'Diablo 3' patch to fix Trail of Cinders rune damage

Diablo 3's next patch will bring the game to version 1.0.5, and one of its fixes is for an unintentionally high damage value for the Trail of Cinders rune, Blizzard announced today.

Diablo 3's next patch, version 1.0.5, will include a fix for an unintentionally high damage value for the Trail of Cinders rune, Blizzard announced today.

The rune will now offer a 300 percent damage boost over three seconds, one fifth of the current value of 1500 percent.

Blizzard became aware of the issue shortly after the launch of the 1.0.4 patch two weeks ago and could have tweaked the damage value without waiting for the next update. But Blizzard is aware that the change might render some players' builds ineffective, so the company wanted to provide "proper notice."

Diablo 3 community manager Lylirra explained the decision:

Ultimately, we want to continue to provide players with more build options and ways to feel creative with their skill/gear selections, but not at the expense of going against our design goals or creating situations which can encourage players to limit themselves defensively.

An outcry immediately rose up from Diablo 3 players on the forums, charging that Blizzard is "nerfing" the rune instead of fixing a bug. But according to Lylirra, the rune in the 1.0.4 patch has a bug that causes it to deal five times as much damage per second as the game's designers intended. While the original patch notes cite a damage value of 1500 percent, Blizzard says the notes were incorrect because they were based on "incorrect information" from the bug. "We missed this issue during testing," says Lylirra.

Blizzard has not yet announced a release date for the 1.0.5 patch.