Item affixes - Some well thought out ideas.

[pulli]

Hi there, One of the things people complain a lot about is that all items are crap & you have to be terribly lucky to find something. On top of that people think the build are very single-sided & the amount of "funny" affixes is simply too low.

In this post I'm trying to compile a list of good ideas for affixes, if someone has an idea please post here and I'll updated the first post!


Anyways the fun thing is, is that people find the item affixes too boring, in that too few "good" affixes are possible. Yet at the same time they think you need too much luck to find something worthwhile. These opinions at first sigh clash (make more special affixes that are good for certain builds only & you need even more luck). This led me to believe the first & second update:

1) Only 1 "main stat" affix can spawn on an item
This would solve a lot of randomizing. No longer an item with +dex & +str. But instead the item gets +dex & something else. While it isn't a guarantee that an item gets useful stats, it at least prevent a lot of the useless stats.

-


2) Stat dependent on class
With this I mean that an affix changes with the character as to make it equally good for wizard, monk, demon hunt, barbarian & witch doctor. What would happen is that instead of a "+dex" affix, you could roll a "+ main stat" affix. That would hence result in +int for wd/wiz, +dex for monk/dh & +str for barb. An item with this affix would immediately become non useless.
To keep it possible to stack some extra armour/res/dodge in case it is not your main stat, it might be best to make an extra affix called +main stat. Though I'm not sure if this is necessary, given the current way the stats work the bonus is nearly negligible. I'd say, remove all +stat affixes & replace them with "+main stat" & +vit only.

-


Above problems would lower the amount of terrible rolls. While still you could get bad items, the chance for an item to be good greatly increases. However it doesn't make the item hunt much more fun, it still is very linear in what you wish to gain. (With only crit, MF to spice things up). This lead me to the following idea, it is not worked out yet & I really would love some comments.

3) Runes through items
Yes you read it correct, I think runes in weapons would really make the game more fun. A rune is similar in this game as a minor "change" in character behaviour. (And as such can act as a thing similar to a +skill mod). These runes would compliment the already active rune, allowing for even more customization of a character. If the runes would clash the runes in items would take priority, and there should a set order in which the runes are applied (last rune to be applied is the one that takes highest priority). The runes could be watered down version of the existing runes, or there could be a dozen extra effects. As one would have to give up another stat for this, it wouldn't become too op, though I'd say only 1 rune affix per item should be possible.
This would allow characters to depend on skill modification & actual effects, rather than depending simply on more dmg, vit, armour, res & crit. It would give build also very much more diversity; allowing the weapon runes to be used to fine tune your character.
There is however a large problem with this: each rune could only be used by 1 class, and then that class has to use the correct skill. While I doubt the chance for a skill can really be changed (yet still giving rune meaningful effects instead of simply "+% larger aoe dmg" that can become very bland), I think the system should take the multiple classes into account. When an item spawns with the "+rune" affix it should assign immediately 5 runes, 1 random rune for each class..

-


So what do you think about the ideas posted here? Have your own, do you think ideas above need to be tuned. Or do you just wish to show your appreciation - please post here. Given enough feedback there might be a possible way to have blizzard actually listen to the playerbase. (we can hope...)

[Lanthanide]

These ideas aren't well thought out. Sorry.

[Kiroptus]

There was a huge list of player affixes back then, I think the D3 developers wanted to pretend that they were listening to the playerbase so they said that they wanted to hear people's ideas for cool item affixes. There was a huge thread here about it with lots of very interesting affixes, others were posted on the official forum as well.

Not even one of huge list of creative affixes got into the game, so no, no one should bother suggestion things for blizzard.

[pulli]

These ideas aren't well thought out. Sorry.

Good, I see you're a king at discussing things. All should hail the statements lanthanide makes!!

[darkslayeromg]

People who suggest itemization improvements seem to not understand how market works.





If (in any way) chances of rolling a decent item will be improved it will no longer hold this "decent" definition that it now has (from market perspective).

So lets say you have now 0.1% chance of rolling an item worth of 1mln gold. If the chance of rolling same stats on an item would suddenly becomes 1% this item will likely to cost 100k gold as soon as market adapts to the change. And the thing is that 1mln would still be equal to 0.1% rare item.

What this mean is that lets say now if you get like chest piece with 200+ combined stats, 60+AR and 3 sockets -you know it has potential of selling within 5-10 mln range - which makes it a good drop. But imagine that the same item suddenly would have price of 0.5-1 mln - would this be a good drop? Unlikely. And to get those 10 mln you would still need to shot for 0.1% of rarity which once again will make you rage over bad drop rates.

Well, of course it would help a lot of players to improve their gear for sure. And in general any improvements item wise would be as good as difficulty nerf. Do we really need this to happen? Also it would rob all the existing players that doesnt have BIS items which is much more of a loss in my opinion than a gain from improving general gear level.

The best way to improve items is to fight bots, which is unlikely to happen since blizzard makes money from them. Less gold supply should increase its purchasing power, thus enhancing non-botters wealth.

[sifuedition]

Getting rid of bots is the best first solution and then you can watch what the market does to see if other changes are necessary.

Back in the real world...

Sorry, that's just never going to happen; being completely bot free. Therefore, other solutions need to be examined too. In your chest piece example, that chest is still "decent" to someone killing monsters. That's the guy that matters to me. Not really worried if someone who wants to sell it thinks it's "decent".

Just my opinion. The AHs should be a side effect of the game at most, not a focus. Right now, it feels swapped. If something were to switch that back, I'll bet that would go a long way to making me feel rewarded for playing again.

[darkslayeromg]

You cannot deny the very existence of the market.
Of course item rolls improvements would make "self-found progression" much more accessible.

However if you ever gonna check AH in this hypothetical conditions you will find out that all this "decent for killing monsters gear" that was enough to clear inferno, cost around 1 mln gold, that you had once you`ve reached 60. And now imagine that you know this information before... well you cannot really assume otherwise, right?

People take rational decisions if we talk in general. That is one of the cumber-stones of economic theory and efficient market hypothesis, which has proven to be true. So with this in mind, most people would spend their million on gear on entering inferno thus most people wont find a single upgrade during whole playthrough thus most people would once again will complain about bad drops. See the point?

[pulli]

@dark slayer:

That is indeed true. However now there is a huge discrepancy between good & bad items. There are so few good items possible. What would be better is that there are a lot of good (not best, there can only be 1 best) items. On top of that market should never be a driving for in a single player game

[darkslayeromg]

The "good item" is a relative term. I have already described why "good items" are so market dependent.

A lot of "good items" around would only make happy those irrational individuals who decline the existence of market. For the rest it would be the robbery of the century. And in the long run this would make no change on item system at all.

I would say that real Diablo is a multiplayer game, however in case of D3 social aspect is poorly designed so it almost dumbed down to single player.

[JackalYYC]

There are some glaring issues. For one, single main stat itemization is not a good thing. While the general concensus is "main stat or go home", others will look at an item, for example a helm, that has 150 Dex, 150 Int, +30 All Resists, some other goodies, and a socket, and say "Damn, if only it had Vit instead of Int!" while others will say "Sweet! My DH is getting an extra boost to resists with this one!"

The three primary stats are beneficial to all classes, albeit slightly. I would much rather see them boost the secondary bonuses gained from stats rather than dissolve the possibility of ever having 2 main stats roll on one item.

Imagine a Barbarian with just as much Dex as Str, and the Dex actually gave a significant boost to Dodge %.

Glorious!