Itemization is more of an issue than you might think of in World of Warcraft: Classic. Sure, there’s a pretty clear progression of gear in the game (and characters like Fury Warriors will still get little to none), but the earliest pieces of gear could frequently be… let’s say less useful than intended. There’s also the cadence of the content rollout to consider. A new post from the development team confirms that the game’s items will only be available at the point they would normally be available based on the content phases, but the game will use the patch 1.12 version that does things like removing Spirit from Warrior plate armor.
The reasoning, simply enough, is that acquiring items is inherently part of the content being released, but it’s not necessary to recreate the feel when those items were tuned badly or needed to be altered. Instead, the goal is to provide gear in its most useful form, not to force everyone to relive the days when Spirit showed up for classes not using mana. Check out the full rundown if you want to consider the fine points of the compromise.
