Diablo V will have item tiers, gear-based sets and possibly stat requirements on items, game director Joe Shely said at the Diablo V panel at BlizzCon 2026. He showed an inventory mock labelled “In development content, not final” and said it shows the pillars of itemization: “depth, clarity, and identity.”
“Diablo V will feature item tiers,” Shely said. “Items will start simple and then grow and go on a journey with you, sort of like they did in Diablo 2.” The mock lists a War Spear (Magic Spear, Tier 3, 87 damage per second, +13 Shadow Damage, +2 Mana on Kill, Requirements: 60 Dexterity) and an Ancient Shield (Rare Shield, Tier 5, 103 Armor, +112 Thorns as Shadow, Summons Inherit 61% of Your Thorns, Shadow Damage has a 36% Chance to Corrupt Enemies, Restores 15% Damage Taken as Mana, Requires 119 Strength, 68 Intelligence). Mana appears as a resource and Corrupt as an effect on the slide; neither was explained.
Items take up multiple slots in the inventory with larger icons, part of nailing “the item’s identity” from the ground to the bag, Shely said, and the team has “some really great solutions” for controller players worried about manipulating them.
Gear-based sets return. “We love what the Talisman did in Lord of Hatred, but we want to attach that set concept to gear again,” he said, adding that sets should broaden the number of builds rather than shrink them. The team is also “experimenting a bit with stat requirements on items,” which he said may not be final.