Items we wished were different:

[kmoustakas]

Ring of stability: remove everything else give it superior stability that can't be found on non-armor non-shield slots.

Gem of many facets: make it no minimum level because otherwise it's so underpowered. (the epic is fine!)

Broken music box: make it no minimum level. It would be balanced by the minimum level of the augments anyway.

[Munkenmo]

I wish handwraps were coded as weapons, even if it meant I had to equip two separately.

[cru121]

I wish named quarterstaves weren't the best blunt THF option available (with few rare exceptions, Moonhowl Axe, Shining Devastation, perhaps Drow Maul).

[TheLegendOfAra]

I wish Ethornlord was different.
And by different I mean I wish it existed.

Also, though it's not exactly lore appropriate, I wish Drow longbows were a thing, with big doubleshot bonus'.

[Qezuzu]

I wish the epic sands items weren't garbage with only a few exceptions.

[EllisDee37]

I wish heroic challenge weapons (both cannith and eveningstar) got the proper paragon 1.5[W] damage.

[viktorserak]

I wish heroic challenge weapons (both cannith and eveningstar) got the proper paragon 1.5[W] damage.

I wish Turbine would not create any more "useless and no matter how you look at it, totally inferior weapons to anything comparable"

Yes, http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Mizzen-Mast_Splinter I am looking at you.

I tried to convince devs (together with many others) that this weapon is pure junk. So they "upgraded" it. Into pure junk. I tried more convincing (together with many others) and..... yeah. Its not really about the weapon, it is about the way you approach design and feedback. When this thing came out, I stopped spending cash on DDO. Someone important somewhere obviously doesnt care about the game he or she runs. And this was pretty much my last coffin nail :-/

[janave]

Item design isnt very inspired lately, but this is all fine, i make sure i play characters that are strong even naked, such as shirady casters. Some characters depend greatly on gear, others are much much less.

Old epic items should not be inferior to lvl15 heroic gear, thats just a huge design erorr. Especially considering how much work is going into an s/s/s epic item vs an autogrant in reward list on casual item.

Dragon Touched T3 Rune that adds glaciation to the 3 piece raid set is listing 78 cold spell power, a single rune of the same name grants 84? This feels kinda broken considering the work involved to get LESSER effects? Almost all old raid gear is listing effects about +4-5 levels higher than found on randgen gear with MC.

The only real benefit of current itemization is that its much less stressful, on the other hand its a lot less interesting, to get vertical scaling stats to infinitum, and if that fails, you just add a few more effects to the items, as seen as in eNecro4.

Set items are almost globally bad, i mean very rarely worth it considering what you are locked into to have them on. Example:The Abishai set used to be extremely grindy and now its an utter pile of junk, same goes for ToD sets.

[Saekee]

I wish the EMG had keen on it since rogues all go IC Piercing
Also I wish all scroll shard seal items had augments (some do--I want all upgraded to have them) since they are a PITA to make anyway and not endgame anymore(just finished eClaw set, drop rates are nice now).

[Inoukchuk]

Ring of stability: remove everything else give it superior stability that can't be found on non-armor non-shield slots.

Gem of many facets: make it no minimum level because otherwise it's so underpowered. (the epic is fine!)

Broken music box: make it no minimum level. It would be balanced by the minimum level of the augments anyway.

I wish all prefix/suffixes were craftable using Cannith crafting.

I wish item augments were craftable with Cannith crafting also.

I wish all named gear was designed to be at least a hair better than what you can craft (e.g. more affixes than 2, and/or better crit profile, and/or lower ML compared to the + on the item, and only useful combinations).

I wish we saw more unique effects on high end named gear (e.g. torc) rather than just more powerful effects.

I wish Mithral armors were granted the benefits of armor 1 step lighter (i.e. counting towards armor proficiency, ASF, evasion) but counted as the base armor category for protection (i.e. PRR and MRR) as it should be.

[JOTMON]

I wish Augments didn't add to the level value of an item.

It used to be fun to try and find an item with an augment because it was better..
Now a random gen item with an augment slot (nothing slotted) is 1-2 levels higher because it has an augment slot making the item subpar for the level it represents..
which basically means now its vendor trash

The only place I found random gen items with augments to be useful is possibly maybe for Cannith crafting.. and the items get cleansed and built around the augment slot. then add masterful craftsmanship to drop the levels down.
Otherwise every random item I find with an augment slot becomes garbage. since the non augment slot version is better at the same level.

[LuKaSu]

I wish we saw more unique effects on high end named gear (e.g. torc) rather than just more powerful effects.

Me too! Unique effects are the kind of thing that really make you make difficult decisions. I remember back in the day, I wanted to wear the StoneSkin guard armor from the Attack on Stormreach chain for a lot longer than its stat bonuses (+4 CON, I think) would have allowed. Just because StoneSkin guard is a fun effect, even if it's not a statistic. Primarily using statistics make only one item be the best. Unique effects make you be the judge of which is better, depending on your playstyle.

Greater Earth Elemental Guard -- upon being hit, it summons a Greater Earth Elemental (un-summons the old one if you already have one out).

Entangle-upon-hit - Works like paralyzing, but with a reflex save (with saves greater than most paralyzing weapons).

Set items are almost globally bad, i mean very rarely worth it considering what you are locked into to have them on. Example:The Abishai set used to be extremely grindy and now its an utter pile of junk, same goes for ToD sets.

There really needs to be some set bonuses that are amazing, to really make the decision hard. Have a special weapon with decent damage, but nothing special other than that. Wear a ring with it and now it has Metalline and Aligned DR breaking (only works with this line of weapons). Wear a different ring and Cleaves from this weapon have a 50% greater range. Wear a different ring (note, several different rings, with stackable effects, so you have to only choose two total) and you gain a Greater Vampiric Effect (gain 1d6 hitpoints per hit -- stacks with the same ring if you have two of them). Wear yet another ring and you gain massive doublestrike.

[Inoukchuk]

I wish Augments didn't add to the level value of an item.

It used to be fun to try and find an item with an augment because it was better..
Now a random gen item with an augment slot (nothing slotted) is 1-2 levels higher because it has an augment slot making the item subpar for the level it represents..
which basically means now its vendor trash

The only place I found random gen items with augments to be useful is possibly maybe for Cannith crafting.. and the items get cleansed and built around the augment slot. then add masterful craftsmanship to drop the levels down.
Otherwise every random item I find with an augment slot becomes garbage. since the non augment slot version is better at the same level.

This ^ is exactly right also.

[bartharok]

I wish Augments didn't add to the level value of an item.

It used to be fun to try and find an item with an augment because it was better..
Now a random gen item with an augment slot (nothing slotted) is 1-2 levels higher because it has an augment slot making the item subpar for the level it represents..
which basically means now its vendor trash

The only place I found random gen items with augments to be useful is possibly maybe for Cannith crafting.. and the items get cleansed and built around the augment slot. then add masterful craftsmanship to drop the levels down.
Otherwise every random item I find with an augment slot becomes garbage. since the non augment slot version is better at the same level.

Comsidering that a random item can have only 2 effects, the augments are not sub-par. You can with luck add 2 more effects for no more increase in ML than what is caused by empty slots. And the augments you add can break the rules considering prefix/suffix. They wont be great, of course, but far from sub par.

[Gabrion]

Celestia.

I wish the damage type didn't get broken by any plus to enhancement. I wish the sunburst effect worked while in undead form. I wish it gave purple numbers any time you hit something vulnerable to light damage.

[axel15810]

I wish the devs wouldn't continue to make end game raid gear obsolete.

They did it with CiTW weapons.

They did it with Fall of Truth gear.

Now they're about to make Thunderforged weapons obsolete when Sentient weapons are implemented.


I wish the devs would rotate gear slots with every new raid instead of having every new raid powerlevel the last one. One raid could give the best weapons, one could give the best rings, one give the best belts/necklaces, ect. This is sort of what we had back when cap was 20 with ToD rings, abbot trinket, VoN 6 sword, ect. I want more than one or two raids worth running.

[Sianys]

I like a lot of what's been said already. To add to that: where's the options for Great Crossbows?! There's a grand total of four named, and only two drop from chests, the rest you have to craft. I've managed to get two random-generated ones that are pretty good, but c'mon: where's the love? If you build it into Rogue Mechanic, one would hope there'd be goodies to help support it.

[Steelstar]

Hey, everyone. Still out of the office for the holidays, but saw a few interesting ideas in this thread and thought I'd take a little time to chime in.

Overall: Item design in DDO is a relatively complicated task. When creating any item (and especially weapons or armor), there are a lot of different settings, effects, and properties that can be adjusted to make the item unique, and there are hundreds (possibly thousands) of named/unique items introduced over the last decade or so that the new item will inevitably be compared to. With each named item being hand-designed and hand-created, each one is (in one way or another) unique.

If you take the "Comparing Apples and Oranges" metaphor, it often feels a lot like "Comparing Apples, Oranges, 542 Other Kinds of Fruit and Possibly a few Vegetables". If it falls on the low side, it's regarded as "useless junk". If it falls on the high side, we're "invalidating the loot we worked so hard to get". Rarely are new items perceived to be right in the middle.

Not every named item is going to be spectacular for everyone, or even viable for everyone. Some may be a lot better for new players (who may not have farmed that one thing from that one old pack) than for vets. In the end, we always try to make new loot interesting, and useful to at least some builds at some levels, and a little different than what's out there for that item type at at that level.

To specific questions:

Broken music box: make it no minimum level. It would be balanced by the minimum level of the augments anyway.

The power of this item is in its versatility. Would it be overpowered if it had no minimum level? No, probably not. However, it was not our intent to create an item that you would want to equip every life from level 1 all the way to level 28, which would be the case for some if it had no ML. It also keeps design space for other augment-slotted trinkets open in the future.

I wish heroic challenge weapons (both cannith and eveningstar) got the proper paragon 1.5[W] damage.

I believe the Eveningstar ones are fixed either for U24 Patch 1 or U25; we'll take a look at the Cannith ones in the near future.

I wish Turbine would not create any more "useless and no matter how you look at it, totally inferior weapons to anything comparable"

Yes, http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Mizzen-Mast_Splinter I am looking at you.

I tried to convince devs (together with many others) that this weapon is pure junk. So they "upgraded" it. Into pure junk. I tried more convincing (together with many others) and..... yeah. Its not really about the weapon, it is about the way you approach design and feedback. When this thing came out, I stopped spending cash on DDO. Someone important somewhere obviously doesnt care about the game he or she runs. And this was pretty much my last coffin nail :-/

To an extent, that has a lot to do with the D&D 3.5 base stats of Greatclubs. I'd still wager it's the best non-Raid Greatclub you can get at level 24, however, and that's what was being aimed for there.

Admittedly, I'm a bit confused by your comment, though; the last feedback I can find from you about the Splinter called the last round of changes to it:

a step in the right direction! And I want to thank you for it.

We really do pay attention to the feedback on items, even if we can't always make certain changes. I'd be interested in hearing more about what changed your opinion on the Splinter between then and now.

Comsidering that a random item can have only 2 effects, the augments are not sub-par. You can with luck add 2 more effects for no more increase in ML than what is caused by empty slots. And the augments you add can break the rules considering prefix/suffix. They wont be great, of course, but far from sub par.

Exactly. Augment-slotted Random loot aren't necessarily going to be the strongest things out there, but their power lies in their versatility.

I wish the devs wouldn't continue to make end game raid gear obsolete.

They did it with CiTW weapons.

They did it with Fall of Truth gear.

Now they're about to make Thunderforged weapons obsolete when Sentient weapons are implemented.


I wish the devs would rotate gear slots with every new raid instead of having every new raid powerlevel the last one. One raid could give the best weapons, one could give the best rings, one give the best belts/necklaces, ect. This is sort of what we had back when cap was 20 with ToD rings, abbot trinket, VoN 6 sword, ect. I want more than one or two raids worth running.

The specific instances you mentioned usually came with a level cap increase.
CITW was a level 24 Raid at a time when the highest-level Raid was 20.
Fall of Truth came next and was level 25, but there wasn't a ton of overlap between it and CITW's items in terms of item slot.
The Thunderholme raids were the first level 30 Raids, with gear up to ML28.
Sentient Items, while still early in the design process, will be a part of the level 30 endgame.

So yes, as the level cap got higher, the loot generally got stronger; it would be odd if it didn't. We do try to spread out some of the types of loot we put in Raids (take Mark of Death, which had no weapons), but weapons do have a general appeal to some players that other item types don't.

I like a lot of what's been said already. To add to that: where's the options for Great Crossbows?! There's a grand total of four named, and only two drop from chests, the rest you have to craft. I've managed to get two random-generated ones that are pretty good, but c'mon: where's the love? If you build it into Rogue Mechanic, one would hope there'd be goodies to help support it.

This is another tough bit about item creation in DDO; we have a lot of weapon types, and often times lesser-used types don't go over well when proposed (see above Greatclub) unless their power is skewed relatively high. That said, we've been trying to get more of the lesser-used item types in lately, and I'll make a note about Great Crossbows.

Thanks everyone!

[Chauncey1]

I wish Turbine would not create any more "useless and no matter how you look at it, totally inferior weapons to anything comparable"

Yes, http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Mizzen-Mast_Splinter I am looking at you.

I tried to convince devs (together with many others) that this weapon is pure junk. So they "upgraded" it. Into pure junk. I tried more convincing (together with many others) and..... yeah. Its not really about the weapon, it is about the way you approach design and feedback. When this thing came out, I stopped spending cash on DDO. Someone important somewhere obviously doesnt care about the game he or she runs. And this was pretty much my last coffin nail :-/

That is a very fine weapon and I use it with great success in Thunderholme and E-Orchard.
Why do you think it's pure junk?

[Fedora1]

Hey, everyone. Still out of the office for the holidays, but saw a few interesting ideas in this thread and thought I'd take a little time to chime in.

Thanks for taking time out of your holiday to chime in.

Oh and we need more named rapiers and shortwords please! I really like my swashbuckler but feel silly using a dagger from L15-18 (Guardian of the Liturgy) so far but it seems to be the best available. The Envenomed Shortsword is close with it's paralyzing, but dps is less. Still I use it when soloing for a little CC, and use the dagger in groups, well, because dps.