Alternative Tier Sets & Midpatch Itemization Changes

[Dragunovi]

Greetings! Today we're happy to announce that alternative class armor sets are in the works and slated for release in a future patch!

These armor sets allow specializations that struggle with itemization to swap their tier pieces to versions that are tailored towards their preferred version, complete with all new set bonuses. If you plan on getting multiple Legacy sets with the intention of changing one of them into its alternative version, make sure to put the Legacy set you want to keep using in your bank as to avoid losing enchantments.

Tier 1, 2, 2.5 and 3 will be swappable to their alternative counterparts, this includes Tier 3 rings. In addition, Tier 1 and 2 will be recolors of their original sets to further differentiate them.

The existing tier sets that drop from bosses will now be called Legacy sets, which keep their current stats, set bonuses, appearances and remain fully usable as pieces of equipment. In addition to this, they will work as tokens that are turned in to acquire their alternative set versions.

You can find the details below:

• Specializations listed with a / share the armor set.

• There will be different alternative Tier 2.5 sets for some classes due to existing versions already being tailored towards DPS.

• We are also planning on buffing set bonuses on the Legacy Rogue and Hunter tier sets due to them not requiring any new sets as to not leave them out.
  
  The following specializations will get new sets:
  • Mage: Arcane, Fire/Frost
  • Priest: Shadow (Tier 1, 2 and 3), Healing (Tier 2.5 Only), Smite (Tier 2.5 Only)
  • Warrior: Arms/Fury
  • Warlock: Destruction
  • Druid: Feral Combat (Cat/Bear), Balance, Restoration (Tier 2.5 Only)
  • Shaman: Enhancement, Elemental
  • Paladin: Retribution, Protection, Holy (Tier 2.5 Only). As a disclaimer, only the Holy tier set is for Tier 2.5, rest of the specializations will get an armor set for all tier sets.

We might possibly consider other alternative tier sets such as Poison Rogue, Melee Hunter and Tank Shaman after Class Changes 2 are complete and these specializations are more fleshed out.

As a smaller announcement, we're planning on doing some midpatch itemization changes with an upcoming server restart which includes the following:

• Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj Class Pieces Rework

• Dungeon Set 2/Tier 0.5 Buffs and Feralheart Set Rework

• Legacy Mage Tier 1 and 2 Buffs

• Legacy Rogue Tier 2 Buffs

• Hateforge Armor Set Buffs

• Minor Steel Armor Set Adjustments

• Other Miscellaneous Changes

Details on these changes will be posted here, on the Itemization section of our forum, alongside some other minor changes and bugfixes that were made before this.

EDIT: The midpatch itemization changes are now live! You can find its dedicated changelog in the Itemization forum section.

Thanks for reading!

[Drubarrymooer]

Tier 3 Feral buff?!?!

[Viva]

So does that mean we can collect a 2nd set of tokens to save for our new set (i.e., a holy priest getting a set of t3 tokens for their Shadow turnin once this is released) or do you have to swap one set for the other?
Will this also affect t3 rings?

[Toirto]

woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
I mean wow, that is good. Thank you.

[Ashstache]

sounds sick

[Dragunovi]

So does that mean we can collect a 2nd set of tokens to save for our new set (i.e., a holy priest getting a set of t3 tokens for their Shadow turnin once this is released) or do you have to swap one set for the other?
Will this also affect t3 rings?

Updated post with details.

[Dated]

bear barkskin when

[Gnomoerectus]

I'm curious about the warrior sets. Fury doesn't really need any help in PvE, maybe we could get something that would help them solo content a bit better? Like getting a temporary x% vampirism bonus after using bloodthirst for example.

[Ugoboom]

LETS FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[Anadrol]

I don't know if I understood correctly. Will we be able to change the benefits of Tier Sets between different sets? If that's what I don't understand about Shadow Priest, I don't think he has any specific set for him.

[Enantiom]

I'm curious about the warrior sets. Fury doesn't really need any help in PvE, maybe we could get something that would help them solo content a bit better? Like getting a temporary x% vampirism bonus after using bloodthirst for example.

I doubt it, they couldn't care less about warriors

[Rowrow213]

Is this gonna be another copy of Epoch like the Belt Buckle enchants or the Feral Attack Power on gear for druids?

[Rowrow213]

I'm curious about the warrior sets. Fury doesn't really need any help in PvE, maybe we could get something that would help them solo content a bit better? Like getting a temporary x% vampirism bonus after using bloodthirst for example.

Please no, Vampirism is ass

[Bittermens]

Since the server is on the custom armor ride and Easter eggs, give to paladins a 1:1 Replica of Pelinal Whitestrake's Armor

[Akalix]

Is this gonna be another copy of Epoch like the Belt Buckle enchants or the Feral Attack Power on gear for druids?

The concept of Belt Buckles has been in World of Warcraft since 2008.

Unfortunately, there is a limited amount of options for us to change in Vanilla WoW, meaning we will likely have some feature overlap with other versions of Vanilla WoW.

These alternative sets have been in production for months upon months. It's never fun to work for a long time on a new piece of content and have someone else announce it before you can. But to call any idea "a copy" is an insult to the work put in by both projects.

[Uatu]

Will warriors have to chose between tank t3 or dps tier 3? for example chest, ring, boots, wrist which are bis tanking items, would the counterpart for dps be equally as good or?

what about for fights like 4hm where you need 8 tanks, do those 8 tanks just not go for that 4 set anymore

will we see what items comes out beforehand? will enchants stay on the gear when you swap them around

[Jimyape]

Will the enhancement shaman set be tailored towards DPS only or also for Tanks?

[Destroforum]

A couple questions.

Priest has shadow tier listed for 1,2 and 3, while other specs just say the spec. Are these specs also all 3 tiers?

The 2nd half of the post mentions it will happen on a server reset. Could we get a clarification of when that might be happening? "Upcoming" makes it sound soon.

[Snakeman]

You guys are gonna make a lot of people mad buffing hunter and rogue set bonuses, they're some of the best designed sets in the game purely because itemising for those classes is so simple rofl

[Dragunovi]

A couple questions.

Priest has shadow tier listed for 1,2 and 3, while other specs just say the spec. Are these specs also all 3 tiers?

The 2nd half of the post mentions it will happen on a server reset. Could we get a clarification of when that might be happening? "Upcoming" makes it sound soon.

Specs that aren't specified will get sets for Tier 1, 2. 2.5 and 3, where Shadow doesn't get Tier 2.5 due to the Oracle set already being DPS oriented.

The restart is for other unrelated itemization changes, we will give more information about them soon.

[Matk]

Please look at hunter T 2.5 pieces and swap out the spell dmg for something useful. Hunters, in general, do not use that set.

[Dragunovi]

You guys are gonna make a lot of people mad buffing hunter and rogue set bonuses, they're some of the best designed sets in the game purely because itemising for those classes is so simple rofl

Rogue especially has some dead set bonuses such as the increased max energy on Tier 1 which we will touch on. The items being good doesn't mean the set bonuses should suffer for it.

[Blackduck]

Looking forward to the smite set. After the recent nerfs to the crusader strike debuff it could use a huge buff to make up for it.

I'm hoping the healing version of t2.5 keeps the extra renew tick because that's actually pretty strong when paired with 2 pieces of t3 on some bosses/trash.

[Drudu]

I don't understand...
I have T3 set for rersto druid now, can i change it for feral T3 like Benediction/Anathema in future to play dps on some fights?

[Aeliren]

• We are also planning on buffing set bonuses on the Legacy Rogue and Hunter tier sets due to them not requiring any new sets as to not leave them out.

Melee Hunter and Rogue Tank could potentially be alternative sets for those two classes.

[Whalemilk]

• We are also planning on buffing set bonuses on the Legacy Rogue and Hunter tier sets due to them not requiring any new sets as to not leave them out.

Melee Hunter and Rogue Tank could potentially be alternative sets for those two classes.

If I have to hear the words "Rogue Tank" one more time...

[Ghola]

will you be able to freely swap between alternative versions of the sets at the cost of your enchants?

[Wilsonsds]

Please, fix the enchanted thoruim set armor, 10 arcanite bars for a blue item, this dont make more sense!

[Aeliren]

• We are also planning on buffing set bonuses on the Legacy Rogue and Hunter tier sets due to them not requiring any new sets as to not leave them out.

Melee Hunter and Rogue Tank could potentially be alternative sets for those two classes.

If I have to hear the words "Rogue Tank" one more time...

Technically, you're not hearing the words "Rogue Tank", you're reading them.

Unless you're using a text-to-speech device, of course.

[Bayanni]

I'm kind of interested to see what sort of new set bonuses we're going to see and if a lot of them are just moving the bonuses to different gear levels and sets. T1 8/8 druids getting 30 seconds off hurricane CD was such a meme, but I would legitimately see it being useful on an actual spell damage set like current T2.5, for example.

[Fizzler]

It would be nice if devs took a look at mage T2.5 set bonuses. The 3 set bonus especially is very awful.

[Leitsch]

Ele shamans, while adjusted on twow still suffer from the vanilla problems in raids: going out of mana to soon and most raids have high nature resist. Will the tier changes adress this (pretty please)? Greetings

[Spriggit]

This is so exciting!! Thank you twow devs!

[Introligator90]

Imo Hunter needs beast mastery set which bonuse give % of master's hp ap crit etc.

[Elm0]

Since there is only a heal version of Priest T2.5 Set, wouldnt make it more sense to create a Shadow T2.5 and Smite T2.5? I mean yeah, the stats on Priest T2.5 are suitable for Shadow, but the set bonis is still a heal bonus. Or did u guys have just a typo?=