Build Introduction
This guide is a collaboration between GhazzyTV and community member Garm Z. The Bone Spirit build is a very expensive, gear-dependent build with the harshest conditions to meet and a fairly complex rotation, just to function. High investment pays off with one of the highest damage bursts among Necromancer builds.
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To see how this build compares to the other builds on our site, you can check out our build tier lists.
Strengths and Weaknesses
- Fun to play
- Huge damage numbers
- Extreme Gear requirements to make the build function (Don’t play it without proper preparations!)
Build Requirements
Blood Moon Breeches
Path of Trag’Oul
Banished Lord’s TalismanPath of Trag’Oul Needs to have at the very least +28 Bone Splinters or the build will either not function or perform very poorly. On top of this, you’ll need a bare minimum of 275+ Maximum Essence under the effect of 
Bone Graft and Path of Trag’Oul as well as 
Elixir of Resourcefulness II due to Banished Lord’s Talisman.
Quick Navigation
Want to skip ahead? Use the table below to jump to the sections you are looking for.
Skill Bar and Skill Tree Points
Blight
Bone Prison
Decompose
Bone Spirit
Corpse Tendrils
SoulriftFollow the points allocated in the Skill Tree above for the complete 71-point build. The additional 12 skill points are completed using the Renown system.
Necromancer Class Mechanic – Book of the Dead
We will be sacrificing all our minions to further scale the efficiency of the build.
- Melee Skeletons: Skirmisher [Sacrifice] – Increased Critical Strike Chance. (If you’re above 100% chance to Crit you can instead sacrifice Reapers for increased Shadow Damage).
- Mage Skeletons: Bone [Sacrifice] – Increased Overpower damage.
- Golem: Iron [Sacrifice] – Increased Critical Strike Damage.
Gear, Stats, Gems, and Runes
The following sections cover the important systems that are essential to improving the power of your character in the endgame of Diablo 4.
Legendary Aspects
Each aspect is listed with its matching gear slot. Do your best to keep each aspect in the assigned slot. Additionally, if you are trying to farm a specific item, we recommend using your Obols to target farm them! Other recommendations for Legendary Aspect farming would be to do the Seasonal mechanic and to some extent you can farm them in Helltides as well.
| Gear Slot | Gems | Aspect / Unique | Legendary Aspect / Unique Power |
|---|---|---|---|
| Helm |  Cir +  Vex |  Aspect of the Cursed Aura | A dark aura surrounds you, inflicting Decrepify and Iron Maiden on enemies who touch it. Curses inflicted this way spread to surrounding targets every x seconds and last 4 seconds outside of the aura. |
| Chest |  Poc +  Thul |  Aspect of Hardened Bones | You gain 15-20% increased Damage Reduction. |
| Gloves | n/a |  Imprisoned Spirit’s Aspect | When Bone Spirit explodes inside a Bone Prison, it explodes an additional time, dealing x% of normal damage. Bone Spirit now prioritizes enemies inside a Bone Prison. |
| Pants |  Royal Topaz |  Blood Moon Breeches | You’ll deal significantly higher overpower damage hits with this. |
| Boots | n/a | Path of Trag’Oul | Makes our Bone Prison larger and shoot bone splinters. |
| Weapon 1H (Mace) |  Royal Ruby | Sacrificial Aspect | Your Sacrifice bonuses are increased by #%. |
| Off-hand (Focus) | Royal Ruby | Aspect of Decaying Humerus | Your Bone Skills now deal Shadow damage instead of Physical. Enemies take x#% increased Shadow damage after being hit with a Bone Skill. |
| Amulet (50% Scaling) |  Idol From Below | Banished Lord’s Talisman | Guarantees Overpowers for our Bone Spirits and makes our crits do more damage. This does require 275+ maximum Essence to work! |
| Ring |  Luminate Eye | Phasing Poltergeist’s Aspect | When Bone Spirit explodes, it spawns 3 spirits that seek nearby enemies and deal #% of its damage. This effect can only occur once per cast. |
| Ring |  Seal of Power |  Shattered Spirit’s Aspect | Casting Bone Spirit also launches 18 Bone Splinters in all directions, dealing x#% increased damage and generating 6 Essence per enemy hit. |
Curious how this build compares to other endgame options? Take a look at our Endgame Build Tier List.
Stat Priority and Tempering Affixes
Below are the affixes to prioritize on gear. Each line of affixes is listed in order of importance. Tempering Manuals and their recommended affixes are provided in the second column, and the bolded affixes are the most important targets for Masterworking upgrades. The main priority for Greater Affixes are marked with a “*”, secondary would be anything providing Intelligence or Life. Be sure to check our Tempering and Masterworking guides for more details about these topics.
| Slot | Targeted Gear Affixes | Tempering Affixes |
|---|---|---|
| Helm | * 1. Maximum Resources 2. Cooldown Reduction 3. Intelligence |  Worldly Endurance #% Total ArmorProfane Innovation #% Corpse Tendril Size |
| Chest | * 1. Ranks to Macabre Skills 2. Maximum Life 3. Essence per Second | Worldly Endurance #% Total ArmorDecay Innovation #% Soulrift Duration |
| Gloves | * 1. Ranks to Core Skills 2. Critical Strike Chance 3. Attack Speed | Worldly Finesse #% Overpower DamageDecay Innovation #% Soulrift Duration |
| Pants | Blood Moon Breeches * 1. Critical Strike Chance | n/a |
| Boots | Path of Trag’Oul * 1. + Ranks to Bone Skills 2. Armor | n/a |
| Amulet | Banished Lord’s Talisman * 1. + Ranks to Core Skill | n/a |
| Ring | 1. Critical Strike Chance * 2. Attack Speed 3. Intelligence | Necromancer Efficiency #% Bone Spirit Cooldown ReductionWorldly Finesse #% Overpower Damage |
| Ring | 1. Critical Strike Chance * 2. Attack Speed 3. Intelligence | Necromancer Efficiency + Ranks to Rapid OssificationWorldly Finesse #% Overpower Damage |
| 1H (Mace) | 1. Lucky Hit: Up to a 15% Chance to Restore #% Primary Resource * 2. Intelligence 3. Maximum Life | Worldly Finesse #% Overpower DamageBone Augments #% Chance for Bone Spirit to Deal Double Damage |
| Off-hand (Focus) | * 1. Maximum Resource 2. Lucky Hit: Up to a 15% Chance to Restore #% Primary Resource 3. Cooldown Reduction | Worldly Finesse #% Overpower DamageBone Augments #% Chance for Bone Spirit to Deal Double Damage |
Keep in mind that the maximum Resistance is 70% by default for each element and can be increased to 85% by various sources.
Make sure to achieve and maintain armor cap of 1,000 as soon as possible! For that purpose, helm or chest temporary tempering can be Total Armor %.
Uniques and Mythic Uniques
Below you will find information on Uniques and Uber Uniques that are useful for this build. Moreover, if you are interested in target farming Uber Uniques, check out our How to Farm Uber Uniques guide.
Uniques
- Path of Trag’Oul – VERY important that you use this with a well rolled pair. Expect to require at least 28 out of the 30 max Splinters.
- Banished Lord’s Talisman – Only way to use this is to hit the 275 Essence or higher. Before gear carries this you’ll need to use the Elixir of Resourcefulness II to manage this.
Fists of Fate – Very desired item with Greater Affix and/or Masterworked lucky hit. This would replace your Shattered Spirit Aspect.
Mythic Uniques
Ring of Starless Skies – Can replace Shattered Spirit Aspect. Greater Affix and Masterworking priority on this item will be Attack Speed.
Heir of Perdition – This would replace your Cursed Aura aspect and to make sure you consistently apply Decrepify you’ll need to swap your helmet runewords to: 
Igni + 
Wat. Greater Affix and Masterworking priority on this item will be + Ranks to Core Skills and Lucky Hit modifier.
Shroud of False Death – Replaces Hardened Bones. Greater Affix and Masterworking priority on this item will be Maximum Life and/or All Stats.
Gems and Runewords
See below for a more detailed explanation of the best Gems to socket into your gear for each category.
| Weapon Gems | Armor Gems | Jewelry Gems |
|---|---|---|
| Royal Ruby For increased Overpower Damage. | Recommended Runewords then Royal Topaz For increased Intelligence. | Horadric Jewels as listed further below. |
The following Runewords are recommended to be used for this build.
| Runeword Combination | Effect |
| Cir + Vex | Gain: 300 Offering. Cast 5 Skills then become exhausted for 3 seconds. Requires: 100 Offering (Overflow: More Skill ranks, up to 3.) 5 second Cooldown, gain +1 to skills for 10 seconds. |
| Poc + Thul | Gain: 5 Offering. Spend 5% of your Maximum Resource Requires: 300 offering. (Overflow: Increased Size) Cooldown: 1 second. Invoker the Sorcerer’s Mystical Frost Nova, inflicting Freeze and Vulnerable onto enemies. |
Paragon board
Below you’ll find the entire end-game paragon board set-up for this build in detail!
Horadric Spells and Jewels (Season 9)
In Season 9, we will have access to Horadric Jewels and Horadric Spells, granting some absolutely crazy abilities that we’ll utilize to enhance our build’s power. Below, you’ll find a list of the recommended powers we use for this build.
Horadric Spell
| Type | Power | Description |
| Catalyst |  Astral Pillar + Bone Spirit | Cooldown: 7 second. Lucky Hit Chance: 15%. Shape an Ethereal Column that Taunts for x seconds. Piercing waves flow from it and deal x damage, until you create another one or move to far away. The Taunted enemies become Vulnerable and move faster. |
| Infusion |  Nebulous Extract | Your Spell Catalyst now deals Shadow and or Corrupting damage. Enemies hit by it deal x% reduced damage for 7 seconds. While equipped, your Shadow Damage Bonus is equal to that of your highest Damage Type Bonus. At Rank 5 it will deactivate enemy monster summoner effects for 5 seconds. |
| Arcana |  Bloody Charm | Your Catalyst gains a specialized Execute effect for non-Boss enemies with 20% or less Life. Bloody Charm will also execute non-boss enemies with Cosmic Anomaly implosions. Successful executions increase your Attack Speed by 20% for 8 seconds. |
| Arcana |  Tranquil Stone | Invoking your Catalyst grants Unstoppable for 5 seconds whenever it activates. |
| Arcana |  Fractured Core | Your Catalyst deactivates monster Damage Resistance Aura effects for 5 seconds, but you take 15% more stacking damage for the same time. |
Horadric Jewels
Use these Jewels over regular gems in your jewelry slots to further enhance the build:
Mercenaries
During the Vessel of Hatred campaign, you will unlock Mercenaries to assist you. While you can choose freely early on, we recommend Raheir as your main merc, and Aldkin as a Reinforcement once you reach endgame.
For the reinforcement, stick with Aldkin, utilizing his Flame Surge skill being cast when the player casts Bone Spirit.
Build Mechanics
Rotation and Playstyle
You’ll want to always make sure that the enemies are cursed with 
Decrepify. After this you’ll utilize Bone Prison to lock enemies in place, follow this up with Blight for more damage scaling. Next you’ll unleash crazy damage via Bone Spirit. Do keep in mind that the Bone Prison is crucial to trigger the Path of Trag’Oul. You also have the option to help pull enemies together with Corpse Tendrils, which will also increase your chances of dealing critical damage. Soulrift should be up at all times during combat.
Which Elixirs Should You Use?
Visit the Alchemist and craft Elixir of Resourcefulness II as it is crucial to reaching the 275 Essence for your Banished Lord’s Talisman to work. Some Elixirs cannot be crafted and only drop from things like Helltides or Nightmare Dungeons. Additionally, make sure to keep your health potion upgraded!
Season 9 Updates
For a full overview of what is new in Season 9, please take a look at our comprehensive season hub. Additionally, Season 9 isn’t changing anything notably for the build outside of providing the new Horadric powers:
- Aspect of Decaying Humerus allows us to make the Bone Spirit build a Shadow Damaging build. Some minor generic changes besides this big one making us turn the build in to a shadow focused one.
Obol Gambling
Obol gambling is a great way to potentially find item upgrades or items missing from your build. Check out the new tool guide from Icy Veins for gambling Obols in the link below:
Changelog
- June 29th, 2025: Guide updated for Season 9.
- May 5th, 2025: Optimized and updated post launch for Season 8.
- April 26th, 2025: Guide updated for Season 8.
- January 19th, 2025: Guide updated for Season 7.
- October 12th, 2024: New Paragon tool.
- October 9th, 2024: Paragon board added.
- October 2nd, 2024: Guide updated for Season 6.
- August 5th, 2024: Guide updated for Season 5, Infernal Hordes.
- May 23rd, 2024: Finalized tempering modifiers.
- May 16th, 2024: Gem updates.
- May 10th, 2024: Guide updated for Season 4 Loot Reborn.
- January 22nd, 2024: Guide updated for Season 3 Season of the Construct.
- October 15th, 2023: Guide updated for Season of Blood Patch 1.2.
- August 7th, 2023: Guide updated for Patch 1.1.1.
- July 19th, 2023: Guide updated for Season 1 including Malignant Hearts.
