Diablo 4’s latest update is now live, and it takes aim at one of the main complaints players have with Season 3 so far–the Seneschal Construct and its perceived lack of power.
Season 3 launched on January 23, introducing a new endgame activity, Vaults, and a robotic companion players can customize with various abilities and modifiers. However, the Seneschal Construct didn’t make a strong first impression, with players of Blizzard’s ARPG being quick to complain the companion didn’t feel like it brought much to the table and that its presence was barely noticeable.
Blizzard did introduce some changes on January 26 to make it so the construct’s abilities could be more easily upgraded, but the actual baseline power of the construct stayed the same. With the game’s now live 1.3.1 update, the Seneschal Construct has received some major upgrades that should make it a force to be reckoned with on its own.
As detailed in the official patch notes, many of the companion’s damage-dealing abilities have received serious buffs, with abilities such as Gyrate, Pummel, and Impale now dealing 30% more damage while Bushwhack, Focus Fire, and Lightning Bolt now deal 20% increased damage. Firefly and Tempest now deal a modest 10% more damage.
But it’s not only the Construct’s damaging abilities that have seen changes. Its healing ability, Reconstruct, has seen major improvements, now healing for 32% of maximum life at level 1 instead of 22%. At level 10, that increases to 50% of max life, up from 40%. The damage of support skills is higher as well, with Burning, Electrocution, Bleeding, Frigid, Poison, and Dusk Support damage increased to 60% of the supported skill’s damage, up from 50%.
The remainder of the update’s changes are largely dedicated to bug fixes pertaining to the season, but there are also significant changes to the game’s Vampiric affix–one of Diablo 4’s more annoying enemy modifiers to deal with. The amount a monster with Vampiric can now heal for has been reduced significantly, going from 50% on World Tier 4 to 25%, and is further reduced on lower World Tier settings. That should make battling against elite enemies with the affix far easier, and Blizzard notes that in a future update it will make ranged attacks from Vampiric enemies gain a unique visual effect in order to help players identify them.
Diablo 4 Season 3 is slated to last until April. Later this year, Diablo 4’s first expansion, Vessel of Hatred, will see players return to an iconic location from Diablo 2 to battle Mephisto, the Lord of Hatred.
