Most Artifact appearances likely to be unlockable post-Legion

Before I get into the meat of this, I want to make it very clear that none of this is set in stone. The World of Warcraft developers are still working on an approach to Artifact appearances post-Legion, but today’s Q&A indicates that they may be leaning toward one that many players will be happy about.

For the uninitiated, the last time we had any real update on Artifact appearances after Legion ends, it seemed like we’d have to unlock appearances during Legion — on each character, no less — if we wanted to use those appearances for transmog in the future. Many players… weren’t too happy with this approach, to say the least. On top of physically hurting transmog addicts, it also felt like some of the coolest weapon appearances in the game would have to be grinded out — again, on every character — before 8.0 if we ever wanted to use them again.

Thankfully, it sounds like the team is leaning toward a much friendlier approach. During the Q&A, Ion Hazzikostas mentioned that the original approach felt un-fun overall, and having people feel like they need to earn every appearance possible on every character possible was not the sort of grind-y gameplay they want to encourage.

Of course, assuming the approach discussed today is the final one, there are some exceptions. Namely, any appearances that require an expansion-specific level of player skill will be locked to Legion. Although that’s a little open to interpretation, Hazzikostas specifically mentioned the Mage Tower challenge appearance, as well as the appearance earned from completing a level-15 Mythic+ within the time limit.

Personally, I’m much happier to hear this — it’s in-line with previous expansions’ Challenge Mode appearances being limited to the expansion, but much more alt-friendly than the original approach of all the Artifact appearances being limited to Legion. And speaking of alt-friendly, Hazzikostas also mentioned that we won’t be seeing any additional Artifact appearances added to the game, meaning all the appearances you could grind for future transmog use are already in the game now.

Update: Since we’re talking about appearances, Hazzikostas also mentioned that any appearances locked behind “Do X while using a specific appearance” requirements will be changed to “Do X after having earned a specific appearance.” In other words, if you want to unlock that super cool appearance on your Prot Paladin but can’t get into Rated Battlegrounds, you’ll be able to do the RBG as Retribution and still unlock the appearance across all specs.