Nobody is particularly surprised anymore when the newest hero or class added to a game ends up being its strongest by far. You can’t really be the new flavor of the month without some extra sauce. But sometimes developers don’t get the balance right and the new toy gets left on the shelf for other, more exciting options.
This is basically what happened when warlocks debuted in Diablo 4 alongside the release of its Lord of Hatred expansion earlier this year. Despite being a marquee feature of the expansion, warlocks were criminally underpowered compared to the rest of the roster. Other classes–with their newly juiced up skill trees—could smash their way through the game while warlocks were left to limp along in their wake.
Normally, I wouldn’t care that much if one class couldn’t compete with another in a largely singleplayer game, but warlocks also suffered from having a number of skills that forced them to stand still to cast, disrupting the flow of combat. They were not only weaker than everyone else but clunkier, too—the last thing you want in a fast-paced action RPG like Diablo. Even paladins, the other new Lord of Hatred class, weren’t as flimsy as warlocks when they arrived.
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Blizzard will be giving warlocks another chance next season. According to people like creator MacroBioBoi, the fussy skills are fixed and the buffs are huge. On the PTR, warlocks are capable of clearing out the hardest dungeon tier in the game even using severely unoptimized gear. In the current season, this was only really possible by exploiting bugs.
Blizzard dumped a ton of buffs into warlock skills and opened up ways to scale their damage that weren’t available before. Builds that were mediocre are now cruising through the game without fear. MacroBioBoi showcased a build where you surround yourself with burning skull minions and had no trouble melting through high-level monsters.
A chunk of the warlock’s power comes from a new seasonal gem that gradually makes you stronger the more enemies you kill, but MacroBioBoi suspects that even if you were to nerf that gem, warlocks would still be one of the strongest—if not the strongest—classes in the game. And the best part is that their newfound power has been distributed pretty evenly across their skills, so a variety of builds should excel when the season comes out for real.
A Season of the Warlock will no doubt help some players cope with Blizzard’s controversial decision to rework the strongest items in the game. Mythic Uniques will continue to function as the new highest tier of items, but will be easier to craft and find than they are in the current season.
We still have no clues on what is missing from the PTR though. Blizzard said the mysterious lack of a new seasonal system (other than the jewels) will be cleared up at BlizzCon. My money’s on a seasonal story that will finally tie directly into the main story as we get closer to a third expansion.