I just got KSM on my main and went to upgrade a piece on an alt… and alts don’t benefit from KSM or the lesser achieves anymore. Have to grind it on all toons to upgrade m+ gear. And now I can’t just grind it out on an alt in a week because of the new system…
Not sure if its a bug or if Blizzard is just once again being hostile towards their own customers
/eyeroll
/eyeroll indeed
As one of my guildies is fond of saying… “Fun detected.”
Blizzard is trying to kill their game its obvious
I’m sure they will eventually make it account wide, it’s just early. The season just started. I don’t know about you guys but I play a lot of M+ on a lot of different chars and I couldn’t imagine having such a surplus of gear that you are ready to start upgrading. I still have such a long way to go before spending valor to n anything. We’ve only gotten one vault item. We are already off to a better spot this season farming 15’s week 1 and 2 because of the gear going into the season. Everything will Shape up nicely in the end.
I upgraded my shield to max this week. Shields cost 250 a tier and have one of the largest impacts on my general tankiness. I will not be mad if there’s a 252 shield in the vault. It won’t have been wasted valor. But, if it’s 252 vs 252 blood scale, I can comfortably take the blood scale.
Just to add to this, any item that costs 250 a tier is totally worth an early upgrade. Rings and necks specifically. If you get the appropriate secondaries, it’s 1 less item to worry about seeing.
I’m all for this strategy if that’s what you want, I just find a bit of patience to ultimately pay off more in the end, especially if you plan on pushing score and keys competitively at some point. I just don’t think the early upgrades benefit much in the content where everyone is doing mid range keys for loot at this point. In niche situations like a tanks shield I can see the value, especially because of how impactful it is per valor point cost, however I don’t think the kind of shield you have has much of an impact on timing keys yet. I was originally commenting on the concern OP had about not being able to upgrade alts and was trying to give a difference perspective.
It’s reduced for prot paladin, but for prot warrior, shield block is only as effective as your shields ilvl. It’s the difference between it doing 25% DR per block to 38% DR per block. Blocking being the most powerful physical damage mitigation in the game.
I’m not trying to flame here, you just underestimate the power of shield ilvl and over value valor.
I also don’t think shields are unique with this respect.
I’m not arguing that it doesn’t improve the power of your character. I agree, it absolutely does. That’s why we play! What I’m saying is, I don’t believe it has a great impact on completing the current content that people are farming. If your going for that early push then absolutely upgrade away, I’m just trying to give a better strategy for the long game if that’s what your interested in. To be honest it really will be irrelevant what path you ended up taking whether it’s upgrade early or save, so I guess just have fun with whatever you choose
This is where you’re wrong, though. A warrior with an average ilvl of 200 and a 252 shield is more capable than a warrior with an average ilvl of 230 and a 213 shield. To farm the content as a tank, you have to survive large pulls, prot warrior specifically are 100% tied to their shield ilvl. Prot paladin, less so, but still important.
I don’t think you are. Valor becomes less relevant as the tier progresses, not more. We saw this in s1. It was introduced mid tier and many players had little to no use for it. Saving is a fools bargain unless you’re trying to upgrade a 2h weapon or another incredibly pricey item.
I may never see a 252 blood scale in my box, same as I never saw a 226 in s1. There’s no amount of time or accomplishment that will make it more or less valuable to have that trinket. I would make the same argument for relevant classes with changeling or ruby.
Valor is a go between system to supplement the main system, treating it as a primary system is foolish imo.
There’s no real reason to be spending valor week 2 when there’s a high chance the vault will be giving you upgrades that you want.
Really hope they change this
This greatly depends on what a person is upgrading, and how many vault options a player has available / week. BiS items that are already 236 are usually worthwhile investments.
This is not even remotely true. The loot pool for m+ is massive. The idea that the appropriate item will drop soon™ is gambling at best and people who say things like this are often victims of the sunk cost fallacy. The item you upgrade will be useful from the moment its upgraded until its replaced.
The valor isn’t a sunk cost. Depending on the slot and how competitive the slot is, you may never see the item. How long before you stop bargaining, “surely this week will be the time it drops.”
Yeah, but then you have the risk of dumping valor points into a fancy ring, and then next week you get a 252 ring. It’s better to just wait it out a few weeks because realistically it takes 2.5-3 months to hit iLvl cap anyway.
This is exactly a sunk cost fallacy. If my stats are haste + mastery and a crit + vers ring drops, it’s not better. Especially in a ring slot. Nvm that the most valor you’ve pumped into that ring is 250 x tier which would be 750 if it was a 236. 3 dungeons, 1 weekly cap. The idea that I get the HOA ring, upgrade it then get that very same ring at 252 that week is ridiculously unlikely.
Nvm that there can’t be anything else worth grabbing at the time.
You could also run the droptimizer Sim and see that some items at 246 outperform other items at 252. I’m not saying to blindly upgrade every item, but playing this what if game is an unnecessary insertion of anxiety when the chances of getting the same item you upgraded is 3/80 chance (if you do 10 15s, which a lot of people don’t).
I guess it depends what your trying to do. I don’t feel like I need the I level right now, and always do 10 15’s at a minimum weekly. I’ll hold onto my currency for now and upgrade when I’m closer to the I level cap for the season.
I’m not hoarding a weekly currency until it becomes completely irrelevant. That’s all I’m doing and advocating. I fully upgraded my shield and when the Blood Barrier drops, I’ll upgrade it to max. After that, I have no plans, but it will probably be rings or neck. So by week 5 I’ll be mostly as powerful as I’m going to be for the tier (provided I get somewhat lucky in raid with domination stuff).
But this is 100% the wrong decision to make.
Ultimately if you go with the idea of “well, you can get upgrades from the great vault” then every item you have will be upgraded from the great vault eventually, but if you upgrade early you improve the runs you’re currently doing and help with raid progression, which is more gear.
If you get a well itemized neck or ring + a good tinket, those get upgraded 100% of the time. If you get a well itemized belt/bracers/boot (and it’s not a dom socket), those get upgraded next. All saving valor does is turn around and have 4.5k by week 5 and like one item to spend it on.
If you look at my character for example, there’s an extremely good chance I’m updating my neck because it has a socket and I’m upgrading my grim codex. None are technically BiS, but they’re still extremely strong for prog. If I replace one of them with this weeks vault (hint, I’m taking a weapon if it pops up), then I’m upgrading my belt.
My perspective is different. I don’t raid, so domination sockets won’t be a thing for me and neither will raid progression requirements to help the group as a whole. I am content on doing mid range keys for the first 8 weekly vaults and then upgrading from there and starting to push competitively. I make a list of bis dungeon items, try and collect them all, meanwhile possibly getting a few 252 versions from the vault the first 8 weeks or so and upgrading the rest. This works for me well in my situation. If I was raiding or actively in a M+ push group it would absolutely be counterproductive and selfish to save valor. In my case, it works the best.