Vyr Archon Wizard Nephalem Rift Speed Farming Variation

The Vyr Archon Wizard can deal reasonably well with Nephalem Rift Speed Farming, mostly thanks to the great mobility offered by the Teleport rune of Archon gained via the 2-piece bonus. We have solo speed GR rankings and solo speed T16 rankings if you want to know more about which builds are best for speed farming.

Within the limited scope of regular difficulties, the necessary damage and toughness to triumph over the enemy is significantly smaller. Thus, your best course of action is to improve utility and speed.

Active Skills
Arcane Torrent Static Discharge Magic Weapon Deflection 1 Archon Slow Time 2 Teleport Wormhole 3 Storm Armor Scramble 4 Explosive Blast Flash
Passive Skills
Evocation Galvanizing Ward Audacity Illusionist

When you are speed farming regular rifts, parts of your playstyle will adapt to the lowered challenge and focus more on speed and utility.

Before starting the farming run, apply the two protective buffs — Storm Armor Scramble and Magic Weapon Deflection. Prior to your first Archon activation, strive to max out the Chantodo stacks to their 20 stack cap via Explosive Blast and Arcane Torrent, then enter Archon form. From then on, Archon stacks should be overlapping due to The Swami effect and the ease of demolishing the difficulty, so for any subsequent Archon re-activations you will not need more than a few Chantodo stacks.

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.

• Archon naturally stays as the focal point of the build, taken with the Cold rune Slow Time.
• Swap the progression-oriented Black Hole to the extra maneuverability of Teleport Safe Passage (or even Wormhole). You can turn this skill into a spammable spender with a Cubed Aether Walker, assisting this build in bounties (although we do not recommend it for the purpose).
• Storm Armor will be retained in the build, but you should alter the proc-heavy Shocking Aspect rune (helpful to keep up the Halo of Karini defense, which is a non-issue in T16) to the additional movement speed of Scramble.
• Arcane Torrent Static Discharge and Explosive Blast Flash will be used mostly as Chantodo buildup material, finishing off the occasional enemy in your Archon downtime.
• Magic Weapon Deflection and Galvanizing Ward will be maintained as staple pieces of your protective lineup. As for the remainder of your passives, the multiplicative close range buff of Audacity and the Cooldown Reduction of Evocation remain cornerstone inclusions. Add to them the speed farm mainstay Illusionist for a nice movement speed increase every time you teleport or slow time.

You will still be taking advantage of the full 6-piece set bonuses of Vyr, but you will only take 5 set pieces and get the complete bonus through a Ring of Royal Grandeur. This allows you to wear The Swami on your character, and take advantage of the near-infinite toughness of a Goldwrap in the Cube armor slot. To complement the Archon build, you will maintain the Chantodo's Resolve set — Chantodo's Will and Chantodo's Force as your main- and off-hand.

You will maintain the combination of Squirt's Necklace and Halo of Karini from the progression build, but you should alter the timing-sensitive damage bonuses of Convention of Elements to the weaker, but consistent elemental damage increase form a Cold Stone of Jordan.

When farming for keys in solo games, you will be using the extra movement speed from the environment destruction-based boosts of Warzechian Armguards in the place of the overly defensive, progression-oriented Ashnagarr's Blood Bracer. When key farming in groups you lose your follower utility, and will need to spawn extra elites yourself by wearing Nemesis Bracers. You should also wear your own The Flavor of Time to extend the effects of Pylon pickups; we still recommend using Squirt's Necklace for the damage amplification however, so this means one of these amulets will be cubed and you will lose out the toughness utility of Goldwrap outlined below. This should have no significant impact in a well-equipped farming group.

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.

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).

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

Bane of the Trapped still bring excellent damage multiplication value to the build in speed farming, and it should be complemented with a Bane of the Powerful for its well-rounded damage increase and damage mitigation bonuses; its limited duration should be of no consequence when you are demolishing the difficulty.

Round out your standard Nephalem Rift farming gems with Boon of the Hoarder, which increases your movement speed and provides near-infinite Toughness through its interaction with Goldwrap.

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

You have some room for choice in your weapons Cube slot; both cooldown reduction powerhouses, Messerschmidt's Reaver (early in a Season) and In-geom (on a fully realized character) are good choices, and can allow you to chain Archon form. Certain rift layouts however, and especially bounties, can counter a kill-based reset mechanic with bad density. If you intend to do bounties on Archon, it is worth considering a slower reset (by a second or two) by wearing an Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac instead of one of your rings and using Aether Walker in the weapon cube slot for the consistent mobility.

Stored in the armor Cube slot, Goldwrap synergizes with Avarice Band and Boon of the Hoarder for a gold-based triumvirate that makes you richer, speeds you up and renders you practically invulnerable, allowing you to focus on killing and looting without regards for your safety. On a fully optimized character, you can consider replacing this slot with Krelm's Buff Belt for the additional movement speed.

Ring of Royal Grandeur will be necessary in order to complete the 6-piece bonus of Vyr's set without losing out on utility legendaries in the Cube.

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.

The recommended follower for this build during standard rift farming for keys is the Enchantress due to her numerous utility bonuses, allowing you to smooth out your speed runs even further.

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.

Your recommended potion is Bottomless Potion of the Tower, whose Armor-increasing properties complement the shield-based defenses of this build, as well as the naturally high All Resistances stat of Wizards (due to Intelligence scaling resistances) for optimal survivability.

This Season revives the Pandemonium Kill Streak buff from Season 19. Each stack grants a bonus to movement speed and damage, capping at +50% movement speed and +100% damage at 1000 kills. Hitting specific kill thresholds unleashes powerful effects. Read more in our dedicated Season of the Eternal Conflict Mechanics Guide!

While speedfarming sees limited use from this theme, Greater Rift pushing benefits significantly. Effects like Geysers (150), Meteors (400), and Angels (500) can clear elites and Rift Guardians instantly. Players may reset streaks after 150 kills to repeatedly trigger Geysers or push for 500+ kills near boss fights, often using Nemesis Bracers to spawn extra enemies.

Because the most potent effects (Geysers, Meteors, Angels) can obliterate Rift Guardians instantly up to GR150, players can retool builds for efficiency and comfort. Here’s how:

Since you can rely on killstreak procs to clear the Rift Guardian, Bane of the Stricken can be safely omitted in favor of:

• Another generic damage-scaling legendary gem ( Bane of the Trapped for builds with any form of crowd control and/or melee range, Zei's Stone of Vengeance for far ranged builds, Taeguk for channeling builds, Simplicity's Strength for primary attack-focused builds, Enforcer for pet-oriented builds, etc.)
• A survivability-oriented legendary gem ( Esoteric Alteration, Molten Wildebeest's Gizzard), or additional utility ( Gogok of Swiftness for CDR-reliant builds, Pain Enhancer for attack speed-heavy builds, or Wreath of Lightning for extra movement speed).

Adjust your equipment to items that favor durability, health sustain, and ease of movement. Consider adjusting non-essential skills for the build to ones that pull, reposition, or otherwise displace enemies to facilitate large pulls of enemy packs. In more concrete terms, this means:

• For class-specific items, Wizards should consider Halo of Karini if it's absent from the build; this is a powerful damage reduction item that incentivizes you to use Storm Armor and maintain a pull for procs at all times, synergizing well with the killstreak theme. Another strong option is Ashnagarr's Blood Bracer to significantly boost the strength of your shielding abilities. These help shore up Wizard fragility, especially in high-tier content.
• For additional options that balance between defense and offense, the class-specific offhand Orb of Infinite Depth offers a balanced boost of damage and defense for the reasonable requirement of Explosive Blast inclusion. Helpful cross-class jewelry includes Unity (combined with the same ring on the follower plus a follower immortality token), and the Endless Walk set ( The Traveler's Pledge and The Compass Rose).
• Situational items that can bolster your defenses include Stone Gauntlets, the drawbacks of which are negated via CC-immunity effects like Ice Climbers, or the Altar of Rites CC-immunity node.A good number of Wizard builds can also afford the inclusion of an Aquila Cuirass (for low AP-spenders) or a Mantle of Channeling (for channelers).
• Utility items like Nemesis Bracers are essential as more elites mean more killstreak maintenance and faster progression. When soloing, they should be equipped by your follower; in groups, at least one party member should commit to wearing them. Edge cases will see the inclusion of Strongarm Bracers (extra damage vs. displaced enemies), Warzechian Armguards or Krelm's Buff Belt (more speed for easier scouting and pulls), and an Aether Walker if you can spare the weapon slot for ultimate mobility. To facilitate large pulls, consider using a Follower equipped with The Ess of Johan, a proc-based analogue to an enemy-pulling skill (albeit outside your control).
• Skill-wise, make sure to include at least one movement skill tool like Teleport and an enemy-pulling tool like Black Hole. Take a look if you can include passives like Illusionist (for easy mobility resets) or Unstable Anomaly (for a cheat-death).