OK, fair warning. THIS ENTIRE POST WILL BE LITTERED WITH SPOILERS both from all the books and the show. Don't read any further if you don't want spoilers..
OK. So the biggest problems I have with what they changed in the show is there is now no sense of character growth, no growth in power, no sense of mystery to the world, omissions of major characters and plot lines, changes to major plot lines, characters doing things that make no sense, some characters being way overpowered too soon, etc. etc.
Rand and Moiraine going into the Blight by themselves was bad enough, but now you have Moiraine just handing Rand access to THE most powerful Sa'angreal in the world for male channelers, with seemingly no consequences. Why does Moiraine have this? How could she possibly know what it is, let alone that it's the most powerful Sa'angreal for male channelers? Not to mention the fact that 3rd age Aes Sedai don't even know the Choedan Kal even exist. Then there is the fact that what she gave Rand is just an access key Ter'angreal for the Choedan Kal. And yet she kept calling it a Sa'angreal.... So now Rand is already walking around with the most powerful Sa'angreal in his back pocket... The Choedan Kal shouldn't have been introduced until the next season and it shouldn't have been used until the cleansing of the source.
Now let's talk about The Eye of the World. Moiraine knows damn well what it is and what it's for. At least she is supposed to. Also The Green Man is supposed to be the caretaker of The Eye. Where was he? He was a major part of the climactic battle in the book and a source of Knowledge to both Perrin and Rand (one of the many reasons all of them should have been at the Eye). Where were Balthamel and Aginor? They were the ones that were supposed to confront Rand at the Eye. Ishamael shouldn't have even been there. Also they found a piece of Cuendillar, but no mention of it being a seal on the Dark One's prison. It obviously wasn't. They didn't find the Dragon Banner there. They didn't find the Horn of Valere there, like they were supposed to. Speaking of the horn, why the hell was it just buried in concrete in the throne room of Fal Dara. It was supposed to have been lost since the Age of Legends. Why is Moiraine cut off from the source here? Where the hell is Rand going off by himself? Moiraine would never let him go alone at this point in time, considering everything she has worked for her entire life since becoming Aes Sedai.
Let talk about the battle at Tarwin's Gap. First of all, Lord Agelmar isn't supposed to die here, but this isn't the most egregious death (we'll circle back to this). Lady Amalisa (an untrained, extremely underpowered channeler) would never have been made a last stand option for stopping the Trollocs, along with other clearly untrained channelers. Not to mention Nynaeve and Egwene being there. They were supposed to be at the Eye.... It's also unlikely Lady Amalisa would know how to link with other channelers let alone so easily. Also, I'm fairly certain you can't burn out other channelers linked with you by drawing too much power from them (I would have to look into this further, because I can't remember). You can burn yourself out, if you are leading the circle.
Now onto the two worst changes. Padan Fain kills, not only Uno, but Loial as well............What?!?!? That doesn't even make sense. Loial is a major major character throughout the books. This series may as well die with him. Oh, but maybe he isn't dead, since apparently Egwene can heal death?!?!? It isn't explained at all in the show, but she seemingly brings Nynaeve back to life. This doesn't make sense and is not a part of any of the books in any way. So I guess that's an easy way to add artificial drama to the show. Character dies? No problem, have Egwene bring them back to life. I sincerely hope this isn't what they are doing, but it sure seemed that way.
Way to ruin an incredible story in just 8 episodes. Congratulations Rafe Judkins, you are now on my shit list. After you talked so much about being as faithful as possible to the books, without making too many major changes, you killed the story in one fell swoop.
RIP Wheel of Time TV series.
Also what the hell were the Sul'dam and Da'mane doing at the end of the episode? Making a Tsunami? Why? UUUUGGGGHHH. This episode had to common sense and broke so many of the rules set in place in the Wheel of Time universe.