Diablo 4 hasn't had a great week, as the game's latest patch caused widespread fury amongst the game's community. In an effort the quell the anger, Blizzard held a Campfire Chat earlier today to address the issues and explain why certain decisions were made regarding unpopular nerfs and changes.
Game director Joe Shely, associate game director Joe Piepiora, and associate director of community management Adam Fletcher were all present to discuss the patch, admitting that it was something Blizzard got wrong and that it won't be repeated in future patches. Fletcher explains that the team has seen player feedback and has heard fans "loud and clear", while Piepiora admits that the "sometimes we just don’t get it quite right."
The team also took the opportunity to announce a bunch of new changes will be coming to the game right now and in the immediate future, including a hotfix that will nerf the difficulty of Nightmare Dungeons that will roll out today. On top of that, the team also announced that Patch 1.1.1 will address a number of issues raised by the community. Sorcerers and Barbarians are expected to get a pretty significant boost to their power, the former getting a nice increase to survivability as well.
Another one of the major changes is an adjustment to XP gain, as fans have found that getting stronger once they hit level 70 is a bit of a slog. Thankfully, this upcoming patch will make getting to level 100 a little easier, as Piepora explains that the Diablo 4 team wants to make hitting max level feel like "an achievement" rather than a job.
Patch 1.1.1 will also increase the density of monster in Nightmare Dungeons and Helltides, another much requested change fans have been crying out for since launch, and will also adjust inventories to allow players to carry more items and elixirs. We don't have a specific date for this patch, but it will be rolled out in the next couple of weeks, possibly soon after the next Campfire Chat which will take place on July 28.
Finally, Blizzard also announced that it will be changing the way it interacts with the community to ensure a patch this unpopular never happens again. Instead of gauging player feedback after a patch has gone live, Blizzard will now release patch notes via streams or blog posts at least a week before the changes go live, ensuring that players are never surprised by potential nerfs or tweaks prior to future seasons.