BlizzConline 2021 - World of Warcraft Q&A Panel
The WoW team is answering questions on World of Warcraft!


  • The Story in Chains of Domination
    • The relationship between the Jailer, Sylvanas, and Anduin is the core of Shadowlands' story.
    • The Jailer was looking for Anduin because they needed a hero with his qualities to get an audience with the Archon in Bastion.
    • Uther recognized the power of the Maw on some level when Anduin passed by him, which is why he touches his wound in the trailer.
    • The confrontation with Sylvanas at the end of Sanctum of Domination will be one of the most epic raid moments in raiding history.
    • The Archon survives her wound. They tried to show this by having her hand move after the event in the trailer.
    • Sire Denathrius
      • The voice actor's performance for Sire Denathrius caused Steve to want to keep him alive. This is why he is trapped at the end of the raid instead of killed.
      • He might have allies that want to liberate him from that sword.
    • Time doesn't really mean anything in the realm of death as it's eternity.
    • Bolvar will still be front and center in Chains of Domination. He is a pillar to rally around in Shadowlands.
    • The story of those lost at Teldrassil is not yet done. Tyrande is still out for vengeance for her people.
  • Burning Crusade Classic
    • You will decide if your character moves to Burning Crusade upon logging in on pre-patch.
    • If you choose to stay in Classic Era, your character will look inactive until you install Classic Era, which will then give you access to your character on the Classic Era version of your server.
    • You also have a paid option to make a copy of your character to keep in Classic Era while also moving on to Burning Crusade.
    • Your name will be saved for both server options. If there are server connections they will likely play out like in modern wow having names with servers attached.
    • The team wants to address faction imbalance in BC Classic with small changes such as Paladin seals being available to both factions.
    • Summoning Stones will be introduced with BC Classic as they were added originally in the expansion.
    • PvP titles will be awarded to only a top percentage of players per region.
    • They will not be added any fresh start servers for their timeline of Burning Crusade Classic, but it is something they have been talking about once the launch is successful.
    • Layering will be used much in the same way for Classic's launch.
  • Customization in Shadowlands
    • There are no plans right now to add more race/class combinations in Shadowlands, but never say never.
    • The team will add more customization options in the future for races that didn't get as much in Shadowlands.
    • More heritage armor will be added in the near future while some might still be further off.
  • The Pandemic
    • While it took some time to implement working from home, the team is happy to be able to continue to bring people together through the game during times of isolation.
  • Faction Imbalance
    • The faction imbalance has become a social issue that will likely require a social solution and it is a top priority for the team.
    • They don't quite have a way to address it yet, but recognize it is a problem that needs to be addressed.
    • The faction balance is actually pretty even when it comes to amount of players. It is only for participation in high-end activities that skews majorly to Horde.
    • Ion says "never say never" in regards to the option of letting Horde and Alliance play together eventually.
    • There is still faction identity when selecting which faction you identify with and not having to worry about cutting yourself off from your friends.
  • Server Connections in Modern WoW
    • The team paused the process when Shadowlands launched because the expansion had a huge effect on server populations.
    • The team will continue to use server connections once server populations become a notable issue.
  • Anima
    • There will be new sources of anima added in Chains of Domination.
    • The anima system cosmetic rewards are designed to be an expansion-wide reward system.
    • The team will always address reward amounts if they feel it needs to be altered.
  • Auction House
    • There won't be a return of the entire mobile auction house app, but they are thinking of creating a way to get resources for raiding and such prior to raid from mobile.
  • Flying in Shadowlands
    • You cannot fly directly from zone to zone. You will still need to use the a flight path to enter a zone.
    • Pathfinder is account-wide and your alts will be able to fly at level 50 once unlocked.
  • Torghast
    • The team will continue to add Anima Powers and new content to Torghast.
    • They also plan to address any classes that still struggle with Torghast.
  • 10-Man Content
    • 10-player raiding exists outside of mythic difficulty.
    • Megadungeons are supposed to fill the roll of challenging small group content.
  • Wandering Ancient Mount
    • The Wandering Ancient will be available with Patch 9.0.5.
    • You will receive the mount simply for owning Shadowlands.
This article was originally published in forum thread: BlizzConline 2021 - World of Warcraft Q&A Panel started by Stoy View original post
Comments 69 Comments
  1. Stormdash's Avatar
    I wonder if it occurs to them how much money they'd make in one day if they opened race/class combos up all the way like they should be.
  1. Dejiko's Avatar
    So they talk about the imbalance between the factions requiring a "social" solution,
    doesn`t that more or less only include removing factions?

    Taking away or changing racials is more of a game mechanic change, they`ve also created the solution
    to the faction imbalance last expansion.
    In the Dazar`alor raid you got changed to a member of the other faction, seems rather obvious that would be
    one way for both factions to group up or raid together as.

    Though losing the visual distinction of your chosen race would be offputting, at least it can be done as they`ve demonstrated it.
    There`s also mercenary queueing for PvP, so they have the means to.
  1. Jodmos's Avatar
    Ooh. Next month for 9.0.5 but asking about how you get the Wandering Ancient when it's already info anyone could find on google
  1. MrMatticus's Avatar
    "The voice actor's performance for Sire Denathrius caused Steve to want to keep him alive. This is why he is trapped at the end of the raid instead of killed."

    I don't want to hear anyone complain about plot armor anymore.
  1. Draknalor186's Avatar
    Why do people ask such dull & pointless questions?
  1. Cosmic Janitor's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Jodmos View Post
    I wished they'd done separate Q&As for Classic and Shadowlands so I don't have to listen to Classic stuff
    So true, lots of people probably didn't care about either one or the other.
  1. Yarathir's Avatar
    This is probably the most let down I've been in such a short amount of time in a long time. Soul-crushing Q&A.
  1. Wekko's Avatar
    "The Archon survives her wound. They tried to show this by having her hand move after the event in the trailer."

    But why?
  1. hulkgor's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Jodmos View Post
    I wished they'd done separate Q&As for Classic and Shadowlands so I don't have to listen to Classic stuff
    Let's be honest, even for the game we're interested in, there are a lot of useless questions about topics we do not care about.

    For me? I don't care about mobile apps for AH, or heritage armors, yet they keep getting asked about.

    Best way to deal with it? Avoid the Q&A entirely, and then check the recap for the questions you're interested in, without enduring the horrible slog Q&A has become.
  1. Cosmic Janitor's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by MrMatticus View Post
    "The voice actor's performance for Sire Denathrius caused Steve to want to keep him alive. This is why he is trapped at the end of the raid instead of killed."

    I don't want to hear anyone complain about plot armor anymore.
    The entire story of WoW hinges on the warped perception of a few wannabe-nerds high on choco-vanilla soy-latte fumes and what they think of as rule of cool.

    Admitteldy though, Bwonsamdi and Denathrius were by far some of the more entertaining characters in recent times, even if it was by pure dumb luck and some VAs haveing the skill to pull of such characters.
  1. loanel's Avatar
    Did she mean that there won't be any fresh start VANILLA SERVERs, or that there won't be any fresh start CLASSIC SERVERS -> no fresh start THE BURNING CRUSADE servers? At this point the naming is so interchangable that i had no idea what she really meant.
  1. Cosmic Janitor's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by loanel View Post
    Did she mean that there won't be any fresh start VANILLA SERVERs, or that there won't be any fresh start CLASSIC SERVERS -> no fresh start THE BURNING CRUSADE servers? At this point the naming is so interchangable that i had no idea what she really meant.
    I think she ment there won't be fresh TBC servers where everyone has to start from scratch.
  1. Aliven's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Draknalor186 View Post
    Why do people ask such dull & pointless questions?
    They dont, but only those were answered
  1. Logwyn's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Baroclinic View Post
    They have to pre-approved them, otherwise it will constantly be a dingus asking "Why I no get epics" and "Can we see Sylvanus' bewbs"?
    You forgot about..." Why does the Jailer have nipples?" question!
  1. Icelin's Avatar
    Ok so the big advertisement of patch 9.1 is flying announced!

    Guys you are not able to have portals to make this more convenient you will still need to use Flight Paths to enter every zone..................

    Man it feels like Customization all over again. With it being the big closing at Blizzcon 2019, "Guys you will be getting massive customization." Here you get meager scraps instead.

    I really don't understand what is going on there at this time. Don't advertise something and do a poor job. I feel like this must be illegal somehow. False advertising?

    I think that is pretty brutal for flying tbh and a lot of people been complaining about customization for a while.
  1. Wheeler's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by TickTickTick View Post
    Really? That's it? I mean... He already kind of had Devos by his side? And were it not for us, she would have defeated the Archon. Yet he was working on the plan involving Anduinn way before we defeated Devos
    I'm actually dying of laughter at them saying this.

    "They needed an audience" like...wtf?
  1. Askyl's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Jodmos View Post
    I wished they'd done separate Q&As for Classic and Shadowlands so I don't have to listen to Classic stuff
    Ye, same. I almost fell asleep during the retail questions and I guess people into retail thought the same about classic questions.

    Would have been so much better with seperate QAs.
  1. Not A Cat's Avatar
    Well I take it tier sets aren't coming back then?

    I guess we'll see but I feel like that's something they would have announced, bummer.
  1. Jodmos's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Askyl View Post
    Ye, same. I almost fell asleep during the retail questions and I guess people into retail thought the same about classic questions.

    Would have been so much better with seperate QAs.
    Wouldn't be surprised if they looked at the questions and it was no, no, no, no, yes, no, no... And didn't have enough they were willing to answer for them separately.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Not A Cat View Post
    Well I take it tier sets aren't coming back then?

    I guess we'll see but I feel like that's something they would have announced, bummer.
    Someone said in an interview that they weren't for 9.0.5 but something they were looking at for a later patch
  1. Nerovar's Avatar
    The relationship between the Jailer, Sylvanas, and Anduin is the core of Shadowlands' story.
    This gave me a good chuckle. I mean, we already knew this but it's just so bizarre to see it spelled out like that.

    The relationship between a character that didn't exist 2 years ago and two characters who have met twice. Ah, yes. A very promising and interesting premise.

Site Navigation