Mandatory up-to-date-boosts

[Deleted]

Store companions, store mounts, heirlooms and other stuff all started out as one-offs. But as every expansion stacked up, everything had to be up to date. Heirlooms are now a mandatory upgrade for every expansion, each expansion there's a new set of heirlooms with a higher level cap.

Seeing the amount of cash blizzard is stacking up since the boost-to-90 (wouldn't suprise me if they have made more than on any other expansion by now, i look around and most people buy 5+ boosts), will we see a boost-to-100 in the expansion after WoD?

Surely the intake was great, but will they expand their ideas to cash in more? Making it a small slippery slope towards a full-on blizzstore game? Or will they stay with the 90 boost and leave it there?

[Jessicka]

It will be updated to Boost to 100 in the final tier of WoD; not exactly out of line with RaF and SoR boost services which also received updates to keep up with advancing level caps.

[RoKPaNda]

What do heirlooms have to do with it?

They MIGHT do a boost to 100 at the end of WoD. Can't really say for sure yet.

[Darsithis]

Heirlooms are now a mandatory upgrade for every expansion, each expansion there's a new set of heirlooms with a higher level cap.

No. Heirlooms were included in Wrath but weren't upgraded to level 85 until MoP. A few new ones have appeared in Cata and MoP but they haven't been upgraded in every one. Nor are heirlooms in any way related to boosts or the cash shop. They're also far from mandatory. A dedicated player can level more than fast enough without heirlooms.

[Dahij]

I wouldn't mind if they put up some rep boost items, like 25% or 50% more rep for 2 hours.

[Arrowstormen]

With how much the 90 boost has been marked as a 'pick up and play the end-game' thing, I'd expect the boost to be upgraded within 2-3 months of WoD personally. Might sound a bit odd at first, but really; $60 is paid to get straight to the end game, not get dropped with ~20% (in terms of real time) of the levelling still to go. I can see them defending it for a while but I'm sure it won't take long for the consumers to want it to remain as it is for the moment, a max level boost.

It's a boost to WoD content so you can play with your friends in the new expansion. No way they'll boost the boost to skip past the leveling in WoD.

[Jessicka]

With how much the 90 boost has been marked as a 'pick up and play the end-game' thing, I'd expect the boost to be upgraded within 2-3 months of WoD personally. Might sound a bit odd at first, but really; $60 is paid to get straight to the end game, not get dropped with ~20% (in terms of real time) of the levelling still to go. I can see them defending it for a while but I'm sure it won't take long for the consumers to want it to remain as it is for the moment, a max level boost.

They're insistent enough of the whole flying thing that they want people to see the game and experience the content. If they have a long final tier as is basically normal now, that'll be when and why they'd update it. I can see them leaving it at 90 if they actually manage to live up to the idea of shortening the last tier - but I actually think it's intended that way to allow players to 'finish up'.

[SlippyCheeze]

It's a boost to WoD content so you can play with your friends in the new expansion. No way they'll boost the boost to skip past the leveling in WoD.

Exactly this ^^^^ -- the design is like the Timeless Isle: the epic gear there was specifically designed to get you geared up and ready to play in the final tier of MoP as quickly as possible, so you didn't have to grind you painful way through every single raid in sequence to join your friends if, say, you took a month off.

At the start of WoD, and during the active life of it, the boost will do the same thing: get you reasonably quickly to the point you can play with your friends. Not the "heroic raiding" ones, the "LFR and flex gearing treadmill" ones. At the very end of WoD I fully expect another Timeless Isle equivalent to let you skip more of the treadmill grinding, and get into the final tier. Possibly even a mid-point one, like the crafted epics.

Finally, they may or may not bump it past 90 in WoD+1 -- I would have said "no" when they put in the profession boost at 60, because that fit my theory that they wanted to mostly encourage skipping over the older content where levelling, honestly, kinda sucks. 1-60 rebuild in cata made it good (for some definitions) and generally smooth; you can feel the rough transition to an older experience when you hit outland. (Again, subjective good, but lets assume that Blizzard think that cata questing is better than BC/WotLK questing, for the same of the argument, kk.)

The boost offered the most rewards for levelling through modern content, skipping outdated stuff, and dropping right back into current stuff. Granted, it also skipped MoP questing, but (a) you could go back and do that without it being ridiculously simple, and (b) the boost launched when catchup put you at a specific point through timeless, and pretty much matched it -- down to putting you *on* timeless.

If they drop you at the start of WoD for WoD+1 they you effectively "pay" for skipping the worst levelling experience the first time around, and they use the positive reinforcement motivator: skip it all if you want, but you get much better rewards for experiencing it. Seems coherent, and suggests to me that they won't raise the boost point, at least for a while.