I’m still concerned about this issue. Making the blacksmithing weapons main hand is a mistake in terms of melee viability and itemization. Not only did they make the blacksmithing weapons main hand, they also changed all Karazhan weapons that are viable to main hand as well (Fool’s Bane and Decapitator). So for example, the best weapons I can use are still both blacksmithing weapons: Dragonmaw (mace) or Black Planar Edge (axe), accept my off hand is a really fast blacksmithing weapon (Fel Edged Battleaxe or Runic Hammer) instead of a slow weapon that’s actually good (slow weapons are significantly better for most melee off hands). Aside from said 2.4 speed weapons, the only other weapons in the pull in phase 1 are heroic blue weapons and pvp epic weapons that come out later in the phase. The change seemed to also “open up the meta” of melee but in fact the change reduced our weapon choices by 5 weapons (Black Planar Edge, Dragonmaw, Annihilator, Fool’s Bane, and Decapitator). With the change being reverted back to one handed weapons nothing is stopping players from straying away from the double blacksmithing mace/axe meta, but making them main handed is forcing a certain type of gameplay/meta and that’s wrong.
Therefore blizzards notion to try nit pick progressive itemization for blacksmithing isn’t helping smooth out the gameplay/itemization curve like they think. And the outstanding reasoning is because having best in slot weapons for the first phase is too strong, witch isn’t the chase at all. Even with the main hand change, we are either using worse best in slot blacksmithing weapons, or blue heroic weapons until Phase 2. Therefore, the best weapons are still mainly blacksmithing weapons (even though the off hand weapon is bad, but still bis) in phase 1 or you use a blue heroic weapon until phase 2. I do not see how that is fun or healthy for all melee.
That being said, TBC is already hard on melee as it is and this change only makes it rougher to be viable and wanted in dungeons and raids.
TLDR:
On the grand scale of the game, this doesn’t affect the difference in killing a boss or not, making melee over powered, or breaking any type of in game mechanic. It greatly reduces the itemization and enjoyment from mainly Ehn shamans, Fury Warriors, and some Rogues. There is no outstanding reason to not have these weapons as One handed weapons.
One of the following really needs to happen in order to have an open ended melee weapon meta with multiple configurations and choice.
The solutions: Do 1 of 3 things.
Revert the Blacksmithing weapons to being one handed weapons.
Revert the Karazhan weapons to being one handed weapons.
Revert both the Blacksmithing weapons and Karazhan weapons to being one handed weapons.
EDIT: With the PVP blue post reveling how the new PVP system will work, the weapon choice is even restricted further and is contradictory to there stance of making the One handed to Main handed change in the first place. There was no rating associated to the weapons in early TBC and now there is and that was the reasoning behind the blacksmithing and Karahan itemization changes. Blizzard what are you doing? If you are going to make changes at least make them consistently.
If you took what I said as “nerf content” I cant help that; however, as a enhancement shaman (witch is a meta class) it effects me heavily and ill be playing whatever is BIS but I’m not thinking about just myself in this post. The change they made reduces the overall weapon pool and you would know that if you actually read it. ggs mate
All the commotion over this seems really ridiculous. Go blacksmithing and you pretty much guarantee a solid weapon. Fortunately, there are many more to choose from. Someone will run the numbers and determine which is “BiS” the rest of the meta sheep can just follow, as usual.
I think this one is the best option of the three. I like Kara being something that melee want to go to rather than just somewhere they gotta go to with their guild. Having BS weapons being MH but Kara weapons one handed keeps Kara attractive while not just handing two bis weapons to melee via BS
Thats a bad take. Who cares that you are using a blue weapon (a bad weapon) for 4 months in a MMO RPG? Most players do. You just aren’t affect so you do not mind.
I can understand a dual wield class wanting something respectable to use in their off hand. I agree if they want to reign in the blacksmithing weapons a bit they should make them 1 hand unique instead of mainhand.
If only they had made the Aldor epic rep weapon a mace instead of a sword many problems could have been avoided.
That’s neither here nor there. Resto druids and Feral Tanks are viable in classic so of course they are seen. I don’t understand why you are comparing naxx gear to the issue i am talking about, the naxx gear is significantly harder to obtain than lvling greens until lv 68 where a lot of naxx gear is replaced. If you don’t know what you are talking about don’t put your input in please.
Assuming you arnt talking in bad faith and are a competitive player (from how you are talking it seems that way) then you would know just buffing the raid is never enough in a competitive setting. You need to push all aspects of your dps / heals / tanking in order to do better then everyone around you. GGs mate you are looking real pathetic.
You’re crying about the quality of gear that’s available, and wanting the game to be tailor-made to a play style that was developed AFTER the game came around. It’s also not my fault you fail to see the comparisons. Broaden your mind some.
Speaking of competition, your parses are compared to others of your class/spec, right? They’ll all be in the same boat. Your parses will be fine.