Dusty Gravestone of Destruction  

 

I don't see any Stats on this item. Should it have Stats?

There aren't alot of 60+ dots, to be honest. There's 4 on necros (I believe), 2 on druid, 3 on shaman, and well, this wouldn't be used for any other class, really. Possibly beastlord, but, I doubt it.

Anyways.

The pre-60 dots stack with the 60+ ones, in most cases. Having this AT 60, would be nice. Some focus effects work below the recommended level. Those planar-made focus items can be bought, but why spend money on that instead of xping, and ending up with this plus other possible loot instead of cash farming to pay for something else that takes up a slot?

How does this item make sense? It gives Burning Affliction 3, which works on spells UP TO Level 60 yet it has a recommended level of 60. Now, if you buy this with your adventure points before you get to level 60 and use it to augment one of your items what will happen? I'm just guessing here, but at the very least I'm assuming that the effect won't work (defeating the purpose of using the augmentation) and in the worst case since the item itself will now be tagged with a recommended level of 60, some of the stats may be reduced.

Now, on the other hand, if you wait until level 60 to use this it will serve you well for ONE level until you get your level 61 spells and wish you had a Burning Affliction 4 item.

I've looked at a few other focus augmentation items and they are the same: level 3 items have a recommended level of 60 and level 4 have a recommended level of 65.

Now here is the real question: Why do these things need a recommended level at all? Aren't recommended and required levels on items intended to prevent twinking? If so, that purpose is not served here. Why? First, you must purchase this item with adventure points. You can only get adventure points by doing adventures and you can't do adventures with characters out of your level range. Therefore, it isn't possible to twink to get the adventure points to buy the augmentation. Second, the augmentation is NO DROP. Therefore you can't have a high level friend buy it for you. Third, once you combine the augmentation with an item, the item becomes NO DROP. Therefore twinking is not possible here either.

So, to sum up, the only way a character can get this augmentation is by earning adventure points. Thus the only question remaining is: Does this augmentation need to have a recommended level because not having one would be unbalancing. The answer to that is OBVIOUSLY no. If a 44th level character, for example, were able to use this augmentation it would work exactly like Burning Affliction 2, which is exactly the same as Burning Affliction 3 except that it only works on spells up to level 44. Since said character could get a Burning Affliction 2 item much easier, what is the harm in letting him use this?

I DON'T UNDERSTAND!!!!

Seriously, if anybody can see the logic behind this, let me know. I mean, the player-crafted ceramic focus items (which any well-funded twink can buy in the bazaar) have level 4 focus effects and a required level of 46. Why should a focus augmentation with the same effect which requires DAYS of adventuring have a recommended level of 65?