Why Borrowed Power is the new power gain

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, Willy here, player power and World of Warcraft, spanning from the early days of classic, all the way up to our very soon to be eighth expansion Shadowlands from the casual player who resolves to follow the story in each patch, the arena junkie for the world first RAYDER. It affects us all in varying different ways, and it's changed with the times from simple to more and more convoluted systems as the expansion's progressed new ways for players to gain power and the levels and frequency of which they did, each growing exponentially.

Forget that Shadowlands is the third item and damaged squishy World of Warcraft has seen warlords. Adreno was the first before the second and just one expansion later. Shadowlands being the third. And it's shaping up for power again to once again be insanely high levels by the end of the expansion. Well, at least looking in from our beta states overall, the temporary systems we have and that we know about at the moment. Now, I don't profess to be a prophet or have all the answers. As Mark Rosewater, head designer for magic, the gathering who held that position before Wow existed as an MMO, said Players are amazing at pointing out something as a problem, but not quite so well-equipped to provide the solution. Let's have a look back to how we got to where we are at today, all the way back from vanilla. We want to know three main things for each expansion. OK, number one, how is player power? And number two, how many sources of meaningful player power other than number three, how big of a player power jumps during the expansion? And for the sake of simplicity, this will be power gain in terms of PG content. PvP could be its whole separate thing, but I'm not the guy to make that since I haven't really done PvP for the past few expansions.

Also, if I missed a thing or two out here, then do feel free to point out this is going to be going over quite a lot of stuff. OK, so for Vanilla Power is going for your abilities, your talents, your gear and your professions, the meaningful sources of it are PvP, dungeons, raids, reputations and quests. The power jumps throughout the expansion are quite sizable rates of raid, but itemization was quite a bit wonky back then. Or if you still play classic, you'll very much know that. And a lot of the gear from early raids are kept relevant items like Onslaught Girdle Bone River's edge both from Ragnarok still tear or crossbow from Black Ringler. That is good and bad to having a system like this, like your right lead are probably dragging you to molten core still because he hasn't got a second binding in the burning crusade. Player power is gained once again. Abilities, talents, gear, professions same as Pinella, exact same how many sources of meaningful player power.

Other while PvP was moved to be given its own stats and contained it in such an environment now. But we still had raids, reputations, quests, and we now have badge gear as well as heroic dungeons in terms of power jumps, not total gear resets with each patch. But it was a smaller gap than it was in vanilla.

We now have two sets for every single specialization and Brading is still mostly linear. We did have catch up in the forms of Zula and during the final patch, the Isle of Crowdedness with the reputation rewards, upgrader professional rewards and Majesty's Taris. We still have the occasional item in there, which is good from an old rate for a very, very long time. Sea Dragon spinn trophy from Grool, for example. In Rafa, the linking player power is gained through abilities, talents, gaer professions. The same format still works. Don't need to change it. How many sources of meaningful player power are there? We had rating Hartmut Ludt in all the heroic grades from trial of the grand crusader and onwards reputations and badge gear, which became a real big deal. However, quests and dungeons fell off in importance for the first time ever in Rafah Lich King. Each patch is like a gear reset rating is no longer fully linear, and Katushka as well as the LFG are much more of a thing are getting people into the gaming system faster than ever before. Each new patch has a new emblem or badge currency awarding normal tier rate loot, starting with emblems of heroism.

Item level 200 by the end of RAF, emblems of triumph, a level two six or gear cataclysmic firepower is gained through abilities. Talents which were reworked from one point equals one level to you had to pick a tree and spend at least 31 points before you could spend the rest in another tree gear and professions. Player power gain from Alpha, which was brought in with dragon soul raids, heroic raids which were now a mainstay of Arabic dungeons early on, which were considerably more difficult than they have ever been. Reputations became worth quite a lot less as they were a lot of grinding for heroic dungeon or normal level raid to loot. But they did still have some relevant and chance in the power.

Games remain similar to Iraq. For the King Averbuch, regear remained relevant and only rarely replaced by the next tier. Mr Panagariya, this is where things start getting interesting. Power was going through abilities, talents which were reworked again. We had one entry per class. Yep, one talent tree per class. And it had some of the best class design we have ever seen, in my opinion, having just your class play well by itself is kind of good. And on top of that, we had the gear, of course, as well as the first expansion where we had Legendary's for Everybody, which were the jema and later on the cloak. And of course, we have professions as well. Player Power came from LFR, writes of great mythic RAVE'S. By the end of the expansion, reputations became well worth it again. Averbuch dungeons were kind enough to the ground and pushed out of relevancy we had under forging in front of the morphologic and siege of Okayama rerolled tokens. Well, bosses, valid points and reforging as we cataclysm. And I think it was a bit too much reliance on LFR to boost the early gaming process. A number started getting really high before the world. Priebatsch Squish Note for Mr. Pandorica. Simplest class design. Most ways to get Lou customize your class. So far. Warlords of Drainville.

We had an ability new stuff in but a lot of old unused stuff out. Specialisations was simplified considerably. I like a lot. Talent's reworked for the third expansion in a row now. We had one tenantry per specialization instead of one size fits all, we get one point per fifteen. Lovell's professions, including many gem slots and enchantments work remove meaningful power came from raids which were now at four different difficulties LFR normal, heroic and mythic. And it felt like only the top two were really keeping people relevant. We had reputations and heroic dungeons very early on were OK, but they fell off and they were only really used to the challenge modes.

We had war forging still rerolled tokens and well, bosses. And how big of the player jumps during the expansion? Well, I can summarize it by Nuray comes out do the new raid. There was only three of them. Warlords of Draine are legion. OK, here's where things start to get a bit crazy. So our power is gained from abilities, talents, gaer artifact, weapons and legendary's. It was the last expansion to have large class changes so far in my opinion, which I'll talk about more later. The meaningful player power came from heroic and mythic, great mythic plus spam for Gear your weekly cash world. I must request Titan forging the Gems, Rolls, Rerolled, Tolkan and a lot of our energy. You could get your best item at any time. Anywhere the player power jumps between each patch really started to push on a massive amount from Legian. New temporary power systems were pushed up a notch with each patch to more artifact power into your weapons. Concordance of legion full upgrading. Getting new legendaries previously had only been the balancing changes on our classes on top of our new gear. Now we have these two power sources, which also must be progressed at the same time. You see where this is going now. Maybe battle for Assaraf. The wheels come off the power game train. So player power is going from abilities, talents, gear, AZRI, armor, Essence's and corruptions.
The sources of power are heroic and mythic raids. Rebel tokens titan forging the gem slaughtering emissaries, weekly chess world quests scaling PvP peers were forced to PVA for gear. Peevey is were forced to PvP for Essence's. That should be a choice, not a requirement for the best gear on Tierce. That's what also now gone after being in the game since launch power game between each patch goes totally off the charts, completely insane with a thirty item level jump between each patch you're mithaka from.

The last rate is now equal to normal in the next. That's too much of a power gap. Aldea Normal is three five five Niloufer is four five five baseline imagine amref the Lecky. We went from two hundred to two six borate baseline and each patch was considered a bit of a soft reset then. So what we've seen here for me is that around Legian was the last real big round of class changes. It gave us the Bible Hunter's being Malé Moloch's with a themone summoning pass the orange storm straight spam.
Don't worry, we'll fix it in eight point one. Well, two years of pass. Don't worry, guys. The other two specs are fine enhancement. Sharmin, you know, someone said to me the other day that Legion set BFA up for failure and I've never really thought of it like that. Did Bethany have to have new temporary power systems? Well, no. But did it have to build on us losing our artifact weapons and legendaries? Yeah, you absolutely bet it did, did it? Nope, it sure did. Well, not until really late into the expansion anyway. I think a big reason for the current new systems in each expansion is because what we have at the moment, class wise, is what Blizzard wants the class, and it's their vision for how your class and specialization combo should fail and play.
In World of Warcraft, back as early as Cataclysm, Blizzard were already having difficulties adding something on constantly with each new expansion, which is why they started squishing and removing. And now we have all these systems, instead of it being all about your class and talents, Blizzard seem to have left them in a state where they're largely happy with them. And the actual play style for the majority of classes has changed very little.

Throughout the past three expansions, and instead they're giving us these new temporary systems to build on each expansion, how much is your main, if you can remember, changed from Legian to Shadowlands on a basic level and legendary's. No, Azariah, any of that, just your class and your spack. Think of it in the space of any of three expansions. You probably have that talent that is literally never been used, but it's just there.

No one ever takes it. It's not best for anything, but it's there. Why is it still there? Pick any other expansion to one three later and just think about how your tenantry looked then compared to now. And I have linked entries from other expansions below. Some of them are kind of scuffed. Also, I couldn't find a working bollards or drain or talent calculator, so I've just linked the post with level 100 Townsends that it used to be just new talent, new abilities, and then we bounce from there.
Now it's just a host of different systems being formed together with the hope that they can be balanced. And time and time again, we've seen Flor's feedback or immediately found upon launch and blizzard tend to be quite slow making changes. Essence's were not buyable account wide for nearly a year. The exact same thing happened with Azariah armor and happened with Legendary's and happened with corruptions. And it takes them such a long time to get it right and working that we have to endure far more of this, the learning process of it not working before it's finally in a decent state.

And then what do we do at the end of the expansion? We throw the whole lot in the bin and try and start again. Next expansion. How much continuity can you expect from a system like beams and conduits which revolve around specific characters and factions is a pretty narrow format. Maybe some will live on post Shadowlands, but probably is how BFA tried to integrate Legendary's into talents, the majority of which were totally underwhelming. Another two years or so we're trying to get it right, throwing it in the bin, barely changing classes baseline and then forcing themselves to come up with another system. It's doing the exact same thing and expecting a different result, which is, of course, the definition of madness. And I can tell you 100 percent that Shadowlands will have insane item inflation once again.
How do I know? Well, let's take a look at the recently released item levels for Kastle Nazaria, the first rate normal is level two hundred. By the way, these are the same levels used to start. Raffaella Lecky. Interesting. So normal is the same as Tier seven ten man, which was next. The operates at the start of Iraqis to thirteen, which is next. Twenty five mythic is the same as Tier eight or ten man. And to top it off, the last two bosses are mythic, which have an even higher item level at two three. Three is one item level higher than the regular tier nine, a.k.a. the non graded trial of the crusader items. So that's one rate. And Shadowlands spanning three different tiers of rating from Rafah. The linking item level wise, I'm guessing we finish anaphora doing around a four digit number at the Top End DPS and at the end of the expansion will be at like fifty or sixty K or something. Before you went from like 25 K to nearly 200 K Deeks, by the way, because there's so many layers to contentless, it feels like there needs to be this many layers to gear and each new tier will majorly invalidate your old gear again also. So and legendaries will have to be upgraded as we go on further pushing powers, at least Covenant's will only be a balancing nightmare.
Right. The thing about all this power gain is it can be done right and wrong. And that's proven to have been the case in the past. Temporary power is at its best when it compliments your class and it's designed specifically for it like artifact weapons. And it's at its worst when it's trying to be a one size fits all for every class and just a bunch of stats and prox like corruptions or the basic sawbones. There have been some good learning points, though, in Shadowlands, like the weekly vote, which can give you a range of care instead of just having your weekly disappointment chest and as well as Legendary's having much more player agency to them in your decision making as to what you want. And we can only about one of them at the moment. No doubt this will change, but it's infinitely better than killer bear. Get a legendary and legion. I think when it comes down to it, the temporary power gain is overtaking what our character can do on a base level. This wouldn't be so bad if it were always tailored to our class, but it isn't. Even Covenant's have a bunch of specialization crossover mechanics, our class, how it plays, how it feels, the abilities and the talents should be the most important factor to our power. If something is temporary, it should be treated like that, an attribute for a far smaller percentage of our overall performance.
Not to say change for changes sake, expansion to expansion. But I can't think of another way of explaining what's happened from Legion to Shadowlands. This also means if you don't like how your class or specialization plays, it won't be changed. Just quit, leave it reroll. And the fact they're not reevaluating this during the expansion is worst of all. When was the last time Favel arcane enhancement, survival, demonology, vengeance, rats', when Walker, for example, were anywhere near relevant at the top end for a prolonged period of. Time compared, say, for hostile fire mages, affliction, brewmaster, wholely Pallava Shadow, it's the same class and specialization combos finding themselves at the top and the same at the bottom again and again, because the core class design isn't changing enough item level jumps need to come down. If a temporary system is in place, it should be a smaller portion of our overall power on top of the number of temporary systems, talents, new abilities and class design philosophies which need to be more actively evaluated during the expansion. Not just saying we won't change it because it would be confusing. You know what I find confusing? The fact that I can't understand what gear setup is best for me without paying repots to perform some quantum entanglement on my six digit number of geering options. And it's not that I want retail to become a simplistic as classic.
It's just we're seeing the same mistakes being made again and again. I think to finish up, I thought the temporary power systems in Legian were great by the end of it. BFA never managed to get it right. And Shadowlands, as it's looking at the moment, while Covenant's just aren't bounce the ball basically because they're not providing a like for like kind of opportunity across the different covenant's. I mean, even on our talents, which do aim to provide a like for like opportunity is in, you'll have a survival rrow mobility by a single target. Roon Abreau. They haven't been bounced right. Since well, forever really. And it's an MMO. It's never going to be perfectly balanced. But I know back when I was playing Affliction Lockean BFA, I had pretty much one set up for the entire time. Bring the power back to our classes and back to our specialisations. If temporary is there, make it minor, not massive. Make it spec specific, not one size fits all or a hybrid or BOF or anything in between. I know people are still going to aim to Min Max, but there to be a step in the right direction. That'll do though. I still have a bunch more to say about Shadowlands. Actually, it's going to be an interesting one anyway. So let me know your thoughts and I will see you in the next one very soon.
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