With Season of the Malignant being released, we get to play the game in a completely new way. Season 1 introduces Malignant Hearts which are items that act like gems, and can be socketed into your Jewelry items.
In this guide, we will cover how you can get and use Malignant Hearts, and how many Hearts Season 1 offers.
How to get Malignant Hearts in Diablo 4
Malignant Hearts are the main theme of the first Season. There are four types of Hearts, and they are Vicious, Brutal, Devious, and Wrathful.
| Heart | Color | Type | Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Orange | Vicious | Offensive Effects |
|
Blue | Brutal | Defensive Effects |
|
Pink | Devious | Utility Effects |
|
Grey | Wrathful | Powerful Effects |
To get Malignant Hearts, you have to complete or skip the campaign, then either collect them through Crafting, defeating Malignant Monsters, or invoking Outgrowths.
Crafting
After completing the first few parts of the Season quest, you will get introduced to Cormond’s Workbench. You will use this workbench to craft and salvage Caged Malignant Hearts.
To craft Caged Malignant Hearts, you need to use a material called Malignant Ichor which can be obtained by salvaging Hearts at Cormond’s Workbench or picking them up from lesser Malignant Monsters.
There are four types of Ichor that match the types of Hearts, and the type of Ichor you get depends on the type of Heart you salvage.
- Salvaging Devious, Vicious, or Brutal Caged Malignant Hearts: 5-15 Ichor of that type
- Salvaging Wrathful Caged Malignant Hearts: 2-5 Ichor of all types randomly.
To view how many Malignant Ichors you have, simply access your character menu, navigate to the Materials and Resources tab, and scroll all the way down to see the accumulated Ichors.
Malignant Monsters
Early on in the Seasonal quest of Season 1, Cormond will give you an item called Cage of Binding, and this can be used to cage the hearts of Malignant Monsters. Those monsters are usually Elites that you can find anywhere within Sanctuary. However, the best way to farm Malignant Monsters is by running Malignant Tunnels.
Upon defeating the Malignant Monster, a Malignant Heart of a random type will drop which you have to interact with. Once you do, a stronger version of this Elite will summon along with some other monsters. Defeating the second Elite will drop the Caged Malignant Heart that can then be equipped into your Jewelry.
Outgrowths
An Outgrowth is something that shows up at the end of a Malignant Tunnel, and from there you can use a Malignant Invoker to bring out the Malignant Monster that is bound inside the Outgrowth. Once you defeat the Malignant monster, you will get a Caged Malignant Heart.
Note that an Outgrowth can be of any of the four types as the Malignant Hearts, and to open them, you will need an Invoker of a similar type. Brutal, Devious, and Vicious Invokers can be crafted at Cormond’s Workbench.
How to use Malignant Hearts in Diablo 4
In Season 1, any Jewelry that drops will have a colored socket assigned to it randomly. The color of the socket can be either orange, pink, or blue similar to the types of Malignant Hearts. You can use a Malignant Heart by adding it to the Jewelry that has a socket color similar to the Heart. The only exception would be the Wrathful Heart which can be socketed into any color.
Keep note that once you use a Malignant Heart, you can never unsocket it from a Jewelry item. However, you can replace it with another Heart. You can also still add gems to your Jewelry if you’d like.
Diablo 4 Malignant Hearts List
For Season 1, there are 32 Malignant Hearts that can be collected and offer entirely different build-changing effects. These Hearts are split between shared Hearts that all classes can use and class-specific Hearts.
The following stats that I am using are taken from a level 20 character, and these stats change as your level increases. Also, some Malignant Hearts can be obtained from specific World Tiers.
| Caged Malignant Heart | Type | World Tier | Effects |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Picana | Vicious | Any Tier | Critical Strikes electrically charge the enemy for 0.75-2.50 seconds, causing lightning to arc between them and any other charged enemies dealing 68-136 Lightning damage. |
| The Dark Dance | Vicious | Tier 3 | Every 5 seconds while above 60% Life, Core Skills cost 68-51 Life instead of your Primary Resource. Skills that consume Life deal 10-20% increased damage. |
| Tempting Fate | Vicious | Tier 3 | You gain 40-60% Critical Strike Damage but your Non-Critical Strikes deal 20-15% less damage. |
| The Lionheart | Brutal | Any Tier | You gain 10% Barrier Generation. You Heal 3-7 Life per second while you have an active Barrier. |
| Revenge | Brutal | Tier 3 | 10-20% of incoming damage is instead suppressed. When you use a Defensive, Subterfuge or a Macabre skill, all suppressed damage is amplified by 250% and explodes, dealing up to 1360-2040 Fire damage to Nearby enemies. |
| Prudent Heart | Brutal | Tier 3 | You become Immune for 2.0-4.0 seconds after you lose more than 20% Life in a single hit. This effect can only occur once every 110 seconds. |
| Determination | Devious | Any Tier | Resource draining effects are 40-50% less effective. In addition, gain 3.0-8.0% increased Resource Generation. |
| Retaliation | Devious | Tier 3 | Deal 510-680 Fire damage to surrounding enemies whenever a Crowd Control effect is removed from you. |
| The Calculated | Devious | Tier 3 | After spending 150-200 of your Primary Resource, your next attack Stuns enemies hit for 2 seconds. |
| The Malignant Pact | Wrathful | Any Tier | Cycle through a Malignant bonus every 20 kills:
|
| Creeping Death | Wrathful | Any Tier | Your damage over time effects are increased by 30-40% for each different Crowd Control effect on the target. Unstoppable monsters and Staggered bosses instead take 110-130% increased damage from your damage over time effects. |
| The Barber | Wrathful | Tier 3 | Critical Strikes and all subsequent damage within 2.0-4.0 seconds is absorbed by your target. Then, the absorbed damage erupts onto surrounding enemies. Stored damage is increased by 10% per second. |
Diablo 4 Malignant Hearts for Barbarians
| Caged Malignant Heart | Type | World Tier | Effects |
|---|---|---|---|
| Focused Rage | Vicious | Any Tier | After spending 100-60 Fury within 2 seconds, your next Non-Basic Skill’s Critical Strike Chance is increased by 20-30%. |
| Resurgent Life | Brutal | Any Tier | While below 40-60% Life, you receive 50-60% more Healing from all sources. |
| Punishing Speed | Devious | Any Tier | Your Skills have a 20-30% chance to Knock Down all enemies for 1.25 seconds when that Skill’s Attack Speed is higher than 35-20%. |
| Ignoring Pain | Wrathful | Tier 4 | Incoming damage has a 5-15% chance of being ignored and instead Healing you for 17-68. |
Diablo 4 Malignant Hearts for Druids
| Caged Malignant Heart | Type | World Tier | Effects |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Moonrage | Vicious | Any Tier | Kills have a 5% chance to summon a Wolf Companion to your side for 20-30 seconds. In addition, gain +3 to Wolves. |
| The Agitated Winds | Brutal | Any Tier | When 8-13 Close enemies, automatically cast Cyclone Armor. This cannot occur more than once every 10-20 seconds. |
| Inexorable Force | Devious | Any Tier | Up to 30-50 Distant enemies are pulled toward you while you have an Ultimate Skill active. |
| The Unconstrained Beast | Wrathful | Tier 4 | When you are hit with a Stun, Freeze or Knock Down effect, there is a 40-60% chance to automatically activate Grizzly Rage for 3 seconds |
Diablo 4 Malignant Hearts for Rogues
| Caged Malignant Heart | Type | World Tier | Effects |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cluster Munitions | Vicious | Any Tier | Lucky Hit: You have up to a 20% chance to launch 3 Stun Grenades that deal 26-32 Physical damage and Stun enemies for 0.50 seconds. |
| Trickery | Brutal | Any Tier | When you use a Subterfuge Skill, leave behind an unstable Shadow Decoy Trap that Taunts enemies. The Shadow Decoy Trap will explode after 6.0 seconds dealing 680-1020 Shadow damage. Cannot occur more than once every 5 seconds. |
| The Clipshot | Devious | Any Tier | Lucky Hit: Up to a 20-40% chance for your Cutthroat Skills to Slow by 40% for 3 seconds and your Marksman Skills to Knock Back enemies. |
| The Vile Apothecary | Wrathful | Tier 4 | Your attacks have a 5-15% chance to apply all Imbuement effects at 40-50% of normal potency. |
Diablo 4 Malignant Hearts for Necromancers
| Caged Malignant Heart | Type | World Tier | Effects |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Sacrilegious | Vicious | Any Tier | Walking near a Corpse automatically activates an equipped Corpse Skill every second, dealing 40-30% reduced damage. |
| The Decrepit Aura | Brutal | Any Tier | When at least 5 enemies are near you, gain an aura that automatically curses surrounding enemies with Decrepify for 5-15 seconds. |
| Frozen Terror | Devious | Any Tier | Lucky Hit: Up to a 10-20% chance of inflicting Fear for 2.5 seconds. Feared enemies are Chilled for 20% every second. |
| The Great Feast | Wrathful | Tier 4 | Each Minion drains 1.0-2.0 Essence per second but deals 50-75% increased damage. With no Minions, this bonus applies to you and drains 5 Essence per second |
Diablo 4 Malignant Hearts for Sorcerers
| Caged Malignant Heart | Type | World Tier | Effects |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tal’Rasha | Vicious | Any Tier | For each unique element you deal damage with, you deal 7-12% increased damage for 3-10 seconds. |
| Spellbreaking | Brutal | Any Tier | After taking Elemental damage, gain 20-40% Resistance to that element for 5 seconds. |
| Spite | Devious | Any Tier | When you are afflicted with a Crowd Control effect, there is a 20-40% chance that the same enemy and enemies around you are also afflicted with the same effect for 3 seconds. |
| Omnipower | Wrathful | Tier 4 | Core Skills that launch a projectile consume all of your Mana. For every 45-35 extra Mana consumed, you launch an additional projectile, and the damage is increased by 3.0-5.0% |
