Blizzard has once again disabled Diablo 4 trading amid a new duplication exploit players were found to be using. In a post on the Blizzard forum, community manager filthierich said the developer is working on a fix for the issue.
“We’ve suspended player trading in Diablo 4 until further notice due to a duplication exploit,” filthierich said. “We are working on a fix to amend this issue and will update you once we’ve reinstated the ability to trade. We will continue to monitor this activity to ensure a healthy playing experience for all.”
Filthierich then issued a stark warning to those who are using item duplication exploits: “Any account that engages in gold and item duplication exploits will be actioned in accordance with our End User License Agreement. We thank you for reporting this exploit to us and your patience.”
This isn’t the first time Blizzard has been forced to disable Diablo 4 trading. In August, just two months after the record-breaking action RPG came out, Blizzard suspended Diablo 4 player trading due to a gold and item duplication exploit, and threatened players who used it with a ban.
The August exploit involved one player initiating a trade with a second player, dropping the items or gold in the trade slot, then forcing the Diablo 4 client to close. From there, the player would log back into the game, with the items or gold reappearing in the player’s inventory while also remaining in the other player’s inventory.
While Diablo 4 technically supports trading (players can trade Common, Magic, and Gold items along with Gold, Gems and Elixirs), it does not include an in-game auction house (Blizzard famously removed Diablo 3’s real-money auction house back in 2014 following a backlash). Instead, players have taken to using Discord to find buyers for their virtual goods.
But the economy underpinning this makeshift market was left in disarray after some players used the exploit to bid huge amounts of gold on up-for-sale items. In one trade that surfaced just before Blizzard’s clampdown, a crossbow was sold for an eye-watering 30 billion gold. Why do Diablo 4 players want in-game gold? Typically it’s to fuel perhaps Diablo 4’s biggest ‘gold sink’, which revolves around the high cost of upgrading gear and rerolling item enchantments.
Diablo 4 launched on Steam last week and saw users dish out a “mixed” review rating of 55%. Diablo 4 launched on PC exclusively on its own Battle.net platform back in June and saw record-breaking sales that secured Diablo 4’s place as Blizzard’s fastest-selling game of all time. Generally, reaction to the new Season of Blood and its many quality-of-life changes has been positive.
Of course, Blizzard is now owned by Microsoft, which finally sealed its $69 billion purchase of Activision Blizzard earlier this month. Xbox boss Phil Spencer has already discussed the possibility of reviving old, owned franchises, with fellow executive Sarah Bond recently namechecking Blizzard’s real-time strategy series StarCraft. Activision Blizzard games won’t hit Game Pass until 2024, however.
Now Season of Blood is live, make sure to check out guide to the new vampiric powers and how to unlock them. We’ve also developed a full walkthrough of the original campaign.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
