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Give us a 1 handed xbow that states "hungering arrow gains the devouring arrow rune". And then let's try this again. Cause we could then use the splitting rune, increase the piece chance to 75%, stuff like that. Or even dual wielding xbows with a set bonus that gives us that rune. Or give us a way to buff generators. Like using one of our unused skills like spike trap. Melee fan of knives is coming, so I wouldn't want to use that. But imagine a 2-piece set for hand x-bows. "Spike trap increases the damage of hatred generators by 100% for 5 seconds" and "hatred generators increase the damage of spike trap by 100% for 5 seconds". Change UE to apply to generators, multi shot and spike traps and suddenly spike traps are viable. M6 is being updated as well, and it seems likely Yang's Recurve might be BiS for new M6 as well. But if M6 will allow our sentries to fire generators, I'd rather use M6 cause I much prefer the play style. I'm still working on gearing a DH but I'm not surprised this build falls a bit short of the best builds.

I'm nearing Paragon 100, and I'm working on getting a hold of my gear. My current plans:

Calamity, Ninth Cirri Satchel, F&R, Hunters Wrath, UH6, Best Amulet, Wraps of Clarity

Cubing up: Buriza, Depth Diggers and Convention

Gems: Bane of the Trapped, Simplicites Strength, then Iceblink (solo) or Bane of the Stricken (group)

This is what I believe might be one of the strongest forms of the build, but only time will tell as I acquire the gear I need for the build.

VMT8, I have a feeling that your version of the build, with the extra emphasis on Multishot, is going to reign supreme for this build. Yang's Recurve. Ninth Cirri Satchel, a lot of Hungering Arrow and Multishot damage, and Convention of the Elements. That version will probably be able to output the highest overall damage. Seeing as the primary difference between this build and the regular Multishot build is that we lose the Dead Mans Legacy, I think we make up for that damage loss with our Hungering Arrow.

Svengali, you can see in my original post that Area Damage plays a crucial role in this build and Area of Effect damage. Our single target DPS is extraordinary, however against multiple mobs we begin to lack in damage. Area Damage is the solution to that idea.

Gielo, that was one of my primary concerns as well. I don't think we can drop any of our three gems in this build. They are all incredibly powerful.

This is it guys. Blizzard buffed it a bit more. I don't know if there is a god, but if so, he works for blizzard and he buffed the Hunters Wrath for me.

Demon Hunter

• Hunter's Wrath
• New Legendary Belt
• Your Hatred generators attack 30% faster and deal 45-60% increased damage

Yes that is real. We only needed a touch more damage, and now we have it. 40% to 60% should be enough to push this build into the "viable" category.

Blizzard employee, if you are out there, and you buffed this with full knowledge of my build, I personally thank you.

Hungering Arrow in Patch 2.3. (Full guide and set preview)

As many of you know, I’ve been pushing Hungering Arrow as a skill for the past few patches. With this guide I hope to fully bring up to speed anyone who is unfamiliar, and go into extensive detail with the build and the possibly variations in patch 2.3

This builds history trails back to the first announcement of the Unhallowed Essence set. Allowing our hatred generators to be buffed by such a huge percent made me curious. Is there a primary skill we can use to deal out some significant damage with this new set? After some basic research, I discovered Hungering Arrow, Devouring Arrow. What this states is that after each consecutive pierce, the damage is increased by 70%. With that, the build was born.

In patch 2.3, we are given the option to select legendary passives without them being assigned to the build. A significant flaw to the build in patch 2.2 is that our Buriza Do-Kyanon, an essential weapon for the build, could not roll discipline as a secondary affix. With the implementation of the Kanai’s Cube we no longer have to utilize the Buriza as our primary weapon, allowing a lot more build potential and versatility.

Lets talk about Hungering Arrow for a second. As it is a primary skill, there are certain gearings that can be focused on it to buff our damage. Depth Diggers, Simplicity's Strength and Hunters Wrath are the three we capitalize on with this build to increase our damage output. Between Depth Diggers and Simplicity’s Strength, we can get 150% Hungering Arrow damage with a level 50 gem. Hunters Wrath simply increases the damage we deal and the speed we shoot, an auto include for the legendary passive alone.

Lets break down the gear slots and options.

Rings: Unfortunately, we only have one option. Focus and Restraint are simply much too strong to be contested by any other build options.

Weapon and Quiver slots: For our weapon, I would recommend an ancient 2 handed crossbow. Any crossbow with discipline, a socket and high base damage will do. Ideally, we want 10% damage, high base damage, a socket, and area damage, but more on that later. For our quiver, the only option we have is the Ninth Cirri Satchel. It can upgrade our chance to pierce from 35% to 60%, which is crucial. I did experimentation with an ancient Etrayu, and to my disappointment, it both underperformed a crossbow and removed the secondary primary slot for our crossbow, which is much better put to use in some other slot.

Boots: Hell Walkers are the only viable boots for this build.

Legs: My version of this build uses Depth Diggers, however there is another version of the build. It is summarized below.

Belt: The best slot for this build is Witching Hour.

Gloves: Fiendish Grips are the only viable gloves for this build.

Chest: Cage of the Hellborn is the only viable chestpiece for this build.

Bracers: Wraps of Clarity is the only viable bracers for this build.

Helm: Accursed Visage is the only viable helm for this build.

Amulet: This slot is the most versatile. Most amulets, as long as they have crit chance and crit damage will be viable. Specific notes for amulets would be the Mara’s Kaleidoscope, Hellfire Amulet and Talisman of Aranoch. Mara’s provides poison resist, one of the strongest immunity amulets in the game. Hellfire Amulet provides an additional passive, which is an incredibly powerful damage upgrade for the Demon Hunter. The Talisman provides cold resistance, which allows us to relax around reflect damage packs, a significant issue for this build. Reflect damage can 1-shot us with a singular arrow, due to the high amount of damage reflected from Hunger Arrow. In essence however, find the amulet that best suits your playstyle and addresses your personal frustrations or weaknesses.

Cube slots: For our weapon passive, the Buriza Do-Kyanon is our only option. For armor, I use Hunters Wrath, and for ring I use the RoRG. With the RoRG it allows us to equip the Depth Diggers.

Stat focus for our gear pieces.

Wherever we can get it, crit chance, crit damage and dexterity are important. We can get Hungering Arrow damage on our pants, belt and quiver, see that we maximize that. Discipline can be found on our chest, quiver and crossbow. I would prioritize this above all else.

A core issue with this build is multi-target damage. We cover one end of that with our Buriza, allowing our arrows to pierce twice more into additional targets, maintaining our crazy damage bonus, but that isn’t enough. In order to solve this problem, I highly recommend putting an emphasis on area damage. It is easy to acquire on our gloves and shoulders, putting us to 90% with paragon. If possible, I recommend getting 24% on our crossbow, 20% on each ring, and 20% on our quiver. If you somehow manage to get perfect rolls on each slot, that puts our area damage to 174%. What that means is that if you shoot one arrow at an elite pack, imagine a blue pack, and they are all clustered together (quite common with blue elites). The first hit does ~500m, the second ~1.6b, the third 2.4~ and the fourth 3.1~ (fourth is statistically unlikely, and I rarely see in game). If we get an area damage proc on the second and fourth hit, one mob takes ~4.7 billion, and the other two each take ~8 billion each. This is absolutely destructive for one singular shot. Imagine firing this kind of damage output at two shots per second. Obviously this is in an ideal scenario, but it gives you a general example of the damage output this build is capable of. With someone clumping mobs, like the new monks, it is not difficult to abuse area damage to its fullest extent.

Legendary Gems: I personally use Bane of the Trapped, Iceblink, and the aforementioned Simplicity’s Strength. I have not tested other gems, as these appear on the surface to be the strongest gems. I highly recommend testing further options, specifically the new seasonal only gem Bane of the Stricken.

Skills for this build:

Hungering Arrow: Devouring Arrow.

This a pretty logical conclusion.

Multishot: Burst Fire.

We need a spender, and I like using a cold skill that slows an entire group of mobs for crowd control purposes. This slot can be used on ANY spender that will proc our Focus/Restraint buff. Cluster Arrow: Dazzling Arrow is an alternative, which allows for some interesting timings to prevent rift boss triggers. I’ve used this skill to stunlock the Crusader King before he can summon skeletons. For the most part, this is a versatile skill, as long as it spends hatred, we want it.

Preparation: Invigoration.

This gives us 15 additional discipline, or a 225% damage bonus at all times. Essential.

These three skills are the most optional. Personally, I like using:

Vault: Tumble.

Companion: Wolf Companion.

Marked for Death: Contagion.

However feel free to modify or adjust to properly suit your own playstyle.

Passive Skills:

I would highly recommend Awareness, Cull the Weak and Steady Aim. Personally, I like Single Out as my final passive, but Archery and Ambush are also options. Another option to suit your playstyle.

Alternate version of this build.

What I outlined above is my personal version of the build. However after a fantastic conversation with user VMT8, they offered an alternative to my version.

By changing the Depth Diggers to the cube, equipping a Hunters Wrath, and running base UH6, we can equip a Convention of the Elements in our cube. Taking this idea, we can imagine a version of the build taking advantage of Multishot to a greater level.

Giving up slots on our Boots and Helm to equip multishot damage, converting area damage to reduced resource cost, switching our crossbow to a Yang’s Recurve, and switching Multishot to the Arsenal rune, we can essentially spend our hatred on our fire cycle of convention, dealing solid group damage, and still utilize the cold section with our Hungering Arrow.

Unfortunately, by the time I became aware of this version of the build, the PTR had been taking down to wipe and patch, and with it, all my spare copies of the pieces I need for this build. Due a lack of motivation to get back on and re-acquire the gear pieces, this version remains untested. However it does seem very viable as a solution to the group damage issues that Hungering Arrow is faced with. Once again, this idea was brought to my mind by someone named VMT8, and without them, this section or idea wouldn’t exist.

Final summary:

Using my version of the build, with only 100% area damage, I was capable to soloing a 55 grift on the PTR. Unfortunately, when I pressed record, I actually stopped a previous recording, and as such, didn’t record any of the footage. I realized this when I finally got around to writing this post, so unfortunately I have no proof of this build and success. It may not be able to push to the highest of grifts, or compete with Nats, but I love playing the build, and its good to see that with enough perseverance, we can find fun builds that are a bit less “conventional” that what would normally be expected.

Link to a “perfect” version of the build in my version of it

http://ptr.d3planner.com/327603246

Please leave all questions and comments below. I check this site often and will be replying to every comment who wants a reply. Ask away about any questions you might have, I will be happy to elaborate upon gearing requirements, viability in grifts, damage numbers, and so on and so forth.

Note to blizzard:

Please give me an item that enables me to use more than one rune of Hungering Arrow. I want to use the splitting rune (THREE ARROWS INSTEAD OF ONE OH MY GOD) and the one that increases pierce chance to 50% (OH MY GOD 75% CHANCE TO PIERCE THATS CRAZY). That would be crazy fun to have arrows splitting and piercing and going all over the place. Really just make it a gear piece for all classes to allow a second or even third rune to skills. That’d be so much fun.

I've been trying to clear a 55 grift but to no avail, just to get footage of the build. As it is now, I just need to edit the pieces I do have and hope for the best. The PTR is down for me right now though, so I can't get in game right now and try again.

I was theory crafting a build involving just that at work yesterday. I was planning on trying something out once I managed to get home. My theories are fire grenades Cluster Arrow, Physical Impale, and Ball Lightning. Once I get into a game on the PTR I'll try them out and see if I get results.

As a DH, we can't start getting cocky, the added survivability that the melee classes have is going to be very relevant moving forward. DH's are very vulnerable to dying, and we can't deal out any damage if we're dead. We gotta keep optimizing our skills and gearing to find the highest damage output we can, while maintaining a level of survivability.

From Ball Lightning to Multishot to Hungering Arrow. The Unhallowed Essence set offers competitive play in many forms. In this video I go over my favorites, in addition to briefly covering the Marauders set, and its future in competitive play (or significant lack thereof).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQNm29jovgQ

For those of you who either cannot or do not want to watch the video: here is a brief summary of what I talk about, with a little bit more information.

M6: The only build I tried was Ball Lightning, with Meticulous Bolts in Kanai's Cube, and a Bombardiers Rucksack equipped along with a Kridershot. This didn't prove to yield a notable damage increase over virtually any other build, and after a few tests I decided that this build, along with M6, shall remain in the dust.

Nat's 6: I don't like Nat's myself, but it is currently in the #1 slot for solo DH and is clearly performing well with the added Cube passives.

UH6: I primarily focused my 12+ hours of gameplay with the UH set. Specifically, Ball Lightning and Hungering Arrow. Multishot is currently #2 in solo DH play, and is going to be a very competitive build moving forward.

UH6, Ball Lightning: A solid build, with excellent damage output, especially on clumped mobs and slow moving targets. This build has in my opinion, the greatest likelihood of being considered the "best" build, with the hardest gearing available. With excellent single-target damage, and even better group damage, the only issues with this build is the survivability issues, and the fact that reflect damage packs must be skipped, as it is virtually impossible to kill them with this build. With my testing, optimal setup for this build is a cubed Kridershot, a cubed Hunter's Wrath* and a cubed Convention of the Elements. With the lightning Convention buff up, each ball was critting for 800-900 million, per tick. This is obviously an obscene amount of damage.

*Hunters Wrath is currently broken with the Kridershot. It doesn't apply the buff as it should, giving Ball Lightning 40% more damage and 30% more attack speed. With this belt in effect, the damage output of this build would skyrocket, making it even stronger.

UH6, Hungering Arrow: This is my own personal build, and with this patch I think it's finally to a competitive level. Each shot crits for about 500-700 million the first pierce, 1.2-1.4 billion after the second, less commonly, but still relatively frequently, the third pierce hits for 2.3-2.5 million, rarely, it will pierce a fourth time, this time for anywhere from 4 million+. With a power pylon, I've seen 11 billion crits per arrow. This is what I believe to be the strongest single target damage in the game. Its ability to decimate 40 billion HP in about 10 seconds is absolutely unparalleled, as far as I am aware. The biggest flaw is the lost group damage. This can be made up somewhat by Area Damage. 100% Area Damage allows some shots to replicate their obscene damage onto every mob around them. This allows our crazy crits to absolutely decimate blue packs, as around 1/5 of our shots will hit every single member of the pack. However this flaw is quite large, and leaves much to be gained by using a build with better AoE damage.

In summary, Unhallowed Essence is quite powerful, absolutely competitive with Nat's. Because we no longer have permanent lockdown from WD's or Crusader's, damage mitigation is much more important for the DH. Right now, because of this increased focus on survivability, melee classes are having a field day in groups, with monks being the primary class played in virtually all leaderboards.

My future on the PTR. As it is, I'm working on a few more "janky" builds, just for fun. Nothing I expect to make a difference in the competitive meta, just fun little things that are goofy and enjoyable to play. I'd love some feedback, and some ideas for future things to test on the PTR. I enjoy theorycrafting, and if anyone else has some ideas to improve these builds or want more information about any of them, feel free to ask for it. I have no issues going into more detail about what I've done for each build.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csOH0tVKBu0

Take a look guys. Primarily the issue is that it's difficult to maintain space between mobs, so without the mobs being controlled by a stun-doc, its vulnerable to frequent deaths.

Under certain conditions you can move Blighter in a area of a rift which the the only dmg you will take is from the poison pool he places on the ground and we wont even cast mega prostate check. So good.