Blizzard confirms numerous changes and updates to seasonal Renown in Diablo 4 items, including map discovery progression and Altars of Lilith.
Blizzard's Diablo 4 Campfire Chat revealed upcoming changes to seasonal renown mechanics, including previously discovered Altars of Lilith and map discovery progression. Since its launch at the beginning of June, Diablo 4 has seen massive success for Blizzard, not just with stellar reviews, but additionally smashing a longstanding sales record for that company. Even with all that success, most players would agree that Diablo 4 isn't a perfect experience, as many patches and updates have previously been released within the weeks since launch.
As a live service title, Diablo 4 is continually changing, in terms of content in addition to adjustments being designed to the core experience. Some of these changes, just like a Nerf to Diablo 4 dungeon XP farming, left fans a little frustrated looking for answers to why these changes were made. To help address fan feedback and tease exactly what the Diablo 4 team is focusing on, Blizzard held a campfire session and revealed numerous upcoming tweaks and adjustments.
The Diablo 4 Campfire Chat, which featured prominent people in the developer team including Rod Fergusson, Joe Shely, and Tiffany Wat with associate director of community Adam Fletcher, answered a few of the more pressing questions the city had raised. On the topic of Renown, a seasonal resource earned for exploring and finishing activities in each zone, Blizzard confirmed the team is reevaluating what system will have to be repeated because the mechanic is supposed to reset with each year.
However, the Campfire Session did make sure some Renown progression aspects don't feel happy having to do it more often than once each season. Namely, map discovery continues to match a player's Eternal Realm achievements, so while waypoints still have to be collected, they'll at least show up on the map. The Renown earned in these areas may also be rewarded automatically to every new character. This is similar to the Altars of Lilith unlockables, which will not have to be collected again for every Diablo 4 season. While side quests, strongholds, and dungeon renown will still reset, the team continues to reevaluate making changes in the future as necessary.
Another major piece for this Campfire Session was the recent uptick in Hardcore characters getting killed because of cheap Diablo 4 gold server disconnects. With the added chance of permadeath, Blizzard is looking into methods to prevent these cheap deaths from happening, though a simple fix isn't arriving soon. For now, game director Joe Shely advised players to help keep a Scroll of Escape within their inventory all the time as a temporary workaround might find the game automatically utilizes it if a disconnect occurs.
Diablo 4 is placed to launch on June 6 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
