Legendary items come and go too
by David Bowers 
Sep 1st 2007 at 3:08PM
On the other hand, Blizzard's philosophy is that gear comes and gear goes: you only use whatever gear you have until you find something better, and this applies across the board without exception. Besides, allowing any item to truly scale with the player could create all sorts of logistical problems that Blizzard doesn't want to get into; they'd have to scale the difficulty of getting the items, the difficulty of improving them as you level, and a whole lot of other work they'd rather put into making new items for you to replace your legendary stuff with.
Some players seem to rally against this philosophy of constant change. Perhaps they feel as though the effort they put in is worth permanent rewards? Or perhaps they feel like their awesome items are a part of who they are, and their characters just don't feel the same if they have to give them up. For myself, I prefer to keep on upgrading my gear than ever to have one permanent item, since it helps to keep things fresh and interesting.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Sébastien Mar 30th 2009 1:38PM
Well, how about a compromise, legendary weapons do not get upgraded, but they open the way to a new and extremely long and hard quest to get new legendaries, but you can only do those new quests if someone on the raiding group has the legendary weapon... That way the legendary weapon owners have something to show for all their hard work when the next expansion hits, even if they will eventually have to store their old legendarie weapons.
ryan Sep 1st 2007 7:09PM
uhh what about upradable weps that require harder and harder to get mats, then u need mats from ssc and tk and so force and so on.
Dave Sep 1st 2007 4:16PM
I think that legendaries should be upgradeable with each expansion and/or new raid.
It could work like the wonderfully done dungeon set 1 -> 2 upgrade chain, and even have a really long and absurdly expensive chain to do it involving even more top tier raid drops to upgrade the item to a currently useful level. It's not like they have to automatically morph with your character as your level increases or anything.
I mean it just seems pretty silly to say that one thing is a "legendary" item when compared to just any old piece of crap axe found in outland, it's simply an ordinary axe. It must feel pretty crappy to have spent months as a full guild effort to get Atiesh, the most powerful caster weapon around, and then a month later when the expansion hits... it's gone from being a legendary item at the top of it's class... to something that's just simply average. If they're going to just get quickly obsolete like any other piece of loot, why are they legendary? They're not that much more powerful than the rest of the top-tier stuff at any given time... so is it really legendary when the next raid will drop something equal or better and the next expansion will have comparable blue items?
Smorisha Sep 1st 2007 5:02PM
Working as it should be, no doubt. I find it rather disturbing how people dream of some items and get "soulbound" to them. PVE progress is not made so you can get items you dream of, you get items to progress more by using them. So far it has been endless chain and it should stay that way. I was so annoyed when some guys kept using Thunderfury while having better tanking weapons in their backpacks, rather silly. Sure, its nice to have it equiped for looks and old times sake but...
Carlin Sep 1st 2007 5:19PM
If legendaries scaled with level, then when a new expansion is released people would simply farm an instance (such as Black Temple, due to the higher level cap everything would be easier) to get the legendary and then they would be set for the entire game and never need to replace their weapon.
Matthew Rossi Sep 1st 2007 6:53PM
My human has a Sulfuras getting dusty in the bank.
Versai Sep 1st 2007 10:41PM
@4 no, there would be no way the instances scale with level so it wouldn't matter if you were 80 or 180. the dark temple and instances here after since the burning crusade have scaled so it just won't happen.
ryan Sep 1st 2007 7:28PM
thunderfury is still a good tankng sword btw
Mats Sep 1st 2007 7:55PM
Thunderfury is not still a good tanking weapon, the threat generated by it's proc got nerfed to booty bay and back in a minor patch between 2.0 and 2.1, and after that any tank still using it is retarded.
Now, as for this upgrade thing. No, it should not happen. It's a good thing that we have a reset button with each expansion. It gives us a chance to get a new main, and it lets us explore new content, and not have us grind useless gray trash to get items.
If Legendary weapon X could be upgraded to Legendary weapon Y, and that was the best weapon in game, it would be a no major problem for a raider guild that wanted that weapon to go farm some gray mobs from pre-exp to get that weapon, and then upgrade it.
So what would that lead to? You have people going and killing stuff for 1 item for hours upon end, in a boring instance that they have done a zillion times before, so there new main tank (who was a alt before the exp came along) can get the base for the best weapon in the game. Thats a horrible idea.
Juliah Sep 1st 2007 7:56PM
Perhaps there is a compromise (and there should be, from a roleplaying perspective): perhaps you could upgrade your weapon to whatever qualifies as mid-level tier quality each expansion. You don't get to keep it as top of the mark, but you do get to keep it at least viable.
olhado Sep 1st 2007 9:08PM
This is a lore issue, not a logistical one. Illidan's blades are way stronger than anything short of what, Frostmourne? And that's that.
Jhae Sep 1st 2007 9:23PM
Legendary items should not scale with level. They should scale with expansion. For example the Twin Warglaives are level 70 items atm. When WotLK goes live they should be upgradeable to level 80 items and seeing as they are Legendary items it should be extremely difficult to do.
As for he number of Legendary items there should be few and far between. This way if you want to get a legendary item when expansion x comes out you can go back to whatever instance you have to go to to get the original item. You can have the Legendary weapon start a quest line at the next level cap when they meet certain requirements.
I mean they killed Ragnoras\Thunderaan\Illidan\etc and did everything necessary why shouldn't you be able to keep that item.
The only thing I can see that Blizzard can maybe do maybe give each class a Legendary\Epic weapon and let them upgrade the weapon. Just make these weapons extremely difficult to get.
Justo Sep 1st 2007 9:41PM
if we kept upgrading our current armor and weapons, shit would get stale after so long. who wants to look the same all the time? i like getting better gear that makes my ton look different. legendary weapons should be no different. new content = new gear, period. heres what i think. if people dont want to give up their legendary weapons, dont spend so much time attaining something that you KNOW will eventually be obsolete. if you choose to get said legendaries, then dont bitch when lv 75 blues are better, because you know it is going to happen. if they just upgraded the legendaries, why would they put NEW ones into the game? keep it fresh, keep it new, and stop being whiny bitchfucks.
Deus Mortus Sep 1st 2007 11:10PM
What would be best is a way to simply show them off, I have all dungeon sets, tiers 1 to 5 and an assortment of awesome weaponry, I would just like a place to put them and be able to show them to my friends and tell them cool raiding story's.
I don't care I can no longer equip, actually, I don't give a flying fuck, but I worked hard to get them and had a lot of fun while getting them and like an old hunter sitting in a room filled with trophy's telling his friends tales from his adventures hunting. I want to sit down and share old times with guildies and tell new guildmembers what it's all about.
Ben Sep 2nd 2007 1:18AM
People CAN keep their legendaries, just like I've kept some of my best epics. I still have Sul`thraze in the bank on my warrior and paladin. I still break it out every now and then, not because I expect it to kick butt like it did back in the day, but because I expect it to give me the warm fuzzies.
Should TF get upgraded so it's a mid-grade 70 epic? Hell no. If you think it's sad banking it now, imagine putting it aside for a 10 stam upgrade or a more useful proc. No, the *massive* effective difference between TF and even introductory raid tanking swords is the only thing that makes retiring TF bearable.
CVJ Sep 2nd 2007 1:08AM
@8 your first line is so retarded and uninformed and I can tell you either do not have one or do not play a tank.
20 percent attack speed reduction that works against bosses, it has been calculated with proc to be comparable to weapons pre Black Temple and is barely above many other tank weapons, if you have it you don't have to spec 3 points into improved thnderclap.
Of course once you get to Black Temple you can easily replace it but I checked and many of the top raiding guild tanks kept it way into level 70 so it is not that bad.
Noroth Sep 2nd 2007 2:30AM
Similar to how #5, Matthew Rossi, mentions having a Hand of Sulfuras just sitting in the bank. It would seem that old gear we have invested a fair amount of sentimental value into tends to just gather and take up an increasingly copious amount of bankspace. The only solutions involving permanently getting rid of these items, never to be seen again, or just leaving them as they are.
So, what if Blizzard gave us a way to use these items purely aesthetically? Similar to the Sergeant, or other Honor ranks, or things like Contender for the Arenas now, where we can select, at will and at any time, from a drop-down one of a few titles to add to our name. We can instead have a way to drop items from our banks, sort of deleting them, but instead storing them in a 'collection' of items we can swap in purely aesthetically. Granted this alone could cause problems; a dagger rogue being seen as a mace rogue and so on. So, it can be an in-town while unflagged for PvP only thing. Walk into Shattrath, and your flag drops anyway, and poof. Your ugly stick of a sword quest-reward at level 76 turns instead into the Warglaves of Azzinoth or whatever other item you've selected to be your 'dress' item for a given slot. We could essentially have another equip panel, but for our 'around town' attire. This way the sentimental value and memories are retained, without costing us increasingly precious inventory space, or forcing us to forsake our more cherished moments in the game for newer items we care for less for. Personal value can then be maintained alongside the undeniable logic of superior stats on easier-obtained items.
Eclipsaa Sep 2nd 2007 4:44AM
Personally i wouldn't mind like buying keys from blacksmiths that would upgrade the dps and stats of "orange" weapons to say a level 70 epic. cost a bit of gold but still make that lovely weapon that you worked so hard for or that you thought you may never see worth using at the peek level. Dosent even have to change the proc, just something that changes the dps and stats to something useful
Tridus Sep 2nd 2007 6:46AM
I'd rather not STILL be farming Molten Core because people want Windfury, thanks.
Tridus Sep 2nd 2007 6:47AM
Thunderfury, rather. :)