Last night, Blizzard posted a dev blog to explain just how World of Warcraft Legion plans to drive a wrecking ball into the game’s existing PvP paradigm.
For starters, honor and conquest currencies are being replaced with honor points akin to experience points and awards on the new honor track, all the way up to 50, at which point you can “prestige” — that is, start over at level 1 and increase your prestige level and rack up some cosmetics. Awards include honor talents that work only in PvP.
Gear, on the other hand, will no longer matter, aside from a “small modifier based on your average item level” because you know they just couldn’t let that go.
“As soon as you zone into a PvP instance, the stats on your gear will be nullified, and you’ll be given a pre-determined set of stats that’s uniquely configured for your specialization. Furthermore, any set bonuses, enchants, Legendary bonuses, or trinket effects will be deactivated.”
This also means PvP gear is going away as a thing to grind for. So basically it’s close to what Guild Wars 2 does, and it’s what Blizzard has been hinting at off and on since it first introduced arenas back in Burning Crusade.
As far as Legion’s PvP seasons are concerned, expect shorter ones, and expect to never need to swap sides again. “In Legion, we’ll be handing out end-of-season PvP awards separately to the top percentages of players in each faction, instead of in relation to the overall player base,” writes Blizz. “That means that, even if you believe one faction to have an advantage over the other, you can still play the one you want to, without having to worry about losing your shot at Gladiator.”
Legion’s alpha will be on hold throughout the holiday. There’s no word yet on the beta announced for this year at Gamescom and BlizzCon.
In other WoW news, CM Lore has announced a fresh wave of bot bannings. “Cheating of any form will not be tolerated,” he writes. Be good to each other.
