Diablo 4 dev shares sage advice for players who don't like PvP: Just don't go to PvP

Diablo 4
(Image credit: Blizzard)

The PvP in Diablo games has always felt kind of vestigial and unbalanced, and Diablo 4 PvP is no exception. Fortunately, Adam Fletcher, Diablo's global community development director, recently released a step-by-step guide for those who just aren't feeling PvP.

In response to a post from Fletcher acknowledging a small issue, disgruntled Twitter user Crizzo recently requested the option to disable PvP entirely. If you remember the best post from the official Doom account, you'll understand the vibe of Fletcher's response: "To do that, follow these steps: 1) Don't walk into optional areas on the map called 'Fields of Hatred.'"

Undeterred, Crizzo insisted on "the option to disable [PvP] so I can enjoy the entire map of the game I paid for." This argument doesn't hold up to any interrogation since these PvP areas were clearly detailed ahead of Diablo 4's release, don't contain any must-see content in the first place (arguably barring a few altars), and are often so devoid of players that you can easily pass through unscathed. Fletcher minced no words: "There are no plans to disable PvP. Again, I recommend just not walking into areas that are marked as Fields of Hatred." 

Finally out of complaints, Crizzo relented: "Fair enough." 

The idea of disabling PvP in optional PvP zones built specifically for PvP, all on behalf of a few naysayers (or indeed one), is amusing on its face, and the Diablo 4 subreddit had endless fun with the exchange. That said, the bigger conversation about different elements of live service games is genuinely interesting. For the unsure: if you aren't having fun with something, you don't have to play it. Too many people have seemingly convinced themselves otherwise. 

Diablo 4 players are turning on its once most-popular class after struggling for weeks.  

Austin Wood
Senior writer

Austin has been a game journalist for 12 years, having freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree. He's been with 12DOVE since 2019. They've yet to realize his position is a cover for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a lot of news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.

Read more
Diablo 4
Diablo 4 boss would push for patches to have more fun stuff to balance out unpopular but necessary nerfs: "Lots of medicine, don't see much sugar"
A demon towers over its foes in some Diablo 2: Resurrected concept art
Diablo 2 creator says players treated the action RPG like a "lifestyle game" because it was fun, and MMOs like World of Warcraft had more to do with starting the live service trend
Diablo 2 Resurrected
Diablo creator rips into modern ARPGs for being all about "killing screen-fulls of things instantly," says Diablo 2's pacing "is great" and "that’s one of the reasons it’s endured"
Diablo 4
10 Games like Diablo to play after Diablo 4
Diablo 4 season 7 screenshot
Blizzard disables Diablo 4 season 7 Witchcraft power that was being used to deal "very egregious numbers" and plans to bring it back "next week"
The Fantastic Four seen running towards Dracula in Marvel Rivals' Season 1 'Eternal Night Falls' trailer.
It's time to stop calling Marvel Rivals an Overwatch 2 killer now that its features have already surpassed it
Latest in Action Rpg
Monster Hunter Wilds trailer screenshot showing a young woman with long blonde hair tied back into a ponytail smiling slightly, pumping her left fist in the air
Monster Hunter Wilds' infamously confusing menus spare no player, not even Gemma's voice actor herself: "This is honestly what I’m struggling with the most"
Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds players are tricking the action RPG into thinking they completed hunt quests in mere seconds using the power of poison ammo
No Rest for the Wicked
Ori and the Blind Forest developer is now "fully independent" after "months of negotiation" with what remained of its gutted publisher
Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds dev says the game's success is thanks to an "emphasis on the story," but I think that's only a tiny aspect of it
A Monster Hunter Wilds character holding binoculars.
Despite Monster Hunter Wilds suffering monstrous performance problems on PC, it still outsold the PS5 and Xbox Series X versions in the US
Skyrim
It took Skyrim players nearly 15 years to discover ingenious loot hack that completely changes the game and, uh, requires you to desecrate a couple corpses
Latest in News
World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft guild cheats its way to winning Race for World First, gets caught, banned, then reverses its name and does it all over again
A AMD Ryzen 7 8700G being put into it's socket by a reviewer
AMD's new Ryzen 9 X3D processors launch today, here's the stock I've found so far
GTA 3 Mobile screenshot showing claude running away from police near a casino
The fan-made Dreamcast version of GTA 3 is looking way better in the latest look, introducing tech that "would’ve previously been a slideshow"
Scarlett Johansson in Jurassic World Rebirth
Jurassic World Rebirth studio asked Scarlett Johansson to join Instagram, but she refused: "The film will do fine"
Deltarune
Undertale creator Toby Fox's tomfoolery leaves Deltarune testers thinking an intentional nerf was actually a bug after they "independently" discovered it
Pokemon Go player trying to catch a Croagunk
Pokemon Go developer Niantic is being bought for $3.5 billion, CEO says it'll help its games be "'forever games' that will endure for future generations"