A Light at the End of the Itemization Tunnel?

If you’ve been thinking that the pieces of the Sentinel’s Fate itemization puzzle just have not fit well together, you are not alone.

While we have not spent a lot of time covering itemization in SF, it is because things have continued to be in such a state of flux during, and after the Beta.

The smooth progression of TSO gear was seemingly replaced by a scattershot approach, with some of the x2 raid items being the best in the game, the x4 Hard Mode gear being only 1-2% better than the x2 Easy Mode gear, and Battlegrounds gear the red herring, providing a confusing shortcut to skip instance gear altogether. In short, the “plan” has not been clear. Until now.

After the jump, check out what Frizznik has posted regarding the EQ2 Team’s itemization plans:

I wanted to give you some information on some of the itemization changes that should hit next week.

We have been looking at itemization and making some modifications to make them more desirable.  Here are some of the things we are changing.

• Added red adornments slots to all raid dropped armor in the Sentinel’s Fate.
• Modified red slot adornment Focus Effect: Critical Chance so that it can be placed on hand slot items as well as feet slot.
• Modified red slot adornment Focus Effect: Potency so it can be placed on chest slot items as well as forearm slot.
• Raid armor drops were renamed so that they could more easily be identified when awarding them.
  • Venomous (Scout Chain) – No Change
  • Vicious (Offensive Plate) – Savage
  • Viscid (Summoner Cloth) – Baleful Caller’s
  • Vivacious (Priest Plate) – Revered
  • Voidshell (Tank Plate) – Hulking
  • Vociferous (Mage Cloth) – Archaic Runed
  • Vivid (Shaman Chain) – Enduring Spirit
  • Voracious (Offensive Leather) – Pugilist’s
  • Versatile (Defensive Leather) – Tenacity
• Sentinel’s Fate raid drop chest, leg, and shoulder slot items in most cases will now have more critical mitigation.
• Many Fabled pieces of jewelry in Sentinel’s Fate have had resistances added to them to make them desirable items sought for increasing resistances on fights that require it.
• Many fabled jewelry and weapons in Sentinel’s Fate have had effects added to them to make them a choice of upgrading from items obtained in The Shadow Odyssey.
• Added Yellow adornment slots to all Sentinel’s Fate legendary items.
• Added Yellow slot adornments that are purchased with Marks of Manaar from a new vendor in Paineel.  They follow the slot and stat standards that exist on non-class specific red slot adornment effects but are less powerful than their red slot counterparts.
• Brellium jewel crafted resistance gear has had stats added to it to make the swapping to them less of a hit to your overall stats.

No word on whether we should draw any conclusion from the fact that it is Frizznik making this post.

UPDATE: In a followup question, Frizznik posted:

>> What about instance fabled drops? Will those be red-slot or yellow-slot?

Good question, those will be yellow as well.