Shrines

From Hellgatewiki.com

Shrines are pretty much what they were in Diablo II. Statue type things you find out in the wilds that give you temporary bonuses to your defense, or attacks, or other stats. We've only seen the Combat and Armor types thus far, but there may be others in the final game. They're not officially called "shrines" in Hellgate: London, but that's what most players will call them, after Diablo and Diablo II set the precedent.

"There are also buffs. Right now we do not have buyable buffs. They last for several minutes, but we're planning on making attack and defense buffs work around damage instead of time."
--Ivan Sulic, March 2006

If that's in the planning it's not in the game yet. When we played in late 2006, shrines were still on a timer, and it was a visible one too. When you had a shrine active it showed an appropriate icon (seen below; they appear in the upper right corner of the screen) with a counter clicking down every second. If you touched additional shrines of that type, the counter increased, and since there were often several shrines of the same type in a small area, it was often possible to bump the shrine time up considerably.

There are also buffs that mimic the effect of shrines, in potion form.

Q. Can you take something like Adrenalin-Drugs to gain more Power for a short time?
A. "Yes. We have all sorts of power-ups. We even have power-up kiosks scattered throughout the game world."
--Ivan Sulic, March 2006

There were plans for short term potion bonuses in Diablo II, but those didn't make it into the final game. Whether or not they will in Hellgate: London remains to be seen; the issue with this sort of thing is always hording, and utility. Will players ever bother to use them? Or will they save them up for the perfect time to use them -- a time that never comes?