Diablo 4: Lightning Storm Druid Build Guide - Mechanics And Gameplay

A quick demo of my take on Lightning Storm Druid today. It’s fun to play, and I really like the look and sound of those Lightning hitting enemies in front of me.

So I decided to test this build in multiple equipment stages with and without Legendary items to really get a feel for it and troubleshoot issues that popped up along the way. This is what I’ve been looking for, too.

Mechanics And Gameplay

First, let’s explain how this Lightning Strikes works. This ability has some very interesting issues due to the channel requirements that increase its strength. Just holding down the button of your choice will increase the number of Lightning Strikes, capped at level 5. After each Lightning Strike will roll its own Lucky Hit, Critical Strike and Overpowered chance.

These phases also do not increase the spirit cost of the spell. This refers to the passage phases and strikes that occur automatically. So, it’s basically per cast.

Now, Channeling takes some time. This greatly limits our DPS. The solution to this problem is provided by improving the ability for the first time, which keeps this phase within bounds and refreshes every time we hit Lightning Storm. Tapping the button was also much faster than channeling, which in turn allowed us to pump out a lot of spellcasting in a very short amount of time.

Some might think that this is an effortless ability to understand. Could it be that the more attacks, the better? Sadly, things are not that simple. Increasing the number of Strikes also increases the area in which these Strikes can occur.

Also Read: Why Supports Will Play A Huge Role In The Meta For Diablo 4?

Each Strike also has its own area of effect that must overlap the target for maximum damage. This means that the more stages you get, the less likely you are to hit the same target with multiple bolts.

The sweet spot I’ve found for a single target seems to be 2 phases, with two attacks always hitting the desired enemy. Some bosses are stronger, like Butcher. This makes it sometimes better to use Diablo 4 Gold to upgrade Strikes effect. Also World Bosses Ashava, do some nasty damage regardless of Charges, which is something we’d love to see.

So, single target DPS depends on the size of the enemy we want to kill. On the other hand, the cleanup pack wasn’t too bad, and 5 Charges gave us some pretty good AOE. We combine this with Poison Creeper, a very powerful AOE CC skill that immobilizes targets. I can use later this for other synergy purposes, and some Lucky Hits require that Ailment to trigger.

Additional Thoughts And Gameplay

I’ve also used Ravens, but I think Blood Howl or Trample are better options. Both give you additional Spirit and benefits like healing, movement, or being unstoppable.

We can also swap Earthen Bulwark for Trample, but I’m missing points in the level 20 beta so it doesn’t feel that great. Most of our Spirit Generation comes from Spirit regeneration after Wind Shear hits an enemy.

Plus, we get +0.1% Resource Generation per point of Intelligence, which further improves the whole Spirit Generation issue. There will be more additional ways to get Spirit, but it locked those behind endgame and legend, so I’ll stop talking about it for now.

Outro

I’ll go into more depth before posting the beginner’s guide and endgame builds. If you have any other thoughts on this build, don’t forget to discuss it with the community players. Hope you can have a pleasant game process.