Life

"Life is an ethereal armor. One moment it's here. Then, just when you get used to it, it's gone."

- Cassia Life (also often referred to as Health, or Hit Points) represents the maximum amount of damage that a player character or monster will be able to withstand. Taking damage causes the Life Points to decrease (when all forms of protection are bypassed). When Life reaches 0, the player character (or monster) dies.

Maximum Life is affected by some certain item properties (+Life) and by Vitality. Replenishing lost Life is generally referred to as Healing.

Mana and other resources are often seen as the opposite of Life. However, some spells/skills, like, Blood Star or , cost Life to cast as well.

Diablo I
In Diablo I, Life does not regenerate naturally, so when the player character suffers an injury/injuries, they do not recover from it without external effects. However, wounds also cannot worsen over time (although one may equip the Constricting Ring to constantly lose Life), the character either cannot die from bleeding or otherwise lose Life outside being under attack by monsters or walking into traps. Once all Life is lost, the character dies, and the game ends (unless someone revives them later).

To heal back to full health, one will have to go and talk to Pepin in town, or drink Healing Potions and Rejuvenation Potions. Regular potions heal random 1-100% of Life, while Full potions heal 100% Life. One may also make use of the Healing and Heal Other spells or the Life Steal suffixes to recover from wounds (The Leech, Blood). Some Shrines and a certain Fountain may replenish the Life pool as well.

Diablo II
In Diablo II, life can be replenished by the use of Healing Potions and Rejuvenation Potions. Healing potions heal over time, while Rejuvenation potions act instantly.

If the character is left idle, Life will regenerate over time, albeit this process is very slow, to say the least.

Maximum Life can also be increased permanently by the use of certain Elixirs, which are prepared by talented alchemists like Alkor in Kurast, who increased the player's life permanently by 20 points, as a reward for clearing The Golden Bird Quest, (and for a total of +60 points after clearing the mentioned quest on all of the three difficulties).

Note that you cannot die from Poison, because poison can only lower your hit points to 1. Your Hireling and all other entities lacking Immunity, however, can be killed through poisoning.

Diablo III
In Diablo III, the player(s) can heal to full life by talking to a priest (symbolized by a heart "♡" on their minimap). Armor and Resistances play in determining how long the player(s) can stand against the minions of Hell and increase their own Toughness. Recovery (also known as Healing) meta-stat shows an approximate average amount of Toughness (not Life) that is regained per second from all sources.

One can increase base Life by getting either Vitality or +Life% attributes from Items and Paragon levels. Vitality can be rolled on any items in the game, while Life% can only be rolled on helms, amulets, shoulderpads, chestplates and rings. The total bonus to Life % from items is limited to 108% (200% with the help of ). Amethyst gems in a socketed helm may also add up to +23% Life (up to the double with the aid of ). One should be careful about increasing Life over Armor and Resistances, though; while a higher amount of Life allows them to take more punishment than gathering protection might some of the time, it is also much harder to replenish a great deal of said Life in the field. This last point is seen in an easier form if you choose to not go with a passive skill that grants a form of healing based on your Life. To name an example, a Barbarian with skills like Warcry could use the passive skill Inspiring Presence, which grants him/her and nearby allies a bonus to Life Regeneration that improves as their Life maximum reaches new heights.

s (and, to a minuscule extent, Witch Doctors who take the Blood Ritual skill) can attune most of their skills to drain Life upon cast, in addition to normal Mana or Essence cost, in exchange for empowered effect. This will never actually kill them, reducing to 1 Life instead or simply preventing the cast if not enough Life is available, but may leave the characters vulnerable to attack if overused. Blood for Blood skill can be used to sometimes remove the cost that would otherwise be drained from Life.

Note that resource cost reduction effects will not reduce Life cost of skills that consume it (Channeling Pylon being a notable exception). Moreover, Life costs of skills bypass all forms of protection (even damage immunities), unless specifically stated otherwise.

There are many ways to regain lost Life in Diablo III:


 * Life Steal (% of damage dealt goes to Life; removed in Reaper of Souls)
 * Life on Hit (heals fixed amount of Life for each attack)
 * Life per Kill (heals a fixed anount of Life for each enemy killed, regardless of how tough that enemy was)
 * Life Regeneration aka Life per Second (heals fixed amount of Life per second)
 * Life per resource spent (heals fixed amount of Life for each point of primary resource consumed by skills)
 * Certain skills (like Templar's healing or Breath of Heaven)
 * Healing Potions (instantly heal 60% of maximum Life, cooldown of 30 seconds)
 * Health Globes (drop from monsters, heal 10-15% of maximum Life)
 * Healing Wells (restore 100% Life when used, but need 60 seconds to recharge)
 * Pools of Reflection (restore 100% Life when used, but do not recharge)
 * Leveling up (fully restores Life and all resources)
 * Speaking to a priest in town (marked with red heart on the map) (fully restores Life)