We will continually update this article with all patches the development team implements for Diablo IV.
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I want to start by saying that I love the Spiritborn class the fast-paced playstyle and the fantasy of being a poison shaman are incredible. Like many others, I have been trying to create a viable endgame Poison/Pestilent Swarm build for two seasons now. After extensive testing, I have some suggestions on how to refine the class design to make the build simpler, more enjoyable, and more in line with the Centipede fantasy while improving its endgame viability without disrupting overall game balance.
Current Issues with the Pestilent Swarm Build
- Excessive Aspect Requirements – Too many mandatory aspects are needed to spawn enough Pestilent Swarms and make them effective, which is particularly challenging in a class that already has fewer aspect options.
- Lack of Intrinsic Swarm Integration – Pestilent Swarms are not inherently part of the Centipede Spiritborn; they must be enabled through multiple aspects and runes. Even with full investment, reliably reaching the 15-swarm cap without runes is difficult (typically only reaching 11-13).
- Underwhelming Unique Ring – The Ring of the Writhing Moon lacks a meaningful damage multiplier or critical strike synergy. Its effects—such as spawning a swarm every four seconds and generating vigor—feel lackluster and not deserving of Unique status.
- Unclear UI and Damage Prioritization – The game does not clearly display skill tags or attributes for Pestilent Swarms, making it difficult to optimize builds. Additionally, swarms generated from different sources have varying damage values, but it is unclear if stronger swarms overwrite weaker ones when multiple spawn simultaneously.
- Difficult Synergy with Noxious Resonance & Spirit Halls – The Noxious Resonance key passive is hard to maximize without specific aspects. Integrating Centipede Spirit Halls into the build is challenging unless non-Centipede abilities are used.
- The Devourer Feels Unreliable – This node is one of the only intrinsic ways to spawn Pestilent Swarms, yet it is inconsistent and may even hinder the effectiveness of Noxious Resonance.
Proposed Solutions
- Improve the Ring of the Writhing Moon (Addresses Issues 1, 3, & 5)
• Merge the Aspect of Infestation into the ring’s effect, reducing the total aspect requirement for summoning Pestilent Swarms.
• Allow the ring to spawn swarms from any Centipede skill, making it a true centerpiece for Centipede and poison-focused builds.
• Replace the movement speed bonus with ranks to Unrestrained Power, Apex, Nourishment, or Ravenous for better synergy.
• Add Lucky Hit Chance, Pestilent Swarm Damage, and/or Critical Strike Damage instead of just Critical Strike Chance to improve its scaling and synergy with Noxious Resonance. - Enhance the Noxious Resonance Key Passive (Addresses Issues 2 & 5)
• Modify Noxious Resonance so that Critical Strikes cause poisoning to burst the enemy dealing poison damage to nearby enemies and causing Pestilent Swarms to erupt from the enemies and spiral outward. The damage could scale based on Critical Strike Damage, making it a more visually and mechanically rewarding way to spread poison.
• Alternatively, if changes to Noxious Resonance are undesirable, the Aspect of Pestilence could be modified to include this effect, applying it via Stinger or any Centipede ability. - Improve UI Clarity & Swarm Damage Prioritization (Addresses Issue 4)
• Display the tags and attributes of Pestilent Swarms so players can better understand how they interact with different Spirit Halls and passives (e.g., whether Harmony of Ebewaka grants Jaguar tags).
• Allow weaker swarms to burst upon being replaced by stronger ones, similar to the Insatiable Aspect for Touch of Death. This could either be a baseline mechanic or an added synergy with Insatiable Aspect. - Improve Centipede Spirit Hall Synergy (Addresses Issues 2 & 5)
• The Aspect of the Undying is so essential for all Spiritborn builds that it forces players into Gorilla Spirit Halls unless they use Harmony of Ebewaka.
• Solution: Adjust Loyalty’s Mantle to lower Vigor Cost and Cooldown Reduction to 40-50% while adding a 30% damage multiplier for skills that match the player’s base spirit.
• Alternatively, the mantle could grant +1 to all passives or make skills with a matching base spirit benefit from all of their upgrades, allowing for true single-spirit builds without losing substantial damage. - Rework The Devourer & Exalted Devourer Node (Addresses Issue 6)
• Current Problems: - The Devourer cannot be recast until its duration ends, limiting toxic glob interactions and causing its damage to fall off over time.
- Exalted Devourer hinders Noxious Resonance, as enemies die instantly instead of allowing multiple poison burst triggers.
• Proposed Fixes:
• Allow The Devourer to be recast while active, with new casts either:
• Releasing additional toxic globs (with increased size and guaranteed crits for Noxious Resonance procs).
• Summoning multiple Devourers (max 3).
• Buff Exalted Devourer by having poison bursts from Noxious Resonance also spawn Pestilent Swarms while Devourer is active.
• Alternatively, allow Devourer’s toxic globs and beam to spawn multiple stronger Pestilent Swarms, reinforcing its role in a swarm-centric build.
Closing Thoughts
I absolutely love the Spiritborn class—it’s my main in Diablo 4, and the Centipede/Pestilent Swarm fantasy is incredibly fun. These suggestions are meant to provide constructive feedback to help refine the class while preserving game balance.
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can someone explain how the mighty weapon throw from 200% to 50% is a buff lol
I hope they fixed thorns damage from minions. Hellbent commander dont works to thorns minion builds since s7’s PTR.
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You already told us twice before. 
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I understand your vision of only focusing on the new stuff for a season, but please
consider in the future to bring more updates/changes to old uniques/aspect f.e. the new ball Ligthning Uniques didn’t hit the mark, so they not juice them up a little bit after you got tons of feedback in S7. This approach seems dated and let to some kind of backlash allready in D3.
Same for new game modes. Would be cool if changes are done more frequently in response. Infernal Hordes came with S5 and are fun and only are updated with a focus season 10. That’s a pretty damn long time.
Same now with Season 7 coming to an end. You introduced headhunts and added Raven Trees to it. For me it seems to be a perfect match for Helltides, but I got the feeling if it’s ever coming, it’s going to be on an Helltide focus season and not instant. So it’s pretty far away.
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I dont understand why Blizzard is intentionally destroying their game??? This season is really bad. Why did no one test this or take a step back and say this is awful?
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bugged 200% aditive vs fixed 50% multiplicaive plus buff to base damage
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The guardian of the d4 forums is upset!
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Are you back from your forum vacation? The CKC missed you.
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Disagree. I had a great time with the stormhorn unique and completed all of my seasonal goals.
- Hoard Key drop chances have been reduced.*
Can someone help me understand why a limit on this in-game activity is a thing?
Pit has unlimited access. (I guess it does have a key, but I don’t understand why this does either?)
Undercity has the same idea but they have different keys for different things and that is a way to choose your reward so I understand this.
Now: Ladder Boss’s you can fight whenever you want just need keys for rewards due to player complaints which I still think was a minority of player complaints… but we don’t have to go there. I think the change will be a net positive but we will truly see in S8.
NMD you can craft.
Why hordes?
Are they lowering the horde drop rate due to the guaranteed GA drop chest or MW materials or exp gain or they want me to actually do 6 and 8 wave hordes or ____?
Edit: this is talking about the new hoard keys and not horde keys like I was thinking. Doh!
I agree here. The drop rate is already too low. Why are they doing this? They may as well just remove this entirely
the people in the back couldnt hear him
I think we’ll end up with more keys. The reduced drop rate is probably just from random elite monsters.
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Explained a bit in the livestream at around 53:00.
Seems they do want a focus, which includes new stuff as you mention and also play styles they want to focus on for improving old stuff.
It seems they’re under resource on this. I can understand their wanting to focus and get their changes right (which we’ll see in s8 how that went) but given the volume of community feedback in this area imo it’s not picking up enough each season.
I think I misread the notes. This talking about hoard keys!? I was thinking it was talking about horde keys.
I think you are right with ending up with more hoard keys as they buffed the rates in NMD/ Blood maiden/legions etc.
Sorry I do not know how to read sometimes. Lol
On another note horde keys don’t drop enough.
It’s not, but the other changes to supporting items/aspects outweigh it.
The nerf to the ability itself means slotting it without a dedicated build gets disincentivized, while having the proper Aspects/Uniques beefs it up more.
Personally, I’m seeing a WW/MT build. The decrease to the Overpower Glyph to 12s now just happens to coincide with MTs 12s duration when using the new Unique that converts CDR to %(x) damage. That means you can MT with guaranteed Overpower, an additional hefty multiplier, then WW for 12s between it. WW also spawns Dust Devils.
Then you stop WW, gain another multiplier, and Mighty Throw again.
I wish it were 6s instead of 12, but it is what it is.
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Sounds like you’re playing wrong. I had two characters with all 12/12 gear… all with double or triple hits… and i have a bunch of extra horde keys.