Blizzard hosted the first of their two Devstreams regarding the upcoming Diablo 4 Season 2, Season of the Blood, yesterday. And, I have to say…it was actually pretty good. In the trove of quality-of-life changes and enhancements coming to the ARPG, a buff to the drop rate of Uber Uniques was mentioned. Diablo Designer Joe Shely followed up on Twitter afterward confirming the buffed drop rate.
Promising changes coming to Season of Blood
In the slide, Shely references, it mentions that players will have “Greater access to Uber Uniques via Uber Duriel”. Duriel is the final of the five new bosses coming in Season 2. Players will need to farm materials from earlier bosses in order to spawn him. In the tweet, Shely states that Uber Uniques will still be rare. But players who farm Uber Duriel are going to see them eventually. In its current form, there’s no way to farm Uber Uniques and even players who spend hundreds of hours farming a season aren’t likely to see them drop.
This is an immensely positive change for Diablo 4, and makes me hopeful about future development. The ability to actually target farm Uber Uniques, even if they still have a rare drop, at least gives players a goal. Blizzard has a history of refusing to change their philosophy on certain mechanics like drop rates. But the decision to make a big change like this is a big improvement over previous Blizzard titles.
I’m still reserving my overall judgment for the fate of Season 2 because that will depend a lot on the new content of the season. But a lot of the changes that were announced simply make the game better. Blizzard plans to support Diablo 4 for years, so we’re still very early on its lifecycle. If it plans to stand with other long-lasting ARPG’s like Diablo 2: Resurrected, Diablo 3, and Path of Exile, updates like this are a big part of it.
Diablo 4 Season 2, Season of Blood, launches on October 17 on all platforms.
