Unique items don't seem all that unique

I think the game should not allow drops of the same 'unique' per character... that will solve the problem of my stash filling up with wanderlusts...

I've always though of uniques as an item with that one or two specific attributes that you need for your build to make it work. I look at them as an end-game piece to maximize whatever skill you are building around.

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bluejays90 wrote:

Go see D3s uniques and then come back and talk about PoE's like that lol These uniques are a godsend in this game

Does everything have to be compared to D2 or D3? Can't this game stand on it's own merit?

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CharanJaydemyr wrote:

I sometimes wonder if this Diamond/Eternal scheme is going to backfire, and I think if all the designers thought like me it definitely would. Thankfully, this is not so -- plenty of Diamond/Eternals are very good at this game and can spot where a unique can fill a niche or, better yet, create one.

I don't think it will, because there are some people who design uniques with a flavor in mind, some who design a unique for a specific build in mind and some who wish to create a specific niche when creating the item. I think it has a healthy distribution of all kinds of people.

For example, when I get to design mine, I don't care about flavor text or a specific build at all, all I'm interested in is creating a completely new mechanic (or something like that?) which creates a niche of it's own.

I have such a weakness for uniques that you have to build a character around (or force specific gearing on you) or something similar!

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LazerTechnoBuddha wrote:

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Hrishi wrote:

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hopr wrote:

It just seems to me that they are really not much better and sometimes not even asd good as rare items...just thinking outloud

Uniques aren't supposed to be best-in-slot. They are, as it's name suggest, unique. Very few uniques are actually best-in-slot. Most uniques are very niche that people build characters around.

well they are not really unique, as all of them are the same, but they have unique abilities. i always loved that part about D1 and D2 - the paradox of calling an item unique, when they are the least unique (in the true meaning of the word) items in the game :)

other than that, this

Just about the only thing they did right with D3. That is, change the name of "unique" items to "legendary". Also, the gold piles with little ingots and necklaces was pretty cool.

Some of them are- those are the ones that are worth a ton of cash.


The problem is there are a bunch that either:

a). don't do anything remotely gamechanging

or

b). just suck




(b) is often caused by putting coold, interesting effects on weapons that are so low level that their low base weapon damage ensure they'll never actually be a permanent part of any build(AKA Pillar of the Caged God, Emphereal Edge, Ungil's Gauche).

Of course this particular flaw only really ruins uniques designed for physical attack builds- spellcasters can use low level items so long as they have a decent spell damage boost.

Other times (b) is caused by having otherwise useful effects occurring on chestpieces that give negligable defenses(armour/evasion/ES) but with effects that aren't worth this sacrifice long term- such as with Zahndethus' Cassock, Bramblejack, the Covenant(of course for now the bug makes it useful though), or Thousand Ribbons.




Also, in general it feels like for itemization weight they overvalued items that give keystones. The Covenant and Hyrri's ire are both awful(to be fair Ire is missing half the benefit of acrobatics in that it lacks the nodes behind acro).



In general I kind of wish that at some point GGG would take a little break from releasing new uniques to buff some of the unused old uniques- some of them have really cool concepts, but just lack any real usefulness compared to existing alternatives.

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hopr wrote:

that could be. I'm only in the low 40's ATM

Stopped reading the thread here.

I was thinking this from the start, but I had assumed someone had put more than 5-10 hours into the game before trying to critique the 100+ uniques.

Low level uniques are usually meant for "twinking" a character, or making it overpowered at early levels. Some of them are out-right impossible to beat with yellows like Shiverstring, Sadima's Touch, Wanderlust, Thousand Ribbons, Karui Ward, Pendulas Blazon, etc. Others are low level but used from level x-100 like Andvarius ring, Wanderlust/perandus again, etc.

Not all uniques are meant to be good, some are meant to be subpar or average, some are meant to be build enabling, some are meant to be massively overpowered with some strong drawback (go check out The Bringer of Rain) and some are just flat out overpowered (go check out Thunderfists.)

There are also some items a lot of people don't see as useful at first, only to find out how insane they are later (Kaom's Heart comes to mind.) Similar to the first time someone sees some of the board passives like "summon +1 totem, you can't do damage yourself" or "your life becomes 1, immune to chaos damage."

Give it some time before you start critiquing it too harshly, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised as time goes on.

Better than rares is not what a unique is supposed to be. I've been beating this dead horse in every one of these threads but it irks me.
A unique item is merely that, a unique item. It has a mini-backstory with it, it contains mods that cannot typically appear on rares of that same item type. It sometimes has special mechanics and it also has unique artwork. That is it. That is all a unique item is. It doesn't have to be better than rares, it doesn't have to be best in slot. It just has to be unique.
If Diamond supporters want to make absolutely piss poor uniques that suit what THEY envisioned, they can do so. If the devs want to do the same, they can. A unique is only meant to be unique, not godly.
Learn to accept this.

I don't think Uniques should be "better then rares". Rares should in general be better workhorses- when it comes down to just getting a lot of total stats, getting high defenses(EV/ARM/ES), or getting a stat that is naturally occuring in slot, Rares should be bar-none the best.


By contrast I think uniques should *usually* serve a very specific purpose- they should either be gamechanging in some way, or serve some very specific purpose that is not really available elsewhere in gear(such as the extra endurance charges from Kaom's sign rings). They shouldn't be btter per-se then rares, but for the right build, their uniqu mechanism should be strong enough to be worth sacrifcing the raw volume of stats a rare would bring.

A number of uniques hold to this ideal- perfect examples would be Voll's Protector, Kaom's Sign, Springleaf Shield, Cloak of Flames, or Maligaro's Virtuosity.


I'm not saying every unique should be a Shavvrone's/Kaom's Heart- merely that all uniques should have some mechanism in them unique and powerful enough to hold a long term slot in just the right build.

Another problem when you refer to lower powered uniques. Many of them were created and added to the game a long time ago, before certain systems came about, before changes to mechanics came, and before players knew some of the things they were capable of.
Due to this, eventually some uniques are naturally going to lose the purpose they once had.