wow Coming This Week: Account-Wide Essences & Horrific Vision Rewards Always Corrupted

[Stan 5,020]

We have two very welcome changes coming to the game this week. The first one's about account-wide Essences making it easier for alts to catch up on the system. The second change makes the gear from Horrific Visions always corrupt.

1. Account-Wide Essences

Blizzard at first did not want to implement account-wide Essences, claiming the system was directly tied to power progression. The decision prevented many players from playing alts in Battle for Azeroth, mainly due to how mandatory Essences are to raid / Mythic progression. Based on community feedback, we learned last week that we are getting a catchup system for alts that makes Rank 3 Essences purchasable from MOTHER on alts with a new soulbound currency, Echoes of Ny'alotha, obtained by participating in Visions of N'Zoth content (Assaults, Horrific Visions, Mythic Season 4, Ny'alotha, Heroic Darkshore). With Mechagnomes and Vulpera released in Visions of N'Zoth, this is a really welcome change for any altoholic!

The new system will be live after this week's maintenance, meaning tomorrow (March 17) for the US and March 18 for Europe. Keep an eye out on the next hotfix update for more details and check out our Essence guide for more details!

Blizzard (Source)

Building on a great deal of feedback and discussion, we’re working on an update to the game. With the next regularly-scheduled weekly maintenance in each region, players who have earned a given Rank 3 Essence on one character will be able to directly obtain that Essence from MOTHER on any subsequent characters.

When playing an alt character that is missing Essences that have already been earned on a different character, most ordinary Visions of N’Zoth activities, such as Horrific Visions, Assaults, raid bosses, Mythic Keystone Dungeons, or BFA Season 4 PvP, will award a new soulbound currency – Echoes of Ny’alotha. These Echoes can be brought to MOTHER in the Heart Chamber, and exchanged directly for eligible Rank 3 Essences. While ordinarily each specific Essence must be learned in order to unlock it for other characters via MOTHER, all Essences associated with Nazjatar and Mechagon reputations will be available if any other different character has earned any of the Essences available from that reputation.

Our goal with this update is to preserve the efforts that players put into unlocking a given Essence through its associated activity the first time, while offering subsequent characters far more flexibility in pursuing that goal. We’ll have additional details in a forthcoming hotfixes update that goes out around the same time as maintenance, but we wanted to let the community know ASAP that this change is in the works.

As always, thank you for all your feedback on this topic!

2. Horrific Visions

The second big change is that gear rewarded from Horrific Visions will always corrupt, giving players more control over the new Corruption system that was introduced in place of Warforging and Titanforging in Visions of N'Zoth. The change substantially increases the number of corrupted items earned each week and it should be live after this week's maintenance as well. You can learn more about Horrific Visions by visiting our Horrific Visions hub and the Corruption system in our Corrupted Items guide.

Blizzard (Source)

Beginning with scheduled weekly maintenance in each region the week of March 17, all gear rewards from Horrific Visions will be Corrupted.

We’ve heard from many players that Corrupted items were not obtainable enough, limiting their ability to play with the system and its inherent tradeoffs. This change will substantially increase the number of Corrupted items reliably earned each week, allowing players to choose from among a greater selection of Corrupted pieces and enjoy using those that work best in a given situation.

Are you looking forward to the changes? Let us know in the comments below!