Item tiers

"Item tiers like D2"? They said. Oh well....

If the implementation of "tiers" simply means T5 has bigger numbers than T4, you haven’t built Diablo II’s itemization. you’ve built another brain-dead power-creep conveyor belt.

In D2, a Tier 1 or low-level base could carry an endgame build to absolute perfection in the right fringe case because itemization was defined by unique utility, break-points, and orthogonal stats, not mindless vertical inflation. If a T5 drop is hard-coded to render T4 obsolete by default, you didn't understand the assignment, you learned nothing from D2, and your loot system is doomed to fail all over again.

Also. Itemization doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and simply copying it while keeping Paragon boards is like putting racing tires on a riding lawnmower. It’s fundamentally incompatible.

D2 itemization worked because direct skill progression up to level 100 actually meant something. Paragon boards are just a fake-deep spreadsheet of generic +5 stat nodes that strip items of their identity and reduce them to dull stat-sticks.

And again: forcing "+26 to a skill" onto a skill tree capped at 5/5 isn't itemization, it's numerical comedy. It completely trivializes the actual tree and proves the loot system is just arbitrary, bloated math.

Ditch the endless board game, fix the hard caps, and let the loot actually mean something.