Here's one: the argument is that randomised loot increases replayability because each playthrough is going to be different.
That's a weak argument, not a good one.
For reasons already pointed. "Every time is different" isn't a quality in itself, if that degree of unpredictability comes with a long list of drawbacks and virtually no advantage.
And even putting aside your completely made-up statistic about how "half of the people loving random loot", we aren't talking about a popularity contest here, but about good core mechanics.
I'd argue randomized loot isn't a great mechanic in general, but more specifically it borders the "dreadful" territory for the way this game implements it.
Yes, the system has some of the drawbacks that you mentioned, but it also has certain advantages over a strictly fixed loot system.
Can't genuinely think of one.
MAYBE the fact it spares the developers the work of designing and hand-placing unique items, but that's also questionable. I wonder how much work went in (clearly unsuccessful) attempts to tweak the item generator over and over in the past months.
A well-executed randomised loot system ensures infinite replayability, but it is obviously not going to be absolutely everyone's cup of tea.
You keep re-proposing the same (weak) argument over and over, but stating something boldly doesn't turn it true.
I have no idea in what ways having generic items rather than designed ones should "give you infinite replayability".
It's not something that increases the amount of content in the game. It just waters it down.
I've never seen anyone replaying a game with random loot thinking "Woah, can't wait to see what the random generators will give me this time". If anything, the opposite tends to happen. Speedrunners and theorycrafters typically love some degree of predictability to plan around for any subsequent playthrough.
But even then the game also has Unique items with fixed stats. Not all loot is randomised. Unique items are among the most powerful in the game. If you have not yet found them then you should be doing more exploration.
I almost finished the game at this point. Unique items are trash. By the beginning of the game thay may occasionally be useful, for a whopping 20 minutes each before you'll need to replace them. By half of the campaign, even more if you played enough side content "doing more exploration" you'll cross most of them when you already out-leveled them badly.
That's another problem Larian apparently failed to foresee.
I remember when they announced during EA that they were going to "add a lot more Unique items in the game" and fearing this could happen.
Putting "unique items" in your game AND STILL sticking to randomized loot for the most part makes the former useless.
Unique items are meaningful when they are remarkable, not when they are constantly outclassed.
Finally, this is not a loot based RPG. Loot plays a very small role in this game.
No, that's a big part of the problem. It shouldn't be, but that's precisely what this system is making it.
