This change originally affected Enhancement Shaman, Outlaw, Assassination, and Subtlety Rogues, as well as Survival Hunter, but each spec has had slightly different reactions to the news.
Item Tuning and Set Bonuses
The problems begin with how these bonus effects have been set up and how they interact with the various dual-wielding specs mentioned above. The Axe and the Dagger are both the stars of the show and being equipped by specs that cannot loot or use the item naturally, but there's a third item in the mix, the trinket off of Coiled Altar.
Additionally completes the set bonus on Zul'jin's Guillotine Technique and provides some AoE damage.
Unlike the Axe, the extra effect here only triggers on individual enemies and has no scaling with additional targets.
Notably, the dagger does not count for the Set Bonus, which significantly impacts its value
The Problem with these changes
There are two main problems that Blizzard is trying to balance with these items, both in who is using them, and why.
The Intended Specs and Crafted Weapons
Specs that are intended to be using the Axe, such as Enhancement Shaman and Outlaw Rogue struggle to justify equipping the Axe at all, given how good crafted weapons are in main-hand slots. With the advent of crafted weapons being equivalent to a 5/6 Myth weapon, equipping a special Axe that only slots into your Main-hand is a tough sell, and especially for 1/6 Myth drops, would require additional crests to be put into early season. Off-hands on these dual wield specs do not provide meaningful damage to ability damage, which leads to Off-hand weapons being a fairly low priority to upgrade. All of this creates a tension and friction in gearing between wanting to use a new special weapon from the Raid, and it simply not being efficient to do so in a majority of situations until later in the season with more crests and possible mythic drops.
Equipping Weapons You're Not Supposed to
Reverting the changes to make the Axe main-hand only doesn't stop any of the affected specs from equipping the Axe, and actually does not change hardly anything at all. With either the Axe or Dagger being able to be equipped in either slot, each of the affected specs has a slightly different reaction, but still end up being able to abuse this combo:
Survival Hunter previously was looking to equip a Polearm, the Abyssal Broodfiend's Bardiche. With either one of the weapons being available in both slots, equipping both is possible competitive to the Polearm. Reverting the Axe changes nothing about their ability to equip these items.
Enhancement Shaman has been dancing around with the idea of equipping the dagger for a while, and while this Main-hand/One-hand change to the Axe does not directly influence their decision making on that front, they are one of the specs directly impacted by the Main-hand change competing with their crafted weapon.
Outlaw Rogue is most likely who the change was originally targeting, allowing the dagger to be used in the off-hand slot, rather than not being able to be used at all, as their main finisher, Dispatch, cannot be cast with a dagger in main-hand. Reverting the Axe changes nothing about their ability to equip these items. It should also be noted that the Dagger is not on the drop table for Outlaw Rogue.
Assassination Rogue requires two daggers equipped in order to cast the single target generator, Mutilate. With the Axe enabling more AoE damage and completing the set bonus from Zul'jin's Guillotine Technique, disabling an unused generator in AoE is of little consequence. For Assassination specifically, weapon swapping in dungeons and using the Axe for AoE over the Dagger will remain optimal no matter the equip status, simply because it enables the set bonus on the trinket. Reverting the Axe means that instead of Dagger Main-hand, Axe Off-hand, Assassination Rogues simply flip the slots and perform a weapon swap in mythic+. It should also be noted that the Axe is not on the drop table for Assassination Rogue.
Subtlety Rogue requires a main-hand dagger equipped in order to cast both single target generators, Backstab and Shadowstrike. Simply equipping the Axe as an Off-hand doesn't inherently disable anything, but it does reduce the amount of procs from Shadow Techniques, as this is not normalized. The Axe however is strong enough to use in AoE even with that downside. Reverting the Axe means that instead of Dagger Main-hand, Axe Off-hand, Subtlety Rogues simply flip the slots and perform a weapon swap in mythic+. It should also be noted that the Axe is not on the drop table for Subtlety Rogue.
For most affected specs, as long as the Dagger and the Axe are able to be equipped at the same time (regardless of slot), there are cases where they would want to do so, even if the item itself is not on their drop table. Reverting the change to make the Axe Main-hand only serves as a cosmetic tooltip change, not a functional one that reinforces the intended drop tables and ability restrictions on these specs.
The easiest solution to these issues would be to change Zatha'tek, Breath of Corruption to complete the set bonus from Zul'jin's Guillotine Technique, and Blizzard needs to remove the weapon restrictions. Removing the weapon restrictions from the Rogue Specs would additionally address a long-standing issue of needing three weapons to play all rogue specs, which forces players into Assassination/Subtlety early in a season due to crafting a dagger with their first spark of the Season, making Outlaw unplayable.
