INFINITY ENHANCEMENT SYSTEM

If you want to get some indepth into the process I've been through to get to this suggestion you can read the "spoiler" tagged section below, if you don't care and want to see the suggestion directly then skip to the next title.

Why do we need a new system?
While Omega System provides a generic advancement system for all your heroes to further customize them and raise their power to unexplored limits (and will continue so as new omega tabs are unlocked as story advances), I've been thinking and sharpening an idea for a parallel system to add to the game to further improve and customize your heroes in an unique manner.

I want to emphasize "in parallel" cause' at some point we need to shorten the gap between new players and veterans as both are important, core parts of the community and the game as a whole. As such, the best way to do so in my opinion is to add a system that runs separately from Omega System so when a new player tackles the game, they can catch up on both systems at the same time instead of trying to enter a race to a higher and higher omega cap. Now to the core of this suggestion.

Why Infinity Enhancement and What is it all about?

First, if you take a look at the story chapters in the game (and its cutscenes) you'll see that we're slowly but steadily heading to a interstellar war against the mad titan, Thanos. And he's gonna bring the Infinity gems to the table.

This is the perfect opportunity to add a socketing system into the game, with more customization options that the one runes provide into your gear, and with a (potentially) much higher impact in the way you play and build your hero: Infinity Gems.

Of course the gems are way too powerful for heroes to control so we would be managing fragments of those gems instead (I tried to avoid the term "splinters" to diferentiate from the currency we all know and covet).

So this is just more runes but instead we call them infinity gem fragments?

Absolutely not. There are 3 main differences I'm gonna explain below:

Infinity gem fragments are socketed into your powers directly, not into your gear. Specifically into active powers, excluding Ultimates. This means the fragment will affect the socketed power alone, and it can alter it in many ways depending on the type of gem the fragment comes from, and the affix it possesses (every type of gem will have a different pool of affixes they can roll, of course themed on their lore).
Infinity gem fragments can be slotted in and out of your powers easily for a fee at either a dedicated NPC or at your Enchanter (I'd prefer the latter to avoid NPC flooding). For a balance reason and because this gems will be far more impactful than runes, a hero will be able to wield up to 3 gem fragments total: first fragment will be able to be socketed at level 20, the second at level 40, the third at level 60 (if they ever decide to raise the level cap, maybe a fourth fragment could be equipped).
Infinity Gem Fragments will be rare and rewarding. This fragments are strong in power, can potentially enable whole new builds, and should be valuable. I'm thinking a level of rarity similar to the hardest to find boss specific uniques/artifacts or maybe a little rarer. Needless to say they should have their own offscreen indicators beams of light visuals. If they drop you have to see them and run like hell to get them.

What are these gems and what would they be able to do in the game?

Alright, the infinity gems in the Marvel Universe are the following:

And the basic information about each:

Power Gem – Increased strength and durability, enhances virtually any known superhuman ability, energy manipulation.
Time Gem – Time travel; stop, slow down or speed up flow of time; accelerate or slow down aging; see into past/future.
Space Gem – Travel through space, mostly through teleportation. Able to interfere with the motion of other objects.
Soul Gem – Observe, attack or even steal a being's soul or spirit. Also used to revert individuals to their natural state.
Reality Gem – Alters all of reality; similar to the effects of a Cosmic Cube, but much, much higher.
Mind Gem – Near-limitless psionic/psychic abilities including empathy, telepathy and telekinesis.

Knowing what gems do in the lore, we can addapt them into the game and provide an affix pool from which each type of fragment will pull a single mod.

COMING SOON: Example image of the UI for fragment allocation into powers

AFFIX POOL FOR EACH TYPE OF FRAGMENT

Power Gem Fragments

Damage: +X% (2% per point on Strength/Fighting/Energy attribute, 0.5% per point for signatures) // (can roll any of those 3 attributes)
Total Defense rating: +10% for 10 seconds when you hit with this power
Doubles your durability attribute total for 5 seconds on power activation (20 seconds cooldown)
Damage: +5% for 5 seconds on enemy defeat (stacks up to 5 times)
Gives the "POWER" Team Buff on critical strike to you and nearby allies for 10 seconds
Gives the "TOUGHNESS" Team Buff on critical strike to you and nearby allies for 10 seconds

Time Gem Fragments

Power Duration: +15% (halved on signatures)
Slow: -25% enemy attack & move speed on hit for 5 seconds
10% chance to immobilize enemies for 2 seconds on a critical strike. Irresistible on a brutal strike (with a 20 seconds cooldown)
Critical Strike Chance: +X% (2% per point on Speed attribute, 0.5% per point for signatures)
-15% cooldown on this power
Damage: +X% (5% per second of cooldown. A flat total of 25% for signatures.)
Attack speed: +5% for 5 seconds on enemy defeat (stacks up to 5 times)
This power cooldown is reduced by 1 second on a brutal strike (up to once per second, up to once every 3 seconds on Signatures)

Space Gem Fragments

Total Deflect/Dodge rating: +10% for 10 seconds when you hit with this power // (can roll any of those 2 ratings)
Gives the "ACCURACY" Team Buff on critical strike to you and nearby allies for 10 seconds
Critical Strike damage rating: +10% for 3 seconds after using a movement power
Move speed: +5% for 5 seconds on enemy defeat (stacks up to 5 times)
Gives 100% projectile deflection for 3 seconds on power activation (20 seconds cooldown)

Soul Gem Fragments

10% resource cost reduction
Applies Vulnerability for 10 seconds on hit
Applies Weaken for 10 seconds on hit
Gives the "ENDURANCE" Team Buff on critical strike to you and nearby allies for 10 seconds
Instead of the resource cost, this power costs 5% of your maximum life.
Enemies hit have a 1% chance to drop a health or spirit orb on critical strikes.
Enemies defeated have a 5% chance to drop a health or spirit orb.
Damage rating for this power: +X (150% of your total spirit)
5% chance on hit to deliver a burst of area damage to surrounding targets equal to 200% of your total health (1.5 seconds cooldown)

Reality Gem Fragments

Area Power Radius: +15%
1% chance to vanish the target from reality on hit (bosses get stunned for 1 second instead, with a 20 second cooldown)
Any crowd control effect applied spreads to up to 3 nearby enemies
Critical strikes become brutal strikes, but non-critical strikes deliver 1/3 their normal damage.
This power now deals physical/energy/mental damage instead. // (can roll any of those 3 types)
Break out from any Crowd Control effects on you on power activation (15 seconds cooldown)
This power also gets the "Melee"/"Ranged"/"Area"/"Summon"/"Movement" tag. // (can roll any of the 5 tags)

Mind Gem Fragments

Damage: +X% (2% per point on Intelligence attribute, 0.5% per point for signatures)
10% chance to confuse enemies for 1.5 seconds on a critical strike. Irresistible on a brutal strike (with a 20 seconds cooldown)
5% chance to taunt nearby enemies for 5 seconds on a critical strike. 10% chance on a brutal strike.
10% chance to knockback enemies on a critical strike. Irresistible on a brutal strike (with a 10 second cooldown on bosses)
5% chance to pull other enemies into the enemy hit (10 seconds cooldown)
Damage: +X% (10% for every other power you have on cooldown)

ROUND UP

So taking into account a hero can socket up to 3 sockets into their power tree (only 1 max on a single power), on any active power except ultimate, you can see the possibilities are vast, a lot of new builds can emerge, other underpowered builds can become viable, and your favorite build, if it already exists, can get a few improvements and utilities to support them.

I'm open to any further input on how to make this happen. Thanks for the read.