General Leveling Tips
To find out more general information about leveling as a Barbarian in Diablo 4, you can check out our main Barbarian Leveling guide. You can also go to our Barbarian Builds page for a list of other leveling and endgame Barbarian builds for you to choose from.
In regard to leveling up on the seasonal realm, you might also want to check out our season checklist, as it will give you some useful tips and tricks for Season 3 of Diablo 4. Don’t miss this chance to make the most out of your leveling journey!
Season ChecklistBuild Introduction
This build focuses on using 
Rend against packs of enemies, followed up by a devastating 
Death Blow to end their lives. We utilize several sources of Bleeding, but primarily rely on two skills to stack damage up against our foes.
- Rend – our strongest bleed source:
- Enhanced Rend – This helps to extend Vulnerability on enemies for increased damage
- Violent Rend – Increases each strike of Rend against Vulnerable enemies.
Flay – our basic attack bleeds enemies as well: - Enhanced Flay – This gives us a chance to apply Vulnerability.
- Combat Flay – This gives us two advantages of Thorns and increasing our Damage Reduction.
We will also be triggering an enhancement for even more damage to Bleeds through the Key Passive 
Walking Arsenal.
Now that we understand our two most basic skills, we can look deeper into how we will be allocating our skill points as we journey from Level 1 to Level 50.
Season of the Construct
Seneschal Construct Companion Powers
The Season 3 theme introduces a Seneschal Construct Companion that can deal damage or provide support to complement your character. Equip the Seneschal with 2 Governing Stones to activate their abilities, and then link them to 3 Tuning Stones each to augment the abilities. There are 12 different Governing Stones and 27 different Tuning Stones that can be found in Vaults scattered across Sanctuary. Fuse together duplicate stones to level them up, increasing the potency of Governing Stones or adding augments to Tuning Stones.
Listed below are the general recommended Governing Stones for Barbarians, ranked by importance.
- Protect: The Seneschal Construct materializes a protective Barrier on the player for a portion of their Maximum Life.
- Reconstruct: The Seneschal Construct channels a reconstruction beam Healing the player for a portion of their Maximum Life over time.
You will be limited on what Tuning Stones you will have available for these skills. Pick and choose from the list below, however, some of the tuning stones are a rare drop.
- Safeguard Support: When used, the supported Skill grants Damage Reduction to you.
- Fortify Support: When the Seneschal Construct uses the supported Skill, you gain Fortify. Skills with slower attack speeds or skills with cooldowns will increase the amount of Fortify granted.
- Tactical Support: Decrease the cooldown of the supported Skill.
- Duration Support: Supported Skills have their durations increased.
- Initiative Support: The supported Skill will cause the Seneschal Construct to teleport to the target if out of range. Can only occur once every so often seconds.
Allocation of Skill points
Your first 20 skill points are used to acquire all of your skills, filling in passive points only as needed to get to the next tier. The allocation of these points is listed below.
| Skill Point Number | Allocation |
|---|---|
| 1 | Flay |
| 2 | Enhanced Flay |
| 3 | Combat Flay |
| 4 | Rend |
| 5 | Enhanced Rend |
| 6 | Violent Rend |
| 7 |  Rallying Cry |
| 8 | Enhanced Rallying Cry |
| 9 | Tactical Rallying Cry |
| 10 | Rend Level 2 |
| 11 | Rend Level 3 |
| 12 |  Leap |
| 13 | Enhanced Leap |
| 14 | Power Leap |
| 15 | Rend Level 4 |
| 16 | Rend Level 5 |
| 17 | Death Blow |
| 18 | Enhanced Death Blow |
| 19 | Warrior’s Death Blow |
| 20 |  Hamstring Level 1 |
| 21 |  Cut to the Bone Level 1 |
| 22 | Cut to the Bone Level 2 |
| 23 | Cut to the Bone Level 3 |
| 24 |  Wrath of the Berserker |
| 25 | Prime Wrath of the Berserker |
| 26 | Supreme Wrath of the Berserker |
As you can see in the table above, we have all of our skills are obtained within the first 26 points. This completes our entire skill bar relatively quickly. If you are making a Seasonal Character, you already start with 10 skill points, so it is even faster.
Your complete skill bar will look like this:
Rend Flay Rallying Cry Death Blow Leap Wrath of the Berserker Now that you are ready to fight the hordes of hell with all your skills filled out, we can fill in your passive points with each level up. As for which passives to take once you have completed your skill load-out and Key Passive, we recommend the following ranked by importance.
- Finish Death Blow to Level 5
Swiftness Level 3- Walking Arsenal
Imposing Presence Level 1
Martial Vigor Level 3
Pit Fighter Level 3
Thick Skin Level 1
Defensive Stance Level 3
Counteroffensive Level 3
Heavy Handed Level 3- Leap to Level 5
Slaying Strike Level 3
Skill Tree
Here is the completed skill tree for the build:
Skill Clusters
Let’s review each cluster in the Skill Tree and discuss our reasons behind each passive and skill choice, so we have a good understanding of the build before we transition into the Rend Endgame Build or Steel Grasp Endgame Build. Keep in mind, if you are leveling a new seasonal character, you will have some additional skill points to spend at the beginning.
Basic Skills
Flay is our choice for the basic skill in this build and will be kept at Level 1. This skill is used constantly, as our Fury pool will be more challenging to keep up until we have more points to invest into Fury Generation. The advantage of using this skill is it becomes a trigger for Vulnerability, making it extremely important for increasing our damage overall as well as boosting Damage Reduction. Be sure to set one-handed weapon to this skill.
Core Skills
Rend is used as our main Fury spender. As we gain Fury through Rallying Cry, Leap and Flay, we will then deplete our pool by spamming Rend. Your positioning will be key during this spam attack. This may take time to feel smooth, but you want to target packs of enemies. Do your best to use it when you have groups of monsters and not waste it on small single target.
Defensive Skills
Our defensive cluster contains our only Shout skill: Rallying Cry. This skill provides us with multiple benefits, first as an escape skill with Enhanced Rallying Cry making us Unstoppable. Then we also benefit from the Tactical Rallying Cry gives us a boost to Fury and increases our generation by 20%.
Brawling Skills
In this cluster we acquire the skill Leap which gives us a huge chunk of Fury and then gives us this the benefits from 
Aspect of Bul-Kathos. We also take the passives below:
- Swiftness – Movement speed is always a priority.
Weapon Mastery Skills
Death Blow is used to trigger Berserking and insta-kill enemies, resetting the cooldown and allowing us to use it as a killing blow again.
- Pit Fighter – Increases offenses and defenses for Close Enemies.
- Slaying Strike – This benefits our Death Blow by increasing our damage to Injured enemies.
Expose Vulnerability – This allows our core skill to trigger Vulnerability on enemies.- Hamstring – this makes Healthy enemies we bleed slow.
- Cut to the Bone – this enhances our Bleeds to have more damage against Vulnerable enemies.
- Thick Skin – This gives us the ability to trigger Fortify and all of its benefits everything time we get hit.
- Defensive Stance – This increases our Damage Reduction while we are Fortified, which from the passive above happens every time we are hit.
- Counteroffensive – This increases our Damage output while we are Fortified and still above 50% Life.
Ultimate Skill
For our Ultimate skill we are using Wrath of the Berserker. This is a great power-up for our Character to use against Elites and Bosses. This makes us Unstoppable and grants us Berserking, which boosts damage and movement speed. While the skill has a long cooldown, it is a great skill to use during intense moments.
Key Passive
The Key Passive Walking Arsenal, we trigger this ability by using 3 different types of weapons across our skills. We accomplish this easily by setting our skills to the following weapons:
- Flay – One-handed Weapon
- Rend – Two-handed Slashing Weapon
- Death Blow and Leap – Two-handed Bludgeoning Weapon
This setup will cycle the activation on Walking Arsenal fairly often, giving us the 45% damage bonus.
Mechanics and Playstyle
The majority of your power in this leveling build comes from Rend, which is aimed into a group of mobs to Bleed them, followed by Death Blow to finish them off. Rallying Cry will help keep Fury generation high, and we can easily manage our enemies by using our Flay or offloading all of our Fury with Rend then building back up again, all the while having our Ultimate, Wrath of the Berserker, to take out Elite packs.
During the majority of your fights, you will also be triggering your Walking Arsenal for a good damage bonus. This rotational way of playing will become important as it prepares you for the endgame version of this build which is played with a very similar skill set. Let’s review some other important elements we use to power ourselves up for leveling.
Bleeding
The majority of our damage comes from Bleeding enemies, we do this through our skill but also we trigger some enhancements from our Legendary Aspects. See the list below:
Defenses
The majority of our Defenses come from our Legendary Aspects and Passives. See the list below:
- Aspect of Might
- Aspect of Disobedience
- Iron Blood Aspect
- Thick Skin
- Defensive Stance
- Counteroffensive
Weapon Expertise
For the Rend Leveling build, we will be focus on using Two-handed swords for the increase to bleeding damage and leveling up this skill to Level 10 for the endgame.
Leveling Options
There are many options to level your character: kill monsters, do quests in each region, follow the Seasonal storyline, farm generic dungeons, participate in regional events, etc. With so many ways to get to Level 50, we have chosen some methods that will accelerate your experience gains.
Open World Activities
The open world is full of monsters and activities, you are welcome to find your own path or leveling areas but if you are looking for some great options, here are two great suggestions for this build:
The Dinidari Flats in Dry Steppes
This area is packed with Spiders! Spiders have the unique ability to break down into smaller mobs after the larger version is destroyed. This allows us to pull multiple larger Spiders together and kill them, unleashing a massive group of smaller, very low life spiders for us to grab some additional experience.
Westering Lowlands
This zone has three events that cycle quite frequently (red marks) and some high-density mob areas (in the green) to farm as you move between the events. This is a great spot as we have a waypoint very close, and we do a simple rotation of two or more events. When you add the time needed to kill the dense packs of monsters in each green area, you will have a great non-stop loop for experience.
Dungeons
Lost Achieves in Fractured Peaks – Levels 1 – 25 recommended.
Forsaken Quarry in Fractured Peaks – Level 1 to 25 recommended.
Sarat’s Lair in Scosglen – Level 25 to 50 recommended. High Poison Resistance needed.
Uldur’s Cave in Kehjistan – Level 25 to 50 recommended.
Questing
Questing is a necessary evil if you are still grinding out your renown levels for each zone. If you need to complete your Renown, it can be a relatively easy way to get some quick experience along the way. If this is something you need to do, take as many quests as you can from one area and complete them all in one go. It may not feel necessarily faster, but going back and forth for each one is a waste of time.
Gear Affixes
In the early levels, targeting affixes on your gear can be very challenging. Part of the reason is we will be playing in world tier 1 or 2 and the best opportunity for rare gear is a maximum of 3 affixes. So the list below will show us the best four options to choose from.
Season 2 Update (Patch 1.2.0): Critical Strike Damage and Vulnerable Damage affixes are changed to be additive with other damage increases. All additive damage increases of the same amount are equal in value, as long as their conditions are active.
| Gear Slot | Targeted Affixes |
|---|---|
| Helm | 1. Cooldown Reduction 2. Attack Speed 3. Maximum Life 4. Needed Resistances |
| Chest | 1. Maximum Life 2. Damage Reduction while Fortified 3. Damage Reduction from Close Enemies 4. Damage Reduction from Enemies that are Bleeding |
| Gloves | 1. Critical Strike Chance 2. Ranks of Rend3. Attack Speed 4. Strength |
| Pants | 1. Maximum Life 2. Damage Reduction while Fortified 3. Damage Reduction from Close Enemies 4. Damage Reduction from Enemies that are Bleeding |
| Boots | 1. Movement Speed 2. Damage Reduction while Injured 3. Fury Cost Reduction 4. Needed Resistances |
| Amulet | 1. Cooldown Reduction 2. Fury Cost Reduction 3. Damage Reduction while Fortified 4. Ultimate Skill Damage |
| Rings | 1. Critical Strike Chance 2. Vulnerable Damage 3. Maximum Life 4. Resource Generation |
| Weapons | 1. Strength 2. Vulnerable Damage 3. Core Skill Damage 4. Damage to Bleeding Enemies |
Legendary Aspects
The Legendary Aspects chosen below are all available from the Codex of Power, so each Aspect can be found from Dungeons in the open world. If possible, finding each of these Aspect on a piece of Legendary gear will offer you a better roll compared to the Codex of Power.
| Gear Slot | Legendary Aspect | Legendary Aspect Power |
|---|---|---|
| Helm | Aspect of Might | Basic Skills grant 20% Damage Reduction for [2.0-6.0] seconds. |
| Chest | Aspect of Disobedience | You gain [0.6 – 1.1%] increased Armor for 4 seconds when you deal any form of damage, stacking up to [36 – 66%]. |
| Gloves |  Aspect of Anemia | Lucky Hit: Direct damage against Bleeding enemies has up to a [20-30%] chance to Stun them for 2 seconds. |
| Pants | Iron Blood Aspect | Gain [2.0-4.0%] Damage Reduction for each Nearby Bleeding enemy up to [10-20%] maximum. |
| Boots |  Ghostwalker Aspect | While Unstoppable and for 4 seconds after, you gain [10- 25%] increased Movement Speed and can move freely through enemies. |
| Amulets(50% bonus) | Aspect of Bul-Kathos | Leap creates an Earthquake that deals [X] Physical damage over 4 seconds. While standing in Earthquakes, you gain [5-15%] increased Damage Reduction. |
| Ring |  Aspect of the Relentless Armsmaster | Gain [20-36%] increased Fury Generation while all damage bonuses from Walking Arsenal Key Passive are active. |
| Ring | Aspect of Unrelenting Fury | Killing an enemy with a Core Skill refunds [10.0-20.0%] of its base Fury cost. Can only happen once per Skill cast. |
| Bludgeoning Weapon (200% bonus) |  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%. |
| Slashing Weapon (200% bonus) | 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-Wield Weapon 1 | Rapid Aspect | Basic Skills gain [15-30%] Attack Speed. |
| Dual-Wield Weapon 2 | Aspect of Berserk Ripping | Whenever you deal direct damage while Berserking, inflict [20-30%] of the Base damage dealt as additional Bleeding damage over 5 seconds. |
Conclusion
Once you hit Level 50 with this leveling build, you will be ready to complete your first Capstone Dungeon and unlock World Tier 3. This will open up the true endgame and allow you to collect new Sacred Rares and Legendary Aspects you will need to transition into the Endgame Rend Build. Once you upgrade your build to the Endgame build, you will be ready to push into Nightmare dungeons, World Tier 3 Capstone Dungeon, the Paragon Board system and so much more.
Gems
Listed below are the best gems to socket into gear for each slot type.
- Weapon:
Amethyst for the increase to Damage over Time effects. - Armor:
Ruby for the increase to Maximum Life. - Jewelry:
Diamond for the All Resistances.
Elixirs and Health Pots
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. Use an Elixir providing any Resistance you need most, or the 
Assault Elixir to increase Attack Speed.
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
- January 21st 2024: Season 3 speculative changes.
- October 23rd 2023: Revamped build for season 2.
- October 13th 2023: Build Adjusted to prepare for Season 2 launch.
- September 16th 2023: Leveling Guide revamp
