damage Reduction (Secondary Stat)
Ring #1
  1. Socket
  2. Critical Hit Chance
  3. Critical Hit Damage
  4. Area Damage
  5. Strength
  6. Physical or Lightning Resistance (Secondary Stat)
Ring #2
  1. Socket
  2. Critical Hit Chance
  3. Critical Hit Damage
  4. Average Damage or Area Damage
Weapon #1
  1. Socket (preferably from Ramaladni's Gift Ramaladni's Gift)
  2. High Weapon Damage
  3. Strength
  4. Cooldown Reduction
  5. Attack Speed (on Oathkeeper Oathkeeper)
  6. Freeze/Stun/Fear on Hit (Secondary Stat)
Weapon #2
  1. Socket (preferably from Ramaladni's Gift Ramaladni's Gift)
  2. High Weapon Damage
  3. Strength
  4. Cooldown Reduction
  5. Attack Speed (on Oathkeeper Oathkeeper)
  6. Freeze/Stun/Fear on Hit (Secondary Stat)

To help you with farming the gear you need for your builds, we have two very useful guides that you can access by clicking the links below: a Salvage Guide to help you quickly check whether or not you can safely salvage a piece of gear and a Legendary Farming Guide to help you efficiently farm legendaries and set items.

4.1.

Altar of Rites

The former Season 28 theme, the Altar of Rites, has been revised and re-added to Diablo 3 as a permanent character progression mechanic. — For virtually all builds and players of all skill levels — from casual to advanced — we recommend progressing through the Altar tree using the path outlined below. The suggested path is geared towards maximum quality of life first, then amplifying damage, and then mopping up the tree with defensive and edge case utility nodes.

Note that while they require reaching them with a Seal, Legendary Potion Powers are not part of the Seal cost system; Potions unlock with a separate resource called Primordial Ashes, obtained from salvaging Legendary or Set items of Primal (red bordered) quality. Upgrade them as soon as possible, and in the order shown below (courtesy of Caleko's Altar of Rites planner).

Altar of Rites Planner

You can read more on the Altar of Rites, Seals and Legendary Potion Powers in our dedicated Altar of Rites Mechanics guide.

5.

Adapting Gems

Both Simplicity's Strength Simplicity's Strength and Bane of the Trapped Bane of the Trapped remain universally desired damage amplification gems for the build.

When using Squirt's Necklace Squirt's Necklace, you will have to introduce a shielding layer of protection in order to maximize its bonus. The most convenient way for most builds to do so, including this one, is to socket a Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard as a legendary gem. Its level 25 bonus provides a Life Regeneration-scaling absorption shield after not taking damage for 4 seconds, and is rather easy to keep up with the crowd control capabilities of this build. If you are playing an Endless Walk version of this build, simply swap this slot out for the other speed farming staple, Bane of the Powerful Bane of the Powerful.

5.1.

Season 30 Soul Shards

In Season 30, your helm and weapon sockets will be taken over by the supremely powerful Soul Shards. For this variant, we recommend the following:

  • HelmSliver of Terror with "Your Attack Speed and Critical Hit Chance are increased by 5% for each skill on cooldown" as its Rank 3 power. For optimization benefits, aim for Strength or Melee/Ranged Damage Reduction on its Rank 2 roll.
  • WeaponRemnant of Pain with "Hitting enemies with Cold damage has a 50% chance to Freeze them" as its Rank 3 power. For optimization benefits, aim for Cold Skills % Increase or Weapon Damage Increase on its Rank 2 roll. This Soul Shard delivers guaranteed crits when you apply hard crowd control effects on enemies (the self-proc from the Freeze roll, in this case).
Slot Gems
Jewelry
Helm
Torso and Pants
Weapon

For more information about gems, please refer to our guide on gems.

6.

Adapting Kanai's Cube

Both Bastion's Revered Bastion's Revered and Depth Diggers Depth Diggers remain very valuable to the build, as they provide a significant chunk of the damage scaling (Frenzy Frenzy-specific and Primary skills overall, respectively).

In order to maintain the 6-piece bonus of the Horde of the Ninety Savages set and the 3-piece Aughild's Authority set bonuses, you will need to slot a Ring of Royal Grandeur Ring of Royal Grandeur in the jewelry Cube slot.

The Kanai's Cube can be used for much more than simply extracting Legendary powers from items. Please refer to our Kanai's Cube guide for more information.

7.

Follower

The recommended follower for this build during speed Greater Rift farming is the Enchantress due to her utility-laden arsenal of skills, and especially her cooldown reduction bonus, which assists your significant CDR needs during farming. Her balance of increasing survivability while also improving damage makes her an excellent choice during speed farming of any kind.

For more information regarding followers, we advise you to read our Follower Guide, which contains detailed advice for choosing the skills and the gear of your follower.

8.

Legendary Potion

You have two viable potion options for this build; either lean into extra health sustain with Bottomless Potion of the Leech Bottomless Potion of the Leech for its Life per Hit bonuses, or try to compensate for your lack of permanent CC immunity due to lesser WotB uptime with Bottomless Potion of the Unfettered Bottomless Potion of the Unfettered.

9.

Changelog

  • 08 Jan. 2024: Revised guide for the permanent addition of the Altar of Rites, and added Season-specific Soul Shard recommendations.
  • 13 Sep. 2023: Added Season 29 Paragon Cap and Gearing recommendations.
  • 22 Feb. 2023: Added Season 28 Altar of Rites recommendations.
  • 26 Aug. 2022: Added Season 27 Angelic Crucible recommendations.
  • 10 Apr. 2022: Guide reviewed for Season 26.
  • 09 Dec. 2021: Added Season 25 Soul Shard recommendations.
  • 22 Jul. 2021: Added recommendations for Season 24 ethereal weapon.
  • 06 Apr. 2021: Variation added.
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