d3 Patch 2.4.2 Is Now Live!

[Zadina 923]

Patch notes and a summary of the main changes and new features included!

The newest patch of Diablo III: Reaper of Souls is now available in the Americas and will go live in other regions later today.

The main focus of Patch 2.4.2 is not adding new content, but improving the already existing one. The team targeted mostly class balance, with various changes that aim to improve the end-game and promote build diversity. For example, Wizard's Firebird's Finery set has been altered and the Spike Trap build for Demon Hunters was buffed. The biggest change was the end of the three-support end-game meta; Wyatt Cheng made an extensive post about this issue.

Some new additions are the new torment difficulties (XI - XIII), new powers to already existing legendaries, new pylon icons, crowd control changes and gold adjustments. Don't forget that all cosmetic items should now drop normally on live servers (there was an issue with three of them). Here are the full patch notes:

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GENERAL

• Developer Comments

  • Players were finding that pulling monsters from extended ranges to a single point on the map and crowd controlling them onto that spot was the most effective strategy, especially in group play . Not only does this cause server performance issues, but it is a stagnant, non-interactive way to play. These changes are targeted at making crowd control more situational, ensuring individual contributors in a group can add to the damage of the party more frequently.
  • Gold rewards have been adjusted. The primary gold sink at the end-game is Empowered Rifts. We want to maintain a general ratio that when you are running Greater Rifts at a particular tier, you can empower approximately 1/3rd of them. Due to the rate at which gold rewards from Greater Rifts and empower costs were scaling it made the gold reward from Nephalem Rifts, Gilded Barons and The Vault feel insignificant by comparison. Lowering the growth rate of gold costs restores the relative value of these other activities while maintaining the ability to empower approximately 1/3rd of your Greater Rifts.

• New difficulty levels, Torment XI-XIII have been added to the game

• Gold rewards have been adjusted:

  • Greater Rift 26 and up has been rescaled to a flat 3% increase per tier
  • Torment VII-XIII has been changed to match Greater Rift reward scaling
  • The cost to empower a Greater Rift has been reduced to match the new gold reward rate
  • The amount of gold dropped by the Gilded Baron Treasure Goblin has been reduced

• Knockbacks now apply a flat 40% increase to crowd control resistances

• Monsters cannot be knocked back if they are over 65% crowd control resistant

• Powers that apply knockbacks continuously, such as Black Hole, can bypass this resistance if they already knocked a monster back successfully. These powers increase the crowd control resistance by 20% per knockback instead of 40%

• The following changes have been applied to the Season 7 Journey

  • Slayer

    • The Greater Rift requirement has been reduced from 35 to 30

  • Champion

    • The Greater Rift requirement has been reduced from 50 to 40
    • The Nephalem Rift timer has been increased from 6 minutes to 7 minutes

  • Destroyer

    • The Greater Rift requirement has been reduced from 60 to 50

  • Conqueror

    • The Greater Rift requirement has been reduced from 70 to 60

  • Guardian

    • The Greater Rift requirement has been reduced from 80 to 70
    • The time limit to defeat Azmodan has been increased from 15 seconds to 20 seconds

CLASSES

• Developer Comments

  • With a plethora of Hatred spending attacks available to the Demon Hunter we want to find a unique role for Spike Trap.  The redesign gives players more control on where and when Spike Trap damage was done using a mechanic unique to it. Using a Hatred spender to detonate opens up the capabilities of Spike Trap by allowing players to time their damage just right.
  • We’ve adjusted several skills which provide buffs to groups. Taken together, these changes should encourage players in groups to contribute damage to their party, while also encouraging a more healthy variety of group compositions. For more information on this change please see this forum thread.

• Barbarian

  • Active Skills

    • Threatening Shout

      • Skill Rune - Falter

        • Can no longer stack with casts from other sources

• Crusader

  • Active Skills

    • Consecration

      • The healing provided from multiple active Consecrations will no longer stack

    • Judgment

      • Skill Rune - Resolved

        • The increased Critical Hit Chance has been reduced from 20% to 8%

    • Laws of Valor

      • Skill Rune - Critical

        • The Critical Hit Damage bonus has been reduced from 100% to 50%

• Demon Hunter

  • Active Skills

    • Companion

      • Skill Rune - Wolf Companion

        • The Active Skill damage bonus has been reduced from 30% to 15%

    • Marked for Death

      • The damage bonus has been reduced from 20% to 15%

      • Skill Rune - Grim Reaper

        • The damage bonus has been reduced from 20% to 15%

    • Multishot

      • Skill Rune - Wind Chill

        • The increased Critical Hit Chance against the target has been reduced from 15% to 8%

    • Spike Trap

      • Has been redesigned

        • Traps no longer have an arming time
        • Traps now only detonate once
        • Now has 2 charges each with a 10 second recharge time
        • All active traps are now detonated by the next Hatred spender you cast

      • Damage increased from 340% to 1160% weapon damage

      • Hatred cost reduced from 30 to 15

      • Skill Rune - Echoing Blast

        • Damage increased from 575% to 2020% weapon damage
        • Has been redesigned
        • Enemies are now slowed by 70% when the trap is detonated

      • Skill Rune - Lightning Rod

        • Damage increased from 880% weapon damage over 10 hits to 2010% weapon damage over 3 hits
        • Decreased the radius that lightning can arc to other traps from 75 to 25 yards

      • Skill Rune - Long Fuse

        • Has been removed
        • Replaced with
        • Impaling Spines
        • While the trap is active, enemies within range are instantly immobilized for 3 seconds
        • Increases damage to 1930% weapon damage

      • Skill Rune - Scatter

        • Now places 2 traps side by side and consumes 1 charge of Spike Trap

      • Skill Rune - Sticky Trap

        • Has been removed
        • Replaced with
        • Custom Trigger
        • Your Hatred generators now detonate Spike Traps
        • Increases damage to 1900% weapon damage

• Monk

  • Active Skills

    • Blinding Flash

      • Skill Rune - Crippling Light

        • The damage reduction applied to blinded enemies has been reduced from 40% to 25%

    • Epiphany

      • Skill Rune - Soothing Mist

        • Healing has been reduced by 60% from 40232 Life per ability to 16093 Life. The heal amount of your health globe healing bonus has been reduced from 10% to 4%

    • Exploding Palm

      • Skill Rune - Flesh is Weak

        • The damage bonus has been reduced from 20% to 15%

    • Inner Sanctuary

      • Skill Rune - Forbidden Palace

        • No longer increased the damage taken by enemies inside Inner Sanctuary

    • Mantra of Conviction

      • The damage of the passive component of the skill has been reduced from 10% to 8%
      • The damage of the active component of the skill has been reduced from 20% to 16%

      • Skill Rune - Overawe

        • The damage bonus has been reduced from 16% to 12%

    • Mantra of Conviction

      • Skill Rune - Fists of Fury

        • The maximum stack value is no longer determined by your attack speed and is capped at 15 stacks

    • Way of the Hundred Fists

      • Skill Rune – Fists of Fury

        • The maximum stack value is no longer determined by your attack speed and is capped at 15 stacks

  • Passive Skills

    • Mythic Rhythm

      • The damage bonus from Mythic Rhythm is now consumed on manually applied Spirit spenders and not automatically from items or set bonuses.

• Witch Doctor

  • Active Skills

    • Big Bad Voodoo

      • The attack speed bonus has been reduced from 20% to 15%

      • Skill Rune - Slam Dance

        • The damage bonus provided to allies has been decreased from 30% to 15%

    • Haunt

      • Skill Rune - Poisoned Spirit

        • The damage increase provided to your allies has been removed. The skill will now benefit your own damage and your pets' damage

    • Hex

      • No longer increases the damage taken by the target

      • Skill Rune - Jinx

        • The damage bonus to the target has been reduced from 30% to 15%

      • Skill Rune - Toad of Hugeness

        • The damage bonus to the target has been reduced from 25% to 15%

    • Mass Confusion

      • Skill Rune - Paranoia

        • Can no longer stack with casts from other sources

    • Piranhas

      • Can no longer stack with casts from other sources

    • Spirit Barrage

      • Skill Rune - Phantasm

        • Damage increased from 675% over 5 seconds to 750% over 5 seconds

    • Summon Zombie Dogs

      • Skill Rune - Chilled to the Bone

        • No longer increases damage done to targets by 15%

• Wizard

  • Active Skills

    • Arcane Orb

      • Skill Rune - Spark

        • The damage increase of your next Lightning spell now has a maximum of 30%

    • Energy Twister

      • Twisters (excluding those created with the Wicked Wind rune) will now despawn if they stop moving
      • This applies only to the PC/Mac version

  • Passive Skills

    • Elemental Exposure

      • The damage bonus no longer applies to your allies

    • Power Hungry

      • Has been redesigned

        • Deal 30% additional damage to enemies more than 30 yards away

• Bug Fixes

  • Fixed an issue that prevented Ray of Frost - Black Ice from creating an ice patch when the player didn't land the killing blow
  • Fixed an issue that prevented the maximum of 8 Energy Twisters from applying
  • Fixed an issue that was causing stacks of Archon from a previous cast due to The Swami to stack multiplicatively instead of additively with a subsequent, overlapping cast of Archon
  • Fixed an issue that prevented Wolf Companion’s active ability from applying the 15% damage buff to pets and followers

ITEMS

• Developer Comments

  • With Haedrig’s Gift, Blood Shards and Kanai’s Cube, the need for the Magic Find stat has diminished since the game’s original release. Replacing the Magic Find property with Resource Cost Reduction made sense. We expect the Topaz will hone some existing builds and open up possibilities for some new ones.
  • In addition to being one of the least popular gems, Invigorating Gemstone had a mechanic that was simply unappealing to many players. Our goal with Legendary Gems is to supply unique tools that complement a build. A gem that increases your healing is truly invigorating!
  • When reviewing items for this patch, Twisted Sword stood out as needing a revision. While we want items to feel powerful, we also want the gameplay style associated with the items to be fun. We heard loud and clear that using Twisted Sword to stack Energy Twister in places where the tornado did not move was effective but boring. We’ve made adjustments to Twisted Sword to prevent this from occurring.

• Socketing a Topaz into your helm will now provide Resource Cost Reduction rather than Magic Find. This grants the same percentage bonus as Cooldown Reduction and caps at 12.5%

• Bottomless Potion of Chaos

  • New Legendary Potion

    • Teleport to another location when used below 40% health

  • Graphical and sound effects have been added to the teleport

  • Added a camera smoothing effect to the teleport

• Invigorating Gemstone

  • Has been redesigned

    • Each hit done increases healing received by 1% for 5 seconds
    • Stacks up to 10 times
    • You are now immune to Crowd Control effects at Rank 25

• Class-Specific Items

  • Crusader

    • Armor of Akkhan

      • (6) Set Bonus

        • Damage bonus increased from 450% to 600%
        • Now also reduces damage taken by 15% while Akarat's Champion is active

      • Khassett’s Cord of Righteousness

        • New Legendary Belt
        • Fist of the Heavens costs 40% less Wrath and deals 150% more damage

      • Darklight

        • Has been redesigned
        • Now gives Fist of the Heavens a chance to be cast a second time at the targeted location

  • Thorns of the Invoker

    • (6) Set Bonus

      • The 800% Thorns damage dealt to the first enemy hit can now benefit from +% Physical Damage

  • Demon Hunter

    • Calamity

      • Now always uses your Marked for Death Rune type and cannot stack with overlapping casts of your Marked for Death

        • Note: This change is retroactive to existing items

    • The Demon's Demise

      • Has been redesigned

        • The blast from Spike Trap will damage all enemies again after 1 second.

  • Monk

    • Gyana Na Kashu

      • The damage bonus granted to the fireball from Lashing Tail Kick has been increased from 525-700% to 1050-1400%

    • Raiment of a Thousand Storms

      • (6) Set Bonus

        • The damage bonus granted to Spirit Generators after casting Dashing Strike increased from 300% to 1250%

  • Witch Doctor

    • Helltooth Harness

      • (2) Set Bonus

        • The Necrosis bonus damage no longer amplifies the damage of your allies. The skill will now benefit your own damage and your pets' damage

    • Homunculus

      • Sacrifice damage bonus increased from 25-30% to 50-60%

    • Ring of Emptiness

      • Haunt and Locust Swarm damage bonus increased from 75-100% to 250-300%

  • Wizard

    • Firebird's Finery

      • (4) Set Bonus

        • Has been redesigned
        • Dealing Fire damage with one of your skills causes the enemy to take 1000% weapon damage as Fire for 3 seconds. This effect can be repeated a second and third time by different skills. If an enemy is burning due to three different skills simultaneously the enemy will Ignite, dealing 3000% weapon damage per second until they die

      • (6) Set Bonus

        • Has been redesigned
        • Your damage is increased by 120% and damage taken reduced by 3% for each enemy that is Ignited. This effect can stack up to 20 times. You always receive the maximum bonus whenever a nearby Elite monster is Ignited.

    • The Twisted Sword

      • Can now only benefit from a maximum of 5 Energy Twisters

  • Several existing class-specific Legendary items have been updated to include a unique Legendary power

    • Note: Existing items will not be affected by the following changes. Only new versions of the items will roll with the added Legendary power.

    • Barbarian

      • Girdle of Giants

        • Legendary power added
        • Seismic Slam Increases Earthquake damage by 80-100% for 15 3 seconds.
        • Existing Earthquakes will have their damage increased when Seismic Slam is used with Girdle of Giants

    • Demon Hunter

      • Trag'Oul Coils

        • Legendary power added
        • Spike Traps gain the effect of the Impaling Spines rune and are deployed twice as fast

    • Monk

      • Scarbringer

        • Legendary power added
        • Lashing Tail Kick deals an additional 300% damage to the first 5-7 enemies hit

    • Witch Doctor

      • Gazing Demise

        • Legendary power added
        • Spirit Barrage gains the Phantasm rune. For each active Phantasm (max 3), the damage of Spirit Barrage is increased by 40-50%

    • Wizard

      • Starfire

        • Legendary power added
        • Lightning damage done is increased by 15% for every 10 yards you are from the target up to a maximum of 60%

• Bug Fixes

  • Fixed an issue that prevented the buff from the Orb of the Infinite from being applied if the damage killed the enemy
  • Fixed an issue that caused the Firebird's Finery (2) Set Bonus to proc early if there was another damage shield on the player
  • Fixed an issue that caused the Treasure Goblin spawned by the legacy Puzzle Ring to pick up Transmog items
  • Fixed an issue that caused Girdle of Giants to increase the damage of all skills by the percentage it applied to Earthquake damage
  • Fixed an issue that caused Scarbringer to grant a damage bonus of 200%. It has been increased to 300% to match the tooltip
  • Fixed an issue that caused Lashing Tail Kick (Vulture Claw Kick) DoT to not benefit from the bonus damage granted by Scarbringer
  • Fixed an issue that caused the Fireball proc from Gyana Na Kashu to not do damage to a target if the target has previously been hit with the amplified damage of Lashing Tail Kick from Scarbringer
  • Fixed an issue that caused Lashing Tail Kick – Vulture Claw Kick to give all targets the amplified damage from Scarbringer instead of the first 5-7 hit
  • Fixed an issue that caused Lashing Tail Kick - Vulture Kick to apply 230% weapon damage per second instead of 230% over 3 seconds
  • Fixed an issue that prevented Bracers of Destruction’s Seismic Slam bonus damage from being applied to the Rumble rune
  • Fixed an issue with Blade of the Warlord that prevented the Fury spent with Bash from triggering the 2-piece Might of the Earth set bonus and reducing the cooldown of Earthquake, Ground Stomp, Leap, and Avalanche
  • Fixed an issue that prevented Kyoshiro’s Soul from activating the 4pc Set bonus from the Monkey King’s Garb set
  • Fixed an issue that prevented the Sweeping Wind bonus provided by Kyoshiro’s Soul from expiring after transitioning between level areas
  • Fixed an issue that caused the old and new versions of Darklight to each proc their special ability when one was equipped and the other was used in Kanai’s Cube
  • Fixed an issue that was causing player attack speed to snapshot and dynamically update along with their stacks of Archon
  • Fixed an issue that caused the Archon buff icon to remain even after players had right clicked and removed the buff granted by the Swami 

CAMPAIGN MODE

• The Skeleton King will now drop Leoric's Crown beginning at Level 5

ADVENTURE MODE

• Developer Comments

  • The experience rewards for the actual completion of a Nephalem Rift felt too low, reducing the feeling of accomplishment for defeating the Rift Guardian and closing the Rift. This change is aimed at ensuring that the bulk of your reward is earned upon completion.

• Infernal Machine drop rates have been adjusted:

  • Torment levels V-XIII have an increasing chance for a second machine to drop
  • There is now a 50% chance for a machine to drop on Torment I increasing to 100% on Torment IV

• Nephalem Rifts

  • Greater Rift Keys are now guaranteed from any Nephalem Rift and increasing the difficulty now increases your chance of getting a second or third key

  • Greater Rifts

    • Some of the Experience earned in a Greater Rift has been shifted from killing monsters to the reward for closing the rift. The overall amount of Experience earned should be roughly the same

USER INTERFACE

• Pylons in Nephalem Rifts now have unique minimap icons

• A hotkey has been added to the game to hide the UI

• When the Blacksmith is trained to maximum level his recipe list will now start collapsed

• The Menagerist Goblin now has a unique minimap icon

(source)

Lastly, the new Season will go live this Friday, 5th of August. We will have a summary for Season 7 and we will announce our new and/or updated guides within the same date.