Diablo 4 Hammer Barbarian Build Guide: In this Diablo 4 Barbarian Class Build, I’ll show you how to play a Hammer Barbarian, which is a melee Diablo 4 Build for the Barbarian that specializes in quickly smashing enemies to bits and pieces by combining Leap for optimal positioning with Hammer of the Ancients as the primary Skill. If you’ve been searching for a good Diablo 4 Hammer Barbarian Build that deals great burst damage, then this guide is for you!

Diablo 4 Hammer Barbarian Build Guide

The main goal for this Diablo IV Build is to maintain high levels of Fury in order to fully utilize the burst damage caused by Hammer of the Ancients. Specifically, the Furious Hammer of the Ancients upgrade lets you deal extra damage based on the amount of Fury you’ve started with right before activating the corresponding Core Skill. But thankfully, there are a number of ways to generate this resource effectively. On top of equipping a Two-Handed Mace, which also synergizes well with Bash, you’ll be making use of Leap, Rallying Cry, and Death Blow.

Leap is the Skill you’ll want to engage with because this allows you to hop from one group of enemies to the next while pairing it with Bash for efficient resource generation. You can then trigger Hammer of the Ancients when your Fury is high or at a maximum to effectively obliterate them. In cases when they manage to survive the persistent smashing of your hammers, you can finish them off with Death Blow, which is also very handy against Bosses. 

And finally, you’ll be reserving Call of the Ancients when facing Elites and Bosses to not only deal massive damage but also to incapacitate them with Slow and Stun.

Diablo 4 Hammer Barbarian Build Guide – Skill Distribution

Each Diablo 4 Barbarian Build is made up of the 6 Active Skills they have equipped and changing these Skills can drastically alter the way the Barbarian Class in Diablo IV plays. In this section, we’ll take a look at what Skills you should slot for the Hammer Barbarian Diablo 4 Build. Your Skill distribution should look something like this:

LEVEL 25 BARBARIAN SKILLS
Skill	Points Spent
Bash	1
Enhanced Bash	1
Battle Bash	1
Hammer of the Ancients	5
Enhanced Hammer of the Ancients	1
Furious Hammer of the Ancients	1
Endless Fury	3
Rallying Cry	1
Enhanced Rallying Cry	1
Tactical Rallying Cry	1
Leap	1
Enhanced Leap	1
Power Leap	1
Death Blow	1
Enhanced Death Blow	1
Fighter’s Death Blow	1
Thick Skin	1
Call of the Ancients	1
Prime Call of the Ancients	1
Supreme Call of the Ancients	1

The above list gives you the general order to invest in Skills, but keep in mind that you should prioritize picking up new Active Skills over investing in passives, so pick up passives later if you can get new Active Skills when you level up.

Diablo 4 Barb Build – How to Handle Packs of Enemies

So there are really several different strategies to employ with this Diablo IV Build for the Hammer Barbarian, and these change depending on whether or not you’re facing a large group of enemies or a Boss. Let’s start with a group of enemies first, and we’ll cover how to handle Bosses in the next section.

Leap

As mentioned earlier, Leap is the Skill you’ll be using to initiate combat. It provides the necessary mobility to instantly hurl yourself on top of enemies to slam and knock them back while dealing a bit of Splash Damage. To make the most out of Leap, you’ll want to unlock Enhanced Leap and Power Leap. 

Here’s the thing with this Hammer Barbarian D4 Build. This Brawling Skill is also useful when you need to create space between you and your targets to escape dangerous situations. In such instances, Enhanced Leap will take effect because you’re less likely to inflict any damage on an enemy. Doing so would reduce the cooldown of Leap by 4 seconds. Alternatively, you can zip in and out of combat just to be able to use this Skill more frequently. When you harm at least 1 target you gain decent Fury as fuel for Hammer of the Ancients thanks to Power Leap.

Bash

Out of the rest of the available Basic Skills for this Diablo IV Build, Bash stands out because it provides the highest amount of base Fury. Here’s where equipping a Two-Handed Weapon starts to become essential. While you’re dealing massive Bludgeoning Damage, you’ll be able to inflict Stun, but with a Two-Handed Weapon, the duration at which your targets remain immobilized increases. 

The conditions for impaired enemies significantly improve once you gain access to Enhanced Bash and Battle Bash. Every time you damage them, Enhanced Bash grants Fortify, thereby considerably reducing the damage you take to keep you alive longer in combat. Later on, you can allocate 1 point to Thick Skin to further raise your resilience even by a small amount. Meanwhile, Battle Bash grants more Fury, especially when you’re wielding a Two-Handed Weapon. This works hand-in-hand with Endless Fury, which further boosts Fury Generation every time Bash is triggered. 

Rallying Cry

Rallying Cry is a versatile Shout Skill for this Diablo 4 Hammer Barbarian Build, because of its ability to boost your Movement Speed, which is a requirement for Barbarians to traverse areas efficiently, and Fury Generation on top of removing crowd control effects. So even though it has a relatively long cooldown, you’ll find this handy to consistently maintain the uptime of Hammer of the Ancients.

For Rallying Cry’s upgrades, you’ll want to obtain Enhanced Rallying Cry followed by Tactical Rallying Cry. With Enhanced Rallying Cry, you become Unstoppable so you can’t be Stunned, Rooted in Place, or Slowed. What’s more, is that you gain immunity to these conditions, letting you move without fear. On the other hand, Tactical Rallying Cry significantly raises your resource by granting 20 Fury and +20% extra Fury every time this Defensive Skill is activated.

Hammer of the Ancients

Hammer of the Ancients is the main draw of this D4 Build, which lets you slam a hammer to deal devastating burst damage in a specific area. Aside from fully investing in this Core Skill, you’ll want to gain access to Enhanced Hammer of the Ancients to continually generate more Fury every time you attack a target as well as Furious Hammer of the Ancients. 

As mentioned earlier, the higher your Fury is before using Hammer of the Ancients, the more potent your damage will be. So ideally, you’d want to trigger this every time your resource is at its maximum level. You’ll then use other Fury-generating Skills in order to make the most out of this Core Skill. Of course, you’re not limited to the ones I’ve mentioned before since it’s better to utilize Death Blow, especially when you need to finish off your already weakened targets.

Barb Build for Boss Fights

Boss fights are handled a bit differently with this Diablo 4 Hammer Barbarian Build because you’re going to have to rely on a few more Skills such as Death Blow and Call of the Ancients on top of Hammer of the Ancients to successfully deal greater burst damage. 

Death Blow

Death Blow is a great way to slay enemies with low HP, regardless of the type. But against Elites and Bosses, you’ll want to gain Enhanced Death Blow to considerably amplify the damage you deal against them. Meanwhile, Fighter’s Death Blow lets you generate additional Fury as long as you attack a single enemy.

Death Blow is amazing, and one that you’ll want to often use, especially when you’re about to kill an enemy. Doing so would instantly reset this Weapon Mastery Skill’s cooldown. So if you’ve sufficiently softened Bosses with Hammer of the Ancients and Bash, you can keep activating Death Blow to annihilate them one by one.

Call of the Ancients

Call of the Ancients is an interesting ultimate because, unlike Wrath of the Berserker, you’ll be employing the help of 3 Ancients to destroy enemies for you. It works best in combination with both upgrades, Prime Call of the Ancients and Supreme Call of the Ancients. You’ll gain extra Attack Speed, increased damage, and additional Fury. 

Fury is replenished when one of the Ancients, specifically Korlic, deals damage using Frenzy. Meanwhile, Talic can inflict Slow with Whirlwind while Madawc can Stun them with Upheaval. So it’s a great mix of Barbarian Skills that will greatly benefit this Build in terms of quickly dealing with the Elites you’re facing. You’ll not only inflict multiple status effects but also obliterate them with huge burst damage. 

Final Tips

For this Diablo 4 Hammer Barbarian Build, be on the lookout for Strength, Dexterity, Damage to Close Enemies, Life on Kill, Damage Reduction, Cooldown Reduction, Maximum Fury, and Fury Cost Reduction. Of course, Critical Strike Chance and Critical Strike Damage Bonus are good to have to land crits frequently. This is a great Diablo IV OP Build of the Barbarian Class that’s beginner-friendly due to the huge damage you deal.

For the Legendary Aspects, the two mandatory ones you’ll want to chase after are Aspect of Unrelenting Fury and Aspect of Ancestral Force. Unrelenting Fury is an incredible aspect because every time you cast Hammer of the Ancients and subsequently kill an enemy, a portion of the Fury you’ve spent will be refunded so this will come in handy when facing mobs. But remember that it can only be triggered once for each time this Core Skill is used. Meanwhile, Ancestral Force increases the AoE and damage of Hammer of the Ancients.

Lastly, you may also want to consider acquiring the Aspect of Ancestral Echoes and the Aspect of Bul-Kathos for this Diablo 4 Build. Ancestral Echoes gives you a chance to summon an Ancient when you deal damage with Leap. The Ancient will then perform the same Brawling Skill against enemies. On the other hand, Bul-Kathos also makes use of Leap but it conjures an Earthquake to deal extra Physical Damage. And as long as you remain within the Earthquake’s area, the damage you take will be lower.

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Be sure to check out our Diablo 4 Wiki for any other questions you have about the game and the Builds page if you are looking for more Diablo IV Builds, as well as our Getting Started Guide and Best Class to Play in the Beta Guide if you are looking for more Diablo 4 content!