TLDR; reducing item level requirements would promote build diversity, encourage level 100 play, and alleviate “storage tension.” this would be most impactful to have reworked/reduced for uniques at the very least in s1.
The current system for item drops always matching player level has major issues:
- players are to shoehorned into storing 2-3 copies of relevant uniques. 1 lowest level possible for build defining uniques. Another 1-2 for progression into harder content.
- there isn’t enough storage to maintain copies of uniques at the desired power levels. This effectively contributes to the build diversity issues if you want to hold on to uniques for use in future builds.
- players are punished for receiving uniques at higher levels as alts effectively shouldn’t plan to use these due to respec friction and player retention decrease as level increases
- An unintended side effect of the recent xp buffs is that players now effectively have fewer chances at getting desired drops at appropriate levels (appreciate the xp buffs please don’t nerf). This is especially true when pushing harder content and considering elite density.
- Players have to level a new character just to attempt to get a desired drop at an appropriate level. One can in fact reach level 100 without ever seeing tempest roar, black river, ring of mendeln, etc.
- Players who boost are at an advantage as they effectively have more chances at receiving desired uniques at an appropriate level for getting builds running.
At a bare minimum the level requirements for uniques should be reworked to not match player level. This would actually provide level 100 chars a reason to continue playing knowing alts could use the items at a meaningful level. Ideally early enough to identify the viability of the build and progressively adjust rather than before before content gets too punishing for experimental changes and not wearing best in slot gear
possible solutions:
- always roll uniques as 625+ item power and have a static level requirement of 45
- remove unique level requirement entirely and have item power scale with equipped char level. ie 50 item power at level 1, 820 item power at level 85