Battle for Azeroth Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Fahrad Wagner]

I hope in the end we don't end up with too many allied races. It might make WoW look like a different game in terms of atmosphere, don't you think?

[Shadochi]

Well they could just use the new model they got, and just custom tweak it to make it more different than the Moonkin, and other skeletons etc...
Maybe if Ogres are playable they could have a sub-race in which Hobgoblins might be playable too. <3

Again, the model isn't the problem with ogres. Since they weren't built around the skele of one of the playable races they are missing a large number of animations that are needed for a playable character (which would take a long time to make). But tortollan (and allied races) were built from the ground up around the skeletons of playable races, meaning that they have all the animations needed.

I'm not against playable ogres (I'm pretty much for anything playable) but at the moment there are races that are more technically feasible than ogres.

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Eh cat's out of the bag imo.

Look in fantasy games you often have dozens of available races. The vast majority play 3-4 core races and the rest are only picked by powergamers who want to use them for a specific built and the rare person who wants to try something exotic.

Even if they add every race imaginable to WoW, Elves will still outnumber the rest by a significant margin.

Fixed that

[Hyrja]

I have a feeling development is still very early. There are so many subjects they didn't say a word about, and when asked in interviews they said they cant talk about it yet.

[Shadochi]

I have a feeling development is still very early. There are so many subjects they didn't say a word about, and when asked in interviews they said they cant talk about it yet.

That was more the case when asked about classic development, for BfA they did have answers but for a lot of them they said that it's not set in stone(can be changed still)

There was certainly more playable stuff at the demo area than during the Legion demo at blizzcon 2015

[Hyrja]

I was just very surprised they didn't say anything about professions, classes etc.

[Draedarr]

I have a feeling development is still very early. There are so many subjects they didn't say a word about, and when asked in interviews they said they cant talk about it yet.

Some of the features, like the Warfronts seems to be in really early development phase. Atleast what was shown on the floor, they may have builds more ahead of time but too bug.
Now we need to wait.

[Nathanyel]

They didnt mention draenor. So i doubt it

Would make no sense for it to be the only non-scaling expansion though. And the zones are sufficiently disconnected story-wise anyway.

[Lahis]

Would make no sense for it to be the only non-scaling expansion though. And the zones are sufficiently disconnected story-wise anyway.

Most of them do fit to a linear narrative though. For Alliance it is Shadowmoon -> Gorgond -> Talador -> Nagrand. The recurring NPC cast travels the zones in that order.

Spires of Arak is mostly a sidequest.

[Shadochi]

I was just very surprised they didn't say anything about professions, classes etc.

They did say, they plan to go in a similar direction as legion, just with less quests (not sure about ranks.)

I think it was in an interview on wowpedia, cant find it now. And class changes they said won't be too big.

[Nathanyel]

Most of them do fit to a linear narrative though. For Alliance it is Shadowmoon -> Gorgond -> Talador -> Nagrand. The recurring NPC cast travels the zones in that order.

Yes, the NPCs follow you, but there is rarely a mention of the previous zones besides maybe Frostfire/Shadowmoon being their home, not sure about Alliance side though, haven't played everything.

Also, Spires of Arak and Nagrand are imho the best zones, would be great if I could level chars through Draenor with just these two.

[Eurhetemec]

Don't know if it was posted yet but this was the leak, way before Blizzcon:

Aha, thank you, it was not, that's what I was looking for.

That does indeed have about 20% of the stuff I've seen people claim was in it. They're clearly conflating it, the other real Battle for Azeroth leak - the GrimVicious one, and fake Shadowfall one, which just copied the GrimVicious one and added Genki stuff to it. That does have Sylvanas using "shards" (pretty clearly of Gorribal) to "take down" Nordrassil (presumably he means Teldrassil), though, which is the interesting bit and the bit Blizzard haven't outright said.

LOL@ poor Xelium, he will be forever remembered as the "Not very reliable..." guy. Hugs, dude, we've all been there.

[Eurhetemec]

They did say, they plan to go in a similar direction as legion, just with less quests (not sure about ranks.)

I think it was in an interview on wowpedia, cant find it now. And class changes they said won't be too big.

They also said, re: professions that they want to use them to allow players to "customize their gear and keep crafting relevant".

http://finalboss.tv/main/2017/11/5/b...iew-transcript

Which is an interesting thing to say - maybe we'll see stuff like the "reroll secondary stats" items that WoD had, maybe even applicable to non-crafted items, or a sort of quasi-reforging (don't get overexcited, it might not be what they mean).

Re: classes they said:

"They are not expecting to see dozens of specs fundamentally reworked like they did in Legion. Clearly there were a lot of large changes there: a lot of those worked out well, some less so. Some specs might see a more thorough rework - revisiting of what they did in Legion and taking a second crack at it and learning based on feedback. No changes as drastic as Survival Hunters are being planned for BfA at this time."

So it's likely to be more like the TBC-Wrath transition, class-wise, than the WoD-Legion one. I bet a number of specs do get seriously worked over though. I can't see SV or Outlaw going without big changes, for example (just not a redesign of the entire concept).

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If Draenor scales, mass turn in of the bounty quests and world objective in Gorgrond under the 15m elixir will level you from 102 to 110 and possibly even be enough to get you to 101.

Presumably you mean 92 to 100? They haven't been clear on WoD scaling, but I am pretty sure they intend it to scale 90-100.

[Malagan]

Aha, thank you, it was not, that's what I was looking for.

That does indeed have about 20% of the stuff I've seen people claim was in it. They're clearly conflating it,

Nah, the dude leaked a bunch of things that proved true:

It's a thing coming in 7.3.5. No need to even wait until expac. (Since Horde gets Nightfall Elves, Alliance gets Void Elves, balanced!)

Here he nails all the Allied Races, and which ones go to which faction, and that things are being updated in 7.3.5 rather than 7.5 or expansion patch.

That part is completely unknown and pretty much 3 of them are already kinda expected, with Void elves being blood elves who now follow Vereesaa's path and get exiled from Silver Moon.

In this one he completely nailed the backstory for the Void Elves.

Btw, Sylvie could burn the tree because she got the shard of Sargeras's weapon which was dropped onto Azeroth and caused the wound. It's very powerful and giving Sylvie the gut.

This one explains how she burnt down Teldrassil, which we have no info on yet, but might prove true in the future. Anyway, nothing he posted has proved wrong so far, with the bulk of it being proved correct.

[Nathanyel]

How so? as soon as you get to 80, there aren't really significant disconnections to apart from who is King/Warchief (and even that is not relevant once past Cata). Scaling will be an issue in WoD now that you can use heirlooms there but the story itself is not disconnected (and the smart way to level an alt through WoD is completely silly storywise anyhow).

My post was about Draenor only, while the zones were connected by the expansion's story, you could basically do any zone without requiring the story of another. Maybe Tanaan and the Garrison setup to get to know the core characters.

[Eurhetemec]

Here he nails all the Allied Races, and which ones go to which faction, and that things are being updated in 7.3.5 rather than 7.5 or expansion patch.

What? I don't see him "nailing all" - he mentions two of them that we'd been aware of for several weeks at that point (and he even gets one of the names wrong), we even knew the factions. The others he just hints at ("kinda expected").

In this one he completely nailed the backstory for the Void Elves.

Apparently not. He has it half-right (they're Blood Elves, but the "exiled from Silvermoon" thing appears to be incorrect), at least according to Red Shirt Guy.

This one explains how she burnt down Teldrassil, which we have no info on yet, but might prove true in the future. Anyway, nothing he posted has proved wrong so far, with the bulk of it being proved correct.

Er, actually he has already been wrong - now you've given me the link, I can see his posts, for example he said:

No idea what Jaina teaser you guys were talking about. But she's gonna show up in the opening CG, doing the same thing she's done back in wrath with Varian and Thrall.

That did not happen, and it's interesting that he got this wrong, because the CG must have been in development for a year or more. So that tells us he has some kind of fairly secondary source, I think.

[Marlamin]

Jesse Cox's interview with Ion is actually pretty cool. Ion seems like a pretty cool dude.

[Lahis]

Jesse Cox's interview with Ion is actually pretty cool. Ion seems like a pretty cool dude.

Damn that Mei cosplay :'D

[Yarathir]

Again, the model isn't the problem with ogres. Since they weren't built around the skele of one of the playable races they are missing a large number of animations that are needed for a playable character (which would take a long time to make). But tortollan (and allied races) were built from the ground up around the skeletons of playable races, meaning that they have all the animations needed.

I'm not against playable ogres (I'm pretty much for anything playable) but at the moment there are races that are more technically feasible than ogres.

To be fair, Blizzard could do animation retargeting, and they've already specifically called that out.

It would mean that the ogres would share some animations, for example, with upright orcs, but that's exactly the kind of thing they're trying to do with allied races. It gives them a lot of options, since they can make new playable characters without making questing zones, racial mounts, an all-new rig with unique animations. That's what makes them exciting. If there is a cool npc race we befriend that uses a playable race rig, then they can make them playable now without any of the expectations players would have for full races.

[Malagan]

Apparently not. He has it half-right (they're Blood Elves, but the "exiled from Silvermoon" thing appears to be incorrect), at least according to Red Shirt Guy.

Red Shirt Guy said the same, actually:




Kicked out of Silvermoon. Exiled from Silvermoon.

[In Ogres We Trust]

Again, the model isn't the problem with ogres. Since they weren't built around the skele of one of the playable races they are missing a large number of animations that are needed for a playable character (which would take a long time to make). But tortollan (and allied races) were built from the ground up around the skeletons of playable races, meaning that they have all the animations needed.

I'm not against playable ogres (I'm pretty much for anything playable) but at the moment there are races that are more technically feasible than ogres.

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Fixed that

Since the ogres from WoD were playable quality, that's a stupid argument.