Diablo 4’s new Legendary mechanic “fundamentally changes” the game

Diablo IV will be a step forward for the franchise in a few different ways, but one of the most eye-catching changes is how Legendary items will function. The highest loot tier brings the best perks, but in past games, not every single perk works well with every class or build. That’s changing in the next game.

Here’s how: Diablo IV will let you extract powers from Legendary loot and assign them to other pieces of gear. This is done via an NPC named the Occultist, who can transfer the powers onto other items. If you find a stronger piece of gear, you can attach your favorite power to it. You can probably already see how this will make a big difference in how builds are chosen and fleshed out.

Rod Fergusson, the general manager of Diablo, elaborated on this concept in an interview with GameSpot. “In previous games, you would pick up a shield that [could] ‘summon two more skeleton mages,'” Fergusson said. “[But] eventually your level would outpace it. So that idea of being able to hold onto your build and be able to truly customize your character by taking legendary powers, extracting them from one thing and imbuing them into another — that fundamentally changes the build system.” This function actually exists in Diablo Immortal already, so you can try the free-to-play game to get an idea of how it’ll work in Diablo IV. The alleged daily reward caps might sour you on the Immortal experience though.

In any case, Diablo IV doesn’t have a set release date just yet, although we do know that the game will be coming to consoles when it launches. Full crossplay will be supported across its various versions too. You can sign up for the beta right now, but note that the beta dates and times haven’t been announced yet either.