Diablo 4 will be getting its “biggest gameplay update yet” in upcoming season

It feels like Blizzard is trying to teach us all a lesson in expectations. We all know, or thought we knew, how Diablo 4 seasons work. New mechanics, play a seasonal character, earn rewards, and so on. With the next season, titled Loot Reborn, Blizzard is changing up that model and will instead focus on a introducing a host of alterations that will impact the whole game.

To call this next seasonal update wide-ranging might almost be reductive as in Loot Reborn, Diablo 4 will see itself almost transformed, making some aspects of the action RPG game simpler in a few ways and clearer in others. The key difference with this season is that while there’ll be some seasonal stuff included, most of the updates are aimed at the game as a whole. First up, if you couldn’t tell by the name, is loot.

Blizzard says it wants to make loot more impactful and easier to understand, especially when you’re working out if an item is an upgrade. As a result, item affixes will reduce in number but be bumped up in effectiveness, meaning you’ll get less to look at but what is there will be far more powerful. In addition, even greater affixes have the chance to appear on Legendary and Unique items. This also means that there’ll be less loot dropping when you’re out there slaying, as Blizzard says it wants you to focus on killing, not evaluating stats.

There’ll be a new crafting system called Tempering which will allow you to add your own affixes to items. By finding Crafting Manuals you’ll be able to apply extra effects to your weapons and armor, though there’ll only be a set amount of times you can do this with each item. Endgame players will be able to partake of the new Masterworking system, which will let you boost stats on Legendary and Unique items making the powerful even more powerful.

So much, so loot, but there’s also new gameplay stuff heading to the game as well. The Pit of Artificers is a huge endgame dungeon spread over two hundred levels, activated by a new collectible called Runeshards. In The Pit the name of the game is killing, slay a boss and you’ll get more time, lose  a player and you’ll lose time. It’s meant to be a trial by fire for the most tough characters out there, much like Nephalem Rifts were in the previous game.

Helltides are being reworked, the Iron Wolves are back, item trading is enhanced, and there’s plenty more. Head over to the Diablo 4 site to get the full lowdown over what precisely is being changed in season four.

Should this spark a desire to dive back into hell, our Diablo 4 builds guide should see you slaying in style. If you want to know what the best of the best is when it comes to starting out, take a peek at our Diablo 4 classes ranking to know where to begin your journey the best way possible.

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