Pulverize Werebear Endgame Druid Build for Diablo 4 (Season 1)

Build Introduction

The Pulverize Werebear Druid is a beastly build with crushing blows and massive Area of Effect (AoE). This is the most popular Druid build, due to its easy access and high DPS. Trample through all endgame activities with this optimized guide. This article covers everything you need to know to get started, such as Skill Tree Points, Paragon and Gear.

Pulverize decimates entire groups of enemies with the Shockwave Aspect. Not only does this build have insane DPS, but it also is extremely tanky with Earthen Bulwark and Debilitating Roar as defensive Skills. Fortify is used as an additional layer of survivability.

Strengths and Weaknesses

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

Build Requirements

Required Aspects (Non-codex)

Shockwave Aspect

Shockwave Aspect is recommended to make the most out of this build. If you do not have the Shockwave Aspect yet, you can also check out our Druid Leveling Guide for new character options!

Vasily’s Prayer is a fairly common Unique Druid Helm drop that improves quality of life, but not required to play the Pulverize Werebear build.

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.

Patch 1.1

• Savage Trample Spirit gain increased from 20 to 40.
• Prime Grizzly Rage now grants Unstoppable for 6 seconds instead of while active.
• Aspect of Disobedience maximum stacks reduced from 100 to 60, reducing maximum Bonus Armor % from 25%-50% to 15%-30%.

In addition to the build specific changes, multiple sources of Critical Strike Damage and Vulnerable Damage were reduced globally for all classes. There are no major changes made directly to this build. Compared to many other builds receiving heavy nerfs, Pulverize Druid remains a top pick for season 1.

Patch 1.1.1

The second major update for Season 1 brings a few buffs to Druids in Patch 1.1.1 being released on August 8th, 2023. The only change directly affecting the Pulverize Werebear build is a Spirit gain increase from 11 to 13 for Earth Spike.

Best Malignant Hearts for Pulverize Werebear Druid

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 are the Malignant Hearts that are useful for this build, 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 the Unconstrained Beast (Wrathful, Super-World Tier IV): When you are hit with a Stun, Freeze or Knock Down effect, there is a 40-60% chance to automatically activate Grizzly Rage for 3 seconds.
7. Caged Heart of Inexorable Force (Devious, Utility): Up to 30-50 Distant enemies are pulled toward you while you have an Ultimate Skill active.

Skill Tree Points and Skill Bar

Skill Bar Setup for Pulverize Druid (order does not matter)

Earth Spike Pulverize Earthen Bulwark Debilitating Roar Trample Grizzly Rage

The following tables show the full allocation of Skill Points for the Pulverize Werebear Druid build. The first table has the most important 50 points to start the build. The second table has the remaining 8 points that are allocated once you obtain all Skill Points from Renown.

Priority Skills	Cluster
Earth Spike Level 1, Enhanced Earth Spike	Basic Skill
Pulverize Level 5, Enhanced Pulverize, Primal Pulverize Heart of the Wild Level 1, Wild Impulses Level 3, Abundance Level 3 Predatory Instinct Level 3, Iron Fur Level 3	Core Skill
Earthen Bulwark Level 1, Enhanced Earthen Bulwark, Preserving Earthen Bulwark Debilitating Roar Level 1, Enhanced Debilitating Roar, Preserving Debilitating Roar	Defensive Skill
Nature’s Reach Level 3	Companion Skill
Trample Level 1, Enhanced Trample, Savage Trample Crushing Earth Level 3	Wrath Skill
Grizzly Rage, Prime Grizzly Rage, Supreme Grizzly Rage Defiance Level 3, Natural Disaster Level 3, Resonance Level 3	Ultimate Skill
Earthen Might	Key Passives

Remaining Renown Points	Cluster
Stone Guard Level 3, Safeguard Level 2	Wrath Skill
Circle of Life Level 3	Ultimate Skill

Alternative Skills

If you do not have Vasily’s Prayer Unique Helm yet, Earth Spike will transform you back to Human form and cannot be casted while in Grizzly Rage. Swap to Fierce Maul instead to remain in Werebear form. Unfortunately, this means you must get into melee range to use the Basic Attack.

If you want a more passive option to Debilitating Roar, you can take Cyclone Armor for non-physical Damage Reduction. You will not use its active while using Vasily’s Prayer.

Druid Spirit Boons

Below is the order in which you should unlock your Spirit Boons for the Pulverize Werebear Druid build. Only offer enough Druidic Spirit Offerings to unlock the first four listed Boons and then fully unlock the rest to activate the final Boon with Spirit Bonding.

Paragon

The Paragon progression system unlocks after reaching Level 50, and offers a considerable boost to character power. Within the Paragon Board, there are many different bonuses, ranging from minor stat enhancements on Magic Nodes to more significant gains with Rare Glyphs and Legendary Nodes.

When progressing towards Glyph Sockets and Legendary Nodes, prioritize attributes such as Attack Speed, Non-Physical Damage, Willpower, Armor, Resistance and Life for Normal and Magic Nodes. As you level up Glyphs, their effects expand in radius. Therefore, if you are unable to meet Additional Bonus requirements early on, it might be better to skip allocating extra nodes for now.

Below, we have compiled a list of the most beneficial nodes for the Pulverize Druid build, sorted in the order obtained in Paragon.

Name	Effect
Werebear	• For every 5 Willpower purchased within range, you deal + [6.24%] increased damage while in Werebear form. • Additional Bonus (requires 40 Willpower purchased in radius range): You gain 10% Damage Reduction while in Werebear form.
Thunderstruck	Storm Skills deal x30% increased Critical Strike Damage against Vulnerable or Immobilized enemies. (Legendary Node not used)
Exploit	For every 5 Dexterity purchased within range, you deal + [3.85%] increased damage to Vulnerable targets. • Additional Bonus (requires 25 Dexterity 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.
Earthen Devastation	Your Earth Skills deal 30% increased damage to enemies afflicted by Crowd Control.
Undaunted	For every 5 Intelligence purchased within range, you deal + [9.6%] increased damage while Fortified. • Additional Bonus (requires 25 Intelligence purchased in radius range): You gain up to 10% Damage Reduction the more Fortify you have.
Survival Instincts	While in Werebear form, you deal 1% increased damage, up to 50%, for every 1% difference in current Life percent between you and the enemy.
Spirit	• For every 5 Dexterity purchased within range, Core Skills deal + [9.6%] increased Critical Strike Damage. • Additional Bonus (requires 25 Dexterity purchased in radius range): Critical Strikes increase the damage an enemy takes from you by x2% for 20 seconds, up to x12%.
Ancestral Guidance	After spending 75 Spirit, you deal 30% increased damage for 5 seconds.

Starting Board

1. Path right and then up to Prime. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
2. Continue up to the Glyph Socket. Insert Werebear and purchase all nodes providing Willpower in radius range.
3. Obtain Impel nearby and 3 Magic Nodes providing Damage.
4. Continue down the left side to Tenacity and purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
5. Continue up the left side to the first Board Attachment Gate. Attach Thunderstruck after rotating the board clockwise 2 times. The Glyph Socket should be located in the bottom-left quadrant.

Thunderstruck (2nd Board)

The Legendary Node on this board is not used. Instead, Thunderstruck is used for the Critical Strike Damage and Vulnerable Damage Rare Nodes.

1. Path left and then up to the Glyph Socket. Insert Exploit and purchase all nodes providing Dexterity in radius range.
2. Obtain Hubris nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Damage Reduction from Vulnerable Enemies.
3. Continue up the middle to Deluge. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
4. Continue up to Restorative and purchase 2 Magic Nodes providing Maximum Life.
5. Continue up and then right to Tempest. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
6. At the top Board Attachment Gate, attach Earthen Devastation after rotating the board clockwise 2 times. The Glyph Socket should be located in the top-left quadrant.

Earthen Devastation (3rd Board)

1. Path up and left to Oppress. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
2. Continue up and right to Earthen Devastation.
3. Path back left and up to the Glyph Socket. Insert Undaunted and purchase all Intelligence nodes in radius range. Undaunted must be at least Level 15 to fulfill the requirement for the Additional Bonus.
4. Obtain Earthen Power nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Critical Strike Damage with Earth Skills.
5. Continue left to Crushing Earth. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
6. Take the shortest route to the Board Attachment Gate on the left side. Attach Survival Instincts after rotating the board clockwise 3 times. The Glyph Socket should be located in the top half.

Survival Instincts (4th Board)

1. Path left and down to Bulwark. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
2. Continue up and left to Survival Instincts.
3. Path back right and up to the Glyph Socket. Insert Spirit and purchase all Dexterity in radius range. Spirit must be at least Level 15 to fulfill the requirement for the Additional Bonus.
4. Obtain Grizzly nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Damage while in Werebear Form.
5. Obtain Battleworn Hide nearby and purchase 3 Magic Nodes providing Total Armor while in Werebear Form.
6. Take the shortest route to the Board Attachment Gate on the bottom side. Attach Ancestral Guidance after rotating the board clockwise 3 times. The Legendary Node should be located in the upper-right quadrant.

Ancestral Guidance (5th Board)

1. Path right and down to Reclamation. Purchase all 5 surrounding Magic Nodes.
2. Continue right to Ancestral Guidance.

The 1 Remaining Paragon Point can be used for Potion Healing, All Resistances or Willpower. Click this link and check the Paragon page on the planner for a visual of the entire tree.

Mechanics and Playstyle

Pulverize Werebear Druid hits hard with a massive AoE due to Shockwave Aspect. Enemies at the edge of the initial slam of Pulverize can also be hit by the following shockwave. Use this distance against elites and bosses to hit them with both portions of Pulverize for the most DPS.

Pulverize becomes an Earth Skill with Aspect of the Ursine Horror. This also automatically applies the Nature Magic Skill tag to benefit from Passives in the Skill Tree.

With Earth Spike as a Basic Attack, the build can be played entirely at a ranged distance. It can also be used during Grizzly Rage if you have Vasily’s Prayer.

This is an extremely tanky build with defensives from Earthen Bulwark, Debilitating Roar, Grizzly Rage and Iron Fur. There are plenty of Fortify sources to keep you completely Fortified at all times with Preserving Earthen Bulwark, Enhanced Debilitating Roar and Safeguard.

Damage Rotation

Use the following rotation to optimize damage.

1. Activate Grizzly Rage against tough elites and bosses. This Ultimate Skill can be used fairly often due to the Spirit Boon, Calm Before the Storm.
2. Cast Debilitating Roar against enemies that deal high damage.
3. Cast Earthen Bulwark to break Crowd Controls or apply Barrier when needed.
4. Spam Pulverize with proper positioning to hit as many enemies as possible, and overlap both portions of damage against elites and bosses.
5. When you are out of Spirit, spam Earth Spike to generate resource and proc Earthen Might. Savage Trample can also be used to gain Spirit.

Stat Priority List

Listed below are the affixes to prioritize on gear for Pulverize Druids. 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 Pulverize Druid 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.

Shockwave Aspect is a core part of the Pulverize Druid build, as it turns Pulverize into a ranged Skill with massive AoE. Aspect of the Ursine Horror enables many beneficial passive bonuses in the Skill Tree.

Gear Slot	Aspect Name	Legendary Aspect Power
Two-Handed Staff (+100% bonus effect)	Shockwave Aspect	Pulverize creates a shockwave that travels forward, dealing [60 – 100%] of its damage to targets in the path.
Amulet (+50% bonus effect)	Aspect of Retaliation	Your Core Skills deal up to [20 – 40%] increased damage based on your amount of Fortify.
Rings	Aspect of the Umbral	Restore [1 – 4] of your Primary Resource when you Crowd Control an enemy.
Gloves or Rings	Aspect of the Ursine Horror	Pulverize is now also an Earth Skill. After casting Pulverize, tectonic spikes continue to deal [X] damage over 2 seconds.
Gloves or Rings	Aspect of the Rampaging Werebeast	The duration of Grizzly Rage is increased by [1 – 5] seconds. In addition, Critical Strikes while Grizzly Rage is active increase your Critical Strike Damage by 10% for the duration.
Helm (replaced by Vasily’s Prayer)	Ballistic Aspect	When you have Fortify your Earth Skills gain +2 Ranks.
Chest (replace by Insatiable Fury)	Aspect of Might	Basic Skills grant 20% Damage Reduction for [2.0 – 6.0] seconds.
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%].
Boots	Aspect of Quicksand	Damage from Earth Skills Slow enemies hit by [25 – 50%] for 5 seconds.

Unique Items

Vasily’s Prayer

Vasily’s Prayer – Your Earth Skills are now also Werebear Skills and Fortify you for [X].

This Unique Helm turns Earth Spike into a Werebear Skill and allows it to be used while in Grizzly Rage.

Insatiable Fury

Insatiable Fury – Werebear form is now your true form, and you gain +2 Ranks to all Werebear Skills.

This Unique Chest Armor provides a decent damage increase with Physical Damage and +2 Ranks to all Werebear Skills. In addition, the Damage Reduction While Fortified and Armor While in Werebear Form values are quite high for survivability.

Temerity

Temerity – Effects that Heal you beyond 100% Life grant you a Barrier up to [40 – 80%] of your Maximum Life that lasts for 8 seconds.

These Unique Pants provide a consistent Barrier due to the healing from every Pulverize casted with Circle of Life. Unfortunately, you lose a lot of potential Damage Reduction affixes and Aspect of Disobedience from Legendary Pants. While not recommended in push content, it can find use in farm or speed content.

Gear Choice and Stats

While farming with the Pulverize Werebear Druid build, make sure to pick up all Rare Item drops that may be upgrades. Additionally, save Legendary Items that have useful aspects in your stash to be used later, or for extracting and imprinting onto well rolled Rare Items.

2-Handed Axe is chosen over Staff for the most consistent damage affix to any target; not all targets will be able to leverage crowd control damage boosts, such as bosses. However, Damage to Healthy will always get some value, especially while farming, allowing possible one-shot kills on enemies. If you find a Staff with more favorable gear affixes or higher damage, use it.

One handed Axe and Totem can be a valid alternative for more attacks and faster, higher Critical Strike Damage ramp on Grizzly Rage. To enable this playstyle;

• Place Shockwave Aspect on your Amulet
• move Aspect of Retaliation to weapon, offhand, or ring
• Add Accelerating Aspect to your weapon, offhand or ring.

Higher Item Level gear provides higher stat values. Replace outdated gear often, and upgrade new gear at the Blacksmith to increase Item Levels further.

Gems

Listed below are the best Gems to socket into gear for each slot type.

• Weapon: Royal Sapphire for Critical Strike Damage to Crowd Controlled Enemies.
• Armor: Royal Sapphire for Damage Reduction while Fortified.
• 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 the highest Precision Elixir available for Critical Strike Chance and Damage.

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

• September 27, 2023: Ownership of page transferred, and guide reviewed. Small additions in Alternative Skills and Gear Choice and Stats. Deer Spirit Boon recommendation changed from Max Spirit to DR vs Elites. No further changes planned until season 2 review where the page may receive more significant updates or restructure. Thank you to Lexyu for all his hard work and excellent content.
• August 2nd, 2023: Patch 1.1.1 section added with a Spirit gain buff to Earth Spike.
• July 18th, 2023: Guide updated for Season 1.
• July 14th, 2023: Stat Priority List reevaluated.
• July 5th, 2023: Paragon optimized by placing Thunderstruck and Earthen Devastation as the first attached boards to gain important Rare Node Bonuses. Paragon Boards in earlier positions have lower requirements for Rare Node Bonuses.