MAngband

For example: Soft leather Boots of Annoyance (2, +5) (+3) cursed, aggro


Pretty much any "worthless" item could be cool if it had a small chance of positive values. I see people selling bows of the Nazgul and the like, so this would just make the game generate them once in a while.
They would still pseudo as "cursed" or "worthless" as appropriate, and they would never be better or as good as the equivalent excellent.

Of course, rings of stupidity or gloves of weakness should never be positive because it doesnt make sense. Also, amulets of DOOM cant be positive. Only a few egos where this makes sense should have it.

This has come up from time to time and I'm not sure I like the idea, vanilla (as far as I remember) spent a fair amount of time discussing the TMJ (too much junk) "problem" but personally I think it just adds flavor. However, one of the things that makes the game fun is when something extremely rare happens and as such this could make sense. However I think it might just be "annoying" - one more item you *have* to check to see if it *might* be good.

I personally wouldn't mind a 'dubious' or 'strange' psudo.
It annoys me that epic arts like Calris or the helm of Gorlim are 'Terrible'. Calling these dubious arts 'strange' could be good.

And I don't think that Annoyance +3 boots psudoing as 'dubious' would really do any harm to balance.

And to limit the pain of 'having to ID more useless items', only items which could have a 'good ego' should be able to become 'dubious' (like, swords could be dubious, but their aren't really any rings which should be able to become 'dubious', since they already have exact counterparts)