Diablo 4’s Season 3 release date brings with it the first major content drop of 2024 for Blizzard’s APRG, kicking off the year with a bang. The Season of the Construct shakes things up by introducing a customizable companion that fights alongside us, a new type of dungeon called Vaults, which house a new family of monsters, and much more.
Aside from a new threat to battle between its start and end dates, D4’s Season 3 is bound to see the much-requested leaderboards feature going live, alongside a variety of other quality of life updates. One of them sees Helltides becoming almost permanently active starting with the Season of the Construct.
Diablo 4 Season 3 Release Date
Although it was unveiled during BlizzCon 2023, Blizzard only “officially” announced Diablo 4’s Season 3 release date, slated to occur on January 23, 2024 at 10 AM PST/1 PM EST/6 PM GMT, in late January 2024.
The developer aims to provide quarterly seasons for the ARPG – each spanning approximately three months – which allowed us to accurately guess Season of the Construct’s start date prior to its official announcement simply going by Season 2’s end date, as shown in-game.
- Diablo 4 Season 3 start date: January 23, 2024
- Diablo 4 Season 3 end date: April 16, 2024
D4 Season 3’s end date is then set for April 16, 2024, as revealed in a message that appears on the in-game character screen.
Diablo 4 Season 3 Content
In terms of content, D4’s Season of the Construct sends us “deep beneath the sands of Kehjistan,” where the Demon Malphas has corrupted the Loom, “an ancient technology designed by Zoltun Kulle and Ayuzhan of Caldeum.”
From the Gatehall, our new base of operations underneath Kehjistan, we’ll battle a new type of enemy, the Constructs, as we navigate a new type of dungeon called Vaults, eventually facing off against Malphas himself.
Diablo 4’s Season 3 introduces the Seneschal Companion, a robotic spider minion which joins us on our adventures after we unlock it through the Seasonal Questline.
We can customize its abilities using Governing and Tuning Stones, which also complement our character’s build, found both in Vaults and throughout Sanctuary.
Governing Stones determine the attacks that the Seneschal Companion can perform. Tuning Stones improve these attacks while providing “greater utility.”
Two Governing Stones – one for each attack – and six Tuning Stones – three of which augment one of the minion’s attacks – can be equipped at once. In total, Season of the Construct introduces 12 Governing Stones and 27 Tuning Stones for us to collect.
Completing Vaults grants one random Tuning Stone, while searching for Wardwoven Chests is another avenue of obtaining them. Both types have a low chance of dropping at any time when delving through vaults or Arcane Tremors, a new type of open-world activity.
Defeating enemy Constructs within the Vaults yields Shattered Stone, a resource that can be crafted into Governing and Tuning Stones at Jeweler NPCs.
Duplicates can be fused together to level up the Stones that benefit our builds, increasing our companion’s power. A full list is available in a blog post dedicated to the season.
Diablo 4 Season of the Construct Vaults
Vaults are described as “specialized dungeons” that house elemental hazards along with the new Construct enemy family.
Entering them requires converting a certain amount of Pearls of Warding, which applies Zoltun’s Warding, a “layered blessing which grants access to riches within the Vaults” onto our characters.
“Falling prey” to the various dangers inside Vaults decreases the number of applied stacks. Keeping Zoltun’s Warding intact after dealing with the Vault Boss unlocks a Wardwoven Chest, which also has a higher chance of granting Legendary items.
Pearls of Warding can be exchanged for extra stacks of Zoltun’s Warding at the Vault entrance. This makes the dungeon tougher but also increases the rewards we can obtain.
Once we reach World Tier III, we gain access to Nightmare Vaults. Vault Sigils drop alongside the usual Nightmare Dungeon Sigils but can also be crafted using Pearls of Warding.
Arcane Tremors then feed into our efforts of stopping Malphas from using Constructs to terrorize Sanctuary.
Diablo 4 Season of the Construct Quality of Life Changes, Leaderboards, The Gauntlet
As far as quality of life changes go, Diablo 4’s Season of the Construct makes Helltides active almost permanently, aside from a 5-minute break that occurs once every hour.
WASD movement is on the way, as is an extra stash tab. In addition, we can also look forward to respec improvements, a cleaner UI when trading Gold, higher drop rates for items required to summon the Beast in the Ice, and more.
As expected, a new battle pass that features both free and premium tiers is also planned. Those of us who opt to pay for the premium tiers can unlock and use the Awoken Adamant Armor set, alongside a variety of other cosmetic items.
As announced previously, Diablo 4’s Season 3 will also introduce leaderboards alongside a “leaderboard-driven trial.”
Upon reaching World Tier 4, we will be able to compete in The Gauntlet, a new, weekly challenge dungeon. According to Game Director Joe Shely, we won’t need to reach level 100 before exploring it.
As opposed to the others already in the game, The Gauntlet is described as a “fixed-seed, non-linear dungeon” that challenges us to put all our skills to use while chasing as high a score as possible.
The layout and monsters of this new dungeon don’t change between different runs, so we’ll gradually learn what to expect from it.
Its non-linear nature then gives us different choices in terms of how we approach getting those high scores.
During BlizzCon 2023, the developer explained that party members can split up and eliminate monsters in different directions to better optimize each run.
Loot only drops at the end of Diablo 4’s The Gauntlet, but we will be able to pick up Proofs of Might as we make our way through it.
We’ll have a limited amount of time to collect as many of these pickups as possible, helping us increase our score.
The players with the best scores appear on Diablo 4’s freshly-introduced leaderboards. At the start of each week, a new Gauntlet becomes available while the leaderboards reset.
Diablo 4’s leaderboards are split into several categories, tracking solo and party runs across individual classes for both non-hardcore and hardcore characters.
The top-scoring players on each week’s leaderboards will then have their accomplishments recorded in the Hall of Ancients, a permanent leaderboard.
Both the Gauntlet and leaderboards will go live several weeks into the Season of the Construct, giving us time to familiarize ourselves with the new seasonal mechanics.
On February 5, Diablo General Manager Rod Fergusson noted that the team “decided to take a bit more time to polish a few things up, so it won’t be launching on Feb 13 as I mentioned on a recent podcast.”
More details about the two features (and hopefully a release date) will be shared come February 29, 2024, during a dedicated campfire chat.
That covers everything you need to know about Diablo 4’s Season 3, its release date, and content.
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