As the title says, share with us what your favorite Rare affixes are and why! 
Even if the reason is “it let’s me play X meme build” or “it fills the holes in my resists”, that will be useful information.
Stonehide, Thunderstruck, of Kings, of Dranghoul (although the latter is well replaced by of Readiness), some “class”-affixes like Reaper’s, e.g.
Why - Stonehide/Thunderstruck/of Kings give us a bunch of resists/stun res/cool proc.
And of Featherstep due to stun&trap res.
Of Dranghoul - because of oa/da and bonus armor
Reaper’s - cuz it helps to almost hardcap BH in my build 
1 Like
Of Arcane Winds for that slow resist
I find the affixes that grant me proc skills (doom bolt, lightning bolt, sky shard, etc.) really fun. Sadly, I don’t have many opportunities to use them in endgame because my builds usually use legendary items. Maybe I should try a build with MI weapons some day.
Functionality wise, high resistance density affixes that allow MIs to fill resistance holes that legendaries can’t even dream of addressing. Thunderstruck, (anything with stun res or slow res), stonehide, scorched runes, etc.
Fun wise: I’d love it if the procs on affixes were more impactful. For weapons the impact of the procs can’t really measure up to flat damage for auto attack builds. Offhands you want juicy hard to get resistances (slow, phys). And armor you want resistances again because they are more point efficient here. It’s easier to get res from armor and damage elsewhere than it is to do the reverse.
Cleric’s: health, DA and pierce resistance
Consecrated: vitality resistance
Menacing, Renegade’s, Tempest and Thunderstruck: resistances and OA
Stonehide and Of Featherstep: resistances
Of Battle Fury: OA and DA
Dread Lord’s: ADctH
General’s and Of Arcane Barriers: health, OA and resistances
Resonant: OA and aether resistance
Rimefrost: aether resistance
Frenzied, Of Fury and Of Onslaught: attack speed and OA
Of Insight: damage boost, OA and energy regen
Of Scorched Runes: health and resistances
Of Soulwarding: health and aether resistance
Up to about level 40 I prefer affixes with procs, but after that I require more of the above.
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i generally liked affixes that provides extra proc attack ability. though if compared to legendaries, they are often underwhelming except for some specific build that requires green or mi.
one affixes i really want to be great is of the abyss. it provides rr to weapon damage attack/abilities, yet it is paired with %chaos damage bonus… you know what happens to anything that is paired with chaos these days…
Not sure if they’re rare per se. “Incorruptible” and “of readiness”.
I also use “Impervious, clerics, preserving” and “of the flesh hulk, of attack”.
Obviously I use Thunderstruck and Stonehide. I rarely use “of kings” as they tend to not roll on the MI’s I’ve hunted down
Generally speaking, everything that gives stun/slow/freeze/etc resistance and movement speed. I don’t like being slowed down. But I usually let magic affixes do that job since I didn’t find many rare affixes that can do it.
I’m not a GDstasher so I work with what I find and craft. I crafted a few nice double rare boots, such as Formidable Stoneplate Greaves of Stonefooting and Devastating Stoneplate Greaves of Kings. I guess those are among my favorites just because I was so lucky to get them
Dunno if this info below helps but I went thru all my 25 endgame builds and these are all rare affixes I’m currently using:
Summary
Prefixes:
- Maniacal
- Aetherfire x2
- Devastating
- Survivalist’s
- Stonefaced
- Infernal
- Thunderstruck
- Stonehide
- Formidable
Suffixes:
- of Arcane Winds
- of Amarasta’s Flurry
- of Kings
- of Stonefooting
- of Destruction
Both Aetherfire items are used by my Krieg Spellbinder, so I’d consider this prefix a favorite as well 
Kings for stun, DA, health and proc. It’s the king of the affixes.
From others not mentioned, sandstorm for off hand. Not just it sounds cool, but also slow resistance and even physical.
For weapon loves Runecaster, cool to have big racial damage, but also elemental.
2 Likes
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of the Dranghoul (on jewelry, gloves and belts) high values of universally useful stats (oa,da,armor); as a GDstasher i barely ever consider anything else at the appropriate slots when i’m using greens there.
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Sandstorm (offhands) very high physical and slow resist, almost at the same status as (1.)
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of the Arcane Blaze. Arcane Missiles are pretty much the best green affix-based proc (highest single target dps at least) and i made a couple of absolutely niche proc based builds with only using 3-4 key legs/epics (skillmods or global conversion) and 8-10 greens with this affix. Not particularly strong but a lot of fun.
Oh, and if this is some kinda “what should we nerf” thread then 1. and 2. would definetly survive a slight hit but please for Dreeg’s sake stop crapping on my poor totems :).
/ps. kudos for 1.1.4.0 its awesome especially the new mines love you 3000/
Yes I forgot about sandstorm. It’s a fantastic affix for offhands
- Bloodletter´s for OA and well, Bleeding.
- of Nature´s Bounty for Resistances and Health
- Incorruptible…great Resistances
- Renegade´s for Cunning
Not mentioned above
- Demonic - nice OA
- Heart Piercing, Sinister -both are fantastic for pierce build
- Plaguebearers - RR
- Tyrant’s - reduced target’s damage
- Venomfang - best for riftscourge slicer (extremely rare btw)
- Of the Untamed - nice chunk of health and OA
- Of the Oracle - good all-round stats (health-spirit-all damage-OA-energy cost)
- Of Binding - nice to go with a company
I like Runecarved, mostly for bleeding resistance.
of the Gildam Arcanum and of Incatations for skill disrupt. Not that many useful epic and legendary items can roll with it so those suffixes are something I always keep an extra eye on when farming.
Ancient is also nice, for armor boost.
Incorruptible : tons of resistances
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Mage Hunter’, Interrorogator’s, of Rituals, and others with “+X to Inquisitor Seal” bonus.
And you guessed it right -because those allow to play a meme build!
Oh, seems I forgot the +3 single mastery affixes that can occur on daggers/scepters/amulets. Those are absolutely delicious but the chances of seeing a good one are way too low sadly due to the nature of the affix.
Armor: Stonehide, Thunderstruck, Formidable, of Kings, of the Flesh Hulk, of the Dranghoul, of Nature’s Bounty, Menhir’s Wall…
Boot specific: the ones with CC resists on top of the regular armor ones.
Jewelry: Incorruptible, Thunderstruck, Tempest, Stonefaced, Harmonious, General, Dreadlord, Unyielding, of the Untamed, of the Dranghoul…
Weapons: Of the Oracle and both sand affixes are great on off-hands.
Not familiar enough because I barely use them or even look at the stats on the MIs, but rare damage type specific prefix + celerity or alacrity is the bare minimum to even consider those IMO. Just browsing Grimtools, most of the seem fine but are extremely damage type specific which makes getting a good roll laughably unlikely…
In general, affixes with lots of generic bonuses (resists, OA/DA, hp…) completely bury the damage type specific ones. If I use the later it’s only because they happen to overlap, such as with Thunderstruck. Skill bonuses on affixes feel way too specific and arbitrary, most granted skill procs on the suffixes feel just like visual noise.
What looks to me like balance design by 4 lines of text on an item seems to be a huge factor in making some affixes undesirable. I feel an affix getting to support two damage types with some meager %damage shouldn’t have less bonus text lines and thus fail at supporting properly both builds. Jewelry augments balance that happened recently did a good job at fixing this issue for me, really hoping something similar can be applied to rare affixes even thought it would look like a really daunting task.
Even though you ask for RARE ones, I’d also wanted to add some MAGIC jewelry affixes:
Of Attack, Impervious, Impenetrable. They’re not worse than any of rare affixes, and often - much better.
Of the rifthound and of the owl were some of my favorites 