http://diablo.incgamers.com/blog/comments/upon-closer-inspection-5-items-in-store-vs.-items-equipped/

"Several times in the early days of Diablo III, the developers told us they were trying to avoid the clown clothing style of mismatched item types that we so often suffered in Diablo II. (I’m looking at you, Mr. Puke Green Shako.) They didn’t spell out how this would happen, but it’s widely assumed that there will be some automatic matching of gear. "

They also said many times over that with all of the combination of item types that no two characters would look the same!

I say keep the mismatched item system!
I am incredibly disheartened to hear that there could be something implace to automatically make one item look like something else so that it matches up better.
I want every player to be unique, to never run across someone else with the same armor on and stand out from the croud if they even want it.

Why dull down the game?

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Q u o t e:
I am incredibly disheartened to hear that there could be something implace to automatically make one item look like something else so that it matches up better.

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That's not a feature or desired feature. I think what was being said was that applying color shades to items and making them a mess of bright purple or bright green is not very visually appealing, and so we'd like to avoid that. And we have, we do have dyes which alter gear color, but it's allowed in very measured and specifically tailored ways so that it doesn't look so garish.

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Q u o t e:
I want every player to be unique, to never run across someone else with the same armor on and stand out from the croud if they even want it.

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Well, there are a finite number of items, so being able to interact with potentially millions of players and never see two people who look alike unfortunately isn't too realistic. In addition, there are only a certain number of set looks per class, and so eventually there will be points where all the highest end players have the highest end set. That's where dyes, and even runes come in, among other things, to visually distinguish individuals. It would be awesome to have unlimited amounts of art going in to the game, but there has to be a line somewhere. Hopefully we can keep that line moving every once in a while though.

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Q u o t e:
How can runes alter how we look?

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Assuming you're not standing around just admiring each other you'll be out and about killing stuff. Since each rune alters each ability in a visual (and usually mechanical) way, even if you and another wizard look exactly alike it's pretty unlikely you'll have the same skills chosen, but if you do, you're even less likely to have the same runes socketed.