Too much of a grind? Absolutely

theflamingblue

We all know weapons in the set of the watchers or alabaster are very good, but are hard to obtain. There are certain factors that must be met to obtain the artifact weapon(s) of this/these set(s) that you require. For example, in order to get a weapon of the watchers set, you must complete a 3 rune run, defeat a boss, an eternal wraith must spawn, which is a low chance, then you must give in an essence to spawn a boss of which you only get 1 attempt at defeating, after this you must kill this boss which is probably the hardest one in the game at the moment), and then hope for several categories to be ticked, 1: A piece of the watchers set to actually drop, 2: To win the roll, 3: To hope it's for the class you are, 4: To be the correct offhand/mainhand weapon.
Now this is absolutely insane, who would go to such lengths to farm for the watcher's set? People with alot of time and alot of luck and alot patience, or people who don't know what they are doing. Now the biggest problem is the piece of alabaster or watchers or whatever it is being worthless, and this will in the circumstance where you have got the mainhand/offhand but do not have the mainhand/offhand (other one), to partially solve this problem, there should be an option to choose or trade which type you would rather have the weapon in, either mainhand or offhand or to award the opposite of which you already have, now if you get a piece of alabaster/watchers for a different class then that may be useful once you get it to level 80 (or if it is level 80) however that doesn't quite make as much sense (dropping weapons for a different class) as awarding it for the same class. An alternative to this is awarding a token to redeem for a piece of alabaster/watcher's of the same class/whatever class/whatever slot.
(Skip to here if you don't want to read it all)
Essentially, getting the same piece of alabaster or watchers for the same class is useless, destroying the value of the item
It's been about over a month since mod 16 dropped and this game is always changing, basically, these weapons are not a long term investment, and will inturn prevent players from this incredible grind to farm for them, leading to a decrease in the time they play, decrease in total current player count, more inactivity = less time to the game = less fun and as you can see from there cryptic, it is a downward spiral, especially for those endgame players who can balance this game out that give tips/help to stop making everyone so clueless. Veteran players should be rewarded for their loyalty to a game, and so far this is the only game that does not value older players (i am not a veteran player just to clarify).
Anyway this is just an opinion and feel free to post your opinions down below in the comments, this is just a vague description so i hope you all understand what i'm trying to say.

Poll (Comment Down Below):
I agree
I disagree
You're just salty
Other (Please clarify)

vorphied

I'm always salty.

Alabaster and Watcher's are ridiculously random and grindy...but if you intend to do LOMM and get the Burnished set, you won't care except if you're a collector of miscellaneous equipment. There's nothing at lvl 80, including LOMM, that can't be completed with the upper tier lvl 70 weapons. Obviously it's easier and faster with level-appropriate weapons, but there's no gate that's blocking people from getting the seals.

Alabaster is arguably the best weapon set for solo content, but that's like saying that a certain pair of shoes is best for doing cakewalks. That stuff is designed to be reasonably doable by relatively fresh lvl 80s. Hence this weapon is "meh, whatever" almost as soon as you get it. I do wish it were more readily available for gearing up alts faster, though.

Watcher's set is decent but has ramp-up time and starts its clock over whenever there is a break in combat.

Burnished is overall the best except arguably for very high HP tanks who haven't bothered building for incoming heals and struggle to have it proc. And it requires no RNG at all, even better.

zimxero

When the four new weapon sets came out, I considered the Alabaster set to be the worst of them. I either missed the fact (or they added it later) that the effect resets each time you kill an enemy. To me, this makes Alabaster set BiS, as a high health tank built for maximum reasonable DPS. I don't think it is too hard to get, but I wish there were options to upgrade legacy weapons as an alternative.


Way I see it... If you are fully prepared for LoMM except for an Alabaster Weapon, then you prepared for LoMM. Do it.
If you need the Alabaster Weapon to have a chance at LoMM, your not yet prepared for LoMM.

sandukutupu

I agree "this is absolutely insane" as you stated.

This is why most of my characters are either sticking with their artifact weapons from module 13 or 14. A few are using the Red Feather weapons but transmuted or the Undermountain weapons given by Neveremeber. Llorna Zorg is running a Red Feather orb she purchased and transmuted into the Fallen Guard orb also purchased in the AH. This cost 5K to transmute and a few hundred to get the orbs. I know it cannot slot my weapon enchant but until something "better" comes along, this will do.

Others like my warlock, Aero Ironcrown have the Mountain weapons up to orange, and don't see a need, to go crazy in the attempt, to raise the item level. The micro buffs on these weapons are just not worth the anguish and frustration. I recommend they remove the BoA or BoP so people can freely trade them. I really don't see any harm done by allowing epic weapons to be sold in the AH.

namelesshero347

Well, one can choose not to grind. I've seen DPS do fine with ebonized weapons in LoMM. And certainly tanks and heals do not need mod 16 weapons for LoMM. They may even do the group better by using MC3 weapons.