No flying in 7.0 confirmed

[Mafic]

You think they are flat out lying? Well, then there is no point in discussing any further. I don't exactly trust them, but my trust is completely irrelevant to the result. They will do what they will do, and we can only hope for the best. But to outright say that they are lying it's pretty unreal.

I'm sorry that you have such a bleak view of them. But anyway, it's not a an abuse of trust and goodwill, it's a nice compromise. Do the content to be finally allowed to skip it. How can that be bad.

They have a history of lies so yeah they are lying about patch finder part one according to a person I know (same person that spilled the beans about no flying in patch 6.1 aka selfie patch).

[Sluvs]

Forget it. Because watcher said, he won't believe it. He feels how he feels.

I should have listened to you.

- - - Updated - - -

They have a history of lies so yeah they are lying about patch finder part one according to a person I know (same person that spilled the beans about no flying in patch 6.1 aka selfie patch).

I would rather trust them then your mistery friend. Sorry.

[SirCowdog]

If someone is going to just dismiss actual evidence contrary to his point so he can be correct, I have no interest in further discussing it with them.

That's the whole point, tho, isn't it? Is someone SAYING something evidence, even if it's a blue post saying it?

Has it occured to anyone that these sort of things are as hotly debated within the Dev team? That often these debates will sway the people who have the final say and things can shift internally because of them?

I've already said my belief on the subject. Blizzard is using Flight as a carrot, and will drop it when it's most effective to keep people interested and playing Legion.

I don't think there is any real mal intent on Blizz's part when they are obfuscating the development process. In the end they have to prioritize what they think is best for the game and that prioritization will ALWAYS piss someone off somewhere. Additionally they have so many things they are working on, and I bet a large number of those things end up on the cutting room floor. That kinda stuff some times leaks through and people bitch (Thal'Dranath is a recent example), think how much more of this would go on if everyone knew every time!? Then you have flying. It was a design decision. One that was very obvious so they had no choice but to be upfront about it. I am willing to bet the process internally to re-enable flying was rocky, it reflected as much in it's re-implementation and that it was interuperted incorrectly by a lot of people as something as ridiculous as intention mal intent by blizz. Which is ridiculous.

I don't think Blizzard is sitting in board meetings trying to come up with ways to flip the bird to players, but I DO think they're sitting in meeting trying to come up with ways to squeeze the most profit out of the game at the expense of the quality they used to have as their trademark.

Like I said, Blizzard burned a LOT of player good will with WoD. A lot of us a done giving Blizzard the benefit of the doubt, or assuming that they have the game's best interests in mind. They showed us how much they care about making a better game, and it doesn't matter what they say they're doing anymore. Their actions speak louder. Maybe Legion will be better than WoD, but, again, that bar is very VERY low.

I'm personally reserving judgement until I see what they do. Just like Blizzard, I'm not being malicious about this decision. Blizzard's words simply have zero credibility anymore. Maybe it'll be good, maybe it won't. But I'm going to see for myself instead of trusting some blue poster with a history of being wrong.

[Hexxidecimal]

That's the whole point, tho, isn't it? Is someone SAYING something evidence, even if it's a blue post saying it?





I've already said my belief on the subject. Blizzard is using Flight as a carrot, and will drop it when it's most effective to keep people interested and playing Legion.





I don't think Blizzard is sitting in board meetings trying to come up with ways to flip the bird to players, but I DO think they're sitting in meeting trying to come up with ways to squeeze the most profit out of the game at the expense of the quality they used to have as their trademark.

Like I said, Blizzard burned a LOT of player good will with WoD. A lot of us a done giving Blizzard the benefit of the doubt, or assuming that they have the game's best interests in mind. They showed us how much they care about making a better game, and it doesn't matter what they say they're doing anymore. Their actions speak louder. Maybe Legion will be better than WoD, but, again, that bar is very VERY low.

I'm personally reserving judgement until I see what they do. Just like Blizzard, I'm not being malicious about this decision. Blizzard's words simply have zero credibility anymore. Maybe it'll be good, maybe it won't. But I'm going to see for myself instead of trusting some blue poster with a history of being wrong.

Neither you or I knows what happens in their meetings, but as we are want to do we will both speculate. And I disagree. I think those meetings happens. It happens with Activision and the people who hold the purse strings. I think the dev team on the other hand does the best they can with what they have. Meanwhile we look at what has happened with WoD and even Mists with their long droughts and just make up our minds that they don't care with little to no inside information.

We can make the claim that trying to come up wtih ways to squeeze the most profit out of the game at the expense of us, sure. But if that is your claim then there is evidence that many have been touting here that DIRECTLY contradicts this. Massive loss of subs two expansions running. Yep they sure are just making these decisions to squeeze us for money. It's just as likely that the reasoning they have given us is correct. They attempted to push out expansion faster than they were capable, and in so doing they abandoned current expansions in order to re-direct effort in getting a new one out faster. It didn't work, they have suffered a loss of confidence and a loss of subs because of it. The know they name of the game when it comes to MMO's. Quickly trying to make a buck using an MMO makes sense with some new shitty IP, but WoW will be a much bigger cash cow if they invest in it's longevity. They screw up sometimes, obviously, but it makes no sense to take a game that has been making them money hand over fist for a while and just switch to low quality content that makes them a quick buck. They tried to up the longevity of the game by releasing content quicker keeping people playing longer, they just realized to late that wasn't feasible.

Let me tell you why, as of this point (and believe me this could change) that your carrot theory is flawed. As of now, and with the announcement of the Emerald Nightmare, the Stormheim mini raid and Nighthold and it's release schedule, the current evidence suggest that they plan on supporting Legion through out the expansion. The need to keep people interested will should only occur if we have some giant drought like with WoD. If Legion, at this point, looked like it would share the same sort of content issues I would agree with you. It doesn't. That sort of carrot doesn't look needed.

I am not asking anyone to trust Blizzard. I don't even trust them. I will always be dubious, but then again I have been from the beginning. I can hope and lean towards the evidence I am seeing, but I don't trust blizzard will pull it off correctly. Trust isn't the same thing as having a positive outlook. This is why I don't pay for game time months in advance. I pay month to month and if Blizz screws up, I cancel right then and there, as I have done every time they have been unable to deliver. Sure I pay more in the end but I have no problem giving blizz a few extra dollar over the course of these many years for quality content. When it doesn't come, neither does my money.

So no, I don't "trust" Blizzard. I have confidence that they mean well, and mean to make the best game possible. Their design philosophies are often wrong, sometimes for years in a row. This screws things up for them. But to be fair sometimes it's not something you can see till after the fact. MOP had a huge drought. They attempted to rectify this in legion with hiring more people. That didn't work, they have now abandoned the idea, hopefully. Again though, I don't "trust" them. I am positive about the Legion's potential and I am positive about their current design direction. If it ends up being wrong, I am gone just like before.

Flying, and their design decisions regarding it, isn't my favorite. I don't like it all that much. It's just not a deal breaker to me in this instance. It is for some. I get that. You don't want to play when they don't give you flying, perfectly understandable to me. I am entirely ok with that opinion being voiced and debated. It's what these forums are for. But I don't think "trust" belongs in the relationship I have with a faceless business entity. So if some people are feeling personally offended by Blizzards actions, well don't throw your pearls before swine.

[Connll]

I'm personally reserving judgement until I see what they do. Just like Blizzard, I'm not being malicious about this decision. Blizzard's words simply have zero credibility anymore. Maybe it'll be good, maybe it won't. But I'm going to see for myself instead of trusting some blue poster with a history of being wrong.

Prettu much this, but with 2 addendums: 1- Its a blue poster with a such rich history of being wrong, that mere incompetence can´t adequately explain it, and 2- having a "you will eat this crap and LIKE IT" attitude counts as malicious in my book.

[Tyranitar]

They have a history of lies so yeah they are lying about patch finder part one according to a person I know (same person that spilled the beans about no flying in patch 6.1 aka selfie patch).

They never lied. They only didn't made a promise back then several times.

/whiteknighing

[SirCowdog]

Neither you or I knows what happens in their meetings, but as we are want to do we will both speculate. And I disagree. I think those meetings happens. It happens with Activision and the people who hold the purse strings. I think the dev team on the other hand does the best they can with what they have. Meanwhile we look at what has happened with WoD and even Mists with their long droughts and just make up our minds that they don't care with little to no inside information.

We can make the claim that trying to come up wtih ways to squeeze the most profit out of the game at the expense of us, sure. But if that is your claim then there is evidence that many have been touting here that DIRECTLY contradicts this. Massive loss of subs two expansions running. Yep they sure are just making these decisions to squeeze us for money. It's just as likely that the reasoning they have given us is correct. They attempted to push out expansion faster than they were capable, and in so doing they abandoned current expansions in order to re-direct effort in getting a new one out faster. It didn't work, they have suffered a loss of confidence and a loss of subs because of it. The know they name of the game when it comes to MMO's. Quickly trying to make a buck using an MMO makes sense with some new shitty IP, but WoW will be a much bigger cash cow if they invest in it's longevity. They screw up sometimes, obviously, but it makes no sense to take a game that has been making them money hand over fist for a while and just switch to low quality content that makes them a quick buck. They tried to up the longevity of the game by releasing content quicker keeping people playing longer, they just realized to late that wasn't feasible.

With all due respect, I'm not talking about how much of an individual dev's heart and soul they pour into their work. I'm talking about the entity known as Activision-Blizzard as a whole. Little to no inside information? That's not entirely accurate. There's plenty of information and evidence of behavior on the web if you know where to look and have been watching for awhile. The game industry has a VERY bad trend, right now, of really pushing the hype train as much as possible, followed by not delivering or living up to it. Blizzard is only recently(the past 5 years or so) falling into that type of behavior as well, and it doesn't take a genius to see it happening. All it takes is a little objectivity. WoD and the flying issue are just symptoms of it.

Let me tell you why, as of this point (and believe me this could change) that your carrot theory is flawed. As of now, and with the announcement of the Emerald Nightmare, the Stormheim mini raid and Nighthold and it's release schedule, the current evidence suggest that they plan on supporting Legion raiding through out the expansion. The need to keep people interested will should only occur if we have some giant drought like with WoD. If Legion, at this point, looked like it would share the same sort of content issues I would agree with you. It doesn't. That sort of carrot doesn't look needed.

Ask almost any raider if WoD was a good expansion and they'll tell you it was great. Flying has zero to do with raiding. I don't really think it's fair to use your example as a counter-argument to their decision in regards to the open world or flight. If you had mentioned additional open world zones like Suramar, I might be inclined to agree with you, but so far we've heard very VERY little in that regard.

Flying, and their design decisions regarding it, isn't my favorite. I don't like it all that much. It's just not a deal breaker to me in this instance. It is for some. I get that. You don't want to play when they don't give you flying, perfectly understandable to me. I am entirely ok with that opinion being voiced and debated. It's what these forums are for. But I don't think "trust" belongs in the relationship I have with a faceless business entity. So if some people are feeling personally offended by Blizzards actions, well don't throw your pearls before swine.

I definitely agree, for the most part. A LOT of people make the mistake of feeling like Blizzard is some kind of good friend that they can always trust to take care of their gaming needs. That's a mistake. Blizzard doesn't care about players any further than the effect that they have on their profits. Again, remember I'm talking about the corporation. I'm sure individual employees of Blizzard might care if people like their work or not(mah visions!), but the company doesn't. They care about money. Correlation does not equate to causation, and I think a LOT of people are very quick to forget that when they're personally enjoying a part of the game.

[Hexxidecimal]

With all due respect, I'm not talking about how much of an individual dev's heart and soul they pour into their work. I'm talking about the entity known as Activision-Blizzard as a whole. Little to no inside information? That's not entirely accurate. There's plenty of information and evidence of behavior on the web if you know where to look and have been watching for awhile. The game industry has a VERY bad trend, right now, of really pushing the hype train as much as possible, followed by not delivering or living up to it. Blizzard is only recently(the past 5 years or so) falling into that type of behavior as well, and it doesn't take a genius to see it happening. All it takes is a little objectivity. WoD and the flying issue are just symptoms of it.

I am not talking about the individual Dev either, I am talking about all the Devs. The people who actually build the game. The information we can find on the internet is extremely limited and doesn't paint nearly a full enough picture to use any of what we do know as evidence without making some assumptions. What I said I believe holds. It's little to none. That being said if you would like to provide enough examples to constitute "plenty" and some context for those examples I am willing to listen. I won't disagree on the game industry trend. That is 100% the case. In part, and with WoW specifically I agree. The idea of shooting out expansions after a year seemed really implausible to me, well to do it and keep the same sort of Blizzard shine anyway. They hyped this new design direction and subsequently bit off more than they could chew.

However in other areas I disagree. Blizzard products are still generally well done as a whole. Even WoW with it's bugs is far less buggy than most MMOs and waaaay less buggy than earlier versions of itself. I was there for Vanilla beta and vanilla launch and every subsequent beta and launch (except WoD beta/launch I bought and played it a week after launch or so). It's gotten better since BC/Vanilla and has maintained quality levels more or less since then.

Further more I don't believe the same sort of issue you are referring to doesn't hold true for the rest of their products. Which further suggests that the issues we have seen with WoW were misguided design philosophy and not the Blizzard's, as a company, grubby greedy little hands that are willing to shoot their own cash cow in the face because they want to sell the beef for a quick penny.

Ask almost any raider if WoD was a good expansion and they'll tell you it was great. Flying has zero to do with raiding. I don't really think it's fair to use your example as a counter-argument to their decision in regards to the open world or flight. If you had mentioned additional open world zones like Suramar, I might be inclined to agree with you, but so far we've heard very VERY little in that regard.

Er, I can't speak for most people. So I will simply relate my anecdotal evidence and parrot the general consensus I see in various forums. The Raids in WoD were decent to great. But no, it was not a good expansion for raiders as that content dried up entirely over a year ago. There was literally nothing to do for the dedicated raider for a very long time. For those who just did dungeons, there hasn't been a single new instance since WoD's release. Heroic became almost entirely pointless extremely early on. Mythic only appeal was transmog gear, which at the time still needed to be collected by multiple toons. Time walking helped with having more stuff to do, did nothing for meaningful rewards. Out door content, well you know the state of that as well as I since it's tied closely to the argument of flight. PvP I can't comment on. I can only imagine their main concern would have been balancing as I know there were no new battlegrounds (something I am led to belive is of little importance to PvPers) I also understand that Ashran was crap. Crafting, gold making and practically every activity outside of the above stuff happened mainly in your garrison. Which became old very quickly. To sum it up, this was not a good expansion for hardly anyone as far as I can tell. I don't know what raiders you speak of, or what forums you visit, but the consensus I gather is not positive.

I definitely agree, for the most part. A LOT of people make the mistake of feeling like Blizzard is some kind of good friend that they can always trust to take care of their gaming needs. That's a mistake. Blizzard doesn't care about players any further than the effect that they have on their profits. Again, remember I'm talking about the corporation. I'm sure individual employees of Blizzard might care if people like their work or not(mah visions!), but the company doesn't. They care about money. Correlation does not equate to causation, and I think a LOT of people are very quick to forget that when they're personally enjoying a part of the game.

I agree.

[Mafic]

If the majority of the patchfinder achievement is completed in part one, but you are waiting for part two what for? That is assuming part two is the only final component of it. They can be lying or they can be obfuscating by saying patchfinder part 1 is 50% of the requirement but part 2 and part 3 respectively are 25% each. To the player they are going to jump for joy at that outcome?

Part one patchfinder grants increased mount speed. That is it.

Players reading into more of what it offers or nothing heavy or substantial is behind the first part are probably in for a rude awakening.

[rebecca191]

For the amount of work you have to put into it, a mount speed increase is pretty lousy and will be useless by the time you have finished 100 unique world quests and the entire Suramar storyline. I hate Blizzard's current design decision that travel has to be extremely slow and regressive until the player has literally done basically *everything*. Making travel slower, more annoying, and more restrictive doesn't make the game last longer for me, it just makes me get burned out much faster. I had enough of Suramar after two freaking days. Two days! It might be less annoying by the time flying achievement is fully implemented due to better gear, but honestly even IF the achievement gave flying now and not a faster ground mount speed, I think I'd be too fed up to even care by then.

[Mafic]

For the amount of work you have to put into it, a mount speed increase is pretty lousy and will be useless by the time you have finished 100 unique world quests and the entire Suramar storyline. I hate Blizzard's current design decision that travel has to be extremely slow and regressive until the player has literally done basically *everything*. Making travel slower, more annoying, and more restrictive doesn't make the game last longer for me, it just makes me get burned out much faster. I had enough of Suramar after two freaking days. Two days! It might be less annoying by the time flying achievement is fully implemented due to better gear, but honestly even IF the achievement gave flying now and not a faster ground mount speed, I think I'd be too fed up to even care by then.

People would skip Suramar if it didn't have its own currency. I think Surarmar is a forced decision along with restricting flight to stretch out content. We know 7.1 is going on the PTR as soon as Legion launches.

So it doesn't seem likely that patch 7.2 is going to have flying but what is the time table of patch 7.2? 7.1 patch is most likely a winter release...maybe Autumn? So is patch 7.2 a late spring/summer release?

And if flying isn't in patch 7.2...then when is patch 7.3?

If Blizzard says there will be more content for legion and patch 7.2 will not be the peak or crescendo of the expansion then when is the mid expansion for flight to be enabled 7.3? 7.4?

And here is the kicker...why is patchfinder part 1 called part 1 if the majority of it supposedly the achievement necessary for flight? Part 2 requires you talk to an NPC and that is it? Ha! Obvious trolling by Blizzard is obvious.

I am washing my hands from this mess and watching from afar as to how this will unravel. As predicted in the first thread...don't be surprised it descends in the same manner in Legion like it did with WoD regarding the timetable with flight.

[rebecca191]

I basically only tried it at this point because I got the beta. It's free, I'll try almost any game for free! After trying it out, I actually feel pretty sad because I feel like it had a lot of promise but Blizzard's obsession with shoving no flying down everyone's throats really drags it down. Even if Suramar had no flying and everywhere else did it would be an improvement because at least you'd get a break from it in other zones. I was a lot less bothered by IoT and TI precisely because most of Pandaria had flying and I could take a break from the no flying and gather mats, do archeology, work on achievements and reps I hadn't finished yet from the launch reps, and that kept me from feeling so burned out. Hitting level 110 was I think the most anticlimactic level cap in WoW ever. The mobs all leveled up with you - couldn't they at least have capped the freaking leveling mobs at 109? The scaling was nice while leveling, avoiding the temptation to leave a zone storyline in the middle because leveling up reduced the XP too much. But at max level, it feels awful. You don't have any faster or better travel. The whistle is a crappy attempt to make travel seem better, you earn it pretty fast but it saves at most a few minutes at the end because you could also hearth to Dalaran and just fly back to the quest giver. There's a toy that gives you faster travel in one zone but its 30min CD 10min duration. It felt like I was fighting terrain and non quest mobs more than I was actually working on quest objectives. From the limited perspective of only having played WoD at the very end, the content in Legion has a lot more potential than WoD's did, in my opinion. Too bad getting to the content feels less like a game and more like an awful chore and your parents won't let you have any fun til you finish your freaking chores.

[Incarnia]

Have fun playing other games, while i'm destroying the legion and playing the new expansion!

Seriously, if flight is what is keeping people from playing all new content, then seriously thats a new low. To deliberately "protest" and not buy the game for that reason and miss out on all the new features and stuff is just beyond me.

Why assume so much Jaylock? It ain't working in your favor. Just so you know.

First. I got Beta. I've played Legion. I know I do not appreciate being kept grounded (WoW's system of traveling is shit without personal flight). And I have to wonder, did you even read what I wrote? Or did my # sent you to instant rage mode?

I'm buying Legion, but I will unsub if they keep up the behavior of stringing us along with a bunch of maybe then, maybe this and maybe that regarding to flight (exactly what they did in WoD). That type of shit behavior (yes it is) I do not accept - not IRL nor in games - and I sure as hell do not wish to support it with my money either. When and if I unsub can only time tell. Might be second content patch, might be third, might be never during Legion, I don't know that for sure yet. So go shove your assumptions somewhere the sun dosen't shine.

[wing5wong]

extremely slow and regressive

overly exaggerated, yet again.

I had enough of Suramar after two freaking days. Two days! It might be less annoying by the time flying achievement is fully implemented due to better gear,

Better gear and flying are completely unrelated. If the mobs are so unbearably difficult that gear is the solution, how does flying improve that experience at all? You still need to do the zone, flight doesnt change it.

Hitting level 110 was I think the most anticlimactic level cap in WoW ever. The mobs all leveled up with you - couldn't they at least have capped the freaking leveling mobs at 109? The scaling was nice while leveling, avoiding the temptation to leave a zone storyline in the middle because leveling up reduced the XP too much. But at max level, it feels awful. You don't have any faster or better travel.

Again, mob scaling and flight are completely unrelated. why would you leave the mobs at 109? What purpose does that serve other than making things easier to kill? It gets you back on your mount faster?

It felt like I was fighting terrain and non quest mobs more than I was actually working on quest objectives. From the limited perspective of only having played WoD at the very end, the content in Legion has a lot more potential than WoD's did, in my opinion. Too bad getting to the content feels less like a game and more like an awful chore and your parents won't let you have any fun til you finish your freaking chores.

Do we really jsut need to add more obs to the quests before this stops being an issue? just because a mob is not specifically noted on the quest does not mean it should be removed. that would make for an extremely empty and boring world.

[Mafic]

I basically only tried it at this point because I got the beta. It's free, I'll try almost any game for free! After trying it out, I actually feel pretty sad because I feel like it had a lot of promise but Blizzard's obsession with shoving no flying down everyone's throats really drags it down. Even if Suramar had no flying and everywhere else did it would be an improvement because at least you'd get a break from it in other zones. I was a lot less bothered by IoT and TI precisely because most of Pandaria had flying and I could take a break from the no flying and gather mats, do archeology, work on achievements and reps I hadn't finished yet from the launch reps, and that kept me from feeling so burned out. Hitting level 110 was I think the most anticlimactic level cap in WoW ever. The mobs all leveled up with you - couldn't they at least have capped the freaking leveling mobs at 109? The scaling was nice while leveling, avoiding the temptation to leave a zone storyline in the middle because leveling up reduced the XP too much. But at max level, it feels awful. You don't have any faster or better travel. The whistle is a crappy attempt to make travel seem better, you earn it pretty fast but it saves at most a few minutes at the end because you could also hearth to Dalaran and just fly back to the quest giver. There's a toy that gives you faster travel in one zone but its 30min CD 10min duration. It felt like I was fighting terrain and non quest mobs more than I was actually working on quest objectives. From the limited perspective of only having played WoD at the very end, the content in Legion has a lot more potential than WoD's did, in my opinion. Too bad getting to the content feels less like a game and more like an awful chore and your parents won't let you have any fun til you finish your freaking chores.

The artifact grind is going to break people IMO with this ground and pound strategy that Blizzard is pushing. This is why I am surprised they think no flying is going to work. They probably know it will fail because they wouldn't have bothered with the flight path whistle.

[SirCowdog]

Do we really jsut need to add more obs to the quests before this stops being an issue? just because a mob is not specifically noted on the quest does not mean it should be removed. that would make for an extremely empty and boring world.

I'd prefer a game world with only the objectives over one filled with useless trash everywhere. It's called trash for a reason: Pointless garbage taking up space. Useless. Unimportant.

Adding more trash and making people slog through it doesn't make the world less boring. It makes it MORE boring because people get sick of dealing with stuff that has nothing to do with what they're actually trying to accomplish. At least in Diablo 3 you're earning experience and pushing your paragon level forward. Do these uselss trash mobs even have a chance to drop artifact power or order-hall resources? Or do they only exist to daze you and push you off your already slow ground mount?

[Eapoe]

I'd prefer a game world with only the objectives over one filled with useless trash everywhere. It's called trash for a reason: Pointless garbage taking up space. Useless. Unimportant.

Adding more trash and making people slog through it doesn't make the world less boring. It makes it MORE boring because people get sick of dealing with stuff that has nothing to do with what they're actually trying to accomplish. At least in Diablo 3 you're earning experience and pushing your paragon level forward. Do these uselss trash mobs even have a chance to drop artifact power or order-hall resources? Or do they only exist to daze you and push you off your already slow ground mount?

As a matter of fact they do drop resources for AP (albeit a very small amount), with chances at world epics and even legendaries. Some mobs also drop resources for crafting professions for people that do not have a gathering profession for the BoP items.

[Mafic]

I'd prefer a game world with only the objectives over one filled with useless trash everywhere. It's called trash for a reason: Pointless garbage taking up space. Useless. Unimportant.

Adding more trash and making people slog through it doesn't make the world less boring. It makes it MORE boring because people get sick of dealing with stuff that has nothing to do with what they're actually trying to accomplish. At least in Diablo 3 you're earning experience and pushing your paragon level forward. Do these uselss trash mobs even have a chance to drop artifact power or order-hall resources? Or do they only exist to daze you and push you off your already slow ground mount?

They are trying to create the illusion of a dynamic world with scaling NPC's. But all it will accomplish is sheer tedium and for players to ask for flying to be added back a lot sooner.

[Connll]

They are trying to create the illusion of a dynamic world with scaling NPC's. But all it will accomplish is sheer tedium and for players to ask for flying to be added back a lot sooner.

What could be the pros of having scaling NPCs?

[Eapoe]

What could be the pros of having scaling NPCs?

Non linear leveling gameplay. Makes every mob in every zone give the chance for max level gear for whatever you are doing (going to a quest area, farming mats, just wanting to run around without going to far from the home base, etc), basically equal loot chance for all mobs. In case one day you might want to farm mats in a lightly populated area or grind mobs out for AP/random legendary drops, you have the choice to do those in any zone. Prevents bottlenecking in leveling zones with being able to progress however you want to.