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Updates Coming To Legendary Items For Patch 2.4.3 PTR

by - 7 years ago

As many of you know, Patch 2.4.3 has been available for testing on the PTR (Patch Test Realm) since the week after BlizzCon 2016. Many excellent changes are already slated for this patch along with some things that are still finding their footing. Several items that were pre-existing with no Legendary powers have received one in this patch.

These powers were showcased at BlizzCon 2016 and the hope is that they will open up some new builds/playstyles once the patch goes live. As such, the community is rather concerned with how well they perform throughout the PTR. Currently, some are doing better than others. If you need a refresher, here are the items and the new powers they’ve gained:

  • Barbarian
    • Saffron Wrap
      • The damage of your next Overpower is increased by 40-50% for each enemy hit, up to a maximum of 20 enemies
  • Crusader
    • Faithful Memory
      • Each enemy hit by Falling Sword increases the damage of Blessed Hammer by 50-60% for 10 seconds
  • Demon Hunter
    • Hellcat Waistguard
      • Grenades have a chance to bounce 3-5 times, dealing an additional 50% damage on each bounce
      • This bonus is increased to 800% on the final bounce
      • The following skills are affected by this power:
        • Cluster Arrow – Dazzling Arrow, Cluster Bombs, Loaded for Bear, and No Rune
        • Rain of Vengeance – Anathema
        • Strafe – Demolition
        • Rapid Fire – Bombardment
  • Monk
    • Rabid Strike
      • Spirit spenders that teleport you while Epiphany is active are also mimicked on a distant target for free
  • Witch Doctor
    • The Barber
      • Instead of dealing direct damage, your Spirit Barrage now accumulates on the target
      • When you stop channeling, it explodes dealing 225-250% of the accumulated damage to all enemies within 15 yards
  • Wizard
    • Manald Heal
      • Enemies stunned with Paralysis also take 13,000-14,000% weapon damage as Lightning

The powers that the community seems the most excited about are on Faithful Memory, The Barber, and Hellcat Waistguard. The others have been a bit underwhelming. Community Manager Nevalistis and Team 3 have been collecting feedback and now have an update on where some of these powers are going next.

Originally Posted by Nevalistis (Official Post)

It’s been great to see a lot of earnest testing and honest feedback. Thanks, everyone, who’s participated thus far! Based on your feedback, we have a few changes pending for some of these items that I wanted to share before they go live in the next PTR patch.

The Barber
Those of you who have been testing The Barber have seen this item jump from flat out not-functioning to most certainly over-performing. We suspect that the damage on this item is a tad high (particularly when using the Phantasm rune), so we’re removing the damage bonus granted by the final explosion. There were also some pretty funky interactions occurring with Phantasm that caused some scaling issues, and we’ll be correcting those.

TLDR: Witch Doctors looking for massive AoE explosions from Spirit Barrage should still see effective results, but they won’t be quite so over the top.

Faithful Memory
Faithful Memory is greatly benefiting from changes made to Greater Rifts and density. As many of you have noted, it’s a wee bit on the powerful side. We’re going to implement a cap on the number of stacks that can be gained and see how this performs. That leaves room for potential tweaking in the future if it’s been adjusted too far.

Hellcat’s Waistguard
We’re pretty happy with how Hellcat’s Waistguard is panning out in practice. We wanted to introduce an alternative play style rather than a new meta for Greater Rift pushing with the possibility that someone might discover a new top-tier combination or build with it, and we feel this item fulfills that goal.

Manald Heal
Manald Heal is in very much a similar place as Hellcat’s Waistguard, though it admittedly needed a bump from its initial version on the PTR. Thanks to everyone who helped us test this item! The builds that are coming out of it actually perform pretty well, and we think there’s still more room for player experimentation here.

Overall, I want to reiterate that we don’t intentionally design items to shift or change “the meta,” nor are we looking to continue feeding power creep. The intention of many of these items (and likely those in the future) will be to provide options to play differently while remaining reasonably competitive with other existing options.

Are you satisfied with these changes or would you like to see something thing different happen to your item of choice? Continue the conversation in the Comments section.


posted in Diablo
JR Cook

JR has been writing for fan sites since 2000 and has been involved with Blizzard Exclusive fansites since 2003. JR was also a co-host for 6 years on the Hearthstone podcast Well Met! He helped co-found BlizzPro in 2013.


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