Diablo 4: The Pit, Explained (2024)

Diablo 4's Season of Loot Reborn has greatly expanded its endgame and itemization systems. This season brought with it The Pit, a new endgame activity that's functionally identical to Greater Rifts from Diablo 3. Players will need to push through increasingly difficult tiers of dungeons as fast as possible.

If you can clear The Pit in the time limit, you'll earn Masterwork materials and Stygian Hearts used to summon the toughest fights in the game. Today, we'll go over everything you need to know about The Pit activity, including how to unlock it, how to get Runeshards, and the rewards you can expect from farming this activity.

What Is The Pit?

The Pit is a timed dungeon run that requires you to slay monsters and defeat a final boss as quickly as possible. Runs of The Pit occur at the obelisk structure in Cerrigar and require Runeshards to enter, an endgame resource earned from most World Tier 4 activities. Completing runs of the Pit will reward Masterwork materials you can use to upgrade your endgame items.

Most endgame players will want to farm The Pit as much as possible to earn these endgame materials, and it's a good gauge of a build's effectiveness. You have 15 minutes to clear The Pit, with deaths lowering your time by 30/60/90 seconds based on how many previous deaths you've experienced on that run. A balanced build with good damage and survivability is key here.

How To Unlock The Pit

The Pit is unlocked upon completing the "Pit of the Artificer" quest. It should unlock after you reach World Tier 4: Nightmare difficulty. Complete the quest steps, then head to Cerrigar in Scosglen. This is where the Pit obelisk is located and where you'll start each Pit run.

Pit Tiers And Runeshards

Similar to Nightmare Dungeons, Pit runs are broken up into tiers. Runs start at Level 100 (T1) and scale up to Level 300 (T200). No modifiers are present in The Pit, so you only have to worry about the high enemy level and time limit. Runs typically require you to clear two dungeons worth of enemies and a simple dungeon boss.

But before you can jump into this activity, you'll first need Runeshards. Runeshards are earned from all World Tier 4 activities—Nightmare Dungeons, Helltide chests, World Bosses, Legion Events, and certain boss fights. Pit runs cost three Runeshards to start and are not refunded if you fail.

The Pit Rewards

The main reason to run The Pit is for Masterwork materials. These allow you to enhance your items beyond their normal quality at any Blacksmith, increasing the stat magnitudes on all your affixes. A character with a full set of Masterworked gear will be substantially stronger than one without. And unlike the Tempering system, you can Masterwork Legendary and Unique gear.

Masterwork materials come in three types:

Obducite is the first Masterwork material you'll earn and is the easiest to obtain. It allows you to Masterwork your items up to Rank 4. Ingolith is a little harder to get and upgrades your items to Rank 8. Finally, Neathiron will upgrade your items up to Rank 12, the highest Masterwork tier.

Beyond Masterwork materials, Pit runs are also a great source of Item Power 925 Legendaries. Since the monsters start at Level 100, every item that drops in this activity will be at the item level cap. The final boss can also drop Stygian Stones at higher Pit tiers, which are used to summon Uber variants of Diablo 4's endgame bosses.

Pit Tips

• Survivability matters. Death greatly reduces your timer, so focus on staying alive above everything else.
  • Scale your armor and elemental resistances before playing this activity.
• Try co-op. The Pit supports up to four players. Clients will only receive half of the host's earned materials and no Stygian Stones, but fighting as a group can make your runs far easier.
• Don't ignore Elites. Elite monsters give the most progress in your Pit run. Reaching the final boss shouldn't take nearly as long if you kill every Elite you see.
• Upgrade your gear. Remember to upgrade your items with Masterwork materials and Tempering recipes to greatly increase your damage.