Can Diablo 4‘s first seasonal patch be saved?
Earlier this week patch 1.1.0 for Diablo 4 dropped in preparation for the first season, Season of the Malignant. But after players resoundingly disapproved of its many changes, Blizzard is hosting a Campfire Chat to talk about all the controversial updates made in patch 1.1.0.
Diablo 4 Campfire Chat set for July 21
A Diablo 4 developer Campfire Chat will take place on July 21 at 11 AM PDT. According to community development director for Diablo Adam Fletcher, they’ve been hearing the feedback.
“We have been hearing feedback from players regarding some of the changes in 1.1.0 for #DiabloIV,” Fletcher tweeted. “We are going to have a Campfire Chat later this week on Friday to talk more about it.”
We have been hearing feedback from players regarding some of the changes in 1.1.0 for #DiabloIV.
We are going to have a Campfire Chat later this week on Friday to talk more about it.
We will have more details/timing in the next day. Thanks again for the feedback!
— Adam Fletcher (@PezRadar) July 19, 2023
The Campfire Chat will have game director Joe Shely, associate game director Joseph Piepiora, and Flecther on the stream to discuss feedback they’ve received from the community, and detail what’s coming for Diablo 4.
The Season of the Malignant
The first season for the ARPG had immense hype leading up to the patch. The developers had said the patch notes were over 6,600 words, giving many players hope that some big issues would be remedied.
With that big of an update, surely Necromancer minions would get a buff to have a viable summoner build. Surely, the Sorcerer class would get a proper rework to make them no longer the weakest class by far. Leveling to 100 in the pre-season proved to be quite a slog, so there had to be some experience changes on the way to make the leveling experience better, right? Well, I think the folks over on the /r/Diablo4 subreddit sum it up perfectly.
Patch notes summarised in one line.
byu/Altissimus77 indiablo4
Then the patch notes released, and they are very disappointing. In fact, in some cases, these issues were amplified as opposed to remedied. Experience gains were nerfed across the board, including making boosting no longer a thing. The patch as a whole feels like it literally slowed the game down. Overall it feels like monsters die slower while hitting harder. All classes got a pretty hefty nerf, including the already weak Sorcerer.
In many ways, it feels like the game suddenly became less fun. But why? Players were complaining about the experience grind taking a bit too long, not that it needed to be longer. I don’t think anyone felt their class was doing too much damage—except maybe this wonky Barbarian Rend Bleed build—and at least not enough to justify such sweeping nerfs. There’s even a one-line patch note about increasing the time it takes to teleport out of a dungeon from three seconds to five seconds. Why?
If I’ve learned anything from being a Blizzard fan for as long as I can remember, it’s that this sort of thing can be commonplace. Until recently, World of Warcraft decisions often seemed to be made in spite of players, not with them. The players would complain, and then changes often brought the final results somewhere in the middle. As this is essentially the first big update, we’ll learn a lot about the future of Diablo 4 based on what Blizzard does now.
Hopefully, Blizzard listens to the criticism from players. I’d really like to be able to play Diablo 4 for a long time.
