The Barbarian, Druid, Necromancer, Rogue, and Sorcerer have all had several buffs and nerfs since the initial release of Diablo 4. Now following the release of the game’s second season, Season of Blood, the question must be asked again: What is the best class in Diablo 4?
No build is objectively bad in Diablo 4. Every class and their build is relevant in some aspect of the game, it’s just that the best builds statistically perform better than the rest, which is what makes them stand out in the current meta. But at the end of the day, play the way you want to that ensures the most enjoyment.
Here is our tier list of the classes in Diablo 4 and how well they stack up in the Season of Blood. The classes’ tier placements are based on their relative strength and the number of viable builds in the current meta.
Diablo 4 Season 2 class tier list
| Tier | Class |
|---|---|
| S Tier | Rogue, Druid |
| A Tier | Necromancer |
| B Tier | Sorcerer |
| C Tier | Barbarian |
Based on the current state of the classes in season two, Rogue and Druid stand tallest as the best classes. Rogues continue to be the masters of crowd control and individual damage dealing, and the changes to both Sorcerer and Necromancer have propelled the always-sturdy and versatile Druid class into the top two. Barbarians remain at the bottom due to a lack of viable builds and a high difficulty curve.
Which class is the best in Diablo 4 Season 2?
Now let’s get into each class, explaining what they’re good at, what they’re not good at, and why they’re at the rank they’re at. Then, you can check out some of our build recommendations for each class.
1) Rogue
- Strengths: Super mobile, lots of damage, lots of great builds, great at early game and end-game.
- Weaknesses: A little squishy.
- Preferred builds: Death Trap, Twisting Blades
If there was one class that was always considered to be secretly overpowered since its release, it was the Rogue. Now it isn’t a secret anymore, everyone is playing the Rogue. This class excels at both single-target boss sniping and crowd-controlling. They are so good at what they do that both of their top builds in season two focus on single target and area damage respectively.
Want to clear high-level content solo? Try out the Death Trap build. Want to take down bosses quickly in a party while your teammates chip away at the lesser enemies? Go for the Twisting Blades build.
The Death Trap build brings out the powerful zoning capabilities of the Rogue’s arsenal of traps with all the damage needed to kill lesser enemies in no time. The titular Death Trap deals damage over time and pulls enemies in (with proper modifiers) to ensure they don’t leave alive. Combine Death Trap with a bunch of Poison Traps and enemies will drop dead as you pass them by.
When you make a Death Trap build for your Rogue, you’ll need to make sure you choose Exposure as your Key Passive. Even better, using the Twisting Blades as your Core ability can help you get your traps off of cooldown incredibly quickly.
The other build that has always been an old favorite is the Twisting Blades build. Speed, speed, and more speed makes this the go-to build for killing demons as quickly as possible. Not only is this build the best boss-killing build in the Rogue’s kit, but Twisting Blades is pretty good at clearing out smaller enemies quickly as well.
Naturally, you’ll be using Twisting Blades as the foundation for the build, and you’ll want to combine that with Shadow Step. Additionally, when you bring out Cold Imbuement and Shadow Imbuement, Twisting Blades becomes a skill that can handle just about any enemy you encounter. Add on the Bladedancer Aspect for good measure, and you’ll be good to Rogue.
2) Druid
- Strengths: Very powerful end-game builds, versatile.
- Weaknesses: Somewhat slow early game slog, but not nearly as bad as Barbarians.
- Preferred builds: Pulverize, Storm Strike-Claw, Bulwark
With all the overpowered classes falling down in the rankings, it was inevitable an underrated class would take their place. Enter the Druid, a powerful shapeshifting mage class that wields the power of nature. You can go one of two ways with Druids, either focusing on their massive nature elemental damage output or turning into beasts to tear apart your enemies.
With that in mind, the two builds of the Druid that stand out the most are the Pulverize build and the Stormclaw build. Both builds focus on different shapeshifting forms of the Druid and they have never been more powerful than they are now.
The Pulverize build brings out the sheer power of the Werebear with the titular Pulverize skill combined with the strength of the Shockwave Aspect. Toss in Earth Spike and Earthen Bulwark to make sure you stand your ground while you smash enemies with Pulverize and Trample. Finally, add a touch of Grizzly Rage and you have a potent Druid recipe that can clear through anything.
Even when you’re using Earthen Bulwark and Trample to maximize your defensive Werebear prowess, there’s a chance you’ll meet foes that deal more damage than you can take. The vampiric power Metamorphosis can give you a much-needed escape card by briefly turning you into an unstoppable cloud of bats when you dodge.
On the other hand, the Stormclaw build focuses on the Werewolf form using Shred and Claw to tear apart your enemies. For elemental purposes, this build uses the Storm element with Cyclone Armor and Hurricane for crowd control.
This build absolutely needs the Greatstaff of the Crone to succeed. This will turn Claw into a Storm skill, and dramatically boost your Storm element effectiveness as a result. Claw turns into a Storm skill while Dire Wolf’s Aspect rounds off the build by letting Grizzly Rage turn you into a Dire Werewolf.
3) Necromancer
- Strengths: Powerful minions and crowd control, strong in early game and late game.
- Weaknesses: Mobility
- Preferred builds: Blood Mist, Bone Spear, Bloodless Scream, Blood Lance
When Diablo 4 was in its early access phase, many feared that Necromancers would be too overpowered and turn the game into easy mode. Unfortunately, as time passed, the Necromancers would not be able to maintain their legendary status. However, the nerfs to this class weren’t as bad as players hoped, leaving it in the middle of the roads and very much playable.
When you think of Necromancers, you think of summoning undead minions to do your bidding, right? While summoner Necromancers are still quite strong to clear early content, endgame builds are determined by the fastest damage output in a short span of time. Two builds stand head and shoulders above the rest, a certain Blood-based build and a Bone-based one.
The Blood Mist build, better known as the Infinimist build, is designed to improve the uptime of the immunity-granting Blood Mist spell to be nearly permanent. This build heavily relies on some items to increase your Lucky Hit chance as high as you can.
To make the most of the Blood Mist build, you’ll need to get your hands on the Howl from Below gauntlets and Black River scythe. The gauntlets will give you a boosted 5.4 to 11 percent Lucky Hit chance, and the scythe will boost a lot of the blood abilities you’ll want to combine with your Blood Mist such as Corpse Explosion and Corpse Tendrils. Use appropriate modifiers to generate a corpse each time you cast Blood Mist, then watch as Corpse Tendrils and Corpse Explosion shred enemies.
The other build is a classic, the Bone Spear build. This build works by maximizing the power of your Bone Spear by increasing your critical hit chance and critical hit damage to high levels. Fire Bone Spears in every direction with the appropriate modifiers to splinter them, thus penetrating through and piercing multiple groups of enemies at once.
One of the hardest parts of the Bone Spear build, or any Necromancer build, is movement speed. With the Bone Spear focusing on critical hit chance, however, the Wind Striker Aspect can be an enormous boon thanks to the fact that it causes critical strikes to grant an 8 to 16 percent boost to movement speed. It can be found by completing the Shivta Ruins in Kehjistan.
4) Sorcerer
- Strengths: Very strong early game, decent amount of viable builds, good crowd control.
- Weaknesses: Relatively squishy, not as viable in end-game content.
- Preferred builds: Blizzard, Firewall, Lightning
How the mighty have fallen. The Sorcerer was considered to be the most overpowered class in the first month after release, which would have come as no surprise to older Diablo players. This class was always considered to be an elemental powerhouse from the early days of Diablo 2 and after going through a series of nerfs in Diablo 4, they are slowly regaining power once again with recent buffs.
Diablo 4 Sorcerers have always been the go-to AOE damage dealer for any party wanting to run high-level areas like Nightmare Dungeons. Powerful builds like the cold-type Frozen Orb and lightning-type Ball Lightning builds have been shoved aside for newer builds like the fire-type Firewall build. If you’re a fan of fire builds on Sorcerers, the Season of Blood is your time to shine.
Typically, a Sorcerer does their best by keeping plenty of distance between themselves and the hordes of hell. The Firewall build, however, will have you playing up close and personal in order to keep enemies from leaving the firewalls you create.
Firewall brings back an often-underused skill to the forefront by conjuring a wall of flame that will slowly burn enemies that walk through it. The primary goal is to create loads of firewalls and keep enemies inside of them by running around said firewalls.
Combine this fire-circling method with Inferno, Flame Shield, and a Firewall Enchantment to bring the most out of this build by creating powerful Firewalls all over the place. However, this build struggles against bosses, so you might want to try the other one.
Blizzard is the other meta option and it is a classic build from Diablo 2. In Diablo 4, this build is responsible for outputting massive amounts of damage in a small area while also crowd-controlling all enemies caught in its area of effect. If you want a powerful build that can tackle all difficulties in season two with little trouble, look no further.
5) Barbarian
- Strengths: Good endgame build potential, high damage, good for melee enthusiasts, tanky.
- Weaknesses: Dreadfully slow early game, few viable builds, outshined by other classes.
- Preferred builds: Double Swing, Hammer of the Ancients
The good old Barbarian. From their introduction in Diablo: Hellfire to their glory days in Diablo 2 and Diablo 3, the class started hot in Diablo 4 as well. Their glorious ascent was quickly culled by the rise of the other characters like the Necromancer and Sorcerer, however. Now, in season two, the Barbarian is shelved at the bottom of the classes’ tier list with only a few viable builds left to run the season with.
Everyone’s favorite Whirlwind Barbarian, which was made famous since the days of Diablo 2, got hit with a string of nerfs dropping it down a few tiers. To take its place, the Double Swing build, which has been consistently good since its inception, has risen to the top of the Barbarian builds. This build works best with two unique weapons and the Double Swing technique for damage and crowd control.
When you’re running with a Double Swing Barbarian, you’ll want to emphasize speed. The Accelerating Aspect will be your best friend, and it pairs very nicely with the vampiric power Ravenous that has arrived thanks to season two.
As far as abilities go, building into Ground Stomp, Enhanced Double Swing, Wrath of the Berserker, and Rallying Cry are what you’ll want to maximize your Double Swing build efficiency. Continuing to build your Fury is the name of the game, and the faster you can do that the better.
Another build that is a classic from the Diablo 3 days is the Hammer of the Ancients build, which is considered by long-time fans to be just as fun as Whirlwind. It is a great build that combines crowd control and massive damage with its signature Hammer of the Ancients skill that is supplemented with Barbarian shouts, similar to other builds.
What drops the Barbarian this low is that everything the class can do, other classes can simply do better with their new builds. In a vacuum, the Barbarian does not perform worse than any of the other classes, it just takes longer to get to the peak of the class’s power.
Published: Dec 21, 2023 03:33 pm