Exactly. And that’s right. Look at the powers of season 8. They could very well be special runes that would fit into special purple items with 4 sockets. In addition to chasing this new item, the powers could remain as nerfed runes forever.
Then in the next season the powers would come with runes again and we would always have new powers combined with old ones and we could vary the sockets of the item, such as arrangements, colors for slots, etc. We would always have something to chase and we wouldn’t have powercrep.
Seasons are supposed to break the rules and make players go oh WTF did they do!? I must try that and experiment with that and build hype and such. S2 did quite a bit of this as it was the first time we got this power setup and that was fine but they keep reusing it. They got nothing left. What we have now in S8 is just a slog to earn the best powers at the end and then do omega dps wtih super op boss powers. What fun is that? Where is the experimenting and breaking the rules? How did we get to this being a season and every season for the next entire year??? All hope is lost for this game. The roadmap just killed this game. Its over.
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Less so seasonal powers and more so that the theme feels tired. For all its ills, i loved S3. S2 might have been the best. S7 was alright. I dont even remember what 5 was. S1 was kinda underwhelming.
Im slightly skeptical, but i will give it a chance
They’re not bad, they’re overused. The game only has so many stats and most of them are already capped. So, you’re either shuffling deck chairs around with those stats or just gaining a straight damage power.
That’s not a bad idea for one season, but not every season.
As much as it was initially hated, S3 is still my favorite season. The pet was interesting to theorycraft and we got a unique seasonal activity. When they said at launch that they had so many ideas for seasons, I thought we’d get more like that, not endless seasons of reputation boards and borrowed powers.
People are clamoring for new things to do and that roadmap said we’re getting more borrowed powers and more reworks. That’s why people are mad.
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You mean the streamer partners playing POE2, LE, and No Rest for the Wicked. They’ll take a day or two to play D4, and then right back to those other games.
It’s not something I get troubled by. Level of attention I give to seasonal features can vary from “some interest” to “negligible interest” and all in between. Don’t pay that much attention to the season dates either really… it’s just something that’s there. I wonder about the relevance of seasons at times, but I can see why they’re there.
Imo there’s different things in the game for different people. It’s not worth getting too caught up in… a lot of it is surface stuff.
I think the fundamentals and the integrity of the platform matter more.
This 100%. It would be so nice if all this was added to eternal game and then we could choose which one we want to use at any given time. Obviously we couldn’t have all extra powers at once, but we could choose what power we want.
Also let us play battlepass on Eternal without an expiration date. If they were to make this simple change I would never play seasonal again. I dislike having to run seasonal just to get rewards from the battle pass.
Also give Eternal players an Eternal journey comparable to the seasonal. Just have the pet at the end be a color swap. One color for seasonal one for eternal.
I just want to be done with seasons and grind for battlepass and rewards on eternal with no expiration dates.
Edit: Choosing which power you’d want would also unlock that seasons events to run and the reputation vendor for said event in Eternal.
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Because it is the same boreing concept in 3 seasons now. Seasonal mechanics should interact with systems like crafting, item drops, socketables, skills, paragon, glyphs etc, to give you power. Not the same old accure power, put in the seasonal tab and level them up, by killing stuff.
This is because they are constructed on top of other borrowed forces - aspects, etc. and all this turns the game into a clown fiesta. Roughly speaking, you press some skill that you have specially learned and kill the mob with anything except this skill.
It was about the same in WoW during the BFA.
Just bad design desicions.
There have been nice seasonal powers that added variation to the builds. Now we will face boss powers that are needed to get anything done. All other skills are just fillers to reduce cooldown and bring up the boss powers asap.
You can compare it to the bloodwave of the necro this season. Attack enemies while doing low damage, collect enough blood orbs lying on the ground like a clumsy kid to activate “Kill Em All” Button.
It could be like this:
- player 1 decides to play twisting blades rogue in S8
- creates or copies a well done build having fun with every single skill he has chosen. And the skills do enough damage to deal with every content and tier.
- player 1 gets happy when he gets access to boss powers who provide nice features like a huge damage blow or stuns all enemies etc… going hand in hand with her/his build. Not dominating it.
But in S8 at the end it will be like i mentioned before. You just mindlessly press some skills that dont do any damage to get your boss-power up and 1-shot anything. No need to see and do boss tactics.
Seasonal… thats what people will defend till eternity. Instead of having more persistance like us having the possibility (no ones forcing you to do so) to keep our precious hard fought weapons and gear.
If you reach lvl 60 you could say: Cool. Now i can use my best gear.
Non-seasonal-computor-voice: Have fun. And keep in mind we already put lots of new greater gear for you to hunt for into the game. Player 1: Yipppieh!!! Lets gogogo for the precious item hunt. But wait… its not seasonal anymore. What about content? What about seasonal powers? Computor-Voice: We got you. Theres new QUALITY activities, bosses, dungeons, skills/powers etc added on a regular basis. enjoy.
Player1: Thats so awesome. I have so much fun. I will buy everything shown in ye olde ingame shoppe twice!!!
Grumpy Seasonal Defender Player 2: But i want to start with a new character from scratch.
Computer Voice: Just do it. Whenever you want.
Here ya go. 2022 - 2 years before the gane came out.
“Diablo IV’s Seasons are modeled after those of Diablo III. When a new season begins, all the characters from the prior season are moved to the Eternal Realm, where you can keep playing, leveling up, and collecting loot. To play in the new season, you’ll create a fresh character and experience the new seasonal features and content while leveling up alongside other players. This, along with capping paragon points in Diablo IV, ensures that your effort and skill—measured by both dexterity and theorycrafting —determine how powerful your character becomes. It also allows players who missed the last season to participate. This season design requires that all sources of character power come from playing the game, so you will not be able to pay for power in Diablo IV.”
To this day, that still holds true. If you’ve been playing D4 since 2024 expecting some miracle change to Seasons and it hasn’t happened yet, I don’t know what to tell you. It’s a Seasonal Game. They stated it upfront.
Personally, I was disappointed more things didn’t carry over after Season 1. I thought I’d be able to keep Seasonal loot I earned, just with non-interactable features (like removing or changing Malignant Powers). That isn’t the direction they went. I was disappointed, but I got over it. Seasonal Powers have always been “borrowed”, and it’s been the model for 2 years. That, flatly - is the game.
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Well except that D3 seasons added the cube and gearing followers and echoing nightmares and new zones …
Regardless, they have a terribly lazy model for seasons. They can’t be surprised by the negative feedback.
And D4 has added new zones, followers, new bosses, new Uniques, Legendaries, Aspects - literally every Season has had some sort of addition to the base game.
But like I stated, it’s a Seasonal game. That’s where the Seasonal powers and gimmicks stem from, and it has been for 2 years. It’s not a surprise. There’s no shocked pikachu face here.
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Ergo, you have to have eternal before seasonal content is available. Seasons are still an activity in the game. Example: You cannot play a season without owning the game (eternal)… I can however play eternal and never touch a season.
Clearly we define “seasonal game” differently. For me a seasonal game only has seasons, no eternal. Play a season, character done, start new season, rinse and repeat.
As an Eternal player I’m not a fan of Seasonal powers that are required to do content.
I don’t mind if they look cool or add SOME damage…but do not make them do MOST of the damage.
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Isnt this the same braindead take every season or every update to other games?
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Okay - and how long have you been playing D4?
And to follow up that question:
- what has changed in the previous 2 years since launch regarding Seasons?
- and why are you just now surprised and shocked?
No, because the seasons until now had different thematics.
Now its powers powers powers, recycled recycled for whole 2025 so we dont even have to wait to campfire crap to get disappointed.
They even got the guts to put the “AND MORE” like a cliffhanger if someone is interested on that crap roadmap anymore lmao
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Been playing since Season 2 if I remember correctly.
From what has been reported, the Boss powers on the PTR for Season 8 are FAR AND AWAY greater than any seasonal power has been…like 90% of the damage.
I dont Like IT cause IT IS another Power layer that Takes away urgency from items and char Progression. They 2 pillars of a ARPG.
Think of IT Like that. You get to a Restaurant and there are 30 different meals to choose. So IT feels Like you choice Matters.
Then you realise that they put in a Ton of taste enhancers that will make all of These meals taste samey.
Suddenly you realise your choice was actualy nit realy important.
In D4 Like any Other Arpg IT IS important to make all classes feels Special and worthwhile.
Borrowed Power IS the Opposite. One Pool of Power for all. They more powerfull the borrowed Power the worse IT gets.
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