In the first of the two planned Devstreams forDiablo 4Season 2, Blizzard revealed some pretty big changes coming to the ARPG. First, the team discussed the details of Season 2, including its new systems and content. Then a plethora of upcoming changes were discussed, most of which on the surface should improveDiablo 4in a big way. Near the end, Blizzard casually announced thatDiablo 4would be launching on Steamat the start of Season 2. Overall I’d say it was a good Devstream. Let’s go over some of the highlights!
Season of Blood
The second season ofDiablo 4, Season of Blood, will go live on October 17 at 1 p.m. ET. The current season, Season of the Malignant, will also end at the same time. Furthermore, Patch 1.2.0 will also go live the same day Season 2 begins. Blizzard has a separate Devstream planned one week from today, on October 10, that will go over some big changes coming in Patch 1.2.0 including Class balance, Unique items, Resistances, and more.
As for Season of Blood, however, it seems as though we’ll be getting a bit more content than we did with Season 1. In terms of the narrative, players will venture into a Sanctuary’s vampire-infested underbelly on a new questline. There we will recruit vampire hunter Erys to our cause and discover a sinister plot behind the vampirism.
A new Pact Armor will allow players to harness the Vampiric Powers of the new enemies we will encounter in Season 2. to do so, we will require Potent Blood. Potent Blood is a new resource acquired from slaying enemies, which can then be used to unlock new Vampiric Powers or upgrade existing ones. Five powers in total can be equipped, with every power being upgradable to Level 3.
In total, there are 22 Vampiric Powers in Season 2. All Classes can equip any Vampiric Power, which in theory should add a ton of build variety.
Finally, there is a new open-world event similar to Helltides that is called Blood Harvest. The event is available starting at Level 1 and will rotate through the various zones.
New Bosses
Five new bosses will appear in Season 2, with each one having different requirements to encounter them. Each boss has its own exclusive Unique items that they can drop, which will more than likely mean we have to far some of them too. Here are the new bosses:
You must defeat Grigoire and Varshan in World Tier 4 to acquire materials to summon Duriel. Duriel is a special encounter because he has the ability to drop the super rare Uber Unique items, as well as potentially a smoldering Brimstone Mount.
Lots of changes, mostly good ones
There are a lot of quality-of-life changes coming with this season. You canfind them all in detail here, but here are the most important ones:
Overall these are good changes toDiablo 4. But a lot of the Devstream seemed to be focused on these changes as opposed to the actual Season 2 content. Don’t get me wrong, these are all good changes that will makeDiablo 4a better game. However, I can’t help but be a little afraid that Season 2 ends up just as lackluster as Season 1, which is not good. I hope I’m wrong, but I guess we will see soon!
Diablo 4Season 2, Season of Blood, will start on October 17 on all platforms.
