Diablo 4 brought the malevolent hearts to the action RPG with Season 1. One of the new items is truly evil, as other players can steal your damage with it.
Season 1 of Diablo 4 has started and has added a new special game mechanic to the action RPG with the 32 malevolent hearts. However, one of these hearts is currently attracting a lot of attention from players, as it allows your teammates to steal your damage.
What kind of item is this? Malevolent hearts are new items that you can slot like gems into the color-matching sockets of your rings and amulets, granting you special effects.
The malevolent heart currently causing an uproar among players is called “Barbier” and can be equipped by any class.
Barbier absorbs critical hits and all the damage you inflict on an enemy within a time span of (2.0 to 4.0 seconds). Once the time elapses, the heart discharges and deals the absorbed damage to the target and nearby enemies, increasing by 10% per second.
How do players steal your damage with this item? If you play cooperatively with a player who has equipped the malevolent heart Barbier, this player will steal your damage. This is also reported by some users on Reddit.
During the damage-absorbing time span, you will not see any damage numbers – instead, a disappointing “Immune” label appears. This is because Barbier not only absorbs the damage of the player who has equipped the item, but also the damage from their teammates.
When the absorbed damage is unleashed, the Barbier wielder enjoys dizzyingly high damage – all other players in the fight receive nothing. Your damage is not gone; you just don’t see it. The Barbier-wielder has stolen it (via Reddit).
Does the item also have disadvantages? Players are still undecided about this. Some users on Reddit write that Barbier may disrupt effects from abilities like Inneres Auge
of the Hunter. This could ruin certain builds.
The Diablo expert and YouTuber “MacroBioBoi” took a closer look at Barbier and found no effects on certain abilities during the test (via YouTube).
According to MacroBioBoi, the abilities “Vitality Drain” and “Flesh Rending” of the Necromancer both activated their effects while Barbier absorbed the damage. For “Vitality Drain”, a hit is necessary, while for “Flesh Rending”, damage must be inflicted.
Whether Barbier can indeed have negative impacts on your builds or those of your teammates is not yet fully clarified.
Since you cannot choose to play with other players in certain areas and during world bosses, it’s unavoidable in certain situations that you will encounter teammates with Barbier – this may not sit well with some players.
Another crazy item that all classes can equip is the “Fists of Fate”:
Diablo 4: Barbar finds unique gloves – “It’s like I have my own slot machine”
