Wudijo Interviews Diablo 4 Game Director Zaven Haroutunian - Lord of Hatred Deep Dive
Content creator Wudijo sat down with Zaven Haroutunian, Game Director on Diablo 4: Lord of Hatred, at the Blizzard campus to discuss the expansion's design philosophy, new systems, endgame changes, and quality-of-life improvements. This interview covers a massive range of topics, so we've broken it down into the key talking points.
Note: This article is based on a YouTube sitdown interview. Some quotes have been lightly cleaned up for readability, but the intent and meaning are preserved.
Design Philosophy - Cleaner Systems, Less Power Inflation
One of the biggest themes of the conversation was Blizzard's shift toward giving each system in Diablo 4 a clear, distinct identity. Zaven explained that at launch, power and customization were spread across too many systems - the skill tree, itemization, Paragon, Renown, Altars of Lilith - and everything was doing a little bit of everything. That made the game harder to balance and harder for players to understand where their power was actually coming from.
Going into Lord of Hatred, the team is deliberately separating these responsibilities. The skill tree is being repositioned as the core of character customization and identity, not a source of raw passive power. A lot of passive power is being stripped out of the tree entirely.
Why? Because free power from leveling was competing with gear upgrades, which undermined the excitement of finding better items. As Zaven put it: "This is Diablo. We're kind of a gear-focused game. Items should be giving you power."
This also helps address power inflation. When the tree gives too much free power, items have to overcompensate to still feel like upgrades, which inflates numbers across the board. By pulling passive power out of the tree, the team can bring the overall numbers back to a more reasonable state.
Torment Tiers Expanding to 12
Lord of Hatred is adding Torment Tiers up to 12, but importantly, Torment 12 will not exceed the current Pit ceiling. The goal isn't to inflate numbers further - it's to make all endgame activities scale competitively so you're not funneled into just The Pit or The Tower.
Activities like Infernal Hordes, Helltides, Nightmare Dungeons, and more will all scale up through these new Torment Tiers, and rewards will scale alongside them in both quantity and quality.
Loot Filter - Free for All Players
The long-awaited Loot Filter launches alongside Lord of Hatred and is free for all players regardless of expansion ownership.
Wudijo raised the concern that a loot filter could become an excuse for sloppier loot design. Zaven pushed back on that, noting that the game already has internal filtering (smart loot, rarity gating, etc.) and the filter is meant to give players more agency, not to dump more garbage on the ground.
That said, some of the existing internal filtering will be loosened at higher levels of play because of the Horadric Cube. Lower-rarity items will have more value since the Cube can upgrade them, so the team wants players to have the option of engaging with those drops if they choose to. If you don't want them, filter them out.
Zaven also acknowledged that the first version won't cover every use case players can think of, but the system is being built flexibly and the team is committed to expanding it based on community feedback.
Horadric Cube - A True Crafting System
The Horadric Cube is coming to Diablo 4 in Lord of Hatred, and Zaven was clear about its design direction: it's modeled after the Diablo 2 Cube, not the Diablo 3 version. It's a crafting system, period. No Kanai's Cube-style power extraction.
Here's what we know it can do:
- Modify affixes on items (add, remove, reroll)
- Convert a Unique item into a Charm for your Talisman - creating a direct link between your gear and the Talisman system
- Upgrade lower-rarity items - Blues and Yellows can be taken on a full "zero to hero" journey through the Cube
- Advanced gem crafting recipes
- Charm and Seal crafting - the Talisman's items are crafted entirely through the Cube, not the Blacksmith
The system is also being built to be easily expandable, with more recipes planned over time.
Transfiguration - Sanctification's Successor
A new system called Transfiguration is being added through the Cube. It's similar to Sanctification (the popular seasonal mechanic), but tuned for the long-term game. It's described as a rare final crafting step that adds properties to items, though the bonuses are less extreme than Sanctification was. Think of it as Sanctification finding a permanent, more balanced home in the game.
The Talisman - Charms, Sets, and Seals
Zaven went deep on the Talisman system, and it's more complex than initially revealed.
The Talisman has up to 6 outer slots for Charms and 1 center slot for a Seal. Charms and Seals are two distinct item types.
Charms
Charms come in multiple rarities, including Set Charms with 2/3/5 piece set bonuses. Some examples Zaven shared:
- Druid Set - At a certain bonus tier, you gain two companion bears following you around. If you're building companion-focused, this is huge.
- Rogue Set - One set grants a permanent Shadow Clone that casts Ultimates for you on a timer. Another lets you auto-cast any Marksman Basic on your bar, so you can load up multiple Basics and they fire automatically.
Every class has multiple sets, plus there are generic sets that go to 2 or 3 pieces and can be mixed and matched.
Seals
Seals go in the center slot of the Talisman, and they do two things:
- Modify the number of Charm slots - A Seal can reduce your 6 slots down to 3 (or other amounts), creating a tradeoff
- Modify Set bonuses - Seals can add additional bonuses to your equipped sets, and they can affect more than one set at a time
This means the optimization space is massive. You're not locked into just running a single 5-piece set. With the right Seal, combining multiple smaller sets could potentially outperform a full 5-piece, depending on the interactions.
War Plans - Endgame Activity Customization
Zaven confirmed that War Plans is essentially opt-in, but he expects everyone will use it because the benefits are too good to skip.
The system works on two levels:
Level 1 - Activity Playlists with Bonus Rewards. You choose from randomized pairings of activities and rewards. Every activity you play through War Plans gives its normal drops plus an additional bonus reward. You can target specific resources by choosing the nodes that offer what you need.
Level 2 - Activity Skill Trees. Playing activities through War Plans earns meta-progression toward individual skill trees for every endgame activity - all seven current activities including The Pit and Undercity. These trees let you customize how each activity plays.
Some examples Zaven gave:
- Add a special Butcher to all your Pit runs
- Replace glyph upgrade rewards in The Pit with loot or currency instead
- Have Duriel replace the Blood Maiden during Helltides
- Have Lord Zir send Bloodseekers into The Pit
- Cross-pollinate elements from one activity into another
The goal is to let players shape their own endgame experience and make every activity feel worth engaging with.
Echoing Hatred - Rare, Infinite, High-Stakes
Echoing Hatred is designed as a hyper-rare event. You need to find a Trace of Echoes as a loot drop - and it's intentionally very rare. When you get one, it's meant to be a moment.
The event itself is infinite wave survival. You play until you die, rewards escalate the further you go, and you get one shot per Trace. Zaven described the intended experience as: "Holy shit, I got a Trace of Echoes. I'm going to go optimize my gear. I'm going to go do this thing."
The Tower - Still in Beta, Big Changes Coming
Zaven confirmed The Tower is staying in beta until the team feels confident in it. No specific date for when it leaves beta.
The biggest current issue isn't the internal mechanics or objectives - it's the loading times between floors. Because The Tower is a multi-floor dungeon, every floor transition incurs a loading cost, and the team is actively working on solutions. Interestingly, Zaven said this work could benefit the entire game, not just The Tower - describing it as a catalyst for broader performance improvements.
Tower Rewards
Two reward tracks are planned:
- Leaderboard placement rewards - for competitive players
- Personal progression rewards - for beating your own best tier, even if you don't place on leaderboards
Rewards will be tiered in chunks (not every single tier gets something), with the gaps getting larger as you push higher. Cosmetics are confirmed as part of the reward pool.
Replayability
The team is exploring ways to shift the Tower meta between cycles so that each reset doesn't feel identical. The idea is to change variables cycle-to-cycle so different builds and strategies become more or less effective, giving players a reason to re-engage rather than knowing their ceiling from the start.
Damage Over Time Builds
Wudijo pointed out that DoT builds have been almost non-existent throughout Diablo 4's lifespan. Zaven acknowledged this is something they're aware of and working on as part of the broader skill tree rework - it's a viability issue that falls under the same philosophy of making more build options competitive.
He also noted that the Killstreak system was specifically designed to account for DoT builds: damage-over-time application counts as extending your Killstreak timer.
Attack Speed and Movement Speed Caps
Wudijo asked about the speed caps that currently exist in the game. Zaven said there's no specific rework to announce, but the caps are largely technical limitations (the game can only render so fast before visual issues occur). If they can squeeze more headroom out of it, they're open to raising the caps.
Tooltip Clarity
Both agreed that tooltip information is a significant problem, especially around breakpoints like attack speed where players can waste item budget on stats that don't actually increase their output. Zaven called it "an informational problem" and said it's something they want to improve, though it's complex given how many sources of stats exist in the game.
Stash Space
No major stash rework is planned right now. The pre-order stash tab brings the total to around 8, and there's nothing additional to announce beyond that at this time.
Quick Hits
- Torment Tiers: Expanding to 12, scaling all activities, not exceeding current Pit ceiling
- Level Cap: Being increased to 70
- Horadric Cube: Diablo 2-style crafting, not Diablo 3 power extraction
- Transfiguration: Permanent, balanced successor to Sanctification
- Seals: Modify both Charm slot count and Set bonuses in the Talisman
- Echoing Hatred: Rare drop access, infinite waves, one-shot attempt
- War Plans: Activity playlists + per-activity skill trees for customization
- DoT Builds: Acknowledged as under-performing, being addressed in skill tree rework
- Loot Filter: Free for all players, built to be expanded based on feedback
This interview was conducted by Wudijo at Blizzard HQ with Zaven Haroutunian, Game Director on Diablo 4: Lord of Hatred.
Original Video: Diablo 4 Expansion will be a MAJOR Shakeup - Interviewing Associate Game Director Zaven Haroutunian