Diablo IV – what’s in the new 1.5.0 patch notes incoming for Season 5? The 10,000-word document suggests it’s a lot

We are into year two now of Diablo IV’s lifespan, and as Season 5 reaches us ahead of October’s first expansion, so too, later this week, will Patch 1.5.0, bringing with it a whole host of changes and balances, as well as no doubt setting up a few things for the future stuff that is fast incoming.

As ever there is a ton of stuff incoming so we will pick through the best stuff and also find out when you will be able to download it. So let’s get cracking.

Patch 1.5.0 highlights for Diablo IV

The patch is earmarked to start making its way down the interweb tubes on August 6th, so we have the patch notes quite a bit in advance here.

A lot of the changes have been made after extensive testing in the PTR realm (Public Test Realm) so hopefully a lot of the issues will have been ironed out long before you get to play.

As ever, if you want to check out every little tweak and change Blizzard has made, you can read the full notes for yourself, but here are a few things that caught our eye.

As the title of this page says the full patch notes are 10,000 words long, so maybe save it until bedtime.

Game Updates

Infernal Hordes

• Distinct audio queues have been added to signal the beginning and end of a wave.
• The number of waves has been tuned.
  Tiers 1-3: 6 Waves
  Tiers 4-5: 7 Waves
  All other tiers remain unchanged.
• The wave timer has been reduced to 60 seconds.
• The number of Monsters encountered has been generally increased across the board.
• The Health Pools of the Council and other Bosses have been reduced.
• Infernal Compasses can now be acquired more frequently and through more means. Tier 4-5 Compasses can drop in High Tier Nightmare Dungeons.
  Tiers 4-8 Compasses now naturally drop in high-tier Pit runs.
  Tiers 4-8 Compasses will now rarely drop in Helltide and from Whisper caches after completing these tiers of Nightmare Dungeons or Pits. (Ex: Tiers 4 and 5 Compasses can drop in Helltide and Whispers after completing Nightmare Dungeons of Tier 75 and 100 respectively).
  Infernal Compasses can now be crafted at the Occultist. They cost Forgotten Souls and Sigil Powder. Additionally, Compasses can now be salvaged for Sigil Powder.
• The drop rate of Compasses within the activity itself has been increased.
• Rewards from chests have been significantly increased, and the price of all chests have been decreased.
• The drop rate for Abyssal Scrolls has been increased.
• Common Herbs and Angelbreath have been added as potential drops. The drop rate for Shattered Prisms has been reduced.
• Defeating the council has an additional, guaranteed drop of Aether that scales with tier.
• Shocktroopers, Aether Masses, Hellseekers, and Soul Spires now drop more Aether.
• Pets now can pick up Aether on the ground.

Bug Fixes

Barbarian

• Fixed an issue where Double Swing did not strike additional times on a fifth cast when using Twin Strikes.
• Fixed an issue where the Expose Vulnerability passive could trigger from Basic Skills when using the Shard of Verathiel Unique item.
• Fixed an issue where stacks wouldn’t be granted from Crown of Lucion while channeling Whirlwind.

Druid

• Fixed an issue where Poison Creeper’s damage could scale extremely high when hitting multiple enemies.

Necromancer

• Fixed an issue where the Aspect of Bursting Bones didn’t properly scale with the effect from Path of Trag’Oul.

Rogue

• Fixed an issue where certain Stun Grenade effects didn’t properly function.
• Fixed an issue where Advanced Flurry and Momentum lost stacks when triggering Lucky Hit or other on-hit effects.
• Fixed an issue where the Tempering Affix that grants bonus life while Dark Shroud is active didn’t function.
• Fixed an issue where the Tempering Affix that grants bonus damage per active Dark Shroud was granting more damage than intended.
• Fixed an issue where the Tempering Affix that grants bonus Resistance and Max Resistance after using a Health Potion did not increase Maximum Resistance.
• Fixed an issue where Enhanced Caltrops did not increase damage as expected.
• Fixed an issue where the Vengeful Aspect had 10% Lucky Hit Chance instead of 25%.
• Fixed an issue where Fundamental Blade Shift did not Daze targets after applying 3 stacks.
• Fixed an issue where Advanced Flurry didn’t gain damage from its stacks if it was imbued.
• Fixed an issue where the damage bonus from Malice was additive instead of multiplicative.
• Fixed an issue where the Bonus Movement from Enhanced Dark Shroud could be lost when switching equipment.

Sorcerer

• Fixed an issue where Enhanced Lightning Spear didn’t properly function.
• Fixed an issue where Enhanced Lightning Spear was granting more Critical Strike Chance than intended.
• Fixed an issue where Axial Conduit’s Explosion did not benefit from Greater Chain Lightning.
• Fixed an issue where the Axial Conduit’s explosion was dealing much less damage than intended.
• Fixed an issue where bonus Chain Lightning Projectiles did not benefit from Axial Conduit.
• Fixed an issue where the Aspect of Elemental Acuity couldn’t be applied to Amulets.
• Fixed an issue where Flame Shield Enchantment was not functioning properly.
• Fixed an issue where the Flame Shield Enchantment granted for free by the Aspect of the Firebird would place Flame Shield on cooldown.

General

• Fixed an issue where Azurewrath did not Freeze enemies or deal Cold damage when equipped by a Druid or Sorcerer.
• Fixed an issue where several new Unique items would become account-bound on pickup.
• Fixed an issue where Tortured Gifts in World Tiers I and II didn’t always drop items.
• Fixed an issue where certain Tempering Recipes could be lost after Seasonal Migration.
• Fixed an issue where skills that grant immunity would trigger their cooldown incorrectly when they were automatically cast by another source, such as Yen’s Blessing.
• Fixed an issue where Boss health in The Pit would decrease each subsequent respawn.
• Fixed an issue where non-boss monsters in The Pit could gain the damage reduction buff applied to Bosses.
• Fixed an issue where the Mother’s Judgement boss could not drop loot.
• Fixed an issue where Varshan could fail to spawn.

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