Diablo 4 Resplendent Spark

Diablo 4 DLC development director urged players to remember to watch The Game Awards on December 11th, almost directly implying: "Hey, we're going to show a super cool DLC trailer at TGA."

Every Diablo 4 DLC is incredibly important, like Vessel of Hatred released in 2024, which brought new classes, new maps, new dungeons, and runewords. This DLC significantly boosted the build strength of each class. So what class will the new DLC bring, and what new systems should it introduce to the game?

New Class Paladin

Although the official information about the next class hasn't been released yet, based on some leaked information (players have discovered a placeholder for Paladin), the next class is very likely to be Paladin.

Furthermore, from a story perspective, demons are already rampaging through Sanctuary, players have already experienced Chaos Powers in season 10, and season 11's seasonal mechanic is Sanctification system. This might indicate that angels will return to the Sanctuary battlefield. The appearance of Paladin, representing angelic power, as a new class would then seem quite logical.

On the other hand, Diablo 4 needs a class that can truly utilize shields as weapons; even necromancers don't necessarily rely on shields.

Therefore, considering all factors, the new class is highly likely to be Paladin, and it will probably be heavily inspired by the Paladin design from Diablo II. The development team might also incorporate some of the iconic skills of Crusader from Diablo III.

However, this expansion might also include a completely new class, such as Valkyrie, which is related to angelic power, or Blood Knight, similar to the class in Diablo Immortal.

Endgame Reward Changes

Diablo 4 needs a complete overhaul of the game's reward system, and it needs the introduction of new endgame mechanics similar to Path of Exile 1 & 2 and Last Epoch.

It could allow players play through specific game content repeatedly, such as Last Epoch timeline, to earn Diablo 4 items and experience. These can be used to permanently upgrade the rewards or difficulty of that content, for example, by enhancing these endgame content through a passive skill tree.

Currently, Diablo 4 has too many item drops, and directly adding a new endgame mechanic would be more mess. Therefore, a major overhaul of the entire reward system is needed. This could be achieved by reducing base rewards but ensuring that players focusing on a particular endgame content ultimately receive greater rewards than they currently do.

This allows players to focus on their preferred game modes. For example, if a player enjoys Infernal Hordes, they can customize the rewards for that mode through a dedicated skill tree, such as making the endgame boss drop only unique items, or changing the final chest to something like Belial chest, allowing players to choose their loot.

Season 10 was highly praised because it introduced Chaos Armor, which provides an alternative to repeatedly farming Lair Bosses for powerful and unique items. Adding a new endgame mechanic could be a permanent solution, allowing players to acquire their desired gear through multiple methods.

Diablo IV's Version Kanai's Cube

In Diablo III, Kanai's Cube allowed players to extract the special effects of Legendary Aspects and place them in three dedicated slots. This allowed characters to gain the unqiue effect without equipping the item, excluding the item's base stats.

This could solve the problem of limited inventory slots. Currently, Diablo IV's gear builds are limited by the occupation of unique items, mythic items, and Legendary Aspects slots, resulting in low build flexibility. Kanai's Cube would provide additional Legendary Aspect slots, allowing players more freedom in their builds and making many previously impossible setups possible.

However, the development team plans a major overhaul of the skill tree, potentially moving transformative Legendary Aspects into the skill tree, reducing the need for Kanai's Cube. Nevertheless, this would still be a valuable system.

Read More: What Should You Do Before Entering Diablo 4 Season 11? | 4 Essential Tips

New Gear

The new DLC introduces new gear types and rarities, particularly set items and a revamped Chaos Armor.

Set items have a high probability of appearing, as the developers stated they were working on sets before the game's release, and the expansion is a good time to introduce them, just as Runes did in its first expansion.

However, set items don't need to be the absolute core and essential for builds like they were in Diablo III. They should be a lateral shift or used only in specific situations, not something every build must wear.

The developers have also stated they are considering re-introducing Season 10 Chaos Armor in some form. In any case, Diablo 4 currently needs more rare and desirable gear types to enrich its endgame objectives.

New Endgame Content

Diablo 4's current endgame content is quite sparse, and like all live service games, players always need more content. The new expansion should not only expand on existing content but also introduce entirely new systems.

There are many gameplay elements that can be borrowed, such as combining dungeons with Roguelike elements. For example, each floor could grant new powers or buffs, and players could use currency to shop at occasionally appearing merchants, creating a complete Roguelike experience.

There could even be a standalone mode where players start at level 1 with no equipment and gradually grow stronger throughout an adventure. Other game genres, such as tower defense, could also be referenced to create unique gameplay. Only a sufficiently rich endgame content can extend Diablo 4's lifespan and keep players engaged.

Diablo 4 boasts top-tier graphics and story among all current ARPGs, but its main weakness is its overly simplified gameplay. While this is good for casual players, it also causes the season's popularity to wane very quickly (because most players experience all the content within a week). Hopefully, this DLC will bring healthy and beneficial changes to Diablo 4.

With the season nearing its end, regardless of your class in Diablo 4 Season 10, you should theoretically have found a suitable build. But have you considered upgrading it further to earn more rewards before Season 10 concludes?

Advanced builds suitable for each Diablo 4 class differ. This time, we'll use Necromancer as an example to recommend Shattered Spirit Build!

This build offers reliable damage output and fast enemy clearing, and can be developed into either a farm-oriented or hit-push-oriented build as needed.

Its only drawback is its high gear requirements, but honestly, that's something you should consider, not a flaw in the build itself, right? And its advantage at the end of the season is that you should have already acquired a considerable amount of rare gear.

Next, we'll introduce you to this build and its two variations.

Shattered Spirit Necromancer Build Overview

With all the necessary gear, this build offers consistently high performance, allowing you to quickly eliminate enemies in the current fight and obtain the desired rewards or advance to the next level of The Pit.

Required Gear

Regardless of how you intend to use this build, or if you want to customize it to suit your personal playstyle, you must ensure that the build includes the following three gears; otherwise, it will not function properly.

• Blood Moon Breeches
• Shattered Spirit's Aspect
• Gospel of the Devotee

The latter two items deserve special mention. The name itself reveals the importance of Shattered Spirit's Aspect to this build; it allows Bone Spirit to launch 18 Bone Splinters in all directions, resulting in a 200-600% damage increase and generating additional essences.

Gospel of the Devotee is unique in that it has a Chaos Armor version in Season 10, further increasing the damage percentage by 36% based on the original item's effect. It also ensures that Bone Splinters penetrate enemies.

Basic Skills

You can decide which skills to add based on your subsequent build variants, but the following skills are essential for any Shattered Spirit Necromancer Build:

• Decompose
• Bone Prison
• Reap
• Bone Spirit
• Corpse Tendrils
• Bone Storm

Book Of The Dead

As a Necromancer class-specific mechanic, the choice of Book of the Dead is also important for the build. There are three types of this mechanic, each with different content to choose from. The following configuration is recommended for this build:

• Melee Skeletons - Reaper: Increases shadow damage. If critical strike chance is insufficient, Skirmishers can be sacrificed to assist.
• Mage Skeletons - Cold: Increases damage against vulnerable targets.
• Golem - Iron: Increases critical strike damage.

Speed Farming Version

To achieve this variant of Shattered Spirit Necromancer Build, you need two things: sufficient cooldown reduction to shorten Bone Spirit cooldown, and Rapid Ossification ranks.

The first requires equipping more gear, such as Harlequin Crest, Lidless Wall Chaos Armor with cooldown reduction affixes, or Crown of Lucion Chaos Armor.

On top of that, you can further Masterworking the cooldown reduction affixes on these gears three times. However, if you're adding an off-hand weapon, you should Masterworking Bone Splinters to allow them to be cast twice for more damage.

Typically, for every 100 Essence consumed, your Bone Spirit cooldown will be reduced by 4.5 seconds until Essence is depleted. Therefore, theoretically, you'll need to replenish Essence every time you cast Bone Spirit.

To achieve this, you can cast Macabre skill. This way, Bone Spirit benefits from the next Rapid Ossification even when consuming Essence, creating an infinite loop of constantly casting Bone Spirit for rapid farming.

In short, the core of this variant is to reduce the cooldown of Bone Spirit to below that of Rapid Ossification. Once you master this, you can engage in simple and effective combat by spamming skill keys.

Note that if you get stuck, you can use Decrepify. This skill consumes a small amount of Essence to trigger Rapid Renewal, refreshing Bone Spirit.

The Pit Pushing Version

The core of this version is to maximize critical strike damage. To achieve this, we start with gear. In addition to the essential items for the entire build, you should continue adding Fists of Fate, whose critical strike chance is a random value between 1% and 360%.

Next, you'll need Okun's Catalyst, then unlock Bone skills, and upgrade these skills through Triple Masterworking. Rapid Ossification only needs to be at the lowest rank, as this version doesn't rely on cooldown reduction.

Of course, this doesn't mean cooldown reduction isn't important; it just means equipping Crown of Lucion is sufficient to ensure basic effectiveness.

Regarding skills, in addition to what's already mentioned, this build variant requires unlocking Corpse Tendrils for better enemy gathering and casting Macabre skills to help restore key resources. Also, don't forget to add more incense and elixir to boost your attack.

Building upon this, combine it with Bone Storm skill and continuously upgrade it for more critical hits. This will allow you to quickly clear regular enemies in The Pit and rapidly kill each floor's boss, advancing to more floors within the time limit.

That concludes our introduction to Shattered Spirit Necromancer Build. If you still have the interest and time to craft new builds towards the end of the season, give it a try!