Retrospective: How would you rate Benthic gear as a CatchUp mechanism for the future?

[Big Thanks]

I ask of you to Forget about the Benthic Casino for raiding purposes AND rate Benthic gear exclusively as both a
Catch-Up mechanism AND Endgame Progression.

In my opinion, one thing is for sure...Benthic gear ended up NOT being for me.
And i can only imagine it being for people who refused to do Mythic+ dungeons.

It was a failure for me...and it may also be considered a "fail" BY me for even attempting to buy Benthic gear.

What ended up happening was me spending WEEKS to improve one piece of gear....only for it to be replaced by Mythic+ dungeon chest rewards.
My bad for not thinking ahead and wasting so much time in Nazjatar.

TLDR:
I dont have statistics on how successful was benthic gear for casual players...but it certainly was not for ME.
Spending weeks farming one piece and improving it as if it was your "baby-digimon" and then replacing it...is heartbreaking.
If im going to spend week improving gear ilvl...it must be the best piece of gear available to me in the game.
Thats the only way this design can work (no idea if it worked for other people)

EDIT: I failed on the title. Try to rate it as both a catchup and endgame progression. Because Benthic tried to be endgame progression.

[Sting]

That all depends on how accessible gear will be in 8.3, and for which audience you want it to be a catchup mechanism.

I don't think it'll be very useful since it was already sort of a catchup mechanism for 8.2.

[crusadernero]

Useless system. I was fine with having the pearls as a currency for bentic gear. It sucked that it was random. The second I found out it was random I didnt bother about it. But thats most of retail now, a huge random slot machine for most stuff.

So yeah

[Amariw]

I didn't need it because i regulalry did high keys in the patch before it, but for my alts it was as easy a catchup as any. I do wish you could use manapearls on main to improve alts gear, not just buy the initial 385 version. I think it achieves two goals pretty well: catchup for new max level chars, and a timesink for people who wany better gear but *dont* want to put the effort into tougher group content. Very similar to timeless isle cheap and costly timeless coins gear.

It shouldnt outpace mythic+ without a big timesink because otherwkse m+ is trivalized. Aside from the bethnic casino and the fact nazjatar is boring as fuck, it worked well.

[Project 501D13R]

I'd say 4 stars, it's only flaw aside from the casino mechanic is that the effects only worked in Nazjatar and EP, meaning that if you jump straight from raid night to a M+ it's very easy to get yourself stuck in the benthic gear which without the effects is actually pretty weak.

[Big Thanks]

I didn't need it because i regulalry did high keys in the patch before it, but for my alts it was as easy a catchup as any. I do wish you could use manapearls on main to improve alts gear, not just buy the initial 385 version. I think it achieves two goals pretty well: catchup for new max level chars, and a timesink for people who wany better gear but *dont* want to put the effort into tougher group content. Very similar to timeless isle cheap and costly timeless coins gear.

It shouldnt outpace mythic+ without a big timesink because otherwkse m+ is trivalized. Aside from the bethnic casino and the fact nazjatar is boring as fuck, it worked well.

Dammit, i did an "oopsie" on the OP...because as a "cathup mechanism" it may very well be good.

But im trying to rate the entire system...as both a catchup AND the manapearl improvement "endgame".

[Throwme]

I am not a raider, other than the occasional LFR when I feel like it.
I do not run Mythic dungeons.
I play the game the way I want to play it, not dictated by how others think I should. Often those two are the same thing, but not always.

For me, Benthic gear was GREAT! My main got one of them as an actual upgrade when it was released, but slowly replaced the other pieces as I got enough pearls to buy and upgrade the other slots. But that's not the point of this discussion. The point the catch-up gear. And for THAT, it was GREAT too. My alts, as soon as they ding 120 with Korrak, can instantly jump into the better end of WQ gear rewards, because I have full sets just waiting to be used. I don't care about the perfect stat combo on MY ALTS, so for them Benthic gear is just awesome. It is an easy way to skip slowly grinding through dungeons and WQs in order to get into a LFR run I don't really want to do, just so I can get into the itemlevel ranges that will reward the maximum WQ gear.

If the 8.3 mechanic is just as good, I won't give a darn about Benthic gear. But if 8.3 gear is harder to come by, as I suspect it is, I will STILL be using Benthic the way it is meant to be used - as a catch-up mechanic for my alts.

Edit:

But im trying to rate the entire system...as both a catchup AND the manapearl improvement "endgame".

Then you shouldn't make that big red line at the very top of your post asking us to rate it exclusively as a catch-up mechanism....

[Jetstream]

Dammit, i did an "oopsie" on the OP...because as a "cathup mechanism" it may very well be good.

But im trying to rate the entire system...as both a catchup AND the manapearl improvement "endgame".

It is, in fact, awesome for catchup. I’ve geared out like four alts that I’ve been leveling through Korrak.

[Big Thanks]

I am not a raider, other than the occasional LFR when I feel like it.
I do not run Mythic dungeons.
I play the game the way I want to play it, not dictated by how others think I should. Often those two are the same thing, but not always.

For me, Benthic gear was GREAT! My main got one of them as an actual upgrade when it was released, but slowly replaced the other pieces as I got enough pearls to buy and upgrade the other slots.

So people like you DO exist! Im glad to know it was just not for me...but it was for you!

(ill change the OP's red highlight)

[Aucald]

I like the Benthic system for catch-up for alts. I've got enough tokens stored up to gear out any alts that hit 120, and then the necessity of Manapearls to get them up to the 400's gives me a want to play them and get them up to where they can take on most of the challenges I'm accustomed to on my main (though usually they lag 10-15 iLvl's behind). I'd prefer it be a bit more targeted than its current randomness, but it's not too big a deal for me as I'm not so focused on BiS for my alts as I am my main.

[Loveliest]

I liked it since I used it mainly on alts. Had like one piece I upgraded on my main but replaced it at one point so there's that. And I liked it on alts because I bought the tokens with my main (who's sitting on over 1k pearls still).

[Renchard]

So people like you DO exist! Im glad to know it was just not for me...but it was for you!

(ill change the OP's red highlight)

I'm pretty sure casuals like the quoted poster (and myself) are a fairly significant minority. I see an awful lot of people in BGs with health less than 250K, which usually indicated sub 400 ilvl and a non-progressed heart.

[oldgeezer]

Eh, it's fine for me. I don't do any form of group content now other than the occasional WQ, and am sitting at 420 plus or minus a level or two on my main and alts. The gear (and gearing system) is completely adequate for the sort of stuff I do, and I can continue to improve it at my own pace.

[Ryonas]

And i can only imagine it being for people who refused to do Mythic+ dungeons.

Yeah. That's most of us.

[kranur]

Not great, not terrible. Acquiring the items and upgrading them and collecting the pearls is fine. What is not fine is the rng around them. Should have just made 1 version for each slot and that's that, instead of having multiple versions per slot, because then you'd obviously want to play the roulette until you get the optimal one before starting to upgrade.
Then being able to titanforge a gem slot was just dumb .

[Blackmist]

As a catch up it's... fine, I guess.

However, it should never have been viable in anything other than LFR and Normal. It certainly shouldn't be replacing FOUR mythic items.

[Kharadin]

I ask of you to Forget about the Benthic Casino for raiding purposes AND rate Benthic gear exclusively as both a
Catch-Up mechanism AND Endgame Progression.

In my opinion, one thing is for sure...Benthic gear ended up NOT being for me.
And i can only imagine it being for people who refused to do Mythic+ dungeons.

It was a failure for me...and it may also be considered a "fail" BY me for even attempting to buy Benthic gear.

What ended up happening was me spending WEEKS to improve one piece of gear....only for it to be replaced by Mythic+ dungeon chest rewards.
My bad for not thinking ahead and wasting so much time in Nazjatar.

TLDR:
I dont have statistics on how successful was benthic gear for casual players...but it certainly was not for ME.
Spending weeks farming one piece and improving it as if it was your "baby-digimon" and then replacing it...is heartbreaking.
If im going to spend week improving gear ilvl...it must be the best piece of gear available to me in the game.
Thats the only way this design can work (no idea if it worked for other people)

EDIT: I failed on the title. Try to rate it as both a catchup and endgame progression. Because Benthic tried to be endgame progression.

As someone who plays with a bunch of friends, so we can easily do +10s several times a week, Benthic gear was literally useless to me excepting the BiS pieces for raiding.

Even without the M+ dungeons to run, I feel like the benthic pieces cost so much to upgrade that if I did need them I'd easily burn out long before I was happy with my gear loadout, but that might more be to do with my dire hatred of Nazjatar as a zone in itself, gimme more Mechagon pls.

[Ragedaug]

Try to rate it as both a catchup and endgame progression. Because Benthic tried to be endgame progression.

I gave Benthic 5 stars because I think it does both things it's intended to do very well. Easy/Quick way to get your Alt to iLvl 400+ so you can Mythic and Raid with your friends & guild. Very good for solo progression, for those not interested in mythics or raids. Those who just like to quest, do achievements, old dungeons, etc.

So yeah, you get it from questing it makes sense it is questing progression gear, I wouldn't expect it to be Mythic progression or Raid progression gear. It's questing progression gear that can be useful for catchup as well.

[FuxieDK]

Catch Up should be doing old(er) content to gear up, not just jumping in a the end of an expansion and almost immediately get full gear.

0 stars.

[Djuntas]

Its an awesome system for new alts. All my fresh freehold boosted alts got to 385-390 in less than 2 hours played due to it. So its great for fresh alts. Only had to support each with like...6-10k gold on top of benthic gear from my mains manapearls I had to many of anyway.