I love Diablo IV a lot, and I’m not afraid to admit that as a casual player of ARPGs (including Diablo), I tend to get excited about small details. Especially when those small details are designed to fix some annoying problem.
With the Season 5 PTR, Blizzard has provided the best solution yet to the series of visibility issues I’ve been experiencing while playing Diablo IV – and this time it’s the right one.
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All of the major mechanical overhauls introduced in the Diablo IV Season 4 PTR were exciting and awe-inspiring, but as I admitted at the time, it was the changes to the Codex of Power that really made me most eager to boot up the game when Season 4 officially began.
You know what, there are similar changes com ing to the Season 5 PTR that started earlier this week that I’m also excited about. No, this isn’t a new Horde mode (which is great) or any new gear, it’s actually Tiny
Diablo IV has always had issues with combat text, namely the various alerts you receive when fighting monsters. These alerts include status effects (vulnerable, hardened, etc.), damage numbers, and more. These alerts can be so numerous that they cover the entire screen, making it difficult to see what you’re actually clicking on. In early patches, Blizzard tried to address the issue by letting players hide everything, show everything, or just hide the damage numbers. While this was a welcome change, it didn’t provide enough ways to customize combat text.
For example, I like damage numbers, but I don’t need constant bombardment of text. There was no way to get that before the Season 5 PTR started. But I’m happy to say that Blizzard has done a much better job this time around, letting players customize every aspect of it.
In the options menu under “Gameplay”, there is now a subsection called “Combat Text Options”. All types of damage (normal, critical, etc.), buffs/debuffs, crowd control effects, defensive actions – all have separate toggles. You can also choose to turn off all combat text.
Flipping through the options menu is one of my favorite things to do in the game, especially after a major patch. Blizzard may not think these toggles are big enough to warrant a big hype, but I’d be lying if I said they’re more important to me than a lot of what’s in Season 5.
If you want to try the PTR for yourself, just fire up BattleNet and download the build. It’s available until July 2nd.
