How will Blizzard handle artifacts after Legion?

[Evangeliste]

I reckon Class Halls will be staying, reason is Class Mounts will be obtainable still after Legion. I'm sure that was said on a blue post or an interview posted on MMO-Champ.
As for weapons, I reckon they will be drained - ultimately keeping them around for more nostalgia and placed into the Class Halls because in the end, things like Ashbringer or Doomhammer being destroyed would be like trying to remove the strips of the United States Flags... It's too iconic and in-grained in the Universe to completely abandon them to the echoes of playerbase hear'say.

If you believe we are venturing towards Northrend again like I do, Frostmourne being drained could help with the era of Bolvar as Lich King... And kinda play out with strengths such as deframing you as the Deathlord and reduce you down to a pawn that was played ever so cleverly by Bolvar into doing his bidding like raise four new Horsemen and things from their Class Mounts campaign - which would work with others. Rather than being in the lead so to speak as you are now, you get knocked back down to above average standards.

[Zigrifid]

If they dont find a good way to get the weapons back , im sure they will just deactivate the traits and use ability and the first weap we will get in the next expansion is gonna be better than our artifacts .

[aisatsana]

I really hope we get rid of them and go back to regular weapon drops. It was fun while it lasted but I prefer just regular weapon drops.

[Mirishka]

Probably something to do with destroying our artefacts to kill Sargeras...

All the artefact power we've gathered gets channeled together into some beam/force that disintegrates his soul, or something thus rendering the artifact useless/destroyed.

Something like this seems likely. The amount of power these weapons will have accumulated/absorbed over the course of Legion is probably obscene, and unleashing that against something would almost certainly be catastrophic.

[Frozenbeef]

Old gods/ sargeras/ Azshara / next threat eats them or makes them useless.

[Mirishka]

I really hope we get rid of them and go back to regular weapon drops. It was fun while it lasted but I prefer just regular weapon drops.

Personally I prefer the Artifact system, the idea of keeping a weapon and improving it over time is more interesting to me than "new raid tier, I hope last boss drops gun/2H/1H, big upgrade 4 me!"

If I could have upgraded Quel'serrar in BC/Wrath/etc it would have been the only 1H I ever used.

The 'closure' I'm most interested in is with the DK weapons... Bolvar is definitely planning something and I'm hella curious if our Artifacts play into that to any degree.

[Thetruth1400]

There's gonna be an <Event> that renders all <Artifact Weapons> useless

Pretty much that. I'm confident that we're going to go to Argus and in the final fight it's going to be "Oh, we need the power of all these weapons to kill the big bad!" or "Oh we need the power of these weapons to seal Argus from our world!"

All I can say is it will be some hack writing that causes them to lose their power because Blizzard wrote themselves into a corner with the weapons.

[Tadewen]

So how would people continue to farm/kill the final boss if we destroy our artifact or deplete it's power on the first kill?? Whatever happens to the artifact I imagine it won't happen until you step into the next expansion. Maybe turn it in as an initial quest for a blue weapon that grants all skin appearances you had acquired on the artifact but then what about the artifacts for your other specs?

[PragmaticGamer]

As long as they're copying D3, maybe use that cube to be able to choose perks going forward?

[Alopex]

"Legacy Weapon: Bonus is inactive"

The lore reason will be different, but the in-game mechanic will be the one they "developed" with old tier sets.

[Derpleton]

If you like your Ashbringer you can keep your Ashbringer

[DeicideUH]

My guess:

Lore:
We will sacrifice the artifacts' power to destroy Sargeras. The artifact itself will remain, and we will keep a depowered version of it.

Gameplay:
Patch 7.X last patch. No gameplay changes to artifacts until next expansion arrives, but lorewise they'll be depowered.

Patch 8.0: Classes revamped, as usual for every expansion. Artifacts lose their skill tree and associated powers. No more grind. All Artifact Power items become gray vendor items. New expansion has no more relics, we will have gear drops again. Unlocked Artifact appearances are added to our transmog tab and will be usable by any spec of that class (but I doubt they'll be available for other classes).

[Strangewayes]

Since the day they announced we'd all be getting Ashbringer, many of us couldn't help but wonder... how could we ever upgrade Ashbringer?

I suspect there are a few reasonable conclusions we could arrive at on how Blizzard will degrade the Artifact system gracefully to make way for a new system. Hopefully, we'll also be able to keep all of the skins we've acquired.

1. We replace Ashbringer with a Green Sword of the Monkey. It just becomes obsolete and remains in our bags.

2. They will introduce a new set of Artifacts to continue with the system, but in order to acquire the new artifact, you must first place the old one in your Order Hall (on display or something). This way they have handled it lore wise, and then systems wise can move you into a new Artifact tree.

3. Part of the starting questline in the new expansion will make us -destroy- our artifacts and remove them. Then we'll get some blue quest weapon to replace it with, this will unlock the leveling content so we'll need to do it before we can progress.

4. We will actually be keeping our Artifacts into the next expansion, but just have more traits or a restructuring similar to the 7.2.5 new traits.



Or something else, or some sort of combination of the above. What are your thoughts?

You just keep the artifact forever and collect 500 trillion AP per quest. And the talent tree is 10 pages long you have to scroll through.

[Xenonn]

i hope they get destroyed at some point, can't think of any other reason to just give them up

[Flurryfang]

What Blizzard will proberly do, is require us to channel the power of our weapens into something during the final fight and after that, we will be told, that our weapens "Are slowly losing their power and will proberly not be usefull for long". This pretty much sets it up for, that when the next expansion comes, our weapens will become grey and magicless, only raw materials.

I personally hope, that they will create a new artifact or some other object for us to spend AP on. I have really enjoyed AP and the artifact system and i hope, that Blizzard remakes the succes.

[Dug]

If the weapons are given up and we do get the keep the appearances that's going to be odd for Ashbringer, doomhamer and frostmourne blades

[Deleted]

3. Part of the starting questline in the new expansion will make us -destroy- our artifacts and remove them. Then we'll get some blue quest weapon to replace it with, this will unlock the leveling content so we'll need to do it before we can progress.

They've already confirmed we're not going to have artifacts in the next expac - so I'd guess we'll get a questline in the pre-expansion patch that either destroys them or makes use give them to some padawan.

Either way, we're not having them in next expac.

[Manabomb]

Honestly I would like to see the weapons themselves go, but the system remain. Keep us gaining "power points" to spend into traits (possibly even further it by making trait trees) and all that jazz, but we actually have to care about our weapon slot and Blizzard can finally start making decent raid drop weapons again.

I think the dumbest part of Legion is that Blizzard showed their hand so early when it comes to artifact weapons and whether or not we'll have them going forward. That's a question to be answered when the next expac is announced, not when a X.1 patch hasn't dropped for the fresh one.

[Sansnom]

Or something else, or some sort of combination of the above. What are your thoughts?

My thoughts?

Like football, or soccer to our friends on the other side of the pond, we keep the original for a while and when the next season, or XP, arrives, we return the original and have a small replica of the original instead.

[Worgoblin]

This is one of the biggest questions going into the next expansion. I wonder if they will carry over the artifact system, but do a reset, in the form of the Legion artifacts being destroyed in some event... and then we get all new ones.