Regarding magic/rare feedback, iirc the feature that made magic/rare items attractive were multiple skill bonuses that could outstrip most of the +1/+2 to all skills affix found on uniques or rune words. To that end if the devs want to include magics and rares as parallel itemization to legendsries and sets then i would suggest focusing on something very specific like +skills/+talents and let the max roll of magics and rares be higher than legendsries as a trade off for no legendary power and fewer total affixes.
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When I was looking at the Item screens showing the Item qualities, I seen:
- Common
- Magic
- Rare
- Legendary/set
- Ancient Legendary/Ancient Set*
- Mythic
My concern is the titanfor…errr…Ancient Item system making a return. I highly dislike idea of having the same item, with different version/quality. Even if it comes 1 one extra affix, it just doesn’t feel good to see that item you want drop, iD it and its not ancient. Basically it decreases your odds at getting what you want, Decreases the teams need to create unique original items. I just don;t like the system.
Also, The term Mythic…Just doesn’t fit Diablo to me. Primal does. but mythic seems too used. Doesn’t get me excited or curious. They “mythic” item system seems cool, if the affix’s truly are random. But still wouldn’t replace the Unique system…
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Yeah, completely agreed. Dont have multiple tiers of the same items.
If you want some kind of progression for existing items, then do it through crafting.
Like recipes to improve the stats on an item etc.
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Why do people care what color the frame is on your items?
All items in arpgs are literally just stat sticks anyway, and sometimes they give unique abilities (which is the fun part).
Why does it matter whether your endgame build has yellow items or green or gold?
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While your correct that All items are stat sticks, You fail to offer any insight into a system that wouldn’t contain any. Are you suggesting that all items be the same quality different names? No items any more period? Just level up?
To me its a mind trick, To create artificial value. To creating feelings, Excitement etc. the RP elements of the arpg.
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I have to say, I was initially VERY excited when they announced rune words only to then discover they aren’t Diablo II rune words AT ALL. The thing that made Diablo II runewords so amazing is that they were literally their own class of legendary item. You spent loads of time gathering these rare runes, if you could complete a rune word AND find the appropriate item to socket them into for your class (6 socket collossus blade or Zerker axe anyone?); Boom you’re rewarded with a high tier end game item with its stats/modifiers predetermined and rolled within set values. A perfectly rolled Breath of the dying ethereal zerker axe was thus worth way more than a non perfectly rolled one. This also encouraged trading for better rolled items to min/max your character.
Another thing missing in this iteration are stat points, I miss the days of being able to distribute my own stat points, and having stat requirements for specific pieces of weapons/armor. I remember trying to find a regular breast plate to socket the rune word enigma into for my bone necromancer because it had the lowest str requirement and obviously I didnt want more str on my necro than was needed. These are the types of decisions that give itemization and character customization DEPTH and make the player feel like their decisions are meaningful. Mess up your character? Let us respec, or make us roll another character, which we do by default when a new season comes out anyway and adds replay value. Also, add new rune words with each season, no new art needed, we socket them into base white items, everyone is happy.
Moving on, I want to agree fully with the OP when I say attack/defense is WEAK, its BAD. THis is not in any way the depth we need in a diablo game, FORGET DIABLO 3 HAPPENED. Copy and paste and BUILD OFF OF Diablo II’s itemization. ITEMIZATION IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PART OF THIS GAME AND IF YOU FAIL DIABLO IV YOU ARE LITERALLY FINISHED BLIZZARD.
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Yeah, I don’t know what they were thinking with runewords. Those aren’t even runewords. Did they even play Diablo 2? Runewords that are 2 runes max are hardly runewords.
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Wait didnt they state in panels that runewords are a thing, as are runes? Perhaps we still have to see those?
I did not play D2 so I have no idea how they work. Only know that people are a big fan of them.
Indeed they stated this and then gave an example of their version of rune words. Their version of rune words are slapping amn and ko together. watch the video again to get more clarity. Its garbage in its current state.
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Which would be a good itemization system?
I see people talking about overlap the damages, that sounds good. Also give value to lower tier items, that sounds good also. On this last idea, i think they could give more rune slots to lower tier items, that would help to make them more useful? Also, i hear there would be gems too, which could help to give items more effects.
It isn’t only too used, the problem is that legendary and mythic means something great was done while using that item, it feels like something one must earn. While unique and primal don’t require anything like that.
Well that does not sound good… 
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I dont have a problem with items in ARPGs being stat sticks, its a staple of the genre.
I was criticising the idea that folks seem to be putting forward that higher tier items being better than lower tiers is somehow a bad thing.
If some magic and rare items are as good or better than legendaries, sets, and mythics then the item tier system means literally nothing.
Higher tier items of the same level should generally be better than lower tier ones.
Items are just numbers on a page, the color coding is for organzational purposes so we can sort through whats good and whats trash more quickly.
There seems to be a shockingly large number of people enamored with the “illusion of choice” rather than meaningful choice.
Id much rather have say, all items of legendary tier and above alter skills in interesting ways than have them just give bigger numbers (although they should do that too).
My question is, what is the actual benefit of having some low tier items be equal to or better than higher tier items? Why do people think thats “better design”? All that does is remove any value of a tier system in the first place.
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I dont think I agree with this.
While their version of runewords is clearly in its infancy, I think theyre going in the right direction. I dont want to have to pull up a guide or memorize what every combination of runes does. I want to be able to look at the runes I have, and to be able to figure out what will happen when i combine them together based on the information I’m given in game.
Which means ideally combining 2 or more runes should do the same thing as using those runes individually, but stronger.
Example: this rune adds critchance when i cast a spell, and triggers the next rune, which adds crit damage when i shapeshift and triggers attached runes. They should still do that when combined, but with bigger numbers and/or more triggers.
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Imo, some pillars (not everything),
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Build-based stats, not class-based. Different builds should desire different stats. My sorceress using frostbolt should want substantially different stats than my sorceress using fireball etc. (and no, merely wanting frost dmg instead of fire dmg stat isn’t substantial enough).
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In relation to that; specialized stats over generic stats. +fire dmg, +melee dmg, +dot dmg etc. over +dmg. Generic stats can exist to some degree, but they need to be weaker than the specialized ones to be balanced.
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Itemization and build design is interconnected. To achieve build-based stats, the builds obviously must benefit differently from stats. Like some skills need to get much more out of Crit than other skills, otherwise Crit will be equally useful for everyone (big mistake in D3). Have skills that proc effects on Crit etc. Crit is just an example, same goes for all the other generic stats one can think of. D3 actually managed to do this, very rarely though, like with some builds using the ‘Pickup radius’ stat. It makes for much more interesting gear progression when some builds want stats that are totally uninteresting for other builds.
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Balancing offensive, defensive and utility stats. Really difficult to do, and solving it is not in itself an itemization problem, it is a matter of enemy designs and death penalties that makes you value your defense or utility. A-RPGs need deaths to matter, if they want non-offense stats to matter! Not just in Hardcore.
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Moving on from stats, some items (uniques/legendaries/whatever) should be game-changers. Stuff that opens up new ways to play existing builds, or new builds entirely. These items should NOT be generic stuff like +500% dmg to skill X, that is not changing gameplay, just enforcing existing gameplay (which was obviously a major design flaw in D3 end-game itemization).
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We know but still we need to be sure.
My bad @cooperton, Should have read your post a bit better wasnt my intention to twist up your words. I get what you were referring to, And agree to an extent.
Yeah. I think the rune system shown has quite a lot of potential, as long as they build upon it. For one, you should be able to chain more than 2 runes. And of course there has to be a bunch of different causes and effects.
Honestly that system seems much more interesting that simply crafting new items with runes like in D2. You can do that just fine with a generic crafting system - which the game should of course also have.
D4 runes seems much more like what PoE has, except it is not tied to the skill system directly - which I think is fine honestly. Having your skills so tied to the socketing system in that game, while interesting, also can be a bit annoying sometimes, because it really locks you into very specific socket colors/numbers etc.
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I generally agree. As i said in my response to OP i think you could have magic and rare as a parallel item choice but only if its specific effect was attractive enough. Like if they could randomly roll more +skill/+talent modifiers than legendaries. So the idea is maybe you consider having an item with a lot of one particular high value stat over multiple affixes and a legendary power. Obviously im just illustrsting in terms of examples, it could be anything.
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I can try to answer this for you. If the game has enough random modifiers (prefixes and suffixes) and you want to make a build that you have in mind that isn’t currently supported with a best in slot legendary or rune word, you will hunt a perfectly rolled rare instead.
One example of this I can recall was that the grandfather Collossus Blade was a highly sought after legendary for general all purpose use on a Barbarian, but it was far from best in slot for any specific activity. If you were lucky enough to find a grandfather, that was an awesome feeling and the item had value in the economy. At the same time, however; you could find a rare collossus blade with randomly rolled prefixes and suffixes that had better stats for dueling outside Tristram. This is just an example but I hope it helps you to understand.
Also, a more to the point example is that a regular white, 6 slot item can be of tremendous value as well if rune words are implemented properly. I remember Ethereal 6 slot weapons of various types being highly sought after and worth multiple SoJ’s. This was due to the fact that finding them could take some real time given the vast number of different weapon/armor types and players would use them to socket rune words into.
All items should have some kind of end game purpose. If itemization is done properly, Rares should be able to compete with legendaries from time to time. Legendaries should always be super powerful in that they offer you a choice to alter your gameplay, but rares should be able to compete for best in slot for some builds. This is of course assuming the game ends up having more than just the dumbed down “attack and defense” that it has now.
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Yes, i think it would be nice if, for example, in a 6 socket item, we could use any combination of “condition runes” and “effect runes”. This would give us the chance of decide if we want a particular effect to activate with many conditions or we want less conditions but more effects.
Also, the idea of different effects helping each other is very good. For example, if an effect cast a fire ball, another could multiply the amount of fireballs or the area of effect.
With that in mind, i think there could be a 3rd kind of rune that was a “modifier” for the effect rune.
In any case, with 2 or 3 types of runes, and 6 slots items, there could be many posible combinations.