Getting back to the art side of the question. We're excited about taking the same amount of art time and number of armor sets and trying to create more variety for more players.
In Emerald Nightmare in Legion, the armor that you saw were recolors or variants of the tier 19 set, which you eventually obtained later on in Nighthold. When you looked at them, they had no connection whatsoever to the Emerald Nightmare. You were going into that zone and killing corrupted monstrosities, but the loot you were getting didn't have a direct link there. That's how raid armor has always worked for years and years and years. We spent all this artist time for class sets, and then we use recolors and variants to flesh out the rest of the loot tables.
This time around, we want to go really heavy on the thematic origins of armor. When you go into Uldir, all the loot from there--cloth, leather, mail, plate sets--feel like they came from this troll titan corrupted vibe. Very different direction from the past. And when we eventually face Queen Azshara, there's a high-elven aquatic vibe we can capture there.
In a world of transmog, we see today lots of people get their tier sets and instantly transmog over to their favorite set anyway. In the short term, if you want that iconic Paladin look, there are dozens of options out there for you.
For Battle for Azeroth, while the mechanics of the system move away from assembling tier set bonuses and focus more on customizing your helmet and shoulders and chest, we want to take the opportunity to add a lot more art variety to the world. To have heavily-themed nautical maritime Kul Tiran sets, and Zandalar troll sets, and Alliance sets, and Horde sets...
There will be a lot of appearances and differentiation - there will be more options than ever before, as opposed to our 22nd or 23rd take on priest class fantasy.
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We've had armor sets in the past...like Naxxramas...that were class focused but geared towards the zone.
At time that also muddies the waters. How do you make a fel set for a mage, that doesn't feel like a warlock? There are blurry lines. What's the Old God themed Paladin set?
This isn't a reduction of art we're doing, it's an increase. It will lead to a lot more variety of art which is accessible to more players in the long run. It's almost certain we'll get back to class-based stuff down the line, but for Battle for Azeroth, Alliance vs Horde, Kul Tiran vs Zandalari made sense to spread out throughout armor art.
Is there one appearance per armor type? One mail, one leather, one cloth, one plate?
Yes per a given zone, but there will be more variety across different zones.
For bfa, instead of a class based set, it's themed about where it's from?
It's the first time we're really giving our high fidelity raid armor treatment to non class sets. with the full added geometry, a lot of visual effects, more epic mythic versions. For the transmog fans out there, it will blow out the space you have to customize character and variety of epic looks you can put together.
