Havoc Demon Hunter DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents — The War Within (11.1.7)

Currently, Aldrachi Reaver is ahead in pure single-target, and with recent changes is much easier to execute than previously. Its free cleave, funnel and priority damage makes it a great all-rounder that is recommended for raid encounters.

Currently, Fel-Scarred is slightly behind in single-target, though it still provides strong AoE burst if an encounter should need it. Its lower execution requirements make it a simpler alternative for raid encounters.

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Aldrachi Reaver in single-target picks up all of the Throw Glaive talents due to their interaction with Reaver's Glaive. It uses Screaming Brutality to activate them rotationally, so does not need to actively press Throw Glaive. It also paths through to Exergy, using Vengeful Retreat to trigger it and Tactical Retreat on cooldown. Some additional notes are:

The Fel-Scarred focuses heavily on maximizing its burst windows with each Eye Beam cast, therefore it picks the left side talents to path to Inertia, ideally aligning them. Each window should overlap with Eye Beam, and every other with Essence Break alongside Sigil of Flame, made explosively strong when paired with a Metamorphosis cast. Outside of this, it simply focuses on cycling Fury as much as possible to maximize the damage benefit provided by Burning Blades. Some notes are:

• It picks up Cycle of Hatred through to Shattered Destiny for significantly higher Metamorphosis uptime. It also takes Essence Break as a mid-range cooldown to align with Demonic triggers.
• Aldrachi Reaver still picks up most Chaos Strike and Blade Dance talents to amplify them further due to how much of the rotation is spent casting them.
• On the class tree it needs to drop Collective Anguish in favor of picking up Sigil of Spite, used as a burst soul generation tool to trigger additional Reaver's Glaive. It also needs to keep The Hunt both as an extra trigger for this and Inertia.
• Cycle of Hatred plays a major part in maximizing Demonic triggers for additional Demonsurge procs, halving its cooldown when used efficiently.
• To go with that it takes all supporting Eye Beam talents to maximize its damage, with Isolated Prey being an optional swap if you can fulfill its conditions.
• On the class tree it also makes sure to pick up Collective Anguish for additional damage with each Eye Beam cast, while still picking up Flames of Fury to boost Sigil of Flame value.

Aldrachi Reaver brings an extreme amount of priority damage and funnel, while still having a strong single-target loadout with its AoE setup. This unique advantage makes it perfectly suited to Mythic+, and as such the recommended choice:

Currently, Fel-Scarred provides higher burst and AoE potential due to its strong frequent AoE cooldowns. Due to sacrificing some single-target and having much less priority damage however, it is more of an alternative AoE build:

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Aldrachi Reaver in AoE situations picks up all of the Throw Glaive talents to amplify Reaver's Glaive, and activates them via Screaming Brutality rotationally. It switches out the movement talents to grab some extra Eye Beam benefits, and fully build out the Immolation Aura talents. Additional notes are:

Fel-Scarred deals extremely front-loaded 2-minute bursts around Metamorphosis, making it well suited for dangerous Mythic+ pulls. It relies on Burning Blades to cover its single-target throughput, and is also quite easy to pilot throughout a key. Its key pickup is Cycle of Hatred for more frequent Eye Beam and Demonic windows, but does not need Shattered Destiny support as its mostly for the additional Demonsurge triggers. Additional notes are:

• It needs to pick up Sigil of Spite for the additional burst soul generation between pulls where The Hunt is not available.
• If you want to opt into movement talents, you can switch both Serrated Glaive and Looks Can Kill for Tactical Retreat and either Inertia or Exergy (both are options, with the former being more burst oriented). This is significantly harder to execute for marginal performance increase, so is more of a niche option.
• Aldrachi Reaver can pick up Essence Break in exchange for the second point in Chaotic Disposition. This is only recommended when playing with Inertia or Exergy movement talents.
• Fel-Scarred picks up the full Immolation Aura package to support its AoE, while picking the capstone A Fire Inside for significantly more uptime. It also picks up Flamebound on the hero tree to further empower it.
• With the increased talent point squeeze, it only grabs Initiative and avoids follow-up movement talents. Instead, it grabs Throw Glaive picks to activate via Screaming Brutality.
• It also opts to buff Eye Beam as much as possible, grabbing two points in Blind Fury, Looks Can Kill and Collective Anguish on the class tree.
• Movement talents are optional, with Inertia providing burst and Exergy sustained damage. The extra execution requirements vs. the simpler alternatives though make it a preference choice for Fel-Scarred.
• Additionally, if playing with movement talents you should switch one point from Chaotic Disposition for Essence Break, as it further aligns with the more burst oriented profile.

Aldrachi Reaver is well suited to Delves due to the high volume of Soul Fragment generation for additional sustain. While some aspects of its kit are quite awkward due to being target-locked by Reaver's Mark, it still justifies itself as an option by having a varied damage profile to handle both large groups of enemies and bosses.

For Delves, Fel-Scarred leans heavily into explosive bursts of damage for large groups of enemies, so for speed clearing them it's perfect. Due to the stronger leaning toward your Metamorphosis window as well, the additional sustain provided by that makes dangerous pulls almost trivial — so long as you have your cooldowns set up correctly.

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