Mythic+ Azerite Armor Improvements
Originally Posted by Blizzard
Throughout the discussions regarding Azerite Armor, there’s been a lot of talk about how you earn Azerite pieces from Mythic+ dungeons. Players have told us – and we agree – that the process of earning Azerite Armor through Mythic+ feels overly based on luck, and that there isn’t enough control in the players’ hands. Even with our bad luck protection systems in place, the sheer number of potential Azerite pieces you can get from the weekly chest means that trying to get ahold of a specific piece feels hopeless.

That’s a problem we want to solve, and give you some control over the Azerite gear you earn through Mythic+. So here’s what we’re working on for Tides of Vengeance:

First, we’re adding a new (as yet unnamed) currency, which you’ll earn from your weekly Mythic+ chest as well as from scrapping (or disenchanting) epic-quality Azerite Armor. This currency is rewarded in addition to the item in the chest (which can no longer be an Azerite piece), and the amount you earn will scale up based on the highest level Keystone you’ve completed. For example, completing a level 10 Keystone will reward you with about three times as much as clearing a level 7. Similarly, scrapping higher-item-level Azerite pieces will give you significantly higher amounts of this currency than lower-level pieces.

To spend that currency, we’re bringing back an old friend: Thaumaturge Vashreen. He’ll have two main types of items for sale. The first are caches that reward a random dungeon Azerite Armor piece for a given slot (helm, shoulders, or chest). They’ll be separated out by item level as well (at 355, 370, and 385), with higher item level caches requiring significantly more currency to purchase.

But we recognize that with six or more options per slot, this may still not be enough control for high-end players who want to be able to work towards a specific piece that perfectly complements their build. Thus, Vashreen will also offer Item Level 385 versions of the specific dungeon Azerite Armor pieces for each class, sold at a premium.

We’re still nailing down the exact numbers, but our goal for tuning this new currency is that you’ll be able to purchase one of the Azerite caches that lines up roughly with the item level of the gear you’re getting from your Mythic+ runs every two or three weeks, with the specific 385 pieces as long-term goals for top players.

Overall, we believe that this change will improve things in a lot of different ways:
  • Mythic+ players of all skill levels will now have a clear path to upgrading their Azerite slots
  • High-end Mythic+ players will have a way to target specific Azerite pieces to optimize their setups
  • Duplicate or unwanted Azerite pieces from other sources (such as raiding) now have some additional value
  • The piece of gear in your weekly chest will have a more reliable item level

You should see all of this hitting the Tides of Vengeance PTR sometime in the next week or so. We really do appreciate your feedback, and believe that this, in addition to the new traits and other improvements coming to the Azerite system in Tides of Vengeance, will help ease a lot of the concerns about Azerite Armor in Mythic+ and as a whole.

Couple quick clarifications based on feedback so far:
  • Only Azerite Armor that drops after Tides of Vengeance is released will scrap/disenchant into the new currency. Don't worry about hoarding the Azerite pieces you're earning now.
  • When the next Mythic+ season starts, and item levels increase, the item levels of Thaumaturge Vashreen's wares will increase accordingly.
  • We recognize that PvPers want more options and choice too. We're talking about that separately.
This article was originally published in forum thread: Mythic+ Azerite Armor Improvements started by chaud View original post
Comments 204 Comments
  1. ro9ue's Avatar
    Too little too late.

    The entire system still sucks.
  1. Nathasil's Avatar
    My reactions were like this:
    *reading "currency"*: Yes! Yes! Yes!
    *continueing to read further details*: No....No......Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

    The latter is the impression that lasted.
  1. Alcsaar's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Sadpants View Post
    So as I read it: You either spend a small amount to buy a token that will give a random piece, or a huge amount to buy a specific piece?

    If so, and because you still get your regular weekly chest item, then it is a great step in the right direction.

    I don't know that its a "Small amount". They said the "intention" is that players can get a piece of azerite gear of "appropriate" item level every 2 to 3 weeks; but thats the RANDOM pieces of gear. The targeted SPECIFIC gear pieces they only said "will be a long term goal for high mythic+ players" so probably pretty unreachable for your average player.

    So random piece of maybe "appropriate" level azerite gear every 2 to 3 weeks, or a specific one probably 1.5-2 months, which is absurd.
  1. Seramore's Avatar
    Why is Blizzard going through the trouble of creating all these complex systems and workarounds, when literally all they have to do is to just enable Azerite drops in M+? I just don't understand.
  1. mtvoelker's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Seramore View Post
    Why is Blizzard going through the trouble of creating all these complex systems and workarounds, when literally all they have to do is to just enable Azerite drops in M+? I just don't understand.
    Because they have stated they don’t want us as players to be able to spam run dungeons to acquire azerite pieces. They want them to be available only via lockouts, such as raiding and the daily cache rewards. I’m not saying I agree with it, but that is their stance.
  1. Archmage Alodi's Avatar
    It's a good step but it's going to need a lot of tweaks to make it good. There should be some sort of currency reward for spamming keys tbh.
  1. mmoc0545cb7e4e's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Alcsaar View Post
    I don't know that its a "Small amount". They said the "intention" is that players can get a piece of azerite gear of "appropriate" item level every 2 to 3 weeks; but thats the RANDOM pieces of gear. The targeted SPECIFIC gear pieces they only said "will be a long term goal for high mythic+ players" so probably pretty unreachable for your average player.

    So random piece of maybe "appropriate" level azerite gear every 2 to 3 weeks, or a specific one probably 1.5-2 months, which is absurd.
    The item level of the tokens are not random. You either buy a 355, 370, or 385 token at increasing costs.
  1. Archmage Alodi's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by lyphe View Post
    Ok ... this is a step in the right direction ..
    BUT ... why do they still need to screw it up with a RNG cache at all?
    Just add the items and let us choose, regardless of iLvL.
    You can buy specific items at a higher price.
  1. prettydots's Avatar
    Welp, looks like I'll stay unsubbed. They keep trying to make this crap Azerite system work when the majority of players admit it stinks.
  1. Targetme's Avatar
    So can we now talk about the grind for ap? I didn't mind the one legion but this one. I have no drive to grind the ap. Most of my friends just don't care about the grind. If there was a cap to it and then you got bonus off it like in Legion I would be fine with it.
  1. elvor0's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Chaosweaver View Post
    This and they're flagging accounts with BFA for free
    Source? Because I'm pretty sure that isn't true. It's a 3 day trial, not a free copy of BFA
  1. ImTheMizAwesome's Avatar
    Anyone that thinks that they would not try to improve the current system and just remove core system that whole expansion is built upon is really delusional and it's good that people like that stay unsubbed.
  1. Kheldin's Avatar
    Beta for Azeroth in progress...
  1. Rawklobster's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Jervaise View Post
    Why do they have to make things so complicated?

    Why are they giving us 385 when mythic raiding quality will be around 430?

    Why do they have to include random chests even in this iteration? How can they not see that this RNG is killing their game?
    Because nerd, at the end of the day it’s still an MMO and RNG loot drops have always been a part of that.
    They are not just going to give players ways to BiS gear out their characters in a matter of weeks. Something you have to accept when playing an MMO is that character progression is something that is supposed to take time because it gives the player a sense of accomplishment. Getting things too quickly is bad for the game in business sense and player satisfaction experience. Seriously if you want to have everything now then go play a PtW phone app game
  1. xxcloud417xx's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Huntingbear_grimbatol View Post
    Heeeey, something undeniably good and something that's been asked for since Legion!
    Does that mean the players sometimes know what they want? DOES IT?!
    You think you do, but you don’t.

    In all seriousness, the change is welcome, but it’s a band-aid on the Gaping wound that is Azerite. Sure they can fix the RNG behind acquiring Azerite gear, but the system is still garbage in terms of compelling and/or fun gameplay, consistency (cuz they keep tuning and retuning traits so fucking much), and being a better alternative to literally any system they had prior. Legendaries were better than this garbage and many people hated those, I was also happy to no longer have tier sets dictate what I was forced to equip in certain slots, but now we have that but worse. Blizzard didn’t just drop the ball on Azerite, they dropped it into a fucking industrial shredder, tried to get it back, lost a hand to the shredder and now the ball is unsalvageable and covered in hand meat so no one can stomach retrieving its pieces.

    What a colossal fuckup.
  1. Sastank's Avatar
    Coming in to read more complaints lol never satisfied
  1. Queen of Hamsters's Avatar
    Any step in the right direction is a good one.
  1. cerberus1838's Avatar
    First, we’re adding a new (as yet unnamed) currency
    Hmmm, maybe they should just call it Azerite. Allowing you to use to it to craft things, switch traits and some other stuff, while sacrificing your HoA levels. That being said they should have made the system that replaced the already developed artifact weapon system, feel well... more developed. That's my primary issue at the moment, it is just missing depth and the 8.1 changes aren't revolutionary.
  1. SinR's Avatar
    Me: Hey, Thaumaturge Vashreen, i wanna buy that 385 Chest token from you! *Hands 100 Azerite Scraps to the dude*
    Thaumaturge Vashreen: OK here you go SinR!
    *gets 385 Chest with terrible traits*
    Me: Wow thi-
    Thaumaturge Vashreen: NO BACKSIES *runs off screaming*
  1. Topornic's Avatar
    Better than nothing I guess but I was highly hoping for kind of a lootbox instead of standard mythic cache where you can pick ONE out of THREE items of which any can be RNG Azerite piece or standard item.
    This feels like gated slow progression towards certain azerite pieces. You cannot loot Azerite in M+ and now it won't appear in M+ cache so most of the scraps will come from a weekly chest and few raid items you might be able to get a grip on. OR the high-end players will be forced to grind all m0 every week to get just a few scraps out of 340 azerite piece.

Site Navigation