- Coming to you from somewhere in Sanctuary. This is episode 4 5 2 of Shattered Soul Stone, your Diablo Community podcast. This episode is called No Blis Con , which some of you may have heard about but I'll go into details in just a minute. Today is April 4th, 2024 and this is Jen. So I'm starting off of course with the update on this year's BlizzCon and Blizzards 2024 live events post that was posted on April 25th.
But I'll get to that in just a minute because some of you may have noticed that I skipped an entire month of podcasting and the reason was I have a ton of food allergies and there was something I ate that had a specific allergen in it that my body cannot break down. So I really was sick for a very long time, like all through March and um, part of April and it was really bad.
I didn't need to be hospitalized or anything 'cause there would be nothing a hospital could do for me to fix that and it was just excruciating and painful and exhausting. But I'm back now. So here we go . So again, I'm gonna start with the Blizzard, uh, post titled and update on this year's BlizzCon and Blizzards 2024 live events. And I'm just gonna read it to you. It's not very long.
This is what they wrote. After careful consideration over the last year, we at Blizzard have made the decision not to hold BlizzCon in 2024. This decision was not made lightly as BlizzCon remains a very special event for all of us and we know many of you look forward to it. While we're approaching this year differently and as we have explored different event formats in the past, rest assured that we are just as excited as ever to bring BlizzCon back in future years.
Over the next few months we'll be sharing more details about our launches coming later this year, including World of Warcraft, the War Within and Diablo Four's first expansion vessel of hatred. I'm gonna stop there for a second. I remember them doing a live broadcast that included some images from the vessel of hatred expansion, some kind of excited to see that or play that I haven't been playing Diablo for in a while because as I said I got sick.
But I'll get back to it To continue on with this post to celebrate these upcoming releases and to bring our communities together in new and special ways. We will soon share some exciting plans for other industry trade shows and conventions like Gamescom. We can't wait to tell you more about those plans soon.
We're also looking forward to the Overwatch Champion series Stops at both DreamHack Dallas and DreamHack Stockholm and we're thrilled to be planning multiple global in-person events to commemorate the 30th anniversary of Warcraft, which will be held in addition to the in-game celebrations across our Warcraft games throughout 2024.
While these events are distinct from BlizzCon, we're harnessing all of our creativity and imagination to ensure that they carry the same spirit of celebration and togetherness. Our hope is that these experiences alongside several live streamed industry events where we'll keep you up to date with what's happening in our game, universes will capture the essence of what makes the Blizzard community so special.
No matter how you choose to connect with us at these events this year, whether it be in person or virtually, we can't wait to see you there. So I figure that's a good way to start off this show considering you haven't seen me anywhere or heard my voice in a while. So there we are. This was posted on April 25th, 2024 video games. News posted Microsoft has quote, let Blizzard be Blizzard end quote following its acquisition Studio says. So here's a little bit from that.
This one was written by Jordan Midler. Microsoft has let Blizzard be Blizzard following its acquisition of the studio last year. That's according to Holly Longdale, executive producer and vice president of World of Warcraft who discussed what life at Microsoft had been like for the developer during a recent interview with VGC quote. If anything, it's just been helpful. Longdale said we got time with Helen Chang from mojang and we were sharing information.
So it's almost as if we have access to what worked for them. We got to speak to the Elder Scrolls online team and share what we're up to and what's been working and it's, it's almost like we get a benefit. There is no one asking us to do anything. She continued World of Warcraft is doing very well and they're very proud of what it's been able to accomplish. So it's almost like just let it be and let it keep being awesome.
They've been tremendously supportive and it's like let Blizzard be Blizzard and that's probably all you need from that one is kind of a short post, but that's what's going on. I think the purpose of this post, if I were to take a guess, is that Microsoft is not coming to Blizzard and saying You must do this or thou shall not do that kind of thing. So I think that works pretty well. We've also got uh, windows central.com who wrote a thing.
This is written by Jez Cordon with con contributions from Samuel Tolbert. Again, this is in from April, so it's the title is BlizzCon is Skipping 2024 in favor for multiple global events to showcase World of Warcraft Diablo's expansion and more. So here's what you need to know, there's a few little bullet points here. BlizzCon is Blizzard's famed convention event typically annualized and held at the Anaheim Convention Center in the United States.
Since 2005, BlizzCon has served as the primary platform for sharing major world of Warcraft, Diablo, StarCraft, and Overwatch News. This year, blizzard has revealed that BlizzCon will skip 2024 in favor of multiple global events. Instead, BlizzCon is not canceled however and will return in the usual format in the future. Update Blizzard confirms this decision was made internally at Blizzard, not higher up at Microsoft. So here's a little bit of stuff from this. It's an update.
Blizzard Entertainment confirms to Windows Central that the decision to skip BlizzCon in 2024 was made by Blizzard and not from higher up at Microsoft. When this news initially broke some speculation on social media questioned where the decision came from. This is a Blizzard decision. We have explored different event formats in the past and this isn't the first time we're skipping BlizzCon or trying something new.
While we have great things to share in 2024, the timing just doesn't line up for one single event at the end of the year, a Blizzard spokesperson tells Window Central. Instead, we want to focus on highlighting individual games and their moments, Warcraft's multiple anniversaries, the upcoming releases of World of Warcraft, the war within and Diablo force's first expansion vessel of hatred in particular.
So there's that. I've also got another thing here from Blizzard, which was kind of a surprise to me. This one was posted on, when was this posted? Exactly? I'm not sure, but sometime recently. So it's a press release titled The Blizzard Entertainment and Net Ease Renew Agreement to bring beloved titles back to China. Microsoft Gaming Net Ease. Enter broader collaboration Blizzard titles to return to Mainland China beginning summer 2024.
Microsoft gaming and Net Ease deepen their relationship with a strategic partnership based on their shared desire to bring new gaming experiences to players across platforms and markets. So here's the presser in its entirety. The rest is kind of hype and most people probably stop reading there unless they're trying to do a show like I am.
Okay, uh, beloved video game titles from Blizzard Entertainment that captivated millions of players in China will return to the markets sequentially beginning this summer under a renewed publishing deal. Blizzard Entertainment comma, Microsoft Gaming comma and Net Ease announced today. I don't know what date this is on there. So today could be whenever, I'm not sure.
Uh, after continuing discussions over the past year, both Blizzard enter entertainment and Net Ease are thrilled to align on a path forward to once again support players in mainland China and are proud to Reaff reaffirm their commitment to delivering exceptional gaming experiences.
The renewed publishing agreement will encompass games Chinese players had access to under the previous agreement World of Warcraft, Hearthstone, and other titles in the Warcraft, Overwatch, Diablo, and StarCraft Universes Building upon more than 15 years of past collaboration. Blizzard and Net Ease are working diligently on relaunch plans with further details to be shared at a later date.
Separately, Microsoft gaming and Net Ease have also entered into an ag, an agreement to explore bringing new Netea titles to Xbox consoles and other platforms. Quote, we at Blizzard are thrilled to reestablish our partnership with Net Ease and to work together with deep appreciation for the collaboration between our teams to deliver legendary gaming experiences to players in China. Said Joanna Ferries, president of Blizzard Entertainment.
We are immensely grateful for the passion the Chinese community has shown for Blizzard games throughout the years and we are focused on bringing our universes back to players with excellence and dedication, celebrating our collaborations. We are thrilled to embark on the next chapter, built on trust and mutual respect to serve our users in this unique community that we've built together.
Said William Ding, chief, chief Executive Officer and director Net Ease quote, our commitment to providing more exhilarating and creative entertainment experience remains unwavering and we are excited to see positive synergies fostered to encourage and empower collaborations to bring the joy of gaming to a broad community. Quote, blizzard and Net Ease have done incredible work to renew our commitment to players. Blizzards universes have been part of players' lives in the region for many years.
Returning blizzard's legendary games to players in China while exploring ways to bring more new titles to Xbox demonstrates the commitment to bringing more games to more players around the world. Said Phil Spencer's, CEO of Microsoft Gaming. I happen to have an Xbox and I like it and I've been playing games on it. I haven't been playing Diablo four yet, but I'll probably jump into the new season as it happens.
But this is kind of good news and I think this sort of collaboration with, um, Microsoft and Net Ease and Blizzard and Net Ease and Xbox and Net Ease, I think that's gonna like fix what was broken before while um, Bobby Kotek was in charge of Activision Blizzard. So I think this is like a renewal and things are gonna go really good and I'm actually really excited that they're gonna have more Xbox stuff for me to play with and others who have an Xbox to play with. So I think that's kind of cool.
Moving on, we have games beat here, um, and it's from Venture Beat actually. It says Activision Blizzard and Able Gamers Fundraiser Champions Inclusive Design. I always like what happens when people do stuff for the Able Gamers group. There's a, a logo here of Able Gamers with a little joystick and then Activision Blizzard next to it. Um, who wrote this one? I don't actually know who wrote this one, but it's here on Venture Beat. So I'm gonna read you some of this.
Activision Blizzard announced last week that it's working with able gamers on a new fundraiser last week. I don't know exactly when this was posted, but okay. The company has opened a sweepstakes where participants are eligible to win special prizes, including special trips to Tray arcs and Blizzard Studios while all funds go to Able Gamers Mission. The campaign is open right now and runs through May 10, so you have some time to get into that if you want to.
The two entities have collaborated on three different experiences. One for Call of Duty, one for Diablo, and one for World of Warcraft. All three offer different prize pools as I guess you would assume though the top prize for each one is a trip to tour the development studio, parentheses tray arc for Call of Duty blizzard for Diablo and wow with paid Hotel stay and round trip tickets.
Other prizes include a custom made Ghost mask, a signed Dragon Flight Collector's edition, and a Diablo four uh, times Hot One's hot sauce bottle called Lilith's Hatred that part's in parentheses. The sweepstakes also promotes Able Gamer's mission of combating social isolation with games. The charity says that on the fundraisers page quote, we empower people with disabilities to forge meaningful connections that aren't confined by their geographic location or abilities.
End quote, Activision Blizzard also praised able gamers efforts in the game design space in its announcement post quote, inclusive game design is a key pillar throughout our organization because we know that we have a responsibility to create worlds where everyone can feel welcome and play their way through its accessible players experience training.
Able gamers has equipped Activision Blizzard developers with the knowledge and resources to develop more accessible games and I think that's fantastic because very often if you have a group of people that have some sort of disabilities but really wanna play video games anyway, there's ways to make that happen and I think they're all working on this together as a group for, you know, able gamers and um, Activision Blizzard and, and all of this kind of stuff.
So, um, some of it is like, here's some prizes you can win, but I think the rest of it is that, you know, time and time again, Activision Blizzard really, really does want to have people who have disabilities able to access their games and enjoy their time in those games and it's gonna depend on, you know, what disabilities you may have or how you're gonna get around those things.
But I think it's good that they're at least like trying and you know, trying to make sure that hey, you know, you may have disabilities, like I have some disabilities, I'm dyslexic as fuck, right? So, um, I'll get words wrong and stuff once in a while. You've probably heard, but like there's a lot of people that uh, have other disabilities that are not like mine that could really benefit from this kind of thing.
I, there are, I don't think there's too many companies that are gonna be like, okay, so we have this new cool game we're gonna, we're gonna put out or we have a new expansion for this game we wanna put out and like just ignore all of the things that would make it possible for people with disabilities to play the games, you know, so they, they need this group because they wanna play too and I think they should be able to play as well.
Moving on, we have from Maxwell Gigi, uh, written by Drey who as I've said many times before, gets everything right in my opinion. Um, so this is the season four campfire chat wrap up. Did I watch the campfire chat? No, I was sick. , this was posted a couple days ago on May 2nd, 2024. So I'm just gonna read this to you and you can get all the information that you'd like to glean from this, but red site's exceptionally good at these types of things.
So here we go. The season four campfire chat took place. The panel consisted of Joseph's Joseph Ppor, associate game director, Adam Jackson, lead class designer, Colin Finer lead live game designer, Derek Nunez, lead seasons designer and Adam Fletcher, associate director of community. The topics included PTR learnings. They did have a PTR, let me like go into that for a minute. There was actually a PTR for the upcoming season.
I, I guess the new season if I'm, I may be wrong about this but from what I've seen online, it seems like the new season is gonna be accessible with your older characters so you could go back and run through like the storyline if you wanna do that. And also there could be like a seasonal aspect. So I think that that would be kind of neat. So the topics include PTR Learnings, class balancing season four and Q and A. See all the major points below.
So here's the general part, the dev team discussed general items, the PTR and what has changed since then. Legendary items give equal amounts of veiled crystal as rare items sacred and ancestral breakdown into two times and three times the crafting materials respectively. Greater apexes now have an easy weight, sorry, easy now have an easy to recognize, lemme try that again. Greater apexes now have an easy to recognize icon in the name while on the ground as well as sitting in your inventory.
Imprinting costs have gone way down allowing players to imprint as they want to. Nightmare Dungeon Glyph XP acquisition has been increased by 25% and ARDS now scale with higher nightmare dungeon runs giving more at higher tiers. Resplendent spark, which looks like some kind of gem now drop off your first tormented boss kill Uber Lilith kill and complete the reputation reward with the iron wolves itemization. There was a reiteration of the changes to items.
Rare items have only two apexes Legendaries have three apexes. Greater apexes are a cool new addition that can give you 150% of the normal bonus to an AFIX or Forex, whichever. Also lowering the quantity of affixes but upping the quality on them on gear was a big step forward. They eased how some damage works. Damage on Tuesday that's in quotes and simplified some requirements slash conditions killing monsters at level 100 now guarantees. Item power 925 loot reducing inventory sifting.
Ultimately it's about getting a good item and working on it. Tempering, not too much has changed since the PTR allowing players to skip the animations was added. Also a stat range was added to the preview of the rolled apex to help make it clear how good of a role it is. Master working, a lot of the system is unchanged. The skipping feature has been made better with the non-critical ranks being autos skipped. There is no fail rate for the later ranks of master working.
However, material costs are adjusted. A little bit to compensate. Also the conversion of materials with caches was stated to be made better from the PTR with a long-term solution. In the works Post season four, the Pit. The pit was stated by the community to be a little too easy. Adjustments have been made to increase Monster Health to not always be one shot. Also master working materials have been shifted into deeper tiers of when you receive them.
Tier one materials equals level one through 30 was one through 20, tier two materials level 31 to 60 was 21 to 40 tier three materials level 61 plus was was 41 plus. So those are definite upgrades that seem like could they could work. The players in a group that did not open the pit level should receive 50% of the rewards of the player that did open it.
This was an increase and hopefully not make group running the pit feel so punishing Boss Ladder and Ariel has been added along with the tormented version monster level 200. The effort versus versus reward wasn't good enough.
The team reduced the summoning material requirements for tormented versions only from three x, uh two, three x from five x with five x the total rewards given other bosses besides Durel and and Darel have a similar chance to, sorry, smaller chance to drop an Uber unique now season journey. This is gonna be kind of interesting. uh, the Dove team will be curating a bunch of legendaries that are focused around a certain build.
These will come from completing certain objectives slash chapters to help get players up to speed quicker. The five build styles are for the barbarian. It is the Dust Devils for the Druid, it is pulverize for the Necromancer it is minion army, which makes absolute sense to me because that's what Necromancers do have. I played one in D four, not yet. Rogue has barrage. I've played a rogue before in the game and a barbarian and some other stuff. Um, and Sorceress has incinerated.
That's the ones they're getting. Then there's the hell hide. A lot has changed with hell hides the accursed rituals to summon the blood maiden for great Luth Lu and Boss summoning materials. The threat meter as it fills up more ambushes and visits from the hell worm happen more frequently when a full hell born not a hell worm. A hell born attacks you defeating it grants more loot and summoning materials for Lord's. Zero hell ties are now in world tiers one and two.
That's new. Some elements like the meteorites and roaming bosses aren't present. This is to make hell tide fun but not too crazy for lower levels. Here's some more information. Cinder drop rates weren't where the team wanted them. They went back and upped the drop rate to get it where they wanted it. Bain full heart drops were inconsistent. They don't want players to hoard them so they made the rate of getting them more stable.
Increased rewards have been added to those who contribute to summoning the blood maiden. Extra legendary items, uh, include forgotten souls, exquisite blood, and a chance that other boss summoning materials can drop there. Doomsayers no longer have a small chance to drop a doomsayer chest. Instead they just drop that loot directly. That's kind of cool. And next is season four Loot reborn, which is from what I've been seeing online is a pretty accurate uh, description.
So this has to do with the iron wolves. If you dunno who they are, they've been in a bunch of different uh, Diablo type games. So, uh, or Diablo games specifically. So iron wolves are a permanent part of Hell Tide and season four seasonal players will be able to heed the quote call of the Wolves End quote. As you participate and work through the seasonal quest line, you'll earn reputation for earning juiced up rewards capped off at the end with a resplendent spark.
It's a little stone Cosmetics as well can be earned. And there's a little picture here of something called profane mind cage and it just shows you like what it can do. Finally, exclusive to seasonal characters is a new elixir, profane mind cage. It increases hell Tide, monster level cinder drop, cinder drop rates and threat gain. They are obtained from hell born and also through the reputation rewards class updates.
Here we go. The dev team discussed itemization, the PTR and what has changed since then. PTR lessons, end game survivability issues, enemies are kind of easy and then they one shot you hard to balance on top of survive, uh, top end survivability variability and player defensiveness is high Armor is confusing. Some stats can get very high allowing for crazy things. We like crazy things but have to take computer performance into account. Ballots changes and bug fixes.
The team brought up three major areas that they took lessons from PTR. They received a lot of feedback and and addressed each one for season four. So armor season three, physical damage mitigation, physical resistance cap of 85% amount of armor you need to be at the 85% cap is based on the level of the monster you're fighting. Examples level 50 monsters is 5,265 level 100 monsters is 9,230. Level 150 monsters is 12,960. Players never know when they're done with armor the hidden systems.
Now for season four, here's what's changed. Same as season three, uh, physical damage mitigation, physical resistance cap of 85% still need escalating amounts of armor as monster level gets higher. Armor now cap when fighting level 100 monsters. Once you get 9,230 armor, you are finished with your journey. The armor being an in an infinite scaling stat right now in season three, the team went back and capped the amount of armor you'll need at level 100.
This is to give the player a goal, to hit a goal that is clear and not hidden and most importantly not waste gear apex slots by going over the capped amount. There's some stat caps. I'm not gonna read all of this to you. Balance updates, okay, I'm gonna read that one. Lots of balance changes based on feedback changes due to combat readability and to balance player power. Fewer dust devils, fewer fractured winter glass, frozen orbs still going to spot a lot, just not crazy amounts.
Fortify damage reduction increased from 10% to 15%. Many tempering effects updates. Druid Wolves Health increased by 200%. RESP spawn rate reduced by 50%. And then there's like some uh, things that are make it clear at the PTR. Here's somebody in a building with a bunch of fire going around them and I can't even see what the character is in there. There's all these numbers just overlapping each other. That was in the PTR in season four.
Some of those numbers still look like they're overlapping and it looks like the season four one. This is actually training dummies that they're fighting at this point. Then there's uh, dust devils, there's visual improvements. So the PTR it was this big glowing round thing. And then season four, it's gonna be a little bit less than that. The new scoundrels kiss originally made a line of arrows, meaning rogues would have to get up close and a little too personally to get all the damage out of it.
In season four, you just point click and all arrows go to that location. Instead there's some bug fixes, uh, Druids hurricane incorrectly, scaling damage ebb and piercers extra missiles incorrectly had a lucky hit chance. Oops. Fixed an issue where FLA Weaver was able to split a fire bolt multiple times if the firewalls were stacked on top of each other. Still discovering and working on other fixes. And then there's some questions in here that you can check out, but this is all from Dread site.
Who does great work with this. Um, I don't think I would be able to parse out all of this anywhere near as well as he does. So when I find something like this that he's posted, in fact very recently, just a few days ago, I try to like let all of you know about it as well. Over on P Diablo, there's a couple of things to talk about. This was written by uh, rush. That's the author's name is Rush on April 26th. So some of this is April, we just got into May. It's fine, it's fine, it's fine.
So this is titled Diablo two resurrected and Diablo three coming to GForce. Now two classics heading to the cloud soon courtesy of nvidia. Now this might make some people extremely excited if they're using GForce. Now here's a little bit of uh, what was written on this. If you enjoy some cloud gaming, there's news from the Nvidia camp this evening regarding Diablo two resurrected and Diablo three on GForce.
Now, while most of you probably won't take advantage of this, it will be an option in the near future. According to Nvidia, there is no date when these two classic Diablo games are being added, but at least we know they're coming. In February, Nvidia announced that Diablo four Overwatch two Call of Duty HQ and Hearthstone were being added to the service.
The way it works is that if you own the games on Battlenet, you can stream them from Nvidia GForce RTX powered servers in the cloud and don't have to worry about your hardware. Download the games to try these out. You can use the free pricing option for a quick test or take out a monthly sub to access all the games. Find out more about pricing here. There's a link to here in that particular thing.
Another thing from Blizzard we have is galvanize your legend in season four loot reborn and there is a blacksmith trying to like modify or fix a sword with all these like embers flying around him. So that's kind of interesting. So here's what this is. I dunno how long this is gonna be, but I'll read it to you anyway. Uh, since I've been gone for so long, the forages burn with renewed vigor, stoked by braziers to hone the steel of sanctuaries finest across the land.
Hell's expanded legions gather and multiply, marshaling their strength to ambush wanderers that fall prey to their hell tide. Fresh from our first public test realm in Diablo four, season four loot reborn begins on May 14 at 10:00 AM pt use the itemization overhaul on new systems tempering and master working to change a noteworthy blade into a force to be feared across all world tears.
Hell Tide is reborn slave monstrosities to fill your threat meter, marking you as prey for the hell born prepared to fight side by side with the iron wolves. A seasoned mercenary company of brethren aiming to quell the demons itemization Reforge master working tempering and more seasons within Diablo four Bear. Their mark on sanctuary in the seasonal realm are unearthing new quests and fresh mechanics to explore and master. Season four loot reborn I they really named it.
This , I think, uh, takes on a new theme, overhauling many core game systems to refresh how items are earned, how they function and how they improve as you level through world tiers during the season.
Unlike previous seasonal themes that affect only the seasonal realm with season four loot reborn, these itemization changes persist beyond the seasonal realm and affect the eternal realm as well read on to learn how itemization will change the way you loot and reap your way across all of Diablo form all updates to our new items classes and skills will be available in our season. Four patch notes which are available here. I didn't bring that into the show though.
Following our developer updates stream on May two, which was couple days ago. General item updates. One of our several goals for the itemization changes is to make it easier to understand which items are upgrades when they drop. We reduced the number of apexes on items down to three on legendary items, two on rare items and made these apexes, yeah, I can't pronounce this right, made these apexes apexes more effective.
Instead of seeing an apex that relies on con conditional values plus 10% damage on non-injured elites, you'll see apexes such as base increase to your movement speed max life or single ranks of a core skill. Dropped items are now simpler to re to evaluate and we've moved their complexity and customization to our new crafting systems. Tempering and master working, which we will describe in more detail below. We've also increased the overall values of these apexes.
So they should feel more powerful. There's a couple of screenshots in here. Uh, by making items more individually impactful, we've significantly decreased the number of items that drop when slaying monsters. The goal here is to spend more time obliterating and less time sorting through the many items that drop. The result is that fewer items will drop overall, but those items will be more likely to be valuable to compensate and stay on par with the norm.
Materials gained from salvaging and crafting have been adjusted to match this change. Also forgotten souls can now be earned from whisper bounties and are rare drop from all elites. The gold cost to re-roll items when enchanting now has a maximum and we've cut down on the materials needed to perform all activities when at the blacksmith.
Additionally, which world tier you play in will directly affect the rarity of the items you earn Sacred items or higher only drop in world tier three and only ancestral items will appear in world tier four. Similarly, legendary items dropped from enemies over level 95 will always have a value of 925 item power.
However, keep an eye out for uniques, some have a chance to appear starting in world tier one and two, all uniques have a chance to drop Starting in world tier three and uber uniques can start appearing as once you're killing monsters that are level 55 at max power level. There's more in here. It goes on and on quite a bit. So I'm just gonna kind of drop it here and you can read all this stuff on chattered soul stone.com when I start putting up everything I talked about.
We've got another one here from Pur Diablo. We just talked about the iron wolves a couple of times. So, um, this one is also about iron wolves. So iron wolves chronicles a blood forged alliance written by grich relive the storied history relief, relive the storied history of this mercenary band of magees. Season four theme iron wolves. As we all know, the first Diablo four PTR ran from April 2nd through April 9th.
During that week, some data was mined from the PTR patch, which suggested that the iron wolves would be featured as part of the season four theme. A handful of articles followed that shared some details about what had been uncovered. These details included an updated version of the Iron W Wolves emblem, which you can see in this article as well as several more icon and detail files, which indicated a clear link to iron wolves.
Content included among the icon files was a map marker comprised of an iron wolves emblem highlighted with a seasonal green leaf symbol. Earlier today, blizzard published a blog post that confirmed the inclusion of the iron wolves in season four. However, most of the recent Iron wolves news has thus far been focused on the seasonal mechanics and cosmetics. Nevertheless, there's much more to know about this famous fellowship. So let's take an in-depth look at their remarkable story.
I'm not gonna read you the whole story, but I'll read you a little bit. Honor bound the Iron Wolves are a storied mercenary company from Stan whose prowess and battle was matched only by their fierce loyalty. Unlike other bands of brigs who could be bought and sold the iron wolves, first and foremost valued honor and duty, all their members were sworn to the the quest of protecting and sheltering the weak and innocent and punishing the wicked.
These combat veterans came from all walks of life, including MAs, cell swords, rangers, and archers. Those who were Fort Wright and willing to conform to the clan's ideology were welcomed into the fold. It was also their tradition to reclaim the armor of their fallen, so it may continue to serve the greater good. Then there's the Iron Maiden, not the band , unfortunately.
Uh, perhaps the one fact that most commonly mentioned when discussing the history of the Iron wolves is that they were founded by a woman named Ashra. In his memory, the fallen angel Terio briefly described her as follows. Ashira spent many years as a member of various unscrupulous mercenary outfits, despising the brutal tactics employed by these groups. She eventually forged the iron wolves and order of cell swords that holds honor and duty above all else.
I know Ashra to be strict with her followers, but also even handed. That's a quote from Teria Ashra. Stu shared an unspoken bond with her retainers and was always willing to fight side by side with them. Under her command, they rigorously adhered to their strong moral code without hesitation. Ash Shira's, most solemn vow was that no harm would ever come to those who were under their protection.
Despite her blunt tone, she was unable to hide her genuine concern for anyone who had been entrusted to her care. She also had a low opinion of the Zacker Room Church, considering it to be both lacking and inferior to sco. I don't know what that one is. The story goes on in this and if you'd like to read more, there's a whole lot of words here you can get into, but this is just kind of the main idea. And I do like reading stories, but I think, you know, I don't need to read everything.
Moving on, we've got, uh, a thing from wow head, uh, Diablo four, season four Loot reborn Developer Update livestream summary. There's a video in here and that's kind of about it. There's a little bit of description that seems to have come from somewhere else, uh, but you can check that out if you want to. Also over on wow head new seasoned blessings coming to Diablo four. Season four increased Paragon Glyph XP OAL drop rate from Hell Tides posted two days ago by arcane.
Uh, here's a little bit of this anticipation is building as Diablo four's fourth season Lu reborn is only a few weeks away, while much is already known about the changes coming with the release of season four. There is still new information being released regularly in the recent blizzard blog post. Alongside other new information, the seasonal blessings were revealed.
So here they are. There are three new seasoned blessings to unlock as you progress through the free tiers of the battle pass, which means you need an Xbox. I think as you reach certain milestones, you will unlock smoldering ashes, which can be spent in order to unlock and upgrade each of the seasoned blessings. These will grant various boons to age you in your journeys.
During season four, earn of Nightmares boost Paragon Glyph XP earned in nightmare dungeons Earn of iron, boost your reputation with the iron wolves from hell tide activities earn of B burning Obel boost the amount of obel you can find in held tide chests, which contain obel during this season. Increasing Paragon Glyph XP is a huge player. Convenience as you begin to approach end game as it will help save a considerable amount of time.
This means the less time spent farming nightmare dungeons and more time for the new and improved held tides or the pit of Artificers exclamation point. The reputation increase with the iron wolves in season four can potentially be quite profitable early game as their reputation. Rewards will include several tempering manuals, which are a critical component of upgrading your gear in the new and improved crafting system.
Increased a drop rate of ovals from held tide chests might seem to be a lesser choice than the others at a glance. However, with the adv advent of the itemization overhaul and new crafting system, blizzard has also simultaneously decreased the drop rate of items. Rare items will no longer flood your screen constantly as you play the game, but if you are on the hunt for a piece of gear to craft onto, Obel can come in quite handily as a means to supplement your drops with exactly what you need.
Plus, if you want to try your luck at getting a better legendary aspect role to put in the Codex, Obel are a fantastic option. It goes on from there. And I've got a few things here to round out the show. You may have seen on Twitter, holy Night, 3000, who has been making amazing artwork about various characters within the Diablo universe. And, uh, he's got the whole thing over in Deviant Art.
So there's a whole thing and it's like really tiny to see, but if you click on these things one by one by one, you could see everything that he's posted and created. You know, it's obviously art taken from the Diablo series, but I don't think any of the Diablo workers or the company, I think they're, they'd be really happy about. You know, how he's pared this out. I think that's really cool. And the center of it is the, uh, thing you've seen probably when you were playing Diablo three.
And it has like all of the characters, you know, in, in battle basically with like gold behind them. It's kind of neat. Um, I highly recommend you check those things out and that's where I'm going to end the show for today. Yes, it went a little long, but I skipped a whole month, so I tried to give you a little bit more in this episode. You have been listening to episode, uh, what is it now? 4 4 51. I think it's 4 52 of the Shattered Soul Stone. Your Diablo community podcast missed an episode.
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Thank you for listening, and thank you for being patient with me while I was sick.