Diablo Immortal Players Report iPhone 17 Overheating After the Engine Update

Diablo Immortal's new engine is supposed to make Sanctuary prettier. On some iPhone 17 devices, players say it may also be making the phone considerably warmer.

A growing iOS bug report now contains two separate iPhone 17 owners describing unusually high temperatures after Diablo Immortal's recent engine update. The original player says their phone becomes noticeably hot within three minutes of launching the game and reaches roughly 40°C externally after around 30 minutes, even while running Diablo Immortal on Low Quality. A second iPhone 17 owner joined the thread on September 5 saying they had experienced exactly the same problem after updating, together with extremely heavy battery drain.

That does not establish that Diablo Immortal's new engine is definitely responsible. Two reports are still a very small sample, and Blizzard has not confirmed a thermal-performance issue affecting iPhone 17 devices. But the matching hardware, timing and symptoms make this more interesting than one potentially faulty phone.

The First iPhone 17 Starts Heating Up in Under Three Minutes

The original bug report was posted on August 26 by a player using a standard iPhone 17 rather than the Pro or Pro Max model.

According to the player, the phone previously became only slightly warm during Diablo Immortal sessions. After installing the recent engine update, however, it began getting noticeably hot in less than three minutes.

The player says they tested the game using Low Quality settings and still measured an exterior phone temperature of roughly 40°C after about half an hour. Closing Diablo Immortal caused the device to begin cooling almost immediately.

They also updated the phone to iOS 26.6.1 without seeing any improvement and specifically asked Blizzard to investigate CPU/GPU load and thermal performance after the engine update.

One hot phone could be hardware.

Then another one appeared.

A Second iPhone 17 Owner Reports the Same Problem

On September 5, another player replied that they had exactly the same overheating issue on another iPhone 17 and that it had also started after the update.

The second report adds another concern: battery life.

The player says Diablo Immortal drained the phone's battery completely in approximately three hours. They report battery health at 89% and argue that the drain is far heavier than they would expect from the device.

Battery runtime depends on brightness, graphics settings, network conditions, background activity, battery health and numerous other variables, so three hours should not be treated as a controlled benchmark.

Still, overheating combined with unusually rapid battery drain is exactly the sort of pattern you would expect if CPU or GPU load has increased substantially.

Whether that increase is actually coming from the new engine remains the unanswered part.

The New Diablo Immortal Engine Is a Major Visual Upgrade

Blizzard has described September's engine update as a substantial technical overhaul rather than a minor graphics patch.

The update reworks visual effects for nearly 100 Legendary Affixes, improves lighting and shadows across more than ten environments, reduces excessive lighting effects and changes ground and water materials. Blizzard allowed players to begin downloading the engine update ahead of the full September launch and even offered 10 Legendary Crests for completing the preparation early.

That is a lot of rendering work being touched at once.

It does not automatically mean the game should suddenly overheat modern hardware. Blizzard's own community team said in August that engineers did not expect currently supported devices to become incompatible because of the engine change.

But compatibility and efficiency are not quite the same thing.

A phone can technically run a game while using more power, generating more heat and draining its battery faster than it did before.

The Engine Rollout Has Already Produced Other Technical Reports

The iPhone complaints also arrive during a period where players are still working through several post-update technical changes.

An Android player using a Galaxy S25+ recently reported that the phone's Back button stopped behaving correctly after the engine update. Instead of closing menus such as the map or inventory, it reportedly minimizes Diablo Immortal and returns the user to the Android home screen. Interestingly, that player says a second phone that had not received the engine update still behaved normally.

We also recently covered players reporting large crafting-resource stacks disappearing around recent Diablo Immortal updates. In that case, as here, there is no confirmation that the engine update itself caused the problem.

These reports should not be combined into one giant “the new engine broke everything” theory. A missing resource stack, Android navigation behaviour and iPhone thermal performance can have completely unrelated causes.

What they do show is that a major technical migration creates a lot of surfaces where strange behaviour can appear.

40°C on the Outside Does Not Tell Us the Internal Chip Temperature

There is another important distinction in the original report.

The player's roughly 40°C measurement refers to the external temperature of the phone. It does not tell us the actual internal temperature of the processor or battery, and it does not by itself demonstrate dangerous overheating.

Modern phones routinely become warm during sustained 3D gaming, particularly when the GPU is being heavily utilized. Devices also have thermal-management systems designed to reduce performance before internal temperatures become unsafe.

The unusual part of this report is therefore not simply “phone gets warm while playing videogame.”

It is the player's claim that the behaviour changed dramatically immediately after the engine update, persists at Low Quality, begins within minutes and is now being independently reported by another owner of the same phone model.

That is what makes it worth investigating.

Lower Graphics Settings May Not Be Enough

The first player's attempt to solve the issue by switching to Low Quality apparently did not prevent the heat buildup. If that report is representative, simply lowering visible graphical quality may not reduce whatever workload is producing the problem.

Players experiencing similar behaviour can still try the usual steps: cap frame rate, reduce resolution and graphical settings, close background applications, avoid charging while playing and make sure both iOS and Diablo Immortal are fully updated.

But if the phone becomes unusually hot within minutes compared with its behaviour before the engine update, repeatedly pushing the device through long sessions purely to see whether it improves is probably not the most useful form of troubleshooting.

A reproducible bug report containing the exact device, iOS version, graphics settings, frame-rate setting and approximate time until the device becomes hot is considerably more useful to Blizzard.

We Need More iPhone 17 Reports Before Calling This an Engine Bug

At the moment, the evidence is suggestive rather than conclusive.

One iPhone 17 owner reports rapid heating, approximately 40°C exterior temperature after 30 minutes and immediate cooling when Diablo Immortal closes.

A second iPhone 17 owner says the same overheating started after the update and reports severe battery drain.

Blizzard has officially rolled out a major engine overhaul involving lighting, materials and visual effects.

Those facts make a connection plausible.

They do not prove it.

If more iPhone 17 users begin reproducing the same behaviour — particularly with comparable settings and before/after measurements — this will become much easier to classify as an optimization problem rather than two unhappy phones.

For now, the new engine is certainly making Diablo Immortal look different.

A couple of iPhone 17 owners would simply prefer it to stop making their phones feel different too.

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Diablo 4’s Transfiguration Fixes the Gear Plateau — Then Creates a New One

Diablo IV's Transfiguration system solves one of the oldest problems in an ARPG surprisingly well: eventually, almost everything that drops becomes rubbish.

Once your character is wearing strong Greater Affix gear, another ordinary one- or two-GA item usually has all the emotional impact of finding a receipt in your pocket. Transfiguration changes that. Suddenly those imperfect items can become experiments. Fix the affixes, put the item through the system and see whether an unexpected result turns something merely good into something genuinely exciting.

That is a much healthier loot loop.

Unfortunately, players are beginning to argue that Transfiguration eventually creates a second gear plateau of its own. Once your equipment becomes strong enough, finding the correct upgrade is no longer sufficient.

The upgrade also needs to survive — and ideally win — another layer of RNG.

Transfiguration Makes 1–2 GA Items Interesting Again

A new community discussion makes a very good case for why the system works so well during most of character progression.

Before Transfiguration enters the equation, a reasonably developed character quickly reaches the point where one- and two-GA items barely deserve inspection. Maybe the Greater Affix landed on the wrong stat. Maybe the remaining affixes are mediocre. Maybe your existing item is simply good enough that replacing it would require an improbably perfect drop.

Transfiguration gives those items another purpose.

You can take a piece that is close but not quite right, clean up the fixable parts of it and then gamble on Transfiguration producing an outcome strong enough to move the build forward.

And because the starting item was not priceless, losing the gamble does not hurt very much.

That is excellent risk-versus-reward design.

A mediocre item becomes interesting because it has potential rather than because Blizzard simply increased how often perfect equipment falls from the sky.

The Problem Begins When Your Next Upgrade Is Already Extremely Rare

Eventually, however, the relationship changes.

Imagine your current item is already excellent. Finding a replacement may require the correct item type, several useful Greater Affixes and the exact combination of stats your build needs.

That item is already rare.

Now Transfiguration asks another question:

Did the rare upgrade also get the right Transfigure outcome?

If the answer is no, an item that looked like a meaningful upgrade can suddenly become worse than the equipment you were already wearing.

This is the point raised in the current player discussion. Transfiguration feels great when it is an optional attempt to turn common high-end drops into something better. It feels considerably worse when your only realistic upgrades require succeeding at Transfiguration after already winning the loot lottery.

The system stops extending the gear chase.

It becomes the gear chase.

A Great 2 GA Item Can Compete With a Much Rarer Drop

Part of the problem may actually sit underneath Transfiguration rather than inside it.

The argument being made by players is that Diablo IV's current gear curve can feel surprisingly flat at the top. A well-rolled two-GA item may already provide most of the practical value of a considerably rarer three- or four-GA drop.

Transfiguration can then bridge much of the remaining difference.

That is wonderful for accessibility. You do not need astronomically rare equipment in every slot to build an extremely strong character.

It also changes how exciting the rarest natural drops feel.

If the magnificent four-GA item still needs the correct Transfiguration result to beat the aggressively manipulated two-GA item you already own, its rarity begins to feel disconnected from its value.

Finding something extraordinarily rare should probably create at least a brief period where you are happy.

Diablo has enough opportunities for disappointment afterward.

Transfiguration Is Supposed to Be a Choice

This is where risk-versus-reward systems become tricky.

For Transfiguration to be interesting, there needs to be a reason not to use it.

If every good item should automatically be Transfigured because the possible gain massively outweighs the danger, then the decision is not really a decision. It becomes another mandatory crafting stage between finding an item and considering it finished.

The current forum argument describes exactly that pressure. An extremely rare item should theoretically create a moment where the player asks:

Do I keep this fantastic drop as it is?

Or do I risk it for something even better?

That is a proper Diablo decision.

But if the possible Transfiguration bonus is strong enough that not taking the gamble feels objectively wrong, the answer has effectively been chosen for you.

You put the item into the machine.

You hope.

And occasionally you learn a valuable lesson about attachment.

This Is Similar to Diablo 4’s Wider RNG Problem

We touched on the same underlying issue in our recent look at why Season 15's good ideas are still colliding with familiar Diablo IV problems.

Randomness belongs in Diablo. Without uncertain drops, an ARPG becomes a shopping list with skeletons in the aisles.

The problem comes when too many independent RNG checks sit on top of one another.

First the correct item needs to drop.

Then the right Greater Affixes need to appear.

Then the editable parts of the item need to cooperate.

Then Transfiguration needs to land correctly.

Any one of those systems can make loot interesting.

Stack enough of them together and a genuine upgrade can become statistically impressive long before it becomes enjoyable to pursue.

The Rarest Drops Need to Feel Stronger

One possible solution is not to make Transfiguration safer.

It is to make naturally exceptional gear more exceptional.

If the difference between a strong two-GA item and an incredible four-GA item were larger, players would have a genuine reason to protect the rarer drop. A four-GA item could already be so valuable that risking it through Transfiguration becomes an optional act of greed rather than the obvious final crafting step.

That would also help address a complaint we have seen repeatedly around Diablo IV's loot systems: players want truly rare items to feel genuinely exciting again.

Rarity alone is not enough.

The rare thing has to be meaningfully better than the almost-rare thing.

But Making Rare Gear Stronger Creates Another Problem

Of course, Diablo IV cannot simply make four-GA equipment dramatically stronger without consequences.

If the performance gap becomes enormous, players begin feeling that their characters are incomplete until every slot contains a near-impossible drop.

That conflicts directly with the faster, more accessible progression philosophy Blizzard has been moving toward.

We recently asked whether Diablo IV is slowly moving back toward Diablo III's seasonal power model. A large part of that model depends on allowing ordinary seasonal players to assemble functional, extremely powerful builds without spending three months waiting for one specific helmet.

Blizzard therefore has two competing goals:

Make rare loot exciting enough to chase.

But do not make rare loot so mandatory that everyone else feels unfinished.

Transfiguration currently sits directly between those goals.

The System Works Best When You Can Afford to Lose

Ironically, Transfiguration may already be an excellent system for most of Diablo IV.

Its strongest moment is when you find an item that would previously have been vendor food and think:

Maybe.

That one word keeps loot interesting long after your build becomes established.

Throwing expendable one- and two-GA items into a high-risk crafting system gives otherwise forgettable drops another life. Sometimes they brick. Sometimes they become spectacular. Either outcome is acceptable because the original item was not precious.

The system becomes frustrating only when the item underneath it is already so rare that losing the gamble feels like losing several evenings of progress.

Diablo 4 Has Moved the Plateau Rather Than Eliminated It

That may ultimately be Transfiguration's biggest achievement and its biggest weakness.

It successfully pushes Diablo IV's gear plateau much further into the endgame.

More drops remain relevant.

More items deserve inspection.

More imperfect gear has the possibility of becoming useful.

All of that is good.

But once a character finally reaches the new plateau, upgrades can become dependent on winning two lotteries instead of one:

find the exceptional item, then hit the exceptional Transfiguration.

Blizzard probably does not need to remove that risk.

Risk is why the system is interesting.

The better question is whether Diablo IV's rarest natural drops are strong enough that players sometimes feel comfortable saying:

No. This item is already good enough. I'm keeping it.

Because if every piece of perfect gear still needs one final visit to the gambling table, Transfiguration has not eliminated the gear plateau.

It has simply built a casino on top of it.

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Diablo 4 Players Say Longtooth Can Eat a Mythic Tribute Without Dropping Loot

Diablo IV's Kurast Undercity is built around a fairly straightforward transaction. You spend a valuable Tribute, make the run more difficult, kill the boss and receive better or more targeted rewards. It is one of those arrangements where the player is generally expected to provide the danger and the game is expected to provide the loot.

Longtooth may currently be forgetting his half of the deal.

Two fresh bug reports from September 5 describe players using Mythic Tributes in the Undercity only for the final Longtooth encounter to fail in ways that leave the Tribute consumed and the player with no reward. In one case, Longtooth reportedly froze after being killed and continued his spinning animation indefinitely. In another, a player says they killed him twice using Mythic Tributes and received no drops at all.

These are player reports, not confirmation from Blizzard that every Longtooth run is affected. But Mythic Tributes are valuable enough that even an occasional failure is considerably more painful than the average boss deciding to behave strangely.

Longtooth Apparently Died Without Actually Dying

The clearest new report comes from a player who used a Mythic Tribute for an Undercity run on September 5.

According to the bug report, Longtooth reached the end of the fight but then became stuck instead of completing his death sequence. His whirling animation continued, the encounter never properly resolved and no loot appeared.

The player attempted to teleport out of the Undercity and return.

Longtooth was still there.

Still spinning.

Still refusing to acknowledge the minor administrative detail that his health bar had reached zero.

The Mythic Tribute, meanwhile, had already been spent.

The player understandably asked either for the Tribute back or for the Mythic reward they believed the run should have produced.

A Second Report Says Two Mythic Tribute Runs Dropped Nothing

Another bug report appearing the same day is even more direct. Its title states that the player killed Longtooth twice while using Mythic Tributes and received no drops at all.

That does not necessarily prove both reports share the same technical cause. One describes a boss death sequence becoming stuck. The other describes completed kills that apparently failed to produce loot.

But from the player's perspective, the distinction is not terribly comforting.

In both situations:

• a Mythic Tribute was consumed
• the player completed or effectively completed the Longtooth encounter
• the expected reward did not arrive

That is the part that matters.

Mythic Tributes Are Supposed to Make Undercity Runs Worth More

Tributes are not ordinary dungeon keys. Blizzard designed them as modifiers that let players deliberately influence an Undercity run and its rewards.

Higher-quality Tributes increase both the challenge and the potential spoils, creating a simple risk-reward relationship: spend something valuable, accept a more demanding run and receive something better if you succeed.

That relationship becomes especially important at the Mythic tier.

Players do not casually throw Mythic Tributes into every run. They are exactly the sort of resource people save for the right character, difficulty and farming session because the expected payoff can be extremely valuable.

Which makes a boss animation bug considerably more expensive than it sounds.

If an ordinary dungeon boss freezes, you lose a few minutes.

If Longtooth freezes after accepting a Mythic Tribute, you may lose the ticket as well.

This Is Not Diablo 4’s First Undercity Tribute Problem

Unfortunately, this is also not the first time players have reported the Undercity consuming Tributes without delivering what they expected.

Back in April, we covered players completing Undercity Tribute runs and receiving almost nothing. One Mythic Tribute run reportedly ended with a single blue item, while another player said an Armaments Tribute produced literally no loot.

Then in July, the problem became even stranger. We looked at Undercity bonus chests that could consume Tributes and open completely empty. Players also reported Mythic Armaments chests refusing to open despite apparently meeting their requirements.

Those older issues may not be technically related to the current Longtooth reports.

But they create a larger confidence problem around the same system.

Players need to know that when they spend a rare Tribute, the reward pipeline is reliable.

Longtooth Has Had Bugs Before

The boss itself also has some history.

Blizzard has previously fixed an issue where Longtooth could temporarily become invisible during a particular attack. That does not establish any connection to the current death-animation problem, but it does show that the encounter has required technical fixes before.

The new report appears to involve something different: the game recognizes enough of the boss's defeat to stop normal combat progression, but not enough to finish the encounter and release the rewards.

That is a particularly nasty category of bug because the player has already done everything correctly.

You entered the activity.

You spent the Tribute.

You completed the objective.

The game simply forgot the final verb:

pay.

There Is No Obvious Workaround Once the Tribute Is Spent

The September report also demonstrates why this bug is difficult for players to protect themselves against.

Teleporting away and returning did not fix Longtooth.

There is no reported method for reclaiming the Tribute from the run.

And unlike a bad random drop, this is not something another five minutes of farming necessarily replaces.

The only cautious advice at the moment is therefore frustratingly simple: be careful with Mythic Tributes until we know whether the Longtooth problem is isolated or reproducible.

That does not mean everyone should stop running the Undercity. Two reports do not establish a widespread failure rate, and most players may complete Mythic Tribute runs without encountering anything unusual.

But if you only have one particularly valuable Tribute left, there is no prize for volunteering it to quality assurance.

The Cost of a Bug Matters as Much as the Bug

Diablo IV has bugs. Every large live-service game does.

The interesting question is often not simply how frequently a bug appears, but what the player loses when it does.

A visual glitch costs almost nothing.

A stuck boss might cost several minutes.

A stuck boss after consuming one of the game's more valuable targeted-farming resources can cost substantially more.

That is why these new reports deserve attention even before we know how widespread the problem is.

Longtooth does not need to break every run to become dangerous.

He only needs to eat the Mythic Tribute you were actually saving.

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Diablo 4 Players Say Activity Keys Are Becoming Rarer Than the Loot They Unlock

Diablo IV is supposed to have rare loot. That is rather central to the whole arrangement. Kill demons, open chest, receive seventeen things you do not want and occasionally make an undignified noise because something genuinely special appeared.

But some players are increasingly frustrated by a different kind of rarity: the items required to access the content where the interesting rewards are supposed to come from. Fresh complaints around Trace of Echoes and Crux of the False Prophet are reopening an old Season 14 argument, with players reporting enormous differences in how often these activity keys appear. Some have several sitting in storage. Others say they can play high Torment levels regularly for weeks — or even multiple seasons — without seeing one.

That raises a useful design question. Rare loot gives you something exciting to chase.

Should access to the activity itself be equally rare?

Trace of Echoes Is Supposed to Be Extremely Rare

There is one important point to establish immediately: Blizzard did not accidentally describe Trace of Echoes as an ordinary drop.

When Echoing Hatred was originally revealed alongside Lord of Hatred, Blizzard described it as a hyper-rare endgame event. To enter it, players first need an “incredibly rare” Trace of Echoes, which can then be offered to the Sightless Eye in Temis.

Once inside, Echoing Hatred becomes an escalating survival challenge with randomized enemies, multiple bosses and better rewards the longer you remain alive.

That sounds great.

Finding the door has proven rather more controversial.

Some Players Say They Have Not Seen One in Two Seasons

The extreme variation in player reports has been visible throughout Season 14.

One particularly persistent player has reported across several Blizzard forum discussions that they have not received a single Trace of Echoes in two seasons. Other players have reached Paragon 250 or higher without one, while some report finding several during the same period.

In one July discussion, a player at Paragon 262 said they had found none during the current season despite receiving seven or eight during the previous one. Another reported zero across characters around Paragon 235 and 260. Someone else had already found three.

That is RNG doing what RNG does.

The difficulty is that the result is not merely the difference between getting a Mythic and getting another pair of trousers.

One group gets to play an endgame activity.

The other group does not.

We previously covered players reaching very high Paragon levels without seeing a Trace of Echoes, and the same complaints continue to appear months later.

The Season Journey Makes the Rarity More Awkward

Trace of Echoes becomes particularly irritating because Echoing Hatred has also been tied to seasonal progression.

Players have pointed out that the Season Journey asks them to complete a sufficiently high tier of Echoing Hatred. That turns an intentionally rare activity into something sitting on a checklist beside objectives the player can actually choose to pursue.

You can improve a build.

You can run a boss.

You can clear a Pit tier.

You cannot make an incredibly rare random key appear through force of character.

Several players have therefore suggested giving at least one Trace of Echoes through Season Journey progression, with random drops remaining available for additional runs. That would preserve the event's rarity without allowing pure RNG to determine whether someone gets to experience one of Lord of Hatred's advertised endgame systems at all.

It is a fairly elegant compromise.

Make repeat access rare.

Do not make first access theoretical.

Crux of the False Prophet Has a Similar Problem

Trace of Echoes is not the only key causing frustration.

Crux of the False Prophet is used for Mephisto's high-end Tormented Echo rewards. Players have complained about its drop rate since Lord of Hatred launched, including reports of dozens of Greater Lair Boss runs without seeing one.

Again, experiences vary dramatically.

Some players report accumulating several Cruxes through Whisper Caches, Undercity runs and bosses. Others say the drops suddenly become extraordinarily scarce for long periods.

One particularly revealing June report came from a player who said they had found more than 40 Mythics, 12 Mythic Crux keys and more than 20 Mythic Tributes while receiving only a single Trace of Echoes — and that Trace then disappeared before they could properly use it.

That comparison illustrates the weirdness rather neatly.

At a certain point, the key to the activity can feel rarer than items Diablo IV otherwise treats as the pinnacle of the loot chase.

Rare Keys Work Better When the Content Is Repeatable, Not Invisible

There is nothing inherently wrong with rare access items.

Diablo has always used keys, organs, materials and other forms of friction between ordinary farming and special encounters. Building toward an Uber fight can make that fight feel more significant.

The difference is whether the player can meaningfully work toward the access requirement.

If ten known materials are required, you can farm ten materials.

If a boss requires a key with identifiable sources and a sufficiently predictable drop rate, you can target those sources.

If the requirement is simply an extraordinarily rare world drop, the strategy becomes:

continue existing near monsters and hope.

That is less compelling when the reward behind the key is not merely loot, but an entire mode.

Blizzard Has Already Adjusted Rare Endgame Access This Season

There is precedent for Blizzard deciding that access has become too restrictive.

During Season 14, the development team responded to progression feedback by increasing Mythic Tribute availability and adding Superior Lair Keys to repeatable reward sources. Blizzard has also adjusted various Lord of Hatred drop rates as player behaviour exposed bottlenecks that looked very different on live servers than they did on paper.

That is worth remembering when looking at Trace of Echoes.

The original concept — an extremely rare ticket into a mysterious survival event — sounds exciting.

But Diablo IV now has enough overlapping endgame systems that players do not necessarily interpret “you may never see this activity all season” as mystery.

Sometimes they interpret it as content they paid for but did not roll correctly enough to play.

Mythics Should Be Rare. Game Modes Are More Complicated.

The broader argument here is not that Diablo IV should shower everyone with every valuable resource.

We have just spent months watching the opposite debate, with some players worrying that Mythics have become too predictable and Diablo IV needs genuinely rare chase items again.

Those positions are not contradictory.

A rare item is exciting because most players know the item exists, know where it can come from and continue playing while hoping to receive it.

A rare activity key can instead mean the player never experiences the activity whose reward structure was supposed to create that excitement.

One is a chase.

The other can become a locked door with a lottery machine where the handle should be.

Diablo 4 May Need a Guaranteed First Key

The cleanest solution may therefore be the one players have already suggested.

Keep Trace of Echoes rare as a repeat drop.

Keep Crux of the False Prophet valuable.

Keep high-end encounters feeling like something more significant than another waypoint on the map.

But give players at least one deterministic path into the activities — perhaps through the Season Journey, War Plans or a sufficiently difficult guaranteed objective.

After that, RNG can resume its normal duties.

Rare loot is one of the reasons Diablo works.

Rare permission to play Diablo is a slightly stranger reward system.

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Diablo 4’s Gem Salvage Bug May Be Back — Players Are Losing High-Tier Gems Again

Diablo IV players may once again have a very good reason to hesitate before pressing the Salvage button at the Jeweler. A fresh PlayStation 5 bug report from September 6 describes high-tier Emerald progression disappearing after gems were salvaged, producing symptoms uncomfortably similar to a gem-salvage problem Blizzard officially said it fixed earlier this summer.

That does not yet prove the old bug has returned. We currently have a new player report, not confirmation from Blizzard that Patch 3.1.0 has regressed. But the history matters because the earlier problem was real, widespread enough to generate reports across PC and PlayStation, and expensive enough that some players lost millions of Gem Fragments before Blizzard corrected it.

When the same sort of thing appears again two months later, keeping your Grand Gems intact for a little longer suddenly seems like reasonable financial planning.

A New PS5 Report Says High-Tier Emerald Progress Disappeared

The new September 6 PS5 report describes a player salvaging Emeralds and discovering that their high-tier gem progression was no longer where they expected it to be afterward. Instead of being able to reconstruct the same amount of advanced gems from the returned materials, the player was apparently left with lower-tier progression.

That sounds extremely familiar.

Earlier this year, Diablo IV players repeatedly reported Grand Gems disappearing or returning far fewer fragments than their crafting value when salvaged. One May PlayStation report said salvaging a Grand Gem was followed by Royal Gems disappearing without contributing correctly toward another Grand Gem. That player reported losing more than 40 Royal Gems and over 10,000 Forgotten Souls while trying to work around the problem.

PC players were seeing similar behaviour. One report described Grand Gems costing one million fragments to craft but returning only 100,000 fragments when salvaged — effectively deleting 90% of their fragment value.

That is not a particularly generous recycling programme.

Blizzard Officially Fixed High-Tier Gem Salvaging in Patch 3.1.0

The important difference between this and an ordinary forum complaint is that Blizzard eventually acknowledged the underlying problem through its patch notes.

When Patch 3.1.0 launched on June 30, Blizzard included a very direct fix:

“Fixed an issue where salvaging high-tier gems returned fewer fragments than intended.”

That appeared to address the most obvious version of the problem. Players subsequently confirmed that Grand Gems could once again return the expected number of fragments, and for a while the issue looked safely buried with the rest of Season 13's bugs.

Not entirely.

A July discussion included another player claiming that roughly 50 salvaged Royal Gems disappeared without being correctly reflected in the Jeweler's progression counter. Another July player initially thought the salvage bug had returned, although that particular case turned out to be a shortage of Forgotten Souls rather than missing fragments.

That distinction is important because Diablo IV's current gem economy is complicated enough to make a functioning system look broken if you are missing one of its secondary crafting currencies.

The new PS5 report therefore needs more reproduction before we can say the old bug is definitively back.

Grand Gems Represent a Lot More Than One Item Slot

The reason even one report deserves attention is the amount of progression hidden inside Diablo IV's upper gem tiers.

Grand Gems are only the beginning of Lord of Hatred's high-end gem chain. Five Grand Gems are required to create one Horadric Gem through the Horadric Cube, and five Horadric Gems are then required for one Flawless Horadric Gem.

We previously calculated just how quickly those requirements escalate when looking at the enormous fragment requirements behind high-end Horadric Gem crafting. A finished set represents millions upon millions of fragments together with Gold, Forgotten Souls and considerable farming time.

We also covered why Flawless Horadric Gems became one of Lord of Hatred's biggest long-term grinds. Losing progression somewhere near the bottom of that crafting pyramid does not just cost one gem. It potentially removes part of everything that would eventually have been built above it.

That makes experimenting with salvage rather less appealing.

Season 14 Was Supposed to Make Gem Progression Less Painful

The timing is particularly awkward because Patch 3.1.0 did more than fix the old salvage problem. Blizzard also substantially increased Gem Fragment drops at Torment X and above and simplified Jeweler conversion recipes so players could more easily turn unwanted fragments into the types their builds actually needed.

Those were sensible changes aimed at reducing one of Diablo IV's more repetitive progression grinds.

But better fragment acquisition only helps if the fragments remain where they are supposed to be.

High-tier gems already have another strange economic issue this season. We recently looked at players still reporting enormous repair bills when Horadric Gems are socketed, despite that behaviour having been noticed months ago.

Diablo IV's gems are becoming increasingly powerful.

They are also developing an impressive collection of administrative side effects.

Do Not Mass-Salvage High-Tier Gems Until We Know More

At this point, there is no reason for panic. One new report does not establish a widespread regression, and plenty of players may be salvaging gems normally without any problem at all.

But there is also very little upside to being the person who performs the next large-scale test with their own collection.

If you have Grand Gems or other expensive high-tier gems that you do not urgently need to break down, keeping them intact until the new report receives more confirmations is the cautious option.

If you do salvage, it is worth noting your fragment totals beforehand and checking the returned amount immediately rather than processing an entire stash at once. That will make it much easier to identify whether anything has actually gone wrong — and considerably easier to produce a useful bug report if it has.

The Similarity to the Old Bug Is the Part Worth Watching

We are not yet at the point where we can say:

“Blizzard's fixed gem bug is definitely back.”

What we can say is that Blizzard previously fixed a confirmed bug involving high-tier gems returning incorrect salvage value, older players documented substantial losses from that problem, and a new PS5 player is now reporting very similar symptoms on September 6.

That is enough to watch closely.

Hopefully this turns out to be an isolated account issue or a misunderstanding of the newer crafting system.

Because Diablo IV's current gem ladder already asks players to collect an extraordinary number of fragments.

Collecting them twice would be excessive even by Sanctuary standards.

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Diablo Immortal’s Winds of Fortune Is a Very Good Week to Farm Normal Gems

Diablo Immortal's Winds of Fortune is back, which normally means the game spends 24 hours throwing extra Gold, Experience and Legendary Items at you while hoping you remember that the timer continues ticking when you go to sleep. This September version has the same broad reward boost, but one part of the event remains considerably more valuable than the rest: Normal Gem farming in a four-player party.

Winds of Fortune runs from September 3 through September 10 at 3:00 a.m. local server time. During that window, every player can activate a special 24-hour buff that duplicates several reward types and increases returns from a long list of normal activities. Most of that is useful. The Normal Gem rule, however, makes this one of the better weeks to deliberately organize some group farming rather than simply allowing the buff to decorate your UI while you do dailies.

Four-Player Normal Gem Drops Are Doubled

Blizzard says the four-player party Normal Gem bonus drop is doubled during Winds of Fortune. More importantly, those bonus drops are unaffected by the normal daily cap.

That combination is the real headline.

Normal Gems are one of Diablo Immortal's longest progression grinds because higher ranks consume increasingly ridiculous quantities of lower-rank gems. We recently covered why losing even one high-rank Normal Gem can represent an enormous amount of accumulated progression. Anything that temporarily accelerates that process deserves considerably more attention than another pile of yellow equipment.

If Normal Gems are currently one of your account's bottlenecks, spend at least part of the Winds buff in a full party.

Only the First 12 Common Gems Are Tradable

There is an important economic limitation.

Blizzard says only the first twelve Common Gems earned each day are tradable. Additional Common Gems obtained through the event can still improve your character, but you should not build a farming plan around dumping every doubled gem onto the Marketplace.

That distinction matters depending on why you are farming.

If you want personal secondary-stat progression, the extra bound gems remain extremely useful.

If you are primarily farming Normal Gems to sell, your interesting part of the day ends considerably earlier.

Sanctuary is generous this week. It has not completely abandoned monetary policy.

Do Not Activate the 24-Hour Buff Before Bed

The easiest way to waste Winds of Fortune remains exactly the same as when we warned about the event's real-time timer in July.

The buff lasts 24 hours of real time.

Not 24 hours logged in.

Once activated, the clock continues while you are offline, asleep, working or explaining to somebody why four strangers running dungeons together is an economically rational use of Saturday morning.

Ideally, activate it at the beginning of a period where you can fit two useful sessions inside the window. A Saturday morning activation, for example, can cover most of Saturday and another session before the same time Sunday.

A midnight activation shortly before logging off covers an excellent eight-hour sleep build.

What Else Does Winds of Fortune Double?

Normal Gems may be the strongest target, but the event duplicates a broad set of rewards. Blizzard lists:

• Gold
• Experience
• Battle Pass Points
• Normal Gems
• Legendary Items

The duplicate effect also applies to rewards from activities including Horadric Bestiary turn-ins, Challenge Rifts, Bounties, Fishing, Dungeons, Purge the Depths, Accursed Towers, Hidden Lairs, wilderness farming and Codex activities.

That means there is no need to spend 24 straight hours inside one dungeon until the tileset becomes a recurring dream. Build the farming day around whatever else your character needs and prioritize full-party play when chasing Normal Gems.

Battle Pass Rewards Themselves Are Not Doubled

There are several pieces of fine print that are very easy to mentally translate into “everything is doubled.”

Everything is not doubled.

Battle Pass Points can be earned in duplicate quantities, but the rewards you claim from the actual Battle Pass track are not duplicated. Blizzard also says the normal weekly limits on Battle Pass Points and Normal Gems remain in place.

The special four-player party Normal Gem bonus is specifically given its own exception from the daily cap, which is why that mechanic deserves so much attention.

Duplicate rewards also have individual event limits. Once you reach the limit for a particular reward type, you stop receiving the doubled amount. Blizzard directs players to the in-game event screen for the exact remaining allowances.

So check the menu occasionally before spending another three hours farming something whose duplication counter has quietly reached zero.

Bonus XP Still Depends on Your Current Modifier

Experience is another useful bonus, especially for players still catching up, but Blizzard notes that the extra XP remains affected by your current experience modifier.

That means Winds of Fortune does not magically flatten Diablo Immortal's usual catch-up and progression calculations. It duplicates the reward within the rules your character is already operating under.

For established accounts, Normal Gems will therefore often offer more meaningful long-term value than simply maximizing XP during the event.

A Simple 24-Hour Winds of Fortune Plan

If Normal Gems are the priority, the most efficient approach is fairly simple.

Activate the buff when you know you have a productive play window ahead of you. Begin with any daily or weekly activities you already intended to complete, then move into four-player farming while the Normal Gem bonus is active. Use Hidden Lairs, Dungeons and wilderness farming according to what your group needs rather than chasing one activity exclusively.

Keep an eye on your tradable Common Gem count if Marketplace value matters to you, and check the event screen as duplicate-reward limits begin filling.

Then make sure you fit another useful session into the 24-hour window before it expires.

That is essentially it.

Winds of Fortune is not complicated. The only real trick is avoiding the temptation to activate it immediately and then spend half the timer doing absolutely nothing.

September 10 Is the Final Deadline

The current Winds of Fortune event ends on September 10 at 3:00 a.m. local server time. If you have not manually activated your 24-hour buff within the final 24 hours of the event, Blizzard says it will automatically activate it for you. Unclaimed event rewards are also automatically delivered the next time you log in.

That prevents players from losing the buff entirely.

It does not prevent them from wasting most of it while offline.

For general players, Winds of Fortune means more of whatever you were already doing.

For anyone trying to push Normal Gems, though, this is the important bit:

find three other players and make the 24 hours count.

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Diablo 4’s Toughness Number Doesn’t Mean What You Think Against Lilith

Diablo IV introduced Toughness to answer a very reasonable question: how difficult am I to kill? Unfortunately, Echo of Lilith has apparently decided that this question requires several follow-up forms.

A growing community discussion began with a player entering the Torment 8 Lilith fight with around 1.2 million Toughness and still being effectively deleted after accumulating encounter stacks. The resulting debate has now grown beyond one frustrated boss attempt and into a much more useful discussion about what Diablo IV's Toughness number actually tells you.

The short version is simple:

Toughness is useful.

It is not a promise that every dangerous mechanic can be tanked.

What Diablo 4’s Toughness Stat Actually Measures

Blizzard introduced Toughness as part of Diablo IV's defensive-system overhaul. Armor and Resistances became rating-based systems with diminishing returns, while Armor began reducing both physical and non-physical damage.

Toughness was added as a way to combine those defensive layers into something players could understand more easily. Blizzard describes it as the amount of raw incoming damage you can survive after your mitigation sources are taken into account.

The game also provides more detailed values for individual damage types when you inspect the stat.

That sounds like exactly the number you should use when deciding whether a boss can kill you.

Mostly, it is.

The problem is that boss mechanics are not always ordinary damage calculations.

1.2 Million Toughness Still Didn’t Save This Player

The current Lilith discussion started with a player reporting approximately 1.2 million Toughness on Torment 8 while still dying after building up stacks during the encounter.

Several responses immediately pointed out that the headline Toughness value should not be treated as a universal survivability rating.

A character may have impressive overall mitigation while still having weaknesses in maximum Life, Barrier uptime, a specific Resistance or conditional Damage Reduction. Conversely, certain unusual defensive setups can survive extremely well despite displaying a Toughness number that looks surprisingly unimpressive.

That makes Toughness a little like Diablo IV's old Attack Power statistic.

Useful at a glance.

Less useful once the build starts doing something clever.

Lilith Is Also Applying Her Own Rules

Lilith makes the problem more obvious because her fight contains mechanics designed specifically to stop players from simply building enough defense and standing still.

Players in the current discussion distinguish between genuinely lethal mechanics and attacks that become effectively lethal after mistakes accumulate. The important part is that repeated failures can apply encounter-specific penalties that make subsequent damage increasingly dangerous.

At that point, your character sheet has not necessarily become “wrong.”

The fight has changed the conditions.

A Toughness value calculated from your normal defensive layers cannot neatly communicate:

• how many dangerous encounter stacks you have accumulated
• whether Barrier or another conditional defense is currently active
• whether a specific mechanic bypasses or overwhelms ordinary mitigation
• how much damage the next failed mechanic will actually deal

So 1.2 million Toughness may be entirely accurate under normal combat conditions.

Lilith is simply no longer offering normal combat conditions.

The Bigger Problem Is That More Damage Often Solves Everything

This is where the discussion becomes less about the stat sheet and more about Diablo IV's boss design.

Multiple players give essentially the same practical advice:

do more damage.

If Lilith dies quickly enough, you spend less time accumulating dangerous stacks, see fewer mechanics and reduce the number of opportunities the fight has to punish you.

One player in the thread describes killing higher-Torment Lilith with a relatively modestly rated build simply because the damage was sufficient to bypass most of the encounter.

That creates a slightly strange incentive.

A player who invests heavily into defense can still spend a long time interacting with dangerous mechanics.

A sufficiently powerful offensive build may simply erase the phase before those mechanics become relevant.

Sometimes the best Damage Reduction is apparently reducing the boss to zero health.

This Is Why One-Shots Feel So Strange in Diablo 4

We recently looked at why Diablo IV players increasingly argue that the real problem with one-shots is understanding what actually killed them.

Toughness adds another layer to that problem.

If the character sheet says you are enormously durable and the next encounter removes your entire health bar, the natural reaction is not necessarily:

“Ah yes, clearly my effective health calculation failed to account for this boss-specific debuff stack.”

It is usually:

“What?”

Better death information would help considerably here. Showing the source of the killing damage, its damage type and relevant encounter modifiers would make defensive failures easier to diagnose.

Was your Fire Resistance insufficient?

Did a stack amplify incoming damage?

Did Barrier fall off?

Was this an actual lethal mechanic?

At the moment, players frequently have to work backward from the corpse.

Toughness Is Still Useful — Just Don’t Build Around One Number

None of this means Toughness is worthless.

Blizzard introduced it because Diablo IV's defensive systems had become difficult to evaluate through Armor, Resistances, Life, Barrier, Fortify and multiple conditional modifiers independently. A summary number is genuinely useful when comparing gear or identifying an obvious defensive weakness.

The mistake is treating it as the final answer.

For difficult boss content, players should still look at the actual components underneath it:

• Maximum Life
• Armor
• individual Resistances
• Barrier and Fortify availability
• conditional Damage Reduction
• mobility and defensive cooldowns

And then there is the stat Diablo IV does not put under Toughness:

knowing the fight.

No character-sheet number can compensate indefinitely for standing in the mechanic designed to make you stop standing there.

Lilith Exposes Diablo 4’s Defensive Communication Problem

The irony is that Blizzard created Toughness precisely because it wanted defensive gearing to become easier to understand.

That was a good goal.

But once Diablo IV introduces boss-specific stacking penalties, conditional defenses and lethal encounter mechanics, one enormous number can create more confidence than clarity.

This matters even more as Diablo IV continues pushing toward extreme endgame scaling. We have already discussed how the game is moving toward faster progression, larger power spikes and increasingly scalable difficulty. As those numbers grow, Blizzard needs to make sure the numbers players actually see still mean something useful.

1.2 million Toughness sounds extremely sturdy.

Against most of Sanctuary, it probably is.

Lilith just has several opinions that are not included on the character sheet.

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Diablo 4’s Horadric Gem Repair Cost Bug Is Still Here Months Later

Diablo IV has many respectable ways to lose millions of Gold. You can reroll affixes, Masterwork an item repeatedly, craft expensive gems or make several increasingly optimistic visits to the Occultist. Apparently, you can also achieve the same result by dying while wearing particularly fancy rocks.

A long-running repair-cost problem involving socketed Horadric Gems has resurfaced again in September, with a new player reporting that their repair bill jumps from roughly 64,000 Gold per death to around 22 times that amount when the gems are equipped. The original bug report dates back to June, while similar player testing appeared even earlier in May.

In other words, this is no longer a curious launch-week interaction that disappeared during one of Lord of Hatred's many cleanup patches.

Players are still reporting it nearly four months later.

Flawless Horadric Gems Can Make Repairs Extremely Expensive

The current PC bug report originally appeared on June 13. The player noticed the problem after equipping Flawless Horadric Gems and said their total repair cost increased from a few hundred thousand Gold to more than 15 million.

The suspected explanation is fairly straightforward. Diablo IV appears to be incorporating some or all of the socketed gem's value when calculating how expensive the parent item is to repair, even though the gem itself does not have durability that needs repairing.

That means your Blacksmith may effectively be charging you for repairing the sword, armor and incredibly expensive magical pebble sitting inside them.

The pebble, for the record, was not damaged.

A New September Test Says the Problem Is Still Happening

The bug thread became active again on September 4, when another player tested several socketables and reported dramatically different repair-cost values depending on what was installed.

Their reported figures included roughly:

• Rune: 1,547 Gold
• Grand Gem: 2,933 Gold
• Horadric Gem: 220,000 Gold
• Flawless Horadric Gem: 550,000 Gold

The exact final repair bill naturally depends on the player's equipment and how much durability has been lost, but the relative difference is the important part. The player says a death costs around 64,000 Gold without the expensive gems, while keeping them socketed increases that bill by approximately 22 times.

That is not a rounding error.

That is a mortgage with sockets.

We Actually Saw This Problem Months Ago

This will sound familiar to regular Diabloz readers because we already investigated the bizarre relationship between socketed gems and repair costs back in July.

At the time, player testing showed a repair bill dropping from roughly 2 million Gold to just 39,000 after gems and runes were temporarily removed from the equipment before visiting the Blacksmith.

That workaround was funny when it looked like a temporary oddity.

It is rather less funny now that another player is reproducing essentially the same behaviour in September.

The newer report also reinforces the earlier suspicion that the game's repair calculation is using an item's value after socketed components are included rather than calculating durability repair from the base equipment alone.

Horadric Gems Are Expensive Enough Before the Repair Bill

The irony is that Horadric Gems already represent one of Diablo IV's more expensive long-term progression systems.

We previously looked at how demanding a complete set of Flawless Horadric Gems can become. Crafting one requires a significant chain of lower-tier gems, and fully equipping a character turns that into a substantial fragment and farming commitment.

Another player calculation put the fragment requirements for high-end Horadric Gems into the millions.

That cost at least has an understandable purpose.

You are creating stronger equipment.

Paying enormously higher repair fees because those gems happen to be sitting inside the equipment is considerably harder to justify.

The Temporary Workaround Is Ridiculous but Effective

If you are affected, the player-discovered workaround remains the same:

remove the expensive gems before repairing your equipment.

Then repair everything.

Then put the gems back.

There are few things that capture the majesty of being Sanctuary's chosen hero quite like stopping outside the Blacksmith and emptying your pockets because he charges extra when he sees jewelry.

Of course, this is not a particularly acceptable permanent solution. Players should not have to unsocket part of their build every time durability drops simply to avoid a disproportionately large repair bill.

It also becomes especially irritating in high-end content where deaths are expected. Pit pushing, difficult bosses and experimental builds naturally involve failed attempts. A repair system that multiplies the punishment because a character has progressed far enough to use expensive gems effectively taxes the players most likely to be repeatedly testing difficult content.

There Is Still No Documented Fix in the Current Patch Notes

Blizzard has fixed a large number of Lord of Hatred problems since May. The expansion has received repeated passes over Horadric Cube interactions, itemization, crafting, socket behaviour and progression bugs. At one point Blizzard even fixed an issue where socketed Runes or Gems could be lost when a Unique was recycled through the Horadric Cube.

But the current public patch notes do not document a fix for Horadric Gems inflating equipment repair costs.

And the September 4 player report strongly suggests the underlying behaviour is still live.

That makes this a slightly different story from when we covered it in July.

Then, it was a bizarre repair trick players had discovered.

Now it is a months-old issue still being reproduced after multiple patches.

Your Gems Should Make You Stronger, Not Your Blacksmith Richer

Diablo IV's economy needs Gold sinks. Without them, currencies eventually become decorative numbers that everyone owns by the billion and nobody thinks about.

Repair costs can reasonably be one of those sinks.

But repair costs should reflect damaged equipment.

A socketed Flawless Horadric Gem has no durability bar, does not become chipped when a demon hits you and does not require the Blacksmith to lovingly reconstruct it with a miniature hammer.

It is simply sitting there.

Four months after players first started noticing the problem, that apparently remains enough to make the repair bill explode.

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Diablo 4’s Warlock May Be Completely Dominant in Season 15

Diablo IV's Warlock did not exactly spend its first few seasons behaving like the mandatory new class Blizzard might have expected. It was powerful, occasionally spectacular and capable of filling a screen with enough demonic administration to concern the local authorities, but it never completely pushed every other class out of the room.

Season 15 may be different.

PTR players are reporting Pit 150 clears in roughly three minutes, enormous Hellfire interactions and Warlock builds producing damage numbers that have stopped looking like mathematics and started resembling telephone numbers. One popular forum discussion has already declared Season 15 “the season of Warlock,” while other testers are asking whether Blizzard should bring the remaining classes up to the same level rather than simply cutting Warlock back down.

PTR numbers are not launch numbers. Blizzard still has time to change everything.

But if the current balance survives, Warlock may enter Season 15 in a league of its own.

Players Are Reporting Three-Minute Pit 150 Clears

The most striking example comes from a Season 15 PTR discussion where a player reports clearing Pit 150 in around three minutes with Warlock.

That immediately brings back memories of Spiritborn at the launch of Vessel of Hatred, when the new class briefly operated according to a different interpretation of Diablo IV's damage system than everyone else.

Other testers in the thread describe Warlock builds dealing hundreds of trillions — and in some cases even higher — through combinations involving Hellfire, Metamorphosis and rapidly triggered abilities. One player describes a one-button setup where the entire screen effectively detonates while automated casts continue feeding the damage loop.

These are player-tested PTR results, not official Blizzard benchmarks. But they match what we already saw in our broader Season 15 PTR evaluation, where Warlock interactions stood out as one of the clearest examples of the enormous gap that can emerge between ordinary builds and whatever the current spreadsheet has discovered.

Blizzard Gave Warlock a Lot of Direct Buffs

This performance did not appear from nowhere.

Blizzard's official 3.2.0 PTR notes contain an unusually long list of Warlock buffs. The Destruction Demon version of Metamorphosis now applies Burning whenever any type of skill is cast, while its Hellfire bonus rises from 4% to 6%. Dark Prison's Calamity variant jumps from 30% damage to 200%. Doomfire Ritual increases from 175% to 250%. Infernal Breath and several of its variants receive substantial increases, while Ravenous Jaws pushes Eviscerate damage from 125% to 500%.

The class mechanic receives similar attention. Command Abodian's bite goes from 155% to 245% base damage, and several Vanguard demon attacks are multiplied dramatically. Lesser Demon Eviscerate damage rises from 200% to 1,000% of their damage.

Then come the Uniques.

Hellhound's Sabatons can grant Abodian 200–280% increased damage while automatically triggering non-Archfiend Hellfire Skills. Gauntlets of Sheol can stack up to 600–750% additional Fiend of Abaddon damage. Scepter of the Three allows all base Ultimate Skills to be equipped simultaneously and adds up to 170–250% Ultimate Skill damage.

There is buffing a class.

And then there is giving several demons access to industrial machinery.

This Is a Very Different Warlock From Season 13

The contrast is especially interesting because Warlock did not dominate immediately after Lord of Hatred launched.

Back in May, we looked at how the new Warlock class was failing to completely dominate the early Season 13 meta. Rogue, Barbarian and Sorcerer were still competing comfortably at the top, and the result felt surprisingly healthy for a brand-new expansion class.

Warlock was good.

It just was not mandatory.

Season 15 appears to be Blizzard's answer to players who felt the new class never received the traditional honeymoon period where everything it touched briefly became illegal.

That may be fun.

It may also create another balance problem.

Sorcerer Shows the Other Side of the Season 15 Problem

The issue becomes clearer when Warlock is compared with classes receiving more conventional improvements.

Blizzard has given Sorcerer a major global Intelligence-scaling increase for Season 15, something we covered when Sorcerer players argued that bigger numbers still do not fix weak skill design. The class is stronger on paper, several abilities have been improved and Blizzard is clearly trying to increase its overall performance.

But a percentage increase to baseline damage feels very different from a Warlock ecosystem where multiple skill variants, demon attacks, Uniques and automated interactions can multiply one another into extreme Pit performance.

That is the danger.

The balance question is not simply whether Sorcerer receives 20% more damage.

It is whether that matters when another class has found an interaction that produces 200 times as much.

Should Blizzard Nerf Warlock or Buff Everyone Else?

The community response is already split along the most predictable line imaginable.

Some players assume there is no chance this version of Warlock reaches live servers unchanged. If one class can comfortably destroy Pit 150 while others struggle much lower, the obvious solution is to reduce the offending multipliers.

Others want Blizzard to do the opposite.

The original forum discussion argues that Season 15 should simply let every class reach a similar level of ridiculousness. Warlock feels powerful and fun, therefore Blizzard should raise Barbarian, Sorcerer, Necromancer, Rogue, Druid and the rest rather than removing that power.

That debate connects directly to the question we asked yesterday: is Diablo IV slowly turning back into Diablo III?

Diablo III eventually embraced seasonal absurdity. Builds exploded entire screens. Difficulty existed mainly to provide another number large enough to survive the explosions. Strong seasonal metas rotated regularly, and being outrageously powerful was often the point rather than a balance failure.

Season 15 Warlock looks very comfortable in that philosophy.

The PTR Exists Specifically So Blizzard Can Change This

There is one enormous reason not to start deleting every non-Warlock character yet.

This was the PTR.

Blizzard explicitly describes the test realm as a place to gather feedback, adjust balance and eliminate problems before the season launches. Season 15 also contains content deliberately withheld from public testing because Blizzard wants to reveal more at BlizzCon.

Warlock therefore has plenty of opportunities to change before the final patch arrives.

A broken interaction may be fixed.

A Unique multiplier may be reduced.

Other classes may receive buffs.

Or Blizzard may decide that Season 15 is allowed to be the season where Warlock finally gets to be stupidly powerful.

After several seasons of being merely good, some Warlock players would probably consider that overdue.

Season 15 May Finally Give Warlock Its Main-Character Season

The most interesting takeaway from the PTR is not that one build cleared Pit 150 in exactly three minutes.

PTRs are laboratories. People deliberately search for disgusting interactions because finding them before launch is the entire point.

What matters is how many different parts of Warlock's Season 15 kit are being pushed upward simultaneously.

Hellfire is stronger.

Demon attacks are stronger.

Several weak skill variants are dramatically stronger.

Old Uniques are being rewritten around much larger multipliers.

And players are already turning those pieces into builds capable of trivializing content that is supposed to sit at the extreme end of Diablo IV.

If Blizzard leaves most of that intact, Season 15 may finally give Warlock the launch season it never really had.

The only question is whether everyone else will still be playing the same difficulty curve.

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Diablo 1 Will Be Playable at BlizzCon — And the Remaster Rumor Just Got More Interesting

A few days ago, the idea of a Diablo 1 remaster was mostly being held together by a suspicious Twitch badge, Diablo's 30th anniversary and the traditional pre-BlizzCon willingness to treat metadata like ancient Horadric prophecy. Now there is something considerably more tangible to add to the pile: the original Diablo will apparently be playable on the BlizzCon 2026 show floor.

The newly published BlizzCon floor map includes a legacy Diablo demo area in Hall A featuring Diablo, Diablo II and Diablo III. By itself, that could simply be Blizzard celebrating three decades of the franchise by allowing visitors to play through its history. That would be completely reasonable.

Unfortunately for anyone trying to stop the remaster speculation, it also fits almost perfectly with all the other strange little clues Blizzard has been leaving lying around.

The Original Diablo Is Getting Its Own Place on the Show Floor

According to a new examination of the BlizzCon floor map, Hall A contains playable stations for all three legacy Diablo games. Diablo sits alongside Diablo II and Diablo III, while the wider legacy area also includes games such as Warcraft III and Heroes of the Storm.

That matters because Blizzard is putting an unusually strong emphasis on its older catalogue this year. BlizzCon also includes sessions titled Custodians of Legacy Games and Classic Game Deep Dive, so classic Blizzard is clearly not being treated as something to display behind glass while everyone politely remembers 1998.

The obvious explanation is anniversary nostalgia.

The original Diablo turns 30 this year. Putting it on the show floor next to its sequels is exactly the sort of thing you would expect at a large anniversary celebration.

But then there is the rest of the evidence.

We Already Had the Strange Diablo Twitch Badge

Earlier this week, we covered the unusual new Twitch badge attached specifically to the original Diablo category.

That detail stood out because an earlier Diablo anniversary badge had explicitly been associated with Diablo IV. The new BlizzCon badge instead uses the plain Diablo category.

Again, there are innocent explanations.

“Diablo” is also the name of the franchise. Blizzard could simply be using broader branding for BlizzCon. The badge also depicts the titular Prime Evil, so it could be pointing toward Diablo himself returning somewhere else in the series rather than a rerelease of the 1996 game.

But we have now moved from:

“There is a weird badge.”

to:

“There is a weird badge, and Blizzard has specifically placed the original Diablo on the BlizzCon show floor.”

Conspiracy boards generally become more interesting when somebody starts supplying actual thumbtacks.

Blizzard Is Still Hiding Parts of BlizzCon

The timing becomes even more suspicious because Blizzard has openly acknowledged that the currently published BlizzCon information does not reveal everything.

In its official Know Before You Go guide, Blizzard says several areas of the show floor remain under wraps and will only be revealed after the Opening Ceremony.

We already ran into the same problem when examining the enormous mysterious “Immortal Event” block on the Diablo Stage schedule. Blizzard has created a convention programme where some information is deliberately vague because the announcements are apparently meant to come first.

That makes almost every strange Diablo detail slightly harder to dismiss.

A Remaster Is Still Far From Confirmed

This is the point where we should remove the ceremonial tinfoil helmet for a moment.

There is still no announcement of Diablo Remastered.

No release date.

No screenshots.

No store listing.

No official statement saying Blizzard has rebuilt the cathedral.

The playable Diablo stations could simply be running the existing PC version. Blizzard has every reason to showcase the original game during its 30th anniversary regardless of whether a modern version exists.

It may also be part of a broader effort to celebrate the company's older games. Diablo II: Resurrected has already received the extraordinary Reign of the Warlock expansion this year, and Blizzard appears unusually willing in 2026 to revisit things previously considered finished.

That is interesting context.

It is not confirmation.

What Would a Modern Diablo 1 Release Even Look Like?

A full Diablo II: Resurrected-style remaster is only one possibility.

Blizzard could release a relatively conservative enhanced version of Diablo with modern resolution support, controller controls, Battle.net integration and quality-of-life improvements while leaving the underlying game almost untouched.

It could produce a console version.

It could bring Diablo and Hellfire directly to Battle.net.

It could create a larger anniversary collection containing multiple classic Diablo games.

Or the BlizzCon surprise could have absolutely nothing to do with rereleasing Diablo 1.

We have previously argued that the original Diablo does not desperately need a remaster. The game remains playable today, and community projects have done impressive work preserving it on modern systems.

But “does it need one?” and “would Blizzard make one during the franchise's 30th anniversary?” are not the same question.

There is still considerable appeal in reopening Tristram with modern presentation while keeping the slow, claustrophobic structure that makes the original game so different from its descendants.

BlizzCon’s Legacy Focus Makes This Even More Interesting

The larger pattern may ultimately be more important than any individual badge or demo station.

Blizzard is dedicating real BlizzCon space to its legacy catalogue.

Diablo II received major new content this year.

The original Diablo is returning to the show floor.

Classic-game panels are part of the official programme.

And portions of the convention remain deliberately hidden until Opening Ceremony.

That is an unusually fertile environment for some form of classic Diablo announcement.

It could be modest.

It could be a remaster.

Or Blizzard could simply be assembling the most elaborate possible 30th birthday party for a game we can already play.

The Remaster Theory Has One More Piece of Evidence

For now, the responsible conclusion has not changed very much.

A Diablo 1 remaster remains a rumor.

What has changed is the amount of circumstantial evidence sitting around it.

Earlier this week we had a suspicious Twitch badge and a major anniversary.

Now we know the original game itself is being placed back in front of BlizzCon attendees as part of Blizzard's unusually prominent legacy-game presence.

There are still plenty of ordinary explanations for all of that.

But if Blizzard does announce a modern version of Diablo during Opening Ceremony, we are rapidly reaching the point where everyone will look back at these clues and wonder how subtle they were actually supposed to be.

The cathedral will be open at BlizzCon either way.

The only question is whether Blizzard has been renovating it.

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Is Diablo 4 Slowly Turning Back Into Diablo 3?

Diablo IV launched in 2023 looking almost determined to prove that Blizzard remembered Diablo II existed. The world was darker. Progression was slower. Great items were genuinely difficult to find. Level 100 felt distant, the endgame was comparatively restrained and the game seemed slightly embarrassed by the screen-filling speed and astronomical power levels Diablo III had eventually embraced.

Three years later, some players are beginning to ask a slightly uncomfortable question: did we just take the scenic route back to Diablo III?

A community discussion asking exactly that has now grown past 160 replies, with players arguing over increasingly fast progression, easier access to powerful gear, enormous damage multipliers and the expectation that every serious build should eventually bulldoze the hardest content. Season 15 has become the latest focus because Blizzard is once again adding substantial character power while making some of Diablo IV's rarest rewards considerably more predictable to acquire.

The comparison is not entirely fair.

It is also becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.

Diablo 4 Has Removed a Lot of the Friction It Launched With

The clearest difference between launch Diablo IV and the current game is not one specific system. It is the accumulation of dozens of changes designed to remove frustration. Leveling became faster. Helltides became more rewarding and more consistently available. Bosses became easier to target farm. Mythics gained deterministic acquisition paths. Tempering became less punishing. Seasonal progression became faster. Build-changing items became something Blizzard increasingly expects ordinary players to actually see rather than read about on Reddit.

Many of those changes were improvements.

Launch Diablo IV could confuse inconvenience with depth. Spending dozens of hours without seeing a meaningful upgrade did not automatically make the eventual upgrade spiritually important. It sometimes just meant your helmet had remained suspiciously adequate since level 71.

But there is a cumulative effect when every source of friction gets sanded down. One player in the current discussion summarizes Diablo IV's development as a repeating loop of adding friction, receiving community backlash, reverting the change and then making the grind easier than before.

Eventually, convenience stops being a collection of quality-of-life improvements and becomes the design philosophy.

Season 15 Pushes Even Further Toward Predictable Power

Season 15 is a perfect example because several of its best ideas deliberately make character progression easier to control.

Blizzard is changing Mythic crafting so an upgraded Unique can become the Mythic version of that same item rather than disappearing into another random roll. We previously called this one of Season 15's most sensible Mythic changes, because upgrading an item should probably not resemble throwing it into a raffle.

Legacy Uniques are bringing Stone of Jordan, Leoric's Crown, The Furnace and other familiar items into Diablo IV. Soul Splinters provide enormous seasonal bonuses, including substantial multiplicative damage increases attached to various trade-offs. Rebirth removes the need to recreate the same seasonal character manually. New crafting systems give players more direct routes toward the equipment they want.

None of these systems is individually “Diablo III.”

Together, however, they continue moving Diablo IV away from “maybe you will find the thing” and toward “here is the path to the thing.”

The Rare-Item Argument Is Really the Same Argument

We saw exactly this tension last week when players started asking Blizzard to introduce truly rare items again. Mythics were originally so scarce that many players could complete an entire season without seeing one. The community hated that. Blizzard gradually introduced target farming, Resplendent Sparks, crafting recipes and eventually Mythic 3.0.

Now some players complain Mythics are too accessible.

There is something wonderfully Diablo about finally receiving exactly what you asked for and immediately missing the suffering.

But the concern is legitimate. An ARPG needs something beyond completing a checklist. If every important item has a predictable acquisition path, the loot hunt risks becoming less about discovery and more about assembling the expected equipment in the expected order before optimizing Greater Affixes afterward.

Diablo III eventually leaned heavily into that philosophy. Seasonal sets could establish an entire build remarkably quickly, after which the real game became increasing numbers, finding Ancient and Primal versions and climbing Greater Rifts.

Diablo IV is not there yet.

But the philosophical distance is shrinking.

The Pit Has Become Diablo 4’s Greater Rift Problem

The comparison becomes even harder to avoid when progression is measured through The Pit.

Diablo III had Greater Rifts. Diablo IV has The Pit. Both provide escalating numerical difficulty and inevitably become a public measuring stick for whether a class or build is “good.”

That creates a particular kind of balance pressure. If one build clears dramatically higher Pit tiers than another, the weaker build can feel broken even if it comfortably handles almost every other activity in the game. The target gradually shifts from “does this build work?” to “how far can this build push?”

The current forum discussion explicitly points toward this mentality, with players describing Pit 150 as the benchmark around which builds are increasingly judged. Once players expect the upper end of scalable content to be realistically attainable, Blizzard has to provide enough character power to make that expectation possible.

Then the numbers get bigger.

Then the monsters get tougher.

Then the multipliers get bigger again.

Diablo III veterans may recognize the architecture.

But Diablo 3 Becoming Faster Was Not Necessarily a Failure

Here is the inconvenient part for anyone hoping to use “Diablo III” purely as an insult:

lots of people really liked Diablo III.

Not necessarily launch Diablo III with its auction house and peculiar economic experiment, but the later seasonal game that knew exactly what it wanted to be. You created a character, assembled a powerful build quickly, filled the screen with enemies, watched increasingly unreasonable numbers appear and then pushed as far as you wanted before returning next season.

One player in the current debate simply argues that there is nothing wrong with Diablo IV following that direction because Diablo III became a highly polished modern ARPG. That position deserves more consideration than “D3 bad.”

Fast seasonal progression fits how many people actually play Diablo now. They arrive when a season launches, build something ridiculous, enjoy it for a few weeks and leave. Asking those players to spend two months hoping one required Unique appears does not necessarily create longevity. Sometimes it just means they leave sooner.

Diablo 4’s Problem Is That It Still Seems Unsure Which Diablo It Wants to Be

This is where the argument connects directly to our wider Season 15 criticism. The biggest concern is not that Diablo IV resembles Diablo III. It is that Blizzard still appears to be negotiating with itself about what kind of game Diablo IV should become.

Players who want a Diablo II-style loot hunt ask for genuinely rare items and meaningful long-term progression.

Players who treat seasons as six-week power fantasies want reliable builds, accessible Mythics and less wasted time.

Competitive players judge classes by maximum Pit performance.

More casual players want to finish a build without needing an external economics degree.

Blizzard keeps attempting to accommodate all of them.

That may explain why Diablo IV can simultaneously feel too generous and too grindy, too easy and too punishing, too deterministic and buried beneath RNG.

The game is trying to serve audiences whose definitions of “Diablo” are separated by twenty-five years of completely different games.

Maybe Season 15 Should Stop Apologizing for What Diablo 4 Has Become

There is a version of this story where Diablo IV slowly becoming more like Diablo III is not evidence that Blizzard has lost its way.

Maybe it is evidence that the game has finally discovered what most of its current audience actually enjoys.

Season 15's Soul Splinters look fun precisely because they offer immediate, dramatic power with interesting drawbacks. Legacy Uniques are exciting because players will actually get to use them. More deterministic Mythic crafting respects the time invested in an item instead of destroying it for another spin of the wheel. Rebirth removes pointless seasonal administration.

Those are good changes.

The danger is what comes next.

If every season needs to be faster, more powerful and more generous than the last, Diablo IV eventually runs into the same escalation problem Diablo III did. Damage grows. Difficulty grows. New progression tiers appear to contain the damage growth. Then players demand access to those tiers, requiring more damage.

At some point, the numbers stop describing combat and become astronomy.

Diablo IV does not need to become Diablo II again.

It does not need to be ashamed of borrowing from Diablo III either.

It just needs to decide which lessons from both games are worth keeping before “more power” becomes the only answer it has left.

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