What you need to know
- Following its latest closed beta, Diablo Immortal is set to undergo some more changes ahead of its launch.
- These include changes to the raid system, social mechanics, set items, and more.
- More information on the game is set to come in the future.
Ahead of its release later this year, Diablo Immortal is set to undergo a variety of big changes.
Following a recent round of beta testing for the mobile game, Diablo Immortal's game director Wyatt Cheng explained some of the many changes in a recent blog post. These include things like controller support being tweaked to detect the presence of a controller immediately, all the way to large-scale changes on some of Diablo Immortal's biggest mechanics.
However, perhaps most importantly, the team at Blizzard have set out to improve various social and group-play functions in Diablo Immortal, including changing how the bounty system in the game works. After some players voiced their opinion that it felt like they were being forced to group up to complete bounties, the game's bounties will now be completely solo, allowing for anyone to go in and finish up whatever they have to do without having to worry about being pulled into long play sessions.
Elsewhere in the game, raids are seeing a bit of an update, with the difficulty gap between the bosses Lassal and Vitaath tweaked to make things just a touch less punishing for players. The eight-player compatibility will also expand outward into the game's Warbands feature, with the aim being to encourage small, consistent groups of players to continue playing together more regularly.
Set Items and Cycle of Strife overhauls
Set Items were introduced in the latest round of closed beta testing for Diablo Immortal, and essentially acted as end-game gear systems for players to keep tweaking after hitting the max level. Wearing a sufficient number of items from the same set would allow players to receive additional bonuses. After player feedback, Blizzard is tweaking this a bit, adding new sets into the game while also doing "a balance pass" on the existing sets so they "support and complement particular builds and playstyles."
As for Cycle of Strife — Diablo Immortal's PvP mode — big changes are on the horizon. Following player feedback, the core structure of Cycle of Strife is changing, and will no longer revolve around Dark Houses and a final Immortal group that players will have to battle. Instead, Cycle of Strife will now feature various clans competing with one another. On top of that, clans will be able to become a "Dark Clan," in which they can battle other Dark Clans to try and be the one clan to challenge Immortals for the top spot in the Cycle of Strife.
World Paragon improvements
Perhaps one of the biggest changes set to come to Diablo Immortal is in its World Paragon system, a mechanic that becomes available once you hit the max level in Diablo Immortal. Each server in Immortal has its own World Paragon Level, which rises two levels per day. Players who are four levels or more above the World Paragon Level are penalized on the experience they earn, while players who are below the threshold gain more experience. Originally intended to be a way for players to help catch up to friends and encourage them to play together, this system is seeing a bit of an overhaul as well.
Now, the World Paragon system will extend to item salvage as well, with players no longer receiving a penalty to their salvage modifiers as they continue to rank up in Paragon levels. However, the flipside to this is that players will require more item salvage overall to increase their gear ranks. The hope behind this new change is that power gaps between players will slow down, allowing people who might not play as much as their friends the chance to stay close in level and play with them.
Diablo Immortal is a fully realized entry to the Diablo series, and will be available later this year to experience
