Devourer Demon Hunter DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents — The War Within (11.2.7)

While early in the Beta, Annihilator has taken the clear lead in single-target. This is due to its higher resource generation, and stronger ability to leverage Emptiness (alongside simply having stronger tuning).

While early in the Beta, Void-Scarred unfortunately suffers from much weaker tuning relative to its competitor. Its greater investment in the melee toolkit to deliver damage is still strong, but general tuning holds it back right now.

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Due to some recent changes with the release of Beta, in Single-Target Annihilator builds heavily lean into a pure caster playstyle. It avoids the entire melee toolkit centered around Voidblade (largely due to tuning issues), instead aiming to cycle Fury and Souls as quickly as possible for Void Metamorphosis. When paired with Emptiness, this allows for longer windows that leverage Impending Apocalypse for big Collapsing Star payoffs. Some additional notes are:

As a Hero tree, Void-Scarred focuses much more on melee abilities and your Void Metamorphosis windows, empowering the entire suite into stronger versions. These are also used to trigger the keystone effect - Voidsurge - so are required picks to build the tree properly. In particular Demonic Intensity heavily encourages filling out the entire left capstone area to reach The Hunt. Some additional notes are:

• Emptiness is always taken in single-target builds on the final choice node. The ramping Haste provided is key to extending Void Metamorphosis as long as possible.
• Spontaneous Immolation is always taken over Tempered Soul, due to the GCD efficiency benefits of triggering it passively.
• Despite Annihilator only using Reap to trigger Voidfall, a handful of key talents ( Moment of Craving and Soulshaper) are taken to help bolster its damage when it is used. It's also required pathing to Voidpurge, which allows for more frequent Void Ray casts to pause Fury drain during Void Metamorphosis.
• Since Doomsayer only activates a single time during single-target encounters, it opts for the raw Voidfall throughput provided by Harness the Cosmos.
• Due to the Void-Scarred tree design, melee talents are required to activate it. The tree can't fully function without utilizing Voidblade, Hungering Slash and The Hunt.
• Unfortunately, at this point in the Beta these melee options are a little undertuned. Talents that empower these tools ( Soulforged Blades, Demonic Instinct) can't be justified, so it instead opts for more resource talents to enter Void Metamorphosis more rapidly.
• While not as required in its rotation, the stronger Reap talents in Moment of Craving and Soulshaper are still taken. This leverages the power of Burning Blades and follow-up casts after each Void Ray channel.

While a bit closer than in Single-target, Annihilator still firmly wins out in AoE situations. This is due to its higher resource generation, allowing it to cycle Void Metamorphosis aggressively to take advantage of Midnight.

While a bit closer than in Single-target, Void-Scarred still falls behind in AoE situations due to melee ability tuning. This can still cycle Void Metamorphosis for powerful Voidsurge / Midnight sequences, but the overall package falls slightly behind.

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Due to a large number of nerfs to the already fairly weak melee components of the build, Annihilator now fully leans into caster tools even in AoE as well. The shorter more frequent pulls in dungeons lead to Soul Glutton winning out over Emptiness, giving you more access to Void Metamorphosis windows, and thus more Voidfall triggers. Some additional notes are:

Much of the Void-Scarred toolkit seems well suited to AoE scenarios due to many melee talents scaling up well into AoE, alongside Voidsurge triggers after use. Unfortunately, the tuning surrounding many of these effects falls a little flat right now in the Beta test, and when paired with its slower cycling of Souls for Void Metamorphosis, hurts the tree a lot. Due to the shorter, more frequent pulls in AoE, Soul Glutton wins out here. Soul Glutton has some additional synergy with Void-Scarred as the more frequent Void Metamorphosis windows allow for more Voidsurge triggers and Hungering Slash casts. Some additional notes are:

• Demonic Instinct is taken instead of Sweet Release in the capstone area, to lean in further to the AoE damage provided by Void Ray.
• Due to frequent combat drops giving opportunities to reset Doomsayer's availability, it's preferred in most AoE content.
• It finishes the entire right side capstone area to reach Eradicate. This helps convert Reap into an AoE tool after channelling Void Ray, allowing you to convert the damage increases from Moment of Craving and Soulshaper for extra value.
• Demonic Instinct is taken instead of Devourer's Edge in the capstone area, to lean in further to the AoE damage provided by Void Ray and Hungering Slash. This is slightly more beneficial for Void-Scarred, which makes use of these tools more frequently.
• It finishes the entire right side capstone area to reach Eradicate. This helps convert Reap into an AoE tool after channelling Void Ray, allowing you to amplify the damage increases from Moment of Craving and Soulshaper further. This has increased value for Void-Scarred as Eradicate applies Burning Blades to all target it hits.

While the current Annihilator build leans heavily into the caster side of the tree, as tuning can (and likely will) shift things around over the course of testing we also want to provide a hybrid option. Right now, the tuning on these tools hold it back, but if you're looking for a more dynamic rotation (without playing Void-Scarred), this provides an alternative!

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Keep in mind that sacrificing some of the more universal caster options to pick up the entire melee package does come with downsides in Single-target. The low tuning on Voidblade hurts, and the Fury pause isn't as impactful as it once was. These tools still add in an extra component that mixes up the rotation though, so can be a more engaging playstyle, provided you can leverage the extra cooldowns. It still leans heavily into longer Void Metamorphosis windows with Emptiness, aiming to draw out longer transformations for repeat Collapsing Star casts. Some additional notes are:

• Emptiness is always taken in single-target builds on the final choice node. The ramping Haste provided is key to extending Void Metamorphosis as long as possible.
• Spontaneous Immolation is always taken over Tempered Soul, due to the GCD efficiency benefits of triggering it passively.
• Despite Annihilator only using Reap to trigger Voidfall, a handful of key talents ( Moment of Craving and Soulshaper) are taken to help bolster its damage when it is used. It's also required pathing to Voidpurge, which allows for more frequent Void Ray casts to pause Fury drain during Void Metamorphosis.

Annihilator focuses on its keystone effect, Voidfall. A variety of Devourer abilities (most importantly Consume and Void Ray) grant a stack, and upon reaching three, your next Reap cast will consume them. Each stack consumed calls down a powerful Void Meteor, dealing heavy Cosmic damage to targets and generating 2 Soul Fragments. The playstyle is relatively simple, only requiring you to slot in additional Reap casts to consume stacks as they cap out. For the offensive choice node, Harness the Cosmos provides a more general throughput increase to Voidfall, while Doomsayer is tailored to Mythic+ and situations where you can consistently leave combat to refresh the effect.

For defense and mobility, Phase Shift grants 2% damage reduction per stack of Voidfall present, with Final Hour allowing it to persist after you consume them. Path to Oblivion adds 3% movement speed on top of that, though adding a third charge to Shift with State of Matter is generally preferrable.

Void-Scarred provides a variety of benefits during your Void Metamorphosis effect. Most importantly, Voidblade, Hungering Slash, and The Hunt are upgraded into more powerful versions while active. Additionally, the first cast of each of these trigger a Voidsurge for extra AoE Cosmic damage. This slots in over the regular Devourer playstyle, but heavily encourages using a hybrid melee approach, leaping in and out of range to activate these effects.

For the three choice nodes on the tree, there are the following options:

• Wave of Debilitation vs. Pursuit of Angriness - both are niche effects, with Pursuit of Angriness generally being better for the small amount of extra mobility vs. the extra CC utility of Wave of Debilitation.
• Set Fire to the Pain vs. Improved Soul Rending - this is a choice between passive damage reduction or self sustain. Generally, staggering some damage with Set Fire to the Pain so you can leech it back is the preferred choice but it's quite minor.
• Student of Suffering vs. Flamebound - due to the current tuning state of melee abilities as Devourer, the benefits of Flamebound focusing on Hungering Slash is pretty weak. Student of Suffering on the other hand significantly improves Fury generation alongside extra Mastery, making it the preferred choice.