100parse

Notes

What WoW Forever changes for gear

22 September 2026

Beta, subject to change. Everything below comes from what Blizzard has said in public and from the Forever beta as it stands in late September 2026. Blizzard can and will change numbers before the 4 November launch. Where a claim is Blizzard's we say so; where it comes from the beta client's own files it is provisional, and we say that too.

World of Warcraft: Forever is vanilla Azeroth with more in it: three new zones, nine new dungeons, two new raids, a new race, a thousand more quests, and revised talent trees for all nine classes. Most of that does not touch a gear draft. Five things do, and they are the reason the Forever version of 100parse is its own game beside the classic era one rather than a new coat of paint.

One hit stat, one crit stat

In vanilla, melee hit, ranged hit and spell hit are three different stats, and an item that carries one of them is worth nothing to a spec that wants another. Forever folds them into a single hit stat, and does the same for crit. Blizzard's words: spell, melee and ranged hit are consolidated into one hit stat, and crit is consolidated in the same way.

For a draft that is a big deal. Today a mage looking at a boss table skips the plate helm with hit on it because that hit is melee hit. In Forever the same helm is still plate, so the mage still cannot wear it, but a cloth item with hit on it is now worth something to a shadow priest, a warlock and a mage alike, and a leather piece with hit is as good for a hunter as for a rogue. The set of items that "count" for a spec gets wider, and the items that get fought over get more crowded. Our weights carry a hit cap per spec, and in Forever that cap is one number for everyone with one pool of items to reach it from.

Less weapon skill on items

Weapon skill is still in the game. What changes is how much of it an item gives. Blizzard says item-granted weapon skill is reduced, which means the vanilla trick of stacking weapon skill from a trinket and a pair of gloves to push past the glancing-blow penalty is weaker. The stat is still worth something to a melee spec. It is worth less per item, and the old "must have" weapon-skill pieces drop down the list.

Dungeon loot reworked

Every dungeon drop in Forever was reviewed. Hundreds of drops were added or changed, some with effects tied to a particular environment or creature type, and the unique items from dungeon bosses were raised to blue quality. The stated aim is more gradual power growth between tiers, so that an older item or a blue item can stay useful for a specific job instead of being replaced wholesale when the next raid opens.

For us that means two things. The item table is bigger and it is different, not just longer: an item you know from vanilla may carry a different stat line in Forever. And the dungeon items matter to the draft in a way they mostly do not today, because some of them will be the best answer for a slot.

Rage by weapon speed

Warrior rage in the beta is normalized. In vanilla, rage comes from damage dealt, so a big hit and a crit both pay more rage. In Forever it is worked out from weapon speed: a slower weapon gives more rage per swing, and a crit no longer pays a bonus. Beta testers on the Blizzard forums have posted per-swing numbers, but the beta's level cap is low and rage per swing scales with level, so we are not quoting figures until they are measured at 60. The talent text in the beta client agrees with the direction: Anger Management now gives one rage every three seconds in combat, Unbridled Wrath is doubled for two-handers, Dual Wield Specialization adds a share of rage from the off-hand, and rage potions give a quarter less.

The formula itself is server-side, so nobody outside Blizzard has it exactly. Our warrior weights already prefer a slow two-hander for Arms and value main-hand speed for Fury. Whether Forever moves those preferences further depends on the numbers Blizzard ships, and that is the kind of thing we will read off real runs rather than guess at.

Item stats are hidden until an item drops

This is the one that sets our calendar. Josh Greenfield has said that Forever is obfuscating item data so that stats are not exposed until an item drops for someone on the server. Items exist in the beta client, and people have pulled lists of them, but a name in a data file does not tell you its final stats or where it drops. Community wikis are saying the same thing and warning that beta-client data changes before launch.

So a clean Forever item table does not exist yet and cannot be extracted before 4 November. After launch it fills in as items are seen. That is why the Forever version of 100parse is coming after launch and not on the day, and why we are not promising a date.

What it means for a Forever draft

Stamina is still worth nothing to a parse. Forever does not change what a damage dealer is scored on: the target dummy does not hit back, so the draft still wants damage stats and nothing else. What changes is which items carry them and how many specs want the same item.

The plan is the one we used for Arms Warrior and the three specs after it. Start the Forever game from the vanilla items Forever keeps, scored under Forever's rules (merged hit and crit, trimmed weapon skill, dungeon uniques as blues), with a Forever weight file per spec. Add the reworked and new drops as they become public. Run bot drafts for each Forever spec against its classic era twin, carry the real classic era parse curve across through the bot ratio, and use that as the launch curve until Forever has enough real runs to stand on its own. Nothing about the classic era game moves. Your runs, your boards and your badges stay where they are, and the Forever game gets its own.

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