As Diablo 4 players like myself have had the chance to play around with the PTR for Season 4, there are many new features that we’re now looking forward to in the coming season. Here are the 8 best changes coming to Diablo 4 Season 4 from the PTR.
Diablo 4: 8 best changes to Season 4 PTR
Reworked Helltide
Many Diablo 4 players haven’t been all too impressed by the Helltide event as of late, but with Season 4’s upcoming Helltide rework, I can see myself enjoying the Helltide more than I used to. Not only has the difficulty spiked, but there’s a whole new system in place.
You slowly generate Threat as you battle enemies in the Helltide, and there are three separate Threat Tiers. At the highest tier, you’ll receive an ambush of enemies and will even have to face off against a tough Hellborne spawn.
Vendor locations
One change that no one is talking about much is the fact that Blizzard adjusted some of the shop locations in the main cities. While this may sound like a minor adjustment, it matters a lot more than you think.
With locations like Gea Kul, shops, and vendors were so far apart that running back and forth between vital vendors was difficult. Now with Season 4, you should have an easier time accessing important vendors within a much smaller area so you’re not running all over town.
Tempering
Tempering is one of the new crafting systems introduced for the Season 4 PTR. I wouldn’t say the old crafting system was terrible, but it wasn’t all that great either. Now Tempering has added a new way to add affixes to your gear.
It took some time to get accustomed to it, but for now, it’s one of the more positive changes arriving with Season 4. You can have an easier time acquiring wanted affixes onto your items through the collection of Temper Manuals.
Greater Affixes
Speaking of Affixes, one way that Season 4 has improved is with the introduction of Greater Affixes. While they only appear on Ancestral, Legendary, and Unique items, Greater Affixes can make certain item drops much more appealing.
Greater Affixes earn a 1.5x multiplier on the maximum roll, giving you a better idea of whether you should keep a gear item around or not. Despite this nice change, players online have been asking Blizzard to change the beam color of the item drop when it has a Greater Affix.
Masterworking
On top of Tempering, we have the new Masterworking system for late-game players. Once players gather new items from The Pit they can use them to improve the values of their affixes through Masterworking.
This is a simple yet useful crafting system that allows players to massively increase the value of their late-game affixes. There are 12 upgrade ranks, and for every four ranks, you get a huge upgrade to one affix. This system makes late-game gear upgrades a lot more enticing.
Early Unique drops
One of the smaller updates for Season 4 is the ability to earn Unique items a lot earlier. For certain players like me who don’t always play into the endgame, we’ll never have the chance to earn Unique items. But this update will allow some Uniques to start dropping around World Tiers 1 and 2.
This is a big change since Uniques were previously only able to drop on World Tiers 3 and 4, preventing players who prefer an easier difficulty to ever find a Unique item. Blizzard also allowed Uber Uniques to start dropping from monster level 55 at 925 item power.
The Pit
Another fun endgame activity is The Pit, which players got the chance to try out during the Season 4 PTR. The Pit of Artificers is for World Tier 4 players who can collect enough Runeshard to activate the Obelisk in Cerrigar and jump into The Pit.
You must defeat enough monsters within a 10-minute time limit, and anytime you die time will get removed from the clock. You can then fight a big boss before the timer is up which can grant you materials for the Masterworking system. With each boss you defeat you can unlock a new Pit Tier, making it even more difficult than the last run. It’s a lot of fun, but it can be punishingly difficult too.
Changing hair
Finally, one small but substantial update for Season 4 of Diablo 4 is the ability to change your hair and hair color after character creation. Typically, once you choose a hairstyle you’re stuck with it forever, although you could still alter your tattoos and piercings through the Wardrobe.
Now the Wardrobe also lets you alter your hairstyle, color, and facial hair. Even though many players may gloss over this update, I appreciate it as a player who may love a hairstyle during character creation but not once I leave it.
Hopefully, when Season 4 drops on May 14, with the possibility of it being an Iron Wolves theme, you can enjoy all the new features and updates that Blizzard implemented.
