Ethan Crossfield 
If you’re pushing endgame speedruns in Diablo 4’s Season 13, the Paladin is currently the class you’re least likely to see at the top: it’s the only one without a recorded Pit Tier 150 run as the season’s meta locks in.
What changed in Season 13’s endgame meta
Across Diablo 4 Season 13, The Pit has become the clearest yardstick for build strength. The activity is a timed dungeon run where players clear waves of enemies and then defeat a final boss under a timer. It’s also tied to World Tiers, with the opportunity to progress up to 150 tiers—making Tier 150 the practical “limit test” for how far a build can be pushed.
With just a few weeks left in Season 13, the leaderboard picture is now effectively settled. The Paladin stands out for the wrong reason: it’s the only class that does not have a completed, recorded run at Pit Tier 150. While that doesn’t mean every Paladin build is weak, it does indicate that, in the current meta, Paladin builds aren’t reaching the same top-end thresholds as other classes.
Who is affected: Paladin players vs. the rest of the roster
The Pit leaderboards for Season 13 show the Paladin as the lone holdout. Every other class has at least one Tier 150 clear recorded, and those clears are also faster than the best Paladin run currently on the board.
At the time of writing, the top Paladin performance sits at Pit Tier 146, taking 13 minutes and 29 seconds. That creates a meaningful gap at the highest tier, where the rest of the meta is already demonstrating Tier 150 completions. It’s also notable that this outcome is a dramatic reversal from earlier seasons: during Seasons 11 and 12, the Paladin was described as the best class in Diablo 4.
The reason this shift is so striking is that class balance usually moves more gradually across patches and nerfs/buffs. Going from “best” to “worst” over the span of a single season signals that Season 13’s balance landscape is currently favoring other class toolkits more effectively for The Pit.
What comes next: Season 13’s expansion context and Season 14 expectations
Season 13 is the first season tied to the Lord of Hatred expansion. As part of that expansion-season setup, multiple classes received buffs, enabling players to clear much higher Pit tiers than before. The source context also highlights that Pit Tier 150 clears were rare historically: before Season 13, the last time any class had managed to beat Tier 150 was in Season 7. In Season 13, seven of eight classes have now achieved it, suggesting a broadly more powerful meta across the board.
Looking ahead, Season 14 is expected to return to traditional seasonal mechanics on June 30. The next season is also described as being shaped by an upcoming mechanic called Pandemonium Ruptures. With players already expressing concern after a Season 14 PTR, the big question is whether the same kind of power spike—and leaderboard dominance—will persist, or whether the meta conditions will change enough to bring the Paladin back into contention.
What players should know
- Pit Tier 150 is currently the clearest benchmark for build strength in Season 13, using timed dungeon runs up to 150 tiers.
- On Season 13 Pit leaderboards, the Paladin is the only class with no recorded Tier 150 completion.
- The best Paladin run at the time of reporting is Tier 146 (13:29), while every other class has a Tier 150 clear.
- Season 13’s Lord of Hatred expansion context includes broad buffs that have pushed the meta higher overall.
| Class status (Season 13 Pit Tier 150) | Current evidence from leaderboards |
|---|---|
| Paladin | No recorded Tier 150 run; top build at Tier 146 (13:29) |
| All other classes | At least one recorded Tier 150 clear, each faster than the top Paladin run |
Expert View
The data point is hard to ignore: if your goal is the absolute ceiling of The Pit, Season 13’s leaderboard record currently puts the Paladin behind every other class. Still, “worst class” here reflects endgame performance at the Tier 150 benchmark, not overall viability. With Season 14’s mechanics expected to shift the balance environment again, Paladin players may get another chance to close the gap—especially if the next meta conditions reward different defensive or damage patterns than the ones currently winning Pit races.
