All Things You Should Know About Diablo 4 - Open Beta & Release Time & Platforms & Features
Diablo IV is an action role-playing game developed by Blizzard Entertainment. This work is the sequel to the series of games Diablo 3. Here are all the things you should know about Diablo 4.
When Will Diablo 4 Beta Start?
There are two open betas taking place over two different weekends:
1. Early Access: March 17-19
2. Open Beta: March 24-26
The March 17th through 19th open beta is only available for people who pre-order Diablo is only available for people who pre-order Diablo 4. For those players who don't know whether to buy the game, you can wait until March 24, because on that day, the open beta is available to everyone.
The open beta will kick off at 9 AM PT / noon ET and run until the ending date at noon PT / 3 PM ET.

Which Platforms Support Diablo 4 Beta?
Blizzard is rolling the Diablo IV beta out to a wide variety of platforms, as you'll be able to play on PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, and Xbox One.
What Are The PC Specs For Diablo 4 Beta?
Below are the minimum and recommended PC specs for the open beta. Please note that these specifications may change after the official release of Diablo 4.
1. Minimum
OS: 64-bit Windows 10
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 660 or AMD Radeon R9 280
CPU: Intel Core i5-2500L or AMD FX-8100
Memory: 8GB RAM
DirectX: Version 12
Storage: SSD with 45GB free
Internet: Broadband connection
2. Recommended
OS: 64-bit Windows 10
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 970 or AMD Radeon RX 370
CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K or AMD R3-1300X
Memory: 16GB RAM
DirectX: Version 12
Storage: SSD with 45GB free
Internet: Broadband connection
What’s The Release Time Of Diablo 4?
Diablo 4 will officially meet players on June 6, 2023. If you pre-order the ultimate or digital deluxe editions, you'll get access to the game four days early on June 2.
What Are The Prices Of The Different Editions Of Diablo 4?
- Diablo 4 Standard Edition Price - $69.99
- Diablo 4 Digital Deluxe Edition Price - $89.99
- Diablo 4 Ultimate Edition Price - $99.99

What Are The Features Of Diablo 4?
*One of the most massive changes coming to Diablo 4 is that Armor will also reduce magic damage taken, a role that was reserved for resistances in past diablo games. Just recently we learned that armor will provide 50% of its reduction to magic damage as well as it’s regular reduction to physical damage.
The amount of armor items provide is directly correlated to a new system called Item Power. Item power will be shown on the item to represent it’s power. Think Item Level like in WoW. Higher Item Power = Higher Armor provided, and the higher level the monsters you slay, the higher item power the items they drop, and therefore more armor.
Monsters will also have this same armor, which is new to Diablo games, and scale with their level. Of course the developers are being careful to ensure the player’s power outscales the monster’s armor, so that the game doesn’t get too difficult as you progress.
*There will be no Runes nor Runewords in Diablo 4 at launch! During Blizzcon 2019 Runes and Runewords were displayed like the rune Amn and the rune Ko as well as what appears to be an affix that rune combination creates it appears - which is different from Diablo 2 - but developers have stated that they will not be in the game at launch, and plan to include them later on in a post-launch patch.
This news, like the absence of set items is a bit disappointing because runewords are so much fun. I imagine it’s hard to implement runewords since they were done so well in Diablo 2, but also wanting to improve upon it maybe by listing the runeword recipes in-game, and balancing the runeword items with other items can certainly be challenging.
*Open world maps will be preset, not randomized like in Diablo 2. However, dungeons will be randomized using Blizzard’s Dungeon Level Random Generator from Diablo 3 which will feature over 140 fully randomized unique dungeons which will be instanced for just you and or your party.

To make dungeon crawling more seamless, going from one level to the next will not require any loading screens! This is exciting! Within dungeons you can even encounter random events, and can affect what happens in future dungeons. Also, you can farm a specific item slot of gear, for example gloves, within specific dungeons, which will change regularly, giving you direction when trying to farm gear.
The world will be larger than ever before, with regions 10-20 times larger than any region in prior Diablo games.
*What’s also cool is that we’ll be exploring areas of Sanctuary that are mostly never before seen other than the area around Caldeum, which we saw in Diablo 3. By comparison you can see how much of the world of Sanctuary we saw in Diablo 1, Diablo 2, Diablo 3, and what the playable area will be in Diablo 4.
Dynamic weather (with day/night cycles) will affect the environment, monsters, and the player visually. Certain class skills will change weather temporarily.
There will be 6 total zones within Diablo 4: Fractured Peaks, Scosglen, Dry Steppes, Kehjistan, Hawezar, and no Diablo game would be complete without Hell. Blizzard has also stated that more zones could be added post-launch.
The open world will constantly have events you can encounter, from escorts to defending key areas from attackers, and even world bosses. There will also be player vs player dedicated zones, which are called the Fields of Hatred!
Is Diablo 4 The Killer Of Path of Exile?
A lot of people have been wondering whether Diablo 4 is going to be the POE killer. Although I don’t think Diablo 4 is the killer, I feel that Path of Exile will be more or less influenced by Diablo 4.
Path of Exile and Diablo are games of the same style, and it is not too much to say that Path of Exile is a reference to the Diablo series. Although many players who like the dark style have come into contact with Path of Exile, but compared with Diablo, it is more hard-core. Perhaps the reason for this is mainly because it is an online game.
The emergence of Path of Exile 2 can be called the biggest rival of Diablo 4, but I don’t think so. If we say that as a look at the Diablo series of games, Path of Exile 2 will never be comparable to the Diablo orthodoxy. Mainly I think it is the following points.

The reason why Path of Exile cannot surpass the Diablo series is not because the game is not good, but because it is more stringent in the content of the game. In terms of equipment, because it is an online game, the appearance rate of top-quality equipment is very rare, so it needs to be traded between players. And trading means that players will have a serious gap between rich and poor. And the players of Diablo series are enough to support themselves just by constantly farming maps and fighting monsters to upgrade. If you can’t have enough weapons or armors in the game, but rely on equipment sales, then the fun of the game will be lost a lot.
In the content of Path of Exile, there is another point that players are quite concerned about. It is the fairly complex passive tree. Players cannot modify the so-called passive tree as they wish. This means that you need to spend a lot of POE Currency to improve yourself. Of course, it is very normal for online games to top up money.
But if you want to play Diablo 4, in addition to recharging in the game, you also need to buy the game and Diablo 4 Gold directly. In this regard, Path of Exile seems to be more conscientious. But the more changes in the passive tree, the more players need to modify, and there is no upper limit for recharging.
The professional characteristics of Path of Exile are not obvious. Although Path of Exile 2 contains 19 subdivided classes, since the skills come from the relationship between keystones, different classes can use the same skills. This makes many players who like specific classes completely unable to appreciate the characteristics of their own classes. Although the professional skills will be different in the later stage, but the early stage will be quite boring and not refreshing enough.
Overall, Path of Exile 2 may be a good online game, but if you compare it with Diablo 4, then it is the wrong object.
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Diablo 4 Season 11 Death Trap Rogue Build Guide | Gear Setup, Skill Selection, And Optimization
Death Trap was the ultimate choice for Rogue players in the seasons preceding Diablo 4, and in Season 11, it remains at the top thanks to its high damage output, amazing mobility, and strong survivability.
So let's take a look at what gear and skills you need to make your build easily sweep through Helltides, Infernal Hordes, and bosses.
Pros And Cons
Death Trap pulls enemies together and deals massive damage. It's powerful and versatile, and its extremely high DPS allows you to instantly clear large groups of monsters and quickly melt bosses.
You can use Dash to quickly traverse the map and eliminate monsters with continuous Dash, making its leveling speed among the fastest of all builds.
At the same time, if your gear and stats are right, this build also boasts excellent survivability and resilience.
Of course, Rogues can't be as perfect as Paladins, and this powerful build comes with some drawbacks.
It has relatively high gear requirements, although these are lower than in previous seasons, but still require specific unique items, affixes, masterworks, and temperers.
Furthermore, it needs to meet several thresholds for energy, cooldown reduction, and attack speed. If these requirements aren't met, the gameplay won't be very smooth. In short, the more materials and Diablo 4 gold you invest, the better it will perform.
Death Trap Gear
- Helm: Harlequin Crest
- Chest armor: Scoundrel's Leathers
- Gloves: Vehement Brawler's Aspect
- Pants: Eyes in the Dark
- Boots: Beastfall Boots
- Amulet: Trickster's Aspect
- Ring 1: Opportunist's Aspect
- Ring 2: Aspect of Artful Initiative
- Dual wield weapon 1: Frostbitten Aspect
- Dual wield weapon 2: Aspect of Surprise
- Ranged weapon: Aspect of Apogeic Furor
The helmet is a replaceable piece. Until you obtain Mythic items, you can use Umbrous Aspect as a substitute. Harlequin Crest is not the only option, and if you want to increase your damage, you can replace it with Heir of Perdition.
Regarding unique items, you need certain unique items to grant Death Trap various bonuses.
- Scoundrel's Leathers: Allows Death Trap to be considered a core ability.
- Eyes in the Dark: Reduces trap deployment time, making Death Trap effective immediately.
- Beastfall Boots: Reduces the cooldown of Death Trap.
The core damage boost of this build comes from Trickster's Aspect, allowing Death Trap to benefit from other independent damage bonuses from Stun Grenades. These bonuses come from Aspect of Surprise, Aspect of Artful Initiative, and Opportunist's Aspect. The remaining Legendary Aspects primarily increase the damage of Death Trap.
Death Trap Rogue Skills
Active Skills
- Death Trap (Rank 5): Prime Death Trap And Supreme Death Trap
- Dark Shroud (Rank 5): Enhanced Dark Shroud
- Shadow Imbuement (Rank 1): Enhanced Shadow Imbuement
- Dash (Rank 1): No Enhanced
- Poison Trap (Rank 1): Enhanced Poison Trap and Subverting Poison Trap.
- Concealment (Rank 1):Enhanced Concealment And Subverting Concealment
Passive Skills
- Agile
- Alchemical Advantage
- Aftermath
- Balestra
- Concealment
- Consuming Shadows
- Deadeye
- Deadly Venom
- Exploit
- Exposure
- Frigid Finesse
- Haste
- Impetus
- Innervation
- Malice
- Mending Obscurity
- Mixed Shadow Imbuement
- Rugged
- Second Wind
- Shadow Imbuement Siphoning Strikes
- Sturdy
- Trick Attacks
- Unstable Elixirs
- Unto Dawn
In most cases, you'll handle monsters, bosses, and dungeons by holding down Dash and Death Trap. If you bind Dash to Shift key and hold down Shift and your Death Trap key, you'll automatically alternate between these two skills, creating a very smooth combo loop.
Your other skills are primarily used to provide various support or defensive buffs and can be used freely without interrupting the loop. However, Poison Trap will interrupt the loop and should only be used in boss fights.
In more difficult sections, such as The Pit, you can add Caltrops and Smoke Grenade for increased damage and replace Dash and Shadow Imbuement.
Death Trap Rogue Requirements
To achieve the full potential of this build, you must precisely meet the following thresholds:
Cooldown Reduction
Your goal is to reduce the cooldown of Death Trap to below 10 seconds, so you'll need Heir of Perdition or similar gear, plus the Great Affixes and tempering bonuses for Death Trap cooldown reduction.
Additionally, you'll need a total of 3 regular cooldown reduction affixes on your gloves and rings, and you'll also need to acquire Death Trap cooldown reduction from the skill tree and Paragon levels.
Death Trap Skill Levels
You'll need a total of 12 levels of Death Trap. The skill tree provides 5 levels, Vehement Brawler's Aspect provides 2 levels, and your helmet provides 4 levels. The remaining 1 level can be obtained from core skill level affixes on your gloves or Masterworking.
Attack Speed
To reach the dagger frame attack speed threshold, you need to reach 130% attack speed.
Paragon Board nodes provide 22.5% attack speed, and your rings and gloves also need attack speed affixes. Elixir of Advantage provides an additional 15% attack speed. You can gain the remaining attack speed passively after combat.
Energy Restoration
Choosing Preparation specialization reduces Death Trap's cooldown by 5 seconds for every 75 energy consumed. You need at least 150 maximum energy to keep Death Trap's cooldown below 10 seconds.
Your energy regeneration primarily comes from Beastfall Boots, Aftermath, and the ultimate ability's energy regeneration affix obtained through tempering.
This value is amplified by your Resource Generation attribute, eventually reaching approximately 150. Once you reach this threshold, you can run your skill rotation smoothly.
If you're willing to invest time collecting gear and power, then Death Trap Rogue offers unparalleled speed and strength. If you're still in the early stages of the game or playing casually, then this build might not be for you, as it's not easy to get started with.
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Diablo 4 Season 11 Boulder Druid Build Guide | Best Endgame & Pit Pushing Setup
Today, we want to share a powerful Druid class build that boasts immense damage potential, excellent crowd control, and high survivability, allowing you to easily become a mobile bulldozer, perfect for quickly clearing maps or tackling high-difficulty endgame content like The Pits. This is Boulder Druid build, and it's definitely one of the best setups that can rank among the top three builds during Diablo 4 Season 11! If you're interested, let's take a look!
Equipment
First, let's look at the unique equipment required for this build.
Dolmen Stone
The first item to mention is, of course, the core item that keeps the Boulder Druid running - Dolmen Stone Unique Amulet. It releases Boulders during Hurricane activation, causing them to rotate around you. For each Boulder rotating around you, damage is increased by up to 50%, stacking up to 10 Boulders.
So, the basic gameplay of this build is: cast Hurricane, and try to maintain Hurricane's duration at 100%, then frantically stack Boulders, constantly dealing damage to everything around you while they rotate.
It's worth noting that you can cast Boulder while moving, which makes this build very fun, as you can essentially become a bulldozer surrounded by Boulders.
Vasily's Prayer
Next is a unique helmet exclusive to Druid class: Vasily's Prayer. While wearing this helmet, your Earth skills also count as Werebear skills and provide you with Fortify based on a percentage of your maximum health. This not only significantly increases your survivability but also synergizes with other passive skills based on Fortify effects, greatly reducing damage, which is why it's a core piece of equipment for Boulder build.
Tibault's Will
Tibault's Will is also a good option; your damage is increased while in Unstoppable state and for 5 seconds afterward. More importantly, the all-attribute bonus of this item allows you to gain the secondary bonuses of all rare nodes in Paragon Board.
Ring of Starless Skies
The last unique item is Ring of Starless Skies. It significantly increases resource generation speed and damage output. This ring reduces skill cost and increases damage by 10% for every primary resource consumed, stacking up to 50%. In addition, it also provides excellent attribute bonuses such as Attack Speed, Critical Strike Chance, and Lucky Hit Chance, making it a highly sought-after piece of top-tier equipment.
Skill Tree
Next, let's look at the skill tree setup for Boulder Druid build. Here is our skill point distribution:
Core Skills
- Claw: 1
- Bulwark: 1
- Cyclone Armor: 1
- Hurricane: 1
- Boulder: 5
- Petrify: 1
Passive Skills
- Heart of the Wild: 1
- Wild Impulses: 3
- Backlash: 3
- Ancestral Fortitude: 3
- Vigilance: 3
- Feral Aptitude: 3
- Mending: 3
- Crushing Earth: 3
- Stone Guard: 3
- Safeguard: 1 (if you don't have Shroud of False Death)
- Defiance: 3
- Natural Disaster: 3
- Resonance: 3
- Catastrophe: 3
- Quickshift: 3
- Heightened Senses: 3
- Ursine Strength: 3
- Neurotoxin: 1
- Toxic Claws: 3
- Envenom: 3
These are some of the necessary skill point investments; you can choose the rest based on your play style.
Paragon Board
Now it's time to look at our Paragon Board.
Starting Board
On the starting board, we have Earth and Sky glyph, which provides bonuses to Magic nodes within its range. The secondary effect is Nature skills, dealing more damage to enemies under CC or Vulnerable status.
Survival Instincts Board
The second board is Survival Instincts, which allows you to deal more damage in bear form, and even more damage at full health. The glyph is Keeper/Abundance, which affects rare nodes within its range. The secondary skill is Companion, which deals higher non-physical damage. Almost all of our damage is converted to poison damage.
Earthen Devastation Board
The third board is Earthen Devastation, designed to make Earth skills deal higher critical strike damage. Its glyph is Dominate, used to increase overpower damage. Then there's the secondary skill: when you overpower enemies, they take more damage.
Heightened Malice Board
The fourth board is Heightened Malice. The more poisoned enemies near you, the higher the damage you deal, and this effect stacks. The illuminated glyph here is Spirit, which increases critical strike damage. The secondary skill is that when you critically strike an enemy, they take more damage from you, and this effect also stacks.
Constricting Tendrils Board
The last board is Constricting Tendricting Tendrils. The glyph we chose is Fang and Claw, which provides a bonus to all magic nodes in the area, dealing higher damage to close-range enemies.
Spirit Boons
Next are our Spirit Boons, powerful passive buffs belonging to Druid class.
- Deer (Utility/Defense): Wariness. Reduces damage taken from elite monsters.
- Eagle (Offense): Iron Feather & Avian Wrath. Increases maximum health and critical strike damage dealt.
- Wolf (Offense/Utility): Energize. Allows you to restore Spirit through damage taken, but you may not actually need this.
- Snake (Offense/Defense): Obsidian Slam. Every six attacks cause your next Earth Skill to trigger Overpower. So, you can easily clear maps by simply continuously casting Boulder.
Mercenaries
As for our mercenaries, here we chose Subo, mainly for his The Seeker skill. The skill selection for mercenaries actually depends on your needs. For example, since our equipment doesn't yet provide the highest movement speed, we chose Ready At Hand talent, which increases movement speed after dealing direct damage to elite enemies; we also activated Opening Fire, which allows you to deal higher critical strike damage to enemies affected by Cover Fire.
The final reinforcement is Varyana with Bloodthirst skill. When she casts this skill, we also gain increased attack speed, so use it on Boulder or any other skill you want.
Divine Gifts
Finally, let's look at Divine Gifts, which, as seasonal powers in D4S11, can often provide you with nice extra bonuses in the late game. Here's what we placed in each slot:
- Top: Essence of Lies, strengthens once per second.
- Right: Essence of Screams, increases resistance.
- Bottom: Essence of Sin, increases armor.
- Left: Essence of Pain, gain maximum barrier when you take damage, 20-second cooldown.
That's everything for this Boulder Druid build. This build is incredibly fun to play because you can constantly throw boulders around while zipping between enemies. Although the number of stackable boulders is limited each time, simply continuously casting Hurricane will trigger a series of other effects. Then you can petrify enemies to your heart's content!
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Diablo 4 Season 11 Zenith Paladin Build Guide | Infinite Cooldowns, High Mobility, and Easy Pit 100
Diablo 4 boasts many incredibly powerful Paladin builds, with top-tier players reaching level 146 in The Pit. However, for average players, such high levels aren't the primary concern; the enjoyment of the process is more important.
Zenith Paladin build is undoubtedly the most satisfying Paladin build currently available. It automatically resets cooldowns, allowing for near-permanent continuous casting of core abilities. Furthermore, these abilities can be converted into movement skills, enabling jumps across the map.
Core Gameplay
Zenith Paladin build's greatest strength lies in its similar exhilarating gameplay to Zeal Paladin build, while maintaining self-healing while dealing high damage.
It deals considerable damage to both single targets and large groups of monsters. Combined with its excellent mobility, it even rivals the effect of continuously using Arbiter and Falling Star. This build offers two distinct playstyles depending on Zenith enhancement path. To unleash its full potential and achieve the smoothest experience, you should choose Empyrean Edge enhancement path.
For a simpler approach, you can replace the enhancement path in the previous version with Sermon of Steel and replace Flickerstep with Ghostwalker Aspect.
This build is very straightforward; it doesn't rely on Diablo 4 items. Its core requirements are simply 100% critical strike chance, 100% bonus attack speed, and maximizing skill levels.
Zealot Oath
Zealot Oath grants your attacks an additional percentage of your original attack damage based on your Fervor stacks.
This effect has a bug, but it's a benign one. It inexplicably doubles the damage. This means that if you have Aspect of the Zealot's Covenant legendary effect on your amulet, it's the maximum damage boost you can get.
It increases both the base Echo damage and Echo damage multiplier. It also increases your Fervor stacks from 3 to 4, meaning you'll get 4 echoes of Zenith's initial damage and 4 echoes of Zenith's secondary damage.
It also interacts with Aspect of Jacques' Fervor. The synergy is excellent; the latter increases critical strike damage based on your Fervor stacks. Each additional Fervor stack increases the critical strike damage bonus from 60% to 80%.
Resplendence
Another core element of this build is Resplendence Glyph, which reduces the cooldown of your aura abilities.
This build incorporates numerous auras, not just for increased damage, but also to reset cooldowns when there's no Flickerstep or the rotation is unexpectedly interrupted. If the rotation is interrupted, you can reduce the cooldown by casting an aura to resume your rotation.
Aspect of Apogeic Furor
The effect of Aspect of Apogeic Furor is that every 10 uses of your ultimate ability reset all cooldowns. This allows you to easily reuse all your abilities repeatedly. Sometimes, Zenith can also reset cooldowns automatically by killing weakened enemies. So, although these mechanics seem quite complex, once you get into the rhythm, you'll find the controls very simple because you can almost constantly unleash abilities.
These are the core items needed for this build. You can adjust them based on your available gear. Let's look at the differences between the two versions.
Empyrean Edge Version
Empyrean Edge enhancement transforms Zenith into a movement skill. Besides providing 25% critical strike chance, it also inflicts Weakens on enemies. Attacking weakened enemies triggers significant damage bonuses.
With cooldown reduction, after using Zenith, it enters a cooldown of approximately 5 seconds. This is where the cooldown reduction provided by Flickerstep comes in handy. Simply dodging Evade through an enemy will reduce your ultimate ability's cooldown by 4 seconds.
Therefore, this playstyle essentially involves alternating between Zenith and Evade. This build works even without relying on mythic items and sanctified gear; they simply raise the potential of this build.
How to Reduce Zenith's Cooldown?
Zenith's base cooldown is 25 seconds, with a maximum cooldown reduction of 75%, meaning a minimum cooldown of 6.25 seconds.
There's an affix in the Tempering affix pool that can reduce Zenith's cooldown by up to 35%. Simply obtain two such forging affixes on your gear, and then stack cooldown reduction on other regular gear slots. Of course, this requires a lot of materials and Diablo 4 gold.
Additionally, there's a node in Paragon board that provides an additional 30% cooldown reduction after moving. So even if your gear isn't top-tier, you can still reach the minimum cooldown reduction.
Zenith Paladin Skills
- Advance: No Enhanced
- Fanaticism Aura: Enhanced Fanaticism and Rite of Vengeance
- Defiance Aura: Enhanced Defiance and Rite of Might
- Holy Light Aura: Enhanced Holy Light and Rite of Judgement
- Falling Star: Enhanced Falling Star and Fanatic Descent
- Aegis: Enhanced Aegis and Stay Resolute
- Zenith: Enhanced Zenith and Empyrean Edge
Zenith Paladin Equipment
- Helm: Heir of Perdition
- Chest armor: Shroud of False Death
- Gloves: Revelator's Aspect
- Pants: Aspect of the Indomitable
- Boots: Flickerstep
- Amulet: Aspect of the Zealot's Covenant
- Ring 1: Aspect of Utmost Glory
- Ring 2: Aspect of Jacques' Fervor
- Mainhand: Griswold's Opus
- Offhand: Aspect of Apogeic Furor
Sermon of Steel Version
Sermon of Steel build deals significantly less damage per attack, but allows for truly continuous, mindless casting. As long as you reach the 100% attack speed requirement of the first attack speed tier, you can cast the skill indefinitely.
However, this build currently has some bugs. Zenith's Unstoppable state should have lasted the entire duration, but in reality, it disappears between attacks, potentially leaving you vulnerable to crowd control.
Zenith Paladin Skills
- Advance: No Enhanced
- Fanaticism Aura: Enhanced Fanaticism and Rite of Vengeance
- Defiance Aura: Enhanced Defiance and Rite of Prayer
- Holy Light Aura: No Enhanced
- Condemn: Enhanced Condemn and Shepherd the Flock
- Falling Star: Enhanced Falling Star and Freefall
- Zenith: Enhanced Zenith and Sermon of Steel
Zenith Paladin Equipment
- Helm: Heir of Perdition
- Chest Armor: Shroud of False Death
- Gloves: Revelator's Aspect
- Pants: Aspect of the Indomitable
- Boots: Ghostwalker Aspect
- Amulet: Aspect of Jacques' Fervor
- Ring 1: Aspect of the Zealot's Covenant
- Ring 2: Aspect of Utmost Glory
- Mainhand: Griswold's Opus
- Offhand: Vehement Brawler Aspect
Even though this build isn't the strongest among paladin builds, it's enough to easily reach level 100 of The Pit. For casual players, besides being very fun to play, this build also progresses very quickly and is definitely worth trying.
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Why Escalating Nightmares Are Dead and Sanctification Shines in Diablo 4 Season 11?
Diablo 4 Season 11 has been live for almost a month now, how has your experience been? While it's still too early to judge the overall quality of the season, you've probably already noticed the differences in value between the various gameplay mechanics.
Generally, the most eye-catching aspect of each season is the exclusive seasonal mechanic, but in Season 11, this rule seems to have been broken.
Below, based on current Diablo 4 experience and player feedback, we will analyze and summarize the best and most useless mechanics in Season 11.
Escalating Nightmares is losing value
Besides various seasonal mechanics, Diablo 4 is actually composed of fundamental mechanics such as Nightmare Dungeons, Helltides, and different difficulty boss battles.
Sometimes, to enrich the playability of new seasons, the development team will update them. For example, in Season 9, a version of Nightmare Dungeons called Escalating Nightmares was added and has remained to this day.
The gameplay of this dungeon involves obtaining an Escalation Sigil and activating a chain of three Nightmare Dungeons. After defeating each dungeon boss, you are teleported to the next dungeon.
All dungeons in Escalating Nightmares have their own positive and negative affixes, which stack up to the last dungeon, making the final Astaroth boss battle more dangerous - and of course, the loot more abundant.
In Season 9, in addition to regular loot, more importantly, you could trigger Horadric Strongrooms in Escalating Nightmares to unlock the seasonal power Horadric Spells, and in Season 10, you could trigger Chaos Rifts battles to exchange for rewards.
Escalating Nightmares in S11
After entering Season 11, this dungeon is no longer associated with any seasonal mechanics or powers. Its only value is that you can farm Mythic Prankster affix to increase the chance of encountering Treasure Goblin Fancy Old Fedric, thus obtaining more Mythic drops.
The embarrassing thing is that due to the limited drop rate, the best way to obtain Mythic Prankster affix is to complete simpler daily tasks to obtain many regular Nightmare Sigils, and then salvage them to obtain Sigil Powder.
This powder can be crafted into new Sigils at Occultist along with gold. Although the crafting results are random, this method is much simpler.
As a result, Escalating Nightmares is no longer valuable, whether considering playability or the final benefits, to the point that most players chose to ignore it in Season 11.
Sanctification's reputation improves
In 2.5.0 PTR, players were not optimistic about the new Sanctification mechanism because its random and irreversible results could potentially ruin the gear they had painstakingly upgraded.
However, after further optimization by the development team, this situation has changed. Now, Sanctification can provide you with a wealth of advanced gear and build enhancement options without disrupting game balance.
Now, after upgrading your gear through the optimized Tempering and Masterworking, you can use Sanctification to add extra affixes, upgrade existing affixes and the quality of the item itself, or replace normal affixes with Sanctification affixes.
Although the results are still random and irreversible, the value ultimately added to the gear is much more stable than in PTR phase.
This means you'll be willing to invest more time farming and upgrading your gear, making better use of all related Diablo 4 gameplay and mechanics.
Therefore, although Divine Gifts are the seasonal feature of Season 11, Sanctification's more profound impact on the game experience has greatly overshadowed these gifts.
It's important to note that fully utilizing Sanctification requires sufficient gear. Therefore, if you currently lack enough gear, the fastest option is to buy Diablo 4 items at D4GOLD!
What kind of new mechanics are worth keeping?
From the player feedback on Escalating Nightmares and Sanctification in Season 11, it can be seen that, besides seasonal gameplay that is only a limited-time feature, it's not easy for other new content to become a core part of Diablo 4.
If a certain mechanism is intended to be preserved indefinitely, it must either consistently provide seasonal loot or have a low enough difficulty in obtaining loot to ensure you have enough motivation to play it.
And if it's a mechanism related to character enhancement, like Sanctification, it needs to ensure that the benefits it provides are valuable throughout the entire season while maintaining a balanced combat environment, not just a bunch of inflated numbers.
Because these requirements are not easy to meet, many Diablo 4 mechanics are constantly being added and removed. However, as things stand, Sanctification is more likely to be retained than Escalating Nightmares.
Unfortunately, there are rumors that Sanctification may only exist for one season and will be removed along with Divine Gifts with the release of Season 12. Many players are puzzled and disappointed by this and hope the development team will retain Sanctification.
To be honest, while Diablo 4's update pace is generally stable, it's always been quite slow in responding to player feedback. This makes it difficult to predict the future of Sanctification; all you can do is hope and wait.
2026 has arrived, and Diablo 4 has also announced its roadmap for the new year. The immediate future includes the return of leaderboards in mid-January, followed by new seasons and expansion.
Therefore, even if Sanctification isn't retained, there will be enough new content in the coming months to keep you entertained. So don't worry too much, just enjoy the game!
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Is Diablo 4 Season 11 Still Worth Playing in 2026 after Gameplay Improvement?
While Diablo 4 is the fourth installment in a great series, it has been compared to other games in the same genre since its release. The general consensus among players is that Diablo 4 is an excellent ARPG, but not the best.
More than two years have passed since its release, and Diablo 4 has undergone many changes, even adding a new class, Paladin, in Season 11. Many players have praised Season 11, so is Diablo 4 worth playing in 2026?
Leveling Up Stage
Diablo 4 excels among all ARPGs in its leveling up and new player tutorials. This is because players have many choices from the start.
You can choose to experience the campaign story with beautiful cutscenes (which they've always excelled at), or jump straight into the opens world for free exploration.
During leveling up, you can conquer Strongholds, participate in Legions events, challenge World Bosses, and experience various dynamic events. Helltides events, which occur every hour, are filled with random events and dense enemy encounters, and are a major source of enjoyment and the primary method for players to level up.
While the developers adjusted the difficulty of monsters in Season 11, they weren't as powerful as in Path of Exile, and they simply returned to their expected level and didn't significantly interfere with the leveling experience.
Early Endgame Stage
When players reach around level 60 and begin accumulating Paragon Points and challenging Torment Ranks, they enter the early endgame phase. At this point, the core activities can be summarized into four main categories (although there are others):
- The Pit: Used to upgrade Glyphs.
- Nightmare Dungeons: Acquire equipment and items like Diablo 4 gold.
- Infernal Horde: Provides XP, equipment, and materials.
- Kurast Undercity: Farming Runes.
These activity systems provide players with ways to obtain materials and equipment, and the overall process is smooth. From the start of leveling to experiencing the early endgame content, experienced players may only need one to two days. While these activities lack sufficient variability and room for modification, the player experience remains good at this stage.
Deep Endgame Stage
However, once the player character is fully developed and enters the true endless farming phase, Diablo 4's current endgame content lack reveals a significant weakness, which is precisely why Diablo 4 lacks competitiveness compared to similar games.
The core gameplay loop in the late game is extremely monotonous: either constantly challenging higher levels of The Pit to level up glyphs to 100 to test the character's limits, or collecting materials, summoning Lair Bosses (which generally don't survive more than 10 seconds), and then checking the loot. This cycle repeats endlessly, switching between different bosses.
The occasional World Bosses are insufficient to break this monotonous loop, constituting the entirety of the current Diablo 4 Season 11 late-game content, which is undoubtedly a weak point that needs improvement.
Diablo 4 needs a deep endgame experience similar to Atlas in Path of Exile or Monolith of Fate in Last Epoch, allowing players to customize their goals and immerse themselves in long-term gameplay. If the developers could add existing gameplay elements to a system like Atlas in exchange for improved endgame content in 2026 update, it would be well worth it.
Crafting System
Besides new classes, the biggest change in Season 11 is the significant overhaul of the crafting system, making it almost entirely deterministic, retaining only the final step's randomness.
If you want to craft a piece of equipment with two Greater Affixes, you first need to add a Legendary Aspect to the equipment, then add sockets through a jeweler- both are guaranteed to succeed.
You can choose to reforge an undesirable affix until you get the desired attribute, then use Temper to select and add a new affix from the provided affix library. Although one less affix is manually added compared to previous seasons, the overall strength remains essentially unchanged due to the increased affix count of items.
Masterworking allows you to progressively upgrade gear quality, with the chance to upgrade common affixes to Greater Affixes.
Sanctifying gear is the only non-deterministic step. After sanctification, all item attributes are locked, but a comprehensive stat boost is granted, with a chance to upgrade multiple affixes to Greater Affix level.
Through this series of steps, you can transform an initially ordinary piece of gear into a top-tier item with multiple Greater Affixes. This highly controllable crafting system further reduces the game's difficulty, allowing players to almost always craft the gear they need by the endgame.
While some would prefer more randomness, the current system is actually quite reasonable. However, Sanctification is a seasonal mechanic for Season 11, disappearing after the season ends, much like Chaos Armor in Season 10.
Retaining Sanctification and Chaos Armor as endgame content would be a great option, allowing players to strategically cultivate their gear in the endgame.
Is It Worth Playing?
Overall, Diablo 4 Season 11 continues to excel in its core gameplay and social co-op aspects, performing almost as well as Season 10 and well worth your time.
However, its shortcomings cannot be ignored. Besides the lack of endgame content, the current skill and build options for each class remain limited, restricting character build diversity and exploration enjoyment. Diablo 4 needs a deeper, more expansive skill tree or similar system to truly allow players to build their characters.
Encouragingly, the developers have revealed future update plans, including expanding the skill tree, adding fishing gameplay, more boss battles, a new endgame system, and classes for the next DLC. This indicates they are moving in the right direction.
Diablo 4 Season 11's performance proves the game is on the rise. If you're willing to enjoy a 1 to 2-week in 2026 start, enjoyable journey with friends, now is a great time to return.
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Diablo 4 Season 11 Paragon XP Farming Guide | How To Use Boss Strategy For Efficient Endgame Leveling?
After reaching level 60 with your leveling build, you enter endgame content, but this is only the beginning. You still need to level up and boost your Paragon level.
In previous seasons, you could continue using your leveling build to farm The Pit or Nightmare dungeons for leveling, but this isn't the most efficient method in Season 11. The latest leveling meta strategy is farming bosses.
Current XP Gain Status
In previous seasons, the core strategy for gaining XP in endgame was to farm a large number of monsters. The main methods were farming The Pit, Nightmare dungeons, or Helltide. However, this method has been significantly weakened in Season 11, with XP gained from The Pit almost halved.
On the other hand, the official XP gain from defeating bosses has been significantly increased, and bosses no longer have invincibility during phase transitions. This means that if your damage is high enough, you can complete a kill in about a minute, making boss farming the meta strategy for XP acquisition in Season 11.
If done correctly, leveling from level 0 to Paragon Level 300 can ideally take only about 25 hours, and even without peak efficiency, 2 to 3 days is enough to reach the maximum level.
Optimal XP Farming Strategy
Of all the bosses, Lair Boss Urivar is the most efficient for XP gain, as a single kill grants nearly 30 million XP. This is equivalent to the rewards from some higher-level bosses, such as Duriel and Andariel, and some other bosses offer even less XP.
However, this doesn't mean Urivar offers the most XP. Bosses like Uber Lilith and Azmodan offer even more XP, so why not choose them? This brings us to Urivar's other advantages.
While Duriel provides similar experience points to Urivar, its summoning animation is extremely long, significantly slowing down efficiency. Harbinger of Hatred provides even more experience, but its Lair Boss materials (3 Abhorrent Hearts) are relatively difficult to obtain. Bosses like The Beast in the Ice and Lord Zir offer very little XP.
Urivar is relatively simple among all Lair Bosses, and its summoning and entrance animations are extremely short, saving a significant amount of time. Furthermore, its materials are easier to collect compared to other Lair Bosses, requiring only 12 Judicator's Masks. This means that while you're farming XP, you can also obtain a large number of Diablo 4 gold, and even Mythic Unique items.
If you use an efficient Boss kill build, you can complete all steps - summoning, killing, and looting - within 15-20 seconds, theoretically achieving 3 kills per minute and gaining approximately 18 million experience points.
At this rate, approximately 1 billion experience points can be gained per hour, achieving a level 1 per hour even in the late game, far exceeding the efficiency of the nerfed The Pit.
How To Maximize Experience Gain?
Besides the XP provided by the boss itself, you can increase XP gain through other means, such as Elixir and Incense. Combining all the following bonuses, you can increase experience gain by up to approximately 50%.
Pool Of Reflection
Pool of Reflection can provide a +15% experience bonus for 60 minutes, and you can stack the refresh time.
You only need to use Forgotten Wisdom Key to open a specific Abandoned Mineworks dungeon. You can find Pool of Reflection within this dungeon, and simply click on it to obtain it. The key can be obtained from the rotating World Boss.
Elixir, Incense And Team
- Elixir: Provides a +5% experience bonus when using any magic potion.
- Incense: For example, incense that provides an +8% XP boost.
- Party Bonus: Gain extra XP by teaming up with other players, and the more players, the greater the XP boost.
How To Farm?
Solo farming is the fastest because you don't need to wait for teammates and can quickly summon and kill Urivar. However, to get the rewards, you need to prepare your own Lair Boss keys.
Team farming is the most economical. If everyone has a Lair Boss key, you get the reward with each kill, saving you time on other events. However, this requires coordination and may involve waiting time, causing your kill speed to be slower.
You need to obtain Pool of Reflection buff beforehand, then drink an Elixir, use Incense, and go to Urivar's location. Summon it and use Lair Boss key to open the chest (skip this step if you don't have the materials), then immediately summon it again and repeat the process.
Regarding build selection, simply choose suitable boss killer builds. I recommend using Blessed Shield Paladin (Captain America build) in Season 11 to farm bosses, and it has high damage, requires minimal skill, and is relatively easy.
If you plan to use this build, you'll need to collect Forgotten Wisdom Key and Judicator's Mask beforehand. This method allows you to quickly reach Paragon Level 300, preparing for the upcoming endgame, The Tower, which will be released in January, 2026.