Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Itemization and crafting in Original Sin II

I liked the itemization in D:OS, although I prefer loot that has abilities almost as gamechanging as most spells in the game. When I played a hydro/tank hybrid build stats often decided my arms race against all the stat requirements in the game. Lose strength and the new armor had to go into stash, lose blocking and (in theory) you took severely more damage, lose int and the mightiest spells and this cape were unusable, for a long time 1 point of speed decided if you could go for the first round combo or not. With a little salty taste it was possible to let go of some constitution at least.

All this put me into the permanent consideration if the new loot, most often barely fitting my needs, actually was better than the old one or not, always depending on what other loot might appear to replace what I already had.

If it is possible to give this restrictive mechanism to the grand majority of builds in D:OS II, then imho this would be even better than handplaced epic loot and everything I have seen so far.
+There is a couple more advantages/pay-offs over predictable loot: There possibly is loot for every build at every stage of the game; Every build more or less has the same chance for interesting loot.

Necessarily the game always had to throw absolutely random loot at me and this in amounts rivalling the huge variety of bonus combinations.

The conclusion is, that sheer amount of valuable loot is a necessity for this system to work. DO NOT CHANGE.

How does crafting fit in? I don't know. I did not use it often enough. The things you could make (if you knew how) were reliable, but replaced after a couple of hours (I used multiple +1 speed rings during midgame due to bad drops). Also, until you knew if it was possible/how to make stuff, you often used a lot of ingredients you probably did not find when it would have come in handy (and even then you needed lots of everything).
By observation, the most appreciated crafting was improvement. Tossing nails into shoes, or putting a ruby into your armor. It was both reliable and it gave a little kick of happiness.
So if it is possible to enable everyone to tinker around with tons of loot patches which might have a wide range of obscure effects, we might obtain a system that is more or less independent from whatever loot you find.
Taking into account my first paragraph the bonuses that can be obtained by patches should, at least until late midgame, be different from everything that loot already provides.
When the time has come, and you hope to find at least some new items, then crafting some +2 attribute on anything might mitigiate frustrating randomness. (For that matter, consider a vendor whose stash can be rerolled with money). Another direction with similar characteristics is crafting stuff which cannot be found (e.g. traps, food, robochickens, fake potions, ...).
Beware the mess in PoE. If you can craft anything, the possibility devalues everything you have: Sometimes less is doing more.


Regarding exploration: Fighting and Exploration do not exclude each other, they go hand-in-hand. That's why I do not see a problem. It might be a good idea to give hidden treasure multiple loot with a level bonus and lower boundary restrictions. Maybe it should be predefined by hand which number/level/tier items appear (This probably has already been done).

What interests me, though, is if the game should have a skewed randomization towards your skillsets, i.e. if you have three people with 2h-skill you will find a lot of 2h in the game.
I personally think this will harm the overall experience. Even implementations with little effect will give you the impression that the game specifically caters to your taste. It is like in Starcrafft II when you decide if you want to save Haven or purge it from the Zerg, you are always right. In one case the colony is not infested, in the other Dr Hanson becomes a monster. Canon is whatever pleases you.
Gameplay-wise this might even improve the game. It is the mindset, that active avoidance of reactivity and contra bothering me. When three guys contend for the same items, they have earned the argument.