Design Philosophy of Affixes

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Novalisk wrote:

I'm not suggesting higher-tier affixes. I'm suggesting alternative ones that apply to less builds but are more powerful as a trade-off.

I must have misunderstood the OP. I've been suggesting non-specialized affixes that are competitive with existing affixes while being difficult to compare. The idea being to force players to make apples-to-oranges evaluations when replacing gear, as opposed to looking for the same properties but bigger numbers.

Then again maybe that's semantics. I rather liked some of the OP suggestions and thought they had broad value.

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Veta321 wrote:

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Novalisk wrote:

I'm not suggesting higher-tier affixes. I'm suggesting alternative ones that apply to less builds but are more powerful as a trade-off.

I must have misunderstood the OP. I've been suggesting non-specialized affixes that are competitive with existing affixes while being difficult to compare. The idea being to force players to make apples-to-oranges evaluations when replacing gear, as opposed to looking for the same properties but bigger numbers.

Then again maybe that's semantics. I rather liked some of the OP suggestions and thought they had broad value.

It is semantics.

Build, Playstyle, Specialization, those can often mean the same thing in PoE.

Bump

Replaying the game self found has been good. Affixes do leave something to desire however. Some incentive to switch main skills during the game would definitely improve itemization. As it is, it's hard not to stick with Spectral Throw or Lightning Arrow for the entirety of the game. That's a shame because encouraging skill and playstyle switches makes for a much more dynamic experience.

Playing through the game again, I'm reminded of all the bad affixes that really do stick out like a sore thumb.

I'm just gonna list them here:

1. Thorns
2. Light Radius
3. Reduced Attribute requirement
4. Stun Recovery
5. Life gain on Kill
6. Mana gain on Kill

All of the above should either be removed in favor of playstyle-oriented affixes, or changed drastically in order to become one.

Some ideas for improving the above-mentioned affixes:



Thorns

Changed to "Reflect % of attack damage back at enemy"


Life Gain on Kill

Changed to "Max Life gain on Kill".

Meaning, that after you kill an enemy, you gain 10 max life for 10 seconds.


Reduced Attribute Requirement

Affects slotted gems as well, like Atziri's Foible.


Stun Recovery

Changed to Status Recovery (meaning it affects freeze and shock as well)


Mana Gain on Kill

Changed to "Increased Mana Regen on Kill".

Meaning, that after you kill an enemy, you get 100% increased mana regeneration for 10 seconds.


Light Radius

Spread some "increased damage to mobs in your light radius" around the skill tree.

It would be great if those things were used. If one had to compare between apples and oranges not which item has more life and resists, it would add a layer of depth and expand character customization even more. Non-Unique equipment would become interesting.
I do also agree with need of buffing those mods

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Novalisk wrote:

1. Thorns
2. Light Radius
3. Reduced Attribute requirement
4. Stun Recovery
5. Life gain on Kill
6. Mana gain on Kill

Thorns are useless but they could be a basis for a quite interesting builds. Light radius need either be combined with other mod or get proposed "increased damage to mobs in your light radius". Gain on kill could be switched to regen(or regen boost) on kill, creating alternative to leech. Reduced attribute requirements are useless as long as item requirements stay the same.

We also need less "generic" rare affixes, such as IAS and Crit Chance, and replace them with more "good for playstyle" affixes:

1. More attack speed before taking damage (3s cooldown).

2. More crit chance when standing for over 3 seconds.

3. More crit chance against frozen/burning/shocked/stunned targets.


And some more alternatives to generic armour/evasion stuff that help address their weakness:

1. More evasion for each nearby enemy

2. More armour after taking a critical hit

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1. Thorns
2. Light Radius
3. Reduced Attribute requirement
4. Stun Recovery
5. Life gain on Kill
6. Mana gain on Kill

The alternatives you gave for these were spot on. GGG needs to steal them immediately.

Thanks Veta!

D2 had some great mods I almost forgot.

Source

Set items and breakpoints were another facet of itemization which made for interesting choices. A side by side comparison might be obvious but add another item slot or set bonus and things became harder to judge.

Powerful magic-only affixes, like +life and mana per level or +3 skills, are also sorely missed. They gave you a good reason to pick up blues. Perhaps magic items could receive a magic-only buff of 50% increased properties. So then +2 Levels to Gems would become +3 Levels and +60 Life would become +90 Life. If there's a problem with regal orbs, then regaling could reduce a property back to its non-magic exclusive form. Admittedly that may confuse some players.

Runes and gems had pretty diverse properties as well, which touches on the subject of crafting. Diablo 2 allowed a great deal of control over basic item properties compared to POE. Notably through, horadric cube crafts, horadric cube recipes, runewords, and jewels, which themselves could be crafted.