After you finish the Lord of Hatred campaign in Diablo IV, the old World Tier ladder is gone. Your job is to push level 60–70, lock in a baseline of 850 Item Power gear, unlock Torment 1, and turn on the crafting and Paragon systems that create real power spikes. This guide covers that first post-campaign window in order.
1. Switch to Penitent and target Item Power 850
Change difficulty to Penitent as soon as the campaign ends. Run standard endgame activities until you wear a full set of 850 Item Power pieces.
Items above 800 Item Power jump hard in raw stats compared with campaign leveling gear. That baseline is what keeps you alive when you start Torment trials. Weapon upgrades matter most: prioritize a strong 850 weapon before polishing every armor slot.
Resistances are not optional early on. Cap them as soon as you can; getting one-shot on Penitent or Torment is usually a resist or Armor gap, not a missing Unique.
2. Follow the War Plans playlist
War Plans are the expansion’s structured endgame playlist. They replace aimless grinding and actively upgrade the loot quality of the activities you run.
- 1
Travel to Temis in Skovos after the campaign and unlock War Plans at the Command Table.
- 2
When building your path, prioritize The Pit and Helltides while their timers are fresh so you catch those windows instead of waiting out a dead rotation.
- 3
Complete the exact activities listed on your current War Plan so the matching activity trees progress.
- 4
Chain Helltides with Tree of Whispers bounties while following the playlist to double-dip XP, gold, and crafting materials.
Activity tree progress heavily upgrades the quality of loot from endgame rewards. The Pit can feel like strong XP, and it is, but you should still run War Plans. The trees and War Chest rewards compound over time in a way pure Pit spam does not.
Also push the Season Journey. It unlocks seasonal content gates and dumps a large amount of rewards while you are already doing the same activities for gear.
3. Unlock Torment 1 through The Pit
Torment 1 is the true endgame gate. It is the difficulty that unlocks Ancestral items (900 Item Power), Greater Affixes (GA), and the rest of the Torment content ladder.
- 1
Reach level 70 and travel to the Pit of the Artificers in Cerrigar.
- 2Clear Pit Tier 10 to permanently unlock Torment 1 difficulty.
You can no longer target specific Legendary powers the way older Codex-heavy loops allowed. Expect to farm drops, Cube upgrades, and imprint what you need from the Codex once you have the Aspects.
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4. Craft immediately: do not wait for perfect gear
Small crafting investments create large early power spikes. Do not sit on untempered leveling leftovers while you wait for “perfect” drops.
Tempering
Visit any Blacksmith and temper right away:
- Armor: generic defenses such as Maximum Life, Armor, and Resistances
- Weapons: damage multipliers first
Tempering is one of the fastest ways to stop one-shots as you step into harder tiers.
Masterworking
Masterworking is available only on items with 850 Item Power or higher. Sub-850 pieces cannot be Masterworked, so wait until your baseline set hits that threshold before spending materials.
Horadric Cube
Use the Horadric Cube early:
- Upgrade high-stat Rare items into Legendaries so you can chase useful affixes before perfect Uniques drop
- Push items toward a fourth affix when the Cube recipe allows; that extra modifier is a major early spike
- Recycle or reroll Horadric set Charms into the ones your build actually needs instead of hoarding mismatched drops
Aspects, sockets, and caps
Go to the Occultist and imprint build-defining Aspects from your Codex of Power over weak Legendary powers.
Add sockets to jewelry and armor. Slot Gems and Skulls to forcibly push Resistances toward the 70% cap and Armor toward 1,000. Resist capping is one of the highest-value defensive upgrades in this window.
5. Build your Paragon foundation
A large share of your raw multiplier power comes from the Paragon board, not from chasing every gear upgrade.
- Spend early Paragon points toward the nearest Legendary Nodes
- Prefer large multipliers and defensive nodes over small damage clusters at the start
- Run The Pit to level your core Glyphs to 25, which expands their radius and unlocks secondary multipliers
If your gear feels “fine” but your clear speed does not, your Paragon path and Glyph levels are usually the missing piece.
Quick priority checklist
| Priority | Action |
|---|---|
| 1 | Penitent + full 850 set (weapon first) |
| 2 | War Plans in Temis (Pit + Helltide when fresh) + Season Journey |
| 3 | Pit Tier 10 → Torment 1 (Ancestrals / GA) |
| 4 | Temper, Cube (4th affix / Rare→Legendary), Aspects, sockets |
| 5 | Cap Resistances / Armor; Masterwork only if 850+ IP |
| 6 | Legendary Paragon nodes + Glyphs to 25 |
| 7 | Reroll Horadric Charms; farm Legendaries you cannot target |
Stay on this loop until Torment 1 feels comfortable, then push Ancestral farming and higher Torment tiers with the same War Plans backbone.
Experiencing issues with Diablo IV?
If you run into crashes, launch failures, or performance problems while playing, check the Diablo IV page for community-reported bugs and fixes. You can also submit a solution if you found something that worked for you.
