I think the option to upgrade crests via trade ins would be a nice QoL to consider. Especially when a fair amount of people have a bunch of unused Whelps/Drakes laying around. Make it where 5 (or 10 perhaps) of the lower Crests upgrade in to 1 of the higher level crests. That way its not overly farmed but allows a way for the lower crests to have some function still and allow for some smoother progression for more social/casual players that dont push higher end content.
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This is akin to asking last season to be able to upgrade to 415 ilvl without earning a 2400 M+ score.
Crests only drop from certain difficulty ranges and being able to upgrade something to mythic quality while only having done open world quests is not what the devs want. They do recognize that top-end players don’t want to feel compelled to do 11-15 keys just to get Wyrm’s crests, as those are still useful to top-end players, so there’s a down-grade option.
The QoL ask related to this is that downgrading an Aspect Crest should get you two Wyrm Crests since you’re going from a higher difficulty crest to a lower one, it shouldn’t be 1:1.
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Maybe if it’s 100 drake crests per wyrm crest, and it stops at wyrm crests. Otherwise, leave it the way it is.
Not really, bc I havent touched the Whelp/Drake crests I have in quite some time now, Ive got 17 of one and 23 of the other. The amount of time to farm enough of those to exchange for enough of the Wyrms/Aspects at an exchange rate of 5/10 per would take some time. And as stated its something to give others who are more casual a way to progress, clearly it wont be as fast as actually pushing content, but in the end there should be some path for casuals to utilize…
So at a 5/10 Whelp crest exchange, 50 crests (750 fragments) would only be 5/10 Drake crests. And this goes on and on. It would take substantial time/efforts to event get enough Wyrms to even max out an item. I agree it should stop at wyrms, but for me, Im in a situation where I have to downgrade the content I’m running to get the wyrms fragments to upgrade my items, I should have another outlet for that as seeing I get the whelps/drakes from world content.
Upgrading something should always be the focus, not downgrading higher crests for lower crests, that seems backwards.
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You’re equating time to difficulty, which isn’t a thing Blizzard has shown any interest in rewarding. Time “doing stuff” was rewarded by the Trading Post and maybe they’ll add other stuff as well of a similar nature. I just don’t ever see them offering an increase in power without putting in an effort at an increased difficulty level, and that makes sense and seems fair to me.
In the recent Korean Interview, Ion did express an interest in providing a higher difficulty for casuals to progress that can be done solo or with only 1 or 2 friends, so even less work than putting together a 5-man M+ team, but the key is that he said “higher difficulty” solo challenges. That will be the way that those who don’t like Raid and M+ will be able to progress, not just putting in time at the lowest difficulty there is (open world content).
The Wowhead English summary of that topic was as follows:
I think we’re forgetting what qualify of life is.
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So for me, this isnt a difficulty scenario but a time one. Bc I do content that is above the wyrms crests, I have to downgrade in content taking time away from doing harder content to get the items I need to upgrade my tier pieces from heroic. That to me is a QoL change that Im sure would benefit others in the same situation and provide a sense of progression for those who are more casual. So I ask, how does someone who is more casual who can perform at a higher level of play but doesn’t have the time to grind out a bunch of stuff with a dedicated group possibly progress at a decent rate? Also, how does someone being abe to upgrade items up to 437 ilvl hurt you and prevent you from doing your more difficult content?
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Ok but it is for some others.
There’s your solution, right there. Add a rating/achievement requirement to the vendor that lets you trade in.
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That actually could work for trading up… if you’ve already demonstrated that you can do the content at difficulty and the low-crest to high-crest trade is something like 10:1 or 20:1, I don’t see the harm in that and it might provide a benefit.
You can’t progress at to higher levels (your rate of progression without M+/Raid is set by your effort and the weekly cap on fragments). Ion said he wants to fix that but it’s not possible in 10.1.
This question seems to come up a lot… power is earned. Upgrading to from 428 to 437 requires Wyrm’s crests which are earned from Heroic Raid or M+ in the 11-15 range. It’s not about personal “hurt you and prevent you…”, it’s simply if you want X then do Y to earn X. If the game design gives stuff away too easily then it’s trivial, people max out, and complain there’s nothing to do and un-sub. That’s a business model Blizz (and Acti-Blizz HQ) would never adopt.
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Could then maybe make it account wide where once its achieved on your main that benefit rolls over to your alts.
I agree. The downgrade feature seems pointless, unless there’s players who actually prefer to stay at the lower item levels.
Downgrade feature lets high skill players play tough content without needing to do easy content. It’s right and proper. Upgrading currency is the literal opposite direction we want to move in - if you want better rewards, do harder content.
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If you don’t run the higher content you wont get gear that needs the upgraded crests though, right? I don’t see your point. You could farm 100 whelps and trade them in for a wyrm eventually, yes? but if you don’t do something that warrants a higher lvl piece of gear you’re just pissing into the wind.
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I see it as a path for more casual people to progress. Not saying it should be a system that allows people to have the best gear without doing hard content, there definitely needs to be a limit to how far that system can go. But, I see it as a way for people to continue to progress (which is what 99.9% of people play this game for) as a way to eventually do harder content. Not everyone has a dedicated support group that allows them the luxuries of doing that harder content. So give them a way to work towards obtaining the gear that would allow them to meet the standards of the groups doing harder content. I dont see how that system would hurt/hinder your gaming experience
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With how convoluted Blizzard likes to make things, introduce a trading system that starts by requiring at least one timed dungeon in the bracket you intend to trade up to and scale the cost down for each additional timed dungeon you have.
or make normal/whelping crests BoA so I can least funnel them to alts.
It’s not my point, it’s Felric’s point per quote below. Since under this hypothetical change one can use Wyrm crests (that you got by trading up from Whelpling crests) to upgrade Champion Gear to 8/8 (437 ilvl seems to be desired by casuals only doing open-world content), which I would guess casuals do not feel is “pissing into the wind.”
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forgive my ignorance here, you or felric, but can u even get wq gear that you can upgrade to 437? That’s what I’m saying, is that you COULD farm enough crests, but unless you’re doing higher level content you’re still not going to have anything to use them on. Idk i could be wrong but i don’t think i am.
Why not both upgrade and downgrade? I think atm the biggest gate are the wyrm and drake crest. It’d be nice to upgrade whelpling and downgrade aspecs
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My issue is I need like 6 Wyrm crests to upgrade all of my Heroic tier pieces, but that requires me to back track in content to sub 16’s in M+, thats a waste of time that I want spent running as close to as many 20’s as possible. Im limited on time, so I want the ability to cash in the crests I’ve obtained from world content and other things that give me Whelp/Drake crests