Peeked at what's on the CoB vendor, and hoping it's just leftover stuff from last years CoB designs. If not.. well... I have some questions. 1. What's the deal with the new EE's? You spent a lot of time reitemizing the pre-50 game with rare items that deliver nice, desireable, strong EE's. EE's good enough that even people 55+ riding stat caps are currently trying to camp a few of these items to round out the TERRIBLE pre-f2p itemization issues that exists in some gear slots (mainly accessories such as jewelry) I assumed that ranked EE implementation would be part of gear progression, preferably starting with CoB (or going back and fixing Vi'Rak's absurd itemization so we have 2 55+ dungeons, not just 1.) These new items seem to have reinvigorated some of the players, and made people look forward to what type of items and EE's you'd put out in CoB. Whoever did the pre-50 rare EE item implementation in IoM, Xenn, etc you did a good job. I think you should be recognized. There's some nice interesting stuff there, and you put a little twinkle in my eye that one day interesting itemization will make it to VG's 55+ dungeons and raid bosses... But now I take a loot at the CoB itemization vendor, and it's as if you activated your "phone-a-friend" lifeline to call some dev from 2009 to itemize CoB. I see a vomit-inducing helping of ratings people are already capped on (quite a few items have well over 300+ to certain ratings, saw 420cdb, 400+ heal critical, etc), but almost no stats, and NO EE's. Not a single EE across the entire item display vendor. As an example, there's a melee necklace with 350 stc and 350 sta on it. No other stats at all. Would someone wear that over the griffon necklace? I don't know, maybe if they have zero augments and can't be bothered to farm perplexing infuse, or its just early in their 55+ life. I'm just not really sure who the audience is for CoB loots atm, and I don't know why EE's were put in pre-50, and now apparently have no place or role in CoB. It seems that items look like 'stat deficiency sidegrades', more then real loot. What I mean is, I could see someone who doens't want to farm any perplexing/overlooked defense runes grab a necklace to wear during fights involving heavily armor targets, but otherwise wil just continue to wear their griffon neck. 2. What's the deal with Unique? There's only one claw on the weapon vendor, and it's unique. You had the courtesy to design two daggers for rogues, an axe and a sword and a club for rangers/bards, but there's no second claw? Either drop the unique tag, or add another claw. A deeper quesiton though... why do you use overuse the Unique tag on virtually every item? Is there a specific reason that a certain medium armor belt, or a heavy armor chestplate, has a unique tag to it? The only use you MAY have for unique are for items that can be placed in multiple slots. That's rings, earrings, and weapons. But again, why? Why can't I wear 2 of the same ring, or 2 of the same earring... or two of the same weapons? If someone wants to, why not??? 3. Weapon balance The weapon damage ranges might be slightly too strong. I think the claw atm is 1 more damage then the spider claw, and the bladed staff is actually 24 points higher on max damage then IWG's staff. The other stuff I didn't look at. Both CoB claw/staff I think have stronger stat allocation then those raid weapons too.
I haven't logged in to look yet, but it almost sounds like the original items that were placed there are back, not the ones that were adjusted AFTER it was first put on Test...
Itemization for COB is still being worked on. We should have updated items sometime this week. Thank you for your feedback so far
Please keep in mind the set bonuses you have locked certain classes into with the 6 (well, 5 required) pieces of PotA tier 3 gear when looking at armor items. The set bonuses from CoB last year were...underwhelming for some (many?!) classes compared to their T3 set bonuses. It might be a good idea to re-familiarize yourself with the PotA T3 5 piece set bonuses for all classes as well as the 3 piece chicken (dark meat only, pls) archetype bonuses before finalizing EEs and set bonuses on CoB gear. Set bonuses kind of make sense when there are well-defined "best in slot" items from a singular source such as APW in the past or PotA in the present, but adding new items that break set bonuses without providing legitimate tradeoffs OR INCREASING FLEXIBILITY TO ACHIEVE THE SET BONUS REQUIREMENTS will make folks irritated and cause such items to be largely ignored.
Torsyn wrote: Agree 100%, I don't know how many times I have tried to convey this message. I feel like I am locked into jewelry upgrades because I can't swap out any of my armor due to the fact I can't lose my 5 piece. Something like a set bonus being gained for acquiring all the parts needed to fill that set would make sense to me, then you just select a set bonus from the list of sets you have enough pieces to meet the requirement for. That is my opinion though and I believe others have disagreed in the past.
Torsyn wrote: They are well aware of the set bonus and EE dillema for end game raiders. How they solve it will be the interesting part.
