Tempering is bad

PC General Discussion
103

Getting 3 good affixes being an easy feat is somewhat irrelevant; what matters is the relative difficulty vs. drop rate. Again; getting 3GA BiS stats and then bricking an item is part of the overall mathematical landscape that has landed drop rates where they are today; the intrinsic chance to fail at the tempering rolls puts the system at where Blizzard wants it to be, overall.

You shouldn’t expect to get a 3 GA BiS drop with good tempered rolls, and that’s ok. You also don’t need to get them. If you do get one, that’s great. Again; if it were the case that you get a 3GA BiS drop and then can temper it endlessly, it would necessitate much less loot dropping in the first place or many more garbage affixes in the pool to offset the change so that the current rate of gearing isn’t significantly changed as a result. It’s an ecosystem of balance; changing one thing drastically changes everything else. If you couldn’t “brick” a perfectly rolled item through tempering, perfectly rolled items would necessarily be MUCH rarer than they are right now, however rare that is.

104

Gambling should be within rational limits, getting 3GA affixes you need is 100 times more rare than getting uber unique item. In case of uber, as soon as you drop it you are done. But with 3GA drop there are again many layers of gambling on top of it.

I dont say we need to get rid of gambling, just make it within rational limits. Think you should agree with me

105

Getting a piece with BiS GAx3 stats being extremely hard to get is not at all irrelevant, it’s part of why I think Tempering is a bad system, as I said before, it’s so hard to get a BiS 3GA piece that most of us will never see it drop in a season, and that’s just one piece, so when it is already so extremely rare, and you do manage to luck out and actually get something like that to drop, why would there still be a silly system on top of that with a chance to make the piece useless?
if they weren’t so rare then it’s whatever, you’ll get more tries, but the fact that they are that rare means you most likely will not get another chance, you probably wont even get get to attempt it in the first place, unless ofc you RMT.

My idea would be to have infinite tries, but lower the quality of the stat by reducing the cap for each roll, and the first roll will always have the highest stat roll chance, so you have a bit more to think about and choices to make, and if you need 10 rolls to get the stat you want then you will have a low rolled stat, which wont be great but at least that extremely rare piece wont be useless,
I just don’t like the fact that we can make a gear piece useless after obtaining it, it’s bad game design in my opinion, and with all the RNG already in the game, being able to brick an item is unnecessary, uninteresting, unfun, and frustrating, I don’t know why anyone would actually want something like that in the game by choice, but these are just my thoughts ofc.

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106

Remove 3GA items. Boom, a lot less RNG.

107

this is what a bad poor idea is called, losing and bricking items its fine.

108

As has been said multiple times, you simply do not need them for anything, nor do you “hold” a resource in order to use on one when you get it, so there is no problem or downside in them purely existing as chase items.

Chase items being super rare, not necessary at all but desirable, and not stopping you from upgrading other items hoping to get one, is just about the best version the model you an get. The only downside is in player perception, which is on display in threads like this. Stop holding out for the perfect item, and stop assuming you’ve got it when a 3ga item drops; you’re only most of the way there. It might still brick, and that is ok.

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109

No you do not need it, I never said you did, I said so already, but it will always be a goal for a lot of ppl when they reach endgame, something to work towards.

And if you’re okay with how the system works then that’s fine, I am not, after bricking multiple pieces by rolling the exact same affix on it 5 times in a row, getting something for a skill I don’t even have on my bars I started to get annoyed and felt that the tempering system is bad as it is now, I don’t understand why you need a system in your game that can destroy your item when trying to upgrade it, that’s basically what it is, it’s pretty much how upgrading works in BDO and it has never been a good system, I feel those kind of systems are seen in bs P2W games only, it has definitely not been in previous seasons in Diablo, so for me it is not okay, it’s a bad system, flawed, uninteresting, and just makes you not want to not play anymore when the RNG gamble gods are not on your side, which is what I haven’t done these last days.

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110

I agree. In BDO, failing on an upgrade attempt doesn’t result in bricking your gear (except for jewelry). The upgrade system in BDO was much, much more punishing and P2W years ago. Since then, the devs have improved upgrading gear to be less punishing because too many players were quitting after experiencing how impossible the RNG felt to upgrade to PEN or even TET sometimes.

111

But you cant beat the feeling if you finally have luck while tempering. The season is only a few days old. Brick items, search new ones, this is what Diablo is about. Item hunt. Luck. Bad Luck. If you dont have some sour times the happy times wont be a special thing anymore. It gets boring.

112

I made a similar post requesting the ability to refresh tempers for like 1 million gold (non-increasing).

It’s unnecessary and unacceptable to have a system that allows for bricked items. It also makes the idea of changing your build (even slightly) more frustrating. Enchanting already consumes your soul when you reach the 3.5 million gold cap, but continue enchanting 30 times and still can’t get critical hit chance to roll on your ring or neck. I’ve easily spent 200 million gold on just two greater legendary items and I still haven’t gotten the bonuses I want for either.

113

So you want all reward but no risk

Got it.

114

Has nothing to do with risk, has everything to do with a terrible system.

It’s not like enchanting where the cost will be mats and time to fix a bad stat, tempering if it gives you garbage affixes cannot be fixed. There’s too many variables to even get what you want, it’s a bigger risk than just enchanting.

It’s not fun, it’s not interesting.

115

Too many variables? The highest amount are 5 variables if i recall.
Most of the times i get my tempering affixes. If not i search for the next item i can try my luck with.

Todays Generation: I want it all i want it now.

116

Gambling and RNG aren’t the same.

Gambling is always RNG, but RNG isn’t always gambling.

You don’t risk anything to get items to drop. The time it takes to get drops isn’t a risk, it’s expected based on whatever you’re doing that produces drops.

You risk items when you attempt to temper them (bricking). You risk gold to get better bonuses when you may not get what you want and blow 200 million gold on a single item because 3.5 million cap isn’t low enough and the RNG of getting the bonus you want isn’t high enough.

Not getting the drops I want doesn’t frustrate me.

Getting the drops I want and bricking them… or failing to enchant the bonus I want after blowing 200 million gold on a greater legendary… that frustrates me a great deal…

117

Exactly why its a failed system. on non GA items, its 3/5. 3GA items are extremely rare hence GA items should be different. The current situation with 3GA items is sell it is way more beneficial than crafting it since you are risking bricking it.

In an item loot hunt game, players chases perfect items. I got lucky with a 3GA weapon with 2 correct tempering. 1 been maxed, the 2nd been 90/100%, I have 3x tempering chances left yet left it since its risking bricking it. Hence Tempering need to rework from its current iteration. Its a copy cat from Last Epoch, you do not have this severe bricking risk in LE.

Few different ways to rework:

A - remove tempering durability, add escalating mats cost as well as gold for limiting factor, essentially enchanting 2.0 and not ideal

B - Keep current 5/5 with no free tempering durability, add wider range of stat aka 10 - 50% size or 100-500% xx damage. Allow individual affix to be selected per recipe oppose to current uneven 1/3 vs 1/7 chances from each recipe. Tempering now exclusive to GA items.

C - Keep existing system but allowing tempering durability reset costing expensive materials such as stygian stones or resplendent sparks.

D - Keep existing system but reduce recipe affix to 4 or 5 from 5-7 affix recipes and boost 3 affix recipe to 4 or 5 affix recipes. If bricking 3GA items is the intention then all class and builds should be even.

The system should allow players to chase for perfect rolls, not fear of bricking at potential perfect roll item drops.

118

Those ideas are all awful.

A: As you state yourself; essentially enchanting 2.0. Results in there still being a functional cap on rerolls, as well as feeding into always being short on materials for any other items that drop too.

B: Not everything has to be equal; it’s ok that different items or paradigms have different chances. Individual affix selection is a ludicrously stupid idea; it functionally makes every item with 3 good stats a near perfect item. Tempering exclusive to GA items massively nerfs everything before WT4, most characters would lose 100s of % of damage before getting GA items. It is no longer worth it to pick up ANY item in WT4 that isn’t GA, regardless of item level of level of gear progress.

C: Better than option A but still unnecessary; as previously stated, any and all options increasing the number of items necessarily decrease the amount of good items dropping in the first place (either by less loot or more garbage).

D: No they shouldn’t? Classes don’t need to be even in terms of gearing up on every piece of gear and build. It’s ok for variance and variation to exist. Arbitrarily capping the number of affixes on a given set, or increasing in another, cedes build diversity for the sake of arbitrary “equality”.

The system does allow players to chase for perfect rolls, in which bricking is a part of the process. To get a perfect item with perfect rolls, you should expect to need to get multiple base items on which to craft before you get what you want.

The current setup is a good mix of approachability and chase, where it is extremely easy to get entry level, good, and even pretty good gear, and gets exponentially harder to get excellent or perfect gear with multiple greater affixes and perfect rolls. This is fine.

I decried a lot of things about D4 but the loot and temper system in this patch is a great step forward, and has landed in a surprisingly good place from a balance perspective (in terms of loot progression rate, not balance between different builds or paradigms). There is room for tempering to change, of course, but every part of that change interacts with the relative gearing progression rate, and where Blizzard wants it to be. If tempering changing will lead to going backwards in terms of the gear dropping on the ground being worse, I don’t want it. And that is the logical outcome of any means of making tempering easier to “complete” successfully.

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119

The only system change that makes sense is a flat 1 million gold (non-increasing) cost to refresh 5 temper durability.

That removes the potential to brick a triple greater item and make you want to scream or punch your monitor.

We already have a stupid enchanting system that increasingly gets more expensive. Enchanting should be fixed at a flat 100,000-500,000 gold and increase the options from two to three while still keeping the option to remain the same.

It may not seem that bad on paper, but when you roll 30 times at 3.5 million gold a pop on a couple greater legendaries because you’re chasing perfect items (and don’t even get the bonuses you want)… you blow in excess of 200 million gold pretty fast. It doesn’t seem to matter how many times you roll an item, what you want could always end up being 30+ rolls further away.

Ultimately, my proposed change wouldn’t affect the game other than to remove some frustrations in a vast majority of the player base. I know I don’t find farming gold to be fun. It’s tedious and repetitive when you should be doing something else with greater chance of getting upgrades.

If you didn’t have to waste so much gold on enchanting, you’d be able to spend more time killing stuff, which is the meat and potatoes of ARPGs. It also makes you waste time trying to improve the stuff you already have (which is likely not fully optimized) rather than focusing on getting more loot which might be more optimized.

Target gold farming is never fun because it’s frustrating when you’re only after one thing and it just takes forever to get enough and you’ll never stop having to deviate from your desired course to go farm gold to fuel enchanting reroll RNG optimization.

Your other suggestions are worse than just leaving the current system broken as they will just tempt people to make expensive risks and be more frustrated.

You’re right in that in a loot hunt game, people chase perfect items. I never expect perfect, but I attempt to get the best possible. Perfection in this game… is like a dozen things to perfect with 1 billion to 1 odds each. It’s never going to happen.

120

Much greater room to change to promote a fair and engaging gameplay. I have personally bricked 11 tabs worth of gears. Not everyone plays as much as I do and there are 3rd party $$$ markets. Last thing we want is to promote $$$ market.

121

I don’t think tempering is bad I think that the hook just isn’t as good as it could be atm. The system will likely get more love in the future to tune it and improve upon it. This is just one system the game will have to improve your character anyway.

What will be wild and crazy to see is how future seasons and expansions interact with it.

122

This is simply nonsense. To claim you have “bricked 11 tabs worth of gear” is asinine. You need to define what you are actually rolling on, what you are rolling for, and what you define as bricked.

Breaking the system for the sake of trading is beyond stupid; the fix to “promoting %%% trading” is to ban people doing it or to restrict trading again.