Season 13 of Diablo 4, paired with the Lord of Hatred expansion and the arrival of Runes of Aldur, has reshaped how players chase top-tier gear. Greater Affixes remain the most sought-after modifiers for any serious endgame character, and the new systems introduced this season make farming and crafting them more approachable than ever before. With the Horadric Cube, Occultist, and Tempering stations working together, players now have multiple routes to secure, reroll, and protect their best rolls.
Before diving into specific methods, let's look at what Greater Affixes actually are, why they matter, and the best ways to farm, craft, and preserve them in Season 13.
What Are Greater Affixes in Diablo 4?
Greater Affixes are premium versions of standard affixes that roll at the maximum possible value and gain a noticeable boost on top of that. Any item slot that normally supports affixes can roll with one, two, three, or even four Greater Affixes, though the odds drop sharply with each additional star.
A few quick points worth knowing:
Greater Affixes appear on ancestral-quality items and carry a gold star icon next to the affected stat.
They roll at the top of the stat range, so a Greater Affix on weapon damage or critical strike damage multiplier is immediately impactful.
Certain Greater Affix items, like Unique Charms crafted from Endurance Faith or Banished Lord Talisman, cannot drop from enemies at all. They must be created through the Horadric Cube.
This last point matters a lot in Season 13 because charm crafting is now one of the biggest sources of character power.
What To Do With Greater Affixes?
Once you have Greater Affix items, the question becomes how to use them properly. Here are the main paths players take:
Slot them directly into your build if the rolled stats match what your character needs.
Reroll non-Greater Affix stats at the Occultist using the Enchant feature to fix imperfect items.
Temper ancestral pieces to add additional affixes while keeping your Greater Affix rolls intact.
Preserve your Greater Affixes using the Occultist + Cube trick before rerolling, so you don't brick expensive items.
Recycle low-roll ancestral uniques through the Horadric Cube's 3-to-1 transmute recipe to get new chances at Greater Affix rolls.
With that foundation covered, let's look at where to actually farm these items.
Greater Affix Farm - Where & How To Farm Greater Affixes and Drop Rate
Before you commit to hardcore Greater Affix farming, get your build into mostly full ancestral gear and confirm you can comfortably clear at least Torment 8. A stronger build speed-farming efficiently will produce more loot per hour than a weaker build grinding higher tiers slowly.
1. Purveyor's Gamble (Best Targeted Farm)
The Purveyor of Curiosities sits at the top of the list because it compresses the RNG pool dramatically. Instead of praying for the correct slot to drop, you can directly gamble for gloves, boots, rings, amulets, armor, or weapons.
The fuel for this farm is Murmuring Obols. To stack them quickly:
Run Escalating Nightmare Dungeons with Obol Reserve sigil affixes.
Chain multiple dungeons together for constant elite kills and obol drops.
Target specific slots when only one or two items are holding your build back.
2. Lair Bosses (Endgame Optimization)
Lair Bosses offer curated loot pools, which is ideal for hunting Uniques, Mythics, and Greater Affix gear. The Season 13 Lair Boss Ladder is divided into Initiate, Greater, and Exalted tiers — higher tiers mean stronger enemies but far better rewards.
Use the middle War Plan upgrade path to amplify Lair Boss rewards and trigger chains of bosses and hoard chests for massive loot explosions.
3. Grim Favors + War Plans
War Plans function like a customizable endgame playlist, chaining together Hell Tides, Nightmare Dungeons, Lair Bosses, Infernal Hordes, Undercity, and Tree of Whispers objectives. While running these, you naturally generate Grim Favors, which reward Whisper Caches - and caches with a small star icon contain Greater Affix items.
Path recommendations for the Tree of Whispers skill tree:
Left side: additional caches and corrupted roots for more spawns.
Middle path (recommended): improved cache rewards, eventually granting Spark chances for long-term Mythic crafting.
Right side: crafting materials focus.
4. Accursed Rituals (Biggest Loot Explosion)
Accursed Rituals are part of Hell Tides and require Baneful Hearts to activate. When a group pools Baneful Hearts together, the ritual boss encounter becomes one of the fastest ways to generate ancestral gear and Greater Affix items in the game. Contribute at least one Baneful Heart per party run to boost your personal drops.
5. Undercity & Nightmare Dungeons (Repeatable Speed Farm)
Both activities produce nearly constant elite kills and end-of-run rewards with almost no downtime.
Nightmare Dungeons feed glyph XP, chest rewards, and large final boss loot explosions.
Undercity gives full control through Tributes and Bargains - target Ancestral Uniques, Obducite, Runes, Boss Keys, or Mythic chances.
For Undercity skill tree priorities:
Left: better end-of-run rewards and Forgotten Souls.
Middle: enables Ancestral Armament tributes, massively boosting Greater Affix drops.
Right: increased XP and tribute generation.
Greater Affix Occultist & Horadric Cube Crafting (Reroll/Enchant)
With a solid farming loop in place, the next step is crafting Greater Affix gear directly through the Occultist and Horadric Cube. This is often more reliable than pure drop-hunting, especially for Set Charms and Unique Charms.
Crafting Ancestral Set Charms with Greater Affixes
Picking Set Charms off the floor rarely gives you Greater Affix versions. The Horadric Cube method is far more consistent:
Acquire one Set Charm belonging to the same set as your target item.
Gather reagents by salvaging unwanted Set Charms and Seals. Keep Seals for gold if you're broke, since their vendor price is high.
Place the charm into the Horadric Cube and use the Reroll Set button.
The result will be a charm from the same set, but everything else (piece, stats, ancestral status, Greater Affix presence) is randomized.
Expect to use roughly 5,000 rare reagents as a minimum, since Greater Affix rolls are uncommon and the specific stat you want is even rarer. Greater Affixes are visible in the preview, so you don't need to examine every single result.
Crafting Greater Affix Unique Charms (Endurance Faith, Banished Lord Talisman)
These Greater Affix charms cannot drop from monsters. You must use the Cube's Craft Unique Charm recipe:
Load a base unique charm (e.g., Endurance Faith) plus three random charms.
Hit Transmute.
Repeat until you hit a Greater Affix result.
Save every random unique charm you'd normally salvage — they're the fuel for this recipe.
Rerolling Unique Power on Legendary Items
If a Unique rolls a low legendary power, simply reroll the Unique Power through the Cube. The cost is low (one material farmable in Hell Tides), so you can roll multiple times until you hit a 50% or higher value, then finish with Ultra Reduce at the vendor.
3-to-1 Ancestral Unique Transmute
Three ancestral uniques in the Cube always produce another ancestral, with a chance for Greater Affixes. Never mix a non-ancestral in — the output will downgrade.
Amalgamating Runes and Tributes
Runes: Turn unwanted Legendary Runes into different ones using 5-to-1 amalgamation. You can also turn 100 normal runes into ~20 legendary runes.
Tributes: Upgrade Rare Armament Tributes into Legendary Tributes, then stockpile Mythic Tributes for Mythic Unique farming.
Legendary Shield 3-to-1 Recipe
Three unwanted Legendary Shields can be transmuted into a new one with unique affixes — up to 10x Extra Gold Dropper, which pairs perfectly with Rodri's Seal of Riches for billions of gold per Infernal Horde run.
Greater Affix Tempering (Reroll)
Tempering lets you manually add affixes on top of your ancestral gear without touching Greater Affix stats, making it one of the safest ways to round out an item. The process works like this:
Pick the Tempering Manual that contains the affix you want (aggressive, defensive, utility, resource).
Apply it at the Blacksmith using Tempering materials.
Use Focused Roll with a Tuning Prism to bias results toward a specific stat when your Tempering charges are running low.
Chaotic Reroll is useful when you want to replace a roll entirely rather than rerolling within the same manual.
Tempering never affects existing Greater Affixes, so you can freely improve a four-star ancestral piece with extra damage or defensive multipliers.
Greater Affix Preserve - How To Protect Greater Affixes When Occultist/Cube Crafting
This is the most important trick in Season 13 for anyone worried about bricking expensive items. The Occultist + Cube combination lets you lock a Greater Affix in place before rerolling other stats.
The Safe Reroll Method (Step by Step)
Open the Occultist and select the Enchant option.
Choose the Greater Affix line you want to protect (for example, weapon damage).
Select "No Change" when prompted. The gold star icon disappears visually, but the Greater Affix stays on the item.
Head to the Horadric Cube or back to the Occultist to reroll the remaining stats.
The locked Greater Affix line will never be touched by any future reroll attempt.
Practical Example
Say you have a sword with Greater Affixes on Maximum Life and Life on Kill, but you only care about Maximum Life:
Reroll the Maximum Life line at the Occultist and hit No Change to lock it.
Go to the Cube and add a preferred affix (e.g., Fire Damage Multiplier).
Use Focused Roll with Tuning Prisms to push the remaining lines toward Willpower, Critical Strike Damage Multiplier, or All Damage Multiplier.
Use Chaotic Reroll to swap out unwanted defensive rolls while the Maximum Life Greater Affix remains safe throughout.
Extra Tips for Preserving Items
Check vendors and Purveyors regularly — they occasionally stock gear with Greater Affixes.
Restock the mercenary supply for additional Greater Affix items.
Always keep a stash of refined Primordials before attempting Focused Rolls, since running out mid-process is frustrating.
Salvage duplicates into crafting materials so you never run dry on Tempering or Enchanting resources.
Season 13 combined with Lord of Hatred has turned Greater Affix hunting into a deep, layered system. Between targeted farming through the Purveyor and Lair Bosses, Cube crafting for Unique and Set Charms, Tempering to round out builds, and the Occultist preserve trick to lock in perfect rolls, there has never been a better time to chase endgame gear in Diablo 4. Stick with efficient War Plan setups, keep your material stockpiles high, and use the preserve method before every risky reroll — your best items will thank you.
