How relevant are item levels above level 60 when it comes to finding great gear?

I tried searching but I have to say the search results were not relevant at all and looking though 6,330 pages is a bit too much.

Basically I'm trying to answer the following question:

If I'm in a level 60-63 map what kind of items will drop compared to items found in a 69 or higher map?

Are the 60-63 map item drops guaranteed to be way way worse than the 69+ items if both items rolled near the top of their range? Will you be finding effective end game items in the lower 60 maps?

The item level is very important when trying to get the highest mod rolls on an item.



Example:

Say you want the best "Physical Damage Reduction Rating +%" mod (prefix) on your gear - your ilevel 60-62 gear can only get the "Thickened" mod which caps at +16%, whereas an ilevel 70 armour (obtained in level 68+ maps) can get +19%.

Edit:



The level of zone you are doing also contributes to the best item drops, so for example, a Harbinger Bow (level 68) is not going to drop in a level 62 zone ever.

As you can see by my avatar I have yet to play the game. I'm used to item level systems from other games but I am specifically trying to see if "close enough to end game" items drop in the low 60s map.

In your example with 19% vs 16%. How much difference does that 3% really make or in a weapon's case, how much of a difference is 2-5 physical damage when you're dealing with a weap that might be a few tiers lower?

Example:
The difference between a 62 and 68 bow is only 1.7 dps. Is that really a big deal? It seems like almost nothing on paper, especially when I've seen streamers who have skills doing 4,000+ dps.

The real question I'm getting at is:

Is it a waste of time to farm anything but 68+ maps for items? Am I going to be stuck with this mentality that if I'm not farming 68+ maps everything other than currency items are going to be trash?

Chances are you're going to have to grind lower-level maps/areas to get the better maps (since map drops are largely RNG). And the lower-level items are not bad per sey, you can get really godly rolls on a lower-level item, but that item is never going to quite as good as the highest-tier ones.

As for how much those small difference make - they can be very important depending on the type of character you make. Some focus on attack speed, so they get the fast lower-level weapons rather than the heavier-hitting but slow high level ones.

An example (armours): the prefixes 'Scintillating' and 'Incandescent' both provide base Energy Shield (alternative to health). Now, the difference between the two best rolls of each is only 6 - but this 6 additional ES is then affected by all the other additive and multiplicative modifiers from the characters passive tree. So this 6 extra ES on one piece of gear might be worth an actual 30+ extra ES, so if you got that on all your armour, you're looking at perhaps 200+ extra effective life, which is a big deal, no?

Yeah, they wouldn't exist if they were not an improvement over a lesser version.

I just think a game is much more fun when you know that no matter what you're doing, it's a good use of your time to further progress your character.

Example:

If you grind a bunch of low level maps to get better maps and before hand you already know that every non-currency item that drops will be 100% garbage it will take most of the fun out of the game (at least for me).

As long as the stuff dropping in those early 60 maps can be amazingly good then I'm good to go and from the looks of it, it seems like it will be.

The question itself is rather flawed, because higher level items would inherently be better, no? The maximum tier of mods can go up to 69, and these mods are unattainable on 60-63.

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Crossflip wrote:

The question itself is rather flawed, because higher level items would inherently be better, no? The maximum tier of mods can go up to 69, and these mods are unattainable on 60-63.

It's either 70 or 71.

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Crossflip wrote:

The question itself is rather flawed, because higher level items would inherently be better, no? The maximum tier of mods can go up to 69, and these mods are unattainable on 60-63.

I don't think it's really flawed. In D2, you didn't need to get max level items for them to be useful and to be good place holders for real "end game" items. A lot of uniques in fact were very useful and obtainable at a pretty low level.

In D3, something like an i58 item (before they changed how drops work) would have been considered 100% garbage. It was so useless you would never even pick it up to ID.

I'm not sure how fun a game will be if 98/100 items that drop will be left on the floor.

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Crossflip wrote:

The question itself is rather flawed, because higher level items would inherently be better, no? The maximum tier of mods can go up to 69, and these mods are unattainable on 60-63.

Most common maces are colossus (ilvl 62) and karui (ilvl 57), bow thicket (56), rapier dragonbone (58), sword Corsair (58). The key is finding these weapons at ilvl 71 so you can have max rolls.

Item itself has the required lvls I listed but you can find a colossus mace on a 69 map and the item level will be 69-71 and will have access to those prefix/suffix rolls.

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Moosifer wrote:

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Crossflip wrote:

The question itself is rather flawed, because higher level items would inherently be better, no? The maximum tier of mods can go up to 69, and these mods are unattainable on 60-63.

Most common maces are colossus (ilvl 62) and karui (ilvl 57), bow thicket (56), rapier dragonbone (58), sword Corsair (58). The key is finding these weapons at ilvl 71 so you can have max rolls.

Item itself has the required lvls I listed but you can find a colossus mace on a 69 map and the item level will be 69-71 and will have access to those prefix/suffix rolls.

Only needed for one of the elemental damage mods. Fire or lightning I think.