Will running LFR grant you a REAL legendary in 5.4?

[ZeroEdgeir]

Given I've seen people struggle to get their meta gem with equal ilevel to me (as an LFR-raider myself), while I walked in and one-shot the Thunder Forge fight, let the solo parts be the benchmark and skill-check to see if it is worth it for you.

Flex/Normal/Heroic raiders will have a leg up on LFR raiders, due to gear levels allowing them to get through mechanics faster. Those of us who have kept up with the progression of the chain, with the implicit statements that the Legendaries will be available to everyone... guess what? If you got the skill to do the solo parts, on top of the time to sink into the raid-progression/grindy parts, then you are rewarded. Hell, the people who earn it in LFR gear should be entitled to more: They did it with a gear handicap over those with a higher ilevel from "real raiding".

I managed the Thunder Forge quest at about ilevel 505 at the time (and yes, I am a Ret Paladin). I've seen people with 515+ fail, horribly, at it. Individual skill sets the bar. Gear helps, but frankly, who's doing the harder version of the solo content, the LFR raider, or the Heroic one? Yeah, guess what, that would be the guy in the 530+ gear, not the one in 502 gear. The content scales down as your ilevel goes up, so those of you running Normal/Heroic for 5.2's content have an ADVANTAGE over the LFR raiders. If we are succeeding, it is by merits of more skill, not "LFR scrub". The fight an ilevel 505 Paladin does is the exact same as an ilevel 535 Paladin, the only difference is the 535 hits harder/faster, and thereby ends the fight quicker, has to focus on survival a little less.

LFR might be the bottom-rung on raiding, but when the LFR raiders with actual skill stand up and do what you did with 20+ ilevels of better gear, it's a problem? REALLY? Elitism much? Not every LFR raider is a fail. Many of us just lack the time to raid with a guild (Hi, I work graveyard shift, starting at 9pm PST, 5 days a week, see a problem?), and use this as a welcome option. How about the guy who was a hardcore raider, still has the skill, but has a family now, so can't dedicate to a real guild, due to a 2 year old son/daughter? Should he be told that, despite dedicating the time he could to progress at a slower rate (reminder: LFR takes over 1.5 months to unlock all raid content that Normal/Heroic get right away or within 1-2 weeks, you do get it sooner, provided RNG doesn't hate you), knowing that his dedication would be paid off, because he can trump over the solo content due to skill and experience with his character, that now he gets nothing, due to changes in life?

Everyone complains that "Blizzard caters to casuals"... many of the people who used to be of the hardcore, dedicated, playerbase of 6-8 years ago have grown up, have jobs, families, etc. They unfortunately don't always have the time for dedicated guilds, schedules, etc. But they are the LONG-TERM customers who have been paying every month for the last 6+ years... not those who "Oh, this tier is done, cancel sub til next patch", who are only still active right now cause RNG has hated on them for quest drops for said legendary chain.

Legendary items were first and foremost pure, dumb, luck.
Classic: Bindings of the Windseeker and Eye of Sulfuras, were both like 0.1% Drop chances or something. Similar for the quest starter for Aitesh (though that one I am a lot foggier on, never saw one finished during my time in Classic, as we never finished Naxx... 12/14 40-Man)
TBC: RNG, and nothing else for the Warglaives or Thorai'dal.
WotLK: I was raiding 10M during WotLK, so I didn't see them at all. Val'anyr was RNG on getting fragments to drop per boss, then you threw them at the last boss, and BAM, resolved, Legendary. Shadowmourne had a LITTLE bit of personal work (not much...) and then similar, but lengthier process to get completed.
Cataclysm: Start seeing more solo-related work involved in the quest lines for both Dragonwrath and Fangs of the Father. Still had elements of RNG though as you progressed, getting the grindy element from bosses of that tier's raid.

Now here we are... everyone can do the annoying grindy part. LFR is slowest, due to the nature of wing unlocks taking like 2 weeks per wing (so 6 weeks for full unlock), where as Normal is open fully at the start, Heroic the following week. Flex will likely to being on 1 week unlocks per wing, based on the description of it from the CMs so far. Maybe Heroic should have slightly better drop rates than the other formats for the quest items, but that is the grind. It doesn't take skill to finish, just RNG.

Skill comes in from the solo components. I've heard of Hunters bitching a ton about the Wrathion cloak fight, with like ilevel 530 gear. If that's the case, I look forward to the fight, cause when I finish it at ilevel 515 or so, it will be hilarious.

tldr; If you raid above LFR, you are actually nerfing the content of the legendary quest, by using higher gear for the solo fights. Don't talk about exclusivity when you get an advantage in the first place.

[Tonyman64]

I think the important parts of the legendary questline, in terms of making the legendary difficult to obtain, are the solo quest portions. Those are the parts where you have to prove that you, as an individual, deserve that reward. And everyone, LFR, flex, Normal, and Heroic raiders, has to do the same solo portions. Given that those are harder than any of the raid portions of the questline, why does it matter if worse geared people complete the same solo content as you and get a legendary?

[cFortyfive]

I presume it will be the same especially when it turns out to be no weapon.

Given that those are harder than any of the raid portions of the questline,

I'd state that even a normal encounter is harder than any of the solo components.

[DrDrae]

I don't think anyone will receive a Legendary Weapon at the end of this quest chain as hinted in a blue post.

You're certain it's a weapon? (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

I reckon 5.4 will bring 'Chance on Hit' weapons from it's final boss as have previous expansions but with a twist, each with different ilvl according to difficulty as did HoF/ToES. I'm guessing the final part of the chain will be a new Legendary Gem (possibly upgraded Crystallized gem) that can only fit these new weapons as they will be 'Sha Touched'. Once socketed you unlock that weapons 'Chance on Hit' ability.

This way there are no overpowered legendary weapons that everyone has relatively easy access too, There is no wasted 'Chance on Hit' items made in 5.4 that no-one wants, there is still RNG involved as you need the weapon to drop for you, and as others have said there is still some challenge in obtaining the final items as you have to do the solo scenario, having different ilvl weapons also gives something to strive for in normal/hard modes.

On top of all this I think to make this new 'Chance on Hit' feel more legendary once procced you will transform into a Sha like creature. I don't trust The Black Prince, and feel like he is setting us up for something like that!

[Tonyman64]

I presume it will be the same especially when it turns out to be no weapon.


I'd state that even a normal encounter is harder than any of the solo components.

Maybe in normal or heroic raid gear that is the case.

[Deleted]

I really hope Blizzard will change the way they do things.

People who dont put effort in raiding should NOT get legendary items, tier sets, mounts, pets.
Just regular low level purples. Thats it!

Right now there is no prestige in normal/heroic raiding.. SAME items with higher ilvl - horrible design.
People who afk in lfr gets same gear - every piece of same gear, just lower ilvl.
Thats how blizzard award real raiders in wow - same way they award afkers in LFR.

LFR was created, so everyone could see content, right now people act like its raiding - its NOT.
I could get better idea of raiding watching fatboss videos on youtube then participating in LFR.
LFR is nothing close to raiding. NOTHING.

I do LFR too on all my alts, and i m happy that i can catch up fast, whenever i like.
But i dont ask for same rewards as normal raiding - thats bullshit.

You can disagree, but deep inside u know - lfr is NOT same thing as raiding - its fast way to gear up, nothing else. Nothing else.

[Woodgela]

Legendaries quit being legends when 10 mans were able to get them. Thank Firelands for the fall of legendaries.

Lol random melodramatic kids who make observations with no substance, that's you. You didn't own the staff at 85 and plz don't try and lie to me. The FL legendary chain took fking ages to do, you really don't have a clue boi. Even at the very end of cata there wasn't an exceptional amount of ppl walking around with them so yeh they were legendary. Whether they were obtainable in 10, 25 or 40 it doesnt matter at all.......they are all difficult to obtain at the time.

[DemoBytom]

first - yes it will grant you legendary. This expansion for sure. Blizzard doesn't like to make game breaking changes mid xpack - and saying that you've worked on your legendary questline for whole expansion and then suddenly can't finish it - would just cause uprising and one of the greatest shitstorms ever.. Remember what happened when they "broke" "The insane" rep grind by removing shand'ralar.. No the Wrathion questline will work the same as it was working since start.

Second - should LFR give legendaries? Yes, I think yes. In it's current form, where getting to last step requires a lot of grinding and time commitment, it's a good way of getting somehow special item.
And the fact that it's so common makes it way easier to balance the game around it. ATM Blizz can safely assume that at each stage of the quest majority of people doing end game content will have their legendaries. That means that when they balance classes they can assume that they will have those items. This mitigates the problem of legendaries being too good to the point that character with it was stupidly OP, or rather one without it was stupidly broken.. Even in Cataclysm - if you were a caster and didn't have your staff, just because your GMs sister's boyfriend rerolled a holy priest - you were subpar caster with no way into getting into good guild.
Today - if you commit your time and work on the legendary questline - you will get it, so if you're behind it's just your fault. What's more since everyone is now eligible for a legendary - their power gain is similar, no one gets ridiculously stronger just because he got orange item.
I really think that current legendary model is the best one for game's balance - we don't want anouther shadowmourne DKs roflstomping everyone in PvE and PvP again.
In the end it's a multiplayer game - and balance between classes should be maintained as much as possible. With old (vanilla, BC) legendary models it's impossible to balance the game with those items in game.

[Sildor]

Most likely there will be different versions of the legendary that you will be able to upgrade. The first version obtainable from LFR and then several upgraded versions, the best one only something that heroic raiders will be able to get.

[Deleted]

Two possibilities:

1) Legendaries are obtainable on Heroic difficulty only.
2) Legendaries for everyone.

[Deleted]

I think everyone that has put so much effort in the whole chain deserves a legendary.
Keep in mind this might not be a weapon or not even a piece of gear.

[Deleted]

We have gotten legendaries, just no legendary gear left.
At this point, I don't see why not, getting a legendary doesn't have to be difficult, just time consuming. It fits WoW's design philosophy to do so and even if you do run purely normal/heroics, it doesn't affect you in any way if someone who just runs LFR gets a legendary.

Except it isnt legendary if everyone has one.
Not being special snowflake or anything but whats the diff between an epic and legendary at this point ?
None, it just ruins the feeling of a legendary.

[Deleted]

Two possibilities:

1) Legendaries are obtainable on Heroic difficulty only.
2) Legendaries for everyone.

there are more possibilities then two extremes

[Nobleshield]

I love the argument from the wannabes here, because as with all of these threads it's never the real elite raiders whining, but the midcores that want to feel special. "BUT THEY DON'T DESERVE IT!". Says who? You? Who are you to decide that? Who is the top 1% to decide who deserves what in the game?

Give it a rest already. We get that you want to feel special and unique and better than the unwashed masses, but it's not going to happen anymore.

[Deleted]

the idea of something legendary means unique and rare. If even the weekly 'LFR afk'ers' get a legendary by the end of this Xpac should we really call it LEGENDARY?
IF you are saying that those who only do LFR deserve a legendary aswell its your point. But the objective behind LFR was to allow casuals to experience end game content not to get free loot. In WoLK if casuals wanted to see the cinematic after Arthas fall they had to look for it on youtube. Now they can see those cinematics in game.
LFR deserves a legendary item? Sure let them have it but atleast give it a lower ilvl for Pete's sake

[Every Pwny]

Maybe, especially considering you could do the legendary quests in lfr and normal/heroic.

[Nirox]

4 Things:
Thing the first: People who do both normalmode and LFR get double the chance to get the items to drop for the legendary.
Thing the second: This has been by far the hardest legendary to get, not in terms of difficulty but in terms of its length, it takes months to get all the parts from just LFR, anyone willing to put in that time damn well deserves a legendary.
Thing the third: People aren't just given the gear, they have to do LFR for months (a bit quicker if you do normalmodes aswell) and also kill a quite difficult solo-boss that can easily kick the ass of anyone that isn't skilled at their class.
Thing the fourth: just because you want to feel like a special little snowflake with your legendary doesn't mean that people that have put in time don't deserve it.

[BatteredSausage]

the idea of something legendary means unique and rare.

Go back to school.

[Deleted]

the idea of something legendary means unique and rare. If even the weekly 'LFR afk'ers' get a legendary by the end of this Xpac should we really call it LEGENDARY?
IF you are saying that those who only do LFR deserve a legendary aswell its your point. But the objective behind LFR was to allow casuals to experience end game content not to get free loot. In WoLK if casuals wanted to see the cinematic after Arthas fall they had to look for it on youtube. Now they can see those cinematics in game.
LFR deserves a legendary item? Sure let them have it but atleast give it a lower ilvl for Pete's sake

guess you've never been to the fountain in the middle of dalaran where you can trigger the cinematic

But joke aside.
Legendary schould mean something rare and unique. If everybody has it it kinda waters down the meaning of legendary, but thats just considering the word and what it means.
Unfortunatly in my opinion the legendary chain works as some kind of loyalty bonus for staying subscribed through a good deal of the expansion.
You've spend several ids farming sigils and rep then you have to farm 6k now 3k valor, then we have ToT with its own multiple id farming og different materials. And the legendary just ends up being a kind of loyalty reward item.
The funny thing is nobody knows what is actually going to end up being, if it is going to be legendary weapons for everyone or legendary gems for everyone.

In the end I do not really care that much, because in my time i've seen a lot of people, that play badly run around with these socalled legendary weapons. So I really do not care.
One thing you can say is that anybody having the persistance to go through the legendary quest somehow deserve a reward at the end. It is not difficult but it is timeconsuming.

[Deleted]

In WoLK if casuals wanted to see the cinematic after Arthas fall they had to look for it on youtube. Now they can see those cinematics in game.

Well, the "cinematic" after Council of the Elders is not seen on LFR. And you can't even skip it in normal/heroic, since it's that OP Awesome! :P