Quote Originally Posted by Urthdigger View Post
It can be a serious issue, yes.
Oh yeah I didn't mean to say it can't be an issue, but for some it could also be a huge positive - also depends on how SE balances it. Of course giving into the notion that sometimes they fail to balance, they think "these options will be valid and we've done great!" but missed one item's true potential and the truth is there is only one choice now lol. WoW had that sometimes, I'd say for the most part they succeeded in at least two options but occasionally a poorly made developer decision shook the earth :P

I jumped in here because of the idea of ability bonuses, not necessarily raid only since I view that as more difficult to balance but am not opposed to it either.

Powercreep is actually a friend in these scenario, can make an ability potent for the release window but with powercreep you can out shadow it in the next wave of items.

There could be other more aggressive systems in forcing balance too. For example you could make it so only two items on your person can have active item effects, you can select them if more than two are on you at once - then the developer has to mindfully design higher tier abilities to be better than the previous tier (sometimes subjectively the previous tier would still be preferred, but far less often and more likely you'd only keep old effects active until you earned the new ones). Or the abilities self nerf themselves when used in content too far out of their base ilvl, like an ilvl200 chest's ability becoming 50% less effective in ilvl230 dungeons (basically saying "time to replace me, now~!").

I just really enjoy these changes because they feel great, imo, to obtain, read, and use. If I got some awesome gun spear from Naul but couldn't use it as an actual gun spear that'd be really sad, and in comparison to other items would feel far less unique as its the exact same stats in a different orientation (usually only "higher"). Especially when I know in WoW it'd almost most definitely have a unique on hit or ability trigger making it so much fun to experience the lore through action as well as perhaps switch up some of my play style, slightly (but importantly get that immediate feel, that impact of knowing you've got something special in your hands). Adding abilities may be a big issue in FFXIV due to the controller, but you could for example have the Naul gun spear replace your spear throw dragoon ability so instead its now a oGCD 20 second cooldown with higher damage potency (meaning you should weave it in) - no extra ability still adds that fun lore interaction (could of course do other things like every critical charges the spear, 5 stacks makes your spear throw oGCD, free, no cooldown, and do more damage).

I wouldn't suggest adding abilities is easy to balance but I still find them quite enjoyable, especially the more fantastical wild ones - even if I know they will be replaced again at the next wave of items. Especially if you use your powercreep or more aggressive balancing tools, you could keep a strict vertical system and still allow items to have abilities. Although imo it shines more when you have more options, since you might ache over which one to go after and utalize and that's fun imo.

To make a counter point though for people too concerned about having to obtain certain items or valuing items from the past, is the ideal goal just to have an always literal BiS with no choice at all? Like oh the new raid is out, all of it is BiS. Tomestone just came out two weeks after the raid, all of it is now BiS. If we're doing that I honestly don't know why gear even has stats, should just remove all the stats from gear, besides people are already annoyed with sweet spot spell speed, accuracy targets, and inconsistent parry values (which if parry was made value-able will probably lead to a similar Vit vs Strength issues, until parry becomes something like counterattack so it becomes the go to non-choice stat after the main ones lol).

I know I've started to offer a slippery slope, but I guess I don't see the value in our current itemization/small pool of diversity and would much rather have things that actually touch upon my character in an immediately tangible way, rather than reading about sweet spot skill speed and feeling more like an accountant eeking out an extra % of regular, sameness, damage as the uniqueness of items. Trait, ability, chance, on hit > discussing the merits of X skill speed, Y accuracy, and Z parry. Imo lol.

Although I do understand the concern about having your BiS separated over many pieces of content that all have low chance based rewards. That sort of starts bringing in the loot system though, which could be tweaked to address some of the concerns, even then I'm not saying its a fact right/wrong - I get thats an opinion on how one would like the game to unfold :3.