With BlizzCon days away, an old Diablo 4 class clue is back in the conversation
A hidden hand crossbow has players thinking Demon Hunter. The Rogue says otherwise.
Diablo 4 has a 1-Hand Crossbow category hidden inside its loot filter, even though the weapon itself cannot currently be obtained in-game, and no playable class can use one.
This is not news per se, but the topic has recently returned within the community as part of the ongoing new-class conversation that is happening just before BlizzCon. And if you played Diablo 3, you can probably guess which class people immediately thought of when they heard "1-Hand Crossbow."
We are, of course, talking about the Demon Hunter.
The Hand Crossbow Clue Is Real
The loot filter's Hand Crossbow entry was first found by players earlier this year. It appears as its own weapon type that you can choose within the filter, and is separate from the regular crossbows that are already used by the Rogue.
There is no matching weapon in the game, so this particular loot filter entry currently has no practical purpose. The obvious theory is that Blizzard added it for a future class that has not been announced yet.
Demon Hunter is the popular guess here, because hand crossbows were one of its signature weapon types in Diablo 3. The class could even dual-wield them, which gave it a very different ranged identity from the larger 2-hand crossbows we have in Diablo 4.
Nevertheless, it is still only a theory. The entry could simply relate to unfinished content, an abandoned idea, or a future weapon addition to an existing class...
Rogue Makes the Theory Much Harder to Sell
The main problem with the Demon Hunter theory is already right there in-game, as part of the character-select screen.
Rogue covers a lot of the same ground. It can use bows and crossbows, throw traps around the battlefield, attack quickly from range, move at ridiculous speed, and even use shadow-based skills. Adding a Demon Hunter class without making it feel like just another version of the Rogue would be quite difficult.
Blizzard could separate the two by having the Demon Hunter focus more on turrets, rockets, gadgets, and dual hand crossbows. But the Hand Crossbow entry alone does not tell us that any of this is happening. Giving Rogue a new one-handed weapon type would be a much smaller (and more likely) explanation.
BlizzCon Should Give Us a Clear Answer
Once again, Blizzard has not announced Demon Hunter or confirmed that another class is coming. We do know that the studio deliberately kept part of Season 15 out of the PTR because it has more to reveal at BlizzCon.
The best place to watch, if you are interested in what is in store for the franchise, is the Diablo: Developer Update panel on Sunday, September 13, from 11:00 to 11:45am PDT, or 20:00 to 20:45 CEST. Blizzard could also reveal something earlier during the Opening Ceremony or Saturday's Diablo Developer Update. Until then, however, the hand crossbow is nothing more than an interesting clue. And with Rogue already occupying so much of the same class fantasy as Demon Hunter, the answer could be far less exciting than the rumor.