While I like the idea of the set bonuses, I hate what heirlooms have done to the leveling experience with a passion. Let me start by saying I have a couple dozen max level characters and full sets of every type of heirloom.
That said, a large part of what makes leveling those characters feel less fun then it used to is the fact that so much gear is insta-shredded because of my heirlooms. I wish the heirlooms were turned into enchants that gave maybe some bonus stats and these new fun set bonus effects. Having your character not really grow in any significant way after completing a dungeon or tons of quests feels counter intuitive in an MMO. I miss finishing a dungeon and equipping a new green I lucked out at or possibly a blue that I lucked out to find or was shared to me by someone who got a lucky drop.
I miss targeting specific dungeons through out the leveling process because I wanted my druids of the fang gear or what have you.
I’m sure there are many others with differing opinions, but at this point, what is the point of leveling to 50 if you don’t even swap out much of your gear as you get stronger…
What is the point of swapping out the gear? To make your character stronger right? The heirlooms are doing that already as you level up. Instead of swapping out gear for more powerful gear, they are doing the swapping automatically.
They lvling process has sped up too much to care about specific drops anymore. Why care about any one drop when one hour of gameplay will see you replacing it with quest greens anyway.
The set bonuses are borderline useless from reading over them.
That crazy speed-leveling guy made some good alternative suggestions and wowhead has a summary:
2 pieces: 15% movement speed that stacks with minor speed to boots + WoD cloak enchant (gift of haste/vers/crit).
4 pieces: Proc that reduces cooldown and does AoE damage to all enemies around you splitting damage based on that number.
6 pieces: Gain the ability to use flying at level 10 (150%) and avatar like damage boost proc.
Move speed is something people have been suggesting since we found out the EXP bonus was being removed.
The AOE dmg proc could be nice.
The flying suggestion seems a bit OP for leveling, perhaps some end of combat sprint/burst of speed effect or copy vampiric speed from Azerite which is a heal and speed boost.
Not having to replace gear has always been of equal value to me, maybe even greater than the experience bonus. No I’m not interested in just bonus enchants.
Why? Because with how quickly we get gear currently that’s essentially meaningless. Wow, I dont have to replace my gear, what a benefit. Too bad I’m gonna get like 5 new replacements before the next level anyway.
Heirlooms should confer a benefit to the player. Both because they’re expensive, but also because the entire point of heirlooms is to reward veteran players. If they’re no better than questing gear, then where’s the reward?
Not gonna lie, came here to flag your post based on the title for trolling. But I like your idea. Maybe a ‘glyph’ type system where you can apply heirloom ‘bonuses’ without sacrificing enchantment slots, while not having to insta vendor every piece of gear wouldn’t be so bad.
Could have chosen a better title for the post, really a good idea.
Edit: Didn’t flag your post, was just my intention after reading title. Just wanna clear that up
Not having to right click an item in my bags and equiping it isnt exactly a super large timer saver.
Some of them, quite literally, are rewards. iirc, some are tied to guild achievements, some a rewards from missions tables, some were loot drops back in SoO.
So, i’m going to assume the fact some were the rewards for certain achievements and hallmarks a pretty valid reasons to think they’re rewards.
For the time/gold cost of players over the course of the game to obtain and upgrade these they do deserve to be better than questing gear.
The bonuses currently attached to them are rather lackluster.
The old heirlooms weren’t worth much once you got to BFA. The new heirlooms are almost entirely worthless, save for the idea that you don’t have to reapply a transmog to them until Shadowlands content. That’s really about it. It’s a bad spot for them to be in, because there doesn’t seem to be much room for them alongside the new leveling system.