Diablo 3 players ‘farm’, which is to say kill repeatedly, Keywardens (a special type of monster) that are scattered throughout different areas of the game for the purpose of getting them to drop their keys.
These keys are then used to unlock special boss battle areas in which players go up against multiple boss monsters (for example Adria and Kulle) at the same time, who all have a chance to drop special salvage items that are used to craft the Hellfire Ring and Hellfire Amulet, two very powerful items in the game that can be further socketed with Legendary Gems.
In any case, whenever the keys drop, they emit a light beam like legendary items do, leading many players to believe that they are a part of the legendary item loot table. This prompted fears that farming for keys denied players from getting more legendary items than they thought they would normally get.
To clear things up, Blizzard community manager Grimiku posted that the crafting recipe items, such as keys, are not on the same loot table as legendary items, so they never compete against each other when items are dropped.
“The keys are not part of the legendary drop table, they are entirely separate entries in the table and have no impact of any kind on whether or not you will get legendary items,” echoed game designer Travis Day.
Day added that the team will be removing the beam of light from keys in a future patch to prevent players from getting confused.