Image: Blizzard Entertainment
Diablo 4’s next season is reworking loot and adding a crafting system to make each item feel much more important.
Blizzard Entertainment hosted a Campfire Chat stream this week to go over a long list of changes coming to Diablo 4’s next season of content - and they are so much bigger than we could have anticipated. This season will finally bring the developer’s long-promised loot rework, with major changes touching on many of Diablo 4’s progression and loot-related systems to make items feel important, and simultaneously add depth and complexity to builds.
You can watch the developer video below:
Diablo 4’s next season is bringing massive gameplay changes
The two hour-long Campfire Chat goes over a laundry list of changes coming to Diablo 4’s upcoming season, though they will likely be finalised when the developer releases a blog with all the details next week. Itemisation is getting hugely impacted with this update, allowing in-game items to function very differently thanks to new crafting systems. Essentially, you’ll be able to customise every piece of gear you get to make the perfect build - but it will take some doing.
Here’s how it works: you pick up loot which have a number of different stats, and then Temper them at a Blacksmith using a new type of item called Manuals. Manuals add different stats to your items, allowing you to customise your gear towards your preferred build. After that, you can use a separate crafting system called Masterworking to upgrade a specific item stat up to 12 times. To put it more simply, you Temper items to add a stat and then Masterwork them to upgrade stats individually.
This allows you to double down on a piece of gear with stat bonuses you really like, rather than tossing it away after finding something more powerful. Items, aspects and more are getting revamped to align with this change. Item stats are getting simplified and class-focused stats like Intelligence and Strength will only appear for their specific classes. You can also trade Legendary and Unique items with other players, and find every Legendary aspect in the Codex of Power. When you salvage a Legendary item, aspect rolls are added to your Codex of Power to use on other items. You can use these aspect rolls an infinite number of times.
That’s just a small taste of the changes coming to itemisation. As you can probably tell, the full patch notes for this upcoming season will likely read like a novel. New endgame activities are also coming, such as Helltides having a new summonable boss and more enemies, a new boss called Andariel you can fight, a new activity called the Pit of the Artificer that contains increasingly difficult randomised dungeons and new Tormented bosses that have a higher rate of dropping Uber Uniques.
Many class changes are also coming, but that’s to be expected of a new season. The biggest quality-of-life feature we’ve spotted in the Campfire Chat is that players can finally zoom their camera out a bit more. How much more exactly, remains to be seen. Blizzard is going to put Season 4’s changes on a Public Test Realm starting from April 2, to let everyone test out these changes before they launch. Season 4 will then launch on May 14.
