A former Dota and StarCraft pro won Blizzard’s race but lost almost 100 hours of progress

Former Dota 2 and StarCraft pro Souaïb ‘cArn’ Hanaf became Diablo IV’s first player to hit level 100 while playing in Hardcore mode (where death is permanent), immortalizing his name inside the new hit action RPG. But his overpowered Barbarian later died in the worst possible way, the grim fantasy realm of Sanctuary’s first champion erased permanently before most players had even finished the sport.

“No…” Hanaf said throughout a recent livestream, his voice full of dread as the sport became frozen on his screen. “Hello...are you currently kidding me?” As previously spotted by PCGamesN, the always-online game had disconnected from Blizzard’s servers, killing the amount of 100 Barbarian within the process. That’s because Diablo IV’s hardcore mode treats disconnect like death to be able to discourage players from attempting to pull the plug inside a losing battle to prevent losing a character.

It would be a brutal and unworthy death for that character who Hanaf had poured 86 hours into during the period of Diablo IV’s first week. Most hardcore mode characters die eventually, truly in boss fights, nightmare dungeons, or any other challenging late-game activities. Instead of going out inside a blaze of glory, Hanaf’s Barbarian essentially died by slipping around the live service multiplayer same as a banana peel.

Blizzard’s hardcore mode race saw a few of the biggest Diablo fans compete to grind the brand-new game as fast and as safely as they possibly can. While some players accomplished it entirely on their very own, others banded together in co-op mode where XP might be farmed more proficiently thanks to such things as bonuses for playing included in a group.

Hanaf particularly leaned on the small exploit for rapidly completing dungeons. Normally, it requires a few minutes to allow them to “cool down” before players can reset them and start again. During Diablo IV’s Early Access period, however, players realized the party leader could abandon the group and restart a dungeon immediately as the rest rejoined, saving time. It was an arguably controversial advantage inside a series most fans keep company with single-player dungeon crawling.

Even though the Barbarian who cemented Hanaf’s victory has become dead, his name is going to be immortalized together with 999 others as they’re carved right into a real-life statue of Diablo IV’s main antagonist, Lilith. It’s the best thing too because the statues will most likely last a long time, as the always-online game itself will ultimately shut down, disconnected similar to the first hardcore mode character who reached level 100 inside it.