Heirlooms in World of Warcraft are outdated. In the past, they were almost a must-have, but now fewer people use them – because they are bad.
For many years, there was a rule in World of Warcraft when playing alternate characters: The more heirlooms they wore, the better and faster they could level up. This could cost a lot of gold, but you were rewarded with increased leveling speed and clear comfort.
But that is long gone. Today, heirlooms are primarily two things: a shadow of their former selves and expensive.
Currently, Classic realms in WoW are extremely popular, as fresh ones have been launched:
What are heirlooms? Heirlooms are a special form of equipment in World of Warcraft. They can be crafted infinitely through the collection and scale with the level of the respective character starting from level 1. If you wear several of these items, they function as a set and offer some set bonuses, such as slower consumption of rest XP.
How heirlooms have changed: Over the course of expansions, heirlooms have undergone many changes. On one hand, heirlooms have extremely many upgrade levels, which you must buy individually with gold for each item. In their basic form, heirlooms now only scale up to level 29. Anyone wanting more has to upgrade the items for a lot of gold. A whole set costs several hundred thousand gold.
A significant change was the adjustment of set bonuses. In the past, heirlooms provided bonus XP as long as they were worn. These bonuses have faded over time. Now there is only indirect and temporary bonus XP by the character’s rest bonus depleting more slowly. However, this is only noticeable if the character is not played for an extended period during the leveling phase.
Lastly, heirlooms are relatively weak at every level. Often their strength is lower than that of quest or dungeon rewards. This was different in the past. Back then, you could basically wear heirlooms from level 1 up to just before the maximum level and only had to exchange them afterwards. The idea: You didn’t have to deal with equipment while leveling.
This is how the community discusses it: The decline of heirlooms over the last expansions is widely discussed in the WoW community, as seen in a post in the WoW subreddit. There, TechnoCloud624 asks: “Has anyone else stopped using heirlooms?”
A question that receives a lot of feedback and especially agreement. Saelora sees it most positively and says:
They are useful for the first few levels and ensure that a new character has something in every equipment slot. But they are no longer worth upgrading.
OkMarsupial also regrets how heirlooms have changed:
I spent an insane amount of time farming and upgrading them at the Darkmoon Faire, but I don’t use them anymore because they scale so poorly. I think they were unfair to [heirloom equipment] during the level squish.
In terms of player preference, heirloom equipment has definitely declined. This is partly because leveling can now be completed in a few hours if you go for it – even completely without heirloom equipment. Do you still use these items? Or are they gathering dust in your collection?
World of Warcraft is currently taking action against players who leave dungeons early.
