Diablo 4: With Vessel of Hatred you get companions, but an expert sees rather the disadvantages

With Vessel of Hatred, you will get companions in Diablo 4 that can support you in battle. However, an expert is skeptical and does not expect much from the mercenaries.

The first expansion for Diablo 4, “Vessel of Hatred,” will be released on October 8, 2024. With it comes a new area, fresh content, and the continuation of Neyrelle’s story. Additionally, you can expect four new companions who will assist you in fighting the monsters in Sanctuary.

After the announcement at gamescom 2024 and the blog post from Blizzard, there is lively discussion about the mercenaries. Some experts and players are skeptical and see primarily disadvantages. Others find the new mercenaries exciting and praise their cool features.

How does the expert assess the mercenaries? In a YouTube video, the Diablo expert wudijo presents the features and skills of the mercenaries based on a Blizzard video. He does not expect the mercenaries to cause “any damage at all,” but that will be seen later.

He says: “I can imagine that they become pretty irrelevant in late-game and might die constantly. Additionally, it doesn’t look like we can actually equip them with gear.” He fears various disadvantages, such as them “drawing aggro” when you don’t want them to. wudijo is dissatisfied with having to use mercenaries.

In a livestream on Twitch, wudijo suspects that the mercenaries can also die. He notes: “It seems they have a HP bar and mainly serve as debuff bots (or be dead)” (visible here in the stream).

In the chat is also the content creator Chronikz. He compares the mercenaries to minions and writes: “Now everyone has to suffer under the minion AI.” wudijo laughs in response: “Now we are all Necros.” In Season 4, the companions of the Necromancers were buffed, making minion builds among the strongest. However, it also happens that the golem and skeletons simply stand still in combat or get stuck somewhere temporarily.

The video gives you an insight into the abilities of the mercenaries:

Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred shows Mercenaries in gameplay trailer

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Expert praises special mechanic of the mercenaries

Are there also positive opinions? Furthermore, there are experts who seem optimistic about the mercenaries and see some advantages.

Diablo expert Raxxanterax highlights a mechanic of the mercenaries in his YouTube video that he finds helpful:

There is a very, very cool mechanic they have introduced called “Reinforcement.” You can set the mercenary to assist in certain situations, such as when you are stunned, or you can configure him to execute specific skills tied to your own skills. […] This is actually a pretty great idea, and if the mercenaries are indeed helpful, I am sure there will be many opportunities to optimize this function. […]

I have a feeling that if the mercenaries are not completely useless, there will be some very cool ways to use this function in the endgame.

Raxxanterax also sees this as an opportunity to introduce something specific in hardcore mode to keep the player character alive. Because a death in that mode is permanent.

Content creator and necromancer expert MacroBioBoi expresses his thoughts on the mercenaries in his YouTube video as follows:

They use very different abilities […] So it is almost certain that the individual mercenary styles will compensate for the weaknesses of certain builds. Personally, I hope that they are not so necessary for gameplay that there are certain builds that could not exist without their mercenaries.

I don’t think we can really avoid that in the future, but I generally have some concerns about the mercenaries in the game. But at least their skill sets look very unique and interesting, and I like how they are built differently.

How helpful and useful the mercenaries ultimately are in the game will be revealed in October when the first expansion for Diablo 4 launches. Until then, this information is speculation based on first impressions.