I really wish we could zero in on what necks are supposed to be used for instead of having virtually every possible affix in the game. I would like to see necks have a more well-defined roll and reduce the Affix Pool.
Right now they have 23 different roles on Barb.
I would get rid of the following:
- % Primary Stat (which zero builds take)
- Max Life
- Life per second
- Life on hit
- % DMG
- Total Armor
- All forms of Resistance Affixes on Neck (obviously leave the implicit)
This makes the item slot more focused in on
- Offensive Stats that Matter
- Resource Management and CDR
- Still has movement speed for build swapping into a speed settup.
- Still has the Passive lottery.
Then balance out the weights a little bit, to make getting a decent neck more achievable.
I run a spread sheet to calculate how “complete” my build is based off of what ever guide I am running. I have a total of 13 Days played this season. On all of my characters, here is how GG my necks are.
Method: I grant 20% potential for each neck affix (5 Affixes = 100%) With GAs, and a perfect temper roll being 20%, high roles being 15%, mid rolls being 10%, bad rolls being 5%, and missing the affix I want being worth 0%.
After 7 days played, here are my necks:
SC Necro (3d played): 35% of Potential affix Power
SC Druid (1d played): 65% of Potential Affix Power
HC Barb (3d played): 65% of Potential Affix Power
Perhaps you are happy with how necks work, and maybe we are just not supposed to ever get the neck we want, but this is sort of the same problem I have with Last Epoch, where you have to farm 30 days just to get the thing you want. No other gear slot has quite the same problem, and this was the whole point of the of the Itemization Rework. If getting a good neck feels unachievable, then, for me… I just lose interest in farming for it at a certain point.
UPDATE 1: I guess a TLDR, is my best neck could be 45% better, but I will likely not see an upgrade for over a day played even if I spam farmed for it.
Thanks for your consideration.