In Diablo 4, the way gear works has been completely shaken up, and it changes how you think about building your character. It’s not about adding new pieces of armour – instead, the game introduces two deep crafting systems that feel like you’ve got four extra affix slots to play with.

These systems, Tempering and Masterworking, turn your gear from something you just pick up into a base you can shape exactly how you want. You’ll find yourself treating drops as raw material rather than the final product, and that’s a huge shift. If you’ve ever wished you could take a decent item and make it perfect, Diablo 4 Items now give you that power.

Tempering is where most of that extra freedom comes from. Across Sanctuary, you’ll come across Tempering Manuals – these are basically recipes for specific affixes you can add at the Blacksmith. Non-Unique Ancestral gear is fair game, and you can slap on one or two extra stats that fit your build. Gloves, for example, might get an offensive bonus like a chance for your core skill to fire twice, plus something more practical like faster movement. You only get a set number of tries, called Temper Durability, so it’s not just mindless upgrading – you have to think about when to roll and when to hold back. That tension makes hitting the perfect combo feel way more satisfying.

Once your item’s base stats and Tempered affixes are locked in, Masterworking is the final polish. The old five-step upgrade is gone – now you’ve got twelve ranks to push through, each giving small boosts to all affixes. The real excitement comes at ranks 4, 8, and 12, where one random affix gets a huge 25% bump. That’s the moment you cross your fingers and hope it lands on your most important stat, whether that’s cooldown reduction or your main damage multiplier. You’ll need rare mats from The Pit of Artificers to climb those ranks, so it’s an endgame grind with a clear payoff: turning a great item into one that defines your whole build.

This shift makes a big difference to how you approach builds. You don’t have to wait for that mythical perfect drop with all four ideal affixes anymore. Now, finding an item with two or three good stats – especially if one’s a Greater Affix – is enough to start crafting your dream gear.

Tempering fills in the missing pieces, and Masterworking pushes it over the top. It opens up space for weird, niche setups that wouldn’t have been possible before, and it turns the endgame into a loop that’s actually fun: get a strong base item, add the right Tempered affixes, then invest your rare mats to Masterwork it, praying for those big crit upgrades. It’s a process that keeps you hooked, and with diablo 4 gold for sale you’ll have the resources to keep chasing that perfect piece.