Nerfing old tier sets makes no sense

[Geckoo]

I think that anything from previous raids that is still worth using over new items from a fresh new raid needs to be nerfed, but just as much as new items need to be buffed to be more interesting. What i hope is that next week almost all possible tier combinations sim lower than just using the new tier and no one feels the need to go back to ToS or even nighthold hoping for a titanforged tier or trinket.

[Accendor]

It makes A LOT of sense.. nobody wants to go do old raids to hope for Titanforged.

I mean, I do. But that does not matter actually: If T21 would just be better right from the start there would be no need to do old content for T20 or T19.

[Spotnick]

I mean, I do. But that does not matter actually: If T21 would just be better right from the start there would be no need to do old content for T20 or T19.

It's a new problem due to legendaries, titanforged and opening 6 slots to tier... that's why they are removing tier sets next xpac.

Otherwise, ilvl, despite of the bonus, was always making it better.

[dcc626]

Aff locks still use 2pcT19, which sucks for me personally because I don't have any of that over 900 lol. It's fairly ridiculous that tier sets from 2 tiers ago is still better than wearing the new tier.

except aff locks want to run 4pc t20/ 2pc t21. until they nerf t20 that is.

[Tolian]

except aff locks want to run 4pc t20/ 2pc t21. until they nerf t20 that is.

Dunno, maybe. I'm stilling seeing top logs using 2/4 19/20. Seems unlikely the guys posting them don't have at least 2 pieces of T21, but it's week 1 so maybe? Either way, I think you'll agree it was a thing all the way up thru last week, 5 months after T20 came out...

[Deleted]

Dunno, maybe. I'm stilling seeing top logs using 2/4 19/20. Seems unlikely the guys posting them don't have at least 2 pieces of T21, but it's week 1 so maybe? Either way, I think you'll agree it was a thing all the way up thru last week, 5 months after T20 came out...

The raid has been out for 3 days. No one is going to run 4 set yet except for the people split running like Method.
Holy shit, you can't be this stupid? Can you?

Infracted

[Accendor]

It does make sense because ANY AND ALL gear can TF now. Which means if a spec's T20's set bonus is better than their 21, they would feel obligated to run ToS (or NH) still in hopes they can get a high TF'd set piece from there instead of Antorus.

Yes, but here is the solution to that problem: Just make the new set bonuses better than the old ones. If that "breaks" the new raid, adapt the new raid.

[Tolian]

The raid has been out for 3 days. No one is going to run 4 set yet except for the people split running like Method.
Holy shit, you can't be this stupid? Can you?

Lol, nice flame, troll. Are you really stupid enough to think it unlikely that some people don't have 4 pieces of tier already? I got 2 without coining, and on personal loot, from a single normal clear. Guilds that are running ML and giving tier to their top DPSers (like many good guilds do, which I guess you probably wouldn't have experience with) would have several people with 4 pc after a single normal clear, before even starting their heroic clear and having more tier drop.

That's ok though, I'm glad you got your moment of sunshine coming out to troll someone on the forums. Now go back under your bridge and shut up.

Infracted

[Saverem]

Yes, but here is the solution to that problem: Just make the new set bonuses better than the old ones. If that "breaks" the new raid, adapt the new raid.

I'd rather just do what they're doing and remove them altogether so people aren't always bitching about it every expansion.

[Deleted]

Just looking forward to BfA and no longer having to deal with tier sets at this point..

That's Blizzard's grand plot I assume, make us hate tier sets so that we won't miss them.

[Khallid]

Blizzard already stated that they will nerf old T20 if it becomes clear that it is too strong in Antorus.
To me this just feels completely wrong (as it already felt in Nighthold).
E.g. for Demon Hunters the T20 is currently better than the T21. If they now nerf the T20 I will need to go to Antorus to get to the same level I was BEFORE the raid opened. This means I am not feeling an upgrade, but I will just break even insteat (crazy titanforging ignored).
I do not understand why it is done this way - Why is the old set considered too strong, when it was perfectly fine in the last raid and not the new set too weak instead? Can someone explain that to me?

There's only two ways to tune a bonus that you get from gear: nerf the stronger one or buff the weaker one.

Nerfing always feels weird, but Blizzard seems to favor it in most cases, since it's "safer" and less likely to blow up in their faces. They must have some directive that highly disencourages buffing as a tuning mechanism, so they tend to go with nerfing. It's just orders from their boss.

Buffing makes more logical sense, as in you take the new bonus because it's better. I think they are scared that following that route bonuses eventually become too strong. The problems only compound after several raid tiers, where if every tier is stronger than the last the end tier would be worth too much. The other problem of buffing a bonus is that the bosses don't get scaled accordingly, so you may end up being too strong. Now what does "too strong" mean? Nothing really, bosses could be scaled up with the assumption that everone has a tier set. Strong tier bonuses are unfriendly towards alts and non-raiders, and it also devalues the gear from mythic+ and pvp to a certain extent, so I would assume those are the main reasons.

These problems disappear if all tiers have the same power. But they like giving completely different effects every tier. Clearly Blizzard is having trouble tuning them.

[huth]

Yes, but here is the solution to that problem: Just make the new set bonuses better than the old ones. If that "breaks" the new raid, adapt the new raid.

That would just create new balance issues for the classes where T21 is already better. It's not just about the raid.

- - - Updated - - -

There's only two ways to tune a bonus that you get from gear: nerf the stronger one or buff the weaker one.

Nerfing always feels weird, but Blizzard seems to favor it in most cases, since it's "safer" and less likely to blow up in their faces. They must have some directive that highly disencourages buffing as a tuning mechanism, so they tend to go with nerfing. It's just orders from their boss.

Buffing makes more logical sense, as in you take the new bonus because it's better. I think they are scared that following that route bonuses eventually become too strong. The problems only compound after several raid tiers, where if every tier is stronger than the last the end tier would be worth too much. The other problem of buffing a bonus is that the bosses don't get scaled accordingly, so you may end up being too strong. Now what does "too strong" mean? Nothing really, bosses could be scaled up with the assumption that everone has a tier set. Strong tier bonuses are unfriendly towards alts and non-raiders, and it also devalues the gear from mythic+ and pvp to a certain extent, so I would assume those are the main reasons.

Buffs modify class balance for the tier. Nerfing the old tier has less of an impact. Ultimately, nerfing outdated content is a far faster and easier way to reach the goal with less chance of negative side effects.

You're forgetting how a buff or nerf would affect other specs.

[ChronoSul]

Blizzard already stated that they will nerf old T20 if it becomes clear that it is too strong in Antorus.
To me this just feels completely wrong (as it already felt in Nighthold).
E.g. for Demon Hunters the T20 is currently better than the T21. If they now nerf the T20 I will need to go to Antorus to get to the same level I was BEFORE the raid opened. This means I am not feeling an upgrade, but I will just break even insteat (crazy titanforging ignored).
I do not understand why it is done this way - Why is the old set considered too strong, when it was perfectly fine in the last raid and not the new set too weak instead? Can someone explain that to me?

They already did it before the expansion with tier 19 and it was smart to. There were some specs (survival hunters and resto druids) who would have grinded out NH for the rest of the expansion due to the original NH tier. Hell even now if you can get a titanforge high enough for survival the T19 is STILL BIS even after the previous nerf

[asil]

Aff locks still use 2pcT19, which sucks for me personally because I don't have any of that over 900 lol. It's fairly ridiculous that tier sets from 2 tiers ago is still better than wearing the new tier.

2pc t21 should be replacing 2pc19 so we won't be using 2pc t19 anymore unless you have like absurdly high titanforged t19, and by absurdly high I mean 940+.

[Riistov]

It's not just T20. T19 is still better for BM Hunters 2 raid tiers later. Not only is T21 completely terrible, the recently nerfed it even more. The original T21 on the PTR for BM was amazing, as it reinforced the zoo build just like T19 did. Then they gutted it and made it the weakest tier set in the history of the game.

Tier 19 for Ele shaman was the same way. T20 was pretty lame and we were all still using our t19s in Mythic +/ AoE fights.

- - - Updated - - -

except aff locks want to run 4pc t20/ 2pc t21. until they nerf t20 that is.

Yeah, kinda feels crappy doing that. I remember a lot of specs doing that with t19/20 as well.

[cparle87]

Aff locks still use 2pcT19, which sucks for me personally because I don't have any of that over 900 lol. It's fairly ridiculous that tier sets from 2 tiers ago is still better than wearing the new tier.

If it's not good because it's not over 900 is it still worth using it over 930 gear? There's gotta be a point where the raw stats + new bad set bonus > old good set bonus simply due to ilvl.

[Nnyco]

i rather have them nerf old tier instead of goin into old raids and pray for that +50 titanforge proc

[rogoth]

It makes A LOT of sense.. nobody wants to go do old raids to hope for Titanforged.

Resto druids still wearing T19 say hello.

just look at my mages gear, haven't replaced the shoulders/pants slots since nighthold (had 915 mythic shoulders previously then went back and got the 930 ones i'm using), and that's with the nerf that blizz did to frost 2p T19, the sad part is, the 2pT19 set bonus sims and performs at about 300k dps increase over not using it.

[Deleted]

Becuase it sucks getting tier from a NEW raid and be like "oh well old tier is better". If your BiS is from ToS titanforging, then all you can do is pray.

[Twdft]

Wouldn't the best fix be to have set boni only active in the raid where the set is from? I think this would solve several problems:

- no need to retune old sets
- no need to raid to get the best gear for mythic+
- you can use your mythic+ gear in the new raid until you get new set