Penetrating Shot Endgame Rogue Build Guide for Diablo 4 (Season 1)

Build Introduction

The Penetrating Shot Rogue build blasts through even the toughest foes. This is your guide to building a character for endgame activities in Diablo 4, with the optimal setup for Skills, Gear and Paragon.

Penetrating Shot always pierces, dealing massive hit damage to any enemies in the way. It also has an extremely generous 80% Lucky Hit Chance when 3 Combo Points are used. Therefore, this build utilizes many beneficial Lucky Hit Effects.

Trickshot Aspect is required to give Penetrating Shot additional arrows for more Area of Effect (AoE). Make sure you have an extracted Aspect or have it unlocked in the Codex of Power. Extracted Aspects from Legendary Items are preferred for their stronger effect.

This ranged build is perfect for players that want a safe playstyle that easily clears groups of enemies. Line them up with the Penetrating Shot Rogue! Alternatively, check out our Dual Core Flurry Rapid Fire Rogue for the fastest speed farming build.

The only starting requirement for this endgame build guide is a character around Level 50 in World Tier 3. Check our Rogue Leveling Guide if you need help getting there.

Strengths and Weaknesses

To see how this build compares to the other builds on our site, you can check out our build tier lists.

Season of the Malignant

Season 1 Patch Updates

The following list details the changes in the Season 1 Patch Update that are specific to this build. Check the Changelog for all the other guide updates.

• Siphoning Strikes now also requires a Lucky Hit chance of 75%.
• Enhanced Smoke Grenade damage bonus increased from 15% to 20%.
• Aspect of Retribution bonus damage to Stunned reduced from 20-40% to 10-20%.
• Aspect of Disobedience maximum stacks reduced from 100 to 60, reducing maximum Bonus Armor % from 25%-50% to 15%-30%.
• Vengeful Aspect Lucky Hit Chance increased from 30-50% to 40-60%.

In addition to the build specific changes, multiple sources of Critical Strike Damage and Vulnerable Damage were reduced globally for all classes. Rogues did not receive any major nerfs to damage directly to their class. The biggest direct change to Rogues is the addition of a Lucky Hit Chance requirement for Siphoning Strikes, significantly reducing their survivability. All other classes received much heavier nerfs, making Rogue a top pick for season 1.

Patch 1.1.1

The second major update for Season 1 brings a few buffs to Rogues in Patch 1.1.1, released on August 8th, 2023. Listed below are the changes directly affecting the Penetrating Shot build.

• Siphoning Strikes
  • Lucky Hit chance increased from 75% to 85%.
• Aspect of Quickening Fog
  • You automatically drop a Smoke Grenade at the end of Dash. Smoke Grenades reduce Dash’s cooldown by .4-.6 seconds per target hit, up to 2-3 seconds.

Best Malignant Hearts Tier List for Penetrating Shot Rogue

The Season 1 theme introduces Malignant Hearts that provide build-altering bonuses. The hearts are divided into 4 categories, each with a color that needs to be socketed in the corresponding colored Malignant Socket on equipped jewelry. Wrathful Hearts are a special case due to their rarity, and can be placed in any Socket. 

Always socket Malignant Hearts instead of a Skull in Jewelry. Malignant Hearts provide an Armor bonus that scales with its Item Power.

Listed below is the Malignant Hearts Tier List for Penetrating Shot Rogue, ranked by importance. Stats displayed reflect what a level 20 character would receive as a drop.

1. Caged Heart of The Barber (Wrathful, Super-World Tier III): Critical Strikes and all subsequent damage within 2.0-4.0 seconds is absorbed by your target. Then, the absorbed damage erupts onto surrounding enemies. Stored damage is increased by 10% per second. – Fixed in Patch 1.1.1 to work with “on hit” effects and Lucky Hit chance.
2. Caged Heart of Revenge (Brutal, Defensive-World Tier III): 10-20% of incoming damage is instead suppressed. When you use a Defensive, Subterfuge or a Macabre skill, all suppressed damage is amplified by 250% and explodes, dealing up to 1360-2040 Fire damage to Nearby enemies.
3. Caged Heart of Tempting Fate (Vicious, Offensive-World Tier III): You gain 40-60% Critical Strike Damage but your Non-Critical Strikes deal 20-15% less damage.
4. Caged Heart of the Dark Dance (Vicious, Offensive-World Tier III): Every 5 seconds while above 60% Life, Core Skills cost 68-51 Life instead of your Primary Resource. Skills that consume Life deal 10-20% increased damage.
5. Caged Heart of the Picana (Vicious, Offensive): Critical Strikes electrically charge the enemy for 0.75-2.50 seconds, causing lightning to arc between them and any other charged enemies dealing 68-136 Lightning damage.
6. Caged Heart of Cluster Munitions (Vicious, Offensive): Lucky Hit: You have up to a 20% chance to launch 3 Stun Grenades that deal 26-32 Physical damage and Stun enemies for 0.50 seconds.
7. Caged Heart of the Clipshot (Devious, Utility): Lucky Hit: Up to a 20-40% chance for your Cutthroat Skills to Slow by 40% for 3 seconds and your Marksman Skills to Knock Back enemies.

Skill Tree Points and Skill Bar

Skill Bar Setup for Penetrating Shot Rogue (order does not matter)

Penetrating Shot Puncture Smoke Grenade Poison Trap Poison Imbuement Dash

The following tables show the full allocation of Skill Points for the Penetrating Shot Rogue build. The first table has the most important 49 points to start the build. The second table has the remaining 9 points that are allocated once you obtain all Skill Points from Renown.

Priority Skills	Cluster
Puncture Level 1, Enhanced Puncture, Fundamental Puncture	Basic Skill
Penetrating Shot Level 5, Enhanced Penetrating Shot, Advanced Penetrating Shot Stutter Step Level 3	Core Skill
Dash Level 1, Enhanced Dash, Disciplined Dash	Agility Skill
Smoke Grenade Level 1, Enhanced Smoke Grenade, Countering Smoke Grenade Poison Trap Level 1, Enhanced Poison Trap, Countering Poison Trap Exploit Level 3, Malice Level 3 Agile Level 3	Subterfuge Skill
Poison Imbuement Level 1, Enhanced Poison Imbuement, Blended Poison Imbuement Deadly Venom Level 1, Debilitating Toxins Level 3	Imbuement Skill
Innervation Level 3, Second Wind Level 3 Adrenaline Rush Level 1, Haste Level 3	Ultimate Skill
Exposure	Key Passives

Remaining Renown Points	Cluster
Alchemical Advantage Level 3	Imbuement Skill
Concussive Level 3, Trick Attacks Level 1 Weapon Mastery Level 2	Agility Skill

Penetrating Shot Rogue Specialization

Combo Points is the preferred Rogue Specialization for general farming due to it providing bonus Lucky Hit Chance for Penetrating Shot, in additional to increased damage.

Paragon

The Paragon progression system unlocks at Level 50 and provides a vast amount of character power. On the Paragon Board, bonuses range from minor stats on Magic Nodes to more powerful Rare Glyphs and Legendary Nodes.

As you path towards Glyph Sockets and Legendary Nodes, you should prioritize Damage, Dexterity, Resistance, and Life for Normal and Magic Nodes. Glyph radius increases as you level them up. Therefore, if you cannot fulfill Additional Bonus requirements early on, skip allocating extra nodes for now.

Listed below are the Legendary Nodes and Rare Glyphs to use for the Penetrating Shot Rogue build, sorted in the order obtained in Paragon.

Name	Effect
Chip	• For every 5 Dexterity purchased within range, you deal +2% increased Physical damage. • Additional Bonus (requires 40 Dexterity purchased in radius range): Physical damage increases the damage an enemy takes from you by 1%, up to 10%, for 15 seconds.
Deadly Ambush	You deal 22.5% increased Critical Strike Damage to enemies affected by your Trap Skills.
Exploit	• For every 5 Strength purchased within range, you deal + [7.2%] increased damage to Vulnerable targets. • Additional Bonus (requires 25 Strength purchased in radius range): When an enemy is damaged by you, they become Vulnerable for 3 seconds. This cannot happen more than once every 20 seconds per enemy.
Exploit Weakness	Whenever you deal damage to a Vulnerable enemy, they take 1% increased damage from you for 6 seconds, up to 15%.
Combat	• For every 5 Intelligence purchased within range, Core Skills deal +4% increased Critical Strike Damage. • Additional Bonus (requires 40 Intelligence purchased in radius range): Skills that Critically Strike restore 12% of their Energy cost.
Cunning Stratagem	Your non-damage Combo Point bonuses are increased by 33.33% when you spend 3 Combo Points.
Ambush	For every 5 Strength purchased within range, you deal + [9.6%] increased damage to targets affected by Trap Skills. • Additional Bonus (requires 25 Strength purchased in radius range): Enemies affected by Trap Skills take x10% increased damage from you.

Starting Board

1. Path to the right and up to Prime. Purchase all 4 surrounding Magic Nodes.
2. Continue up to the first Glyph Socket. Insert Chip and purchase all nodes providing Dexterity in radius range for the Additional Bonus.
3. Obtain Lawless nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Armor.
4. Obtain Skillful nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Damage.
5. Continue up the right side to your first Board Attachment Gate. Attach Deadly Ambush after rotating the board clockwise 1 time.

Deadly Ambush (2nd Board)

1. Path up and then left to Spring-Loaded. Purchase 2 surrounding Magic Nodes providing Trap Skill Cooldown Reduction.
2. From the starting Board Attachment Gate on the bottom, path up, right and then up to the Glyph Socket. Insert Exploit and purchase all Strength nodes in radius range.
3. Obtain Cunning nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Damage Reduction from Enemies Affected by Trap Skills.
4. Obtain Engineering nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Damage to Enemies Affected by Trap Skill.
5. Continue left to Deadly Ambush.
6. Take the shortest route to the Board Attachment Gate on the right side. Attach Exploit Weakness after rotating the board clockwise 1 time.

Exploit Weakness (3rd Board)

1. Path right and then down to Exploit . Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
2. Continue right and then up to Exploit Weakness.
3. Use the path between Exploit and Exploit Weakness to obtain Unassailable. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
4. Continue right to Cold Resilience and purchase 2 Magic Nodes providing Maximum Life.
5. From your starting Board Attachment Gate on the left, path right and then up to the Glyph Socket. Insert Combat and purchase all Intelligence nodes in radius range.
6. Obtain Dosage nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Potion Healing.
7. Obtain Artifice nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Vulnerable Damage.
8. Continue right to Hunter Killer and purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
9. Take the shortest route to the Board Attachment Gate at the top. Attach Cunning Stratagem without any board rotations.

Cunning Stratagem (4th Board)

1. Path right and then up to Slayer. Purchase all surrounding Magic Nodes.
2. Continue right to Cunning Stratagem
3. From Slayer, path left and then up to Fundamentals. Purchase all surrounding Magic Nodes.
4. Continue left and then up to the Glyph Socket. Insert Ambush and purchase all Strength nodes in radius range.
5. Obtain Lawless nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Armor.
6. Obtain Finisher nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Core Skill Damage.
7. From the Glyph Socket, path right and then down to Dominant. Purchase all surrounding Magic Nodes.

Click this link and check the Paragon page on the planner for a visual of the entire tree.

Mechanics and Playstyle

The Penetrating Shot Rogue build is fairly simple to play, but has some complex mechanics to learn. Penetrating Shot has a focused Area of Effect (AoE) in a straight line that can be hard to utilize. Trickshot Aspect helps overcome this downside by adding more arrows to increase coverage and help clear packs of enemies.

Damage is increased further with Concussive, Weapon Mastery, Exploit Malice, and Alchemical Advantage.

Survivability is gained through Agile and Debilitating Toxins, while Smoke Grenade prevents enemies from attacking you.

Finally, Stutter Step, Haste and Dash speed up movement for faster farming.

Since Penetrating Shot already has plenty of AoE damage to clear packs, Poison Imbuement is preferred over Shadow Imbuement for more single target damage.

Poison Trap is not specced to deal damage, but instead has a Knockdown with Enhanced Poison Trap. Exposure reduces your Trap cooldowns, which include Smoke Grenade when you have Aspect of Quickening Fog.

Lucky Hit

Penetrating Shot has a high Lucky Hit Chance of 80% when used with 3 Combo Points, and it has a chance of proccing on every enemy hit by the piercing arrows. Therefore, many Lucky Hit Effects are used, including Countering Smoke Grenade, Innervation and Exposure. Lucky Hit Chance is further increased with Second Wind.

Puncture can also be used to proc Lucky Hits with 35% chance per blade thrown. This works extremely well with increased Basic Attack Speed and 3 blades thrown per cast on Fundamental Puncture.

Status Effects

The Penetrating Shot Rogue utilizes multiple status effects to render enemies helpless. Advanced Penetrating Shot Slows enemies and Knocks Down elites when casted at full Energy.

Fundamental Puncture easily applies Vulnerable to a target with a single Basic attack. In group play, apply this debuff to Elites and Bosses so your teammates deal 20% more damage!

Smoke Grenade is another powerful Crowd Control (CC) in our trapper arsenal. This Skill can be used often to Daze groups of enemies with Countering Smoke Grenade and Exposure reducing active Trap cooldowns. Dash also drops an automatic Smoke Grenade with Aspect of Quickening Fog. Critical Strikes against Dazed enemies knock them down with Trick Attacks, activating Concussive for increased Critical Strike Chance.

Advanced Penetrating Shot and Disciplined Dash both apply Slow to restore Energy with Aspect of the Umbral.

Stack Damage to Poisoned, Vulnerable, Dazed, Slowed and Controlled Enemies on gear and the Paragon Board to scale your damage further.

Damage Rotation

Use the following rotation to optimize DPS.

1. Use Smoke Grenade or Dash with Aspect of Quickening Fog to Daze enemies.
2. Alternate between Poison Trap and Poison Imbuement to keep enemies Poisoned.
3. Cast Puncture 3 times to build Combo Points. Try to stay close enough to shotgun elites and bosses to apply Vulnerable and proc Lucky Hit.
4. Line enemies up to piece through them with Penetrating Shot.
5. Repeat the rotation. Try to cast Penetrating Shot while you have full Energy to activate Advanced Penetrating Shot and Edgemaster’s Aspect.

Gear Choice and Stat Priority in the Endgame

Make sure to pick up all Rare Item drops that may be upgrades while you are farming with Penetrating Shot Rogue. Save Legendary Items with useful aspects in your stash to be used later for extraction and imprinting onto well rolled Rare Items.

When comparing weapons with similar item levels, Crossbows are preferred over Bows for the Vulnerable Damage implicit. The DPS value on Dual Wielded Weapons does not matter as much, because they are only used for Puncture. Therefore, other beneficial affix mods on Dual Wielded Weapons can be prioritized instead. Swords are preferred over Daggers for the Critical Strike Damage implicit.

Stat Priority List

Listed below are the affixes to prioritize on gear for Penetrating Shot Rogues. Each line of affixes are listed in order of importance. Affixes on the same line are considered to be equally important, since their exact values differ for each character. All stats have an effect that is dependent on how much is already stacked. Bolded stats are the most important and sometimes vital for the build to function properly.

Legendary Aspects and Codex of Power

Listed below are all the best-in-slot Aspects found on Legendary Items that are important for the Penetrating Shot Rogue build. Aspects from the Codex of Power can be used if you cannot find the proper Legendary drops, but they have weaker effects. Extract Aspects from lower level Legendary Items and imprint them onto better Rare Items with preferred stats.

Resource Aspects, such as Aspect of the Umbral and Ravenous Aspect, help with Energy management early on. Unfortunately, they are limited to Ring slots and replace Offensive Aspects. Resource management is improved elsewhere in this build, so important separate damage multipliers are not lost.

Gear Slot	Aspect Name	Aspect Power
Ranged Weapon (+100% bonus effect)	Trickshot Aspect	Whenever Penetrating Shot damages an enemy, 2 additional arrows split off to either side. These side arrows deal [10 – 25%] of Penetrating Shot’s Base damage and do not split.
Amulet (+50 bonus effect)	Smiting Aspect	You have [10 – 20%] increased Critical Strike Chance against Injured enemies. While you are Healthy, you gain [20 – 40%] increased Crowd Control Duration.
Dual-Wielded Weapon Slot #1 (replaced by Condemnation)	Vengeful Aspect	Lucky Hit: Making an enemy Vulnerable has up to a [40 – 60%] chance to grant 3% increased Critical Strike Chance for 3 seconds, up to 9%.
Dual-Wielded Weapon Slot #2, Rings or Gloves	Edgemaster’s Aspect	Skills deal up to [10 – 20%] increased damage based on your available Primary Resource when cast, receiving the maximum benefit while you have full Primary Resource.
Dual-Wielded Weapon Slot #2, Rings or Gloves	Aspect of the Expectant	Attacking enemies with a Basic Skill increases the damage of your next Core Skill cast by [5 – 10%], up to 30%.
Dual-Wielded Weapon Slot #2, Rings or Gloves	Rapid Aspect	Basic Skills gain [15 – 30%] Attack Speed.
Dual-Wielded Weapon Slot #2, Rings or Gloves	Accelerating Aspect	Critical Strikes with Core Skills increase your Attack Speed by [15 – 25%] for 3 seconds.
Helm, Chest or Boots	Aspect of Explosive Verve	Your Grenade Skills count as Trap Skills. Whenever you arm a Trap or drop Grenades, you gain [10 – 18%] increased Movement speed for 3 seconds.
Helm, Chest or Boots	Aspect of Quickening Fog	You automatically drop a Smoke Grenade at the end of Dash. Dash’s Cooldown is reduced by [0.4 – 0.6] seconds for each enemy Dazed this way, up to [2.0 – 3.0] seconds.
Helm, Chest or Pants	Aspect of Might	Basic Skills grant 20% Damage Reduction for [2 – 6] seconds
Helm, Chest or Pants	Aspect of Disobedience	You gain [0.25 – 0.50%] increased Armor for 4 seconds when you deal any form of damage, stacking up to [15.00 – 30.00%].

Unique Items

Condemnation

Condemnation – Your Core Skills deal [20 – 40%] increased damage when spending 3 Combo Points. Your Skills using this weapon have a 30% chance to generate 3 Combo Points.

This Unique Dagger synergies well with this Combo Points build for an additional damage multiplier.

Not Recommended Unique items

Listed below are the Unique Items not recommended for this build and the reasons they are not worthwhile.

• Skyhunter – This Unique Bow is a huge DPS loss compared to a Legendary Crossbow with well-rolled affixes, a Vulnerable Damage implicit and an Offensive Aspect with +100% bonus effect on 2-Handed Weapons.
• Asheara’s Khanjar – The Attack Speed bonus on this Unique Dagger is decent, but the rest of its affixes are lacking. A Legendary Sword with well-rolled affixes and an Offensive Aspect is more beneficial.
• Grasp of Shadow – These Unique Gloves provide up to +3 Ranks for all Core Skills, but Legendary Gloves with +4 Ranks of Penetrating Shot are better. The summoned Shadow Clone attack does significantly less damage than the original attack being copied.
• Temerity – These Unique Pants provide a consistent Barrier when paired with Siphoning Strikes. Conceited Aspect can also be used with this Barrier generation for increased damage, but this build already has enough Offensive Aspect choices. Using Temerity causes you to miss out on 4 Damage Reduction affixes and an Aspect from Legendary Pants, making them not worthwhile.

Gems

Listed below are the best Gems to socket into gear for each slot type for the Penetrating Shot Rogue build.

• Weapon: Royal Emerald for Critical Strike Damage to Vulnerable Enemies.
• Armor: Royal Ruby for Maximum Life or Royal Topaz to prevent deaths from chain Crowd Controls.
• Jewelry: Malignant Hearts if playing Season 1. Otherwise, Royal Skull for Armor.

Elixirs and Health Potions

Visit the Alchemist in any main town to craft helpful Elixirs that increase stats and experience gain for 30 minutes. Make sure to forage plants and pick up the necessary crafting materials during your adventures; they randomly spawn around the world. Craft a Precision Elixir or Assault Elixir.

Return to the Alchemist again when you reach Level 20, 30, 45, 60, 70, 80 and 90, to upgrade your potion. The extra healing is essential to survival.

Changelog

• August 30th, 2023: Not Recommended Unique Items section added.
• August 2nd, 2023: Patch 1.1.1 section added with build specific changes.
• July 18th, 2023: Guide updated for Season 1.
• July 14th, 2023: Stat Priority List reevaluated.
• July 12th, 2023: Aspects reevaluated.