Competitive demon slaying is about to take over Diablo 4 as its next update finally adds official leaderboards

It's not enough to slay thousands of monsters simply for the fun of it. What if all that bloodshed was to show off how much better you are at it than the rest of them? After years of asking for it, Diablo 4 players are finally getting leaderboards—and a new mode to go with them—in its next update.

Blizzard calls it The Tower and it's coming in a patch on January 12 as a beta mode that promises to improve over time. It's basically a multi-level dungeon where you slay monsters for a high score, leveraging both speed and power to clear your way to a final boss. Diablo 3 players will recognize this format as an updated version of Greater Rifts, a super endgame mode for players who are pretty much done perfecting their builds.

To even the playing field, there are pylons scattered throughout The Tower that give you a big boost in damage when you destroy them. We won't know until it comes out if they're worth playing around, but I think it's Blizzard's way of giving less-than-optimal builds a chance to compete with people who adhere to the meta.

Leaderboards have been an important part of action RPGs since Diablo 2. In a genre about becoming a demon-slaying god, it can be fun to see how you match up against other players chasing after the same status every season. It's also an opportunity for people to puzzle out unique setups that excel in a race against the clock. Diablo 4 was in desperate need of something to do once you've picked up all the gear you'd ever need.

With the introduction of paladins this season, the balance among the classes has been a little lopsided. The fresh new class also has fresh new bugs that make them considerably stronger than the others. Thankfully, The Tower leaderboards are broken out by each class and the number of players involved. All the paladins can fight amongst themselves while the rest of us try to get some good runs in using old-fashioned classes from 2023.

Blizzard made a smart decision to run the leaderboard rankings for two week periods instead of for the entire three-month season. That way, if some absurdly broken exploit happens it will be siloed to one set of ranks before it's fixed. It's being very transparent about The Tower not being considered finished, so I expect some wonky stuff to pop up as players dive in. And with the expansion coming in April, there will surely be plenty more to test when the second new class arrives too.

The Tower and the leaderboards will go live on January 12 along with a patch that fixes some bugs that have been minor annoyances for players in the last few weeks.