109820-gear-up-process-through-hunting-for-a-single-stat-ridiculous

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I hit level 50 a few days ago and I've been hearing from veteran (compared to my end-game experience) players that almost all pre-raid gear from dungeons and adventures is rubbish and I need to look for crafted weapons and armor (for PvE activities). Apparently crafted gear can be made in such a way that one stat is boosted in expense for others. Now there is nothing wrong with that particular fact, but that also means that indeed most of other gear pieces are salvage material?Is it really so?Doesn't it make gearing up process extremely boring?
 
Isn't it actually a major design flaw when only a single stat is most useful and we were given an option to do so? (Because the option to make such a gear thus becomes no longer an option, but a mandatory course of gearing up for raids? What raid leader doesn't want her/his members to maximize their performance?)
 
Doesn't it make almost all the gear from pre-raid PvE activities useless? (Which kind of makes venturing into dungeons and adventures a waste of time when one wants to be considered as valuable raid member?)P.S. I even read people saying that of about 60 gear pieces collected during raids only about 10 were actually useful, and that's for an off-spec gear? Isn't it simply ridiculous?	
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			They are aware of the issues with stat weights and it's on the to-do list.  Another one is Grit vs HP bonus.  Grit is never good.  It's probably not going to be a quick fix though, so I'm expecting it to come with a fairly major patch down the line.	
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Yes and no...
 
There are a few factors that weight in on this issue. As Xithian said it's something they're working on, but its not something you can probably do a quick fix for.
 
To elaborate a little further though...
 
The most problematic being the stat budgets available to crafting. You're capable for example of pushing a less desirable stat down to a minimum of 3 and pushing a desired stat up to as far as 125(usually brutality) or more depending on the risk you want to take. This essentially is allowing people to craft items that exceed their respective tier to varying degrees.
 
Then there is itemization of stats where certain stats either are "useless" or scale poorly enough that trying to get said stats are not worth the effort. This comes from two types usually where:
1)The stat(s) in question are not useful to your role and or class.
2)You get a stat such as Grit which is in almost all cases trumped by Base health. For tanks especially you'll often see on their crafted gear armor and base health iuin high amounts with Grit usually just there either as a +3 or a small amount to gain a milestone.
 
There is also the factor of rune slots. While both crafted and dropped gear all have the RNG aspect in this matter it is far more...."easier" to produce multiple pieces of gear from crafting to get a good rune slot setup which can make a huge difference in some cases.
 
This is not to say crafting out does everything, but it can effectively be THE go to area for gear because of those factors. From my own experience the only items I have difficulty making equal or better tend to be the weapons and "accessory" type items like shields,implants, etc...	
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			And that is the reason why lots of players were fed up with the loot change in 18 July. I'm fed up as well with crafted weapons and armor because for my class most crafted gears are better than dungeons/adventure drop so I have to spends lots of gold to replace the epics I acquired.	
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No worries, instead of buffing other stats they plan to nerf AP, most likely into the ground.
 
 
 
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Yes and no...
 
There are a few factors that weight in on this issue. As Xithian said it's something they're working on, but its not something you can probably do a quick fix for.
 
To elaborate a little further though...
 
The most problematic being the stat budgets available to crafting. You're capable for example of pushing a less desirable stat down to a minimum of 3 and pushing a desired stat up to as far as 125(usually brutality) or more depending on the risk you want to take. This essentially is allowing people to craft items that exceed their respective tier to varying degrees.
 
Then there is itemization of stats where certain stats either are "useless" or scale poorly enough that trying to get said stats are not worth the effort. This comes from two types usually where:
1)The stat(s) in question are not useful to your role and or class.
2)You get a stat such as Grit which is in almost all cases trumped by Base health. For tanks especially you'll often see on their crafted gear armor and base health iuin high amounts with Grit usually just there either as a +3 or a small amount to gain a milestone.
 
There is also the factor of rune slots. While both crafted and dropped gear all have the RNG aspect in this matter it is far more...."easier" to produce multiple pieces of gear from crafting to get a good rune slot setup which can make a huge difference in some cases.
 
This is not to say crafting out does everything, but it can effectively be THE go to area for gear because of those factors. From my own experience the only items I have difficulty making equal or better tend to be the weapons and "accessory" type items like shields,implants, etc...
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{| class="blockquote"
Yes and no...
 
There are a few factors that weight in on this issue. As Xithian said it's something they're working on, but its not something you can probably do a quick fix for.
 
To elaborate a little further though...
 
The most problematic being the stat budgets available to crafting. You're capable for example of pushing a less desirable stat down to a minimum of 3 and pushing a desired stat up to as far as 125(usually brutality) or more depending on the risk you want to take. This essentially is allowing people to craft items that exceed their respective tier to varying degrees.
 
Then there is itemization of stats where certain stats either are "useless" or scale poorly enough that trying to get said stats are not worth the effort. This comes from two types usually where:
1)The stat(s) in question are not useful to your role and or class.
2)You get a stat such as Grit which is in almost all cases trumped by Base health. For tanks especially you'll often see on their crafted gear armor and base health iuin high amounts with Grit usually just there either as a +3 or a small amount to gain a milestone.
 
There is also the factor of rune slots. While both crafted and dropped gear all have the RNG aspect in this matter it is far more...."easier" to produce multiple pieces of gear from crafting to get a good rune slot setup which can make a huge difference in some cases.
 
This is not to say crafting out does everything, but it can effectively be THE go to area for gear because of those factors. From my own experience the only items I have difficulty making equal or better tend to be the weapons and "accessory" type items like shields,implants, etc...
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I hit level 50 a few days ago and I've been hearing from veteran (compared to my end-game experience) players that almost all pre-raid gear from dungeons and adventures is rubbish and I need to look for crafted weapons and armor (for PvE activities). Apparently crafted gear can be made in such a way that one stat is boosted in expense for others. Now there is nothing wrong with that particular fact, but that also means that indeed most of other gear pieces are salvage material?
 
Is it really so?
 
Doesn't it make gearing up process extremely boring?
 
Isn't it actually a major design flaw when only a single stat is most useful and we were given an option to do so? (Because the option to make such a gear thus becomes no longer an option, but a mandatory course of gearing up for raids? What raid leader doesn't want her/his members to maximize their performance?)
 
Doesn't it make almost all the gear from pre-raid PvE activities useless? (Which kind of makes venturing into dungeons and adventures a waste of time when one wants to be considered as valuable raid member?)
 
P.S. I even read people saying that of about 60 gear pieces collected during raids only about 10 were actually useful, and that's for an off-spec gear? Isn't it simply ridiculous?
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Yeah gear drops have completely random stats. People have posted pics of healing weapons with tank stats on them.
 
Rng on rune slots at least I can understand if not agree with... but totally random stats on items is really silly and seems like somebody either got carried away or had one too many shots the night before.
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It's nostalgia for Diablo 2 loot and the hunt for that JACKPOT item that rolled perfectly while everyone else has janky stuff
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Crafting isn't the problem at all.
If the stats weren't so far out of balance a 125/3/3 piece of gear would basically be garbage
But they are that far out of balance so completely lopsided crafted gear is amazing instead of terrible
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Actually it's still part of it. I'm not saying it is the only problem and that the stat budgeting is only one aspect of a much larger issue in terms of itemization.
 
Let's say for that the stats themselves were all worth it having and you didn't have the issue with base health vs grit for example, then it comes down to the role you're trying to fill such as tanking which would primarily focus on defensive stats. You'd still have the problem of budgeting coming in to play unless they modify how much you can place and increase the minimum you can have for a stat. The 125+ stat with +3s is an extreme example of how far you can push a stat, but even balanced crafted items can in some cases exceed dropped gear due to the high ceiling and low base allowed. Effectively crafting is not working as intended because you're capable of exceeding the respective tier with and without lopsided stats.
 
When you combine that with how easy it is to create multiples of a certain piece for the correct rune setup in the same or less time it takes to run a dungeon/adventure to get 1 item, crafting can and sometimes does trump dropped gear. 
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It would be better if there was some kind of "diminishing returns" or something that made sure you didn't stack one stat in lieu of the others.  As it stands, since AP trumps crit no matter the relative amounts, and AP comes from one stat, crafted gear generally has one stat.
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That's what I'd imagine the overcharge to do really. Perhaps making it harder to respec your crafting talents too would help with this, becuase often crafters at least for armorer will only go up to tier 4 then respect for a really small amount of voucher points(I dont remember offhand, but it's less than 2k a respec at that point)
 
It's also hard for me to really say what might work best in my opinion, because I don't know exactly how new stat weights when/if implemented will be or the charge equation for them which I imagine or would hope might be adjusted to coincide with said changes. I'm very hesitant to say "This is what will solve our problems" without having all the numbers in hand. It goes for runes as well where I lvoe the ideas proposed by J-tal, but it's hard for me to go "that's perfect!" without seeing it in practice if that makes sense...
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Folsarc,
 
I think to the average player, the current stat itemization is just fine and you should have no problem gearing up in the dungeons.
 
The guys who are making the most noise here are the min/maxers, who are looking for the 100% most efficient way to increase the damage/healing output for your class. As it stands, 1 point of direct support power or assault power directly increases your dps/hps output better than 1 point of any other stat. This is why people tend to stack one stat for their class, and why certain types of rune slots are more heavily favored than others (generally the ones that let you get runes/sets that directly increase AP or SP).
 
How much it actually matters in order to clear content however is heavily debatable. The min/maxers will point out (correctly too, I might add) that maximizing your character will definitely minimize the time it takes to clear a dungeon (critically important for silvers, currently) and maximize your output for dungeons and raid bosses (important for pretty much everything), but just because you HAVEN'T  done that doesn't mean you can't successfully run those places (it might just be a bit more challenging).
 
If you would ask me (you're humble Aurin healer) what stat I felt was the most important for any given class that wasn't a tank, I would say that Shield value is right up close to top, only because I've seen enough people with paper health bars eat a single hate bolt from a boss and bite it, whereas if they had 500 more HP or shield they may have made it out alive to finish the boss (because I don't care how high your output is, you're worth jack to the group if you're dead). But again that's all just my opinion.
 
I think what people want is some better balancing to some of the other stats to help justify taking them over direct AP or SP, just so people can play with different builds. For example, right now it's useless to try and put together a heavy Strike Severity build (your moves crit for a ton of damage) or a high Strike Chance build (you don't crit for as much, but way more often), just because the stats currently don't give you enough righting to justify the flat loss in DPS from stacking AP or SP.	
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Folsarc,
 
I think to the average player, the current stat itemization is just fine and you should have no problem gearing up in the dungeons.
 
The guys who are making the most noise here are the min/maxers, who are looking for the 100% most efficient way to increase the damage/healing output for your class. As it stands, 1 point of direct support power or assault power directly increases your dps/hps output better than 1 point of any other stat. This is why people tend to stack one stat for their class, and why certain types of rune slots are more heavily favored than others (generally the ones that let you get runes/sets that directly increase AP or SP).
 
How much it actually matters in order to clear content however is heavily debatable. The min/maxers will point out (correctly too, I might add) that maximizing your character will definitely minimize the time it takes to clear a dungeon (critically important for silvers, currently) and maximize your output for dungeons and raid bosses (important for pretty much everything), but just because you HAVEN'T  done that doesn't mean you can't successfully run those places (it might just be a bit more challenging).
 
If you would ask me (you're humble Aurin healer) what stat I felt was the most important for any given class that wasn't a tank, I would say that Shield value is right up close to top, only because I've seen enough people with paper health bars eat a single hate bolt from a boss and bite it, whereas if they had 500 more HP or shield they may have made it out alive to finish the boss (because I don't care how high your output is, you're worth jack to the group if you're dead). But again that's all just my opinion.
 
I think what people want is some better balancing to some of the other stats to help justify taking them over direct AP or SP, just so people can play with different builds. For example, right now it's useless to try and put together a heavy Strike Severity build (your moves crit for a ton of damage) or a high Strike Chance build (you don't crit for as much, but way more often), just because the stats currently don't give you enough righting to justify the flat loss in DPS from stacking AP or SP.
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			Gearing up process = Farm gold, search the auction house, rinse and repeat.	
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Well, the process really sucks since they changed Gold medals not awarding Epics anymore.
 
I understand the change, but then, get random pug malgrave groups to actually pug gold over and over again....for the effort/time spent making sure a pug doesn't mess anything up....it's sort of disheartening to finish gold and get 3 of the same blues, and a blue that previously dropped in the adventure. Man! This new system is awesome.	
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			If you want to wait until drop 4 or 5 for the fix you can. I suggest playing some AHtycoon in the meantime or find a friend to craft you some BiS pre-raid gear.	
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Except Diablo threw loot at you like a machine gun.  :lol:
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It's nostalgia for Diablo 2 loot and the hunt for that JACKPOT item that rolled perfectly while everyone else has janky stuff
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Gearing up process = Farm gold, search the auction house, rinse and repeat.
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OP: Gear from veteran content is perfectly fine for Pre-Raid. As stated earlier in the thread, the folks upset over the issue are the min/maxers.
 
Currently some Best in Slot (BiS) gear Pre-Raid can be crafted gear (for example, 1 out of 12 gear slots on my Heal spec medic has a BiS item that is crafted; the Adventus healers chest). While that doesn't prevent the Vet content gear from still being great; it does rub folks who are diametrically opposed to crafted gear being useful the wrong way; as it means many classes can fill some portion of their gear slots with crafted gear and have pre-raid BiS.
 
AFAIK, JTal and the itemization team are making changes to AP in order to reduced the benefit of stacking AP over every other stat; reduce the randomness of # of rune slots on gear; and make the randomness of rune slot types much better (by making rune slot types re-rollable) + some other things. Once implemented that should solve most of the problem.
 
Best,
Naz	
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OP: Gear from veteran content is perfectly fine for Pre-Raid. As stated earlier in the thread, the folks upset over the issue are the min/maxers.
 
Currently some Best in Slot (BiS) gear Pre-Raid can be crafted gear (for example, 1 out of 12 gear slots on my Heal spec medic has a BiS item that is crafted; the Adventus healers chest). While that doesn't prevent the Vet content gear from still being great; it does rub folks who are diametrically opposed to crafted gear being useful the wrong way; as it means many classes can fill some portion of their gear slots with crafted gear and have pre-raid BiS.
 
AFAIK, JTal and the itemization team are making changes to AP in order to reduced the benefit of stacking AP over every other stat; reduce the randomness of # of rune slots on gear; and make the randomness of rune slot types much better (by making rune slot types re-rollable) + some other things. Once implemented that should solve most of the problem.
 
Best,
Naz
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{| class="blockquote"
OP: Gear from veteran content is perfectly fine for Pre-Raid. As stated earlier in the thread, the folks upset over the issue are the min/maxers.
 
Currently some Best in Slot (BiS) gear Pre-Raid can be crafted gear (for example, 1 out of 12 gear slots on my Heal spec medic has a BiS item that is crafted; the Adventus healers chest). While that doesn't prevent the Vet content gear from still being great; it does rub folks who are diametrically opposed to crafted gear being useful the wrong way; as it means many classes can fill some portion of their gear slots with crafted gear and have pre-raid BiS.
 
AFAIK, JTal and the itemization team are making changes to AP in order to reduced the benefit of stacking AP over every other stat; reduce the randomness of # of rune slots on gear; and make the randomness of rune slot types much better (by making rune slot types re-rollable) + some other things. Once implemented that should solve most of the problem.
 
Best,
Naz
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