Negatively, Beneficial Hats

[Lingus]

That's not necessarily true. It's possible in v3 that items will affect skills as well. Plus if the stat system were made differently there's potential for different variations of items. With that said, having some hats have minor negative stat effects and slightly higher bonuses in other stats wouldn't be a horrible thing. It would just have to work out that the negative effect is always taken into consideration no matter what that does to the person's stats.