Diablo 4 patch 1.0.4 changes Helltide Chests to drop Unique items

Blizzard made a lot of noise Thursday with the announcement of a new character class — the first new Diablo class in nearly a decade — for Diablo ImmortalThe reveal of Diablo 4’s first season. It also released a brand new patch for Diablo 4This makes for a few meaningful changes to the game.

Along with a range of bug fixes, patch 1.0.4 changes Helltide chests so that they now drop Unique items — the most powerful class of loot in the game. The change came as news to Diablo big cheese Rod Fergusson, who admitted on Blizzard’s developer update livestream that he had no idea Helltide chests didn’t drop Uniques. They do it now.

The players can now farm Uniques without having to grind Nightmare Dungeons. Helltides are hourly monster-filled events that are available in Nightmare and higher difficulty levels after completing the campaign. This will be a nice change for those who are bored with the same old scenery. Diablo 4Players on the item farming treadmill in late game.

However, if you’re on the hunt for the six ultra-rare Uniques in the game — which Blizzard now seems to be calling Uber Uniques — don’t dive in just yet. At time of writing, a note on the game’s launcher says that Uber Unique drops have been temporarily disabled altogether “while we address an issue with Helltide Chest drops.” Blizzard expects to issue a hotfix and make the six rarest items in the game available again late Friday or early Saturday.

Lower-level players may be delighted to learn that three of the game’s more frustrating bosses — Vhenard, Brol, and Cyhrach — have had their health pools and damage output nerfed in the patch. Cannibal warlord Brol, in particular, proved quite a roadblock on my first solo run through the campaign, so I’m delighted to see the big bully brought down to size.

The cap for crafting materials that players can accumulate will also be increased from 9,999 up to 99,999.

Diablo 4’s first season, Season of the Malignant, starts on July 20 and introduces socketable items called Malignant Hearts that confer new powers on players and open up new character build possibilities that Blizzard describes as “stupid broken” — in a good way. But you’ll need to finish the campaign and start a new character to take part.