not going to happen. sets provide a defined goal for players when thinking about item progression, as well as being the best place for armor artists to show their stuff.

Sets may make people "clones", but it is a nice goal. There is pictures of Tier 4, so it seems Blizzard wants to make more sets. Also, you get neat little bonuses if you collect them all!

I can't say I'd miss 8(-9) piece sets if they went away forever and ever. I never completed a full set on my Rogue through the time I had playing this game hardcore. Well, I did finish Nightslayer but that was months after I stopped wearing a single piece ordinarily, wore it once to take fall dmg in Org and heal it up with the imba 8/8 bonus. Min/maxing (not least because of dkp systems) items through one piece from here and another from there has always been more appealing to me. Take the big upgrades, 4-5 pieces, and run with miscellaneous items in the rest. Get a weapon early for the dkp you save, or something. ;)

Right now the setup is so clear it hurts. 8 Bonescythe, BoN-EA, Unnatural Forces, Slayer's Crest, DFT(/KotS). Neck is a bit of a toss-up, Barbed/Prestor's/KT's. Much like Gurg's list on tank gear.

I like sets better than assorted pieces. There will always be pieces that are the best for a particular purpose, and having six of those pieces be part of an eight piece set and two of them being bright green shoulders and gloves doesn't really interest me.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

And yet the Tier 4 sets that have been leaked all look to be 8-peice, so I wouldn't bet on this. I do agree with the OP though, I would much prefer smaller sets. To the point of the artists being able to show off their stuff, that is possible without explicit sets. It would allow them to focus more on themes for a particular raid dungeon, and particular peices. I mean come on, all that artwork done on Tier 3, meant I get a crappy pallete change on a Level 40ish robe for my Crystal Webbed Robe... I still shudder whenever I log on and see my Warlock wearing that thing....

I want more sets. IMO only having -one- Tier set, or PvP set at a time is boring.

I hate bringing up diablo, but at least the game had a few diff sets that (at various points in leveling) were worth collecting/wearing. Even if they're sets you get for only a couple fights, but the bonus makes it damn worthwhile...

I would be thrilled with that. The whole "socket" dynamic provides a sort of "mini-set" thing, but other than that I would love to see more things along the lines of the ZG ring sets, the Eskandar's set, etc. Having individual 2-4 piece sets that one can mix and match, or having set bonuses going, say, only to a max of 3/8, would provide for much more interesting gear-choice dynamics, as in the case of the Zul'Gurub ring sets, in particular. The Jin set provides a key example of this. It kills any other choices pre-Epic (and to a certain extent pre-Nefarian, though the Don Julio's Band is close to MDR).

Still, with differing set bonuses for the small set bonuses, or multiple synergistic effects, you would ensure diversity.

I like this idea too, although I don't know how feasible it really is. But again, it becomes much more feasible when the sets are smaller, which means loot tables are not overloaded with like 16-32 different 8-peice sets.

One thing I'd especially like to see, and am baffled why we havn't yet, is a Sword'n'Board set. We have dual-wield sets and the like, but there is no main-hand/shield set in the game.

I've never went for sets for my mage or my warlock because there are always individual pieces that are better for certain slots (save the stuff in Naxx) I find that mixing and matching pieces will usually net better results and that the 3-5 piece sets are better than a full 8. On my mage I only picked up 4 magister (head, chest, shoulders, and bracers) because they were high in stam and int at the time. When it came to gearing my warlock I went with a smattering of blues and epics that would put any warlock in Felheart to shame. I don't understand why people would want a full set from an effecitveness standpoint, but I can understand if they want their character to look nice. When it comes to looking nice, you don't need a full set though, the head, shoulders, and chest pieces make up most of the look especially for casters. You can't see the other pieces for the most part and they can be supplimented with other gear.

I'm hoping that Blizzard will stray away from a full 8 set and stick to the 3-5 piece ones that are found in ZG and AQ. I can only assume that is what they are planning on doing seeing as the instances will have smaller caps > smaller sets. That logic is probably flawed.

This has been one of my personal largest complaints with WoW, the majority of raiding characters all look alike, and this is a result of gear being so set centric for raiders. Nothing like looking at your raid and seeing your entire mage corp in full netherwind, your entire warrior core in full full wrath etc. Moving away from 8 (or 9!) peice sets to perhaps a wider variety of 3 or 5 peice sets could help this somewhat.