Reading all this stuff kind of opened my eyes and reminded me of a few other ideas.
You could make magic items able to have runewords made in them instead of rares.
Then instead of undoing the buff on rares you could just buff magic items maybe?
Also I've played other servers that have had boots belt and gloves being socketable.
I'm not sure if it's a good idea or easy to make it happen but adding that could be interesting.
I'm not saying adding it for unique's, though a few maybe could be special like nephalem amulet.
If normal items and magic could have sockets it would add the possibly for some glove/belt/boots runewords.
Also you could even add a chance for sockets on rares but not make them able to have runewords made in them.
Few things I just thought would be interesting to throw on the table and add to this topic.
I'd like everyone else and of course Game to give their opinion on this as well.