Dev Interviews - Patch 9.2 Final Major Patch of Shadowlands, Level 60 Boost Now Live

Shadowlands Patch 9.2 - Eternity's End Developer Preview

Developer Interviews - Patch 9.2 Final Major Patch of Shadowlands
Game Rant, Inven, NGA, GamerBraves, and Millenium interviewed developers about Patch 9.2.

Story and Lore
  • The Shadowlands story arc was planned to have three acts, so Patch 9.2 will be the finale of Shadowlands. There could be a Patch 9.3, but it's unlikely.
  • Dealing with Anduin is the only way players will be able to confront the Jailer.
  • Uther may be able to guide Sylvanas through those treacherous waters of having a soul returned to the body after death
  • Tyrande and Sylvanas are on a collision course and there will be heavy interaction between those characters, and that is pivotal to the final conclusion of Shadowlands.
  • This patch will explain all of the Shadowlands story lines and this is actually the ending of a series of story lines starting from Warcraft 3.
  • There is room for sweeping, cosmic narratives and small, personal stories alike.
  • The team recognizes that players want to see the small things that flesh out the world as well as a cosmic story.
  • There are many facets of the Warcraft universe still waiting for us to explore in both the cosmic sense of Eternity’s End, and the more grounded events in Azeroth featuring characters we know and love, with many areas yet in Azeroth to be discovered.

New Raid - Sepulcher of the First Ones
  • The new raid has 11 bosses, with Anduin being the 8th boss.
  • The first week of the new raid will take us up to Anduin, allowing us to take a closer look at his story.
  • Anduin will be a very, very complex boss.
  • The final three bosses will be available on Normal, Heroic, and Mythic difficulties during the third week of the raid.
  • The Jailer will be the final boss of the new raid.
  • The Jailer fight will be in a very dynamic room, with pillars and fog, and may be the craziest boss the team has done.
  • After defeating the first boss in the Sepulcher, you need to take a flight path to the next boss in the instance. As you travel, you get to see all the epic scenery, huge structures in the raid, and get the sense of scale and fantasy.
  • One wing of the raid is constantly creating new things and prototyping creatures, and one of the bosses in that wing is a prototype of the Pantheon of Death.
  • In previous raids, everything led up to a moment with the final boss. This time we have a big story moment with both Anduin and the Jailer.

Zereth Mortis
  • Zereth Mortis will be very large.
  • Zereth Mortis was an opportunity for the team to show a whole new level of Warcraft cosmology, about this mystical and ‘higher form of magic’ place that we hadn’t seen before.
  • There will be opportunities for you to get gear to get you to where you can feel successful playing through the Zereth Mortis story content.
  • Zereth Mortis and its creatures, the Automa, speak with a runic pattern called the Cyphers. Players will not know it all at once, but will learn it over time.
  • Zereth Mortis exists for the sole purpose of creating "the Afterlife", all of it. Shadowlands was fashioned there along with many things of the strength of Death that we have yet to discover.
  • Zereth Mortis is our first in-depth look at the Founders, the cosmos and cosmology, of that balance of power that governs the entire universe.
  • Zereth Mortis has no day / night cycle since it is neither a star nor a planet but an "area" located in the heart of the ether of the universe itself.
  • In the end you will have the flight in Zereth Mortis thanks to the decryption system.

Tier Sets
  • Tier sets are a combination of class fantasy and the aesthetics from the zone, creatures, and ecology of Zereth Mortis.
  • Tier sets will be available through the raids and Great Vault.
  • After Patch 9.2 releases, you'll unlock the Forge of Creation, and earn a new currency. This currency, along with an item from PVP or dungeons, can be transformed into a tier set piece.
  • The Forge of Creation is supposed to work like a bad luck protection, or for people wanting to make new characters, or as a catch-up method if you’ve started late.

PvP
  • The new PvP brawl is the Solo Shuffle. It'll take 6 players and have them fight in 3v3 arena matches in every possible combination you could form with those players. The one with the best rating at the end wins.

Legendary Items
  • Players will have access to new level tiers for legendary items that require materials that come from Zereth Mortis directly.
  • You'll be able to equip two legendary items at once, one regular legendary and one Covenant legendary.
  • Players will need to unlock the capability to equip two legendary items.

Misc
  • The PTR is coming in the next few weeks barring any technical challenges with the rollout.
  • The team wants to move to a world where players have new content to consume more frequently.
  • The team will not add new levels of Renown.
  • There are no plans to update Soulbinds in Eternity’s End. (Source)
  • With Kel'thuzad in Mythic Mode, players came up with a strategy that the development team did not anticipate.
  • For Kel'Thuzad and the Scribe of Doom, the two underwent successive nerfs in order to allow the "middle guilds", to defeat these bosses in the weeks and months that follow.


Eternity's End Raid Schedule
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Narratively, the Eternity’s End raid tells two stories, one after the other. Our current plan for the release of the raid looks like this:
  • During the first week of the release of Eternity’s End, the raid will not be open.
  • Beginning with the second week, the raid will open for Normal and Heroic difficulties, and the first eight bosses will be available in those difficulties.
    • It will not be possible to fight the final bosses on any difficulty during week two.
    • This is intended to provide a moment to tell the story in a way that accounts for the passage of time between the events of the eighth encounter and the subsequent encounters.
  • Beginning with the weekly reset of week three, all bosses will be available on Normal, Heroic, and Mythic difficulties.
    • This will also be the opening of the first wing of the raid on Raid Finder difficulty.

Jump Back into Action with the New Level 60 Character Boost
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
There comes a time in every hero’s journey when they need a helping hand to get them over the hump and right back into the action. With the Level 60 Character Boost*, you can instantly grant one character a one-time boost to level 60, so they’re ready to get back into action with the latest content Shadowlands has to offer and prepare for the continuing story in Eternity’s End. Bring your hero up to speed and get ready for your next thrilling adventure!


Not sure where to begin? Check out our Catching up at 60 article to learn what’s new in Shadowlands.

* Level 60 Character Boost not available in World of Warcraft® Classic. Or Burning Crusade Classic™.
This article was originally published in forum thread: Developer Interviews - Patch 9.2 Final Major Patch of Shadowlands started by chaud View original post
Published on 2021-11-11 08:22 PM
205 Comments
Comments 204 Comments
  1. damonskye's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Relapses View Post
    You're right -- perhaps Blizzard should buy a couple of game developer boosts from sweetgamedevs.org. They could save all the hassle of having to train and acclimate people to the process.
    It's called human resources. They do that sort of thing at Activision Blizzard, too.
  1. MrLachyG's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Biglog View Post
    We should be getting 10.0 expansion news fairly soon then also, with them cutting Shadowlands short at 9.2 and it hitting the PTR in a few weeks. What we don't want is for 9.2 to be another SOO patch, where "it's a big raid" but that's the content for a year and a half.
    well they said they had planned the story arc to have 3 chapters, so they're not really cutting it short. whether or not you believe them, that is another story
  1. Relapses's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by damonskye View Post
    It's called human resources. They do that sort of thing at Activision Blizzard, too.
    There isn't enough HR in the world if the people that Blizzard would need to achieve their goal simply don't exist. Being a billion dollar corporation doesn't mysteriously give them the ability to instantly find qualified game developer candidates. And let's be real here, with the bullshit going on with the lawsuit I can't imagine people are chomping at the bit to work at the company right now.
  1. damonskye's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Relapses View Post
    There isn't enough HR in the world if the people that Blizzard would need to achieve their goal simply don't exist. Being a billion dollar corporation doesn't mysteriously give them the ability to instantly find qualified game developer candidates. And let's be real here, with the bullshit going on with the lawsuit I can't imagine people are chomping at the bit to work at the company right now.
    The idea that there aren't enough game developers out there to fill an expansion of Blizzard's WoW capacity is absurd. I have well a over a dozen friends who work in the gaming industry, most for much smaller companies, and while most of them are pretty happy where they are, the realistic ability to work on a product like World of Warcraft would get most of them jumping in a heartbeat (especially if Blizz cleans up its act with its employees.) And there are new game designers coming out of schools every year.

    No, the fact that Blizzard HASN'T expanded its development team to fill this purported desire to expand content comes down to one thing and one only: money. Not talent, money. The corporation doesn't want to SPEND more money than they have to, so they push the people already working as hard as they can. The end result is exactly what we are seeing now: exactly one actual content update in the 12 months following Shadowlands launch, and if it's true that 9.2 is the last full patch of this expansion, only two content updates in two years.
  1. Berndorf's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Musta View Post
    "The team wants to move to a world where players have new content to consume more frequently."

    again and again and again i see the same line and nothing changes.
    I agree and at this point I think on some level they know they are feeding players 100% pure hopium when they say that. It's been one of their most common mantras going back to MoP and every single exp since then.
  1. Zephre's Avatar
    " Tyrande and Sylvanas are on a collision course and there will be heavy interaction between those characters, and that is pivotal to the final conclusion of Shadowlands "

    I've sure I've seen this kinda crap before with Lorth'remar and Jaina, Isle of Thunder and then a panda comes along spewing life lessons and everyone is friends. I fully expect this to end the same way, they'll butt heads call each other names and then suddenly be friends or something equally stupid, I wonder who the Panda will be this time, Uther?
  1. Onikaroshi's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by OrangeJuice View Post
    So since you need to take a FP to the boss, there will be no flying in that zone. It'll be big meaning it'll have mountains all over the placed and crammed with an ungodly amount of NPCs to waste your time. Literally just copy paste development.
    There's literally a clip of a "spider mount" flying in the zone during the preview. Seems like there will be flying.
  1. OrangeJuice's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Onikaroshi View Post
    There's literally a clip of a "spider mount" flying in the zone during the preview. Seems like there will be flying.
    Ok have fun unlocking it a year after release. I guess technically that means you're right.
  1. Relapses's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by damonskye View Post
    The idea that there aren't enough game developers out there to fill an expansion of Blizzard's WoW capacity is absurd. I have well a over a dozen friends who work in the gaming industry, most for much smaller companies, and while most of them are pretty happy where they are, the realistic ability to work on a product like World of Warcraft would get most of them jumping in a heartbeat (especially if Blizz cleans up its act with its employees.) And there are new game designers coming out of schools every year.

    No, the fact that Blizzard HASN'T expanded its development team to fill this purported desire to expand content comes down to one thing and one only: money. Not talent, money. The corporation doesn't want to SPEND more money than they have to, so they push the people already working as hard as they can. The end result is exactly what we are seeing now: exactly one actual content update in the 12 months following Shadowlands launch, and if it's true that 9.2 is the last full patch of this expansion, only two content updates in two years.
    Oh, sorry I guess I didn't realize you have "friends in the industry" and that somehow makes your random internet opinion about the hiring practices of a billion dollar company more relevant. Neither of us have any idea what's going on with the company internally; I'd just prefer not to stoke the common cynicism that Blizzard hates its customers and that's the only reason it doesn't make more content.
  1. Dartz1979's Avatar
    i dont want sylvanas to be killed forever shes my favorite.
  1. Stormwolf64's Avatar
    I guess blizzard has run out of ideas. It's just clash between hero characters or we clashing against them. Fun fun fun... Not...Please steer this fucking ship in a direction that's at least somewhat interesting.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Dartz1979 View Post
    i dont want sylvanas to be killed forever shes my favorite.
    Let them both die at this point tbh. Sylvanas was interesting ruined by shitty writing and direction. Jaina was interesting ruined by shitty writing and direction. Just kill them both off
  1. Kumorii's Avatar
    Tyrande and Sylvanas will clash, Sylvanas will plead Tyrande for understanding... Anduin will then unite them both and a beam of love kills The Jailor.
  1. PenguinChan's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by damonskye View Post
    Activision Blizzard is a billion dollar corporation. If they wanted to expand their team to put out more regular content, they absolutely could, and the market is full of people wanting to do just that. I'm not sure who's hill you're dying on there.
    I feel like this is more of a developer leads / producers issue - not a necessary amount of workers one. They've had hundreds of people working on the game itself (Not PR) and released very little content in the past (Remember WoD)? So it sounds more like that they have an issue of implementing content itself, being happy with it - and somehow engaging the players to keep going; without pushing them away inevitable with a misstep in design.
  1. Orwell7's Avatar
    Seriously looking at these developers...
    I am pretty certain they THINK the game is liked because ABC, so they make this shitty "systems", outdoor zones and grinds with lots of meaningless cosmetics.

    There are no "hard-to-achieve" AND "cool looking" sets/weapons/mounts anymore, just RNG outdoor drops for recolors.

    Meanwhile most neckbeards want new bosses, new dungeons, new abilities to play with, interesting items and fair play.
    And we get more single player content. Jeezzzz.
  1. bmjclark's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Musta View Post
    "The team wants to move to a world where players have new content to consume more frequently."

    again and again and again i see the same line and nothing changes.
    Things do change, they got significantly, significantly worse this expansion for example . Daily reminder that in legion they had already released 3 major content patches by this point
  1. damonskye's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Relapses View Post
    Oh, sorry I guess I didn't realize you have "friends in the industry" and that somehow makes your random internet opinion about the hiring practices of a billion dollar company more relevant. Neither of us have any idea what's going on with the company internally; I'd just prefer not to stoke the common cynicism that Blizzard hates its customers and that's the only reason it doesn't make more content.
    My real-world experiences are perfectly valid in being relevant to shaping my opinion about this game. You're a very confusing poster, because you alternate between positions and temperament on a regular basis like someone's shot your dog. I really have no idea what hill you're dying on here.

    I don't fault its developers; I fault the company itself. It used to put out plenty of regular content; it doesn't do that any more. It used to also be an independent company; now it's an Activision subsidiary. There is no reason not to connect the dots. (And whether you believe me or not makes no difference to me; I have a lot of friends in this industry, and *everyone* who works in the industry knows what's going on at Blizzard internally. It's certainly not hard to decipher. These are good people continually being pushed to make more with less, and it shows.)
  1. rhorle's Avatar
    They need to allow heritage armor to be gained on allied races when using a character boost. No reason to keep it restricted at this point as it only lowers the pool of what you can use a boost on.
  1. Dartz1979's Avatar
    why does everyone hate jaina so much shes such a sexy waifu and shes my type of woman too.
  1. Relapses's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by damonskye View Post
    My real-world experiences are perfectly valid in being relevant to shaping my opinion about this game. You're a very confusing poster, because you alternate between positions and temperament on a regular basis like someone's shot your dog. I really have no idea what hill you're dying on here.

    I don't fault its developers; I fault the company itself. It used to put out plenty of regular content; it doesn't do that any more. It used to also be an independent company; now it's an Activision subsidiary. There is no reason not to connect the dots. (And whether you believe me or not makes no difference to me; I have a lot of friends in this industry, and *everyone* who works in the industry knows what's going on at Blizzard internally. It's certainly not hard to decipher. These are good people continually being pushed to make more with less, and it shows.)
    Buddy I'm not dying on any hill here. I'm pointing out that you have no better idea what's going on with Blizzard and their lack of content development than any other random internet stranger on this forum. You're connecting dots that you have no business connecting and now
    you're doubling down on your baseless appeal to authority as if what you're saying is obvious to anybody in the industry.

    Cute.

    My point remains: It isn't always money that prevents companies from achieving their goals. And it isn't always greed that prevents companies from spending money. You're free to keep living in a world where Blizzard is going out of its way to dissatisfy the people who play their games because Bobby Kotick needs a third helipad on his second yacht; but I'd prefer to believe that the actual reasons are far more human than they are transactional.
  1. damonskye's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Relapses View Post
    Buddy I'm not dying on any hill here.
    You are though, but that's fine.
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