You want to give us 6 tiers of loot??? Ok.
Oh, you want to also add 8 levels of upgrades for EACH TIER OF LOOT? Ok.
If you want to make us farm 6 levels of tier…at least hard cap the ilvl for the love of God…
And take away all the dang currencies… Bruh…
Its not that bad. You dont want to upgrade anything until your at least 580 gear. Its optional to do it under that, but i dont mind it in order to continually progress. I still have yet to do mythics though and im fine with the current gear grabs, as its so much everywhere that its very alt friendly.
I just don’t like incremental upgrades in general, whether it’s via drops or an actual upgrade system like we currently have.
Always feels like a forced grind for minimal value.
I understand it adds up, but +3 ilvl increments on single pieces mean nothing individually.
I hated gearing in Destiny 2 for this exact reason. Everything was based on what your current gear score was, so you’d only ever get, you know, a couple points above that from anything.
If WoW is going to keep it, it could definitely be streamlined a bit though.
Don’t change the currency name every season. Make it a forever thing. Wipe the currency at the start of each season. If we need a fix to catalyzing old gear for appearances, alright fine, just let people choose which appearance they want from their piece. It’s not like ilvl matters for Shadowlands gear anymore.
That alone simplifies things. Crest 1, 2, 3, 4. Done.
I don’t care how they’re named. Maybe just copy the Upgrade Track titles? Adventurer, Champion, Hero, Myth?
Now, delete Valorstones. Crests are already timegated. The additional requirement of Valorstones is pointless. Why have 2 currencies for the exact same thing? It creates an initial hurdle to upgrading for no reason, and turns into something that we don’t even think about because the crest limits gate us much more than Valorstones do. Remove them. Crests alone suffice.
Now the currencies are at least a little more straightforward.
Next, get rid of the Crest Overlap between Upgrade Tracks.
If something drops on Champion Track, Champion-level Crests should be able to upgrade it all the way. It’s just a timegated grind to get there on more pieces.
The overlap they currently run with makes everyone who hits their content wall before “literally the highest content bracket” end up with 2 tiers that effectively have the same max ilvl, because they can’t actually get the Crests they need to differentiate the tracks from each other. Currently, this mostly happens for people stuck on Hero Track who aren’t comfortable or otherwise can’t / won’t do M+8 or Mythic Raiding. But it’s a problem. Their gear might as well all be Champion Track, there is no difference, and that’s dumb.
Get rid of the overlap.
And, lastly, remove the need for Enchanters to turn your Crests into something usable for crafting. They already have their meat and potatoes. We already have to get our Spark. We already have to get the actual mats for the item. Crests are a currency. So just have one of the required mats be x number of Crests. So instead of “Enchanted Weathered Harbinger Crest” being a mat, it’d just be “30 Weathered Harbinger Crests” (or whatever generic names we switch to). This makes having someone craft higher ilvl stuff so much more straightforward. Sending non-crafters to the enchanting vendor every time they want to get something made is extremely unintuitive.
While I don’t like the way we have to go about upgrading (I think two different currencies, one of which has several tiers to keep straight, is b-a-n-a-n-a-s) I am glad we are able to upgrade gear.
It means (for me) my gear can be slightly better than trash, and it also adds an alternative route to acquiring mog from the current expansion. In most cases I’d have to wait an expansion or two to even consider collecting some of this stuff. Last expansion I actually did raiding outside of LFR.
Let me just burst this tinfoil hat theory before this goes any further.
There are plenty of overlaps with all the gear upgrades. This allows more means to gear towards thresholds without getting “stuck”.
Yeah I’m not a fan of upgrading either. It seems to reintroduce the very thing they cited for removing reforging, in that it kills a lot of the fun of getting a new piece of loot. You can get a piece on a higher track, but your current piece might be a higher level. So until you go back and upgrade the new one it just sits in your bag. And hopefully you have enough currency for the upgrade! Hell, it’s worse than reforging for this really.
I’ve taken one look at that chart.
The fact it exists tells me WoW’s gearing system has reached peak stupidity.
No game should EVER have a gearing system that complicated.
Good news: WoW doesn’t have a gearing system that complicated, because it really isn’t complicated at all.
It’s not complicated. It’s just showing you what drops what and the range.
Most do not even bother with a majority of that chart.
I made the mistake of using my catalyst charges on lower tier gear. I pretty much reset my main to no tier when everyone else has like 6 pieces. RIP lol.
The game is a loot carousel. Get better loot > new content comes out with better loot > engage in that.
Learn to enjoy the journey
I love the upgrade system. It’s pretty much what I asked for when I gave feedback about the Korthia gearing system.
Like most of the systems in WoW that people whine about, gear upgrades are a direct response to the whining people did about all the other gear systems.
I would say they are a combination of Blizzard’s fixation on getting people used to never stopping the grind and forcing them into harder content than they are ready for.
It’s 100% borrowed power. You demanded it and you got it.
The alternative to this is to remove non-raiders/-M+/-PvP:ers their gear. So… yes. The different tiers of loot exist in the game for a good reason.
Yes, because this adds more depth to your gear that’s universally good for the game and players participating at every level of play.
Folks complaining about loot existing for more than just endgame end pillar players is and will always be a really weird stance to take.
Just because someone can write something to explain it doesn’t make it complicated. This is a bizarre hill to stand, and even less die, on.
You asked for borrowed power back and they gave it to you.
You mean, not counting the ones that opt out of the system because they don’t feel that grinding out content they don’t want to play to get hundreds of unnoticeably small upgrades feels like it’s entertaining.
Having more gear upgrade levels and ranges =/= borrowed power.
its pretty bad and confusing. if you know it because you are used to doesn’t mean its good or ok.
we had the perfect system with only valor and 14/14 upgrade paths. no need to loot the same item over and over. but for some reason they have to over complicate everything they touch.
Make all the lame excuses you want. It’s 100% borrowed power. You mean they’re going to let you keep it? Can you carry over your upgrades? Even diablo immoral let you do that.
It’s literally not borrowed power though…
Borrowed power was things like legion artifacts, azerite armor, SL legos and the covenant system in general.
Just being able to upgrade your gear is not borrowed power lol.