Fully clinching its status as an live service game, Diablo 4 will indeed have a battle pass. Diablo 4's battle pass is not available at launch, however, so cool your heels and just enjoy killing demons for the joy of it until next month. The first reward track will drop alongside Diablo 4 Season 1, which Blizzard says will arrive in the second half of July.
So far, we don't know the specifics of what's going to appear in the first battle pass, only that Blizzard has said that the paid tier "will not provide any in-game power, but instead unlocks tiers that provide cosmetics unique to that season." Here's everything we know about the Diablo 4 battle pass so far including the price, tiers, reward types, and start date:
When does the Diablo 4 battle pass start?
The first Diablo 4 battle pass will begin in "mid to late July" alongside the first season of Diablo 4. Blizzard hasn't given the exact date yet, but you've got about six weeks to work on clearing the campaign without the shadow of reward tiers chasing your heels.
Blizzard has said that you need to complete the campaign before you can participate in Season 1, though it didn't mention whether that includes the battle pass. Given that there's a paid tier of pass, I'd wager not. I'm sure Blizzard would be plenty happy to let you pay for the premium battle pass even if you've not officially saved Sanctuary. If you want to be certain though, best send Lilith packing in the next few weeks.
How much does the Diablo 4 battle pass cost?
Worth noting is that the Premium and Accelerated tiers do include the cash shop currency Platinum, which Blizzard says you can put towards purchasing future battle passes.
What rewards can you get in the Diablo 4 battle pass?
As shown above, there are 90 total reward tiers in the Diablo 4 battle pass, 63 of which are exclusive to the paid versions of the pass. In all versions of the pass you'll earn cosmetics and the special currency Smoldering Ashes. The accelerated tier of battle pass also includes a "special cosmetic," presumably new each season, and exclusive to that highest tier. As it goes with battle passes, the cooler looking cosmetics will probably be hanging around in the paid tiers.
Based on the example image that Blizzard shared, here are the reward types we can expect in Diablo 4's battle pass:
- Weapon and armor skins
- Emotes
- Smoldering Ashes
- Platinum Currency
- Tattoo/markings
Smoldering Ashes are spent to unlock "season blessings" which are passive buffs that give you a better earn rate on character experience, gold, or murmuring obols. The obols are what's worth noting, in my opinion, since they can be spent at the Purveyor of Curiosities to get random gear which may be legendary quality. That blessing isn't shown in the image above but is mentioned in the official Diablo 4 blog.
It's a bit of an intense strategy, but I bet we'll see at least some folks opting for the accelerated battle pass, skipping tiers to get soldering ashes to grind murmuring obols faster and take their chances rolling for gear with legendary aspects at the purveyor.
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