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Friends Per Second podcast: Clay Stone on resistance gear, the economy, addons and horizontal progression

The Stormwind Stockade loading screen from the WoW Forever client

· ForeverDB

On the Friends Per Second podcast, WoW Forever's Associate Production Director Clay Stone talked about growing the world sideways, keeping power jumps between raid tiers small so gear lasts, resistance gear at launch, managing the economy and why addons may matter less. This comes from a podcast reported by other sites, not from a Blizzard post.

Episode 106 of the Friends Per Second podcast interviewed Clay Stone, WoW Forever's Associate Production Director. He talked about how gear and power will grow, resistance gear, the economy, addons and collections. This did not come from a Blizzard forum post or a patch note. We read it through write-ups by Wowhead and AccountShark, and the podcast episode itself.

Reports from a podcast, not a Blizzard post or patch note. Blizzard has not published these points on the forums or its site. These are plans, and plans can change before launch. The beta client's files can't confirm raid requirements, economy rules or future tiers, so none of this is checkable in the game data.

Growing the world sideways

AccountShark reports that Stone wants to expand the world horizontally rather than only upwards. Professions are a big part of that, with more planned. The Legacy system could also give extra rewards or perks for reaching certain goals in the game. In plain terms, the aim is to give players more to do at the same power level, not just a steady climb in item level.

Small power jumps between raid tiers, so gear lasts

On gear, the stated goal is to limit how much power each new raid tier adds. AccountShark reports there will still be some vertical power jump between tiers, but the team wants to keep it as small as possible. An item from an earlier raid could stay your best in slot for a very long time, though, as Stone is reported to have put it, that may not be forever, and eventually you may choose to replace it. For players this means gear is meant to hold its value longer than it does in modern WoW.

Resistance gear at launch

Stone is reported by AccountShark to have said resistance gear is unlikely to be required for the opening raid tier at launch. There is no Blizzard post on this, and raid requirements are decided on Blizzard's side, so treat it as a plan rather than a settled rule.

The economy

Stone pointed to lessons from Season of Discovery about actively managing the economy, including vendor price caps, with Black Lotus given as an example, according to AccountShark and Wowhead. He also talked about rewarding endgame play with more gold through systems that already exist, but hesitated to call them weekly quests, so no daily or weekly quest system is confirmed. An Alchemy rework was described as still undecided.

Addons and collections

On addons, AccountShark reports Stone said Forever's dungeon encounters are simpler, often with only a couple of mechanics, so addons matter less than in modern WoW. On collections, players would see an item in a collection only once they have actually collected it, which keeps discoveries hidden. That lines up with how items reveal themselves in Forever, which we track on our hidden items page.

Sources

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