As the new transmogrification system has arrived on the Midnight Beta, players are getting their first taste of it. And the big discussion going on at the moment is about just how expensive it all is!
From Cheaper to More Expensive
Initially, Blizzard’s transmog system announcement was well-received. Players saw it as an improvement and a cheaper alternative to what we have today. You save individual slots instead of individual items and can switch to them, even with triggers to auto-switch. However, there are two issues making it potentially more expensive, depending on how you use it.
Outfit Costs
First off, we have the costs of the outfit slots themselves. These aren’t that bad, but are extremely back-loaded, meaning the final slots cost much, much more than the earlier ones. The first two are free, then they’re pretty cheap, and the final few are around 100,000 gold. In fact, the final 5 slots make up over half the cost of all 20. The total cost for all of them is almost 800,000 gold. But you probably won’t need all 20 slots, and the first 10 come in around 75k.
However, there’s a potentially big issue here: the outfit slots are NOT account/warband-wide! That’s right, you’ll have to re-buy these on each and every alt. Again, if you don’t need that many slots, this won’t be a problem for you, as the first 5 are really cheap. Here’s the full cost breakdown, courtesy of ICanHazSkillz.
| Slot # | Gold Cost | Cost So Far | Percentage of Final Total (Cost So Far / 796k) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Free | Free | N/A |
| 2 | Free | Free | N/A |
| 3 | 100 | 100 | 0% |
| 4 | 500 | 600 | 0% |
| 5 | 1k | 1.6k | 0.2% |
| 6 | 5k | 6.6k | 0.8% |
| 7 | 10k | 16.6k | 2.0% |
| 8 | 15k | 31.6k | 3.9% |
| 9 | 20k | 51.6k | 6.4% |
| 10 | 25k | 76.6k | 9.6% |
| 11 | 30k | 106k | 13.3% |
| 12 | 40k | 146k | 18.3% |
| 13 | 50k | 196k | 24.6% |
| 14 | 60k | 256k | 32.1% |
| 15 | 70k | 326k | 40.9% |
| 16 | 80k | 406k | 51.0% |
| 17 | 90k | 496k | 62.3% |
| 18 | 100k | 596k | 74.8% |
| 19 | 100k | 696k | 87.4% |
| 20 | 100k | 796k | 100% |
The Real Problem (for Some)
This isn’t the only change to transmog pricing, either. The gold cost for applying transmog to the outfit slots is also a lot higher than applying it to individual items now. While a regular full item set with all slots transmog costs you around 1,000 gold now, it will be around 6,000 on in Midnight! These are the all-key-slots used costs, mind you, with only shirt and tabbard skipped.
Now, this is an actual outfit slot you’re saving, so you’ll be able to re-use it infinitely. But, if you want to change the transmog in that slot or save it to another, you’ll have to pay again. This will be particularly rough for role players, as they tend to use a LOT of transmog for different situations, as brakndawnt explains.
So, Is It Cheaper or More Expensive for Me?
This will depend on your transmog switching and just how many slots you might want. If you’re a light/”normal” transmog user, the new system should be cheaper in the long run. You simply buy around 10-15 outfit slots and once you pay the big upfront cost of filling them up, that’s pretty much it. You can swap between them whenever you want, even automatically with the new triggers. However, if you like switching a lot as new transmog comes in, or want the full 20 slots, things will get a lot pricier. And if you have a lot of alts and want a lot of transmog for them, things will get really expensive, really fast.
Generally, if you stick to 15 outfit slots at most, and don’t add new transmog frequently, you should be fine. But considering there are many transmog enthusiasts, especially in the role playing community, perhaps Blizzard might rethink this new massive gold sink for them. The costs to save to an outfit slot seem to be the real issue, so that’s definitely something to look at.
