During the developer livestream on April 24, the developers announced more details about Season 8, which will be released on the 29th, and also announced that a new patch 2.2.0 will be released. According to the data released, the patch is mainly focused on strengthening and weakening the six classes in the game appropriately, while fixing some problems in the system, so that Season 8 can bring you a more balanced Diablo 4 experience.

According to this livestream and other official news, both the new content of Season 8 and the changes brought by patch 2.2.0 have a great impact on the next development of the game. To help you prepare for these changes, we will introduce the main information for you.

Main Changes In Season 8

Undoubtedly, one of the biggest changes in Season 8 compared to the past is the new battle pass system Reliquaries. This system changes the previous battle pass settings and allows you to receive rewards in the order you want, giving you more freedom in terms of benefits. Other loot and Diablo 4 Gold reward settings are also expected to be further optimized to improve your overall gaming experience.

Compared to the changes in the basic system, the pure new content is obviously more attractive to you, such as the return of the classic Diablo 3 boss Belial in Diablo 4, and the army of Apparition he brought-you will be able to experience the related Apparition Incursions event. In addition, the 24 boss powers that can be obtained and equipped are also very powerful, and some of them even come from terrible lair bosses like Lilith.

Another new event that is worth looking forward to is Berserk crossover that will be launched in Diablo 4 on May 6. During the event, you can get Behelits by defeating enemies and exchange them for more special event rewards, such as Hawks Destiny Back Trophy or Skull Knight’s Heraldry Mount Armor. And you can also exchange other new Berserk-related new armor and appearances with gold or event tokens in the in-game store.

Patch 2.2.0 Main Content

In general, the focus of the 2.2.0 update is to make the game provide a more balanced gaming experience. On the one hand, the strength of each class is adjusted uniformly, and on the other hand, the boss mechanism is changed, so that the boss battle will not be too difficult for you while maintaining a certain challenge, and the loot provided can also match the difficulty, rather than too little or too much. For example, Duriel has a new combat mechanism, and Lord Zir can output more damage.

Specific Changes To Each Class

The adjustment of the 6 classes is mainly reflected in the changes to the damage and defense values ​​of some major skills to make them more in line with the combat requirements of Season 8.

Barbarian

• Whirlwind: Damage increased from 32% to 52%.
• Furious Whirlwind: Bleed damage increased from 40% of Whirlwind’s base damage over 5 seconds to 120% weapon damage over 5 seconds.
• Double Swing: Fury consume reduced from 25 to 20; damage increased from 60% to 66%.
• Hammer of the Ancients: Fury consume reduced from 35 to 30; damage increased from 90% to 98%.
• Upheaval: Fury consume reduced from 40 to 35; damage increased from 120% to 132%.
• Rend: Fury consume reduced from 35 to 30.
• Warrior’s Mighty Throw: Damage bonus reduced from 200% to 50%.
• Steel Grasp: Base damage increased from 35% to 80%.
• Fighter’s Steel Grasp: Damage bonus reduced from 400% to 200%.
• Warrior’s Steel Grasp: Number of charges gained increased from 1 to 2.

Druid

• Storm Strike: Chain acquisition radius increased by 50%.
• Cyclone Armor: Non-physical damage resist increased from 15% to 20%.
• Ravens: Passive damage increased from 31% to 90%.
• Poison Creeper: Passive damage over 2 seconds increased from 47% to 65%; Active damage over 2 seconds increased from 126% to 180%.

Necromancer

• Blood Lance: Always spreads Lanced effect to another enemy, even when hitting a non-Lanced enemy.
• Blood Wave: Damage increased from 450% to 500%.
• Bone Storm: Damage increased from 300% to 350%.

Rogue

• Shadow Clone: Always a Cutthroat Skill, rather than only with its Rank 5 Bonus.
• Death Trap: Base cooldown increased from 50 seconds to 60 seconds; cooldown reduction from kill or Overpower reduced from 10 seconds to 5 seconds.
• Prime Death Trap: Bonus trap damage reduced from 50% to 20%.

Sorcerer

• Ice Shards: Shard projectiles now spawn slightly further behind the player to consistently hit close enemies.
• Familiar: The casting of Familiar has been refined, resulting in snappier gameplay.

Spiritborn

• Rushing Claw: Base damage increased from 50% to 80%.
• The Seeker: Rank 5 bonus capped at 200% damage increase.
• The Devourer: Rank 5 bonus capped at 200% damage increase.
• Poised Rushing Claw: Rushing Claw now has 20 maximum charges. Casting it consumes all of its charges to increase its damage by 25% per charge and it hits a larger area.

No matter which class you decide to start with in Season 8, you must understand the basic gameplay of the class and adapt to these skill changes in order to better master the class. I hope you can achieve excellent results in the new season!

Nowadays, with the rise of the electronic game industry, in order to allow players to have a further gaming experience in an increasingly modern environment, various pure game-carrying devices have also emerged, such as PlayStation series, Xbox series, and Switch series.

The biggest difference between these devices and PCs and mobile terminals is that their only function is to allow you to play games, so their design does not need to consider too many other factors, and the gaming experience they provide is also more comfortable. Among them, Switch series is smaller and is a more portable device. Although this makes it unable to load large games like PS4/5, portability itself is a significant advantage.

Since the release of the first generation of Switch in 2017, the series has been enthusiastically sought after by players, and then the lighter and more fancy Switch Lite was launched in 2019. But no matter which one it is, it has been more than 5 years since now, so the birth of a new Switch is imperative-fortunately, Switch 2 will indeed meet you soon! The current release date is June 5, 2025.

Once the game console is released, it is bound to cause a carnival among players. If there are games that can be launched on the platform in the first batch at this time, it will definitely bring a wave of popularity to the game itself. As one of the most popular ARPGs in recent years, Rod Fergusson, one of Diablo 4 leaders, recently hinted that the game may get a Switch 2 port after Switch 2 is released.

So how feasible is the cooperation between Switch 2 and Diablo 4? Can this game console, which is still mainly characterized by portability, carry a game like Diablo 4 that requires a large amount of memory? Let’s analyze it.

There Seems To Be No Problem With The Hardware

Generally speaking, in order to run Diablo 4 smoothly and ensure that the picture quality and sound quality of the game are not compressed, large devices from PC or PlayStation series will be better. Because if the devices do not meet the requirements, it may even cause you to encounter freezes during the battle, so that you lose some Diablo 4 Gold due to bugs during the post-war settlement.

Fortunately, despite Switch series being a small game console, this aspect should not cause you too much trouble. In fact, Diablo 3 and Diablo 2: Resurrected have both been available on Switch in the past, and are expected to be playable on Switch 2 via backward compatibility.

From this result, if Diablo 4 is launched on Switch 2, there should be no technical problems such as lag caused by overload, but at the same time, another question is also in front of you, that is, can Switch 2 provide reliable online services? After all, Diablo 4 requires a network connection to run.

Can Switch 2 Provide Reliable Online Services For D4?

The portability of Switch series is reflected in all aspects, one of which is that it is mainly operated by inserting game cartridges. Usually, this only requires you to connect to the network for a while when you just start the game, and then you can play offline at any time and place without worrying about network problems.

The tricky thing is that although Diablo 4 does not require you to team up with other players all the time, it is a MMORPG after all, requiring you to stay online, and you will always meet other online players in the game. This is undoubtedly contrary to the design concept of Switch series.

Therefore, if Diablo 4 and Switch 2 want to achieve perfect cooperation, the latter must ensure stable online services. We will not talk about how well the first generation and Lite versions of Switch do in this regard, but as the latest product, Switch 2 should not be difficult to provide more stable online services while ensuring the basic advantages of the series, and it is said that Switch 2 does introduce more optimized content.

To be honest, from the player’s perspective, as long as you choose to experience Diablo 4, you can’t avoid the key issue of online services, which is not the advantage of Switch series. Therefore, based on ensuring network stability, it is a bit difficult to ask too much of Switch 2.

Can Cooperation Achieve A Win-Win Situation?

Not long ago, Diablo 4 released a roadmap for 2025. The game will bring Season 8 Belial’s Return on April 29, and will release new seasons at regular intervals after that. It is expected that the second DLC may be released next year-all this shows that the game is still determined to expand the number of players and influence.

As for Switch series, the new game console Switch 2 will maintain a high popularity for at least one or two years after its launch. Besides classic games suitable for playing on Switch (such as Animal Crossing: New Horizons or The Legend of Zelda series), many new games will also want to log in to Switch 2 and use the popularity of the game console itself to open up their own market.

Although Diablo 4 already has a large number of loyal fans, the expansion of the experience platform is always a good thing, which means that you can choose the way to play Diablo 4 more freely, and it will also attract a group of new players who focus on Switch.

On the other hand, if Diablo 4 is available on Switch 2 and does a good job in online services, other games similar to Diablo 4 and their fans will have more confidence in the development prospects of Switch 2 and will tend to cooperate with Switch 2 to expand the game library of Switch 2. Naturally, more players will be willing to choose Switch 2 as their first choice of gaming device.

However, all this will be gradually confirmed after the official release of Switch 2. Before that, all you have to do is manage your new character of Diablo 4 Season 8 well, or prepare to compete for the pre-order qualification of Switch 2! Good luck!

As a rich ARPG, Diablo 4 has its own huge item system, in which each item will play its own specific role to help you progress smoothly in the game. Among them, the rarer and more important items include unique items and legendary aspects.

These two types of items play different roles, but there is no doubt that they can both help your Diablo 4 battles. In order to ensure that you can make full use of these two item systems in each Diablo 4 season, the game will add new specific content to some seasons in addition to the universal unique items and legendary aspects.

There is less than a week left before the release of Season 8. In order to enable you to farm and use the new legendary and unique items in time, we will introduce them to you.

What Is Unique Item?

The main function of unique items is to provide effective assistance to your character through the four gear affixes they have, as well as some special powers that cannot be provided by other methods or items. Not only can make you get enough XP to complete the upgrade faster, but also earn a lot of Diablo 4 Gold.

Among all the unique items, there is a rarer one called Mythic Uniques or Uber Uniques. You can only get them by defeating Tormented Bosses (lair bosses in Season 8), and Duriel and Andariel among these bosses have twice the chance of dropping Mythic Unique items than other bosses. In addition, Ancestral Uniques have an item power 800 and at least one Greater Affix.

What Is Legendary Aspect?

You can think of Diablo 4 Legendary Aspect as a unique modifier. Its function is to significantly enhance the ability of your character by turning your equipped rare items into legendary items. There are currently two ways to get this type of item in the game. The first is the most traditional way: by completing quests or clearing dungeons, waiting for it to drop while killing enemies. You will also receive XP and gold as regular rewards in the process.

The second method is more like a shortcut, by obtaining Codex of Power to directly imprint the effects of the legendary aspect onto your gear. Although this method is easy, on the one hand, it does not include some really powerful aspect effects, and on the other hand its aspect effect value is always the lowest value.

Season 8 New Legendary Aspects And Unique Items

Since each season has its own exclusive seasonal power and mechanics, in order to allow your character to combine class skills, weapons, unique items and legendary aspects with these new mechanics after entering the new season, to play a better synergy, Diablo 4 sometimes adds new unique items and legendary aspects to some seasons.

Since there are 6 classes in the game, and each class has different characteristics, in addition to the universal Legendary and Unique Items, these classes have their own exclusive items. In Season 8, Diablo 4 adds a unique item and a legendary aspect to each class. Let’s take a look at what they do.

1. Barbarian

Unique Item: Bane of Ahjed-Den (Gloves)

This item detonates a pulse every 12 seconds, causing fire damage and 400-600% bonus damage to enemies when you use your next Mighty Throw. The corresponding affixes include:

• +4-6 Ranks of Mighty Throw
• +114-150% Critical Strike Damage
• +7-10 Fury Per Second
• +8-12.5% ​​Cooldown Reduction

Legendary Aspect: Aspect of Delayed Extinction (Offensive Aspect)

The effect is that your Mighty Throw and Iron Grip can gain damage multipliers, and the damage caused can be increased by an additional 125-250%.

2. Druid

Unique Item: Gathlen’s Birthright (Helm)

Allows your character in human form to use Nature Magic to deal 400-200 critical strikes to the enemy, and then you can also gain Anima of the Forest that lasts for 15 seconds. After injecting it, you will gain Perfect Storm and Earthen Might as key passive skills. The corresponding affixes include:

• Inherent: Anima of the Forest Grants 15% Attack Speed
• +10.5-15% Willpower
• +224-296 Armor
• +2-3 Ranks of Humanity
• +17.5-23% Movement Speed ​​While in Human Form

Legendary Aspect: Aspect of Impending Deluge (Offensive Aspect)

Storm Strike attacks twice as many enemies as it can, and increases the damage enemies take from other spells by 30-50% for 6 seconds.

3. Necromancer

Unique Item: Sanquivor, Blade of Zir (Two-Hand Sword)

Allows summons to deal damage to enemies while still being affected by Vampiric Curse. Consuming corpses also contributes a soul to Vampiric Curse, which can now stack up to 20 souls. Then have Army of the Dead release these souls, and each soul releases 15-25% more damage to enemies. The corresponding affixes include:

• Inherent: +60% Summoning Damage
• +32-50% Chance for Army of the Dead to Deal Double Damage
• +214-242 Intelligence
• +1,060-1,142 Maximum Life
• +2 Ranks of Skeleton Warrior Mastery, Skeleton Mage Mastery, and Golem Mastery

Legendary Aspect: Aspect of Service and Sacrifice (Offensive Aspect)

Skeleton Warriors explode on death, dealing 200-300% physical damage.

4. Rogue

Unique Item: Band of Ichorous Rose (Gloves)

Poison Trap deals full damage over 3 seconds, and all upgrades increase its effectiveness by 50-100%. The corresponding affixes include:

• Inherent: +4 Maximum Poison Traps
• +10.5-15% Attack Speed
• +3-5% Maximum Poison Resistance
• +41.5-55% Poison Resistance
• 18.5-27.5% Chance for Poison Trap to Cast Twice

Legendary Aspect: Aspect of Contamination (Offensive Aspect)

Poison traps deal 150-250% poison damage when they burst, and if the burst is a critical hit, you can continue to deal 20-40% poison damage for 5 seconds.

5. Sorcerer

Unique Item: Hail of Verglas (Helm)

Ice Shards not only expand two additional shards, but each time a shard damages an enemy, the actual damage you deal will increase by 1-1.5%, up to 50-75%.

• Inherent 1: 7.5% Maximum Cold Resistance
• Inherent 2: 50% Cold Resistance
• +10.5-15% Intelligence
• 13-17.5% Maximum Life
• +10.5-15% Attack Speed
• +4-6 Ranks in Ice Shards

Legendary Aspect: Shivering Aspect (Offensive Aspect)

Adds up to 35-55% more damage to enemies depending on how frozen or staggered they are and apply an additional 15% more Frozen effect.

6. Spiritborn

Unique Item: Sunbird’s Gorget (Amulet)

Pick up a Storm Feather and create a firestorm around you for 8 seconds, dealing 200-400% Fire damage every 0.5 seconds. The firestorm becomes 100% stronger for every 5 additional Storm Feathers picked up.

• Inherent: +30% Resistance to All Elements
• +16-25% Movement Speed
• +2-3 Ranks of Potent
• +2-3 Ranks of Furnace
• +2-3 Ranks of Acceleration

Legendary Aspect: Rip and Tear Aspect (Offensive Aspect)

Increases the damage of Rushing Claw by 10-30%, and will gain more enhanced effects, such as dealing more damage or providing healing, depending on the number of charges it has when it is cast.

The above is the relevant information we provide you about the new Legendary and Unique Items in Season 8. I hope it can be helpful to you. Thank you for reading.

In the content we have introduced about Diablo 4 Season 8, the new concept of “lair boss” has been mentioned to you more than once. No doubt, this is enough to arouse your curiosity and attention, and make you realize that this will be an important mechanism in Season 8.

Before Season 8, lair boss was called endgame boss. Although the name has changed, in essence, lair boss still refers to those dangerous bosses that appear in the endgame stage. What is really worth your attention is that the unlocking of lair boss encounters and the way to obtain loot will change greatly from Season 8. If you still use the old strategy to deal with these bosses, you are likely to lose everything in Diablo 4 Season 8.

In order to avoid this situation and allow you to welcome the arrival of the new season with the most relaxed attitude, we will introduce you in detail how to earn loot through lair boss.

What Is Lair Boss?

Since a few seasons ago, some players have always felt that Diablo 4’s endgame difficulty and loot drop settings are not good enough. The development team has fully learned from the lessons and started relevant reforms starting from Season 8 - lair boss is one of the results.

Compared with previous endgame boss battles, lair boss battles are expected to be more difficult, more challenging, and require longer battles, and have higher situational awareness requirements. However, correspondingly, after defeating these bosses, you will be able to earn more Diablo 4 Gold and unique items with a more stable drop rate.

What Is Special About The Lair Boss Mechanism?

In addition to the difficulty upgrade and more guaranteed loot quality, the special features of this new boss mechanism are mainly reflected in two aspects:

First, unlocking the lair boss no longer requires you to collect summoning materials in advance. I believe that in the past, after entering the endgame, you always ran between various areas on the map to collect boss summoning materials. Although you were happy when you got the loot, this preparatory work was indeed a bit troublesome, not to mention that you might collect the materials but still fail to defeat the boss.

As for the second feature, it is actually closely related to the first one, that is, there are very few loot you can pick up directly after killing the boss. You must collect the corresponding lair keys to open the boss’s hoard to open more loot. This change adjusts the summoning materials to lair keys, and changes the time node for investing additional materials from before the battle to after the battle, so that the process of obtaining loot can still be challenging while avoiding material waste.

How To Participate In The Lair Boss Mechanism?

When you enter Diablo 4 endgame stage and unlock Torment difficulty, you can challenge the lair boss at any Torment difficulty level. All lair bosses are divided into 3 levels, from low to high:

• Initiate Lair Bosses: Beast in the Ice, Grigoire, Lord Zir, Varshan, and Urivar.
• Greater Lair Bosses: Andariel, Duriel, and Harbinger of Hatred.
• Exalted Lair Bosses: Belial, Lord of Lies.

It is worth noting that Belial is the final boss newly added in Season 8, while Urivar and Harbinger of Hatred are new bosses from DLC Vessel of Hatred, which means that if you want to challenge the latter two bosses in Season 8, you must have DLC.

Lair Boss Keys

The number and type of keys required to unlock the hoards of lair bosses of different levels are also different, as follows:

• Initiate: 12
• Greater: 3
• Exalted: 2

Exclusive Keys

• Malignant Heart: Varshan
• Living Steel: Grigorie
• Distilled Fear: Beast in the Ice
• Exquisite Blood: Lord Zir
• Judicator’s Mask: Urivar
• Shard of Agony: Duriel
• Pin-Cushioned Doll: Andariel
• Hatred Hearts: Harbinger of Hatred
• Betrayer’s Husk: Belial, Lord of Lies

Comparatively, the drop rate of the exclusive key of the greater lair boss will be lower. In order to balance this setting, the game allows you to obtain Stygian Stone that may drop when killing the Initiate lair boss. This item can be used to exchange for the greater lair boss key.

In addition, since the above items are set as lair boss keys, their drop rates in the corresponding channels also need to be increased to meet the needs of the system. For this reason, Diablo 4 has made the following adjustments:

• Helltide Chests will drop more Living Steel.
• Nightmare Dungeons will drop more Distilled Fear.
• Blood Maiden will drop more Exquisite Blood for each contributed Baneful Heart.
• Legion Events drop more Exquisite Blood.
• World Bosses drop more Exquisite Blood.
• Random Boss Keys are more likely to be a key other than Malignant Heart.

How To Find Lair Boss?

Diablo 4 Season 8 has set up unique icons for lair bosses on the map to make them easier to distinguish. Once you find these marks, you can use the new teleport function to teleport directly to the boss to challenge them. In addition, to ensure that you can open hoards in time after winning, the description of each lair boss will list the type of lair key required for the boss and tell you whether you have enough keys.

It is expected that after Season 8 is officially launched, there will be more details about the lair boss mechanism waiting for you to discover, which can help you farm these bosses more efficiently. Good luck!