Thinking back I always found the “Renegade’s” prefix totally lame, but usually when I find some such unsatisfying content or mechanic I tell myself that I probably just haven’t looked at it from the right angle, and so I thought that one day I might find a “Renegade’s” item that would be satisfying or come to the conclusion that it does totally rock and I just never saw it.
After over a thousand hours of GD though no “Renegade’s” gear has ever felt worthwhile.
Even if I found an item with a good synergy, like some “Renegade’s” gloves “of the Rifthound”, there always was some far better item available.
Here’s the base stats for a level 66 “Renegade’s” enchantment, according to the Graceful Dusk item database:
22% Pierce Resistance
20% Chance of 40% Reduced Attack Speed Retaliation For 5 Seconds
+5% Cunning
+25 Offensive Ability
So, the pierce resistance is ok, but there are many sources of pierce resistance in the game, some of them offering staggering amounts; it’s also easy to come by using components and/or augments.
The cunning bonus is nice but then again it doesn’t offer a significant damage bonus nor a significant OA bonus if you haven’t put a lot of points in cunning; which most people don’t seem to do.
The flat OA bonus is a nice touch but it isn’t big enough to really encourage me to use that item.
The chance for reduced attack speed retaliation is rather useless in most cases.
So from my current point of view - if I want more cunning, a different enchantment is a better alternative, if I want more OA, a different enchantment is a better alternative, if I want more pierce resistance a different source might be a better alternative, and that retaliation might as well not be there.
I feel that, for one of the rarer rare affixes, this “Renegade’s” is too much of a niche prefix that, for me, practically never feels worthwhile.
What do you think?
Is the “Renegade’s” prefix fine as it is?
Could it use a buff?
Could it use a redesign?
Sure, I considered that, but I think it’s not necessarily satisfying.
Not getting punched in the face, not getting kicked in the guts, not getting run over by a car and not dropping your smartphone into the toilet will not necessarily make you a happy person.
So to me the question is - under what circumstances would you prefer such a “Renegade’s” item over another item that offers similar but more pronounced stats?
I feel that the answer is something like “if I desperately need some more cunning AND some more pierce resistance”; and that’s not a scenario that I have ever encountered in the game.
That’s why I say that this enchantment is probably to niche.
I’d say there are just as many average affixes you’ll never use (if you have the choice) as there are average epics or legendaries. Feel lucky if you find a good one and just forget about the rest.
Maybe you’ll only rarely encounter a situation where your build needs Pierce Res + Cunning + OA, but there are simply so many affixes that you have to make some of them a bit odd/special/niche (especially when an affix is giving different bonuses in different item categories). The same goes for some epics or legendaries, where you could ask as well “Who will ever use these?”
Slow is the one thing that super bosses can’t always resist, so there’s that. Depending on level, it’s something like 50% resist versus 500% resist for just about every other status effect.
@shaboo:
I guess there have to be subpar enchantments so that the good ones can shine, but I would expect those subpars not to be rare enchantments; and that’s what made me wonder.
And yeah, there are a few epics that I have never used because they are so very specific, but with epics generally being fine-tuned by hand to cover a certain use-case I wouldn’t find that as irritating as having an unsatisfying rare enchantment.
@KoalaeiO and Hal900x:
Hm, if attack speed reduction really works that well on bosses, this could be the aspect that I was missing.
Usually I either am tanky enough to not care, or I am not letting the boss hit me; face-tanking a boss with a fragile melee character in a prolonged fight is nothing I normally do, and this probably made me dismiss that attack speed reduction stat in the first place because that’s the most prominent scenario that I see as a use-case for that prefix.
Yet I still can’t really say that I like it.
I think the reason is that with a character I, as hinted at above, would either:
a) try to maximize damage and OA so that I can end the fight quickly, minimizing the enemy’s opportunity to deal damage, or
b) try to be tanky enough and/or have enough sustain to be able to face-tank a boss, or
c) try not to let the boss hit me
Now the stats on that prefix are neither offensive enough to help me end the fight fast, nor do they seem defensive enough to help me endure the damage. I guess I would have to test it against some bosses to see if that attack speed reduction is really that strong.
But even if it is against default attack bosses, it still doesn’t help against the caster types, and with it’s 20% chance to be applied it also is not a good countermeasure against sudden bursts of damage, so that prolonged melee boss fights really seem to be the only scenario where I would find that stat useful.
And when the alternative is either another prefix that offers me 50+ percents worth of resistances or one that offers me 5+ percent more DPS or even just some epic item that does about the same and gives me 40 or 50 flat OA on top, then I am inclined to rather go with the later than to take a gamble with the rather unreliable “Renegade’s” item.