Vampiric Powers are new abilities in Diablo 4, introduced in season 2. By equipping them — which you’ll do with the use of Pacts — you can make your character feel a bit vampiric as you hunt down demons in Sanctuary.
Every season in Diablo 4 is a chance to try out different builds for your favorite classes. Vampiric Powers give you even more options. If all you want is to start the grind and use some blood-induced magic, you can jump into it pretty quickly: As you start the season and complete the very first couple of Season Quests, you get “The Hunter’s Chase” quest, which introduces Vampiric Powers and gives you access to your Sanguine Circle.
Our Diablo 4 guide will show you learn how to unlock and equip Vampiric Powers. You can also find a complete list of all Vampiric Powers you have access to in the season to plan your next build.
How to unlock and equip Vampiric Powers in Diablo 4
To unlock most of the Vampiric Powers available during the Season of the Blood, you need to go to the Vampiric Power tab in the Character menu.
Then, you need to spend Potent Blood, a currency introduced in Diablo 4 season 2. You gain Potent Blood by completing contents such as quests, participating in Blood Harvests, and chests. Spending 25 Potent Blood will activate a pop-up window featuring three Vampiric Powers will appear. You can choose to unlock or upgrade one of the three. You can’t choose which powers will appear and you can only upgrade already unlocked powers.
There are, however, seven Vampiric Powers that you can’t unlock using this system. You can get two powers — Sanguine Brace and Accursed Touch — by increasing your Hunter’s Acclaim Tier. You earn the other five — Metamorphosis, Moonrise, Undying, Ravenous, Hectic, and Accursed Touch — by completing the Season Quests.
Equipping Vampiric Powers is directly related to Pacts. To equip a Vampiric Power, you need to select — among those you’ve unlocked — the abilities you want and put them in your Sanguine Circle. However, a Vampiric Power can be either Active or Inactive in the circle. To activate them, you must have the Pacts required by the power’s Activation Cost.
Having an Inactive power in your circle doesn’t affect you negatively, but it’s a waste of potential in case you have a suitable replacement.
Diablo 4 Pacts explained
During the Diablo 4 season 2, helms, chest armors, gloves, pants, and boots come with a new attribute: Pacts. There are three different types: Ferocity, Eternity, and Divinity. A piece of gear can come with more than one of these.
Pacts are used to activate Vampiric Powers, making these new attributes a core mechanic in season 2. Depending on the powers you want to use, you must look for pieces that have the quantity of Pacts you need. While you inevitably earn gear with the Pacts necessary for your build, there are a few methods to depend less on random numbers.
By completing dungeons and opening Seeker’s Caches in Blood Harvest areas, you can find seasonal consumables called the Pact of Ferocity, Pact of Eternity, or Pact of Divinity, which allow you to add one point of a specific Pact to a piece of gear. In case luck is not on your side, you can craft these three items by talking to Alchemists. Each of them costs 250 Potent Blood.
Other important items related to Pacts are the Cleansing Acids. These are used to remove Pacts from a specific piece of gear. There are four types of acids, three that remove two points of a specific Pact and one that removes all of them from a piece. Acids might seem contradictory but they are actually pretty useful when you want to use a new piece of gear and need it to have specific Pacts. Since there is a limit of points of Pacts each piece can have, cleaning them becomes necessary to find the best set of gear.
All Vampiric Powers in Diablo 4, plus Pact costs
There are 22 different Vampiric Powers in Diablo 4. Here’s a complete list of all Vampiric Powers, their abilities, and their associated Pact costs:
- Domination: It increases the damage you deal by 12% to enemies that are Stunned, Immobilized, Frozen, or Feared. They are killed if they aren’t an Elite and are also Injured. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Ferocity.)
- Undying: By casting skills, you’re healed for 1.5% of your Life. This value doubles when you’re below 50% of Life. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Eternity.)
- Sanguine Brace: Killing an enemy gives you Fortify for 3% of your Base Life. You gain a bonus of 4% of Critical Strike Chance when you have more Fortify than half of your Maximum Life. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Eternity and 1 Pact of Divinity.)
- Feed the Coven: Lucky Hit – The attacks of Conjuration, Companion, Minion and Far Familiar have a 30% chance of restoring 10 Primary Resource and increasing your damage by 10% for 4 seconds. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Eternity.)
- Infection: Direct damage infects enemies with Pox. After 8 stacks, they take from 52 to 77 [30%] of Poison damage. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Ferocity.)
- Anticipation: In addition to reducing the cooldown of your Ultimate Skills by 20%, this ability buffs the damage caused by these skills by 6% based on the number of nearby enemies that are affected by your Damage Over Time effects. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Divinity.)
- Resilience: With this ability, you gain 1% of Damage Reduction for each 3% of Life that you miss. (Activation Cost: 2 Pacts of Eternity.)
- Prey on the Weak: It increases the damage you deal to Vulnerable enemies by 8%. Enemies are Vulnerable as they are affected by a Vampiric Curse from any of your other Vampiric Powers. (Activation Cost: 2 Pact of Ferocity.)
- Ravenous: Lucky Hit – You have up to 20% chance to have your Attack Speed increased in 20% of your Total Movement for 6 seconds. Activation Cost: 3 Pact of Ferocity.
- Hectic: One of your active Cooldowns is reduced by 1 second for every 5 Basic Skills you use. (Activation Cost: 3 Pact of Divinity.)
- Hemomancy: With this ability, attacking deals 40% of your Maximum Life as Physical Damage every 4 seconds to nearby enemies and you’re healed in 1% of your Maximum Life for each enemy damaged. (Activation Cost: 3 Pact of Eternity.)
- Coven’s Fangs: Conjuration, Companion, Minion, and Bat Familiar deal 26% more damage to Crowd Controlled enemies and when a Lucky Hit lands there is a 30% chance of them inflicting Vampiric Curse to enemies. (Activation Cost: 2 Pact of Divinity.)
- Terror: You have a 7% chance to cause Fear and Slow by 80% nearby enemies for 2 seconds when hit. Critical Strikes are guaranteed to enemies who are Feared. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Ferocity, 1 Pact of Divinity, 1 Pact of Eternity.)
- Rampart: After not moving for 3 seconds, you gain a Barrier for 20% of your Maximum Life for 6 seconds. This effect happens only once every 20 seconds. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Divinity, 1 Pact of Eternity.)
- Jagged Spikes: With this ability, Thorns has a 10% chance to cause 150% increased damage and inflict Chill to enemies for 8%. (Activation Cost: 1 Pact of Ferocity, 1 Pact of Divinity.)
- Metamorphosis: Evading turns you into a cloud of bats, becoming Unstoppable for 2 seconds. In addition to this, deals 138 to 206 Physical damage and inflict Vampiric Curse to enemies along your path. (Activation Cost: 2 Pact of Ferocity, 2 Pact of Divinity, 2 Pact of Eternity.)
- Moonrise: Hitting an enemy with a Basic Skill grants 4% of Attack Speed for 10 seconds. This effect can be stacked up to 5 times. When max stacks are reached, you enter a Vampiric Bloodrage state, gaining 80% Basic Skill damage and 15% Movement Speed for 10 seconds. (Activation Cost: 6 Pact of Ferocity.)
- Call Familiar: Upon using a Mastery, Weapon Mastery, Macabre, Wrath, or Imbuement Skill invokes a Bat Familiar that deals 69 to 103 of Physical damage to enemies with a 30% chance to Stun. (Activation Cost: 3 Pact of Ferocity, 3 Pact of Divinity.)
- Bathe in Blood: Creates a pool of blood around you when Channeling a Skill. Your skill deals 20% increased damage and you gain 30% Damage Reduction while channeling the skill. (Activation Cost: 3 Pact of Divinity, 3 Pact of Eternity.)
- Accursed Touch: Lucky Hit – You have up to a 22% chance to inflict Vampiric Curse on enemies. Afflicted enemies have a 15% chance to spread it to other enemies. Besides that, Vampiric Curse’s souls deal 100% increased damage. (Activation Cost: 6 Pact of Divinity.)
- Blood Boil: When your Core Skills Overpower an enemy, 3 Volatile Blood Drops spawn. Collecting a Volatile Blood Drop causes it to explore, causing 103 to 155 Physical damage to nearby enemies. Every 40 seconds, your next skill is guaranteed to Overpower. (Activation Cost: 6 Pact of Eternity.)
- Flowing Veins: Increases the Damage Over Time you deal to enemies that are moving or affected by a Vampiric Curse by 30%. (Activation Cost: 2 Pact of Ferocity, 2 Pact of Divinity, 2 Pact of Eternity.)