Should loot be made scarce again?

[thunterman]

That we can agree upon. There can be added RNG to let pieces grow slightly stronger, but there needs to be a cap relative to the difficulty of the content, and sockets being RNG as well can go die in a dumpster fire. I want sockets and gemming return to what it was back in Cata.

That's all I want, A suggestion I've seen float around is that maybe have WF = 5 and TF = 10 ilvl's, with a 20ilvl difficulty step. Thus, a heroic item that is TF would be 10 below a mythic with no RNG upgrade. Shit, for some classes t hat would even outweigh a socket. Mythic+ could have a TF Chance multiplier per level, with certain levels gaining a 20 step e.t.c so it matches raids as I suggested earlier.

RNG is fine if it's tightly controlled, what we have now is just total chaos.

hmm this is interesting. i also experience far more titanforges/warforges in M+ and the weekly chest than in raids, too.

i also think its a factor in how much you play. 930 ilvl will be norm mode for antorus in the next patch. getting to 930 should be relatively easy, and if youre there you could wait til antorus for more 'meaningful' upgrades. A lot of people who play regularly in my guild are 940+ now, so they could probably jump straight into heroic antorus content off the bat if they wanted to. When i get to the point where my only upgrades can come for TF, i just decide to take a break til the next patch or gear an alt (aside from the inner tearings of me telling me i should be grinding for legendaries, which i try to ignore so i can enjoy the game lol). I think that cycle is gonna be pretty consistent for WoW at this point tho.

They actually increased the chance of TF on your weekly chest. It was in a blue post (it happened with 7.3) I've had a TF item every single week since, and it's miles ahead of my heroic ToS gear. And yea, 930 norm antorus is not enough, even non-raiders are over 930 by now. You can hit 930 easily in M+ alone. I know it's only normal, but IMO The only thing stronger than Antorus Normal loot should be ToS Mythic, maybe even WF Mythic too. This is new shit, even on normal it should offer upgrades, all normal is to be is a couple wasted hours practice for heroic on day 1.

[A dot Ham]

If this were a decade ago, sure. But in modern times, Nope. Gear gets replaced every tier. It’s a fact of WoW.

Not sure this is what he is talking about.

http://www.wowhead.com/item=146774/n...#same-model-as

vs

http://www.wowhead.com/item=47708/du...#same-model-as

@digichi right?

Instead of that one item dropping say... 10% of the time. In Legion that item drops 50% of the time. But only 10% of the time... does it have the killer stats you're really looking for.

That doesn't even take into account the chance to titanforge and all the the incremental levels of 5 in between.

I shouldn't need to keep 5 different version of the same piece of gear and have to sim out which is the best actual upgrade.

- - - Updated - - -

Actually we should remove gear itself. Pretty archaic progression system.

In favor of...

[digichi]

They actually increased the chance of TF on your weekly chest. It was in a blue post (it happened with 7.3) I've had a TF item every single week since, and it's miles ahead of my heroic ToS gear.

oh interesting. well there u go. looks like u could start running a +10 myth/week, and by the time antorus launches, u would basically have a character 930-940 ilvl and ready for new content (other variables not included. lol).

[epLe]

Maybe not to the levels of vanilla loot, but its gone too far towards diablo style loot now.

[Deleted]

Absolutely fucking not having gold or artifact power drop from a boss is already the most frustrating thing in the game, and you want that to beveven more frustrating?

I'd rather have things be less satisfying than more frustrating.

[MoanaLisa]

Actually we should remove gear itself. Pretty archaic progression system.

I agree with this. Progression through what you wear is silly. Your character's progress and power should be primarily reliant character activities. This way power could be redefined a few ways, much like skills. You could still have more power accrue from more difficult content and from gear but a wider system should allow for more ways to play and characters that are defined by the things they do.

[digichi]

Not sure this is what he is talking about.

http://www.wowhead.com/item=146774/n...#same-model-as

vs

http://www.wowhead.com/item=47708/du...#same-model-as

@digichi right?

Instead of that one item dropping say... 10% of the time. In Legion that item drops 50% of the time. But only 10% of the time... does it have the killer stats you're really looking for.

That doesn't even take into account the chance to titanforge and all the the incremental levels of 5 in between.

I shouldn't need to keep 5 different version of the same piece of gear and have to sim out which is the best actual upgrade.

this is the type of stuff i had in mind when i made the post, lol. ty for making it clearer and adding an example/comparison.

too much versions of the same gear does make it feel watered down. do i use the shoulders with 886 mastery and 457 haste, or 886 haste and 457 mastery. does it matter? why are there two versions of this... i keep a lot of gear stashed in my bank just in case i can use it to 'optimize' my stats in a week or two when i get that random TF from the weekly chest. Okee dokee, replacing 925 ring for 940 ring with completely different stats. lets go to the bank and play around with all my other gear. hmmmm. alrighty. do i sacrifice ilvl here for stats there? we're about to find out.... lets dial it back a little.

when i inspect the issue more, i see a lot of these gear duplicates i think are naturally coming from the m+ system. 10+ versions of the same dungeon gear with incremental upgrades to the stat. is this a byproduct of the new system that just feels weird and unnatural right now (just because its new?) perhaps. still worthy to critique though.

as a side note, for the aesthetics side: instead of the same pieces from myth 1-15, they could have different sets for 1-5, 5-10, 10-15... (someone wearing m+2 looks the same as someone wearing m+10 gear at this time. not a huge worry. just a fun thing the blizz artists could do if its worth the hassle.)

[HuxNeva]

My main which I raid mythic with has just reached 936 ilvl. My paladin which I started playing just over a week ago is now 932 just from doing 1 run of hc ToS and purchasing gear from the AH. While it might be nice to be able to gear alts to the point where they can rival your mains, it shouldnt be the case, my alts should be significantly lower than my main but due to how easy it is to obtain gear and titanforging, it makes it feel like theres no point in spending hours wiping to mythic when you can just enter LFR and get a 930 titanforged bis relic (Yes that actually happened)

Bet your main with ilvl 936 is waaaaay closer to a BiS stat and trait distribution for the ilvl that your 'ran once though HC' alt, and tha tincludes guildies tunneling you loot they long ago stopped needing. And aren't we tired of that 'one lucky forge from LFR' meme yet? enjoy your one million hours of LFR farming to equal your 5 weeks of Mythic loot.

[MisterBigglez]

Bet your main with ilvl 936 is waaaaay closer to a BiS stat and trait distribution for the ilvl that your 'ran once though HC' alt, and tha tincludes guildies tunneling you loot they long ago stopped needing. And aren't we tired of that 'one lucky forge from LFR' meme yet? enjoy your one million hours of LFR farming to equal your 5 weeks of Mythic loot.

See, heres the thing, my paladins stats are actually pretty good in terms of bis, but then again, a ret paladins stat weights are very close to each other so its easier. I joined a pug, so besides a pair of legs, the rest of the gear I got myself. Just "one lucky forge" eh? nah I got quite a few actually but who cares right? ^_^

As I mention to someone else, I didn't say farming lfr for titanforge was efficient, ofc doing mythic is going to be the best because you are guaranteed to get 930, but how many people do mythic exactly? If I can just log into an alt and get 940 belts, 925 tier gloves, 930 relics just from doing lfr, something has gone very wrong with how loot works.

[Thorbalt]

No, professions just need to go back to how they were in bc/wrath. which means gems and enchants need a major revisit, i loved the old ways on those

[Dekkers]

Gear should at least have more meaning and permanence.
It would greatly enhance the satisfaction of earning loot and defeating content.

[HuxNeva]

If I can just log into an alt and get 940 belts, 925 tier gloves, 930 relics just from doing lfr, something has gone very wrong with how loot works.

That would be at the very extreme of RNG, and you would probably be part of a 0.0000001% of RNG gods.

- - - Updated - - -

Gear should at least have more meaning and permanence.
It would greatly enhance the satisfaction of earning loot and defeating content.

So, no re-rolls during an entire expansion?

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

Personally I think if loot becomes more scarce again then Blizz needs to massively increase the Pity Gold we get. Right now it still feels terrible to not get loot. Because the gold is chump change, augment runes aren't fun, and with Artifact Knowledge now at stupid levels we don't get noticably more powerful from bosses dropping AP Tokens.

[Marrilaife]

Nope, it shouldn't be "scarce" but it should reflect difficulty and effort you put into the content. Catch up gear is fine, as long as it's not up to par with the best gear in the game - people need to be able to catch up or you're scaring off new / returning players.

Now having crafted, world boss or world quest gear equal or better to the top pve / pvp gear is another story. Well, crafted gear would be fine to be super high if crafting required appropriate amounts of effort, for example the crafted legendary is in my opinion fine, you need to do 2 dungeons, 1 raid boss, grind broken shore a bit and get 8k nethershards or get someone else to sell the component to you. Now the argus gear is a joke, 935 trinket for handful of easy / cheap mats and the only downside is it forces you to be an alchemist (as if people weren't already rerolling to it since the start of legion with the crazy old pots).

Also the ilvl inflation because you can get tons of ilvl by grinding trivial content and being lucky creates this problem that pugs become more and more elitists because people see "ilvl appropriate" pugs fail, people within "suitable ilvl bracket" have no clue about their class or the raid / dungeon because they got to that level by grinding trivial content. So we have things like not only "ilvl" or "achievement" but "armorying everyone must have multi-clears" or "checking wowprogress must have x m+ score".

I kinda noticed it myself, inviting slightly lower ilvl people to my m+ group but people who have 8/9hc TOS, some tier bonuses, decent trinkets, enchants and gems nets me better experience than people who just have ilvl but zero experience in any content, zero gems or enchants and just slapped what is highest ilvl they found. I mean 8/9hc by now isn't even anything amazing, but it shows they're active on that character and play it in group pve setting instead of just solo.

I don't mind loot being plentiful as long as the quality of it differentiates the players who put effort and those who just unsub every patch and only ride on catch ups.

[Greco]

The answer is absolutely, 100%, yes. Everyone voting No is being very short sighted in my opinion.

My RL friend started playing WoW with me for the first time ever, 3 weeks ago. in 3 weeks time he has two level 110's (DH and Monk), and his DH iLvl is 938 without ever stepping foot in a raid. He has played many other MMO's and is now getting to the point where he is ready to quit because he is not finding any satisfaction in actually finding upgrades. I started playing on a vanilla server a few months ago in my down time, and the gameplay is extremely refreshing to me. Perhaps I am in the minority but I completely share my friend's sentiment.

[Soon-TM]

I want less loot, but more meaningful. Not this nonsense of getting a +20 ilvl upgrade that actually isn't one due to completely wrong secondary stats.

[Spotnick]

Must say it's a bit sad that in 2 months you are fully decked from heroic and basically have to either play alts or play for luck at this point.

Not that the feeling of getting no upgrade for weeks was fun either.

[Deleted]

Legion says hello. They literally stated that the old "raid-or-die"-design had to go.

Seems to me that the simpletons, are the people believing that their own jaded attitudes somehow reflect the entire game.
Also, GW2, really? I'm sure its systems work for that game, but which game is the bigger success again? If it's such objectively superior "fun", why aren't people flocking to GW2 over WoW, FFXIV and the rest?

The best possible loot IS already scarce, nobody is decked in 950 item level from LFR. And no, the game is not a "game for simpletons". The GW2 systems are not exactly rocket science...

So, do you ever have opinions of your own?

GW2 is objectively a better game because its better than WoW in more aspects than WoW is better than GW2. Mostly because WoW only does one thing. Also, quality has never been synonym with great sales (but GW2 improved alot and the latest xpac is quite popular).

As someone who wants WoW to get better i can do more than just pout and think this game is great cause it may still has the biggest ammount of players. I can also say it's lost more than half it's players in the last few years. Maybe that puts you in perspective.

Oh and finally, i didn't say it's a game for simpletons, it's a game made by simpletons. But of course you would read it like that eh?

[Daffan]

The problem is that it's too easy to get loot.

There should be LOTS of avenues of acquiring loot, so that every playstyle is happy including crafting for once.

But stop giving it just for logging in and killing the boar that took two seconds and no skill. This game(Expansion) is rife with content that is obsolete, trivialized and just a waste of time. So much welfare and catchup makes stuff so pointless, I wonder how many people actually have done EN before it became obsolete. Why did the average person bother farming AP for weeks when they know it's only gonna take 5 min later? Or gearing, unless your raiding Mythic, hardcore gear farming is so dumb because all it lets you do is the same stuff a little faster. Because M+ just gets boosted anyway every so often.

When they speak about character progression and sense of reward in the Q/A it feels so hilarious. Are they talking about the part where the game progresses itself? or gives you all the rewards for free? Only a very small portion of the player-base actually concerns themselves with character progression because they actually need it for Mythic Raiding, everyone else just gets the game played for them (Myself included these days)