Highlights
- Diablo 4 's first season brings exciting new content, but the battle pass's limited cosmetics may not be worth the effort for many players.
- The Awoken Coldiron armor set, the main feature of the battle pass, only suits Diablo 4 's Necromancers, limiting its appeal to other classes like Druids, Sorcerers, and Rogues.
- The battle pass's lack of broad appeal and restricted cosmetics may hurt its success in the long run, and Diablo 4 's second season should consider offering sets that appeal to more classes for a higher chance of success.
Diablo 4's first season is finally here, and it has mostly delivered so far. While there were many controversial changes, the various additions are a welcome change to the formula. The Malignant Hearts shake up the meta, the gameplay is still exciting, and the new mechanics are interesting. However, season one also introduces the first Diablo 4 battle pass, and it leaves much to be desired.
The Season of the Malignant battle pass is filled with new cosmetics for players to grab, but the items that are included feel restrictive. While the headlining armor set looks cool, it only benefits a select few. Unless players are going for a very specific aesthetic, season one's battle pass rewards may not be worth the effort. It may be too late to go back and fix that, but hopefully Diablo 4's second season does not repeat the same mistakes.
Diablo 4's Season One Armor Set Is Heavily Limited
Diablo 4 Season of the Malignant sees a new form of corruption sweep across Sanctuary. This corruption infects enemies across the world and creates new creatures known as malignant monsters. This leads to new challenges for players to overcome, new items for them to collect, and a brand-new Malignant Heart system that lets players unlock new powers. The battle pass is also heavily focused around this new corruption, and that limits the potential of its cosmetics.
As players progress through this battle pass, they will unlock pieces of an armor set known as the Awoken Coldiron. Once they finish the pass, they will have unlocked the entire set and can put it on whatever character they choose. While the set looks extremely cool, it only works for a certain aesthetic. It looks like something that a demonic undead soldier would wear, and that really only fits Diablo 4's Necromancers.
While it makes sense for the Season of the Malignant battle pass to be all about the Malignant, it also makes its appeal pretty limited. Druid players will likely never wear the Awoken Coldiron set, Sorcerers would look weird in it, and it is not stealthy enough for Rogues. The set may work on a Barbarian, but only if that player wants a necromancer-like aesthetic. The complete set meshes extremely well with Necromancer players, and most of the battle pass rewards feel catered around that deadly class.
The weapons, the horse armor, and the armor set all represent this powerful corruption sweeping the world. Most if it would look weird or out of place on a class that does not deal with the undead. There are some rewards that work well with everyone, but most of them only work for a select few. Unless players want to look like an undead warrior, they have no reason to check out Diablo 4's first battle pass.
Necromancer players will want to get their hands on everything this battle pass has to offer, but it may not be worth the effort for other classes. Most may have no use for any of these cosmetics, and that gives them little reason to buy into it. The armor set's limited appeal could hurt the success of the battle pass in the long run. If Blizzard continues to offer Diablo 4 armor sets catered around a certain aesthetic, then the entire battle pass system may suffer.
Diablo 4's second season needs to include sets that more classes will want to use. The battle pass can be themed after whatever new mechanic Blizzard introduces, but the rewards should be enticing for everyone. That may require multiple variations of the armor sets, but it should be worth the effort. The more appealing the battle pass is to everyone, the likelier it will become a success.
Diablo 4 is available for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
