Quill Volley – Spiritborn Build for Diablo 4 (Season 9)

Build Introduction

This endgame build for the Spiritborn focuses on Quill Volley in combination with the Rod of Kepeleke. This build is a good option to fight bosses and bigger groups of enemies. You benefit from the Gorilla’s Armored Hide skill, giving you the survivability to withstand hits while also maintaining good damage output. This combination allows you to tackle tough challenges with speed.

Starting new? Begin with our Quill Volley Leveling Build and switch to this one at Level 60.
Have questions or feedback about this guide? Join Ghazzy’s livestream and ask him!

This video shows only the base build interactions and does not include Seasonal Powers.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Build Requirements

Required Uniques

Ring of the Midnight Sun

Rod of Kepeleke

Loyalty’s Mantle

Want to know more about the Uniques supporting this setup? Jump to the Uniques section.

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

Recommended

Suggested Skill Bar

The HunterArmored HideCounterattackScourgeVortexQuill Volley

Wondering what comes after Level 60? Head to the Paragon Board section to power up the build even further.

And if you want to see how everything plays out in combat, check out the Rotation and Playstyle section for a quick breakdown. If you are missing skill points, complete Renown Tier 1-3 in every zone.

Spiritborn Class Mechanic – Spirit Hall Choice

The Spirit Hall allows you to combine two different Spirit Guardians or stick with just one. For this build, we picked Jaguar as the primary and secondary Guardian for overall damage.

• Primary Spirit Guardian: Jaguar
  • Every 15th time you deal direct damage to an enemy with a Jaguar Skill, unleash an additional strike dealing 15% of the damage you have dealt to them in the last 0.5 seconds. All Skills are now also Jaguar Skills.
• Secondary Spirit Guardian: Jaguar
  • Maximum Ferocity is increased by 1. Gain 1 stack of Ferocity whenever you kill an enemy or damage a Boss.

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Gear, Stats, Gems, and Runes

The following sections cover all systems that are important if you want to improve 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. Remember to salvage Legendary Items with higher Aspect values to unlock them in the Codex of Power, and then imprint them onto gear pieces with the preferred affixes.

Additionally, if you are trying to farm a specific item, we recommend using your Obols to target farm them!

Gear Slot	Gems/Runes	Aspect / Unique	Legendary Aspect / Unique Power
Helm	Grand Amethyst	Loyalty’s Mantle	While your Spirit Hall choices match: Their bonuses are 100% more potent. Skills of their Base Spirit gain {x}% Vigor Cost Reduction. Skill of their Base Spirit gain {x}% cooldown reduction.
Chest	Ahu Qax	Aspect of Might	Basic Skills grant 20% Damage Reduction for {x} seconds.
Gloves		Aspect of the Moonrise	Damaging an enemy with a Basic Skill grants you +4% Attack Speed for 10 seconds, stacking up to 5 times. Upon reaching maximum stacks, you enter a Vampiric Bloodrage, gaining x{x}% Basic Skill damage and 15% Movement Speed for 10 seconds.
Pants	Poc Xan	Aspect of Forest Power	Lucky Hit: Up to a 25% change to create a Mystic Circle for 10 seconds. Casting a Gorilla skill in Mystic Circles empowers them to periodically grant you a Barrier for 25% of your Maximum Life which increases your Armor and Maximum Resistances by {x}% while active.
Boots		Duelist’s Aspect	Maximum Ferocity increased by {x}.
Amulets(50% bonus)	Idol From Below or Grand Skull	Aspect of Plains Power	Lucky Hit: Up to a 25% change to create a Mystic Circle for 10 seconds. Casting a Jaguar skill in Mystic Circles empowers them to keep your Ferocity at Maximum and increase your damage by {x}% per stack while you remain within.
Ring	Myriad Stone orGrand Skull	Rebounding Aspect	Quill Volley’s feathers explode at their apex and return to where they were cast, dealing {x}% of their normal damage both times.
Ring	Luminate Eye orGrand Skull	Ring of the Midnight Sun	When you critically strike, you regain {x}% of the vigor you’ve spent in the last 2 seconds. Gain Counterattack’s passive effect.
Weapon (200% bonus)	Grand Topaz	Rod of Kepeleke	Your Core Skills are now additionally Basic Skills and free to cast. When cast at Maximum Vigor, your Core Skills consume all Vigor to return to full damage, cast at their largest Size, and become guaranteed Critical Strikes, with x{x}% increased Critical Strike Damage for each point of Vigor Consumed this way.

Curious how this build compares to other endgame options? Take a look at our Endgame Build Tier List.

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Stat Priority and Tempering Affixes

Affixes on the same line are considered to be equally important. Bolded affixes are the most important targets for Masterworking upgrades. Be sure to check our Tempering and Masterworking guides for more details about these topics. Want to jump back up to the gear table?

Slot	Targeted Gear Affix	Tempering Affixes
Helm	All Stats Movement Speed Damage Reduction Ranks to Velocity	N/A
Chest	1. Maximum Life 2. Armor 3. Resistance to All Elements	Worldly Endurance (Defensive) – Maximum Life Natural Schemes (Utility) – Barrier Generation
Gloves	1. Maximum Life 2. Lucky Hit: Up to A 15% Change to Restore Primary Resource 3. Ranks to Quill Volley	Jaguar Finesse (Offensive) – Mystic Circle Potency Natural Schemes (Utility) – Barrier Generation
Pants	1. Ranks to basic Skills 2. Maximum Life 3. Dexterity	Natural Schemes (Utility) – Barrier Generation Spiritborn Resolve (Defensive) – Total Armor
Boots	1. Movement Speed 2. Amor 3. Resistance to All Elements	Natural Motion (Mobility) – Movement Speed Eagle Innovation (Utility) – Vortex Size
Amulet	1. % Dexterity 2. Attack Speed 3. Resource Cost Reduction	Jaguar Finesse (Offensive) – Mystic Circle Potency Worldly Stability (Resource) – Resource Generation
Ring 1	1. Dexterity 2. Attack Speed 3. Maximum Life	Jaguar Finesse (Offensive) – Mystic Circle Potency Worldly Stability (Resource) – Resource Generation
Ring 2	Dexterity Cooldown Reduction Critical Strike Damage Ranks to Mirage	N/A
Weapon	Critical Strike Damage Maximum Resource Ranks to Vigorous Chance for Core Skills to Hit Twice	N/A

Prioritize capping all of your Resistances, and make sure to reach the Armor Cap of 1,000. In higher difficulties, there will be a penalty to armor and resistance, so you will need a higher amount to compensate for the loss.

Looking for progression beyond gear? See our Paragon recommendations or Runewords Synergy next.

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Uniques and Mythic Uniques

Below you will find information on Uniques and Mythic Uniques that are useful and recommended for this build. Moreover, if you are interested in target farming Mythic Uniques, check out our How to Farm Mythic Uniques guide.

If a Unique or Mythic Unique is not listed here, it is NOT recommended and won’t benefit this specific build in any way.

Uniques

Listed below are the recommended and optional Unique Items for this build.

• Loyalty’s Mantle (Required): While your Spirit Hall choices match: Their bonuses are 100% more potent. Skills of their Base Spirit gain 20-60% Vigor Cost Reduction. Skill of their Base Spirit gain 20-60% cooldown reduction.
• Rod of Kepeleke (Required): Your Core Skills are now additionally Basic Skills and free to cast. When cast at Maximum Vigor, your Core Skills consume all Vigor to return to full damage, cast at their largest Size, and become guaranteed Critical Strikes, with x0.1-0.5% increased Critical Strike Damage for each point of Vigor Consumed this way.
• Ring of the Midnight Sun (Required): When you critically strike, you regain {x}% of the vigor you’ve spent in the last 2 seconds. Gain Counterattack’s passive effect.

Mythic Uniques

This Quill Volley build does not require any specific Mythic Uniques.

If you are interested in target farming Mythic Uniques, check out our How to Farm Mythic Uniques guide. Or you can return to the Build Requirements.

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Gems and Runewords

Listed below are the recommended Gems and Runewords to socket into your gear.

Gems

Weapon Gems	Armor Gems	Jewelry Gems
Grand Topaz For more Basic Skill Damage	Grand Amethyst For more Barrier Generation	Horadric Jewels or Grand Skull or Grand Diamond For more Armor or Resistance to All Elements

In Season 9, you should rather socket Horadric Jewels in your Jewerly. These gems will give you +120 Armor, +6% Resistance to All Elements and a unique power to boost your Horadric Powers. Check out more information in this section.

Runewords

Runewords are unlocked during the Vessel of Hatred campaign and replace gems in gear. Improve your build by combining a trigger Rune of Ritual and an effect Rune of Invocation. You can equip up to two Runeword pairs (four Runes) at a time. For a detailed guide on Runewords, check out our Runewords Guide!

The following are recommended Runeword combination options for the Quill Volley endgame build of the Spiritborn:

Runeword Combination	Runeword Effects
Poc Xan	Poc – Gain: 5 Offering. Spend 5% of your Maximum Resource. Xan – Requires: 300 Offering (Overflow: Increased Duration). Cooldown: 1 Second. Your next attack will cause your hits to be a guaranteed Critical Strike and Overpower for 0.35 seconds.
Ahu Qax	Ahu – Gain: 15 Offering. Lucky hit: 100% when hitting a non-Healthy enemy. Qax – Requires: 400 Offering (Overflow: Further Increased Damage). Cooldown: 1 Second. Casting a Skill other than a Basic or Defensive spends all your Primary Resource to increase your damage up to 100% for 1 second.

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Paragon Board

Paragon unlocks at Level 60 and plays a big role in endgame progression. The following Legendary Nodes and Glyphs are recommended for this build. Keep in mind that each Glyph’s information and radius listed below is for the Level 46 version.

Need a refresher on how the skills are set up? Click here to return to the Skill Tree section.

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Horadric Spell (Season 9)

During Season 9, you will unlock Horadric Spellcraft, letting you build and bind your own spell to one of your active skills. You can upgrade your spell’s power using Horadric Phials, increasing its impact on your build.

Slot	Power	Effect
Catalyst	Celestial Surge pair it with Quill Volley	Awaken an Oracular Rune that Pulls In all surrounding enemies. A torrent of stars follow that randomly strike the area 20 times for damage each. Rank 10: Stars periodically fall around you and are guaranteed to crash around a Nearby enemy for the same damage.
Infusion	Smoldering Ember	It destroys enemy structures and has a 10% chance to ignite the ground beneath enemies, dealing 150% Burning damage over 5 seconds. While equipped, your Fire Damage Bonus is equal to that of your highest Damage Type Bonus. Rank 5: Deactivates monster Chilling Winds effects for 5 seconds.
Arcana	Bloody Charm	Your Catalyst gains a specialized Execute effect for non-Boss enemies with 10% or less Life. (+2% each rank). Bloody Charm creates the following effects for each Catalyst: Celestial Surge: The moon’s impact Executes non-Boss enemies with 10% or less Life. Successful Executions reduce your Cooldowns by 2 seconds.
Arcana	Fractured Core	Your Catalyst deactivates monster Damage Resistance Aura effects for 2.5 seconds, but you take 10% more stacking damage for the same time (+0.5 each rank).
Arcana	Reactive Ooze	After your Catalyst activates, you gain 5% Maximum Resource Generation per second for the next 10 seconds (+3% each rank).

Horadric Jewels

Horadric Jewels can be crafted at the Wayfinder using Horadric Phials and Gem Fragments, once you have collected the Horadric Tome for this specific jewel. You can collect these recipes by doing Horadric Strongrooms in Nightmare Dungeons.

Horadric Jewel	Effect
Idol From Below	You gain 6%[x] primary stat, 8%[x] maximum life and you are always Unhindered. However, you will be hunted in Sanctuary’s darkest places by Jewel Guardians who were entombed to protect this relic.
Myriad Stone	After you cast your Catalytic Skill, if it is an Ultimate, gain 30%[+] Attack Speed for 10 seconds.
Luminate Eye	Your Catalytic Skill gains 25%[+] Cooldown Reduction.

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 companion, and Varyana as Reinforcement.

Raheir Skill Tree choices:

• Core Skill: Ground Slam
• Core Passive: Raheir’s Aegis
• Iconic Skill: Bastion
• Iconic Passive: Inspiration

Varyana Reinforcement choices:

• Opportunity Skill: Quill Volley
• Reinforcement Skill: Bloodthirst

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Build Mechanics

Rotation and Playstyle

This build is straightforward and easy to play as you heavily focus on your primary damage-dealing skill Quill Volley. The Rod of Kepeleke allows your Quill Volley to count both as Core and Basic Skill, benefiting from a wider range of buffs. Quill Volley allows you to do massive AoE Damage while making enemies Vulnerable. On top of that, Counterattack helps with your dodge chance, and increases your critical strike damage.

Furthermore, Vortex is a great skill to quickly get into the fight, gather enemies around you, and let Scourge poison them, while Armored Hide provides more survivability. Last but not least, The Hunter is a great ultimate skill that is calling the Jaguar spirit guardian to your help for additional damage.

1. Enter the fight with Vortex.
2. Scourge to poison the enemies.
3. Armored Hide for protection.
4. Counterattack for more dodge chance. It will also increase your critical strike damage before using your main skill.
5. The Hunter to immediately gain more Ferocity and to deal increased damage to Injured targets.
6. Spam Quill Volley!

Runewords Synergy

• Poc Xan: This combo is a high-risk, high-reward runeword that feeds off resource spending. Poc builds Offering by burning 5% of your max resource, and when you hit Xan‘s 300 Offering requirement, your next attack will guarantee both a Critical Strike and Overpower, letting you spike down enemies with precise timing.
• Ahu Qax: This pairing plays into momentum. Ahu gains Offering when you trigger a Lucky Hit on non-Healthy enemies. Once you hit Qax‘s threshold, casting anything outside Basic or Defensive dumps your Primary Resource to massively boost your next damage instance by up to 100%. It is a burst window, great for closing kills or defeating elites fast.

Which Elixirs Should You Use?

Visit the Alchemist and craft an Elixir providing any Resistance you need most, or the Assault Elixir to increase Attack Speed. Some Elixirs cannot be crafted and only drop from activities like Helltides or Nightmare Dungeons. Additionally, make sure to keep your health potion upgraded! 

The following Elixirs are useful for most Spiritborn builds:

• Elixir of Precision provides the highest damage output increase.
• Elixir of Advantage increases your attack speed
• Elixir of Resourcefulness helps with resource issues, if you struggle with resource management
• Elixir of Fortitude for additional survivability 

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Season 9 Updates

For a full overview of what is new in Season 9, please take a look at our comprehensive season hub.

Here is a quick overview of seasonal changes relevant to this build:

• Harmonious Hunter:
  • Damage bonus to Injured decreased from 100%[x] to 50%[x].
  • Reduced maximum Ferocity gained from 4 to 2.
• Exalted Hunter:
  • Previous (on PTR): Killing an enemy while The Hunter is present reduces this cooldown by 5 seconds. Hitting a boss reduces its cooldown by 1 second.
  • Now: Killing an enemy while The Hunter is present has a 40% chance to instantly reset its Cooldown. This chance is halved after each consecutive reset.
• Paragon Legendary Node: Convergence
  • Previously: You deal bonus damage equal to 20%[x] of your 2 highest bonuses to Damage with Physical, Fire, Lightning, Cold, Poison, and Shadow combined, up to 30% total.
  • Now: You deal bonus damage equal to 3.5%[x] of all your bonuses to Damage with Physical, Fire, Lightning, Cold, Poison, and Shadow combined, up to 30% total.

Obol Gambling

Similar to Kadala in Diablo 3, the Purveyor of Curiosities lets you gamble your Obols for 750 item power gear at Level 60, making them a great way to fill in missing affixes, Aspects, or upgrades. There is also a small chance to receive an Ancestral piece with item power 800.

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Changelog

• June 15th, 2025: Updated Skills, Gear requirements, Paragon, Horadric Spell, and Jewels for Season 9.
• April 26th, 2025: Removed Overpower variant. Revamped build as Poison Quill Volley build for Season 8. Updated requirements, gear, skill tree, paragon, and added boss powers.
• January 18th, 2025: Updated Tempers and added Witchcraft Powers and Occult Gems for Season 7.
• November 18th, 2024: Fixed recommended Overpower variant Ring affixes.
• November 11th, 2024: Changed recommended affixes for Rings.
• October 30th, 2024: Fixed Ring affixes and tempers for Overpower Quill Volley.
• October 22nd, 2024: Updated Skill Changes information and added Paragon Board images.
• October 19th, 2024: Overpower endgame variant, Orange Qull Volley, added for Season 6.
• October 5th, 2024: Guide theorycrafted and created for Vessel of Hatred, Season 6.