Is the Spiritborn still worth playing in Diablo 4 Season 7? Resoundingly yes.

Spiritborn entered Diablo 4 with the Vessel of Hatred expansion to the incredible enjoyment of the community for one simple reason: they were ridiculously overpowered. Thanks to a few unintended skill interactions (and bugs), the Spiritborn could absolutely melt faces from pretty low paragon and only ramped up further throughout the expansion launch’s Season 6 play, leading to an incredibly fun season of laying absolute waste to Sanctuary’s enemies. Of course, those interactions have been subsequently nerfed, but Spiritborn are still fun despite the the fact that they no longer completely dominate the end game — and Maxroll still ranks Quill Volley as an S-tier Leveling and Endgame Boss Damage/Speedfarming build.

But should you still be playing a Spiritborn? Let’s explore three big facets to Spiritborn gameplay which might draw you to the class despite the Season 7 patch nerfs.

Spiritborn are comparable to Rogues for mobility

While no one is quite as restricted as the Necromancer, Spiritborn challenge the Rogue’s supremacy as “most mobile D4 class.” Two of its four spirit guardians — Eagle and Jaguar — are about precise or rapid strikes (respectively). Combined, they turn the Spiritborn into a dashing dynamo, soaring, jabbing, and slashing through their enemies.

Additionally, the skill nerfs didn’t really impact the class mobility options, so you feel pretty awesome dashing in and out of combat like the aforementioned Rogues. Also like Rogues, that can mean keeping a closer eye on your health. However, you can work Gorilla’s defensive capabilities or Centipede’s health regen into your build without too much damage penalty, courtesy of the Spirit Hall.

The Spirit Hall expands skill compatibility and combinations

The Spiritborn class mechanic — the Spirit Hall — is how you interact your spirit guardians. Selecting your primary and secondary guardians enhances your equipped skills in a variety of ways:

• Gorilla brings the defensive, tanking playstyle of resilience to attacks and vengeful damage in retribution.
• Eagle is your precision strike spirit of both lethal attacks and positioning around the battlefield.
• Jaguar is your rapid strike spirit, embracing fast, brutal, relentless attacks.
• Centipede controls the battlefield with poisoning damage-over-time and self-sustain from the enemies around you.

But a key factor for any of these is that the spirit selected for your Primary in the Spirit Hall adds their skill keyword to your equipped skills. Why is this important? Well, selecting your Primary Spirit adds enhancements when you cast that spirit’s skill, but with that spirit’s keyword added, all your skills are also Eagle, Gorilla, Jaguar, or Centipede skills. This works a lot like the Necromancer’s pet sacrifice option, except you’re not trading anything — you’re adding on. Cool, right?

Spiritborn represent different DPS styles in one class

Spiritborn bring some serious “jack of all trades” energy to Diablo 4 despite being listed as “close combat specialists.” They have a variety of playstyles (informed by the spirit guardians behind the skills) that can eerily mimic existing class builds in the game. For example:

• Do you enjoy the Barbarian’s Leapquake style? Try something Gorilla-focused with Crushing Hand and/or Concussive Stomp your setup.
• Feeling fierce as a Druid Werewolf? The Jaguar’s Rushing Claw and Rake are equally vicious.
• Previously rocked the Necromancer Shadow builds? Spiritborn Centipede could be your jam with Enhanced Stinger.
• And of course, players of Barrage Rogues and Ice Shard Sorcerers could enjoy a turn with the Quill Volley Spiritborn’s mobility and deadly projectiles!

Plus, you can play them all on a single character with the introduction of the Armory in Season 7’s patch.

In sum — Spiritborn remain incredibly mobile and uniquely themed while able to fit a surprising number of DPS playstyles. Their skills can still mesh together really well to create interesting, if sometimes ridiculous builds (looking at you, Aspect of Combined Strikes and Rod of Kepeleke). Even with patch 2.1’s nerfs to the class, they deal respectable DPS and can keep up with all endgame challenges.

This wasn’t meant to be love letter to the Spiritborn so much as a “don’t count them out yet” — the class still holds a warm place in my heart as the first new class to Diablo 4. So, if you somehow missed the Season 6 Spiritbornanza, yes, the class is still worth trying and still has power behind them to tackle all of Sanctuary’s challenges. Just maybe keep a slightly closer eye on your health.