BfA Patch Speculation thread (8.3 and later).

[Queen of Hamsters]

June 25th seems to be the general consensus for release, and given the amount of circumstantial evidence supporting it, it does seem to be the most likely.
Really cannot wait for it. Went on the PTR and ran around in Zin-azshari for a while earlier today just listening to the music. For once my usual WoW burnout has benefited me, because i have barely played on the PTR since the first few builds. So there should be a lot of interesting stuff to "discover" on the live release.

On an unrelated note, transmog seems to be a bit more of a focus point this expansion, might just be imagining it though. But between Heritage armor, varied armor sets between each form of aquisition (if not a whole lot of variance within each), and the recent confirmation that hide everything (except pants) is coming to 8.2.
I am starting to wonder if 9.0 will finally make my little hunter transmog slut heart happy by allowing me to transmog the other armor types, even just leather would make me insanely happy, not to mention give me loads of fun farming transmog again.

BfA has a lot of focus on transmog sets, for sure. Legion had the Artifact Weapons, but most of the gear appearances were from raid content still. BfA has sets from Islands, Warfronts, Raids, World content, Races...
It's nice to see that transmog isn't "done" with, that they're still iterating on what it allows us to do.

And God do I hope you people are correct with June 25th!

[shade3891]

Any news about new allied races? Would be nice if we had something to look forward for.

[Queen of Hamsters]

Any news about new allied races? Would be nice if we had something to look forward for.

No new allied races for 8.2, but new model update for Goblins/Worgens will likely come between 8.2 and 8.3.
I bet that they're saving any additional allied races for the between expansion content drought.

[Sondrelk]

With the exception of DI dwarves and Mag'har, all the allied races have been released in .5 patches. And given we have confirmation there will be no new allied races in 8.2.5, we can only assume they will come in 8.3.5 or some other post-8.3 patch.

Other than that, bets seem to be on Vulpera for Horde, and Mechagnomes for Alliance, both are fully realized with fitting reputation attached that in theory should be done by the time the Allied races become available.

[Alga]

With the exception of DI dwarves and Mag'har, all the allied races have been released in .5 patches. And given we have confirmation there will be no new allied races in 8.2.5, we can only assume they will come in 8.3.5 or some other post-8.3 patch.

Other than that, bets seem to be on Vulpera for Horde, and Mechagnomes for Alliance, both are fully realized with fitting reputation attached that in theory should be done by the time the Allied races become available.

Ion kinda said in Rise of Azshara, which might include 8.2.5 aswell, but did they really said anywhere straight up that we won't have AR in 8.2.5. Since they are in general really secret keeping with 8.2.5 stuff.

[Sondrelk]

Ion kinda said in Rise of Azshara, which might include 8.2.5 aswell, but did they really said anywhere straight up that we won't have AR in 8.2.5. Since they are in general really secret keeping with 8.2.5 stuff.

I could have sworn they specifically mentioned 8.2.5 would not have an allied race. Don't quote me on that though, i might be completely wrong. But i could have sworn that was the announcement i heard.

8.2.5 is surprisingly for a patch like that almost completely a mystery honestly. Beyond the Worgen/goblin update/heritage armor quests. We have no idea what kind of story will be told there beyond the braod strokes, or what new features it might have. I would love for someone to list potential features that might show up in 8.2.5 that has yet to be added (thinking WoD timewalking or Brawlers guild type features)

[Alga]

I could have sworn they specifically mentioned 8.2.5 would not have an allied race. Don't quote me on that though, i might be completely wrong. But i could have sworn that was the announcement i heard.

8.2.5 is surprisingly for a patch like that almost completely a mystery honestly. Beyond the Worgen/goblin update/heritage armor quests. We have no idea what kind of story will be told there beyond the braod strokes, or what new features it might have. I would love for someone to list potential features that might show up in 8.2.5 that has yet to be added (thinking WoD timewalking or Brawlers guild type features)

And even with the models and Heritage Armor they are quite silent in talking about timeframes, even if it's 100% logic that we will see this stuff in the next patch. Also we knew of the Brawlers Guild and CoS since September, so I guess they really want to suprise us, so I always put my hope on for eventual AR.

[AngerFork]

I could have sworn they specifically mentioned 8.2.5 would not have an allied race. Don't quote me on that though, i might be completely wrong. But i could have sworn that was the announcement i heard.

8.2.5 is surprisingly for a patch like that almost completely a mystery honestly. Beyond the Worgen/goblin update/heritage armor quests. We have no idea what kind of story will be told there beyond the braod strokes, or what new features it might have. I would love for someone to list potential features that might show up in 8.2.5 that has yet to be added (thinking WoD timewalking or Brawlers guild type features)

All I've been able to find in a quick check is the "won't be in Rise of Azshara" quote, which people have attributed to 8.2.5. I personally suspect this is a misspeak from Ion and he was referencing 8.2 (which may or may not mean Allied Races in 8.2.5), but I can see why people add in 8.2.5 as well.

As for the list, I'm not sure what all they would be, but here's a few I thought about that may or may not be in 8.2.5. I'll add in the known as well as the unknown and put commentary where appropriate.

- Worgen/Goblin model updates (known to be there)
- Worgen/Goblin Heritage Armor (known to be there from interview)
- Preparations for WoW's 15th Anniversary (known to be coming, only some details known overall)
- War Campaign Quests (almost a certainty, may tie up war or bring us more Allied Race info)
- Mage Tower-like thing (perhaps for Race-based weapons?)
- Deaths of Chromie-like scenario.
- More holiday/weekly event updates.
- Allied Races (I still think we're getting 2 in 8.2.5, quote or no)
- Classic Timewalking (probably unlikely, but would fit in well with Classic release coming in August)
- Cataclysm Timewalking raid (likely Firelands, perhaps Blackwing Descent) (Nymrohd mentioned this first)
- Hints to next expansion (Really, 8.2.5 will be their last chance to best hint at what is to come if it's released pre-Blizzcon.)
- Darkshore Heroic Warfront
- Another Island Expedition or two
- New RAF setup

[Sondrelk]

Firelands Timewalking maybe.

Could be, that still leaves about 80% of a .5 patch if you include story in that 80%

- - - Updated - - -

All I've been able to find in a quick check is the "won't be in Rise of Azshara" quote, which people have attributed to 8.2.5. I personally suspect this is a misspeak from Ion and he was referencing 8.2 (which may or may not mean Allied Races in 8.2.5), but I can see why people add in 8.2.5 as well.

As for the list, I'm not sure what all they would be, but here's a few I thought about that may or may not be in 8.2.5. I'll add in the known as well as the unknown and put commentary where appropriate.

- Worgen/Goblin model updates (known to be there)
- Worgen/Goblin Heritage Armor (known to be there from interview)
- Preparations for WoW's 15th Anniversary (known to be coming, only some details known overall)
- War Campaign Quests (almost a certainty, may tie up war or bring us more Allied Race info)
- Mage Tower-like thing (perhaps for Race-based weapons?)
- Deaths of Chromie-like scenario.
- More holiday/weekly event updates.
- Allied Races (I still think we're getting 2 in 8.2.5, quote or no)
- Classic Timewalking (probably unlikely, but would fit in well with Classic release coming in August)
- Cataclysm Timewalking raid (likely Firelands, perhaps Blackwing Descent)
- Hints to next expansion (Really, 8.2.5 will be their last chance to best hint at what is to come if it's released pre-Blizzcon.)
- Darkshore Heroic Warfront
- Another Island Expedition or two

Ohh yeah, i completely forgot about the anniversary, given the mount and surprise scenario, that should be a healthy amount of new "stuff".

- - - Updated - - -

Mage tower will not happen until 8.3 at the earliest, and likely not even then. A system like the 7.2 mage tower takes time to develop and test, especially if you want it to be a surprise for the people who try it first. Not ot mention the amount of weapons that would have to be made if you wanted to give everyone race-themed weapons. It is easy to think they already have a lot of them laying around from lloking at, say, the Velf themed weapons. But they really don't.

[Taeldorian]

Hopefully soon, having full AP is boring.

Huh? We’ve been “grinding” AP since release, being full AP isn’t boring at all. It’s actually nice to finish the grind, gives more time to relax and do other things in the game. Concordance in legion was dogshit honestly, a never ending infinite system that eventually became not worth it to grind because it was infinite? Nah, miss me with that shit. I don’t mind the AP grind as long as there’s an end goal, I think in that regard the AP grind in BfA has been fine, it’s just azerite and the way it worked with AP was bad unfortunately.

Regardless, definitely don’t want an infinite grind. The AP grind gives people incentive to do more than they usually would which is fine. I personally don’t like it but as long as it has an end goal I’m okay with it. Make it infinite and that gives a lot of room for apathy.

[AngerFork]

Mage tower will not happen until 8.3 at the earliest, and likely not even then. A system like the 7.2 mage tower takes time to develop and test, especially if you want it to be a surprise for the people who try it first. Not ot mention the amount of weapons that would have to be made if you wanted to give everyone race-themed weapons. It is easy to think they already have a lot of them laying around from lloking at, say, the Velf themed weapons. But they really don't.

Totally disagree. I honestly don't think that it would be all that much to set up. The essence of the Mage Tower we saw in 7.2 was 6 boss-style fights with a couple small quest stories leading into them which gave appearances. While the fights themselves might need a bit of design work, none of them seem really all that intensive on dev time. This goes double if you have them in copied areas that already exist in-game, just instanced. Many of the Allied Races have had race-based weapons datamined, such as the Velf ones you mentioned earlier. Given the amount of guard NPCs we've already seen in-game from many of the other races, Blizz could easily find a good weapon to represent each race in-game (Orc Axe, Tauren Totem), rebuild it as a high-rez object, then put it as a transmog piece behind one of the bosses.

If Blizz were to put it as an individual fight for every race and role in the game, I'd agree. I'd also agree with you if they made the quests to get into the "Mage Tower" too complex to deal with. But if they keep it simple like they did the Mage Tower, they could make it work as an extension of content in 8.2.5.

[Sondrelk]

Totally disagree. I honestly don't think that it would be all that much to set up. The essence of the Mage Tower we saw in 7.2 was 6 boss-style fights with a couple small quest stories leading into them which gave appearances. While the fights themselves might need a bit of design work, none of them seem really all that intensive on dev time. This goes double if you have them in copied areas that already exist in-game, just instanced. Many of the Allied Races have had race-based weapons datamined, such as the Velf ones you mentioned earlier. Given the amount of guard NPCs we've already seen in-game from many of the other races, Blizz could easily find a good weapon to represent each race in-game (Orc Axe, Tauren Totem), rebuild it as a high-rez object, then put it as a transmog piece behind one of the bosses.

If Blizz were to put it as an individual fight for every race and role in the game, I'd agree. I'd also agree with you if they made the quests to get into the "Mage Tower" too complex to deal with. But if they keep it simple like they did the Mage Tower, they could make it work as an extension of content in 8.2.5.

Sure, in a vacuum, the fights themselves are easy. But you forget how much ancilliary stuff that has to be there for it to have a point.


First you need a framework for it. You cannot just have a placeholder in near the Boralus inn that spawns the boss next to you and you instantly begin. This is the easiest part to fix and it would still take some dev time.

Then you need to design a system for how this works as a gameplay mechanic. Is it somethiing like hte mage tower that is up for a limited time? Do you have to gather resources from somewhere else to get a shot at it? Is there a questline before to open it up? Should any of those quests have voice acting? Or cinematics?

Then you need to balance it for each class. You cannot just throw it out there and hope every class can do it at roughly the same difficulty, the mage tower in 7.2 was tested extensively, and it still missed the mark when it came to being balanced.

Finally you need to figure out a reward. Achievements/FoS is easy enough, but what if you want some transmog as well? Well, you'll have to make the armor, which is not as easy as some might think, especially if it should be good enough to warrant the challenge.

Some people throw around that it should give race-themed weapons, which i find to be the most blatant example of myopia about game design i have seen in a while.
The sheer amount of weapons needed to at least give each spec a single race-themed weapon they can use is astronomical. Take the amount of weapons you got from a warfront, subtract 3-4 and multiply it by the amount of races in hte game. It would easily top 100 unique weapons, even if some of them were recolors that would reach the amount we normally get for an entire expansion.

- - - Updated - - -

Just to brielfy mention your idea for having a weapon from each race. Would you be okay with your orc shaman getting stuck with a goblin mace, made to look like a grenade as the sole reward for your hard-fought efforts? Or your Nelf druid getting a Stormwind halberd as the vanity achievement that shows off your amazingness as a druid?

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Huh? We’ve been “grinding” AP since release, being full AP isn’t boring at all. It’s actually nice to finish the grind, gives more time to relax and do other things in the game. Concordance in legion was dogshit honestly, a never ending infinite system that eventually became not worth it to grind because it was infinite? Nah, miss me with that shit. I don’t mind the AP grind as long as there’s an end goal, I think in that regard the AP grind in BfA has been fine, it’s just azerite and the way it worked with AP was bad unfortunately.

Regardless, definitely don’t want an infinite grind. The AP grind gives people incentive to do more than they usually would which is fine. I personally don’t like it but as long as it has an end goal I’m okay with it. Make it infinite and that gives a lot of room for apathy.

Concordance was a proc so getting a stronger proc every level isn't as nice as Azerite right now. I'd rather have the "grind" still be there then not at all. Gives more oomph when I'm out doing World Quests(And no WQs aren't enough as the end all of World content I've made that argument b4 and someone else has to).

[Zandalariprelate]

Basically the new system is a grind inside of another grind like an asian mmorpg, whoa I am not even surprised, this expansion is just a really long experiment to get data on what the majority of the players likes to play or at least stay sub.

[rrayy]

They can entirely be wrong are you dense? I can be of the opinion the sun is cold that doesn't make me not wrong because I say its my opinion.

You would be wrong because the sun is in fact warm. Scientific data backs that up. What a terrible analogy.

[AngerFork]

First you need a framework for it. You cannot just have a placeholder in near the Boralus inn that spawns the boss next to you and you instantly begin. This is the easiest part to fix and it would still take some dev time.

You definitely need it instanced in some form to be sure, but you don't really need to go far beyond that. Most of the Mage Tower fights/scenarios in Legion were in areas that were already otherwise used in-game, such as Agatha's location.

Then you need to design a system for how this works as a gameplay mechanic. Is it somethiing like hte mage tower that is up for a limited time? Do you have to gather resources from somewhere else to get a shot at it? Is there a questline before to open it up? Should any of those quests have voice acting? Or cinematics?

The overall design of these elements would be largely based on what is around it, so most of these decisions would already be made before this became an issue. The Mage Tower was all a part of the Broken Shore building setup which is where the limited time/currency/questline was set up. If you want it to be it's own separate entity, it's as simple as the following: Keep it always up, use Dubloons or Service Medals, keep out the Voice Acting/Cinematics as this isn't the major content of BfA, and all you have to deal with is the questline. Or if you have some sort of other new content setup (not a common thing in .5 patches), you'd simply tie it into that setup and let it feed into/out of that setup.

Then you need to balance it for each class. You cannot just throw it out there and hope every class can do it at roughly the same difficulty, the mage tower in 7.2 was tested extensively, and it still missed the mark when it came to being balanced.

This IMO is a bit of a misnomer. It will always be easier/harder for various classes. Blizz can try to balance it, but perfect balance is near impossible to obtain. A lot of the balancing we would get would happen during the PTR beta phase, so this is more balancing and adjusting numbers/minor mechanics. It's largely more spreadsheet-based, less programming based, with some of those numbers for sure getting adjusted post launch as everything else already tends to be.

Finally you need to figure out a reward. Achievements/FoS is easy enough, but what if you want some transmog as well? Well, you'll have to make the armor, which is not as easy as some might think, especially if it should be good enough to warrant the challenge.

If we go with those aforementioned Race-based weapons, that reward has already been figured out. And even those, you don't have to do much to have all spots hit. A 2H weapon, a 1H weapon, an Off-Hand, and/or a Shield would hit all spots. Not that it isn't a large amount of weaponry to be sure (21 races x 4 weapons = 84, not a small amount, could easily be halved if you skip the Off Hand/Shield)...but given that some have already been developed, Blizz likely would have built these alongside most of the heritage armor sets, so much of the work may already be in place. Many others again could probably be used from NPCs or old weapons getting better rez versions.

Some people throw around that it should give race-themed weapons, which i find to be the most blatant example of myopia about game design i have seen in a while.
The sheer amount of weapons needed to at least give each spec a single race-themed weapon they can use is astronomical. Take the amount of weapons you got from a warfront, subtract 3-4 and multiply it by the amount of races in hte game. It would easily top 100 unique weapons, even if some of them were recolors that would reach the amount we normally get for an entire expansion.

This is definitely some scope creep I'm seeing here. I'm speaking about a weapon/set of weapons per race, not one per spec. As mentioned above, I see this as 84 as a starting worst-case scenario which could be easily halved if you cut out shields/off hands. You need a weapon to transmog to each slot, not a weapon for each spec.

Just to brielfy mention your idea for having a weapon from each race. Would you be okay with your orc shaman getting stuck with a goblin mace, made to look like a grenade as the sole reward for your hard-fought efforts? Or your Nelf druid getting a Stormwind halberd as the vanity achievement that shows off your amazingness as a druid?

I could be, but you are talking about class weapons here whereas I'm specifically discussing race-based weapons. My Nelf Druid wouldn't need a Stormwind Halberd if they have a NE staff, and that NE staff would make more sense for the Druid anyhow. My Nelf Priest could also use that staff, especially if it's unlocked account-wide once one character gets it. Even story-wise, you can easily explain getting the proper weapon as turning in the quest to your Race leader in the Embassy with them thanking you for your continued dedication.

[Sondrelk]

You definitely need it instanced in some form to be sure, but you don't really need to go far beyond that. Most of the Mage Tower fights/scenarios in Legion were in areas that were already otherwise used in-game, such as Agatha's location.


The overall design of these elements would be largely based on what is around it, so most of these decisions would already be made before this became an issue. The Mage Tower was all a part of the Broken Shore building setup which is where the limited time/currency/questline was set up. If you want it to be it's own separate entity, it's as simple as the following: Keep it always up, use Dubloons or Service Medals, keep out the Voice Acting/Cinematics as this isn't the major content of BfA, and all you have to deal with is the questline. Or if you have some sort of other new content setup (not a common thing in .5 patches), you'd simply tie it into that setup and let it feed into/out of that setup.


This IMO is a bit of a misnomer. It will always be easier/harder for various classes. Blizz can try to balance it, but perfect balance is near impossible to obtain. A lot of the balancing we would get would happen during the PTR beta phase, so this is more balancing and adjusting numbers/minor mechanics. It's largely more spreadsheet-based, less programming based, with some of those numbers for sure getting adjusted post launch as everything else already tends to be.


If we go with those aforementioned Race-based weapons, that reward has already been figured out. And even those, you don't have to do much to have all spots hit. A 2H weapon, a 1H weapon, an Off-Hand, and/or a Shield would hit all spots. Not that it isn't a large amount of weaponry to be sure (21 races x 4 weapons = 84, not a small amount, could easily be halved if you skip the Off Hand/Shield)...but given that some have already been developed, Blizz likely would have built these alongside most of the heritage armor sets, so much of the work may already be in place. Many others again could probably be used from NPCs or old weapons getting better rez versions.


This is definitely some scope creep I'm seeing here. I'm speaking about a weapon/set of weapons per race, not one per spec. As mentioned above, I see this as 84 as a starting worst-case scenario which could be easily halved if you cut out shields/off hands. You need a weapon to transmog to each slot, not a weapon for each spec.


I could be, but you are talking about class weapons here whereas I'm specifically discussing race-based weapons. My Nelf Druid wouldn't need a Stormwind Halberd if they have a NE staff, and that NE staff would make more sense for the Druid anyhow. My Nelf Priest could also use that staff, especially if it's unlocked account-wide once one character gets it. Even story-wise, you can easily explain getting the proper weapon as turning in the quest to your Race leader in the Embassy with them thanking you for your continued dedication.

I don't claim that there are not ways to work around the issues i raised, the mage tower is up after all. I just want to point out how this is not some trifling amount of work that Blizzard can knowck out quickly solely based on fan requests. It requires way more planning and thought than i think you realize.


For a weapon transmog reward to be fair, it would have to have at least a single weapon for use by your class.
I am a hunter, so i would require at least 2 weapons, a ranged weapon and a polearm. A warrior would need a shield a 2H weapon and a 1H weapon.
If you want them to all be race themed then it is an absolutely massive amount of effort you are handwaving, and if you want maybe only 1 or 2 weapons from each race to dover all teh weapon bases, then you have to consider if you want the ultimate reward for your ultimate achievement to be a Gnome themed rifle for your Nelf, or a Belf themed polearm for your orc.
Whether you get all weapons from doing it on a single character is irrelevant, either you get weapons from each race that fits each class, which is an astronomical amount of work, or you get a sizeable amount of mismatched weapons, most of which oyu cannot use on your character, and others which don't fit the character you are playing.

[Taeldorian]

Concordance was a proc so getting a stronger proc every level isn't as nice as Azerite right now. I'd rather have the "grind" still be there then not at all. Gives more oomph when I'm out doing World Quests(And no WQs aren't enough as the end all of World content I've made that argument b4 and someone else has to).

Yeah no. We’ve had “oomph” doing world quests for the past 8-9 months. It can stop for a while at some point and then resume again later. Not having an end goal is ridiculous. The concordance system was pretty horrible. Why would you farm for something that will literally never end? That’s a shitty system. The way AP works now is fine. You grind for a while>reach the end and stop grinding>grind resumes again later and you finish it then stop grinding. A never ending grind is garbage.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Yeah no. We’ve had “oomph” doing world quests for the past 8-9 months. It can stop for a while at some point and ther esike again later. Not having an end goal is ridiculous. The concordance system was pretty horrible. Why would you farm for something that will literally never end? That’s a shitty system. The way AP works now is fine. You grind for a while>reach the end and stop grinding>grind resumes again later and you finish it then stop grinding. A never ending grind is garbage.

The oompth disappears when you hit 50 HoA since a lot of the World Quests offer Azerite which become pointless once you're capped. Again concordance was bad because even progressing you couldn't really feel it unless you procced it, that and pacing of its leveling was worse in Legion then Azerite ever was.

[Explicit Teemo Nudes]

Are people even doing Ulduar and Black Temple timewalking? Sure, some will want BT for the glaive transmog, but other than that.
Is there any point in adding more timewalking raids?