How to Improve the Gear Rewards Systems of WoW!

[Clash the DK]

UPDATED - Alternative system at the bottom of the post!

* Posted on page 7 https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads...-of-WoW!/page7

It is my opinion that we should have a better gear progression system in place for casual world content. Many people want to gear up their character but do not like participating in mandatory group content. I like to compare this to so many people who live in the suburbs; They like or don't mind living around other people, but do not want to consistently interact with their neighbors. Some people enjoy that balance of community and solitude. After playing since the beginning and doing everything this game offers over the years, I now fall into this category. I prefer solo content unless temporary convenience dictates the matter.

And then we have the many people who thrive on group content and playing the game with others. Nothing wrong with that. But, all current endgame content centers around this group of people. And that is my big problem. It makes zero sense to design any MMO exclusively around one group of players and force the other group to conform.

Next, we have the problem of people feeling forced into doing things they don't want to do in order to min/max what they do want to do. For example, some feel the need to run M+ or PvP to get the best gear they can even if they only really want to raid and vice-versa. People should be allowed to focus on one single form of content if they so choose OR dabble in multiple aspects of the game if that makes them happy.

So in an attempt to address all of these issues with one over-arcing design, I believe that the answer is specialized bonus gear. For example, I will refer to current gear numbers to explain how this system would work.








WORLD CONTENT

The biggest goal here is to extend the gearing process and further increase player power through world content but without stepping on the toes of other endgame progression.



World Quests

Gear rewarded from World Quests would scale from 148 to 220. Renown gates this system, allowing the gearing process to be done incrementally over time. This gear would offer outdoor bonuses similar to what was used with Covenant Gear.



Covenant Gear

This would be the endgame for those who focus on just world content. Covenant Gear would scale to 226. I think this gear should have offered bonuses related to the Maw and Torghast. And maybe the upgrade currency should have been Stygia or something similar that can also be attained through normal Torghast. This puts people into the more difficult outdoor areas of the current patch with a good reward system in place.



World Bosses

Gear drops here would scale just like World Quests within a patch cycle. Maybe valuable trinkets and weapons would be acquired here. It just needs a little something extra to differentiate it as being weekly content.



Faction Reputation

This is probably fine. It should serve as a temporary boost along your journey.



Profession Crafting

On one hand, I believe that the gear from crafting should just be transmog gear. Make it interesting and maybe more practical looking gear opposed to all of the crazy looks we get from gear elsewhere. Example being the vendor weapons we gain access to from the new starting area. Otherwise, I would just designate this gear as starter PvP gear or catch-up gear.







RAIDS

Gear from raids would now have a bonus system that would give a max bonus of 30% at 15 pieces. All raid encounters would obviously be tuned according. You would want raid gear to raid. Those progressing through say Heroic would probably want to also run Normal if gear upgrades exist there. This is in opposition to the current gearing scheme where people feel forced to run M+ or PvP to fill in the gaps in their gear.

5 Set Bonus: Increases your Primary stat and Stamina by 5% while in a raid.

10 Set Bonus: Increases your Primary stat and Stamina by an additional 10% (15%) while in a raid.

15 Set Bonus: Increases your Primary stat and Stamina by an additional 15% (30%) while in a raid.







DUNGEONS

Gear from Dungeons would have the exact same bonus system as Raid gear, except this bonus only works in dungeons. Once again, people who want to just run dungeons won't feel the need to do other things to succeed or cut corners. Additionally, gear rewards could be slightly increased across the board since you wouldn't be gaining gear from multiple sources.

5 Set Bonus: Increases your Primary stat and Stamina by 5% while in dungeons.

10 Set Bonus: Increases your Primary stat and Stamina by an additional 10% (15%) while in dungeons.

15 Set Bonus: Increases your Primary stat and Stamina by an additional 15% (30%) while in dungeons.








PVP

Gear from PvP needs to be simplified and have any rating requirement removed. Rated play should be all about fame, glory, and transmog gear. We only need one PvP currency with a weekly cap just like Conquest now. You buy the PvP gear with that currency and upgrade the gear with that currency. This process should be gated similar to how Honor gear was this patch. PvP gear would eventually upgrade to 226. There would now be a long path of progression through PvP even for casual players.

Versatility would be changed to a PvP stat that only comes on PvP gear. All pieces of PvP gear would have Versatility, even all trinkets. Versatility would increase damage and healing by X% and decrease damage taken from other players by X%. PvP gear would have a set bonus tied to Versatility.

5 Set Bonus: Increases your Versatility by 5% while in Arena and Battlegrounds.

10 Set Bonus: Increases your Versatility by an additional 10% (15%) while in Arenas and Battlegrounds.

15 Set Bonus: Increases your Versatility by an additional 15% (30%) while in Arenas and Battlegrounds.








GREAT VAULT

PvP rewards would work similar to the Raid and Dungeon rewards.

Reward 1 - Win 1 Battlegrounds or 3 Arena matches.

Reward 2 - Win 5 Battlegrounds or 10 Arena matches.

Reward 3 - Win 10 Battlegrounds or 20 Arena matches.







Using this example, I believe that a compromise can be had regarding how gear rewards work. Everyone would feel adequately rewarded for doing the content of their choosing. I really do believe everyone could be happy with this system but I would like to hear your feedback.

Additionally, I think it would be appropriate to rethink the color schemes of gear in accordance with this plan:







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NEW - Alternative Bonus Power System


After taking some feedback into consideration, here is an alternative to the bonus gear system that I proposed originally.

I believe that some sort of bonus system is the right move to solve the problem, but I now believe that this theoretical bonus system doesn't necessarily have to be attached to the actual gear. So here is the new idea: basically there would be a separate PvE and PvP power bonus that you would gain after completing different levels of content. This system would be evergreen and the bonus would reset with every season/patch cycle. We would require a new panel maybe with a toggle button accessible from our character panel. Below is a rough example showing how it might look for a player progressing through any certain patch cycle:



This creates a bonus reward system for players who participate in more "difficult" content that translates into other similar areas of the game. By adding power through accomplishments, it reduces the need for the actual gear to be the main focal point of the rewards structure. This in turn, creates an avenue for world content gear to scale to maximum ilvl just like all other gear within each patch cycle. Gear progression is the rock that WoW was founded upon. And with this new proposed system, all content would provide a long rewarding path that puts all players on equal footing within the outside World...of Warcraft.

* Note that I did not overthink what exactly the bonus should be or it's relative value.

[saixilein]

For me gearing in PvP is just a big fun-stoper. I just wanna PvP, i dont want to grind gear, i dont want to farm Items, etc etc. Just give as back Legion PvP. Maybe just give us 2 PvP Trinkets, to boost 2 of your preffered Stats, like "I want to be an Arms warrior with max Crit & Mastery" or something, so at least the is a bit diffence between the players and maybe some other covenant playstyles.

For PvE i dont realy feel its necessary for change content. If you force people to farm of every conent specific gear they will mimimi. as a leader you need to check if they 226er+ Itemlevel AND have the right set. Beside thats i dont know anyone who is just doing world content, mostly they raid casual and enjoy the game. Never met someone who is criticizing on a level like you and is fine with some worldquest staff.

Beside that the game is grindy enough at this point, introducing 2 more sets you maybe need is just.. no.

And if we take the adantage off of "in dungeons you do X% more dmg with this set" then the whole thing become redundant. If WQ/Openworld content is the way to get fastes/easiest 226+ items they spam it the whole day, instead of running mythics like in BFA. Players will always min/max every stupid thing, so there will be ever to strong/weak ways to gearing up or have some good/broken systems.

Players today are like= how to get the most gear/progression with the aleast amount of things i need do for that.

And this will never ever be undone.

So for me i dont need gearing in pvp, pve gearing is fine, just let me force to do daylie/weekly boring stuff for months and let me gearing alts so fast before Legion.

[heheszek]

and as a result we would have another way to gear up = another daily chores to do even when our char is already above that type of content currently
no thanks

[Clash the DK]

and as a result we would have another way to gear up = another daily chores to do even when our char is already above that type of content currently
no thanks

People who are involved with any one form of current endgame progression usually partake in other forms as well in order to min/max. With what I am proposing, you would at least have a choice. You could focus on one path of progression or you could do whatever you want. You would have multiple options, but yes you would have to put in extra time to be successful at multiple things. I believe that to be fair.

- - - Updated - - -

For me gearing in PvP is just a big fun-stoper. I just wanna PvP, i dont want to grind gear, i dont want to farm Items, etc etc.

Gear progression is the rock that WoW was founded upon. If you don't like grinding gear for PvP, then you're probably playing the wrong game. I'm sure there are plenty of other PvP focused games out there that do not require a gear grind and that are probably better at PvP than WoW.

[Maell]

In one word: NO

If you want all gear to be specialized then someone who does all 3 forms of content would require 3 full sets of gear. I know it may sound lovely when that idea was bouncing around between your ears, but it just would not work. If people complain about gearing now, imagine if this idea went ahead and how the complaints would be massive. It would be a shitshow, obviously.

[Clash the DK]

In one word: NO

If you want all gear to be specialized then someone who does all 3 forms of content would require 3 full sets of gear. I know it may sound lovely when that idea was bouncing around between your ears, but it just would not work. If people complain about gearing now, imagine if this idea went ahead and how the complaints would be massive. It would be a shitshow, obviously.

I already use 2 sets of gear (PvE and PvP) plus situational pieces. And I have plenty of bag space in my bank. I don't see the problem.

[froschhure]

Even more resources for systems that be abandoned yay. Just return to bfa loot table and let's get over this already...

[Clash the DK]

Even more resources for systems that be abandoned yay. Just return to bfa loot table and let's get over this already...

I'm not sure how you see that. This is an evergreen plan for gearing that would be replicated each patch.

And as for BfA, that was awful. I started that xpac playing casually but loot just fell from the sky. I got super lucky with drops and TFing and was better geared than some Heroic raiders in a ridiculous amount of time. I got so much gear so fast that I quit the game because there was no more gear progression for my character. That's just dumb. I want a reason to log into the game and play. There needs to be a balance between time and reward. BfA went too far in one direction and Shadowlands has gone too far in the opposite direction.

[Dracullus]

mmo-champion should probably create a subforum called "I think I'm a game designer"

Nothing wrong with puting suggestions. Problem starts when forum Andy thinks he's more competent than devs cause he play this game 5/10/15 years.

[Echocho]

Can't wait until arkanon finds this thread *grabs popcorn*

[VinceVega]

At that point you can just hand out gear from a vendor. Max level gear from WQ... lol.

Honestly if they did that i think i would quit.... Seperate gear sets for every part of the game? Max level loot for.... well nothing...

You would need to armory vet every freaking person to see of they have the right set because iLvl would be completly useless.

You say Blizz should not cater to people who want to play in groups IN A MMO! I say a MMO should never ever cater to single player focused gamers because there are hundreds of games for those. Leave at least the 2-3 viable games that exists in that direction alone without turning them in your own personal loot pinata.

[TheLucky1]

It is my opinion that we should have a better gear progression system in place for casual world content. Many people want to gear up their character but do not like participating in mandatory group content. I like to compare this to so many people who live in the suburbs; They like or don't mind living around other people, but do not want to consistently interact with their neighbors. Some people enjoy that balance of community and solitude. After playing since the beginning and doing everything this game offers over the years, I now fall into this category. I prefer solo content unless temporary convenience dictates the matter.

And then we have the many people who thrive on group content and playing the game with others. Nothing wrong with that. But, all current endgame content centers around this group of people. And that is my big problem. It makes zero sense to design any MMO exclusively around one group of players and force the other group to conform.

Yes, and it is perfectly fine that people chose to play this way but they shouldn't be catered to, there are other games just for them that put all resources and the overall design into that: Single player rpgs, since some are even heavily modifiable like skyrim i can even guarantee that everyone finds their perfect fit there.

I don't get the entitlement from that group of players, for example there isn't a subgroup of players in League that crys about aram not being the competitive focus simply because that would be ridiculous.

[MrKnubbles]

With the solution you presented, we'd have to acquire a set of gear for each type of content and that's not something I think is good for the game. It feels really bad to try something new but find out you're severely underperforming because you don't have the right type of gear. You could be 10 ilvls higher than someone else and do much less dps because they have raid gear in a raid and you don't. Nah, I don't like that. I've already gone 5 months without getting a weapon. I don't even want to imagine the grind of putting together 3 or 4 different gear sets.

[Clash the DK]

At that point you can just hand out gear from a vendor. Max level gear from WQ... lol.

Honestly if they did that i think i would quit.... Seperate gear sets for every part of the game? Max level loot for.... well nothing...

You would need to armory vet every freaking person to see of they have the right set because iLvl would be completly useless.

You say Blizz should not cater to people who want to play in groups IN A MMO! I say a MMO should never ever cater to single player focused gamers because there are hundreds of games for those. Leave at least the 2-3 viable games that exists in that direction alone without turning them in your own personal loot pinata.

But they already hand out gear from a vendor; It's called raiding. And it's not that hard. Having a specific time commitment for playing a game is difficult and I will give you that. But the game in general is not that hard. If you spend time playing the game, you should be able to progress your character no matter what.

You have to armory vet every person in PvP. Why would doing the same in PvE be a problem? And also, is Blizz not adding RIO for M+?

Regarding your last statement.....What I have proposed does not "cater" to people who like to play solo. It doesn't cater to anybody. The plan offers gear progression for everybody no matter what type of content you prefer. Just because someone gains high ilvl gear from world content doesn't mean they are going to join your raid group and smash your epeen on the damage meters. World content gear would be missing the raid set bonus which makes a huge difference. Going forward, ilvl will be what it should be, a number that identifies your power in world content which is in reality the only place in the game where you will genuinely feel power upgrades in the first place.

[Jujudrood]

So under this philosophy, I would have:
- 1 set of gear for raid (Guardian) - have this today
- 1 set of gear for raid (resto) - have this today
- 2 sets of gear for raid (dps) - have this today, with small item swaps here and there (not full blown sets)
- 1 set of gear for M+ (guardian) - don't have this today (outside of a couple items to swap)
- 1 set of gear for M+ (resto) - same as above
- 1 set of gear for M+ (dps) - same as above
Then replicate that for PVP, should I feel froggy one day.

As a druid, I now have to collect a full 15 piece set at least 3 times (raid, M+, pvp), and considering item swaps for stats between specs, I'm probably looking at anywhere from 80 to 100 unique items to complete my sets and be relevant in the content (because I lose set bonuses to which the raids are balanced).
And that's just instanced endgame content.
Ouch.

Look, I'm all for them addressing stuff like covenant gear, which got to too high of an ilevel too fast, but in a normal world, the .1 patch would have already been out and it wouldn't have seemed like you had nowhere to go due to the treadmill starting up again.
They do need to address the speed at which a "casual, solo player" gears up to help them along and allow them to continue the power climb, but don't jack up instanced content anymore than it already is...

[Clash the DK]

With the solution you presented, we'd have to acquire a set of gear for each type of content and that's not something I think is good for the game. It feels really bad to try something new but find out you're severely underperforming because you don't have the right type of gear. You could be 10 ilvls higher than someone else and do much less dps because they have raid gear in a raid and you don't. Nah, I don't like that. I've already gone 5 months without getting a weapon. I don't even want to imagine the grind of putting together 3 or 4 different gear sets.

As I mentioned before, I already keep 2 man sets (PvE and PvP) plus different accessories for each set. That's not counting the Honor and Covenant gear I have stashed in my bank. But realistically, 3 sets (Raid, Dungeon, PvP) would be the most you would have to keep up with if you want to run all 3 forms of content. I honestly don't see that as being a big determent to this concept considering all of the benefits.

Blizz is already planning on having PvP gear magically drop in ilvl when not PvPing, which is much more confusing IMO. I think that what I am proposing is a much more clean solution.

- - - Updated - - -

So under this philosophy, I would have:
- 1 set of gear for raid (Guardian) - have this today
- 1 set of gear for raid (resto) - have this today
- 2 sets of gear for raid (dps) - have this today, with small item swaps here and there (not full blown sets)
- 1 set of gear for M+ (guardian) - don't have this today (outside of a couple items to swap)
- 1 set of gear for M+ (resto) - same as above
- 1 set of gear for M+ (dps) - same as above
Then replicate that for PVP, should I feel froggy one day.

As a druid, I now have to collect a full 15 piece set at least 3 times (raid, M+, pvp), and considering item swaps for stats between specs, I'm probably looking at anywhere from 80 to 100 unique items to complete my sets and be relevant in the content (because I lose set bonuses to which the raids are balanced).
And that's just instanced endgame content.
Ouch.

Look, I'm all for them addressing stuff like covenant gear, which got to too high of an ilevel too fast, but in a normal world, the .1 patch would have already been out and it wouldn't have seemed like you had nowhere to go due to the treadmill starting up again.
They do need to address the speed at which a "casual, solo player" gears up to help them along and allow them to continue the power climb, but don't jack up instanced content anymore than it already is...

This is a legitimate complaint as a Druid, although having to keep extra gear for 4 specs does come with the territory. My idea of shifting Versatility to a PvP only stat should help reduce the amount of gear possibilities some. But yeah, if you want to min/max a Druid for all 4 specs and do so in all 3 major forms of endgame content, then you would have to store plenty of gear.

[Kumorii]

I don't see how this is improving it. It's just more gear grind if you participate in all content. Do people have multiple sets? absolutely... will this make the situation even worse? Absolutely...

I don't get the benefit it gives, it just makes you more powerful in X content, which either means you trivilize it or you have content that are balanced around it. both of which are bad. If it's balanced around it you are not getting a "nice" bonus for doing that content and get gear for it, you just have to "re-prog" in another aspect of the game.

Something I enjoy is to get my character as powerful as I can before a new raid, through mythics, heroics and raids and this would just nullify that a lot. Unless of course it's not balanced around the bonus, but then when you get the raid pieces it just becomes a joke instead. The bonuses you are proposing aren't exactly small, they are gigantic.

[Clash the DK]

I don't see how this is improving it. It's just more gear grind if you participate in all content. Do people have multiple sets? absolutely... will this make the situation even worse? Absolutely...

I don't get the benefit it gives, it just makes you more powerful in X content, which either means you trivilize it or you have content that are balanced around it. both of which are bad. If it's balanced around it you are not getting a "nice" bonus for doing that content and get gear for it, you just have to "re-prog" in another aspect of the game.

Something I enjoy is to get my character as powerful as I can before a new raid, through mythics, heroics and raids and this would just nullify that a lot. Unless of course it's not balanced around the bonus, but then when you get the raid pieces it just becomes a joke instead. The bonuses you are proposing aren't exactly small, they are gigantic.

Content would be balanced around the system. For example, the difficulty curve would be more steep from Raid Boss #1 to Raid Boss #8 compared to the current raid structure. Nothing would be trivialized.

People who run say M+ and Raid are already collecting plenty of extra gear. In this case they would just be keeping more that is acquired to complete sets instead of vendoring so much of it because it would more likely be useful.

[Kumorii]

Content would be balanced around the system. For example, the difficulty curve would be more steep from Raid Boss #1 to Raid Boss #8 compared to the current raid structure. Nothing would be trivialized.

People who run say M+ and Raid are already collecting plenty of extra gear. In this case they would just be keeping more that is acquired to complete sets instead of vendoring so much of it because it would more likely be useful.

How does having more gear improve it though? it just means you have more gear in the bags and it also means it takes more time to collect sufficient gear in all areas.
Is the point to just make gearing take longer? What is it you are trying to solve? Casual gearing? By implementing a system that requires more time to get gear?

As a casual you can't just dabble into X from Y because you will be so far behind, you have to commit. Meanwhile now as a casual, you can go into m+ or raids or pvp if you've just done one type of content before because you have gear that isn't as far behind as this system would make.

[Crimson Spears]

You know the moment in TBC where people started to let terrible players call themselves casuals and stopped calling them out really was the moment the community lost control of itself.