This Diablo 4 Warlock build is all about blowing everything up with Hell Fracture. Normally, this would be a very costly skill, but once you hit the endgame, Wrath generation becomes a non-issue, and if you equip all the right items and support skills, Hell Fracture becomes more than capable of clearing content in Diablo 4's final Torment tiers. If you want to fill your screens with explosions while playing as a Warlock, here's the build for you.
Where to Get Dawnfire in Diablo 4
Dawnfire is the key to making the most out of Aura Paladin builds in Diablo 4. Here's how to get it.
Diablo 4 Endgame Warlock Hell Fracture Build
This is a hybrid Occult Hellfire and Abyss build that supercharges Hell Fracture with multiple damage modifiers, namely Overpower, Volatility, Hex, and Shadowform (albeit to a smaller extent). The gameplay loop is simple: cast your buffs, spam Hell Fracture, blow everything up, repeat.
Alongside well-rolled gear and the right Aspect setup, you need two things to make this build work on high Torment tiers:
- The Chains of Horazon Charm Set
- The Ritualist Shard with Twisted Fragment
Chains of Horazon gives you a massive 200% damage multiplier to all of your attacks for 10 seconds after summoning your Soul Shard demon. Also, summoning one Soul Shard demon will summon all of them, and you'll get a bunch of strong bonus stats for every demon on the field as well. Without this, you wouldn't be able to deal enough damage to fight anything in Torment 10 and beyond, so you'll have to get used to constantly using your Soul Shard demon summon skill frequently if you want to play this build.
The Ritualist Shard and Twisted Fragment are here to amplify Hell Fracture's damage by letting benefit from Volatility while also signficantly improving the bonus damage provided by Overpower. Since you'll be constantly spamming your Soul Shard skill (Command Valloch, in this case), you will almost always have maximum Overpower stacks, and since we'll be turning Hell Fracture into an Occult Abyss skill, this Shard/Fragment combo will further magnify that ability's damage output by making synergize with Volatility passives on top of making it do more explosions.
As of writing, this build was able to reach Pit Tier 95, and we're sure it can push further than that with some more optimizations to itemization. There's a bit of risk involved here, as Hell Fracture requires you to stand in place for a fair bit of time while casting it, though it shouldn't be much of an issue if you can play around it.
Active Skills
|
Skill |
Upgrades |
|---|---|
|
Hell Fracture (15/15) |
Cost Reduction Additional Fracture Ruptured Abyss |
|
Tortured Wretch (13/15) |
Cost Reduction Duration Death Saws |
|
Nether Step (15/15) |
Extra Charge Movement Speed Gloomwalker |
|
Sigil of Chaos |
Volatility Duration Chain Reaction Sigil of Smoke |
|
Metamorphosis |
Maximum Life Dominance Terror Demon |
Try to get as many ranks into Hell Fracture as you can via item affixes.
Offense
Hell Fracture is your main source of damage. Using this causes the ground you're targeting to explode and form a fissure. Every time you cast a skill again, a new fissure forms, and all existing fissures will explode again. Enemies can be hit by each explosion, greatly increasing the value of this ability. We scale Hell Fracture's damage using the following effects:
- Ritualist Shard and Twisted Fragment let Hell Fracture scale with Overpower while also allowing it to become empowered by Volatility. While you have Twisted Fragment equipped, Hell Fracture (with the Ruptured Abyss upgrade) can empower and other Occult Abyss while you are Volatile, causing their initial hits against enemies to cause an additional explosion.
- Ritualist Shard also makes Hell Fracture apply Hex when you have at least 4 Overpower stacks. The Ruptured Abyss upgrade pulls in enemies affected by Hex; this counts as a Crowd Control effect, allowing you to take advantage of CC-related damage modifiers. Hex also increases the damage you deal to enemies based on their missing Life.
- Chains of Horazon significantly improves Hell Fracture's damage when you summon a Soul Shard demon.
- Paragon Board Glyphs and Legendary Nodes further amplify your damage with Occult Abyss skills. Some nodes also boost your damage after you use a Sigil or summon Greater Demons.
To play this build, drop your Sigil on top of yourself to become Volatile, use Command Valloch to trigger Chains of Horazon and gain Overpower stacks, then spam Hell Fracture until everything is obliterated. Make sure to pay attention to buff timers.
Defense
Tortured Wretch is your first line of defense. This will taunt every enemy in a huge area, grouping them up for concentrated Hell Fracture blasts. Use this when you're getting overwhelmed, or when there's an elite/champion pack on screen. Gear with good defense like Tyrael's Might will boost your survivability, but they won't be enough to protect you from everything.
Nether Step's Gloomwalker ability gives you three full seconds of Immunity. Granted, you won't be able to cast anything while you're in the shadow realm, but at least you won't be dying either. Use this only for emergencies.
Metamorphosis is mainly here to grant you Stealth and provide Shadowform-related damage bonuses. While Stealthed, enemies will mostly focus on your summoned Greater Demons, allowing you to spam Hell Fracture without getting targeted. This skill will also reduce Dominance costs while active, letting you use Command Valloch and Tortured Wretch more.
Soul Shard
As mentioned, take Ritualist Shard and Twisted Fragment to get Overpower bonuses and Volatility for Occult Abyss skills. Valloch, the demon tied to this Soul Shard, does not do any fighting. Instead, they passively increase your max Wrath and Overpower stacks. When commanded, Valloch grants bonus Overpower stacks and Wrath Regeneration.
Gear, Stats, and Aspects
|
Slot |
Unique/Aspects |
|---|---|
|
Helmet |
Heir of Perdition |
|
Chest |
Might of Tyrael/Aspect of Shelter |
|
Gloves |
Aspect of Calamity/Heresy |
|
Pants |
Protecting Aspect |
|
Boots |
Aspect of Impetus |
|
Amulet |
Aspect of Ignition |
|
Rings |
Aspect of Authority/Edgemaster Aspect of Ritual Synthesis |
|
1H Weapon |
Spine of Tathamet |
|
Focus |
Eye of Baal |
Here's a summary of how this setup works:
- Heir of Perdition gives a passive damage boost as well as some very good stats. Great choice overall, but exceedingly rare.
- Might of Tyrael provides a serious survivability bump. This can be replaced with any chest piece that provides just as much defense.
- Aspect of Calamity gives you 60% additional crit chance against fully-Hexed enemies. Replace this with Aspect of Heresy to get bonus multiplicative damage for every Occult skill you cast once you get max crit chance from your items and Tempering stats.
- Protecting Aspect is your safety net that will keep you from getting instantly killed.
- Aspect of Ignition increases the damage dealt by Volatility-empowered skills. It also allows empowered abilities to retain their Volatility empowerment.
- Aspect of Authority grants bonus Dominance. Only use this if you're having trouble managing this resource. Otherwise, replace it with a damaging Aspect like Edgemaster.
- Aspect of Ritual Synthesis reduces the Wrath cost of Abyss skils when you use Occult skills. Since Hell Fracture is an Occult Abyss skill, it will trigger this Aspect's effect by itself.
- Spine of Tathament multiplies Hell Fracture's damage while causing every third cast to cause additional explosions.
- Eye of Baal grants a stacking damage modifier every time you summon Soul Shard demons.
Stats
|
Slot |
Stats |
|---|---|
|
Helmet |
Critical Strike Chance Lucky Hit Chance Movement Speed +Ranks to Core Skills Maximum Life |
|
Chest |
Movement Speed Resistance to All Elements Damage Reduction Maximum Life |
|
Gloves |
Willpower Maximum Life Armor Critical Strike Chance Critical Strike Damage |
|
Pants |
Willpower Maximum Life Potion Capacity/Armor Wrath Regeneration Resistance to All Elements |
|
Boots |
Movement Speed Willpower Resistance to All Elements +Ranks to Occult Skills |
|
Amulet |
Vulnerable Damage Multiplier Critical Strike Damage Elemental Resistance +Ranks to Core Skills Damage per Overpower Stack |
|
Rings |
Maximum Life Critical Strike Chance Elemental Resistance Critical Strike Damage Damage per Overpower Stack |
|
1H Weapon |
Weapon Damage Willpower All Damage Multiplier Critical Strike Chance Critical Strike Damage |
|
Offhand |
Weapon Damage Willpower Shadow Damage Multiplier Critical Strike Chance Critical Strike Damage/Attack Speed |
Aim to get at least 18 Wrath regeneration per second. When you use Command Valloch, you'll get a massive boost to this stat, giving you essentially infinite Wrath that will allow you to make full use of Edgemaster's Aspect for the majority of your time in combat.
As for Runes, use BacMot to gain Dark Shroud stacks that grant damage reduction as you move. You can go with another defensive Invocation Rune like Que to get Earthen Bulwark, or use an offensive one like Ohm for free War Cry casts.
Talisman Setup
We've already mentioned why the Chains of Horazon set is so good for this build. As you're building your Talisman in Diablo 4, look for Seals and Charms with the following traits:
- Make sure your Legendary Seal has six Charm slots. Preferably, it should also have a bonus effect for the Chains of Horazon set as well as an offensive stat like Attack Speed, Critical Strike, or Willpower.
- Your Set Charms should have any of the stats listed above, preferably Bonus Ranks to Abyss Skills, Maximum Life, and Movement Speed.
- Equip a Banished Lord's Talisman on your sixth slot. This will massively increase your damage for every Overpower stack you have.
Paragon Boards
|
Board |
Glyph |
|---|---|
|
Starter |
Abyssal |
|
Chaos |
Empowered |
|
Overmind |
Headhunter |
|
Greater Hex |
Destruction |
|
Ritualism |
Entropy |
To summarize, this setup will significantly increase your DPS output as you're using Hell Fracture and its support skills. You don't need to adapt your playstyle for the sake of these nodes and glyphs. However, none of these offer any defensive bonuses, so make sure to grab some survivability nodes as you're making your way to the Legendary and Glyph nodes.
- ESRB
- Mature 17+ / Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Language, In-Game Purchases, Users Interact
- Developer(s)
- Blizzard
- Publisher(s)
- Blizzard
- Multiplayer
- Online Multiplayer, Online Co-Op, Local Co-Op
- Cross-Platform Play
- All platforms
- Cross Save
- All platforms
- Prequel(s)
- Diablo 3
- Franchise
- Diablo
- Number of Players
- 1-2 players
- Steam Deck Compatibility
- Verified
- PC Release Date
- June 5, 2023
- Xbox Series X|S Release Date
- June 5, 2023
- PS5 Release Date
- June 5, 2023
- Genre(s)
- Action RPG, Hack and Slash
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, PC
- OpenCritic Rating
- Mighty
- Local Co-Op Support
- 1-2 players (console only)
- How Long To Beat
- 26 Hours
- X|S Optimized
- Yes
- File Size Xbox Series
- 158.25 GB
- PS Plus Availability
- N/A
- Wiki