The Journey across Sanctuary

It has been 50 years since the player characters destroyed the Black Soulstone the Prime Evil and took down the fallen Archangel of Death Malthael at the end of Diablo 3, the world has changed. Sanctuary what was once meant as a refugee from the war of the High Heavens and the Burning Hells, a place not meant for Humans has once again changed, there is a power vacuum and cultists roaming that land calling out to that of Lilith, daughter of Hatred.

The world of Sanctuary will forever be changed by her presence and the last of the Horadrim now stand in defiance of Lilith’s plans, will you stand with them? Or will you succumb like so many others to the power of Lilith?

Acts system changes

Previous iteration in the series has always followed the Act system, you will generally spend the majority of each act in unique locations and move onto different maps and locations upon completing and arc of the journey, this has been a system that has been present in Diablo since Diablo 2 and really set the tone of the story. Diablo 4 in this case decides to do away with this system and now acts as an Open-World experience, from the get go you’re able to go anywhere you want and complete the story in any order that you wish, this gives Diablo 4 a really interesting structure as you can start one story, progress it towards completion and move on to an entirely different part of the story completely out of order without it impacting the overall experience.

Traverse the lands of Sanctuary solo or with your friends, with the open world experience even if you’re alone other players may drop in and you’ll always see people in the various towns littered across the game world. I’m in two minds regarding these changes as I did prefer the nostalgic feeling of moving from one place to another in order but I will admit all the changes, not only to classes but the game in general very much overpower that of any nostalgia bias that I may have had coming into this.

Heroes of Sanctuary

To battle the vast undead and demonic encounters players will need to decide to take the mantle of a specific class, while I didn’t have the pleasure of playing every possible class and spec variety I will briefly cover each of the classes here as well as the unique feature linked to them.

Necromancer

Where best to start but with the classes that I sunk the majority of time into, not just while playing the beta but during the early access too. As with every class Necromancer has been given quite an overall. It’s key element is the new Book of the Dead mechanic, while progressing Necromancers will as expected be able to summon the undead to help combat the evil within Sanctuary, Diablo 4 has decided to take this in a new and unique way by giving the player multiple options in how to handle this staple of the class.

With the Book of the Dead in hand the Necromancer can change their undead minions around to suit his/her needs. Are you about to venture into a dungeon filled with high health minions? Simply swap your frail melee based skeletons into Defenders that not only keep you safe but come complete with block mechanics and high health to add onto this the Book of the Dead can further augment your minions by giving them unique abilities, consider that of the Necromancers most famous minion that of the Golem, this hulking juggernaut can be augmented to share damage taken by the player character if you’re looking for something to tank or.. You could select an Iron Golem (Thankfully you don’t have to sacrifice an IK or Trang’s for this) for its unique slam attack that spreads Vulnerability upon your enemies.
However if you feel minions aren’t your game you can choose to sacrifice all of these for personal power and buffs, the time when Necromancer was only known as the minion class as far changed with this latest iteration.

Sorcerer

This was the class I spent the least time on, after my Diablo 3 experience with its counterpart Sorcerer has always been one of my least favorite classes. Thankfully Sorcerers Enchantment mechanic really gives the class a new spin and while it’s still one of the highest damaging classes in the game the Enchantment system gives it some unique and interesting aspects that gives the class a bit more identity than a living conduit that zips around at lightspeed nuking everything in sight (you can however still do this if you choose) the sheer amount of combinations is quite staggering so I will briefly mention some of the abilities that I enjoyed the most and don’t fret as teleport is still absolutely amazing

Teleport – Your evade is replaced by a short-range Teleport with a 17-second cooldown.
Fireball – Enemies you kill explode in a Fireball that does 50% of its damage.

Barbarian

Another of the classic classes and one that has probably had the biggest overhaul to its appearance and combat, while you can still be the classic whirlwind barb of old all while screaming at the top of your voice, look into the new Arsenal system before running headfirst into the denizens of the dead.

Barbarians now require certain weapon types to get the job done, i.e Slicing, Bludgeoning etc etc so rather than running around with a single Two handed club or Axe Barbarians now have the strength in hand to run around with up to four weapons, yes, you heard that right four weapons! Barbarians are the kings of the stat stick after all so while progressing make sure to routinely update all these weapons for your collection or you may find your strikes beginning to dull.

Barbarian is a completely different beast in this interaction, weapons and skills work in unique ways but while using a skill will swap the corresponding weapon that doesn’t mean you can’t manually swap weapon, you have the option of selecting each weapon that goes with each ability that you choose and the list can get quite staggering when it comes to choice, adding onto this is the Expertise system that adds a further layer to the madness, keep slicing away at those demons and you’ll gain expertise, thus further improving the pure mayhem you can wreck on the battlefield by improving stats and ranks.

Rogue

Next to Necromancer this is most likely my favorite class to play, this may not be the classic Amazon nor the brooding Demon Hunter of old but Rogue is certainly a good mix of the two with a little bit of the original Assassin mixed in and wrapped up in a neat little bow. Rogue can be a little tricky to figure out so I’ll briefly break down the new mechanics included while covering it’s two unique mechanics, first, much like Barbarian, Rogue has access to multiple weapons in this case you have access to a Bow (Amazon variation) as well a two one handed weapons, note however that certain abilities require certain one handed weapon types, for example certain abilities will require daggers and thus can’t be used with one handed swords so the Rogue needs to carefully choose the right tools for the job. This really pulls into the feel and aesthetic of the class and is one of the reasons outside of Necromancer that I picked this class.

Druid

A savage shapeshifter wielding the elements Druids can pretty much do anything and everything, take on the aspects of the Bear and Wolf while receiving the blessings and boons of the spirits leaves Druids to will any niche in the party.

Summon a pack of wolves, ravens and poison creepers to ravage any enemy that Lilith throws at you, tailoring your druid based on the spirit boons you select will make Druid one of the most unique classes in the game, link yourself to the spirit of the Deer for Advantageous Beast- Reduce the duration of Control Impairing Effects by [15%]. Or link yourself to that of the vicious Wolf and receive Packleader-Lucky Hit: Critical Strikes have up to a 20% chance to reset the Cooldowns of your Companion Skills.

While it feels a little slow to level overall due to need so many different abilities and aspects Druid slowly evolves in a monster of a class when geared correctly can become close to unkillable with it’s mixture of elemental and nature magic along with it’s companion skills and shapeshifting abilities Druid really is the jack of all trades class but master on none.

Gearing and Aspects

So you’ve chosen a class, how do you go about improving your power to stand against the horde of undead and demonic forces plaguing sanctuary, well Diablo 4 follows that of the tried and tested timeless notion of loot drops, killing a foe can result in many thing, gold, potions or even pieces of gear itself that the player character can use and improve to make the fighter easier.

The gearing is broken down into Normal,Magic,Rare and Legendary items. However much unlike it’s previous iterations players now have the ability to gain Aspects, upon clearing certain dungeons in the world you’ll be granted an Aspect related to the dungeon, you can use these aspects to transform your weapons into that of Legendary quality, while you will find Legendary weapons and items on your travels, these Aspects gained from dungeons are permanent and can be used repeatedly to suit your playstyle, to make things easier if you happen upon a legendary item that as an affix/bonus that you don’t current want to use you can visit the Occultist in town and simply rip that Aspect from the weapon and save it for later in your inventory, this is a simply amazing feature allowing you to tailor your build to your specific needs, did you find a unique weapon for a good affix but can’t make use of it now? Rip it out and make use of it as a one time upgrade later down the line, the possibilities can quite quite insane later on down the line when legendaries become more commonplace

These aspects can range from additional minions to that of changing abilities themselves, aspects are the way to completely tailor your build and in some cases the aspects alone will make the build itself.

Level 50 and Beyond

The game doesn’t end simply by reaching level 50, much like it’s previous interaction Diablo 4 comes complete with the paragon system but unlike Diablo 3 this paragon system has been expanded to an incredible degree now rather than selecting minor skills the paragon system now functions as a board, while this was a daunting system at first I’ll break down this system as well as it’s different mechanics so it’s easier for people to understand.

The Paragon Board is unlocked upon hitting level 50 and serves as the main system to tailor your build and make it unique from everyone else, to break it down we’ll first begin with the basics  – Nodes, the Paragon board contains Normal, Magic, Rare and Legendary nodes.

Normal Nodes are the most basic node on the board and serve as a way to connect everything together the weakest of the nodes mostly giving simple +5 in a certain stat don’t however doubt the power of these nodes as you will need a certain total of these stats to unlock further abilities on the higher nodes.

Magic Nodes grant much larger bonuses overall and tend to drift more towards percentage gains, such examples could be that of a 7% damage increase to a core skill, magic nodes are generally populated around that of a Rare node regardless of the board and helps to facilitate the bonuses that come with them.

Rare Nodes, this is where your careful planning comes into play, unlike Normal and Magic nodes, Rare nodes confire a substantially larger bonus overall, however the caveat with Rare nodes is that to further improve these nodes the player must meet a certain amount of stats to gain it’s additional bonus, so all those +5 stats quickly add up overall and in some cases the rare nodes can become equal to that of a legendary node due to instances of doubling the stats included within the node itself.

Legendary Nodes, thankfully these are some of the easiest to breakdown, each paragon board only contains one legendary node which generally determines the theme of the board itself, so make sure that you always look at the legendary node when choosing which paragon board you wish to progress as each give a unique ability upon completion.

The keen eyed will note that I mentioned multiple paragon boards, yes Diablo 4 beyond level 50 really opens up the leveling experience to a new degree, how do you go about selecting a new board? Well that’s quite simple, you make use of the Board Attachment gates littered around each board are several board attachment gates that link one board to another, while you are required to start on one board you can quickly jump to another should the bonuses and nodes be something you’re not interested in. I really enjoy this system as it really means that you can tailor your builds to suit your needs and while there will always be the standard cookie cutter builds, tailoring your own builds in this way really makes the journey to level 100 a lot easier to handle overall.

Finally I will cover the last aspect of the paragon board, every Paragon board also includes within it Glyph slots, these Glyphs are powerful enchantments that also require a certain amount of stats to fully unlock the power hidden within, in order to gain this power however you will need to venture on that of Nightmare Dungeons from World Tier 3 and beyond you’ll be able to unlock Nightmare Dungeons, upon clearing you’ll attain not only better gear but also that of Glyphs and experience related to them, leveling up a Glyph improves it ranking.

A magic Glyph for example comes with a radius of 2 board spaces, while covering this radius the Glyph will gain the included stats that the radius covers making it much easier for it to unlock that of its bonuses and abilities.

Further improving your Glyphs will evolve them into rare Glyphs that can increase their overall radius to that of 4 board spaces making it much easier to tailor your build to suit your needs.

I won’t hesitate to say that the game truly begins after the campaign and level 50 to level 100 is a monumental task to take on, there is just so much to do beyond the level 50 mark from PVP, Nightmare Dungeons, Grim Favors and Legendary farming that I simply can’t fit all aspects into just one review. Overall, this really brings the game to life for me, while the struggle to 50 can be taxing at times once you hit that mark the sanctuary just opens up, be sure to look out for those World bosses and unique events to nab yourself some much needed legendary power and outfits.

Conclusion and Player Quotes

Diablo 4 is a stark change from its previous counterparts, therefore I’ll be doing something that I’ve never done before when it comes to reviews, I’ll be including that of player quotes based on the classes that I didn’t have the time to fully enjoy. After all, in order to get this out for the main release I had to sink more than a couple days worth of hours into my main to make it to the later content overall.

Sorcerer is surprisingly tanky with all the barriers and immunities. Loving the CC that sorcerer has. Only issue so far is that I’m running out of mana quite often cause I don’t have the needed aspects for my build. – Aza

“As a Rogue you have a very solid base of skills and playstyles, like Melee, Range, Trapper and more. During the story you can easily experiment what playstyle you like, or completely change it when you find a new Legendary effect. Your Ultimates and Keystones might feel a bit lackluster at the start, but later Aspects and Uniques can drastically change that.” – Todi

I main Druid and to begin with it’s slower on the damage side but scales very well as you progress through the story. Legendary aspects can take a build to the next level and Druid has many options via its companions, earth, and element variations. It is a naturally tanky character that can put out lots of damage and AoE too. A downside is mobility but this can be resolved through skill nodes and gear. A very fun class to play if you like to get up close and personal. – Shadow

In conclusion Diablo 4 is a highly addictive ARPG with a somewhat lacking story attached to it, although named “Diablo” other than a reference in the story I have yet to come across the Lord of Terror himself, the carrot and stick style of progression although tedious at time is incredibly hard to put down and I’ll certainly be sinking more hours of my life into getting those perfect rolls and gear pieces.

Despite the muddled story Diablo 4 is a massive improvement over its predecessors and while there are still numerous bugs and structure issues (being able to farm an event endlessly for loot being the main issue) that need to still be patched these are incredibly specific instances that while making the experience a bit more annoying overall don’t diminish the achievements that Diablo 4 has achieved. With the changes that Diablo 4 has made overall it has now returned to its podium as one of the top ARPG’s in the world of gaming the change to the overall format while done in other games before really changes the overall experience of Diablo as a whole and while I don’t always agree with Blizzard’s practices this is nothing short of a pure success for the company and the series as a whole.

As of the time of writing the doors to Sanctuary have been fully flung open, will you after Lilith’s call?

Important information

For the purposes of this review I have noted that the game was played of a laptop with a lower than required specification. Some of the issues I faced may purely be the result of my current PC situation. I also have been referring to my time playing the Necromancer classes but did briefly mention each class. I have included quotes from other players to better cover the classes I didn’t get as much time to play as during my time.

Skriven av: Steve Gilman