My Hardcore character just died and I don’t have access to the PTR, so I had some time and thought as an exercise I would take a look at the itemization in D4.
I tried to analyze the goals, the current system and end with an idea which I think could solve the biggest problem I see in itemization.
Design Requirements:
-
Weapons should support long-term progression and investment.
Players should be able to meaningfully upgrade and customize their weapons across a long time span.
Rationale: Supports the live-service model and keeps players engaged beyond the initial drop. -
Crafting should include moments of high variance that feel exciting and rewarding.
Players should experience moments of surprise and satisfaction when outcomes deviate positively from their expectations.
Rationale: Reinforces dopamine-based feedback loops and enhances replayability. -
Item progression should offer meaningful player choice and agency.
Players must be able to experiment with and influence the evolution of their gear through clear, strategic decisions.
Rationale: Fosters intrinsic motivation through competence and agency. -
Loot drops should evoke excitement, anticipation, and satisfaction.
The moment of a drop should be impactful — whether through visual/audio cues, rarity indicators, or the potential power of the item.
Rationale: This emotional payoff is central to the ARPG experience and a key hook for retention.
Main Systems:
A: Legendary Powers (Aspects)
B: Tempering
C: Masterworking
D: Enchanting
E: Greater Affixes
Analysis:
A. Legendary Powers (Aspects)
(1) Long-term Progression: Limited
Legendary Powers can be upgraded via higher rolls, but:
Progress is not visible or trackable.
Powers don’t auto-upgrade; players must re-imbue manually.
No immediate feedback if a drop improves your current build.
(2) High Variance in Crafting: No alignment
No real RNG at the point of imbuing. Once you extract a power, its outcome is deterministic.
(3) Meaningful Choice: Strong
Primary system for build-defining customization. Players imprint Aspects to shape their builds.
(4) Exciting Drops: Mixed
Finding a better version of an Aspect can be exciting, but:
You destroy the item to extract the power, nullifying the excitement of the item itself.
Encourages disassociation from loot as gear — it’s just Aspect delivery.
Summary: Strong in build identity (3), but undermines drop excitement (4) and fails to support randomness (2). User experience hinders (1) due to unclear progression.
B. Tempering
(1) Long-term Progression: No Alignment
Players avoid tempering early to wait for stronger manuals, creating dead time where the system feels irrelevant.
Once the player has the right manual, the player will temper once. Items can no longer be improved through this system.
(2) High Variance in Crafting: Strong
Clearly present. When the right affixes hits, it feels rewarding.
(3) Meaningful Choice: Undermined
Intent is strong, but undermined. Players can choose tempering categories, but random affix outcomes reduce control.
(4) Exciting Drops: Mixed
Manuals affect future upgrades, but because tempers are limited, players will only temper an item with the best manual.
Summary: Tempering fights between (2) and (3). Intended as a choice-driven system, but excessive RNG erodes player agency. Its dependency on manuals and limited uses delays its relevance, weakening long-term use (1).
C. Masterworking
(1) Long-term Progression: Strong
Best system for investment. Players commit to gear over time, improving specific affixes through a multi-stage process.
(2) High Variance in Crafting: Strong
Strong engagement. Hitting the same affix on breakpoints (4/8/12) creates dopamine spikes.
(3) Meaningful Choice: Limited
Limited. Player choice exists in deciding whether to continue or reset, but rerolling undoes all progress, discouraging iteration. Conflicting with 1.
(4) Exciting Drops: No Alignment
No impact. Masterworking only begins after acquisition — the system doesn’t influence the thrill of item drops.
Summary: Strongest support for (1) and (2), but limited agency (3) and no excitement impact on drops (4). Penalty for resetting conflicts with 1.
D. Enchanting
(1) Long-term Progression: No Alignment
One-time use per item. No scalability or continued investment.
(2) High Variance in Crafting: Minimal
Player sets a target and either hits or doesn’t. Very binary; limited dopamine.
(3) Meaningful Choice: Strong
Lets players reroll specific affixes to fine-tune items.
(4) Exciting Drops: Indirect
Makes more items potentially viable, expanding what players care about when drops occur.
Summary: Strong in player agency (3), modest support for loot excitement (4), but limited in progression (1) and risk-reward (2).
E. Greater Affixes
(1) Long-term Progression: Strong
Acts as a high-end chase goal. Finding multiple Greater Affixes becomes central to progression in endgame tiers.
(2) High Variance in Crafting: Indirect
Hitting them during Masterworking or on a crafted item can trigger post-input excitement.
(3) Meaningful Choice: Indirect
The player want Masterworking to hit the Greater Affixes.
(4) Exciting Drops: Strong
Designed to spike anticipation and satisfaction when seen on items.
Summary: Strongest overall alignment across all four pillars. Drives excitement, progression, decision-making, and surprise.
Idea:
From this analysis, Tempering appears to be in the most trouble. Having the Design Requirements 2 and 3 actively fighting each other and not aligning well with 1 and 4.
My first attempt to design an alternative basically copied an existing system from another competing ARPG, which is not desirable. So I went in a different direction.
My goals are:
(I) Adding a temper to an item should never feel wasted (no weak Manuals, no wrong Affixes) to reduce tension between 2 and 3 and align more with 1.
(II) Over time I can increase the strength of my temper (to align with 1).
(III) Makes loot drops more exciting.
Instead of unlocking Tempers through manuals, the player improves their Blacksmith through finding Loot in the world.
Each piece of loot is related to a category with several affixes, like manuals are now.
When consumed it increase a single Affix in the Blacksmith.
When tempering an item, the player chooses the affix they want to apply to the item.
If the affix has been improved at the Blacksmith the Player can update their tempering. Updating the tempering to the new range, but keeping the same random roll.
Why does this improve the system:
(1) Long-term Progression:
Over time the player improves the ranges of the affixes, these increased ranges can be applied to the item.
(2) High Variance in Crafting:
The variance is mainly in which affix at the blacksmith is updated, players still get rewarded for RNG, but not punished for getting the wrong affix.
The variance of getting the right affix is removed, but is still present in rolling with the range of the affix.
(3) Meaningful Choice:
This was already strong in the original setting, but is no longer undermined.
(4) Exciting Drops:
Manuals currently are a necessity that only drop once, weaker version of Manuals have no long term value.
In the revised version their are repeated drops that give the chance of improving your affix, creating two moments of excitement (when dropped and consumed)
This system can work by just using Temper Manuals, that drop repeatedly, another way to implement the system would be to remove Aspects from Legendary Items and add Tempers to them, when salvaging Legendary Items you increase these Tempers at the Blacksmith. Removing Aspects from Legendary Items would also help with some other problems. An easy solution would be to have them as separate drops (e.g. from elites and bosses). Which could greatly help the impact of these drops by improving the user experience (communicating immediately that it is a power you want, or use and if it is an improvement) and increase the worth of loot in the early game, by not having to salvage everything to gain and improve the aspects that you want.