Dev Discussion Affinity Bonuses

Overview
Affinity Bonuses are character boosts, via stat increases or additional abilities, which will become active when the character meets some set of requirements. The first Affinity Bonuses will come from wearing Episode 16 Elite gear. That gear has this tooltip to let you know it works with Affinity Generator Mods: "Wearing this and other pieces of Elite gear will activate your currently installed Affinity Generator Mods that require Elite gear."

Generator
Affinity Generator Mods are a new type of Generator mod. These mods can only be installed into the new bottom row of the Generator, labeled Affinity. The mods have four categories that correlate to how many pieces of Elite gear your character is wearing. The Generator has one socket for mods that work with two pieces (Type A), one socket for mods that work with four pieces (Type B), one socket for mods that work with six pieces (Type C), and one socket for mods that work with eight pieces (Type D). This allows a character to have four different Affinity Bonuses active at once.

The sockets on the Generator follow the normal rules of the Generator in that they require the cells to be active in order for them to function.

• 1 Cell active = Type A bonus socket active
• 2 Cells active = Type B bonus socket active
• 3 Cells active = Types C & D bonus socket active

Affinity Generator Mods
The bonuses are better depending on how many pieces of gear are required to activate it. The two piece Elite gear Type A Affinity Generator Mods grant half an equipment mod's amount of a stat for the given tier. The four piece Elite gear Type B Affinity Mods grant the full amount of an equipment mod's stat for the given tier. For instance a tier VII Might equipment mod grants +121 Might. So a two piece Elite gear Type A Affinity Generator Mod v7 would grant +61 Might and a four piece v7 Elite gear Type B Affinity Generator Mod would grant +121 Might. The six and eight piece Type C & D mods will be available at a later date.

• The mods correspond to a specific column in the Generator and will only work in that column
  • This is different from how other Generator mods work
• The 2 piece Elite gear Type A and 4 piece Elite gear Type B mod items have a version number and use an icon that matches that like 'v7'
• Installation also contributes 8 prestige toward weekly Base walk-in
• The mods can be purchased from a new vendor in the Tech wings of the HQs and have a POI marker on the map. They are also available from the Amenity R&D Vendor.

Character Inventory UI
In order for you to know which Affinity Generator Mods are currently installed and/or active, the top right empty slot in the Inventory UI is labeled Affinity Bonus and used to show a tooltip. The tooltip will gray out any installed but inactive mod descriptions and will be gray plus show "None" if the Generator does not have a mod in that slot. If all the cells in your generator are depleted a message is shown at the top of the tooltip that says, "Your Generator is unpowered. Add power to the Generator in your Base to activate your Affinity Mods."

where do you get this?

The mods can be purchased from a new vendor in the HQ Tech Wings called "Affinity Generator Mod Vendor". The first gear pieces that work with it come from the Episode 16 Elite Alert "Desecrated Catherdral (Elite)".

I found mine in the R&D amenity in my base.

took me a while to find. ppl kept finding in base and i couldn't [wrong amenity/vendor] but the same vendor [r&d] in watchtower doesn't have. just a little confusing. lol

The vendor isn't labeled, it's just a random console on the opposite side from the R&D area. Might want to label it better or something to make it easier to find.

People cannot find these in HQs. I invite them into my base to get them lol.

Also I feel like the second half of the bonus should be colored green. You know for example "Boos Might by +61"

Maybe we can have separate affinity sets for Support & Damage roles?

Would be nice to boost the important stats for your current role if you have elite gears on both roles.

FYI the Type A mod is only 61 might.

that would be good, i got 2 123 pieces in one run, and already had one, I put the newer ones on DPS, but when I get another I'll add it to support.

Devs, can't the affinity stack? like if you have 4 pcs, you shoould get twice the bonus (so like 122 might) plus the Type B mod (which is 121 might) for a total of 243 might bonus if you have 4 pcs. I think this would be a better carrot than just haveing A + B. Right now, the only good thing about the elite gear is the CR boost.

Yeah sorry if that example confused you. I updated the post with the actual numbers.

The color highlighting doesn't play nice when the tooltip is grayed out. So to make it less confusing we just didn't highlight the stat increase.

I find the stat bonuses of the mods to be small and insignificant. It being only single stat boosts also means that elite gear is only useful on one role so only one set in needed. I know they said that the elite affinity bonuses were supposed to be really cool but I don't find these to be cool at all.

The affinity bonuses do stack as you stated A + B. We have purposely kept the stats to an amount that is a nice bonus but it isn't going to throw off entire builds when you don't have it.

I like the idea of making elite gear meaningful.

Any chance we can have two options? For my celestial dps i would like precision. My celestial healer I would like restoration. Is it possible to give us an option for both roles?

The affinity slot shows for ourselves, but is not showing for inspection. Is this intended? Is this in the works for future development?
https://dgcissuetracker.com/browse/DC-824

Why just stats though?
Seems like these tiny stat boosts reach a point of diminishing returns. What about some new innate bonuses or something like home turf mods, pets, or even special super charges?

I kind'a feel like things are boost crazy right now for the traditional stats. I don't know, but between elite gear, generator, skill point, mods, and now affinity bonus ... +51 resto seems a little unoriginal?

The upcoming Type C & D mods are not stat boosts.

Go on...