This page contains details about the three difficulty levels in Diablo 2 Resurrected - Normal, Nightmare and Hell difficulty.

There are three difficulty levels in Diablo 2 Resurrected, Normal, Nightmare and Hell. They must be completed sequentially to unlock the next difficulty - once you defeat Baal on Normal difficulty, you’ll unlock Nightmare difficulty. Defeat Baal again on Nightmare difficulty to unlock Hell difficulty.

You’ll progress through the same Acts in the same order between difficulties, and you can even complete all the same [quests] again, earning the same rewards (including +Skill Points, +Stat Points and +Resistances), which stack with those earned in previous difficulties. In addition, you’ll be facing off against higher-level monsters, who can drop superior loot, opening up entire new tiers of uniques, sets and runes to acquire. This isn’t just a boon, however, it’s a necessity, as in addition to facing strong enemies, several other changes have been made to increase the difficulty. You’ll need to acquire some of these new items to stand a chance against the foes you’ll face as you progress through the difficulties.

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There are three difficulties in Diablo 2 Resurrected - Normal, Nightmare and Hell. They must be completed sequentially to unlock the next, higher difficulty.

Normal Difficulty¶

Everything is rosy. Sure, you don’t start out with any resistances, but at the outset most foes won’t bother with elemental damage. Stumbling across the odd Lightning Enchanted boss can be quite a shock, but damage spikes are rare, enemies generously fall over after some light prodding, and while the uniques are generally forgettable, the odd runeword (likely farmed from the [Countess] can really shift the odds absurdly in your favor.

By Act 5 you’re starting to see signs of things to come in Nightmare difficulty, but unique monsters are limited to one random property, map sizes are relatively small, unique enemy spawns are densely populated, death carries few penalties and monsters with immunities are almost unheard of. Even if you find the odd monster with immunity, there’s still a good chance you can just whack it with whatever you’ve got in your hand.

The Area Level (aLv) of areas (and hence, loosely, of enemies) in Normal difficulty will vary between 1 - 42.

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(1 of 3) Unique enemies in Nightmare difficulty will spawn with two mods and may even possess an immunity.

Nightmare Difficulty¶

Act 1 Nightmare is a pretty smooth difficulty gradient from Act 5 Normal, although the Blood Moor can lull you into a false sense of security. You’ll find more unique packs loitering around the map - the sizes of which have increased to accommodate the higher enemy counts and generally make doing runs more complicated. In Nightmare mode you’ll find that your resistances (fire, cold, lightning and poison) have all been lowered by 40%, and unique monsters have two random properties, rather than just one. Combine this with the fact that monsters also have higher levels (and hence, stats) than in Normal difficulty and acquiring new gear may prove necessary.

A list of changes can be found below:

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(1 of 3) Almost every monster will posses an immunity in Hell difficulty, and unique monsters will have three random modifiers.

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Almost every monster will posses an immunity in Hell difficulty, and unique monsters will have three random modifiers. (left), Many unique monsters will have two immunities! (right)

Hell Difficulty¶

Unlike the transition between Normal and Nightmare, the difficulty gradient is much harsher between Nightmare and Hell. After trudging through Nightmare you probably got used to higher enemy stats and compensated for your resistances being lowered, only to find that in Hell difficulty nearly every enemy in the game has some sort of immunity to some element or another while you’re hit with another 60% reduction to your resistances. In addition, monsters are even stronger, some maps are larger, and you’ll lose more XP when you die. On the plus side, you can now obtain some of the very best loot in the game, and numerous choice items from Nightmare difficulty still hold up remarkably well even for endgame builds.