So I have been thinking about this for a few weeks mostly because I also had to educate myself about the gear in general within the expansion. This is just my opinion, but I feel like it would be the most positive approach concerning the topic. Feel free to correct anything you believe I may have overlooked. I will break this into categories as they will have different progression patterns.
Professions: Before going in depth for this, I will mention that this portion will pertain to a bit more than just gear. Specifically how Jewelcrafting fits into this discussion. I believe that all professions should have all things available to them so long as the given faction and raid is available to do so. This means if a pattern drops in Serpentshrine Cavern, you will not see that until phase 2, but compared to original TBC. It would be ahead of when it was actually released. If it was added to the trainer in later patches, it would be available in phase 1 as it fits within the given ilvl. To the Jewelcrafting comment, this would have certain meta gems available earlier than when they were released, but the epic gems like Crimson Spinel and such won’t be available until phase 3 when they are actually obtainable.
Badge of Justice: Gear obtained through Badges of Justice should release similarly to how they were available in original TBC. There was different gear added in different patches and mostly intended as either early options that were competitive with the current gear or later being catchup gear that also kept decently competitive with that current gear. It would be unwise to have the later Badge of Justice gear available too early as they are so strong, they can outclass even world boss gear drops. Just not ideal to make content less relevant sooner than needed.
Darkmoon Faire: The Darkmoon Faire cards in TBC are probably some of the strongest iterations out of any expansion. At the very least, I believe it would be best to keep it out of phase 1. I would suggest Phase 3 would be the most appropriate point to have them available, but discussion for it being in Phase 2 would not be out of the question.
Arena: How they have the current planned progression seems correct. Had they not changed there minds about the seasons in there prior iteration, then I would have had more to say here.
Although they haven’t explicitly said it (might have missed it somewhere), it’s likely they will follow the same formula with badge gear they followed with item availability in classic. Many of the vendors where phased in what was available for sale. A prime example of this is the nature resist gear from CC wasn’t available until phase 5 of classic. I agree with you that availability should match up with the original release schedule.
Indeed I believe that will be the case as well. But communicating these things are still important as the team behind Classic has been very receptive to the players feedback. It would be a mistake on our part to be complacent about majority of factors pertaining to the game.
Does depend on what role you are playing to be fair. Darkmoon Card: Crusade is the most egregious offender of them which is basically just permanent attack power or spell power that is much stronger than most trinkets in Phase 1 and 2. As to the ones that have Stamina on them, Vengeance would be a strong one for Paladins that are boosting or gold farming. Though also not a bad option for AoE threat generation as 10% is a pretty good proc rate. Darkmoon Card: Madness is just interesting from a dungeon/raid trash perspective. Random buff that can pop up that lasts for a minute and assured to proc on a mob dieing. Not sure if it has an internal cooldown, because if it doesn’t. You can click off a buff you don’t want and roll the dice with the next mob that dies.
Attack Power buff is 6x20=120 AP after a ramp up, and requires hitting the next target within 10 seconds to maintain.
Badge of Justice alternative: Bloodlust Brooch.
73 AP
279 AP for 20 seconds on use effect
Spell power is 8x10=80 spell power, requires LANDING a spell within 10 seconds to maintain the effect. Harder to do because you’ll just be using instant casts until you get the chance to hard cast.
Badge of Justice alternative: Icon of the Silver Crescent
44 Spell Power
156 Spell Power for 20 seconds on use
Are they better than Crusade? I don’t know. I’m pretty sure they both have 2 minute cooldown on their use.
I’m pretty sure they want to use block value/block chance trinkets. 10% chance to do ~100 holy damage that’s increased by Sanctity Aura sounds good but I don’t think it’s game breaking.
That does sound like a cool work-around but I haven’t looked up all the effects. I imagine there’s some niche uses in arena but I’m not sure it’s worth losing the pvp trinket+battlemaster trinket.
I don’t even remember if Darkmoon Faire decks were in at the start or added later, I’m pretty sure there wasn’t an Outlands faire location.
It was added in 2.1 which is Black Temple. The cards themselves would drop in dungeons and possibly in the open world. The Faire still resides in the same locations as Classic.