In the new WoW expansion ‘The War Within’, the popular tier sets become boring. But there is a good reason for this.
The beta of the next WoW expansion is live and many features can already be tried out. This includes the new tier sets that will be available in the first season of The War Within. However, the sets have a catch. This time they will be particularly boring. And that is intentional.
What has been said? Blizzard has announced that the bonuses of the tier sets available in the first season of The War Within will be quite simple. This likely means that the damage or effect of certain abilities that are already part of the rotation for the respective specializations will be improved.
Why is Blizzard doing this? The reason behind the simpler tier set bonuses is that Blizzard wants to put a stronger focus on talent diversity and the choice of hero talents. Therefore, the tier sets should have as little influence on gameplay as possible and should not affect hero talents at all. Blizzard states in the WoW forum:
It is very important to us that these class sets do not significantly influence the selection of hero talents. We want our players to be able to choose the corresponding hero talents in the respective content that they prefer. As we move through The War Within, we will explore ways to increase the complexity of the class sets while still ensuring that this core goal is preserved.
Thus, it seems they want to avoid that tier sets have a big impact like in Dragonflight.
How was it in Dragonflight? In Dragonflight, there were some issues with the tier sets. Especially in the later seasons, the bonuses were very specific and often focused on individual talents. This often forced the classes and specializations into a very particular talent distribution.
In season 3, for example, shadow priests had to learn basically every talent for ‘Shadow Word: Death’ and choose all their abilities accordingly. This led to a very monotonous playstyle that allowed hardly any deviations.
Blizzard apparently wants to avoid such restrictions with ‘The War Within’ and place more focus on the hero talents. Therefore, tier sets, at least initially, have to take a step back. What do you think of this solution? Is it a good thing to promote the new hero talents? Or did you like the highly specialized tier sets?
