Shadowlands: Rapidly Climbing the Ladder in Popularity

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

9.1 would be nice, but I suspect 9.1 will bring us Pathfinder 1 (with the new reqs) and then PF2 with 9.2 and flight almost instantly (at least within a few weeks). Personally, I miss having flight at max level the way we did in BC, Wrath, Cata, and MoP. Hell, Cata was so bold we got flying right from the start.

Blizzard said it's coming in the first major patch. Not part 1.
https://attackofthefanboy.com/guides...t-shadowlands/

In an interview with WoWHead.com he stated flying will debut in Shadowlands Patch 9.1.

[McNeil]

The most credit I can give it so far is that it’s better than Cata, WoD and BFA. About on par with MoP and Legion, not anywhere near as good as TBC and WotLK. I like that there are less needless grinds but it is lacking in content which will hopefully be brought in upcoming patches.

[Shedaar]

Overall pretty good with class balance being on such a terrible level that it drains the fun out of it.
If they balance top and bottom specs to be more in-line then I'm all in.

[dexx]

Its very subjective i know. For me Shadowlands is the worst expansion.

"gear is gear" sucks for me, personally, since it seems to have included a huge nerf to acquisition.
Doing 3 or 4 dungeons between drops doesn't feel good. IMO.

Lack of gear progression is my gripe. I dont like all the new systems and currencies.
World quests are few in scope with crappy rewards. You can do PvP for gear if you like. But otherwise the best source is raid/dungeons

[kaminaris]

Blizzard said it's coming in the first major patch. Not part 1.
https://attackofthefanboy.com/guides...t-shadowlands/

Plot twist, also ION Canon:

Uhhm guys next raid and storyline continues in 9.0.5, that would be 6 months from now, and after that we plan to do another raid + bunch of stuff in 9.0.6 another 6 months in...

I know, unlikely to happen but patch number doesn't say much.

[OMGTwitchTV]

in what universe could someone actualy unironicaly compare wod with tbc calling it tbc 2.0....wod had NOTHING outside of the usualy stuff like raiding and pvp,garrison was a joke not even needing mention,meanwile tbc was the most inovative expansion adding many new things and had a consistent content flow

It's called a personal opinion. One where we actually go to Draenor, and the next one where we fight the Legion... again.

- - - Updated - - -

Blizzard said it's coming in the first major patch. Not part 1.
https://attackofthefanboy.com/guides...t-shadowlands/

https://www.wowhead.com/guides/shado...in-shadowlands

Shadowlands Pathfinder Requirements
While most of the requirements for Pathfinder in Shadowlands are still unknown. we do know that Covenant Renown, not faction reputation with several factions, will play a key role in unlocking flying in Shadowlands. This is a welcome simplification, because you won't be required to grind rep with several different factions. You'll be able to concentrate on a key focus for your Covenant activities, which is something you'd be doing anyway at max level. Covenant Renown will also have a built-in catch up mechanic for those who start late or who are unable to dedicate enough time to prioritizing Covenant abilities.

You will need to complete your covenant launch campaign, as well as subsequent steps in a future patch, to unlock Shadowlands Pathfinder. Blizzard has stated flying is coming in the first major patch of Shadowlands, which is an improvement as usually flying comes in an expansion's second major patch.

For more information on how to build Renown with Covenants, please reference the Shadowlands Covenant Overview guide's section on Renown.

Not even WoWhead has all the answers, so the "fan site" you linked is pretty much speculation. Unless of course you have a Battle.net link for Ion's quote about Pathfinder.

- - - Updated - - -

so the title should be Shadowlands: Rapidly Climbing the Ladder in Popularity (for me personally)

any mod that can change it?

Pretty sure that was covered in the OP. Perhaps you should apply to work as a mod since you are more interested in adjusting the topic than discussing it.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh? So far it has taken the spot as the second worst expansion ever for me.
Can't really think of anything the expansion does well really but I can for sure think of quite a few things it does very, very wrong.

It's a long way to go so it might very well be the worst in the end, who knows.

Claiming this one will be worse than WoD shows how slanted and skewed your "opinion" is of this game.

- - - Updated - - -

I don't believe there's a ladder to climb and a year from now it's a sure thing that it will believed to be "the worst expansion ever" on this forum.

FWIW, I like the expansion as well. I'll reserve judgement on it until it's all out. I enjoyed Cataclysm when it was first released. Afterwards, Blizzard turned it into one of the great shit shows of all time.

I suppose anything is possible, but nothing, at least for me, could fall BELOW Warlords of Draenor on the all time shit show scale. Twitter feeds, selfie cams, and Karabor scrapped due to time constraints thus sticking us with Ashran/Stormshield. Time will tell I suppose.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

Not even WoWhead has all the answers, so the "fan site" you linked is pretty much speculation. Unless of course you have a Battle.net link for Ion's quote about Pathfinder.

Not sure why it has to be from Battle.net but I found some interviews.

https://youtu.be/8_qMW-Zu0Sk?t=991

https://www.windowscentral.com/world...andom-and-more

Dev comments is not speculation I believe.

[Raelyn]

I have yet to play shadowlands.
But based on the overabundance of lame sylvanas, the still not repaired classes and the lame jailer villain are enough to make sure shadowlands can't get in the top 4 of my fav wow expansions.

But that still makes it possible it could prove better than wod, bfa and cata.

Sylvanas hasn't, as far as I can recall, even made an appearance yet in Shadowlands.

[OMGTwitchTV]

Not sure why it has to be from Battle.net but I found some interviews.

https://youtu.be/8_qMW-Zu0Sk?t=991

https://www.windowscentral.com/world...andom-and-more

Dev comments is not speculation I believe.

I just needed it to be an actual Blizz source. Even "interviews" have a link that goes back to the source content. But if it is a video showing Ion being interviewed, that works as well. I'm just leery of 3rd party info being passed off as gospel. Sometimes we can't even rely on what we hear at Blizzcon.



We all know it is subject to change. I just wanna hear it from the "horse's mouth"

[Matsumotto]

I think for people who played the whole of BFA or a majority of it, Shadowlands brings exactly what they wanted: almost no mandatory content.
I quit early into BFA and returned during the free weekend and man, there was so much to do...i can see why it must have been hell to feel compelled to run every single thing each day to gain power.
BUT as a returning player who did not have to grind things for the last year? It's on par with WoD at launch. The only difference is that since WoD they've implemented systems like M+ and WQs, but imo WoD with these things would have been a far, far better expansion than Shadowlands.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

I just needed it to be an actual Blizz source. Even "interviews" have a link that goes back to the source content. But if it is a video showing Ion being interviewed, that works as well. I'm just leery of 3rd party info being passed off as gospel. Sometimes we can't even rely on what we hear at Blizzcon.

https://i.imgur.com/h3Tu3OA.png

We all know it is subject to change. I just wanna hear it from the "horse's mouth"

Do you not know what a interview is? They're literally from the "horse's mouth". Also now you're just deflecting from "it's just speculation" to "they were wrong in the past".

[Otimus]

For my turbo casual solo-ish playstyle, it's been the best since MoP, but I still don't think it's better than MoP, and engagement/storywise/character wise/plot wise, it's nowhere near WOTLK or MoP, but it's better than all the rest, massively better than Classic, BC, Cata, WoD, and BFA IMHO. I think it's probably better than WotlK if I take off the nostalgia. The true testament, I guess, is if I I'm willing to stay subbed until the next major patch, or wait and resub until the major next patch. I'm still undecided (I may or may not let my sub lapse, and resub once all of the first LFR is out, IDK), but I am really pleasantly surprised that I feel like I have a "path" for my playstyle, and I feel like I can continue on it at my own pace and not feel like I'm losing 99% of the game by doing so. A huge plus for me! (Hell, I've been here near launch, and I still have yet to do a dungeon... I feel I can be turbo casual and still have a good time. That's a good sign to me. A great sign. Whereas with BFA, I was pretty much bored within the first week or two.)

[oplawlz]

It's been a breath of fresh air, for sure. Slower gear means I feel a lot less pressure to play constantly to keep up with my fellow raiders, and all the systems have been super alt friendly. My only gripe is legendary acquisition, but having seen hte absolute worst method possible for that in legion I'm not going to cry too hard about what we got.

[deenman]

It's called a personal opinion. One where we actually go to Draenor, and the next one where we fight the Legion... again.

its not an opinion,its a fact,but yeah,it was similar in the sense of going to draenor and legion,with that ofc i agree,but i was under the impresion the point was about what the expansions offered and contributed to the game

- - - Updated - - -

It's better than BfA, WoD, Cata and WOTLK.

Not better than Legion and MoP, so far.

I'll be able to enjoy it more when we get flying and they boost XP gains in Threads of Fate.

well simply for the fact that there is no bullshit legendery rng,huge titanforge +70 ilvl procs,no infinite ap grind makes sl better than legion by default,all thats left to make it better than mop and tbc is for the content to come at a good pace and have the raids be pretty good with some interesting items

- - - Updated - - -

The most credit I can give it so far is that it’s better than Cata, WoD and BFA. About on par with MoP and Legion, not anywhere near as good as TBC and WotLK. I like that there are less needless grinds but it is lacking in content which will hopefully be brought in upcoming patches.

the wotlk fanatisism is crazy i sweat,what was better in wrath?besides your personal nostalgia and maybe class preference? because in many ways wrath was worse than wod even,just being beat by the existance of more patches,but raiding was crap besides ulduar,worst timegating in icc ever,easiest raiding ever seen besides vanila,zero content outside pvp and raids,horrific badge system,easiest dungeons ever with the most op catchup ever(besides tbc badges that was pure insanity)

[Otimus]

It's been a breath of fresh air, for sure. Slower gear means I feel a lot less pressure to play constantly to keep up with my fellow raiders, and all the systems have been super alt friendly. My only gripe is legendary acquisition, but having seen hte absolute worst method possible for that in legion I'm not going to cry too hard about what we got.

This has been one of my favorite parts, the lack of outgearing stuff before you're even able to do it is a major plus, and harkens back to MoP for me, where, like... LFR will be worth doing more than once (again, as the turbo casual that I am). Having an actual gearing path when you're not a "legit" raider or a "legit" mythic+ player that lasts more than a week is an absolute major plus. I frankly didn't even bother with more than half of BFA's LFR (mostly because lorewise it was dull, but also because it was only worth doing if I got lucky with titanforges or whatever, and I pretty much never bothered with heroics ever again after the first couple of weeks.... frankly, Legion wasn't much better off, even though I liked Legion, almost all of it was one and done for me.)
That should, at least in my part, I guess, show that the casuals don't want things handed to them, they just want things to work towards.

[razorpax]

All of that was once and done, quickly. Those are facts, base reputations were like 1-2 months or so?
New reputations that came with new patches similar amount of time.

The only actual goal that was longer was the whole cloak. I did all CMs in last patch in about 6 days or so.
It wasn't bad but it was short (at least anything that did mean something).

SL just doesn't have any of that.

So your complaint is there was an endpoint to the grind

[ashblond]

I know it is an unpopular opinion. But I think SL will ends up a worse expansion than BFA.

I have been pessimistic about SL since beta: there is Nothing new in SL, except covenant and Torghast. Covenant and Torghast are refreshing and new in lore and story. but in long term, they will do more harm than good to gameplay, because of the balance issue.

The biggest problem of SL is there is no new content. End game has been the same for last 3 expansions: M+, raid, pvp. They are good as usual, but also grow old and boring. I am not sure Torghast can even be qualified as a type of endgame, and it doesn't look impressive so far.

It is not enough for today's ever changing market and players. I predict players will get bored and quit SL faster than any previous expansions.

[Zendhal The Black]

The content is really good...

BUT

the storyline, the villain, the villains she underdog and the she underdogs asslicker are just too goddamn awfull...

Only Ravendreth is quite unique
Ardenweald is blue Val'sharah with "funny" fairies and "wild hunt" that's doing shame to Witchers proper wild hunt
Bastion is brighter Stormheim where everyone becames oblivious Valkyr with dementia
Maldraxxus... just updated plaguelands with scourge knockoff... (and my single most hated zone in wow)

the idea that this is afterlife when you die in real world makes me want to kill myself... in shadowlands... for real

also plotholes like everywhere, Azeroth/Draenor characters as prominent leaders everywhere, Strung femaele characters... and then, there's the maw... where all the maw WALKERS resides...

what's next? an expansion where we all are The Abyss Backpedalers?



Expansion is good, started out better that BFA, might be better than Legion

[kaminaris]

So your complaint is there was an endpoint to the grind

No. That those things in MoP, while short, at least had some meaning. SL grinds are long/short/god-knows-how-long and they don't have meaning aside from renown which is just neck level but steep not smooth.

Anima (resouces) - completely and utterly useless.
Reputations - not even catchup gear is worth anything, just transmogs and pets.
Sanctum upgrades - biggest disappointment of entire expansion alongside with adventure table.
Adventure table - Now its not only useless, it is also convoluted and straight up annoying.
Torghast - just a grind for weekly soul ash, no gear, no progression, not even resources. It could have been at least fun but fun was nerfed out.
Professions - just for leggos that you will craft as soon as you get your bis and maybe off piece. Gear from them is uber garbage. I feel zero need to to push my professions.

And the only thing that could be arguably worth something is stygia because of sockets but you won't be using that before you get decent gear in those specific slots and that can take quite some time depending on how hard rng will fuck you.

Blizzard achieved almost perfection in BfA, literal perfection at 8.2 with the balance of things to do that give you power, fun things to do and reward structure. The only thing that was bad back then was professions.

[razorpax]

No. That those things in MoP, while short, at least had some meaning. SL grinds are long/short/god-knows-how-long and they don't have meaning aside from renown which is just neck level but steep not smooth.

Anima (resouces) - completely and utterly useless.
Reputations - not even catchup gear is worth anything, just transmogs and pets.
Sanctum upgrades - biggest disappointment of entire expansion alongside with adventure table.
Adventure table - Now its not only useless, it is also convoluted and straight up annoying.
Torghast - just a grind for weekly soul ash, no gear, no progression, not even resources. It could have been at least fun but fun was nerfed out.
Professions - just for leggos that you will craft as soon as you get your bis and maybe off piece. Gear from them is uber garbage. I feel zero need to to push my professions.

And the only thing that could be arguably worth something is stygia because of sockets but you won't be using that before you get decent gear in those specific slots and that can take quite some time depending on how hard rng will fuck you.

Blizzard achieved almost perfection in BfA, literal perfection at 8.2 with the balance of things to do that give you power, fun things to do and reward structure. The only thing that was bad back then was professions.

Torghast has soul ash and leggo recipes and followers

The extra stuff through things like rep and anima are for catch up or to help players who don’t do things like m+ and raid or the anima conductor which gives the offering to help get more leggo powers

In 4 weeks even casuals will have 200ilvl

The rep grind right now is for profession items or items to help fight rng like 181 boots or a leggo recipe

The maw rep is a different story As the grind will always be a thing


BfA was a constant grind and it was a bad design which is factually backed up by the fact they had to remove the grind

- - - Updated - - -

Players are undergoing culture shock from the fact we can be done with the grind

It’s like when you spend 4 years in an abusive relationship and don’t know how to react to a good one