In the latest Campfire Chat for Diablo 4, Blizzard announced a host of upcoming balance changes in a livestream that opened with a somber tone.
In a lengthy stream in which developers discussed upcoming changes to their hit ARPG, the mood seemed quite grim initially, as the usually smiling panel were seen with more serious expressions after a tough week of critical feedback from the Diablo IV community. In the past, many of the familiar faces could be seen smiling and making jokes, especially in the opening moments of their Campfire Chats, but today's presentation had a noticably different mood.
It's also worth noting that Campfire Chats have been described by Blizzard as casual discussions where patch notes aren't discussed, but they broke from that tradition in today's stream and detailed a lengthy list of promised changes to Diablo IV, which mostly focused on the two character classes that have received the most complaints online: the Barbarian and the Sorcerer.
The patch notes were lengthy — so much so that we're still jotting down the details for the other three classes — but here is everything that was announced for the two weakest classes in the current Diablo IV meta:
- Sorcerer:
- Skills:
- Flickering Fire Bolt change to fire bolt generates 2 mana when hitting an enemy, instead of hitting a burning enemy.
- Fireball: enhanced fireball increases its radius by 50%, destructive fireball’s critical strike damage is increased by 20% which goes to 30% if it hits 3 or more enemies.
- Greater Chain Lightning deals 5% more damage with each bounce, Destructive chain lightning’s chance to form cracking energy goes from 25% to 30%.
- Passives:
- Vyr’s Master: damage bonus increased from 10%-15%
- Esu’s Ferocity: both bonuses are also granted for 3 seconds when hitting a boss with critical strike. No longer requires a kill.
- Combustion: Your burning effects deal x20% increased damage, plus an additional x2% increased damage per unique source of burning you have applied to the enemy.
- Paragon:
- Searing Heat Legendary Node: Casting Fireball or Meteor increases your Critical Strike Chance by 5% for 5 seconds, up to 15%
- Ceaseless Conduit Legendary Node: increases cracking energy’s damage from 2% to 3% per 20 Intelligence the player has.
- Reinforce Rare Glyph: damage reduction increased from 10% to 15%
- Territorial Rare Glyph: Damage reduction increased from 10% to 15%
- Warding Rare Glyph: Damage Reduction increased from 13% to 25%
- Keeper of Flames Rare Node: Damage reduction increased from 4% to 5%, bonus damage reduction increased from 4% to 5%
- Smoldering Embers Rare Node: Damage reduction from burning enemies increased from 4% to 5%, bonus damage reduction from burning enemies increased from 4% to 5%.
- Guarded Rare Node: Damage reduction from Vulnerable enemies increased from 4% to 5%, Bonus damage reduction from vulnerable enemies increased from 4% to 5%.
- Oppressive Rare Node: Damage reduction from Vulnerable enemies increased from 4% to 5%.
- Lightning Resilience Rare Node: Maximum Life bonus increased from 4% to 6%.
- Restorative Rare Node: Maximum Life bonus increased from 4% to 6%.
- Legendaries:
- Serpentine Aspect: You may have 1 additional Hydra active, and Hydra’s duration is increased by 14-24%. This now also affects Hydra’s Enchantment Effect.
- Aspect of Conflagration: Bonus burning damage increased from 20%-30% to 20%-40%.
- Aspect of Engulfing Flames: Bonus burning damage increased from 30-40% to 60-80%.
- Aspect of Three Curses: Increase the Critical Strike Damage of Meteor and Fireball by 20-40%. Double this bonus against healthy enemies.
- Firewalker’s Aspect: Bonus movement speed duration increased from 4-6 seconds.
- Gravitational Aspect: Ball Lightning orbits around you and deals 15-25% increased damage.
- Recharging Aspect: Each time Chain Lightning bounces, you gain 2-3 mana
- Aspect of Unbroken Tether: Bonus chain lightning bounces increased from 2 to 4
- Charged Aspect: Bonus movement speed increased from 20-25% to 25-30%.
- New Legendary - Mage-Lord’s Aspect: TheVyr’s Mastery Key Passive damage reduction is increased by 20-30% for each close enemy, up to 60-90%.
- Aspect of Frozen Orbit: damage increased from 20-30% to 30-40%.
- Storm Swell Aspect: Bonus damage increased from 11-20% to 21-30%
- Snowveiled Aspect: Unstoppable Duration increased from 2-3 seconds to 3-5 seconds. Additional functionality: also grants 10% bonus armor for 3-5 seconds
- Incendiary Aspect: Lucky Hit: damage from your pyromancy skills has up to a 12-17% chance to restore 10 mana.
- Snowguard’s Aspect: While within your own Blizzard and for 2 seconds after leaving it, you take 20-25% less damage.
- Aspect of Concentration: Mana regeneration increased from 20-30% to 40-50%. Duration requirement to gain its benefit is reduced from 3 to 2 seconds.
- Uniques:
- Gloves of the Illuminator
- Damage penalty reduced from 65-55% to 45-35%. Damage to stunned affix replaced with Lucky Hit: Change to restore resource. Reduced the distance offset per bounce range from 3 to 2.5 (should make it easier to hit close enemies with Fireball).
- Gloves of the Illuminator
- Skills:
- Barbarian
- Skills:
- Bash: fury gain increased from 11 to 13
- Flay: Fury gain increased from 10 to 13
- Frenzy: Enhanced Frenzy: fury gained increased from 2 to 3.
- Lunging Strike: Fury gained increased from 10 to 12.
- Double Swing: Damage increased from 40% to 50%.
- Rupture: Enhanced Rupture: Damage increased from 45% to 70%
- Charge: Enhanced Charge: Damage increased from 30% to 60%. Mighty Charge: Vulnerable duration increased from 2 to 4 seconds.
- Upheaval: Violent Upheaval: If Upheaval damages at least 2 enemies or a boss, you gain berserking for 2 seconds, increased to 3 seconds if it damages at least 4 enemies.
- Passives:
- Aggressive Resistance: Damage reduction increased from 3% to 4%.
- Gushing Wounds: Bleed damage dealt based on Critical Damage bonus increased from 100% to 115%. Bleed damage when overpowering increased from 11% to 70%.
- Unconstrained: Berserking damage bonus increased from 24% to 35%. Updated the tooltip to more clearly reflect this Key Passive’s value.
- Walking Arsenal: Bonus damage duration increased from 6 to 8 seconds.
- Legendaries:
- Aspect of Ancestral Force: Damage increased from 32-50% to 40-58%
- Death Wish Aspect: Thorns increased from .5-.75 to .65-.85
- Aspect of Unrelenting Fury: Core skill cost to refund increased from 10-20% to 20-30%.
- Aspect of Ancestral Charge: Damage increased from 50-100% to 75-125%.
- Aspect of Burning Rage: Damage increased from .22-.28 to .3-.38
- Aspect of Bul-Kathos: Damage reduction while in Earthquakes increased from 5-15% to 15-25%.
- Earthquake Aspect: Damage bonus in Earthquakes increased from 5-15% to 15-25%.
- Uniques:
- Fields of Crimson: Damage increased from .18-.34 to .22-.38. Damage that enemies take standing in pools increased from 15% to 20%. Rupture cooldown reduction affix replaced with Bonus critical strike damage.
- Hellhammer: Damage increased from .6-.8 to .85-1.1. Burning duration increased from 3 to 4 seconds. Damage to Crowd Controlled enemies affix replaced with bonus critical strike damage.
- Ramaladni’s Magnum Opus: Physical damage affix replaced with vulnerable damage.
- 100,000 Steps: Attacks reduce Evade’s cooldown affix replaced with bonus evade charges. Damage against stunned affix replaced with bonus movement speed.
- Battle Trance: Basic Skill Damage affix replaced with Cooldown reduction. Bonus attack speed to other skills increased from 10-20% to 35-45%.
- Skills:
As one of many who was devastatingly impacted by the Season of the Malignant update's debuffs, these changes certainly seem like a step in the right direction. The 1.1.1 patch is planned for rollout next week.
Diablo IV Season 1 rolled out with much fanfare earlier this month, but it was soon met with major backlash over balance changes, battle pass implementation, and more. Blizzard has promised to address community feedback as quickly as it can.
For more, check out our complete guide to Season of the Malignant.
Travis Northup is a freelance writer at IGN.
