I guess I am not writing anything new here and it will probably fall on deaf ears anyway. But here are 3 problems I see that urgently need fixing when it comes to (unique) items. Click to expand:
1. Lack of unique items and new additions
The amount of unique items in Diablo 4 is too low. Most classes getting 2 new ones over the course of 6 months / 2 seasons is ridiculous for a loot-based game. To keep up motivation to grind and for skill balancing reasons, it is necessary to up the unique item number to 3 or 4 per season. Take notes from Season 5.
Items are the most essential element to boost content and build variety in ARPGs. This is exactly what the community has been asking for since Season 1. Because the point where you have seen almost everything in Diablo 4 is reached quickly which leads me to my next point:
2. Target farming is overused
Having item target farming for everything is idiotic because it puts players on a straight path with limited surprises. It is efficiency served on a silver platter, predictable, repetitive and boring. You know what items to expect from these pinatas in advance, or shortly after, and soon from the game as a whole. And you know the requirements or activities to access them efficiently. This is the straight path I am talking about. Players dont need to go anywhere else.
Ultimately, without regular unexpected moments of pure random luck from time to time, players will burn out faster. Greater affixes cannot compensate for this lack of impulse, as they are just higher numbers of stuff you already know of.
Here is an idea for unique items: 1/3 for boss loot pinatas, 2/3 for gambling, 3/3 random. I highly suggest to make mythic items random only or scrap them from the game. But before considering all of that, fix point 1.
3. Slow item updates and balancing
Since Unique items are so important, they need to be balanced, quality checked and updated more frequently. If builds and items are not competitive then players wont acknowledge them as content, but as an example of wasted development time.
This, in particular, has not worked since launch and I suspect it never will. So I cant give a solution for that. Because changing stuff is one thing, but recognising a design as problematic is the first step.
The team in charge have shown time and time again their heavy reliance on life server data to fix their seemingly random hit & miss balance. Some fixes take multiple seasons of adjusting numbers in one direction, cementing an impression, that the D4 team has no way of playtesting their own game.
I feel like the devs neglect this, arguably most fun to develop, area of the genre. So in the coming days, I will post in detail about how I would rework existing unique items (affixes and aspect power) for my liking and highlight issues if necessary. Unique upgrades in Season 5 turned out well, but there are many things to improve still.