Ok so like many of you, I was pretty put off by the upgrade system. I’ve been playing this game a long…well really long time. I fully understand there is going to be a loot gating system. That will never stop being a thing. I do think the loot upgrade system is a bit confusing at times with the flighstones, crests and what not. But here let me summarize what they did for those that don’t understand:
Removed the currency cap - Valor was capped, flightstones are only capped at what you can hold at one time, encouraging you to actually spend them instead of hoarding.
The cap is now placed on the amount of fragments for each crest you can get. If it makes it easier, think of crest fragments as the two focus’s with one more baby one added for the whelping category to help bridge catchup gear. For week one we are capped at 300 whelpling/drake (20 full crests), 150 wyrm (10 full crests), and aspects im unsure but assuming 150 (10 crests as well).
The acutal gear - This is the best and most AMAZING part- So gear comes with multiple gear type tags (adventurer, explorer, veteran, champion, hero - etc). LFR Raid drops veteran which has a ilvl cap of 424 - So LFR gear can reach halfway through what normal base drops at. Normal starts droping at 415 and upgradable to 437 (champion tag). Heroic drops Hero gear which can cap at 441. Mythic has no tag and simply starts dropping at 441.
So what this means is no matter if you get your juicy trinket from LFR/Normal/Mythic you can increase that piece a lot closer to the gear ceiling. For example:
LFR VoTI drops Incarnate trinket at 382 - Normal drops at 395 -Heroic drops at 408 - Mythic 421
LFR Aberrus drops Beacon of the beyond at 411 and is Upgradable to 424 -Normal drops at 424 and is upgradable to 437 - Heroic drops at 437 and is upgradable to 441- Mythic drops at 450.
So previous system each difficulty is a static 13 ilvls difference
New system is scale that has its largest gap at LFR (as it should) with shrinking gaps each difficulty you move up.
Old-
LFR - Mythic: 382 - 421, 39 ilvls
Normal - Mythic: 395 - 421, 26 ilvls
Heroic - Mythic: 408-421, 13 ilvls
New-
LFR - Mythic: 424 - 450, 26 ilvls
Normal - Mythic: 437-450, 13 ilvls
Heroic - Mythic: 441-450, 9 ilvls
One other note To even more reflect the potency of this, I used a low tier mythic item in the old system and the pinnacle item level tier in the new system. For other trinkets and gear, the sooner it drops in the mythic progression the even SMALLER it gets.
It’s definitely an improvement on the system. Hopefully this helped those confused with how this system works and is beneficial across all tiers of difficulty and content.
But that’s not a good thing. That just means that the gear when you get it is not optomised, and you have to make it good. People don’t get gear from a single tier. It’s not hard, and has already happened to me, to have a piece of gear you have put points into upgrading, only to get an item that is a lower item level but a higher tier. So it can one day be a higher item level. But first I have to spend resources upgrading it. For now I just have to carry it around.
That is not fun! That takes the fun out of getting a new piece of gear! That’s literally the reason they gave for removing reforging from the game! In fact it’s also reminiscent of azerite gear, where you’d get a higher item level item but not year have the necklace high enough to unlock the powers on it.
what feels “bad” to me, is that much of what drops in the caverns is plain useless.
If you had a “geared” toon, even from LFR and mid-level mythics, none of the explorer stuff is worth anything.
If you have been using that later time of 10.0.7 to get gear for your alts in the forbidden reach, your alts are already at 395. the explorer gear gets you to 398 by chasing rares (hoo boy).
I just don’t quite understand two “catch up systems”.
Now that we are actually in the new content, my main toons are getting from ~405/406 and approaching 415. that feels like progress.
But now the crest systems is the hold up. more chasing rares. mostly getting whelp stuff when I need drake stuff.
Crests can be traded down, but not up. and they are soulbound (I think) not account bound. so again, I am spending time on my primary toons and not getting the mats I need to upgrade the actually useful stuff.
I realize that blizz is having to create early season rewards for all levels of players, but I am not convinced that more “catch up” gear helps or that the rate at which crest mats drop feels right.
Sparks are different. since they can craft the most powerful items, I can see that being in a gated system. but crests are run of the mill mats. they should drop with more frequency, in my opinion.
If you already have a piece of a higher item level, the lower item level item for the same slot costs reduced flightstones and no crests last I checked.
Yes it does. Up to that same level. Then the crest cost is back for levels beyond. And I have still spent more flightstones to get it to that same level anyway, even if they are reduced slightly. So I’m not actually saving anything. At the end of the day all it is telling you is that if you have even a chance of getting an item from a higher tier for a slot, don’t ever upgrade it.
STOP WHINING. This is better (faster to gear up) compared to previous Seasons. It’s raining gear… all of them upgradable. You just have to pick the right one from a large pile of garbage. And there’s many loots that are of the right ones.
But the more active you are, the more loots you get, the easier to pick and upgrade stuffs. But if you’re lazy, slower but the loots/ gear are there for you.
You’re just describing the problem. Lots of gear that’s not worth investing in just emphasises the pointlessness of the system. Why bother investing any points when there’s a high chance of getting something else that is more worth the points?
You can upgrade gear a lot quicker, especially with no IO requirement, but unless you’re starting off at champion, you’ll be upgrading slots multiple times.
Play smart not play hard. If you are active, you go to the hardest content that you could do… do them over and over to get pile of loots and pick the right ones for upgrade. On me, right now I have 3 chosen gear out of 30 loots that I garbaged. Upgrading those 3 to the max level would take time. I would get more chosen gear while farming the same drake/whelp upgrader stuffs.
If you are not piling up loots becoz you are lazy or whatever softer term you like and you have fewer loots to choose for upgrade, you would be on the dilemma you are describing.
Keep in mind that there are discounts on upgrading, as well.
Once you upgrade or obtain an item at a certain item level, any upgrades to other items to reach that item level for that given slot will have a discount. For instance, once you obtain a 434 chest piece, upgrading any other chest piece up to 434 will have discounts.
That means it’s not “punishing” you for upgrading a second piece. And once you hit the threshold, you then spend the same amount you would have anyway.
It’s open world content. Of course it’s not going to be worthwhile to you if you do high end content. But the flightstones are always relevant and so are the Crests.
