Hey all, would really like your feedback on a question I've had since I started work on this game. Is it a worthwhile endeavor to include super-rare unique items?

If you haven't played Second Death, the loot system is akin to drops in the Borderlands series. A normal weapon can drop, with damage, speed, and weight stats, but rarer loot will drop with a special effect. Effects include the chance to inflict poison, knock enemies back, gain AP with every hit, etc. In Second Death, a weapon or armor can roll with up to 3 of these effects.

In Borderlands and other games of its kind, there are uniques -- hard-to-find weapons that don't have a random mix of effects, but rather have very special effects that you can't find in any other item. Potential uniques for Second Death could be a pistol that regenerates ammo, or armor that has a chance to slow time when hit.

But I've always been bothered by uniques in this way -- if you know there are awesome, extra special weapons to be found, I feel like it decreases the excitement in finding a decent, non-unique item. Also, I could take the time I spend coding unique effects (that a player is likely to never experience) and use it instead to broaden the pool of effects that players can find in non-unique weapons/armor.

So what do you think? Are uniques worth it, or not?