Idea for weapons next expansion

[Enrif]

i'm not a fan of just replacing the Artifact Weapon with another all mighty weapon. This would just mean our Characters are worthless without the weapon. And shouldn't it be about the wielder not the weapon? I think the Outlaw Rogues Weapon dealt a little with it. All the "Power" of the Artifact were actually accomplished by their wielders, but no one would thought that this would be possible so they blamed/claimed that the weapon has the power.

so i'm all for green lvl 111 weapons in the next expansion. Also more Weapon Transmogs to use among all classes instead of locked to specific classes

If we want a gameplay system similar to Artifact weapon there are simple solutions like the Path of Titans, remember that? Or what i would favor, Lets get back our old Talent Trees!, kind of. Let's call it Mythic Talents. It's not replacing the current talent system, but works similar to artifact trees. but you can use all of your new Mythic Talents on any spec.
Say you are a Blood DK, you can spend Mythic Power into the unholy Mythic Tree, to get permanent minions too.
Or as a Disc Priest putting Mythic Power into the shadow Mythic tree to get more damage options, put Mythic Power into the Holy Tree to get more healing options or remain in your disc mythic Tree to get more and better barriers and shields.
A BM Hunter who doubles down into BM can get 3 pets, 4 pets, 5 pets at once. while MM and Surv could spec into BM to get 2 Pets
A Prot Warrior could spec into Fury to get the ability to use also twohanded weapons in one hand. Spear and Shield!

of course such a system wouldn't be exactly the same as the current one as it should not be able to max out every trait in it.

[Kuja]

Why settle with other's weapons? If we craft our own, they can become even more powerful, considering that we've beaten everything from Hogger to the Legion, something not a single legendary hero who's weapon we're using now has ever achieved.

So a new weapon crafting feature would seem like a good idea. Would allow far more customization, so it would be easy to bring to the future expansion as well. Instead of AP we'd grind crafting parts or something.

[Kathranis]

I rather have them destroy the artifact weapons and in the next exp pack you reforge the shards into a new racial based weapon back at your capital.

Crafting new racial artifacts is my hope, too. Ideally allowing players to actually build them from components (maybe 3 pieces) and give them unique names (probably by selecting two words in your character's native language from a list approved by Blizzard).

It would work great in an expansion also introducing subraces, with a new focus on races the way they focused on classes in Legion.

[Ponji]

Inherently flawed? I just don't like the idea of crafting weapons. Professions have been gathering and crafting weapons for all of WoW. It just seems a little silly to now all of a sudden be able to craft a weapon that's more powerful than the artifacts we've been using. And from a class fantasy point of view, I don't think it's original enough for a Boomkin to collect twigs for a weapon stronger than the Scythe of Elune. You, the Druid of all Druids, Destroyer of the Legion, must now gather leaves, feathers, and twigs to craft... Branch of Elune!

Agree to disagree, but not flawed. You just see it differently than me.

You're playing an MMO. If the story dictates that the Mother of Dragons, Break of Chains, Liberator of Orgrimmar, Chosen of E'lune, Monkey king of the Andals, yadda yadda, go out into the world and collect some stuff as a part of the primary storyline and You don't like that, you're probably playing the wrong game.

Additionally, if you have been actively playing the expansion with a cognitive and functionally sound mind, you would recall that our artifacts started out as dumpy antiques that just happened to give us a special ability. Only through collecting a bunch of different stuff and killing a metric f*!@ton of demons did we end up with the power we currently have (not referencing the grind, moreso the RP part of the MMO-RPG you're playing).

Also, I'd be willing to bet a tree branch blessed by E'lune would be far superior to your artifact in a next expansion. Why? Because Blizzard says so.

[Golden Yak]

I suspect that the artifact system of nodes and power resources will be kept, but it won't be tied to our weapon. It can simply exist on its own as a separate system from gear. The artifact system is pretty much what I always imagined the Path of the Titans would be.

[rayvio]

it wouldn't surprise me to see a smaller version of the artifact system being applied to legendary items in future
as to our current artifacts though, there'll likely be a lore reason for them being depowered and the gameplay will have most of the affects unusable after level 111

[Magistrate]

Crafting your own weapon just doesn't make sense for all classes, to me. I can see a Warrior or Rogue doing that, but I can't envision a Mage all that motivated to craft a staff.

We actually do that in the old class-specific quest line. (Regarding mages.)

@Topic: replace weapons with pool noodles.

[yetgdhfgh]

A build your own weapon seems like the logical choice though i know people miss weapon drops in raids.

I personally hope we wont just replace our artifact with some green but i honestly dont think thats what will happen.

[oplawlz]

I want the old weapon system back. Artifact power and traits were a major detractor from this expansion for many people.

[Blamblam41]

Crafting your own weapon just doesn't make sense for all classes, to me. I can see a Warrior or Rogue doing that, but I can't envision a Mage all that motivated to craft a staff. Or a Demonology Warlock to write a book or assemble a... skull, or w/e they use. I dunno, just feels forced on a few classes. Also going from Doomhammer to a crafted mace would feel cringeworthy on a Shaman, to give another example. Of course I'm just talking about class fantasy things. Naming our own weapon is kinda cool, I guess, but you'd get people naming their weapon "Anal Probe" and shit like that. Kinda makes me doubt Blizzard would allow that sort of thing on WoW. Plus, with custom named weapons, that'd be weird if all the weapons looked the same but with different names.

Why wouldn't that be something that mages or warlocks do? They literally study magic. They have to make these tools in order to study and control it. That's literally implied in the game.

All a warrior has to do is pick up a stick and a rock and pretend he's bladestorming like it's S7.

[Wrecktangle]

If we go back to generic green weapons I'll probably care a lot less about my character. Blizz may have missed the mark on AP and stuff, but the core concept of artifacts was actually very fun for me. I thoroughly enjoyed chasing the different appearances and colors and powering up and grabbing new perks along the way (even if some/most were shitty % ups).

On one hand I don't mind the craft our own weapon approach (I actually prefer it), but I wouldn't be opposed to "absorbing" the power and them just doing away with the weapon slot and having it be cosmetic and tying progression to a different piece.

IMHO anything is better than going back to raid drops and random greens.

[Kuntantee]

What's wrong with old formula?

[Andromedes]

Fallout 4 system could be interesting.. Bosses would drop hilts, blades, guards, and you would forge your weapon from those components.. not sure how it would work with bows

[Wrecktangle]

What's wrong with old formula?

Speaking strictly IMO - the problem is that once we went to the artifact system you can't just go back to a previously less robust system. You also can't hand people a weapon that is thematically pretty awesome and they've spent 2 years growing side by side with and expect them to be excited over a savage blade of the monkey green or blue, etc. While there is no doubt the old formula works, it was never terribly fun to me, and going from something that was fun, to something that isn't can be gamebreaking to some.