The four-month Domination and Nemesis challenge leagues will end at 8pm PST on February 23 (this is 5pm NZT on February 24). This news post describes how the process works and what properties of those leagues will make their way into the core game afterwards.
The characters in these leagues will transfer to their parent leagues. Domination characters will transition to Standard and Nemesis characters will transition to Hardcore. Please note that this process is not instant - it can take some time.
Your stash tabs from the challenge leagues will also transition to their parent leagues as remove-only tabs. This is so that you aren't penalised for not having enough stash tabs. Remove-only tabs will last until the items are removed from them. Once you remove an item from a remove-only stash tab you cannot return it to that stash tab.
New challenge leagues will start on March 5 (when the 1.1.0 mini-expansion is deployed), so there is a period where the only leagues are Standard and Hardcore. This is a good opportunity to consolidate your long-term wealth and share items between characters from different past challenge leagues.
One of the purposes of the challenge leagues is to trial new game features that may later be incorporated into the game as a whole. There are some previously trialled changes which will be applied to the permanent leagues, but these changes will not be made until the 1.1.0 update on March 5th.
Here are the set of changes related to Domination/Nemesis that are being made to the main game:
The new base types introduced in the challenge leagues will be joining the main game. Two-Stone Rings, Sanctified Life and Mana Flasks, Quartz Flasks and Jade Flasks will drop in all leagues from 1.1.0 onwards.
Prismatic Rings will no longer drop, but can still be obtained from vendor recipes.
The Unique items from the challenge leagues will not drop any more, but may return as race rewards or drops at some later time.
Item quantity will be revisited in 1.1.0. We are highly likely to prevent the Item Quantity support gem from dropping in 1.1.0 and to prevent the Item Quantity mod from spawning on magic or rare items. Item Quantity will continue to exist on Unique items, but we may review its magnitude.
Old mods and items will not be removed or changed for players who currently have them. Powerful legacy items are a feature of the permanent leagues.
Nemesis mods will start to occasionally spawn on rare monsters in the core game. When a rare monster spawns, there's a percentage chance that it receives a Nemesis mod. It will still be in addition to prefixes and suffixes. Some Nemesis mods will be adjusted, removed, or transformed into a regular prefix or suffix.
Shrines will be added to the core game. They will not spawn as frequently as in the Domination league and some may be rebalanced.
The new challenge leagues begin on March 5, and will include exciting new league mods, challenges, unique items and base item types. In addition, the substantial changes in the 1.1.0 mini-expansion (which is deployed as the new leagues start) bring new game features to all leagues.
Players who completed all eight challenges in Domination and Nemesis will be sent a special t-shirt. We'll announce the winners and collect their details once the leagues have ended.
The new challenge leagues will have their own sets of challenges and a similar prize for people who complete them all. We've taken extensive feedback into account when designing these challenges. Many of the challenges relate to either new league-specific properties of new 1.1.0-specific content. More information on this (including the names of the new leagues) will be available in the coming weeks!