thats kinda sus tho
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I can only speak for myself.
I would really like to have more but “cool game changing modifiers” on items
I wanna think and compare different strengths
If blues had more ADA stats and rares had more affixes and legendaries had skill modifiers, you would have 3 systems that are supported by 3 different item types that are all important
That’s the itemization I want
The purpose of having magic items with higher affixes (potential for higher) is a good idea. It is for those builds or more often likely, those specific situations in which you are progressing, that you want to have the most life or attack rating, or whatever, that you can. So you find a magic ring with +100 to attack rating. Sweet! I will use that over the life steal, resistance, damage ring, since I want to have the highest chance to hit.
Basically look at Diablo II and do a lot of what it did. Diablo 2 still has the best itemization of any game in the genre.
Legendaries - unique items that have fixed affixes and don’t necessarily need some insane legendary power, but could have it. They have to feel special, so having random affixes on them and one legendary power that can be found as a consumable and used on a rare item, really negates the special feeling of finding a legendary item.
Rares - Have the most random affixes with potential end-game rolls. These should not necessarily be found as end-game often, but it should be possible to find them with such good rolls that they rival end-game legendary items. Having these rare instances of items that stand out, even when compared to unique more fixed legendaries, allows players that find those kind of rares to feel special and different. If legendaries are just as random, that removes that feeling and makes legendaries boring.
Magic - 1-2 affixes that can potentially roll higher than rares
White - Worse than the rest, but can be used as a base for rune words, crafting, something else similar.
Then there is Mythic. Not sure how I feel about these. Kind of like them, and kind of don’t. They should obviously be powerful and only allow one equipped at a time, but they should not be so powerful that they trivialize other gear slots. Also, if they have specific unique powers, those should not be dropped as consumables (assuming they stick with the consumable power idea).
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My Lv81 D2 character’s gear at Hell
Not 100% BiS, but you get the gist. 
EDIT: These items are unique.
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Not really
This pictures shows item art
Not item types
All those items are unique.
I don’t agree with UngivenFame about full legendaries being a problem.
But I also don’t see how that picture is a counter to what he said.
I kinda like that, assuming ADA isnt a trash system of course.
If you are missing some ADA on your rares/legs you might then try to fix it with a blue item until you get better rares/legs.
Let me try to explain the magic items topic from the very beginning and see where this leads us to.
So, as I wrote in a previous feedback thread:
Let’s say they go with 15 item slots and they want to push a lot of tier 2 meta diversity. This would mean they can make 5-6 from these 15 item slots not bound to legendary effects (aka reserved for magic/blue items).
Now, the problem with magic items is that once the player finds the optimal (or satisfying enough) stats on a magic he is after, the item gets CEMENTED on that item slot, no matter how much we tweak the skill tree after a certain point.
While this is good for mid game and would create item shuffling, it alone won’t change the fact that late game magics would still be CEMENTED on the item slots. For that to change they need to include stats manipulation nodes (like PoE’s majority of passive choices) in the skill tree. This would guarantee the player will still be looking for replacements of the magics in the very late game too.
So, basically there are these scenarios how to construct the itemization and skill tree regarding magic items:
1] Current small skill tree without stat nodes and magics being purely lower tier; Current number of item slots
2] A lot bigger skill tree with stat nodes and magics being useful in late game; More item slots from now
They are still potential rewards (that’s why you’d keep them in stash).
What you suggested heavily pushes the game towards crafting and stashing items. While this might be fun at a certain degree, I doubt anyone here wants to spend half his day upgrading items instead of fighting mobs and collecting the same items.
I’m quite fine with magic items being obsolete in very very late game (as in you literally have BiS in all slots).
Them fulfilling a role of hitting ADA breakpoints whenever needed would be a meaningful purpose, without necessarily making them Have BiS-potential themselves.
Their only purpose would be to close gaps in your current gear setup. You might always have a few saved if you needed more ADA after replacing some other item piece.
Those elements are completely separate and you can have larger/smaller skill trees at the same time as Magic’s being useful/useless, as well as more/less item slots.
I don’t think the skill tree should have stat nodes. That would serve no purpose imo. A few more item slots would be nice.
Maybe have a charm slot, where the items are craft able only, like relics in Grim Dawn.
This would still leave some of these useful in the very late game (since there will always be some gap to close). It could work if you manage to completely isolate them from late game somehow.
No, they aren’t.
Re-read what I quoted about meta tiers. If you have 9 item slots and magics being OP, you’ll have high diversity in the 2/3/4 meta tiers (due to lower number of useful legendaries occupying only a few item slots), but low character identity (due to everyone using these same builds/items). The point is we go in neither of these situations:
- Low meta diversity
- Low character identity
For that to happen you need to balance the 3 variables properly:
- Number of item slots
- Skill tree
- Magics design
It serves the purpose of us switching magics in late game (due to min/maxing).
Is that a problem?
At least potentially, you might reach a point where you hit all the ADA breakpoints you want without magic items.
There is no reason they would be connected. You also ignore rare items? It is not legendary or magic only.
More item slots does not lead to more build diversity. It is similar to skill points. It is a curve. Too few and too many both leads to less build diversity.
Why would it do that?
i think the only purpose of item types should kinda be to appear “cooler” to casual gamers who actually want to be all in orange
skill changing modifiers are cooler than just a lot of affixes, even if the affixes are better in some situations. and a lot of affixes are cooler then less affixes with higher numbers. thats why i as a kid was always moving from blue to yellow to gold. because i didnt even realize there could have been any purpose in lower tier items. i didnt care.
its a system that pleases both camps
It might become a problem if you wear more than one in late game (because of what I wrote about balancing the 3 variables).
It is. Rares become legendary in late game.
It leads. Always.
It won’t be meta builds, just different builds serving for larger character identity.
Think of it this way: If we have 1 item slot and 3 items in our mini aRPG game, we’d have 3 builds. If we increase the slots to 2, we’d have 6.
Because when you reach/switch different stat nodes, you’d switch blue items.
If we have an unlimited amount of item slots then all builds can get “everything”, which reduces build diversity. Somewhat similar to unlimited skill points.
But yes. 2 item slots is more build diversity than 1 item slot.
1 billion item slots is likely less build diversity than 10 item slots.
Why would that be the case.
Or rather, why would it be more the case than if there are no stat nodes, and we simply get stats from items.
That is hardly confirmed, especially not after the most recent blog post stating the opposite goal.
Being able to turn rares into legendaries is not the same as rares themselves no longer existing as viable items.
You could wear magics in all item slots without it being a problem (other than it being boring imo).
However, if magics only increase ADA powers that would guarantee you wouldn’t wear lots of them, since there would be no point in reaching high ADA breakpoints without wearing rares and legendaries which had affixes unlocked by those breakpoints. That is what makes it a decent idea imo. The only valuable thing about the magic items here would be that they made your other items stronger. Magic items would be really weak on their own (except for the inherent effect of the ADA affixes of course; proc chance, and duration increases)
No, it is not. You do realize we always have more items than item slots, right?
Because that’s the case in PoE where there is such passive tree.
Can you quote it?
Yes, it could work properly, if they expand the tree and the item slots. Otherwise you’d have CEMENTED magics that fulfill the support role of all other items potentially leading to low meta diversity or low character identity.
Doesnt really matter. You will get more of everything. Everyone will be the same. Even taking into account legendary bonuses, each of this will have less and less impact when you have a billion of them.
You take off your magic/rare items in PoE due to stat nodes? Unless something drastic has changed in PoE that is not my impression.
And again, even if you did, how is it in any way different from a scenario where you got those stats from items? The source of those stats simply doesn’t matter.
We’ve also had very mixed team feedback regarding core itemization. We’re currently looking at how to best differentiate our various item qualities. For example, should Magic quality items have higher affix stats than Rare items?
Turning rares into legendaries with no role for rares themselves is not exactly differentiating item qualities.
Still no reason why such a connection would exist.
Even with 2 item slots and no skill tree, the aforementioned system could work; as in, using a magic item to boost your rare item through reaching an ADA breakpoint.
It doesn’t matter. It’s still more character identity. That’s the whole point. People in aRPGs LOVE TO BE UNIQUE. More item slots give you more uniqueness, but destroy the meta tiers diversity.
It matters since you’d choose certain nodes over others when you make your skill tree path.
Yes, I am constantly changing routes in PoE skill tree when changing rare items since often the optimal path changes. If PoE done one thing right, that’s their passive tree.
You look too much into it. They just meant magic items design might change.
We want to make it optimal however aka not cementing the mid game found GG magic (aka not moving it from that item slot ever again).
the fewer choices we make due to fewer item types/tiers to choose from, the less rpg it is. of course, many d3 folks want it even simpler than it already is. if they give us anything at all from d2, please for the love of diablo make it core itemization. that’s it. everything else is whatever just give us at least this. i dont think it’s much to ask
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Making specialized builds is indeed great and a major part of what A-RPGs is about. But again, having endless item slots, skill points, skill slots etc. leads to less uniqueness, not more.
It is a balance though, since fewer choices also leads to less uniqueness. I certainly think Diablo 4 should have more item slots than 10. But more is not automatically better.
Similar to choosing certain items over others. It doesn’t make any difference for the usability of blue items, where you get the stats from.
Changing between rare items is not the same as stopping to use rare items though?
As for changing between different rare items, you would also still do that in PoE, without the stats from the skill tree.
And that rare item and legendary item design might change. Rare and legendary design is way more important than magic item design.
Which would again not have to happen.
If you need 100 Ancestral Power. And you get 75 from a magic helm, and 33 from legendary boots.
Then you find some rare gloves that gives you 33 Ancestral power, and that makes you switch out the blue item with a rare item with 34 AP.
Kinda similar to what you seem to describe with the skill tree scenario. Well, except more dynamic of course.
Due to (presumably) respec costs, having breakpoint stats build into the skill tree would be a an unnecessary and bad idea.