Havoc Demon Hunter Gearing Guide

Tier Set

• 2 piece: Each slash of Blade Dance has a 50% chance to Throw Glaive an enemy for 35% damage.
• 4 piece: Throw Glaive reduces the remaining cooldown of The Hunt by 0.4 seconds, and The Hunt’s damage over time effect lasts 4 seconds longer.

Why it’s important to Sim yourself:

There are a lot of variables when it comes to gear in World of Warcraft and it makes it almost impossible to tell you exactly what the best combination of gear pieces is, which is why I will always recommend running a simulation of your own character. This can easily be done with https://www.raidbots.com/simbot. If you wanna maximize your characters potential it is essential that you learn to Sim yourself to take all your variables into account.

Droptimizer:

If you quickly want to figure out where you could acquire upgrades with your current gear make sure to make good use of Droptimizer: raidbots.com/simbot/droptimizer.

This feature will allow you to check which dungeons or raids will provide the best possible upgrade for you.

Havoc Demon Hunter Best in Slot Gear

You should still prioritize the gear you use by running a sim for your character, but the lists below will give you a good idea of what items are considered good for Havoc Demon Hunter, and help you target the right content for each piece of loot.

UNCERTAINTIES ABOUT TRINKETS FOR SEASON 4 (In terms of BiS) WILL BE ADDED SHORTLY!

Read more about the potentially useful trinkets further down below.

Overall Best Gear

Best Gear from the Raid

Best Gear from Mythic+

Trinkets

Elementium Pocket Anvil: An infamously strong Single Target once again being the best performing pure Single Target trinket choice, giving your Chaos Strike and Annihilation a chance to deal shadowflame damage on-hit. Additionally it provides a on-use effect dealing AoE dmg and increasing on-hit damage by 33%, stacking up to 5 times.

Cataclysmic Signet Brand: An incredible Single Target choice for Havoc doing a high amount of damage that stacks dealing more as the fight goes on. When stacks have reached 15 it will start pulsing AoE damage to nearby enemies. The stacks will decay once you leave combat but chain pulling can keep the stacks ongoing forever if so desired in Mythic+.

Manic Grieftorch: Incredibly powerful on-use trinket with a 2 minute cooldown and a 2 second channel. Grieftorch being affected by crit and versatility is incredible for Havoc, and lining the trinket up with a Initiative proc is relatively easy. Additionally the cooldown of Manic Grieftorch is reduced by 90 seconds if an allied player dies in proximity, making it especially potent during raid encounters as you will be able to “spam” use it if people die.

Augury of the Primal Flame: Good passive trinket doing a significant amount of single target damage which deals bonus damage off of your critical strikes making it great for Havoc. The trinket however loses some value in AoE situations.

Ashes of the Embersoul: A powerful 2 minute on-use trinket with high value in AoE situations providing a massive amount of Agility in your burst window which decays every 2 seconds. The Single target value however decreases a lot in comparison to other choices.

Whispering Incarnate: Stat stick with an additional stat stick proc granted if a ally with a healer specialization or tank specialization has it equipped.

• DPS: Critical Strike
• Healer: Haste
• Tank: Versatility

Ominous Chromatic Essence: Stat stick which is affected by the different “Dragonflights” providing the wearer with a secondary stat of choice, additionally for each other chosen Dragonflight in your party you’ll get a secondary stat buff of the selected choices.

• Bronze: Haste
• Azure: Mastery
• Emerald: Critical Strike
• Ruby Versatility
• Obsidian: Every secondary stat (same amount total stat combined)

Dragonfire Bomb Dispenser: Strong Single Target trinket with 3 charges which deals damage 7 seconds after use, making it possible to abuse the Havoc talent Initiative in its favor increasing the crit chance significantly in our favor. The trinket refreshes quicker through Critical strikes, which is in abundance on Havoc, making it possible to be used very often.

Pip’s Emerald Friendship Badge: Stat stick with a proc granting even more secondary stat. A decent choice for single target, cleave and Mythic+.

Storm-Eater’s Boon: A once powerful AoE trinket which has since been nerfed serving only in situational situations for pure AoE burst damage. The trinket is a 3 minute cooldown making you into an air elemental for 10 seconds, dealing AoE damage. However do be aware that once it's used you have to be stationary for the duration, also making you unable to Fel Rush and Vengeful Retreat, which is non ideal for Havoc.

Embellishments and Crafted Gear

Single Target / Raid

1. Toxic Thorn Footwraps
2. Life-Bound Bindings with the Toxified Armor Patch

Mythic+ / AoE

1. Life-Bound Bindings / Life-Bound Belt with Blue Silken Lining
2. Signet of Titanic Insight with Blue Silken Lining

Gear upgrade suggestions (Flightstone/Crest usage)

• Thorncaller Claw
• Elementium Pocket Anvil
• Cataclysmic Signet Brand / Manic Grieftorch
• Seal of Diurna’s Chosen

Antique Bronze Bullion Priority

With the reintroduction of the “Dinar” system from Shadowlands Season 4, it offers up an easy way to access high end raiding gear through defeating an Awakened boss once a week. The cap rises by 1 every week, so don’t worry about missing out if you miss out on a kill a week.

Priority of Bullion purchases can be affected by current gearing situations so I would recommend always simming your character before using your Bullion to get the most value out of them.

It's also an option to consider buying “Very Rare” items first as it can be troublesome to acquire them due to low drop chances and high demand from several classes.The baseline recommended purchase in terms of “pure” dps value is the following:

• Thorncaller Claw
• Seal of Diurna’s Chosen
• Elementium Pocket Anvil
• Cataclysmic Signet Brand / Manic Grieftorch
• Seal of Filial Duty