Diablo 4 Season of Blood, with its vampirism, new bosses, quests and more, looks far better than Season 1

Blizzard has officially detailed everything we've been dying to know about Diablo 4's second season. During a two-hour developer update, Blizzard revealed the new mechanics coming with Season of Blood, new bosses, seasonal event, quests, characters, and a host of quality of life changes launching with the new season.

We're going to stick to the new content coming with Season of Blood in this story, and we'll be covering all the other exciting additions in a separate one.

Season of Blood arrives October 17 in Diablo 4, which is also when the first season wraps up. It goes live at 10am PT / 1pm ET / 6pm BST with the 1.2.0 patch. The new season introduces a fresh Season Journey, battle pass, event, and a new questline with new character, Erys, as the lead.

As the name suggests, the main theme of this one is vampires and vampire hunting. But you won't just be going after them, you'll become one yourself by harnessing their blood.

Vampiric Powers

Defeated enemies will drop Potent Blood, which can be spent in the new Vampiric Powers tab in the character menu. The Vampiric Powers tab is where you go to unlock any of the 22 new powers, or upgrade existing ones (up to maximum level of 3). More powers can also be unlocked after finishing the seasonal questline, and by taking part in the Blood Harvest seasonal event.

Powers are class-agnostic, so they're designed to work with all classes. You can have up to five of them equipped to your character, and you get to choose whether to specialise into certain ones, or diversify and invest in multiples of them.

Each power has a Vampiric Curse - effectively detailing what it's going to do in combat.

Pacts and Pact Armor

There's another layer to this in the form of Pacts, and Pact Armor. Ferocity, Divinity, and Eternity are the three types of Pacts you'll see on Pact Armor. Pact Armor can drop throughout the world during Season of Blood. Pact Armor is what allows you to activate the Vampiric Powers, each of which has an activation cost. By matching Pact Armor with the power you want, you get to use its effects in combat. Basically, you'll need ensure your armor covers the cost listed on each power.

The more powerful Vampiric Powers will require more Pacts, which could require more than one piece of armor with the same Pact type - or a different one with more Pacts - to activate the power.

Standalone Pacts and Cleansing Acids

The good news is that if you don't find the Pact Armor you're looking for, you'll be able to change it using Standalone Pacts, and Cleansing Acids.

Standalone Pacts come in all three types, and can be used to add (or boost) a specific type of Pact on your chosen piece of Pact Armor - assuming it's not already maxed out. Cleansing Acids do the opposite, which is remove all Pacts from existing armor pieces. Both drop from Blood Seekers (high-level lieutenants), and in the Blood Harvest season event. They're also found in the Season Journey, the new S2 quest, and Opulent Coffins.

Blood Harvest seasonal event

Blood Harvest is another major source of all vampire-related content in the new season. It's available from level one, and will always be active. Blood Harvest moves around, targeting an area of the map with an invasion of vampires, and vampire-related rewards.

Taking part in any activity in a Blood Harvest area will also earn your Reputation, which is used to climb through tiers and earn rewards in the new Hunters' Acclaim system. Rewards include Potent Blood, some Vampiric Powers, gear and more.

Blood Seekers and Blood Lures

Blood Harvest is also where you can earn the rare Blood Lures, which let you summon Blood Seekers. Those are vampire blood-infused versions of all of Diablo 4's classes, so they're going to use the same skills and moves the heroes do against them.

Blood Seekers can occasionally be found throughout the world, and may even appear without warning, much like our friend The Butcher.

New endgame bosses

Season of Blood introduces three new challenging, endgame bosses to the game. Each boss can drop unique cosmetics, and new unique armor/weapons. The new bosses are available in World Tier 3 & 4. The endgame bosses have been reshuffled to effectively cap off pinnacle endgame activities.

You'll also now need to farm certain materials to summon them. Grigoire, The Galvanic Saint (WT3/4) requires Living Steel to summon. Grigoire is the ultimate boss of Helltide. Echo of Varshan (WT3/4) is now the boss of Whispers, and you summon him by accumulating enough of his body parts.

The Beast in the Ice is another new boss (WT4), and it can be summoned by gathering Distilled Fear, which drops in Tier 30 or higher Nightmare Dungeons - making it the ultimate boss of Nightmare Dungeons. Echo of Duriel (WT4) is also new, and it can be fought after defeating both Grigoire, and Varshan in World Tier 4. You'll be able to summon Duriel by collecting Mucus-Slick Eggs and Shards of Agony - and he has a chance to drop Uber Uniques.

Finally, there's a more difficult version of the season's new villain, Lord Zir, Dark Master (WT4). Dark Master is the ultimate boss of Legion Events and World Bosses. Both activities drop Exquisite Blood, which is used to summon Dark Master.

All bosses can only be summoned once, before you'll need to spend more materials and meet the summoning conditions to summon them again.

It's worth noting that the non-Season of Blood content will be available across the Eternal Realm as well, so long as it doesn't tie into any of the new vampire-related mechanics.