Diablo 4 added 5 new Uniques in Season 3, but the bad news is they're tied to a boss that everyone hates grinding
The Beast in the Ice is now a premium source of loot
Diablo 4: Season of the Construct is here and, it's safe to say, off to a less-stellar start than Season 2, with players complaining of some annoying and lackluster seasonal content. The release of several new Unique items has thankfully put some pep in the action RPG's step, but there's a catch here too: the new Uniques drop from the Beast in the Ice, one of the least popular bosses in the game.
The new Diablo 4 Uniques grant such potent buffs to specific skills that they may well redefine the whole class meta. Here's an abridged version of the full list, straight from the patch notes which note that "all new Uniques for Season 3 will be available in the Beast in the Ice drop table for Season 3."
- Barbarian - Ring of the Ravenous: Rend's duration is increased by a few seconds, and damaging enemies with Brawling skills will apply two stacks of Rend's bleed (one per enemy per four seconds).
- Sorcerer - Starfall Coronet (helm): Meteor has two charges with a cooldown instead of a mana cost, and drops three extra meteors at base.
- Druid - Unsung Ascetic's Wraps: Lightning Storm gains an additional strike each time it grows, plus Critical Strikes will strike twice and deal increased damage.
- Rogue - Beastfall Boots: using an Ultimate causes your next Core skill to consume all of your Energy and deal bonus damage for each point consumed, and using a Cooldown restores five Energy.
- Necromancer - Mutilator Plate (chest): You are always Blood Lanced, and when Blood Lance would damage you, it Fortifies you instead, with a 5% chance to spawn a Blood Orb. Blood Lance also deals increased damage.
The cool loot is the good news. The Beast in the Ice is the bad news, as our friends at PC Gamer pointed out, because it's an especially tedious boss to farm. Players have complained about the Beast regularly since its release, from the time it takes to gather the necessary boss materials to the length and difficulty of the fight, which features an unusual amount of attacks that you simply have to avoid.
Blizzard has thankfully boosted the drop rate of the Distilled Fear needed to access the boss, but the Beast is still a drag compared to many other end-game fights. With Season 3 explicitly tying its most-coveted items to the thing, Diablo 4 players are going to get mighty familiar with the Beast grind whether they want to or not.
Diablo 4's annoying Season 3 traps are driving players up the wall: "I don't understand their obsession with trying to waste our time."
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Austin freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree, and he's been with GamesRadar+ since 2019. They've yet to realize that his position as a senior writer is just a cover up for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a focus on news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.
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