The game is telling me there are different appearance - for example - for protection, holy and retribution when all 3 have the same appearance and changing specialization and opening the item doesn't add to the collection within ATT.

This occurs will all tier items.

not 100% sure i understand what you mean -- "the game" is telling you, like the appearance section of the game itself, independent of ATT?

in unique mode (with "completionist" unchecked in the first options tab) you'll see all available versions of a tier appearance until you collect one, and then they'll all disappear. they have the same visual appearance, so in unique you'll get credit for all of them once you learn one. with completionist checked, you'd have to collect all of the different versions.

also, if you're trying to get a different specialization's version of a tier appearance, make sure you're changing your loot spec and not your spec in general.

sorry for leaving 5372957392 comments, but i just realized that you mentioned pally specs, which means your issue might be a blizzard-specific one. if you're looking at the spec icons for a token and it can be received by all specs (like, if all 3 spec icons show up for the token instead of just holy) then you need to take the token to a vendor and manually exchange it for the piece you want.

i've only seen this issue with paladin tier (although it may affect other classes unbeknownst to me), but some pieces aren't properly assigned a specific specialization, so even if you're in the correct loot spec you could get the wrong spec's piece. i'd also suggest sending in a bug report to blizz about the tier tokens it's affecting if that's the issue you're running into.

Hi all,

Thanks for the replies.

You're both right - it turns out you need to hand in the tokens to the vendor to get the appearance for that specilization (I had originally tried changing spec but no specialization, I'll test that later)

But handing in to the vendor allowed me to choose the specific spec pieces that were missing.

Glad it helped. If you have any other issues please let us know and we'll do our best to help you.

Slumber covered majority of the basis.

Ultimately in order to know what exact issue you are having we would need a screenshot of what you are seeing so we can see the item and it's rewards you are missing.

There are two cases that can arise from this which depends on are you on Completionist mode, Main Only or do you have neither checked? Look before for each scenario. If none of the below is what you are experiencing and doesn't help then feel free to add a screenshot. Screenshots with the item in question and what you are seeing plus a screenshot of your settings help a lot when diagnosing what issue might be at hand so we can either tell you how to rectify it on your end or fix it on our end if it's something we messed up on.

Main Only / Nothing Checked:

Definitely need a screenshot on this so we can look at it further and see what might be the issue. Some tier tokens do indeed have different appearances. Not always, but there are rare cases. The ones I know of offhand are Druid/Shaman.

Completionist Mode:

Classes that have multiple specs can encounter a specific issue. Classes such as Priests, Druids, Monks, Shamans, Paladins, Warriors and Death Knight can all experience this issue. Some classes such as Druids and Paladins suffer it a lot more.

When you get a tier token try turning on "Show Collected Things" and hovering the token. You'll see something like this:

In this particular case it's for a tier token from Heroic Sha of Fear in Terrace of Endless Spring. You can see that Protection spec rewards a specific piece as well as Retribution, however you can see the Holy piece can be awarded in Protection and Retribution. This means that no matter what spec you try for you could end up with Holy piece. For these pieces you will want to exchange them at the vendor instead so you can get specifically what you are wanting. Some tokens will have a note on them about it, but not all as Crieve and I have been trying to note them when we find them to warn other users in advance to not right-click.

In the next example, we have a case that is limited to Burning Crusade tier tokens only.

In this image you see six helmets instead of the usual 3. Justicar can be obtained by right-clicking it as usual and in this image picking specific specializations and then learning it will grant the correct pieces. So there's no need to visit a vendor on this one. However, you will notice something called "Gladiator's" on this token. These are PvP appearances that Blizzard allows you to turn the token in at in order to obtain the appearance. So you will need to go to Isle of Quel'danas (where Sunwell is) and turn the token in there. I've been in the process of adding this note to some and not sure which ones I did include it on yet.