Diablo 4’s rebalancing work begins with Sorcerer and Barbarian buffs in next patch

polygon.com:

Blizzard has vowed to “improve the effectiveness and the fun of the Sorcerer and the Barbarian” classes in the next patch for Diablo 4, which will be released next Tuesday, Aug. 8.

In its latest Campfire Chat livestream, the Diablo 4 dev team set out a series of what it hopes will be fan-pleasing changes, following the Diablo community’s intense disappointment in the 1.1.0 patch that just preceded the launch of the game’s first season, Season of the Malignant, on July 20.

That patch had attempted to reset Diablo 4’s balance and lay a new foundation for its future as a live service game, but it did so by slowing player progress in a number of ways, and without fixing a number of prominent player complaints around issues like storage space, itemization, and the viability of certain character classes and builds.

That work now begins. Talking in detail about what to expect from patch 1.1.1, game directors Joe Shely and Joe Piepora and class designer Adam Jackson highlighted changes coming to the Sorcerer and Barbarian, the two classes currently felt to be the most underwhelming in the game.

Jackson said the the Sorcerer’s much-derided survivability would be improved, and the associated penalties for some of its skills would be eased. He called these “kiss-curse mechanics,” whereby when power is added something else is taken away to balance it. The feeling is that this balancing has gone too far with the Sorcerer and held the class back.

Changes to the Barbarian are focused on making the experience of playing the class feel better and more fluid in the early game, Jackson said, and improving the late game by making the class’s Unique items more attractive and effective.

Beyond these two classes, underpowered builds and Unique