I’m not really liking the idea of Personal Loot only going forward
In the recent Dev Q&A, they hinted pretty heavily at the possibility of master loot going away entirely and personal loot being the only loot system for raiding in Battle for Azeroth, their stated reasoning being that with the removal of tier set pieces, it will be better for the raid environment since it will help curb raid groups funneling tier pieces to a handful of members on split runs. Personally, I think the idea of taking away something from everyone just because the top 0.01% of players use it in a way Blizzard doesn’t approve of is a bad idea for a lot of reasons.
First, this change won’t kill split runs. Even if it’s harder to do, high-end mythic raiders will absolutely find a way to funnel gear to the people they need it to be on, one way or another, even if it means filling the entire raid with plate classes to give the one or two DKs in the guild every plate upgrade they can trade over. Second, Blizzard shouldn’t be punishing people for being dedicated to their game in the first place. If mythic raiders want to do split runs on alts and funnel gear, why shouldn’t they be allowed to? What they do affects no one but themselves and no one’s making them do it. They’re making the conscious choice to run these raids with the intention of gearing up a needed asset for their guild, which is the kind of teamwork Blizzard shouldn’t be meddling with. Third, there are plenty of guilds that use master looting but DON’T do split runs that are being unfairly punished by this. Personal loot cannot be traded if it’s an item level upgrade, and now these guilds are going to be bottlenecked on progression because trial runs are going to be getting gear and leaving, or actual upgrades for a lower-geared player can’t be traded over because the item level is higher on the person who got it, regardless of the item’s actual stats.
Basically, I feel like Blizzard is too focused on forcing players to play the game the way THEY want them to, as opposed to simply creating the environment for players to interact in and keeping their hands off it. I don’t mind the idea of personal loot as a system, in fact I use it a lot myself since I PUG fairly often, but it shouldn’t be forced on players and guilds that don’t want it. Removing options is never a good thing.