LoD Spirit Barrage Witch Doctor BiS Gear, Gems, and Paragon Points

As this is a Legacy of Dreams setup, the rest of your gear slots will be comprised entirely of legendary items. As a rule of thumb, focus on synergistic stats like Attack Speed, Average Damage and skill bonuses, and remember the setup's requirements for ancient items, as well as its restriction on other set bonuses. You can run individual set pieces with beneficial stats, as long as they do not form any set bonus.

The Legacy of Dreams power allows you to run any legendary item combination while not losing out on the damage amplification and reduction associated with the traditional 6-piece sets. You can obtain this power in two ways; the older way is equipping the two rings — The Wailing Host and Litany of the Undaunted — as your only active set bonus. The newer (and more powerful, since it also opens your ring slots for legendary jewelry) method is the Legacy of Dreams legendary gem.

In a setup with Legacy of Dreams, you will be wearing your two best rolled rings and cubing the third between Convention of Elements, Unity, and Ring of Emptiness. Unity will cut incoming damage in half when paired with another on the follower, along with an immortality relic for him (i.e. Enchanting Favor). Ring of Emptiness greatly amplifies your damage as you spread the two DoTs inherent to the build, Haunt and Locust Swarm. Convention of Elements simply provides a massive damage increase during the Cold cycle of its rotation.

The recommended amulet is The Flavor of Time, whose revised legendary power now doubles the duration of Pylons — an extremely potent power that, with careful timing, can turn the progressively harder fights in Greater Rifts greatly in your favor. The former recommendation for the slot, Hellfire Amulet of Intelligence, remains a viable option, especially if you obtain a roll with a synergistic fifth passive like Spirit Vessel.

As previously noted, Mask of Jeram curiously affects the Phantasm spectres, bringing a massive 100% additive damage increase to the build. Rolls-wise, aim for Intelligence, Spirit Barrage %, Crit Chance and an open Socket.

In terms of gearing outside the jewelry, we can roughly divide gear into four categories: offense, defense, utility and Spirit Barrage-specific.

Your offensive armor equips will be evenly split between boosting elemental damage and pet damage, working in unison to boost your primary skill. A straightforward addition to the build, Frostburn will increase Cold damage (affecting both Phlebotomize and Phantasm), as well as bring circumstantial survivability to the build via the 50% chance to freeze affected enemies. Swamp Land Waders are a well-known addition to LoN Witch Doctors, who completely disregard the Sacrifice properties of the item for the universally useful elemental damage roll. As previously noted, Mask of Jeram curiously affects the Phantasm spectres, bringing a massive 100% additive damage increase to the build. Finally, the glass cannon staple The Witching Hour brings its unique Crit Damage and Increased Attack Speed rolls to a great benefit for Spirit Barrage.

Your two defensive items bring the bulk of the survivability in the build, requiring you to pick skills, passive and Cube choices to cater to their mechanics. Aquila Cuirass reduces damage in half as long as you do not dip below 90% of your resource pool, which is main reasoning to use Draining Spirit early on as you get used to the build. On the other hand, Lakumba's Ornament is a class cornerstone that reduces incoming damage significantly as you Soul Harvest your way through fights.

As far as utility picks are concerned, you will focus on maneuverability and cheating death with Illusory Boots and Pauldrons of the Skeleton King respectively. Illusory Boots are an Act 2 cache legendary item that enables you to move through enemies (ignoring collision), as well as through Waller affixes. In a build that relies on Soul Harvest for much of its survival, this freedom of movement cannot be understated; you could, however, find temporary substitutes in similarly synergistic legendaries like Boots of Disregard (Act 3 cache item) and Ice Climbers. Lacking any truly synergistic shoulders, your best bet for the slot are the Pauldrons of the Skeleton King — an Act 1 cache legendary that gives you an independent, yet minor chance for a cheat death proc.

Finally, your weapon and offhand will naturally be dedicated to the Spirit Barrage-specific The Barber and Gazing Demise. The Barber has seen several reworks, changing both its unique properties and base item type in a rather confusing pattern. It is also worth mentioning that since Area Damage procs do not benefit from the accumulation of The Barber damage, it is not a priority stat while gearing. In your other hand, the Gazing Demise will be a crucial piece in the formation of the build; it brings the "pets" of the Phantasm rune for free and multiplies their damage for each spirit in the field. The item has an unfortunate base Life Regeneration roll and lacks a natural Crit Chance stat, making it hard to obtain with a good roll and a high priority gamble target.

Slot	Pieces	Stat Priority
Head	Mask of Jeram	Intelligence Socket Spirit Barrage % Critical Hit Chance Vitality
Shoulders	Pauldrons of the Skeleton King	Intelligence Vitality Life % Armor
Torso	Aquila Cuirass	Intelligence 3 Sockets Vitality Reduced damage from Elites Armor
Wrists	Lakumba's Ornament	Intelligence Critical Hit Chance Cold Damage Vitality
Hands	Frostburn	Critical Hit Chance Critical Hit Damage Attack Speed Intelligence Vitality
Waist	The Witching Hour	Intelligence Critical Hit Damage (if The Witching Hour) Attack Speed (if The Witching Hour) Vitality
Legs	Swamp Land Waders	Intelligence 2 Sockets Vitality Armor
Feet	Illusory Boots	Intelligence Vitality Armor All Resistance Movement Speed
Amulet	The Flavor of Time	Socket Critical Hit Damage Critical Hit Chance Cold Damage Intelligence
Ring #1	Convention of Elements (Best in Slot) The Wailing Host (alt in early progression)	Socket Critical Hit Damage Critical Hit Chance Average Damage
Ring #2	Unity (Best in Slot) Ring of Emptiness (Alternative) Litany of the Undaunted (alt in early progression)	Socket Critical Hit Damage Critical Hit Chance Average Damage
Weapon	The Barber	High Damage Range Intelligence Socket (preferably from Ramaladni's Gift) Attack Speed % Weapon Damage
Off-hand	Gazing Demise	High Damage Range Intelligence Critical Hit Chance Spirit Barrage % Vitality

Slot	Paragon Points
Core	Movement Speed up to 25% cap Intelligence Vitality Maximum Mana (up to personal preference)
Offense	Critical Hit Damage Critical Hit Chance Attack Speed Cooldown Reduction
Defense	Armor Life % All Resistance Life Regeneration
Utility	Resource Cost Reduction Life on Hit Area Damage Gold Find

Bane of the Stricken is a frequent part of Greater Rift solo progression builds, as it is meant to aid strong AoE builds against their nemesis — high health, single target Champions and Rift Guardians. Its stacking damage mechanic is a mechanical guarantee for taking down bulkier enemies in high progression, making it a natural inclusion in Spirit Barrage builds.

Enforcer is the gem meant to aid pet builds — and whether Phantasm fits the stereotype or not, it benefits from this scaling, independent damage multiplier.

Your final slot is best occupied by the Legacy of Dreams legendary gem, which provides a scaling bonus for each legendary item equipped, as long as you have no set bonuses equipped. This bonus is multiplied for Ancient or Primal quality items, and when the gem is maxed out, it matches the Legacy of Nightmares ( The Wailing Host and Litany of the Undaunted rings) set bonus. This potent bonus allows you to play around with all your gear slots for synergistic legendary powers at the cost of a gem slot; in the older LoN setup, this socket would be occupied by Bane of the Trapped.

Slot	Gems
Jewelry	Bane of the Trapped Bane of the Stricken Enforcer
Helm	Flawless Royal Amethyst (Toughness)
Torso and Pants	Flawless Royal Topaz (Damage and All Resistance)
Weapon	Flawless Royal Emerald

The power of Echoing Fury in your weapon Cube slot is highly synergistic with the Spirit Barrage Witch Doctor, as it provides a scaling Attack Speed and Movement Speed bonuses, both of which are vital to this IAS-centric, mobility-dependent build.

While a less obvious choice, a cubed Belt of Transcendence brings a stronger version of the Fetish Sycophants passive to the build (guaranteed proc on cast vs. chance based). In turn, this provides you with a sizable army of Fetish companions, who bring indirect survivability in the form of a meath shield that distracts enemies and soaks affixes and spells.

While bringing nice damage and survival buffs of their own, the true purpose of including Haunt Poisoned Spirit and Locust Swarm Cloud of Insects is to proc Ring of Emptiness — a powerful, DoT-reliant damage multiplier.