Throughout your journey in Diablo 4, the alchemist will provide you with important elixirs and healing potion upgrades you'll need for increasingly challenging fights. You'll need to bring your own alchemy ingredients, including both herbs such as Gallowvine, and monster parts such as Grave Dust. Using these to upgrade your healing potion and brew elixirs is vital for giving you the edge you need to take on the game's hordes of enemies. You can find an alchemist to buy upgrades from in most towns and all the hub cities. And if you're wondering where to find Crushed Beast Bones, read on...
Healing potion upgrades
The most important alchemy decision of all is upgrading your healing potion—you should be keeping it at maximum potency at all times, otherwise, you'll find yourself struggling, particularly against bosses. Each upgrade is unlocked at a particular character level and will require specific ingredients. The good news is that healing potion upgrades are all permanent—they're not consumed like elixirs are.
To reach each level of healing potency, you'll need the following:
Tiny Healing Potion
- Level 10
- Eight Gallowvine
- 250 gold
Minor Healing Potion
- Level 20
- 15 Gallowvine
- Five Biteberry
- 400 gold
Light Healing Potion
- Level 30
- 20 Gallowvine
- 10 Biteberry
- Five Crushed Beast Bones
- 470 gold
Moderate Healing Potion
- Level 45
- 20 Gallowvine
- 12 Howler Moss
- Five Demon Heart
- 900 gold
Strong Healing Potion
- Level 60
- 27 Gallowvine
- 15 Reddamine
- Five Paletongue
- 1700 gold
Greater Healing Potion
- Level 70
- 36 Blightshade
- 18 Lifesbane
- Five Grave Dust
- Five Angelbreath
- 2500 gold
Major Healing Potion
- Level 80
- 10 Angelbreath
- 27 Reddamine
- 27 Biteberry
- 27 Blightshade
- 27 Lifesbane
- 27 Howler Moss
- Five Fiend Rose
- 5000 gold
Superior Healing Potion
- Level 90
- 10 Forgotten Soul
- 20 Angelbreath
- 10 Fiend Rose
- 20 Grave Dust
- 36 Blightshade
- 20 Demon Heart
- 36 Howler Moss
- 12500 gold
Elixirs
Elixirs are created in the same way as healing potion upgrades, but they're single-use consumables—once you drink one, it's gone. They each provide a 30-minute long buff, but also, importantly, a 5% increase to your experience point gain. If you're aiming for level 100, that little boost can make a big difference to your speed of levelling.
My only word of caution would be that you should always keep in mind while crafting elixirs what you're going to need for your next health potion upgrade—it's easy to lose track and end up running out of vital ingredients, particularly rarer ones like Crushed Beast Bones or Angelbreath. You also need to remember you can only have one elixir active at a time, so you'll want to choose ones that are most useful to you in your current goals—for example, a dungeon full of beasts will be a lot easier with an Elixir of Beast Slaying.
Elixir recipes unlock automatically as you hit certain levels, and like healing potion upgrades they require both a set of ingredients and a minimum level. To craft each one, you'll need the following:
Weak Iron Barb Elixir
Increases Armor by 50, Thorns by 25, and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 5
- Five Gallowvine
- Five Biteberry
- 1000 gold
Weak Third Eye Elixir
Increases Dodge by 4% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 10
- Eight Gallowvine
- Five Howler Moss
- 1000 gold
Weak Elixir of Cold Resistance
Increases Cold Resist by 15% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 15
- 10 Gallowvine
- Six Biteberry
- 1000 gold
Weak Elixir of Fire Resistance
Increases Fire Resist by 15% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 15
- 10 Gallowvine
- Six Lifesbane
- 1000 gold
Weak Elixir of Lightning Resistance
Increases Lightning Resist by 15% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 15
- 10 Gallowvine
- Six Reddamine
- 1000 gold
Weak Elixir of Poison Resistance
Increases Poison Resist by 15% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 15
- 10 Gallowvine
- 6 Howler Moss
- 1000 gold
Weak Elixir of Shadow Resistance
Increases Shadow Resist by 15% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 15
- 10 Gallowvine
- Six Blightshade
- 1000 gold
Weak Assault Elixir
Increases Attack Speed by 7% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 20
- 12 Gallowvine
- Six Lifesbane
- 1000 gold
Weak Crushing Elixir
Increases Overpower damage by 20% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 25
- 12 Gallowvine
- Four Howler Moss
- 1000 gold
Weak Precision Elixir
Increases Critical Strike Chance by 2%, Critical Strike Damage by 15%, and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 30
- 15 Gallowvine
- Five Blightshade
- 1000 gold
Iron Barb Elixir
Increases Armor by 200, Thorns by 100, and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 35
- 10 Gallowvine
- Six Biteberry
- 1500 gold
Weak Acrobatics Elixir
Reduces the cooldown of your Evade by 8% and increases Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 35
- 15 Gallowvine
- One Angelbreath
- 1000 gold
Elixir of Beast-Slaying
Increases damage against beasts (including spiders and maggots) by 20% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 36
- 15 Gallowvine
- 10 Howler Moss
- Five Biteberry
- One Angelbreath
- Three Crushed Beast Bones
- 1000 gold
Elixir of Demon-Slaying
Increases damage against demons (including goatmen) by 20% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 36
- 15 Gallowvine
- 10 Reddamine
- Five Blightshade
- One Angelbreath
- Three Demon's Heart
- 1000 gold
Elixir of Man-Slaying
Increases damage against humans by 20% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 36
- 15 Gallowvine
- 10 Reddamine
- Five Lifesbane
- One Angelbreath
- Three Paletongue
- 1000 gold
Elixir of Undead Slaying
Increases damage against undead by 20% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 36
- 15 Gallowvine
- Five Lifesbane
- 10 Blightshade
- One Angelbreath
- Three Grave Dust
- 1000 gold
Third Eye Elixir
Increases Dodge by 6% and Experience by 5% for 30 minutes.
- Level 40
- 10 Gallowvine
- Eight Howler Moss
- Six Crushed Beast Bones
- 1500 gold
Ingredients
It's not always obvious where to find the ingredients you need for crafting your health potion upgrades and elixirs. Herbs are gathered out in the world, but some are only found in certain regions, and while monster parts drop from enemies as you play, it's not always obvious which parts will drop from which enemies.
Below is a list of potion ingredients and where to find them. It's also worth hoovering up any sidequests in a region while you're gathering—they'll often reward you with a cache once completed, which may contain a nice bundle of ingredients and shortcut your search.
Plants
Gallowvine
Found almost everywhere in every region. It looks like a green bush with little pink flowers.
Angelbreath
Found in every region, but it's very rare—you need to explore thoroughly to find it. Look for a golden yellow flower with long stalks.
Fiend Rose
Found during Helltide events, which are only accessible at World Tier 3. It's a red, rose-like flower with a twisted, thorny stem.
Howler Moss
Found in Scosglen, north of the Fractured Peaks starting area. It looks like a thick clump with long stalks sticking out of it.
Biteberry
Found in the Fractured Peaks, the starting area of the game. Look for a green bush with bright red berries.
Reddamine
Found in the Dry Steppes, west of the Fractured Peaks starting area. It's a weird-looking plant—a sort of almost coral-like pinky-red growth.
Blightshade
Found in Hawezar, south of the Fractured Peaks starting area. Look for light blue, trumpet-shaped flowers.
Lifesbane
Found in Kehjistan, southwest of the Fractured Peaks starting area. It's a tall green stalk with a clump of small, red flowers towards the top.
Monster parts
Demon's Heart
Dropped by demon enemies—that includes goatmen, fallen, and flies as well as the more obvious demonic foes.
Paletongue
Dropped by human enemies—that includes cannibals and cultists, no matter how monstrous they may seem.
Grave Dust
Dropped by undead enemies, weirdly including incorporeal ones like ghosts. Though I suppose that's no weirder than them dropping a shiny new pair of trousers.
Crushed Beast Bones
Dropped by beast enemies. That includes obvious things like bears and wolves, but also spiders, maggots, snakes, and werewolves. Spiders, despite not having bones, have dropped the most for me, and the Sarat's Lair dungeon in southern Scosglen dropped a lot when I cleared it. Scosglen generally also has more beast enemies than other regions.
