This is spot on.
We are still iterating heavily on the system, so the exact details may vary from what we talk about today, so let's talk about our values. By focusing on our design values, even if the exact implementation changes, you''ll be able to see our intent and what's important to us. Here are some of our design values for enchanting:
Value: It's important for the actual hunt for the loot to still matter
How enchanting supports this: As currently designed, you are only allowed to reroll ONE property on an item. In this way, each item can only be changed so much from it's original state. This allows enchanting to feel meaningful, while still allowing lots of room for players to resume hunting for an even better "base item" to enchant into an even better item.
Value: We want this to be a meaningful end-game sink
How enchanting supports this:
1. As previously mentioned, all items that are enchanted will be bound to account
2. Even though you are allowed to reroll only ONE property, you can reroll that property over and over. For example, suppose an item has 200 str, 200 vit, 80 res all, +1200 Life on Kill and +400 Life on Hit. You might choose to reroll the +1200 Life on Kill and get +87 Hitpoints per second. You can then reroll the +87 Hitpoints per second and get +4 gold pickup radius. You can reroll the "mutable" stat as many times as you want, but the other 4 stats (200 str, 200 vit, 80 res all and +400 Life on Hit) are now "locked in" and cannot be rerolled.
3. We want to ensure enchanting is meaningful on Legendary items. We are working hard to make sure Legendary items are awesome. If we want enchanting to be a meaningful end-game sink, it needs to work on the best items in the game. It has not yet been determined whether this means you can enchant the "guaranteed" properties of a Legendary, or if you can only reroll the "random" properties of a Legendary. This aspect of the design is still under iteration but at the end of the day we want enchanting Legendary items to be worthwhile.
Value: We want to avoid "Buyer's Remorse"
How enchanting supports this: Have you ever played an RPG with an enchanting system that sometimes randomly made the item worse? Since we're allowing the result to be random, it's possible that your choices for enchanting are worse than the property you're replacing. Oftentimes this can lead to a feeling of dread when you begin the enchanting process. Or maybe you re-enchant the item over and over hoping to at least get something better than what you started but you get unlucky and run out of money or reagents before you get a good roll! To mitigate this, when we present you the list of options one of the options is ALWAYS the original property. So if you don't like the new options you can always choose to keep the old one. Now you can enchant with peace-of-mind.
Standard disclaimer. Enchanting is a work-in-progress. Expect it to change before it's done, but this is a glimpse at the current state.
