Legion Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Arbs]

Has anyone saved the pages Arbs linked? They are 404'ing now.

Fixed them!, I copied pasted them with out grabbing the full link instead of the cut down version.

[huth]

Has anyone saved the pages Arbs linked? They are 404'ing now.

Edit. And they're up again. Hmm.

They weren't down, the links were just messed up.

[Xentronium]

Yeah, they must be working on them.

No real surprises or juicy info in any of the panels. Unless there is a super secret invite only panel.

[Imnick]

I wasn't expecting a D3 expansion so I am excited about 3 hours of HotS.
There's a whole hour about new battlegrounds, and a whole hour about new characters, instead of both squashed into one! That's very exciting.

[Arbs]

Game Systems Panel, Let's hope it is about servers too.

I have been away for abit, but I have a theory has anyone noticed Servers on Battle.net are no longer showing up this has been going since beginning of this month.

A Big complaint has always been about dead servers for so long. What if Blizzard is actually doing Mega Servers finally. 4 Mega Servers per Region. 1 PvE, 1 PvP, 1 RP & 1 RP-PvP. Oceanic will have it own set aswell. Basically the servers from each region are just combined into a Mega Server will have Multiple phases like ESO has. Easier to spread out the flow of people logging in & everyone will be technically all on 1 server you just can't see everyone & the servers are adjusted that their stable anough without crashing. The amount of servers US & EU have, if they do Mega Servers their is no reason we should have another WoD Launch situation or big queues as you will be funneling everyone into the open areas of all the servers, but if you want to play with your friend just have them invite you over to their said phase or yours.

They could even add an Overflow server that could funnel better into the open servers more efficiently without bottle neck. Since people will always be logging in their will always less open spots, but when people get bored or people leave Servers aren't left dead as your connected to 1 Mega Server & it feels like no one left.

[rda]

I recall him asking on Twitter whether a developer had ever been sacked due to public campaigns, clearly in an defiant effort to tell people it isn't going to work, but the truth is that people in public facing positions are often moved along when they become such a PR liability as Holinka seems to be determined to make himself.

Did Holinka pull any new PR stunts lately? If so, do tell, I have missed this. :-)

If that's about PVP in WoD, yeah, he should be absolutely ashamed. Ashran alone is a ton of weight on someone's legs...

[CosmicGuitars]

Did Holinka pull any new PR stunts lately? If so, do tell, I have missed this. :-)

If that's about PVP in WoD, yeah, he should be absolutely ashamed. Ashran alone is a ton of weight on someone's legs...

If by 'PR stunts' you mean having had the audacity to be excited about what he's working on, then yes.

[rda]

I have been away for abit, but I have a theory has anyone noticed Servers on Battle.net are no longer showing up this has been going since beginning of this month.

A Big complaint has always been about dead servers for so long. What if Blizzard is actually doing Mega Servers finally. 4 Mega Servers per Region. 1 PvE, 1 PvP, 1 RP & 1 RP-PvP. Oceanic will have it own set aswell. Basically the servers from each region are just combined into a Mega Server will have Multiple phases like ESO has. Easier to spread out the flow of people logging in & everyone will be technically all on 1 server you just can't see everyone & the servers are adjusted that their stable anough without crashing. The amount of servers US & EU have, if they do Mega Servers their is no reason we should have another WoD Launch situation or big queues as you will be funneling everyone into the open areas of all the servers, but if you want to play with your friend just have them invite you over to their said phase or yours.

They could even add an Overflow server that could funnel better into the open servers more efficiently without bottle neck. Since people will always be logging in their will always less open spots, but when people get bored or people leave Servers aren't left dead as your connected to 1 Mega Server & it feels like no one left.

Mega-servers will appear one day, they aren't terribly difficult to do, it's mainly a question of optimization / hardware and both these things evolve faster than the number of players ever can.

I don't think that's a terribly big priority though, cross-server groups give you 90% of what you'd get from mega-servers. Most of what mega-servers add on top of that is just making your life - and sometimes the dev's life - worse - like interface for the AH becoming unusable because the search is limited to 200 items and with mega-servers all 200 are going to be the same item, you can no longer search for items starting with specified text, the game suddenly needs new UI and the AH new API, etc.

- - - Updated - - -

If by 'PR stunts' you mean having had the audacity to be excited about what he's working on, then yes.

No, I mean the gaffes and the arrogance.

[George Costanza]

If by 'PR stunts' you mean having had the audacity to be excited about what he's working on, then yes.

BGs - Cut.

[CosmicGuitars]

No, I mean the gaffes and the arrogance.

He hasn't done anything recently aside from showing excitement for Legion, which people still somehow interpret as a negative.

[Xilurm]

Shouldn't the SC panel be called The Future of Starcraft? Why are they adding the II? I thought it was over with LotV.

[Kaesebrezen]

Disappointed on only 1h of Diablo vs 3hs of HotS. WoW is getting 4.5hs which should be more than enough.

Intro panel 1.5 - System panels 1h - Q&A panel 1h = 3.5h. Q&A panel is going to be as good as always, leaving 2.5 for information.

Overview panel is likely going to be repeat after GamesCom with new Screenshots/Videos added.
System panels is going into a little bit more detail on Class Halls/Artifacts/Professions/Demonhunters/Itemization - But that is only one hour - not much can be said about anything of these topics.

[rda]

Intro panel 1.5 - System panels 1h - Q&A panel 1h = 3.5h. Q&A panel is going to be as good as always, leaving 2.5 for information.

Overview panel is likely going to be repeat after GamesCom with new Screenshots/Videos added.
System panels is going into a little bit more detail on Class Halls/Artifacts/Professions/Demonhunters/Itemization - But that is only one hour - not much can be said about anything of these topics.

If overview panel is going to be a repeat of GamesCom with next to no new info, that's going to be a very big disappointment.

I want *at least 70%* of the panel to be new info. At least. Because, again, Legion currently looks small, and because they said pretty much nothing after GamesCom and it's been a while.

[Imnick]

Shouldn't the SC panel be called The Future of Starcraft? Why are they adding the II? I thought it was over with LotV.

They aren't going to end support for SCII as soon as the expansion is released though, they will want to talk about multiplayer and future balance/arcade patches and the like.

They're also not going to be revealing Starcraft III, so the only game they could possibly talk about is Starcraft II.

[rda]

Also: I expect very little from the Q&A. Blizzard Q&As have been terrible lately, even if we exclude that silliness that happened on GamesCom.

[huth]

Intro panel 1.5 - System panels 1h - Q&A panel 1h = 3.5h. Q&A panel is going to be as good as always, leaving 2.5 for information.

You forgot the cinematics panel.

[Arbs]

Also: I expect very little from the Q&A. Blizzard Q&As have been terrible lately, even if we exclude that silliness that happened on GamesCom.

Wait you mean the same type of Q&A they have done at Blizzcon for years with people lining for questions?.

[rda]

Wait you mean the same type of Q&A they have done at Blizzcon for years with people lining for questions?.

Yes, I mean those. They were bad lately. Bad questions topped with downright terrible answers.

[Imnick]

I think the Overview should mostly be new information, though that may be wishful thinking.
It does at least mention a "sneak peek at upcoming features" in the description.

[Kaesebrezen]

If overview panel is going to be a repeat of GamesCom with next to no new info, that's going to be a very big disappointment.

The descriptions reads more like an extensive lore tour guide through zones, dungeons and raids - with some sneak peek at upcoming features. That's pretty much was GamesCom was - in a equal timed window.

Likely we'll see much more videos for Zones/Dungeons/Raids than we had on GamesCom (taking up additional time), some new artifact/class hall screens/videos, and be done at that point.

System panel will bring you "How you get and spend your artifact power", "This is how awesome the profession dailies are going to be", "That's how you craft the raid quality items now", "This is the UI for your 5-10 Class hall Followers and that's the daily objectives they offer you", "Look at this Demon Hunter Resource bar you fill by double jumping", "We removed multistrike, but now we give amplification another try", "We cut down the PvP ranks to 30, because getting a talent point every 3-4 ranks felt to unrewarding", etc.

You might want to keep your expectations low. What we saw at GamesCom is likely going to be all.

You forgot the cinematics panel.

True. But i don't really expect that panel to be much different then a Reaper of Souls Cinematic panel, just in Legion style. The only information i can take from this panel is that the cinematic is likely finished by the time of BlizzCon, and we'll get to see it.