As we all know gear is either a constant grind in a dungeon or a lengthy wait for traits to be researched. And most gear is easily attained. But for end game players I'm sure we would like a type of armor that is unigue to the player. So I thought of the idea of artifact gear much like the old daedric artifacts of old.
Artifact gear would be a item usually only one piece obtained from an ancient blueprint. These blueprints would detail the creation of unique weapons and armor of epic proportions. They could be dropped rarely from trials on the hardest difficulty and rarely from top 10 leaderboards in pvp.
The items used to craft these items would be unique drops clearly stated in the blueprint. " say a daedric titan heart from killing titans etc etc. farming a item of immense proportions from equally legendary enemies. They would require a certain amount of blood ( a new crafting component) farmed from lesser creatures and a certain large amount of metal or hide. The creation of these items would then have a timer for completion. much like research time.
So as an example crafting the "blade of woe" you would need to farm a certain amount of metal. Collect the blood from a certain amount of assassination targets and the heart of a lich. Craft time would be a few days. Effects of this weapon would be a one piece perk. Very similar to that of the old blade of woe. When attacking a target from stealth cloaked or otherwise you deal 30% more critical damage, you inflict a leaching effect on the target where any healing cast by target is drained by 30% and siphoned to you. Healing you for the duration of set timer by zenimax.
I have other plans for other relic items for each and every weapon and armor peice each equally powerful and zenimax could choose what path to take on the crafting of these items. They could choose to limit these things on how many of these relics can be equipt because I'm sure these forums will explode with complaints on these items being capabable of breaking the game. I suggest that these items be limited to either only being able to equipt 2 weapons or only one set of armor but not both so if one wanted to craft a set of artifact armor they can't equipt artifact weapons. If they chose to equip weapons then they couldn't equip the armor. Comment below on your opinions and try not to smash this idea these items would be a quest to obtain a powerful item and as such should be a reward for players who are skilled enough to obtain them. These relics would be bound to player and account upon creation.