PATCH 2.4 BALANCE CHANGES

January 21, 2022

DIABLO II: RESURRECTED PATCH 2.4 BALANCE PTR

Patch 2.4 PTR (PC-only) will be available starting Tuesday, January 25, PST! This patch will focus mostly on balances, balancing classes, mercenaries, and set items. This patch also brings us 7 brand new runewords, check them out below!

Read the full patch notes here

From the Blizzard post

PTR FOCUS & DETAILS
We’re ecstatic to make balance changes that will improve the viability of each class while retaining the class fantasy of our favorite heroes. It has been more than eleven years since we’ve made changes like this to the game! So, when we started making balance adjustments, we wanted to focus on expanding more skill build variety and adding more viable possibilities with playing each class. The game is built around completing the Acts on each difficulty and we wanted our players to be empowered to play their heroes in the ways they preferred. A key opportunity we saw was improving the effectiveness of lesser-used skills.
As we progress in this PTR, please be aware there may be periodic maintenances, outages, hotfixes, or minor patches. All the changes implemented in this PTR are not in stone. We want to gauge reception and feedback on these changes before we make them final for Live. We encourage our PTR participants to explore and play the following new content:
New Class Balance Changes: To ensure that the most significant class changes receive an ample amount of attention, we'd love feedback on changes affecting our seven unique classes.
New Rune Words: We encourage you to experience the new Rune Words that can be created and inserted into correlating socketed gear. Please share your feedback on these new items.
New Horadric Cube Recipes: New Horadric Cube Recipes have been implemented to complement Set items, we encourage you to craft these and share your feedback; especially in tandem with new improvements being made to Set items that are generally underused by players.
And much more: Mercenary changes, Set Item Bonus Changes, New Level Area changes, Item Tooltip changes, and other changes to gameplay have been implemented for testing in this PTR. Your impressions and insights on how these changes affect your experience would be very appreciated.
Please leave your feedback in the PTR Feedback forum. If you discover any bugs, please report them in the PTR Bug Report forum. So, without further ado, let’s dive into these new changes!
PLEASE NOTE: Game content discussed in this blog is not final and subject to change.

An overview of the 7 new runewords

List of patch 2.4 new runewords
Runeword	Sockets	Allowed Bases	Runeword Recipe	Level	Stats
Flickering Flame	3 sockets	helm	nef + pul + vex	55	Level 4-8 Resist Fire Aura When Equipped (varies)+3 to Fire Skills-10-15% to Enemy Fire Resistance (varies)+30% Enhanced Defense (pul)+30 Defense vs. Missile (nef)Adds 3-14 Cold Damage+50-75 to Mana (varies)+5% to Maximum Fire Resist (vex)Half Freeze DurationPoison Length Reduced by 50%
Mist	5 sockets	missile weapon	cham + shael + gul + thul + ith	67	Level 8-12 Concentration Aura When Equipped (varies)+3 to All Skills+20% Increased Attack Speed (shael)+100% Piercing Attack+325-375% Enhanced Damage (varies)+9 to Maximum Damage (ith)20% Bonus to Attack Rating (gul)Adds 3-14 Cold Damage (thul)Freezes Target +3 (cham)+24 to VitalityAll Resistances +40
Obsession	6 sockets	staff	zod + ist + lem + lum + io + nef	69	Indestructible (zod)24% Chance to cast level 10 Weaken when struck+4 To All Skills+65% Faster Cast Rate+60% Faster Hit RecoveryKnockback (nef)+10 To Vitality (io)+10 To Energy (lum)Increase Maximum Life 15-25% (varies)Regenerate Mana 15-30% (varies)All Resistances +60-70 (varies)75% Extra Gold from Monsters (lem)30% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items (ist)
Pattern	3 sockets	hand to hand	tal + ort + thul	23	+30% Faster Bock Rate+40-80% Enhanced damage (varies)10% Bonus to Attack RatingAdds 17-62 Fire DamageAdds 1-50 Lightning Damage (ort)Adds 3-14 Cold Damage (thul)+75 Poison Damage over 5 seconds (tal)+6 to Strength+6 to DexterityAll Resistances +15
Plague	3 sockets	sword, knife, hand to hand	cham + shael + um	67	25% Chance to Cast Level 15 Poison Nova On Striking20% Chance to Cast Level 12 Lower Resist When StruckLevel 13-17 Cleansing Aura When Equipped (varies)+1-2 All Skills+20% Increased Attack Speed (shael)+220-320% Enhanced Damage (varies)-23% To Enemy Poison Resistance0.3% (0-29.7) Deadly Strike (Based on Character Level)25% Chance of Open Wounds (um)Freezes Target +3 (cham)
Unbending Will	6 sockets	sword	fal + io + ith + eld + el + hel	41	18% Chance To Cast Level 18 Taunt On Striking+3 to Combat Skills (Barbarian Only)+20-30% Increased Attack Speed (varies)+300-350% Enhanced Damage+9 to Maximum Damage (ith)+50 to Attack Rating (el)+75 Damage to Undead+50 to Attack Rating Against Undead (eld)8-10% Life Stolen Per Hit (varies)Prevent Monster Heal+10 to Strength (fal)+10 to Vitality (io)Damage Reduced By 8+1 to Light Radius (el)Requirements -20% (hel)
Wisdom	3 sockets	helm	pul + ith + eld	45	33% Piercing Attack+15-25% Bonus to Attack Rating (varies)4-8% mana stolen per hit (varies)+30% Enhanced Defense (pul)+10 EnergyLowers Stamina drain by 15% (eld)Cannot Be Frozen+5 mana after each kill15% damage taken goes to mana (ith)