Justice for... Justice!

The very first PvE currency WoW introduced was the Badge of Justice. At first, only heroic 5-man bosses would drop these during Burning Crusade. PvE currencies have evolved considerably since then - with Wrath's introduction of tiered currencies and then Cataclysm's simplification of Wrath's system by making two tiers of currency: Current (Valor) and Old (Justice.)

Justice Points were basically the main catch-up mechanic. The idea was that every 5-man boss would drop Justice Points, and you could easily get a lot of JP from running random dungeons. At the expansion's launch, this would provide decent heroic-dungeon-level blue items, and as the expansion went on, the gear that used to sell for Valor Points would be downgraded to sell for JP. Because a player running old dungeons could acquire JP with relative ease, if you needed to catch up, you could run dungeons until you had enough of last patch's gear to enter the current content.

The entire premise of JP as a useful currency is based on the idea that it's easy to acquire, and easy to acquire quickly.

The irony in Mists is that JP is actually kind of hard to come by.

The acquisition of both Valor and Justice has been considerably slowed this time around, not to mention the fact that Valor gear has been locked behind reputations requiring weeks to grind (on a per-character basis, though I don't want to get too far into that.)

While Valor isn't exactly flooding us, the methods of acquiring it are myriad. One gets VP from dungeons, scenarios, raids and raid finder, and even daily quests. JP is only acquired through dungeons, and recently, scenarios. Therefore, it's actually easier to come by VP than JP these days, which raises the question: why have JP?

The culprit here, I think, is Raid Finder, and specifically Blizzard's decision to push Raid Finder as the main PvE activity. One does not gain JP through LFR.

Also, JP gear is not even up to the same level as heroic dungeon gear. It seems as if JP gear is meant to get you into heroics, rather than past them.

The thing is, we're still in the early phase of the expansion. We may be past the first patch, but we're still on the first raiding tier. I don't know what the intention for the various points is, though what I've heard is that they intend to reduce the VP cost for the current stuff. This seems to suggest that it will still be VP.

Truthfully, it looks as if we're returning to a one-currency system, which we have not had since BC. The irony is that this will likely make catching up more difficult, as they will keep that one relevant currency hard to acquire.

And if this is the path they take, it means we'll probably hit a point where we've got tons of JP and absolutely nothing to spend it on.