One of the questions that has been most frequently asked by the Diablo community ever since Diablo 4 was announced at BizzCon 2019 is when are we getting leaderboards? This particular question, perhaps more than any other, highlights the distinction between the two major cohorts of gamers in general, which are the competitive players and the non-competitive (casual) players.
The fact that so many gamers have repeatedly asked this question over the years is not all surprising considering what Diablo 3 had evolved into by the time the first Diablo 4 Beta was released. What is a little surprising, however, is how many gamers are still asking this question as we approach the release of the Vessel of Hatred Expansion along with the Season of Hatred Rising.
The Good Old Days
A bit more background would probably be helpful at this point for those players who are relatively new to Diablo gaming. Diablo 3 had essentially become a competitive-only game a few years before the last new Season was released in 2023. The very best pro streamers would spend the first fifteen to twenty hours of a new Season racing to achieve a world-first Rank 1 clear for a level 150 Greater Rift.
Those same pros would then spend the remaining three months of the Season trying to best each other and to defend their ranks on various leaderboards. Pretty much all of the class build, leveling, farming, and other strategy guides for a given Season revolved around the top players wanting to flaunt their Diablo gaming machismo in this way.
Rude Awakening
However, the bottom fell out of that sector of the pro streaming market when the Diablo 3 developers stopped releasing new Seasonal themes right before Diablo 4 was shipped last year. The problem was that Diablo 4 launched without leaderboards, and the result was some major shrinkage among the ranks of the most well-known Diablo Giga Chads.
Consequently, some of those Diablo streaming luminaries sought other revenue streams, such as going to work for Blizzard, getting a staff position at one of the major Diablo fan sites, producing even more clickbait doom and gloom videos on YouTube, or just dropping out of the Diablo community altogether and moving on to other games like PoE, etc., never to return.
Keeping With Tradition
Earlier this year, when Season 4 was releasing, I interviewed my friend Jen of Hatred about the present and future of Diablo 4. One of the most widely discussed topics at the time was how Season 4 seemed to focus so heavily on simply making the game better for casual players without adding much in the way of new content.
During the interview I asked Jen about whether she believed the focus on casual gaming would persist for upcoming Seasons. Her prediction was that the Devs would need to give some love to the pro streamers sometime in the near future in order for the game to remain fully viable. I offered essentially the same opinion in my article The Lowdown on Leaderboards based on the belief that competition was necessary for continued innovation.
Plot Twist
Yet here we are just a week prior to the release of Season 6 and there have been no announcements for any new competitive activities being introduced in the game. To add insult to injury, the Devs have also decided to remove the Gauntlet. Very few longtime Diablo fans could have predicted a year ago that we would be in this place right now. However, I, for one, am not at all disappointed.
The landscape of the Diablo 4 player base has apparently shifted significantly compared to the large group of Diablo 3 gamers who would devote hundreds, if not thousands, of hours each Season to be able to enshrine their leaderboard achievements in perpetuity. I suspect that this shift is likely due, in part, to the massive influx of new casual players as a result of adding Diabo 4 to Xbox Game Pass.
In Answer to Your Question
So, what’s the point of power in the Vessel of Hatred? Why do the Devs continue to add new and different ways to power up characters if players cannot compete with each other in a publicly measurable manner? Well, I suppose the easy answer is that expanding upon the power fantasy in Diablo 4 and making it accessible to more players has turned out to be a great deal of fun for a lot of gamers.
Although the common complaint about not having enough to do in the endgame may have been perfectly valid a year ago, the same cannot be said for the game in Season 6. Conversely, there’s so much new content being added to the game with the VoH expansion that many casual players will likely feel a bit overwhelmed when attempting to prioritize their endgame activities.
Just Can’t Let Go
Despite all the pro Content Creators who predicted that Diablo 4 would be long dead and buried by now, it’s pretty clear that the game is becoming a great success with a loyal player base that continues to grow. Nevertheless, there are still a few holdouts who just can seem to let go of that last little bit of nasty cheese.
As recently as earlier today, I read some comments an extremely popular forum that were posted by a player who was disputing the value of adding new ways of progressing characters in a game with no competitive elements (other than the Fields of Hatred, which virtually nobody takes seriously). All I can really say in response to folks like him is that it’s probably time to move on.
So, you may continue to hear a few players making statements about how the game is too easy, or it’s just for cassuals now, or that there’s not enough to do. If so, then just keep in mind that what they’re really saying is they don’t get enough enjoyment, or can’t generate enough income, from playing non-competitive games. I can certainly understand why having already spent the money to purchase the base game might cause them to feel dissatisfied. Nevertheless, continuing to beat that dead horse won’t change anything, at least for the time being anyway.
Looking Forward
Yes, leaderboards will be added to the game eventually, but that objective still seems to be fairly low on the list of priorities for the Devs based on the feedback they offered in their recent Livestream. I’ve never been a competitive Diablo player, so that’s just fine as far as I’m concerned. I’m all in favor of limiting botting (an inevitable consequence of adding leaderboards) to the Fields of Hatred like it is now and would prefer to delay the introduction of more botting for a long as possible.
It’s true we may see some new botting next Season in conjunction with Rune farming, but hopefully the Devs will be able to keep it to a minimum. Considering that the vast majority of Diablo 4 players are solo casuals, I suspect that the demand for black market Runes won’t become a huge problem.
See You Next Time
The PureDiablo community would like to know your opinion on this topic, so please sound off in the comments section below, or contact me on Twitter. Let me know if you have any ideas or suggestions for future topics here at PureDiablo. In the meantime, be sure to keep an eye on the news feed so you’ll have all the up-to-date info you need to get the most out of your game.
If you believe that any of the information shared above is inaccurate in any way, please let us know, along with a reference for the correct information, so we can update this document accordingly.
Gazerrick is a staff writer for PureDiablo who focuses primarily on casual gaming interests and lore for the Diablo community. When not hacking and slashing his way through a new Season, he can be found participating in, and presenting at, various pop culture conventions in southern Arizona. You can follow him on Twitter @Gazerrick9000 for even more of his gaming indulgences. A collection of his creative media is also available at Cactus Palm Perspectives.
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