World and Zone Events Guide
Abundance Basics
Players can do Abundance runs in any of the 4 zones, but one of the zones is empowered at a time. This empowered Abundance run can be activated using a Shard of Dundun which players can only obtain eight of in a week. When doing an empowered Abundance run, players will get 300, 600 or 900 Unalloyed Abundance depending on how much score they accumulated in that run. Players accumulate score by turning in orbs to a shrine, looting Artisan nodes, trigger bonus events, and skin/mine/herb the global nodes in the encounter area.
As Unalloyed Abundance is an important currency for crafters, only eight runs in a week, and absolutely no catch-up for "missed" Unalloyed Abundance, players valued the safely in making sure they got 900 currency every time.
The Raid Group Meta
When Abundance first came out, players quickly found out that the best way to complete Abundance runs consistently was to do them in a raid group. With more players in a single instance, the bonus bar triggers more often, granting significantly more score and bonus events, which triggered even more bonus bars, and so on.
Therefore, it was always the right thing to do to make sure you were in a raid group and this seemed to cause problems in other areas of the game, causing significant lag to the zone with the Empowered Abundance run in it.
The Nerf?
Within the last couple days, there appears to have been a significant nerf to Abundance. There has been no direct mentions of Abundance nerfs in hotfixes, but many players on the WoW Reddit, the WoWEconomy Reddit and social media have noticed a change.
Here's what the nerfs look to be, but are unconfirmed:
Abundance orbs are now shared amongst players
Abundance orbs despawn quicker
These are some hefty nerfs and makes getting the cap of 900 Unalloyed Abundance inconsistent. It's important to note that there is no catch up for missed weeks or for unobtained amounts of Shard of Dundun, or for missed amounts of Unalloyed Abundance. For many high end crafters, this can be a large setback on profit margins by not getting the Epic tools the week you're "supposed" to.
The Result
Abundance was once a silly, fun activity where players soaked up lots of loot and turned it in to Dundun for big rewards. Now, Abundance can be a lot of hard work which comes with a lot of pressure as getting 900 Unalloyed Abundance is no longer guaranteed. And players have to do it eight times a week if they want to maximize their rewards. It's one thing to do eight runs, which are trivial and basically guaranteed, but now it's another thing to do eight runs where you have to work hard to secure the rewards you want.
Unfortunately, this means that any crafters who did not already use their Shards of Dundun may start falling behind if they fail to get the required Unalloyed Abundance to craft their Epic tools. With no catch up on either Dundun Shards or Unalloyed Abundance, this means that these players will be behind permanently.
