Bricking super rare items should not happen, and is very bad for the longevity of this game. I will never find another 3 GA 2H Mace like i did last night. It had the 3 stats i actually wanted/needed and was bricked by this awful tempering system and now it will not help me progress. This is the worst feeling, having this happen, and i do not feel like continuing on playing when such a thing can happen to your character.
The tempering system needs to be changed to be more like enchanting. Let us roll until we get something close to what we want. Let it cost us, like enchanting does. Tempering is hitting the same roll again and again and again on multiple items, and it’s just too frustrating to continue on like this. I cannot get excited about item drops (which is the whole point of this game) when i know there is a chance it will (more than likely) be ruined by the tempering process.
Blizzard, please change the tempering system for the health of this game.
Signed,
A long time Diablo player who just can’t do it anymore.
6 Likes
I’m fortunate I haven’t bricked a 3GA, but I have bricked multiple 2GA’s this season (I need to touch some grass) so I somewhat feel your pain and came here to provide feedback as well. I was going to create a new post, but figure I will just jump in on yours as it hits some of the same feelings and issues I have. I’m sure nothing I’m saying is new or even insightful, but its one of the few systems in the game right now I’m not enjoying.
From what I remember from some of the Dev streams is they want that risk/reward feeling to come from this system, where when you land on what you want you get that “success” dopamine hit that you may not otherwise get if there is an infinite amount of chances to roll. And I get that concept/feeling. The issue for me now is that any time I get a good item post leveling, I feel a sense of dread going to the tempering menu with the expectation of the item becoming “bricked”, and when I do successful craft what I want I feel relief (not joy) which I do not believe is what they are going for.
The changes to Tempering this season have already been an improvement, as having some tempers having less options has made me ruin less items. Just having such optimal items get ruined has caused pain. As for my thoughts towards the future:
I feel a change that would make me feel the best (not necessarily the best for everyone) would be a system where the original tempering is unlimited, however all the rolls are minimum at this stage. To assist with game balance, they can add or change crafting costs associated and even adjust the low end of the ranges as necessary. In this tempering stage you could even make it where you are able to just select what specific temper you want on your item if balancing costs aren’t needed.
Once you land on the temper you want, you can then “lock it in”. At this point you can add the finite re-roll mechanic where the range of your temper can change. This adds the risk/reward feeling of re-rolling to try and get the best possible temper without feeling like the entire item and my luck with the drop has been wasted. I get the gambling high of landing a high roll on the temper, and if the roll ends up on the low end of something I really value I both get the want to seek another item while still being able to use it somewhat effectively.
Other options/mechanics I’ve seen mentioned that could also help with the issue:
- Ability to reset temper rolls. At this point, with the amount of gold that can be made from infernal horde runs at high tiers, I’d be more than fine dropping upwards of 100 million gold to reset the temper rolls for a 2+ GA item that I bricked. Might even attempt it for something I had a low temper roll on. Still not sure I’d get any dopamine hit from the tempering system with this though.
- Infinite tempers with increasing associated costs similar to enchanting. Definitely the most boring option, with no dopamine hit other than landing a near perfect stat roll on what you want. Basically D3’s re-roll system (which I didn’t hate).
- Adjusting masterworking costs and reroll costs to compensate for infinite tempering rolls. The systems feel combined, yet separate. If for overall game balance one would need to be adjusted for the other, I feel that could be fine. I actually like the Masterworking system, even though over two seasons and a lot of gold/mats I’ve yet to get a triple crit. So I hope they wouldn’t change this system too much if it were determined to be needed.
I think Blizzard needs to rethink a lot of philosophy on the game systems. Other ARPGs tend to function like a slot machine where pulling the lever is free. Eventually you’ll win something given enough time.
D4 seems to take the approach that things need a cost. The problem is the player feels like they’re actually losing something in the case of rendering hard to find items unusable for your build, or even just “wasting” boss materials and not getting the drops you need.
The gameplay of earning a bunch of stuff through time and work (or what can feel like work) just to “put it all on black” at the proverbial craps table isn’t something the majority of people actually find appealing. It’s is great for people with gambling addictions, but for those of us with adverse personalities - the mentality that we’ve “lost” something makes us want to quit to minimize the feeling of loss.
Nope, it’s a design mistake. The risk is spending countless hrs finding something useable only to worthless in 25 seconds.
Tempering needs to be a % roll rng or drop the system entirely and add it to the loot table with high occurrences for each suffix.
Agree 100% the Temper Bricking is awful ive had it happen to a 3 GA item and it made me outright quit the game for the season and i assume other players have done the same. regardless of what all the white knights are saying if a system makes players actively leave the game it should probably be changed.
At the very least make it like enchanting where you have multiple options or keep your current roll… not just replace entirely… terrible system
I’ll repost my idea here.
1- There shouldn’t be any RNG attributed to which affix you get, only for the strength of the roll. Tempering is a limited ressource, it’s a miserable feeling to throw away an item because it fails to give you an essential affix.
2- Have an option for preselected affix for each gear, have a button to automatically temper any equipped item (that hasn’t been tempered yet) with it’s preset affix. This will allow people to quickly switch gear while leveling so we don’t have to spend hours rolling instead of leveling. This feature will not effect already tempered items so you won’t wast rolls on them.
3- Also, if you want to manually reroll on an item, you shouldn’t have to reselect the manual over and over. Just let us choose the affix and reroll it’s range and have it only choose the highest roll, again, rolls have a set limit so just give people what they want. There’s already plenty of RNG involved in getting gear, greater affixes being the main one, and we play seasons, so there’s no reason to make it so difficult to get ideal gear within one season. We don’t need another hamster wheel in the form of “bricking” items because of bad tempering. It’s a very, and I mean very unpleasant feeling and 2 of my friends have already quit over it after coming back for this season.
1 Like
If nothing else, I totally agree the amount of “admin” work we need to do just to swap out an item is very tedious.