Diablo 4 becomes a literal rat race after players convince themselves its rodents sniff out the best loot

A band of brigands from Diablo 4 swarm through a desolate landscape, with their leader raising a cleaver to the sky.

(Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

A Reddit thread by user zerger45 is swearing that Diablo 4's rats will lead you to legendary loot, which wouldn't on its own be news, except for the fact that over 8,000 people seem to agree with them. That, or they're just throwing their voices into the new rat cult for kicks, hoping some rodent genuflection might result in one of Diablo 4's mega-rare loot drops. Either way, I'm concerned we have another cow-level pipedream on our hands.

"Okay this is going to sound really bizarre, but you need to follow the rats for good loot. Don’t follow the predetermined path in any dungeon, instead, just follow the rats. The rats smell the cheese! I’m telling you it’s real," types zerger45 in a somewhat religious trance. "I found multiple legendaries doing this within a span of maybe 10 minutes."

Fellow co-conspirator LuxSolisPax comments: "I know most of us are joking, but following the animals has led me to [plant resources]. Following the rats doesn't sound that ridiculous in that context," they add: "There's other things too. Every time I've seen an NPC at the beginning of a dungeon crawling and screaming about how the place is doomed that I can't interact with, the butcher spawns."

With some players the confirmation bias has already set in. User azanti wrote: "I am not going to log in and try this" four times in a row. So they logged on and tried it, obviously, later posting a screenshot of their vermin-gotten gains. Meanwhile user letsmodspc just wants to watch the world burn in holy rat fire: "I'm going to upvote just because this sounds so damn loony tunes."

Look: I'm not a superstitious person. I walk under ladders, I don't freak out if I break a mirror, and if I see a black cat cross my path my first instinct is to pet it. I think we live in a universe that is entirely built upon random chance and coincidence. I do not think there is any statistical evidence to back up this rat theory, and that this entire thing is some kind of low-level brain hazard that belongs in the SCP canon.

That being said, the first thing I am going to do when I get home today is hop on my druid and follow the rats. I just have to know. After all, they can play Doom, so who's to say they don't have the inside scoop on Diablo as well?

Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia. He made his start as a freelancer, writing for websites like Techradar, The Escapist, Dicebreaker, The Gamer, Into the Spine—and of course, PC Gamer. He'll sink his teeth into anything that looks interesting, though he has a soft spot for RPGs, soulslikes, roguelikes, deckbuilders, MMOs, and weird indie titles. He also plays a shelf load of TTRPGs in his offline time. Don't ask him what his favourite system is, he has too many.