Diablo 4 Lord of Hatred: Apocalypse Warlock Build Guide

In this Diablo 4 Apocalypse Warlock Build Guide, I am going to be showing you the Brimstone Apocalypse Warlock build. This is a Hellfire Warlock that uses Hellfire Skills to inflict massive AOE damage, clearing mobs quickly.

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Whether you are running a fresh Warlock class or jumping straight into the endgame, this build can reliably deal with most enemies up to Torment 1 or 2, with the potential to scale into higher tiers once you have obtained better gear and Paragon Points. If you have been looking for a strong Hellfire setup for the expansion, this guide is for you.

Diablo 4 Lord of Hatred: Apocalypse Build Mechanics

Image via Fextralife; Source: Blizzard

The build centers around the Annihilation upgrade of the Apocalypse Ultimate skill. It revolves around using various Hellfire skills in combination with Apocalypse to fire off a huge explosive attack that decimates large groups of enemies.

Gameplay and Skill Tree

Some of the skills you will be relying on will change depending on whether you’re facing large groups or a single boss, but your overall playstyle will stay largely the same. Going into details for the skill tree:

Basic Skill

The basic attack skill that is most effective to stack up for Annihilation is the Molten Bomb with the Demon Turret upgrade. This will allow the skill to place turrets with each strike up to a maximum of 6, and the attack from the turrets also contributes to the stacks, making it easier to reach 100 stacks of Annihilation.

Archfiend Skill

Infernal Breath, while not being the main source of damage for this build, plays an important role as the Demonic Breath can easily stack up multiple hits within a short period of time.

The Ramping Damage upgrade will help the skill deal more damage as it increases every time the breath hits up to 25%, and Expensive Damage will increase the damage by 140% at the cost of doubling the Dominance cost.

Ultimate

The Apocalypse skill is the main source of damage for this build and it will create a sigil that detonates after 2 seconds dealing massive damage. With the Annihilation upgrade, the skill requires stacking up instead of having a cooldown and it will turn into a ranged attack launching a Hellfire blast. The skill can be stacked up by dealing damage using any hellfire skill, with each stack increasing the blast’s size and damage by 40%.

Sigils

With the sigils, using the Sigil of Chaos will help buff the skills of this build through Volatility. The buff will empower hellfire skills by increasing their damage by 50% and, combined with the high damage of Apocalypse, the skill will allow you to one shot most enemies.

Mobility

You’ll want to grab the Nether Step as it will greatly improve your survivability by allowing you to swiftly get away from danger by stepping through the shadows. This can act as a “get out of jail” option if you find yourself surrounded, as it will allow you to pass through enemies and emerge at a different location, functioning similar to a blink.

For this specific build, we will not be upgrading the skill, but if you find yourself wanting more mobility, you can get an additional charge through an upgrade.

Soul Shards

The Warlock’s special mechanic allows you to summon a special demon through soul shards and this build benefits from using the Vanguard Shard and summoning Abodian, the hellhound.

In addition to accompanying you and attacking enemies, you can use the command skill to ride the hound for a short duration granting you increased movement speed, making it a great tool for either exploring the open map or repositioning quickly during fights.

During this time, you will gain Demonform, which increases your max life, and Abodian will drag all enemies that you pass through with a chain before leaping onto them and dealing fire damage. This is a great way to gather up all the mobs into a single spot, making it easier to destroy all of them with your Apocalypse shots.

Passive

Each shard can have a passive shard and the Hellguard Fragment will increase the cast speed of Abodian by 50% and movement speed by 20%. Additionally, it will allow you to spawn Brimstones periodically as you ride the hellhound, helping with stacking up the Annihilation stacks and dealing damage.

Paragon Boards

Regarding the Paragon Boards, you will want to focus on boards that increase your Hellfire damage, and the Pyrosis board is the first board you would want to unlock.

The Legendary Node, Pyrosis, will increase the damage of Hellfire skills to healthy enemies by up to 450%, increasing the initial damage significantly. In addition to damage, the board will help with surviving the higher Torment levels through additional Life and Armor nodes.

Next, going for the Ritualism board is also helpful as the legendary node will give you a 90% damage boost for 15 seconds after casting a sigil. Since the build will be using the Sigil of Chaos to gain Volatility consistently, the buff can be obtained easily and it will increase the damage of Apocalypse even further.

Charms

With the Lord of Hatred Expansion, the Charms system is making a return in Diablo 4 and for this build, looking for the full set of Horazon’s Chains will help as it will buff Abodian.

With the full 5-piece set, you will be able to summon all four Soul Shard demons for a short duration whenever you use the shard skill in addition to increasing your damage output by 200% for 10 seconds, further increasing the damage output of Apocalypse.

Mapping and Boss Fights

The advantage of this build is that it works great for both mapping and fighting bosses without needing to change your skills or upgrades.

The multiple Molten Bomb Demon Turrets combined with the Infernal Breath can reliably take care of regular mobs. You can take advantage of the Demonform bonus summoning additional greater demons with some skills by immediately casting Infernal Breath after riding Abodian. This will summon a skill that will float around you breathing fire in all directions instead of one, which will help increase clearing efficiency.

When fighting bosses, ideally, you will want to cast your Apocalypse with the skill empowered by Volatility. During boss fights, when there aren’t a lot of enemies to power your Sigil of Chaos, you can sacrifice your Molten Bomb Demon Turrets as they count as Lesser Demons. If you find yourself struggling to kill enemies inside the sigil, you can use the Hellfire Aura upgrade to turn it into an aura which will instantly kill lesser demons inside it.

This will allow you to easily buff the Hellfire skills, increasing their damage. With the Double Blast upgrade for Apocalypse, and when empowered by Volatility, the skill will hit twice, doubling the already high damage and easily taking down huge chunks of the boss’s life bar.

Final Tips & Gearing

Regarding your gear, you will want to look out for Intelligence and Wisdom, along with cost reduction and cooldown reduction to help with resource management. Any lifesteal through life on hit or kill is also helpful for sustain since the Warlock class is relatively squishy. Because you will be continuously attacking with this build, these stats will help you survive most attacks from regular enemies. Stats that give bonuses to skills and movement speed are also generally helpful when putting this build together.

In order to maximize your damage output potential, you will want to look for gear with All Damage or Fire Damage multipliers. You can also socket Ruby gems to increase your fire damage, which will bring up your damage output even further.

At the blacksmith, you will want to temper on affixes that increase your Hellfire damage on pieces that allow offensive affixes, such as hands, focus, and weapons. On pieces like helms and chests, going for utility tempering like Sigil duration will help with infusing your skills with Volatility.

Tempering movement speed onto boots and amulets will help with map clearing speed and repositioning during boss fights. With the rings, tempering on affixes that increase your hellfire damage or your overall damage will help, as they all contribute to the damage of the Apocalypse skill. We will not be going for resource related affixes because the build does not use much Dominance apart from the Infernal Breath skill, and Wrath is not a problem since our basic skill will be generating sufficient amounts.

All of these affixes will contribute towards your damage output and will help ensure your Apocalypse is taking out whatever foe you come across. When running dungeons or exploring the map, try to pull huge groups of enemies together rather than fighting small packs, which can easily be done using the Command Abodian skill. Because this build relies on massive AOE explosions, your clear speed actually increases when there are more enemies packed tightly together. Since we will not be using any crowd control abilities, you do need to be mindful of your positioning and use Nether Step to avoid dangerous situations and prevent getting cornered by hordes of enemies.

For Legendary Aspects, the Aspect of Ignition will increase the effectiveness of this build even further as it increases the bonus provided by Volatility, providing an additional 40% while also giving a chance for the buff to persist after using the skill. Another aspect that is extremely helpful for this build is the Aspect of Lava, which will explode the Brimstones into lava pools, dealing damage over time to enemies while also giving you Volatility by standing in it.

Since this build revolves around using the Ultimate skill, the Vehement Brawler’s Aspect fits perfectly, as casting an Ultimate increases your damage for 8 seconds. With optimal placement of the Infernal Breath demon, you will be able to cast Apocalypse consecutively within 8 seconds, maintaining the bonus damage for your next shot.

Finally, do not feel forced to play on the highest Torment level as soon as possible. While the higher tiers offer a gradual increase in the rarity of crafting materials and loot drops, they do not always guarantee the highest power level items. Often, playing on lower Torments yields the same overall experience and Paragon points per hour simply because your clear speed is dramatically faster. If you are struggling to survive, consider reducing the Torment tier to farm for more gear and materials to temper and masterwork your equipment before attempting higher torments.

So, this wraps up my Apocalypse Warlock build for Diablo 4. I hope you found this helpful and feel free to share your thoughts in the comment sections below!