New Item Rarity -- Divine

Might be interesting.
But MUST have a drawback with each mod.
Also it would somewhat contest the role of uniques in the game. They are weaker than rares, but can have those fancy special mods.
If there would be a rare with the fancy mods, what would be the purpose of uniques?

I have one suggestion as per the topic.

Since divine orbs already exist:


Calling the new rarity: Exotic (or something similar) might be less confusing.

"

Josephoenix wrote:

I have one suggestion as per the topic.

Since divine orbs already exist:

Calling the new rarity: Exotic (or something similar) might be less confusing.

If you're gonna call it Exotic, why not Ascended, instead? :P

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Here's how I'd go about adding a new "Tier" of gear:
- Items can be Blessed/Cursed
- Blessed/Cursed is obtained through effort, not lucky drops.
- High level Maps have a chance to present a Shrine associated with a random entity of Wraeclast lore, both good (blessed) and bad (cursed).
- There might be a blessed and cursed shrine for each entity.
- Higher difficulty maps (more/harder mods) bring higher chance to present such a Shrine.
- The Shrine can only be interacted with once the whole map is complete.
- Whether a Shrine Blesses or Curses depends on its appearance.
- Each entity would have an appearance for their shrines - one for curse, and one for bless.
Perhaps the difference between Bless/Curse would be color/texture/vfx.
- Each player in the Party is allowed to Bless/Curse a single Item
- Blessed Items have bonuses
- Cursed Items have stronger bonuses, but also a strong penalty. A REAL penalty.
Item Curse example:
High amount of Life Leech % bonus, but also causes high physical degeneration equal to X% maxHP/sec.
Kill stuff, or the item will kill you.
- Blessings and Curses might vary with item slot, so a single deity could have different blessings and curses for weapon, shield, chest, boot, glove, head, amulet, ring and belt.
Maybe even Flasks.
- To prevent cheesy gameplay, unequipping a Cursed item causes you to keep its penalty on you for 15 minutes - just the penalty, not the bonus.
- Cursed Item penalties don't affect you while in Town, but once you leave Town the penalty affects you again, if you have the item equipped or unequipped less than 15 minutes ago.
- To make sure this system rewards skill/dedication, rather than merely luck or wealth, blessing/cursing an items would either...
a) make it Accountbound
OR
b) lose the blessed/cursed bonuses when traded

Cursed items don't belong in dungeon crawlers. When it can be next to impossible to find/make a good piece of gear, adding in some that are detrimental is beyond aggravating.

Even time-based and kill-based suppressants are going to fail very often, due to back-tracking, difficult fights, and areas that just didn't spawn a lot of monsters. Inventory management alone could make this a problem. Players would be literally punished for taking the time to do it.

If you question the players of any game that had items that gave a bonus and a penalty at the same time if they ever used any of those items, most will say no. Why use an item that cancels itself out to be average, when plenty of good or better items already exist?

No curses, please.

You're not being the slightest bit reasonable.

I never said you'd be cursed by surprise or against your will.
I never said you'd get cursed items as Drops.

My suggestion is giving players the ability to KNOWINGLY curse or bless an item.
If they choose to curse it, it is because they want it to be cursed - because they want the bonus bad enough that they're willing to endure the penalty.

And they don't curse equipped items either.
They curse an item and THEN decide if/when they want to equip it.

That situation you speak of only exists in your head...

Cursed items would be the ultimate example of Risk vs Reward, as far as items go.

"

Nurvus wrote:

You're not being the slightest bit reasonable.

I never said you'd be cursed by surprise or against your will.
I never said you'd get cursed items as Drops.

I never said you did.

"

Nurvus wrote:

My suggestion is giving players the ability to KNOWINGLY curse or bless an item.
If they choose to curse it, it is because they want it to be cursed - because they want the bonus bad enough that they're willing to endure the penalty.

And they don't curse equipped items either.
They curse an item and THEN decide if/when they want to equip it.

That situation you speak of only exists in your head...

Cursed items would be the ultimate example of Risk vs Reward, as far as items go.

No, the problem exists concretely in the real world and not just in my head; my 25-ish years (I'm 33 now) of playing role-playing games and having friends and assorted networks of other role-playing gamers has given me plenty of knowledge to work with.
The vast majority of gamers, when given an option like this, elect not to equip it, making its inclusion a waste of time to implement.

If you want to make a great item, make a great item. There's no reason to try and "balance it" with something terrible.
When a game does that, the smart player either ignores the item, or (if possible) counteracts its detrimental effect with a different item. Now the player is wasting an effect to cancel out the penalty, and the item isn't looking so great anymore when averaged against this.

The only way anyone is going to use an item like this is if the curse effect is so small it's negligible, or the bonus is so large that the item is instantly OP, and in either case, you've basically made an OP item that everyone would be stupid NOT to use, thus removing choice.

You seem to have gotten the wrong idea.

I want the Cursed Items to be as good as the Blessed items.
That's why I suggest them to have a BETTER bonus, but to compensate, they'll also have a MEANINGFUL penalty.
This penalty must be meaningful, but not too strong, enough that the Cursed Items are just as good as the Blessed items.
Not better, not worse. Equivalent.

If this is done properly - if the penalty balances out the bonus properly so that it's as good as a Blessed item - then players will use it.

Your hypothesis is based on a hyperbolic scenario where either the curse is too strong that no one will use it, or the bonus is too powerful that everyone will use it.

Lastly, I agree with you that the problem is in RL - the developers - because in most games, developers make stupid decisions.
And I'm here because I have faith that PoE developers have a different mindset.

"

Nurvus wrote:

Your hypothesis is based on a hyperbolic scenario where either the curse is too strong that no one will use it, or the bonus is too powerful that everyone will use it.

They kind of have to be. There is no reason to accept a detriment unless it is very small or the benefit is very large. Your example about taking DOT when not fighting (and yes, I'm sure that's not your only idea) is a particularly bad one, because it removes the ability of the player to have downtime in a game that needs downtime (back-tracking, inventory management before going to town, etc.)

"

Nurvus wrote:

Lastly, I agree with you that the problem is in RL - the developers - because in most games, developers make stupid decisions.
And I'm here because I have faith that PoE developers have a different mindset.

I have to agree with you here. It COULD be done well. But I've never seen it done well and I'm not holding my breath.

Well, let's put it in a different way:
If there is a monster within X radius, you will suffer said degeneration.

This way backtracking isn't affected.
It was just an idea.

The purpose was the flavor: The item is hungry for killing/blood.

Properly designed items with a good amount of flavor are often alot more sought after than bland numerical boosts.

+1 Sounds very cool