It's time for Shattered Soul Stone, featuring the latest news from sanctuary and beyond. Each episode, a heroic party of Neum Band together to help keep you informed on everything in the Diablo universe. And now, your Diablo Community podcast. Coming to you from somewhere in sanctuary. This is episode 3 95 of Shattered Soul Stone, your Diablo Community podcast. This episode is called Ups and Downs. It is January 27, and this is Jen. So I'm gonna start off with Proletariat.
Polygon has an article here you might remember if you, if you caught the last show. I think I talked about proletariat and unioning and unionization and how this, you know, how this goes at Activision Blizzard, right? So the last thing I talked about was them wanting to include everyone in, in the the union vote.
And so the article from Polygon is titled, workers at World of Warcraft Studio Proletariat Withdrawal Union Petition Proletariat's Union include intended to include all non-management workers. This is written by Nicole Carpenter, workers at Boston-based World of Warcraft Support Studio Proletariat, also known as Blizzard. Boston are pulling their petition with the National Labor Relations Board and will not vote on a union. They announced their petition in late December, both,
but withdrew it. The application on Tuesday, a representative of Communications Workers of America blamed management's quote, confrontational tactics, end quote for the withdrawal petition, claiming the company held, quote, a series of meetings that demoralized and disempowered the group making a free and fair election impossible. Proletariat Workers Alliance was looking to secure the company's current paid time off plan, as well as flexible remote options.
Healthcare benefits and ensuring transparency and diversity are top priorities. With the petition withdrawn, workers at Proletariat will not vote in a union. And that's really sad because that means if you're nasty enough to people that want to ha want to have a union, first of all, it's, that's a sign that they need one because you're not treating them well at all.
But in addition to prevent this particular group from having access to healthcare benefits in the United States where it's really hard to get healthcare, it's expensive and it's complicated, and this is just being mean. That's all that is, that's just being mean. So here's a quote.
We appreciate that the CWA has unilaterally decided to withdraw its petition in response to employee feedback media relations VP Joe Kris said in a statement to Polygon, as we've stated, we welcomed the opportunity for each employee to safely express their preferences through a confidential vote. Our team at Proletariat does extraordinary work every day.
They remain focused on working with their teams to continue to make proletariat a place where all can grow, thrive, and be part of an amazing team and culture. Dustin Yost, a software engineer at Proletariat, said in a statement issued through CWA that originally the majority of workers supported the union. The workers said meetings, which framed the conversation as a personal betrayal and quote to management, took a toll on that support.
While we are withdrawing our union election petition today and truly hope that management will prioritize the concerns that led us to organize, I still believe that a union is the best way for workers in our industry to
ensure our voices are being heard. Yost said, other workers, some of whom describe themselves as pro-labor, felt that the process was rushed announced when the company was on holiday break, followed by confusing communication proletariat, user interface artist and user experience designer Kat Dolan told Polygon Dolan disputed that the characterization, that management folded union efforts, she added that some workers felt disenchanted by the process saying if they
had been approached differently, things might have ended up differently. And it goes on from here. But you kind of have the, you know, the main idea. Um, there's some explanation about, you know, Raven, uh, went through this B lizard, Albany went through this. They did get their unions as far as I, as far as I remember. I'm pretty sure that's true. But here's a, here's a last piece of this article I'm gonna read to you here.
Companies sometimes fight to expand the size of a unit to water down union organization efforts to increase the probability of a union vote failing. But an NLRB ruling in 2022 made it easier for organizers to unionize smaller groups within a company called Microunits, which puts the onus on a company to provide overwhelming evidence that a group should be opened up. So there's that, and I'm hoping that these guys will still fight for their union and get it
because this is garbage. I mean, I could see if you wanted to have a group that wasn't, you know, that wants a union, just this small little group in your huge, huge company, why not let them just have it, especially since it would mean they'd get things like healthcare, which as I've said in the United States, this is really hard to get. It's expensive, it's hard to keep, there's all this complication in it.
And if they're just like, even just for that, I can't imagine why a big company would be like, nah, let's let them not have healthcare. You know, that's what I'm seeking this as. In addition to working very hard to make the concept of a union disenchanting, I mean, this is monstrous and that's gotta stop. And the more we talk about it in things like this, or when people write about it, it online or tweet about it, we could probably sort of chip away at that big stone of, you know,
nasty companies being mean to their workers, is my opinion. Speaking of that, the New York Times has an article called Unions and Video Games, which, um, I'm gonna read a little bit to you from, and it's, uh, written by Herman or German Lopez. It's probably Iman Lopez if I'm, if my Spanish is correct. So he wrote this, uh, this was written on,
let's see what the date was. January 24th. Tonight, tens of millions of Americans will wind down from a day of work or school with a leisure activity that did not exist a century ago. Video games until fairly recently, games were considered a niche hobby, typically associated with children. And let me just state as someone who's old, um, it was also, it wasn't just, uh, a niche hobby typically associated with children. It was a niche hobby, specifically directed at boys for a long time.
It was a stigma if you were a girl playing a video game anyway, but it's not that he's wrong, you know, but the industry has grown widely in recent decades, about two thirds of Americans, most of them adults play video games. The video game industry was worth nearly 200 billion in 2021 more than music, US book publishing and North American sports combined. It employs hundreds of thousands of people in the US alone,
and then he reaches out to non-gamers. Wondering why this is a big deal, I'm gonna skim ahead here because I'm not gonna read an entire New York Times article into this podcast. And similar to the types of abuses or and tragedies in Hollywood or the N F L that reverberate beyond fans of movies and sports, the game industry has also faced accusations of brutal work conditions, discrimination and harassment. The conditions have prompted more workers to move to unionize.
This month Microsoft recognized its first union after video game, testers organized today's newsletter, which apparently is this. We'll look at how game developers are confronting problems that have been entangled other companies, including Amazon and Starbucks as workers pushed to shape a relatively new industry. So here's some stuff. Uh, there's a section here called Unsafe Workplaces. A common refrain in the video game industry is that no one goes into it for the
money. They could earn more doing similar jobs at other software companies, but instead passion drives them to games. Industry workers have accused employers of taking advantage of this devotion to allow poor conditions to flourish. Quote, the impact so many games have had on me. I want to be part of giving that to someone else. Said,
Amanda Lavin a game tester at the company. Activision Blizzard, quote, corporate leadership, no, we'd rather be here testing a video game than another piece of software so they can pay us way less. Among the more criticized practices of the industry is crunch, where employees are pushed to work 60 to 100 hours a week for up to several months to hit a milestone on a project.
Jason sch Schreyer Schreyer Schreyer, probably a video game journalist highlighted the issue in Time's opinion on 27 in 2017, while crunching one programmer working on the Elder Scrolls four Sky Room in 2011 ended up at an emergency room three times because of severe stomach pain. After he stopped crunching, the pain disappeared. Video game companies say that sometime they sometimes need crunch to finish projects on time and on budget, but are working to minimize their use of it.
Workers like Lavin argue that many companies have done too little and continue to overuse crunch. Activision Blizzard says it pays employees more than its competitors on average and tries to mitigate crunch by paying overtime, spreading hours among team members and dispensing meals. We care deeply for our employees, said Joe Krisna, a spokesman for Activision Blizzard. Wow. They're actually naming who's who, who the spokesman is when they send out quotes for these things. That's,
that's a, that's an update. They haven't done that in quite some time. Uh, he continues, Krisna continues. We don't want any of them to feel like they have to make unfair sacrifices. Another pervasive claim, gender-based discrimination and sexual harassment. In 2021, California sued Activision Blizzard for what the state described as the company's frat boy culture in which women were underpaid and sexually harassed.
Activision Blizzard said that the accusations were a misrepresentation of the company's inner workings and that it had taken steps to improve its culture. In recent years, the accusations got a lot of attention, but those in the industry say the problems go beyond Activision Blizzard. Other big companies have also faced claims of discrimination and harassment, including Riot, Ubisoft and Sony.
Moving to organize the conditions have driven more employees to try to unionize, including several studios at Activision Blizzard and Microsoft organizers told me, meaning the guy that wrote this, that dozens more efforts are underway in the us though most are not public yet. Most game developers support unionization. A recent survey found companies have responded differently to the efforts. Microsoft pledged a neutrality when it's workers move to Union unionize.
Activision Blizzard, which Microsoft is trying to buy, has tried to block unionization pushes. And there's more in here if you wanna read it. Everything I talk about in the show will be in the show notes@shatteredsoulstone.com. And I've got some tweets here that have to do with a gaming conference and covid and I think that's kind of important news for people to see. And not everybody's on Twitter. So I'm gonna read some of these tweets to you. There's a person named JC Lau who wrote this.
I've seen a lot of who will be at G D C discourse, but none around covid safety, which seems surprising given that G D C ended up being a spreader event last year. Here's the short version of covid requirements for G D C from their website. So let's take a look at their website for a minute. And there is a health and safety section that she has linked to. Here's what it says. Ensuring G D C is safe to attend for 2023.
There will be a new slate of health and safety standards to make sure that we are able to come together safely this march. The event will be organized in accordance with the informa all secure health and safety standards and G D C works in conjunction with state and local health authorities to adhere to all regulations and guidelines. At the time of the event, learn more about some of our initiatives below, or review the full list of health, safety and security teams and terms and conditions.
We will continue to update this page as new information becomes available. So here's what it says now, uh, there's vaccine requirements. Proof of covid 19 vaccination or negative COVID 19 test will be required and checked when you arrive at Moscow Center.
I hope I'm pronouncing that right. For the in-person event, attendees will be required to bring a physical or digital proof of the first series of vaccinations, such as the two shot Moderna or Pfizer vaccines, or the one shot Johnson and Johnson vaccine, along with their government issued photo ID or acceptable proof of a negative COVID test. Acceptable proof of a negative COVID test includes a printed document or electronic test result from a test provider or laboratory.
A P C R test must be administered within 48 hours before receiving your badge. While a verified rapid antigen test must be administered within 24 hours before receiving your badge. Testing will also be available on site self-administered tests like at home. Rapid antigen tests not verified by a third party will not be acceptable for entry.
So one of the things I'd like to say about this is if the only thing they're asking for is proof of the first series of vaccinations, so the two shot from Moderna or Pfizer and the one shot from Johnson and Johnson is the ones that they're aiming at. So it goes on mask policy. A face mask will not be required to wear while indoors, but is strongly encouraged. That's the thing.
As soon as people see strongly encouraged, if they are already disinclined to wear a face mask in a large group setting, they're just not gonna do it. There's an onsite covid testing thing and it's showing where you can go and what times. Uh, there's a social distancing thing that simply says, please maintain appropriate social distance and respect the personal boundaries
of other attendees. Now, the personal boundaries thing might be some people don't wanna be hugged, you know, it might be that kind of thing, but the maintain appropriate social distance and then not say what the conference considers to be appropriate. Social distance means no one is going to socially distance, you know what I mean? This is, this is how you get a super spreader event. Again, uh, they're doing contactless registration, so, um, to make things easier, okay, that's cool.
There will be hand sanitizers throughout the facility and they're doing something. The facility is doing enhanced deep cleaning before, during, and after the event, so that's good. Apparently the Moscow Convention Center was awarded the Global Bio Risk Advisory Council, G B A C Star Facility Accreditation by issa, the world's leading trade organization association,
sorry for the cleaning industry. So that's a good thing, and they're gonna do a lot of stuff with the air ventilation to make, make things a bit safer. Proof of vaccination or negative PCR within 48 hours slash rapid test, 24 hours is required at the door to get your badge. Tests have to be done by a third party. This is the same as last year where there was this huge hours long line of people and confusion for how this was managed.
There's nothing that requires proof of boosters after the initial vaccination, either we're how many variants out from the initial COVID shot. Now there is no additional testing required for attending CDC G G D C. So if you get covid but have proof of vaccination, you're okay to attend. Masks are not required for G D C this year. That part's in all caps. This is a change from last year where everyone was required to be masks in the Moscow Center.
This time it is strongly encouraged but will not be enforced onsite COVID testing is back again, although it specifies on their site to fulfill the negative covid test requirements. So it's not clear if this also covers the testing that was available for everyone last year. Having the ability to rapid test onsite was really useful. G D C also has a list of health and safety terms and conditions,
which I think you have to agree to as part of registration. Maybe I am cynical, but given the FOMO that people really have for G D C, I am skeptical about people complying if they really want to attend. There's general stuff about social distancing, hand sanitizing, et cetera, given where we are in an ongoing pandemic, plus the fact that multiple people got sick during slash after the conference last year, this is a reminder to do what you need to do to feel safe if you do
decide to attend. And I think that's some good advice overall. That's not something I'm gonna do. I don't think I'm going to go to any of these big conferences until I don't know when, you know, I don't wanna, like I am at huge risk of catching whatever's going around, be it the flu, a cold, whatever, or any covid strain. So I don't know, just take care of yourselves, people, be safe, be smart. And then we have some controversy,
which probably didn't need to be a controversy, but here it is. Uh, this is from Bloomberg. It is titled Blizzard Manager Departs in Protest of Employee Ranking System. And this is written by Jason Schreyer and it has a World of Warcraft, uh, logo at the top of this one. So I'm just gonna read you this and we'll go on from there. A manager at video game developer Blizzard Entertainment said he was ousted after refusing to give a low evaluation to an employee that he felt didn't
deserve it in order to fill a quota. In 2021 Blizzard, a unit of Activision Blizzard Inc. Implemented a process called Stack Ranking in which employees are ranked on a bell curve and managers must give low ratings to a certain percentage of staff. According to people familiar with the change who asked not to be named
discussing a private matter. Managers were expected to give a poor quote, developing end quote, status to roughly 5% of employees on their teams, which would lower their profit sharing bonus money and would hamper them from receiving raises or promotions in the near future at the Irvine, California based company known for games like Overwatch and World of Warcraft. They named the guy in here, Bloomberg named the guy in here who, who this is about.
Uh, it's been all over Twitter. It's been all over the internet. Um, and I'm, he did respond. So I'm gonna just roll with this so we at least have context. Uh, Brian Birmingham, who was the co-lead developer of World of Warcraft classic, wrote an email to staff last week to express his frustration with this system.
He wrote that he and the other managers on the World of Warcraft team had been able to circumvent or skip filling the quota for the last two years, and that he believed the mandate had been dropped or wasn't strictly enforced. But recently, Birmingham said he was forced to lower an employee from the average of successful rating to developing in order to hit the quota. Now,
I don't know if this quote is accurate or not. When teams, when team leads asked why we had to do this world of Warcraft, directors explained that while they did not agree, the reasons given by executive leadership were that it was an impor was important to squeeze the bottom most performers in a way to make sure everybody continues to grow Birmingham wrote in the email, which was reviewed by Bloomberg.
This sort of policy encourages competition between employees, sabotage of one another's work, a desire for people to find low performing teams that they can be the best performing worker on and ultimately erodes trust and destroys creativity. Birmingham wrote, according to Bloomberg, that he refused to work at Blizzard until the company removed this stack ranking policy. If this policy can be reversed, perhaps my blizzard can still be saved. And so, and if so,
I would love to continue working there. Birmingham wrote, if this policy cannot be reversed, then the Blizzard entertainment I want to work for doesn't exist anymore and I will have to find somewhere else to work. He sent, before he sent the email, Birmingham told a large group of colleagues he was resigning. He said he was then called by an HR representative to confirm his resignation and he told them that he was still considering it, but that he would not work until the policy was retracted.
He was then terminated. According to the email, Birmingham didn't respond to a request for comment. Now I don't know where that, that, uh, email came from exactly. I don't know if Birmingham sent that or not. It's kind of fishy. So let's hear from Birmingham himself on Twitter. He wrote this. I wasn't intending to make this public, but apparently it's in the news already. So I'd at least like to set the record straight.
I am no longer an employee of Blizzard Entertainment, though I would return if allowed to so that I could fight the stack ranking policy from inside. I'm told the forced stack ranking policy is a directive that came from the, a BK level above Mike Ibarra. I don't know for sure, but I suspect it's true. Everybody at Blizzard I've spoken to about this, including my direct supervisors, expressed disappointment about this policy.
For those who don't know, a BK is the parent company formed by Activision Publishing expressed their interest in buying World of Warcraft from Vivendi in 2008. Blizzard's market value was enough that Activision Publishing could not buy it outright. Instead, they arranged to form a new company called Activision Blizzard, which would own Activision Publishing and VII's Games division, including Blizzard Entertainment. Vivendi had about 50% of the shares of Activision Blizzard at the time,
or less than I'm not sure. Uh, greater than, yeah, greater than, okay. In creating Activision Blizzard, they needed an executive. And Bobby Codick from Activision Publishing was selected as the new c e o of Activision Blizzard. Mike Mohe, still president of Blizzard at that time, reported up to Bobby Kotek staff at Activision Blizzard Bobby and an investor group staged a hostile takeover, meaning that they brought up more than 50% of Activision Blizzard shares
brought up. Sorry. Uh, there's no actual violence in a hostile takeover despite the name. I forget which year this happened, but it resulted in greater control. Activision Blizzard then acquired King, becoming Activision Blizzard King or A B K A BK was then apparent company of
three different companies that they owned. Activision Publishing, blizzard Entertainment, king I I R C. The first year we were asked to meet a specific quota of developing RA ratings was in the 2020 evaluations across the winter of 2020 to 2021 I I R C. This was also the first year they tried to unify the review slash appraisal systems across all three child business units. Activision, blizzard and King all had similar appraisal processes by this point, and a BK wanted to unify them into one.
Presumably this was the motivation for enforcing a 5% developing rating to make it match in all three studios. I'm not defending this, only explaining. Brian Birmingham says, we at Blizzard push back pretty hard in 2021 and I truly believed we had reversed the developing quota policy when the sexual harassment lawsuit was revealed later that year. We saw some change following that as well, and it felt like we could make an impact on a BK policies.
The realization that there's still a minimum quota for developing, despite our objections and sternly worded letters leads me to believe I was operating under an illusion. I hope Blizzard's positive culture can overcome AB K's poison, but it isn't succeeding in doing that yet. So having explained all of that, I bear no Ill, ill will Torned my former colleagues at Blizzard Entertainment.
The blizzard I knew and always wanted to work for is being torn apart by the executives at a bk and it makes me sad. I truly respect the developers I worked with at Blizzard. I will still play Blizzard games. The developers at Blizzard are still amazing. Dragon Flight and Wrath of the Lich King Classic are gems. Dragon writing is amazing in Dragon Flight, as is the old r raid, the new Titan Roone Dungeons in wrath of the Lich King. But a BK is a problematic parent company.
They put us under pressure to deliver both expansions early. It is deeply unjust to follow that. They drive that by depriving employees who worked on them of their fair share of profit. The a BK team should be ashamed of themselves. I must stress that the above is my best recollection of events and we're gonna kind of skip over that one. I can't tell you whether to boycott blizzard games or not.
How best to express your displeasure is up to you. As I said above, I won't boycott, but I can't participate in a policy that lets a BK steal money from deserving employees and I can't be made to lie about it either. And to wrap up, I want to again clarify that I was surprised to see the Bloomberg article below. That's the one I just read you. I did not provide them the email they're quoting from, but I believe the quotes are accurate.
They have neither spoken to me nor reached out to me in any way. So that's sketchy as hell coming from Bloomberg. I mean, aren't news websites supposed to actually, you know, talk to the person before they publish stuff? This is kind of sketchy in my opinion. It's like they wanted to be first with this news and this affects real people every time they do that. It affects real, you know,
humans that are going through something unpleasant. So, I don't know, man, that's, that's kind of sketchy on Bloomberg's part. And we've got a couple people here in Twitter who have talked about this as well. Uh, one of them is, uh, Valentine, i r l Valentine Powell, who is, um, he's got a couple tweets here they think are pretty valid.
He wrote. So while I'm not happy with how this came out, I want to voice my agreement and support for my fellow game devs who left bli, my fellow game dev who left Blizzard. While there was several reasons I left Blizzard Valentine's says Stack ranking was among my top reasons. It's a policy that is fundamentally damaging to team building. I sincerely hope that Blizzard can change its culture in meaningful ways and support its developers who all bring amazing things to the teams.
They are on Blizzard. Developers deserve better than archaic systems that can't take into account the diversity of how people work. I want Blizzard to be the place that I believed it was when I started working there. And I sincerely hope that eventually they will live up to their core values even when it's not easy or profitable to do so. Also, by the way, the guy in question is amazing.
He was one of my favorite advocates for change at Blizzard and a constant source of inspiration whenever I felt overwhelmed. And then there's another person named Josh Greenfield who is a game producer at World of Warcraft classic personal account. And he wrote this, this might be vague and confusing, but if you see a story about our team today, I want you to keep in mind that the person who is the subject of that story did not give his consent to that news being published.
And the quote journalist who wrote that story almost certainly didn't stop for one second to consider the damage that could be to that person right now. They just wanted to scoop. It's objectively good to applaud the bravery of the person who is the focal point of that story. They took a principled stance for something they believe in against something
that is fucking wrong. So I'm very, very proud of him, but I'm also not the only one looking for a new, new job while trying to support a family publishing and signal boosting. This story only adds to the difficulties that this one person may have. Whether or whether or if the person in this story is ready to speak about this,
they can make that decision for themselves. And as we've seen, they, they spoke about this on Twitter, uh, Josh continues until then, consider the harm that this bit of quote journalism and quote can actually do to an ordinary person who only wanted to do the right thing and didn't ask that he'd be outed by some stranger who just wants clicks and page views. He's just a normal guy with a family. And then someone asks about a wow head article and, and Josh's like, no, no, no,
that's not the article I'm talking about. He's talking about Bloomberg. But speaking of wow head, uh, we do have the article here for that. And it does have his name in it and his picture. And I'll just read you a little bit about this. Uh, it's coming from the Bloomberg thing, so it's probably already, probably already said this. Uh, they did add an update to add in Brian Birmingham's Twitter thread, um, which they have in here. So that's, that's at least they did that.
They did give him, you know, his voice in this, which Bloomberg apparently really didn't. And that kind of sucks. Out of the blue, there's a StarCraft two 5.0 point 11 patch notes. This popped out on January 23rd. Yeah, so if you're playing that game, cuz I know they still, they're still, you know, it's still there. I didn't expect patch notes, but here we are. So this is what they're calling it. Um, I'll just read a little bit from here.
Patch 5.0 point 11 has arrived featuring our wide range of balance, quality and life, quality of life changes and bug fixes. These changes were curated by our very own StarCraft two community, which consisted of pro players, content creators, tournament organizers and maters. We want to thank all of them for all their efforts on this update. So there's worker units no longer need to wait for full deceleration before beginning to attack.
Developers comment because of workers' slow deceleration as a result of their mining behavior, we felt they felt very unresponsive when order to attack nearby units. Zurg has creep tumor, uh, that's what they're regarding. Uh, cool down increased from 10.71 to 13.57 seconds. Slight range reduced from 11 to 10 seconds.
Developer comment clarifies where the vision provided reaches for the Zurich as the site range now matches the creep spread by the tumor, slightly reduced in amount, the amount of creep spread in the early game from the Zurich player, especially in situations, and I don't even know what most of this is, but I'm gonna read parts of it. Hatchery Laren hive have creep spread. Interview decreased from 0.3 to 0.25 increases the rate of creep spread from the structures by 20%.
Does not affect creep spread from creep tumors. Site range increased from 10 11 to 12 to 12. Viper after casting abduct the viper cannot move or US abilities for 0.57 seconds. Ultra list reduced size by 12.5%. Increased distance target that can move ultra list's. Attack is canceled from one to 1.25. There's a hydro list thing, there's a brood lord thing, it goes on. Uh, then there's the Protoss stuff.
So if you're really into this, I recommend you check this out cuz it looks like it's got a lot of updates that probably are beneficial based on who they came from. Blizzard posted the Diablo two resurrected PTR 2.6 new Roone words now live thing. Um, and it is their first testing period of 2023. PTR 2.6. We'll go live on January 24, which means it's live now and concludes on January 31st at 10:00 AM p s t. And there's a lot of stuff in here.
So there's eight new Roone words that are coming out and there's a, there's a chart here. There's no way I can explain this quickly in a podcast. So just check it out cuz it's like it's got the new Roone word. The Roone order allowed items, character level, and final stats for all of these new ones. There's a description in here. We are introducing eight new Roone words for ladder and offline, offline single player play.
Our intent with introducing these additional roone words to Diablo two resurrected is to sprinkle variety into the competitive meta, creating an opportunity for players to forge new strategies as they race to level 99. The bulk of these roone words focus on bolstering resistance bonuses while the other roone words are centered on movement, speed and assassin and druid builds. So there's all those in there, which I recommend you go check out if you're interested in that.
There's a developer's note that gives a little more information about that. Then there's this little section here, PTR Focus and details after the PTR progresses. Please be aware there may be periodic maintenance outages or updates based on player feedback. Any changes implemented during this PTR period with to the new Roone words are not set in stone. And we may make additional changes to how these roone word function post ptr.
We are testing eight new Roone words with the desire of spicing up the ladder meta and giving players additional tools to bring new builds to life. The new Roone words are only a portion of the content arriving with patch 2.6. Stay tuned for what else is to come when the patch officially releases it's already been released. Uh, please note that the ladder play is not available for this ptr. The ladder flag can be toggled, but character creation will fail.
To ensure these new room words provide an experience that best serves our players. We will need your assistance and urge you to provide any feedback you may have. You can leave your feedback in the PTR feedback forum. If you discover any bugs, post them in the PTR bug report forum. And then there's how to participate to get into the ptr. And most of you probably know how to do that or don't wanna. So either way,
Maxwell has an Amazon Lev leveling guide. Uh, this is from 2021, but it was updated on September 25th, 2022. So if you wanna play an Amazon in Diablo too resurrected, you can. And there's like a build set and progression and all these wonderful examples of how to make this work really good for you. So if that's your, if that's your class and you really wanna do that one, I definitely recommend Maxwell for, for this, this and any other class builds. They do, they do good stuff.
And then we have the Diablo three PTR 2.7 0.5 preview, which went out on the 26th. Uh, there's an update that on the 27th of January, uh, we have added additional information to further explain the altar of rights and primordial ashes feature. Okay, so here's the stuff. Uh, just a quick run through of this, the PTR focus and details. We will be continuing the patch 2.7 0.5 PTR starting Tuesday, January 31st. So that's ahead of us. Uh, during this time there may be periodic maintenances outages,
hot fixes or minor patches. There will be ptr, unique buffs active to help you on your journey, increased experience gains and double blood char drops. You can also buy new gear for testing from the special PTR vendor named Jank
meme. DJ A N K M I apostrophe em, which I think is hysterically funny, who will exchange blood shards for class specific bags full of legendary items that we'd love for you to test read down below to learn more on the new vendor updates that we've been implemented, that we've been implemented to assist the PTR experience. Starting with PTR 2.7 0.5 class balance and item changes to ensure that the most significant class changes receive an ample amount of attention.
We'd love for you to focus on testing the and feedback on the skill changes to the bunk class and item changes for the barbarian demon hunter, monk, Nero, Maner and wizard classes. The new season theme testing is we're looking to gather feedback on the seasonal content around rights of sanctuary. So, and here's some stuff with how to play the ptr. So season 28 is called rights of sanctuary. For season 28, rites of sanctuary we're traveling deep into the mysterious ruins of the
festering woods. Amid a hunting expedition, citizens hailing from Nutrisystem stumbled across an ominous altar, carved from an archaic material bearing cryptic markings shaken to their core by the Eldridge Charro of the monolith. They enlisted the assistance of brave neph willing to investigate this sinister discovery that was once left to time the altar of rights are it t e s, home to power, uh, home to power thought to be extinct from sanctuary.
The altar of rights will bestow these mystic forces upon worthy nephem. After a sacrifice is offered, you can begin interacting with the altar of rights at level one. Upon arrival at the altar of rights, players will see 26 icons called seals and three legendary potion powers. Take a moment to familiarize yourself with the elements below. So here's the stuff that it does with the seal and legendary potion, powers seal your kill streak timer. Duration and reward bonuses are doubled and there's,
that's a B is pulls of reflection. This is like a whole alphabet thing. So you know I'm not gonna read 'em all. Uh, b as pulls of reflection last for the entire season and are not removed by death. Uh, c items have no level requirement. D 200 plus damage E 25 missile damage reduction, F 25% movement speed, uncapped. It goes on and on throughout the alphabet. And I'll let you check that out. There's one for letter U is pets pick up death's, breaths, , which is interesting. It's like, here you go.
I found this thing for you that's kind of interesting there. How seals and potions work. As you can see after unlocking the first seal, the order in which you unlock additional seals and obtain their power is entirely up to you. And which powers align with your characters build the most. Once a seal or legendary potion power is unlocked, you'll immediately receive that seal or potion power and will have the ability to unlock connected seals or potions.
Once you have all the required materials, all seals and potions can be unlocked by players and the powers apply to all your characters. These power, uh, these powers last for the entirety of season 28. And then there's a description of how to do it. And then there's uh, costs. There's costs to unlock a seal or legendary power or potion power. So one, you need 10 reusable parts. That's pretty easy. Two, one flawless diamond or greater. 15 arcane dust, 20 reusable parts. Uh,
three is one greater rift. Key 10 deaths. Breaths four is any class specific set. Helm, these are gonna get expensive as you go. Holy cow. You know, 19 is never ending questions. I don't know where you get that exactly, but I'm sure people will find it and it just goes on and on. For potion three, you need 165 primordial ashes. That's the the highest one on the chart. Uncover an ancient legend, unlock all the seals. So if you can unlock all of these seals and get all this stuff done,
you get this cool armor apparently. So that's kind of neat. The primordial ashes feature, they really, really went through this. Um, acquiring primal items is no small task. That's why we're adding a new primordial ashes feature with this patch to aid you in your quest at the blacksmith, you can now salvage a primal item for 55 primordial ashes. We've also added a primal item recipe to Cane's cube, allowing you to upgrade any non crafted legendary item to a primal item for 100 primordial ashes.
Only one upgraded primal item may be worn at a time and upgraded primal items do not retain the properties of the legendary item that was used. New apexes are rolled for all upgraded primal items. There's a lot of monk changes, which is interesting to me cause I've been playing a monk for a while. Um, so you can read that if that's your class. There's also item changes for pretty much every class one way or another. So I'll probably have to look at this again once that season rolls out.
I don't usually do ptrs because I honestly forget that they're there. So, um, there's that. But this looks exciting and interesting and it's probably going to be a bit confounding as people try to adjust to what this new stuff is. But I think we'll like it overall as, as a group. Reddit has a thing written by Pez radar, blizzard, community lead for Diablo Mortal and various other things. And he wrote to this looking at 2023 Diablo Mortal. And this was, uh, seven days ago racing into 2023.
The flames of the burning hills are burning hotter and brighter than ever before, a telltale sign of prolific things to come for Diablo Immortal. Our team is committed to injecting frequent new content into Diablo Immortal. And we have numerous updates planned for this year that we cannot wait to share with sanctuaries many defenders. In the meantime, here are some additions to Diablo Mortal. We plan to deliver this year quarterly major updates.
We plan to release four major updates containing improvements to clans in game social features and gameplay, while also introducing a new class and Helic query bosses narrative additions, sanctuaries, a land plagued by constant demonic threat simultaneously the world stone charge forced, sudden, and violent change to the landscape on a whim this year, immortals narrative will continue to grow through new main quest lines and side
quests that further develop sanctuaries, inhabitants ever-evolving gameplay. They actually plan to induce to introduce a competitive mode and fishing activity, and some other stuff. So that ki kind of sounds exciting. I personally can't keep up with all the changes, but a lot of people can. So if they're, if they've got a group of people that burns through these things very quickly and then wants more, I think they're on the right track.
I'll get in there when I get in there, you know. Okay, then we have, uh, from Polygon. This weird thing has to do with Diablo immortal. It's titled Diablo Immortals quote, misleading Blessing of the Worthy Gem under legal scrutiny. This is just, you know, there's been a problem with gems early on in the game when somebody like used third party, uh, things to buy gems from and then had gem debt or something like that.
This is different. Um, this is written by Nicole Carpenter who wrote the other one I read to you earlier. Lawyers from a Class Action specialty firm, SIO Andra are looking for players who are upset about a particular Diablo immortal item. The blessing of the Worthy Gem. The gem was available to players, uh, to purchase in the game, including in bundles that cost up to $100.
Players found that the rare legendary gem had some discrepancies in the wording of its description, rendering it less powerful than players originally thought. Developer Blizzard Entertainment has since changed the text description for the item making the damage scaling more clear. It also handed out in-Game Gems to all players.
Blizzard hasn't changed the functionality of the Gem, however, the problem is that players bought the blessing of the worthy gem via those bundles, expecting that the Gem's Effect would have a 20% chance to do damage worth 12% of a player's maximum life, something the original description promised. But in actuality, it's a 20% chance to do damage worth 12% percent of a player's current life. If your current life is low, the gem won't actually do much damage.
This might not not have been a huge deal if the Gem could be acquired for free, but players on social media have said they've bought the bundles spending up to $100 and more for upgrades specifically for the blessing of the Worthy Gem. Players have been clearly upset in forums on so and on social media with some threatening a class action lawsuit due to the misleading and text lawyers at Ccio and RAD are apparently answering that call with an investigation into
Diablo Myrtle's description of the gem, which it calls false advertising. Quote. This practice essentially amounts to a bait and switch since a purchasable item was advertised with one effect that players wanted and ended up with something completely different. Lawyer said, neither Blizzard Entertainment nor gli, Accio and Rad have responded to Polygons request for comment. And there we are, you know, , there we are. That's kind of a mess.
And uh, rod Ferguson, who is the S V P GM of all things Diablo at Blizzard, tweeted to this, happy to share that Diablo four recently won the most anticipated game of the year 2023 Inven Award in Korea. The Korean fans are amazing and we can't wait to launch globally on June 6th. And, um, there's a, uh, little award there if you want to see that. And finally, I'm going to leave you with a video that came out just recently on YouTube.
It's titled Diablo four Official Release Date Trailer Breakdown. And that's exactly what it is. It's being, it's a deep dive into the backstory of the Diablo four official release date trailer with the Diablo development team. And they do explain some things because you gotta understand if you're new to this, um, some of you might be new to Diablo stuff, but it's been around for a very long time. I think like the nineties or earlier and, um, maybe early nineties.
And there's been a lot of lo going around that you'd have to track down different places. I've done some lore stuff at, uh, it's unshaded soul stone.com and I think I did one about an Nous and one about Lilith. So I think they're in there. I think you're two separate ones if you're really have no idea who those two
characters are. There's some stuff for you for resources and the, there were three people in this one and they just kind of explored a little bit and showed a lot of the really awesome, uh, release trailer that everybody was so enthralled with because it was really good. But it's also to kind of explain a little bit to people who are new and have never heard of Lilith or Anaria. Now I'm sure they've heard of Lilith recently because there's been a lot of
hype. There's been a statue, there's been, uh, t-shirts and things like that. There's been all of the people that got the, what looks like a, a red monk cloak kind of thing. And the whole deal with the candles and stuff like that.
A lot of people got those. They had to read the thing to Lilith. So I mean, I think people either know that name by now if they're interested in this game or, um, they, they kind of have some idea of of who that, you know, what that character is, but I don't think they know an arias. So it's sort of a way to to, you know, get you in there and learn more.
Uh, the, this particular video kind of said, well, we're gonna tell you more about these characters in upcoming things, so there's more to come. And I think that's cool because one of the best things for me about all of the Diablo series is the lore in it. I like stories, I like storytelling, I like figuring out who's connected to who and how with whatever media
I'm enthralled with, I'm gonna keep using that word cuz it's fun. Um, you know, at the time, and it's gonna be a lot harder for someone who's like just brand new to any Diablo game to understand like how, who these characters are, what they mean to the universe at the game, what they've done in the past where you can find the lore, all this stuff,
it's harder to do. So I think if they're gonna do a series about the lore of, you know, Diablo four essentially in, you know, including Lilith and an Arias, who as they say in the video created sanctuary together. That's a lot of stuff to summarize. So I'm just excited for people to learn more of that stuff and get more like understanding of the game and why things are the way they are,
that kind of thing from like a story perspective. So, all right, I'll quit babbling about Laura now and stories and I'll leave you there and I'm going to close out the show. You have been listening to episode 3 95 of the Shattered Soul Stone. Your Diablo community podcast missed an episode. You could find the show blog and listen to the show archives at
www.shatteredsoulstone.com. Come join us in game our in-game community and clan, both named Shattered Soul Stone, are open to anyone who would like to join. You can also join us on Discord for the ultimate team and community based experience, find the Discord invitation link on our Twitter and Facebook page, as well as the Shattered Soul Stone website. Thank you for listening.