Rate Shadowlands

[intenz]

I enjoyed Legion but I got the legendary I wanted fairly early and that was probably the GOAT era for subtlety in PvE doing that mid-air dance DFA combo with crit shoulders. So I would rank TBC first, then Wotlk and Legion equal (both good but flawed) and everything else a fair way below them.

I think a lot of Shadowlands success is purely because it's better than BFA. If we compare it in isolation to older expansions it's not very good.

[Jastall]

Good, so far, an 8 I'd say.

Sticking points are the loot changes (read: overly nerfed in M+/raids), the Maw in its entirety, the overarching story, being a bit too long to max level, and being a bit buggier than I'm used to with expansions (Necrotic Wake is still a buggy mess to this day).

Most everything else; the art, the quests, the individual zone and Covenant stories, the Great Vault, class mechanics, dungeon/raid quality, Covenants in their integrality, Torghast, I either like or love.

[vian]

It's ok.

I ran out of interesting content the first week.

I've been spoiled by other games

[vesarius]

Bad: 4

The good:

Lots of great ideas in the expansion - don't mind covenants - love the zones and the flavor. Reminds me of legion class halls.

The bad:

Everything is completely unfinished/unpolished and the balance is about as bad as I've ever seen it - including vanilla.

The maw feels like it was slapped together by an intern in a week - same with torgast.

Torgast has so much wasted potential it hurts - where are the actual mechanics? Why is everything the same in it? There could be raid bosses from all the previous expansions in here and it would be nostalgic, look better - and they would have some ideas to draw upon at least other then: CAST FIREBALLS FAST, HEAL or SMASH STRAIGHT LINE.

The fact that some classes/specs faceroll this and others barely even have unique abilities or have a chance is equally hilarious - was this actually even tested?

Class balance:

The state of class balance should be embarrassing to them. The fact that you could flat buff the bottom 5 classes by 25% (not just single abilities - everything they do) and they still wouldn't be top 5 pretty much says it all.

Even corruption wasn't balanced this poorly - did all their competent devs quit?

Legendaries: The amount of specs with legendaries that parse 50-100% above all other options is frankly a complete embarrassment as well.

Every facet of this expansion is untested and unbalanced (even lfr had gates that couldn't open - all you had to do was test it once to see how broken as fuck this entire lfr wing was - which they did not do)

I'm sure it will be tons of fun by 9.2/9.3

[Ticj]

anima gives you higher renown level. higher renown unlocks more soulbinds/conduits

AP gives you higher HoA level. higher HoA level unlocks more traits/essences

Exactly the same system, under different names.

If you're struggling to hit 1000 anima in an entire week idk what to tell you

[VinceVega]

The borrowed power is very imbalanced atm.

NF hunter with wild spirits do 20-30% more damage on are than non-NF hunters. NF boomkin convoke can 1 shot multiple people in arena, which is more impactful and worse than any essence/corruption in BFA. etc...

And oh yes, I can get 1K anima very fast every week in SL. But in BFA, I didn't need to farm AP at all. I didn't do any AP world quests, islands or emissaries. We got AP from missions, dungeons, races, etc. insanely fast. I laugh at people who complains about AP farming when they don't need to.

In SL, weekly Torghast is mandatory if you need ash, and there is no alternative. SL calling quests are worse than BFA emissary quests in every possible way.

The ash stuff is allready done. And people don't want to have balanced covenants. Becuase that would mean it is balanced around the oh so evil raiders. Balance is something that can never be achieved in wow. To many variables. And for that it is ok-ish right now. In raiding our Moonkin is not even Nighfae anymore but Kyrian because it is better for ST.

The is no one covenant above all for most classes. Sure for some there is. You know it. You can switch if it bothers you. Otherwise live with it? If you play in something competetive or progress oriented you have to live with the fact, that you sometimes have to take stuff you would not have taken if given the choice. Otherwise take whatever you want.

And for the ash: If you have done it allready you have enough ash to build multiple Legendaries allready. Yes it is kind of mandatory in the beginning. But you can't make everything optional.

Seriously the mandatory content in wow is less than ever before. You can ignore THorgast by now, anime is story and soulbind stuff you also don't "need" or you can do it via the catchup mechanics. The 1000 anima can be done quite fast also. 35 per Boss in Raids. 35 per mythic+. 250 weekly for the open world boss and more than one 250 anima WQ. If you NEED to have it immediatly after reset... well your choice, than it is a bit more true.

[ashblond]

If you're struggling to hit 1000 anima in an entire week idk what to tell you

Nobody struggles to get 1k anima a week.

But we don't like to have our covenant campaigns gated behind this anima farming quest every week.

[Stevano]

I don't have a lot to share but still some thoughts:

Starting with the best part: PvP has been improved. Gearing and the combat itself. I like the burstier gameplay, although some classes take it a step too far.
Difficulty of the expansion has been increased and that's something I've been waiting for for years. Still not convinced we don't need PvP stats tho.
Dungeons aren't the best they've been but they are fun to do now and then. The overall themes don't really appeal to me but that's just personal taste. Bosses are fun tho.
Raiding is still okay. Fun first raid of the expansion, nothing else to say.
For some bad, for me good, the way gearing is made harder.

The crudges: the time-gating in this expansion is beyond redemption. The way we can do a small portion of the story every week got me disconnected and uninvested in it. I purely do it for the Renown now, which is also a huge annoyance.
The amount of dungeons has been a huge letdown.
The Maw (hell). It does it's name right. Like I can write an entire essay on why it is the worst designed piece of content in the history of WoW. Getting ganked in War Mode on the edge of the map just to be spawned back in Africa is 'breaking your screen' annoying. Not been able to mount COULD be good, IF the Maw was not such a useless empty wasteland. I prefer running on foot in Arathi Highlands or something because there is still something to look at. I just don't understand most of the thinking about all that is given in this region. The only positive things I can tell are the way it's for the most part unrequired to progress, difficulty at lower item level and that it could potential be a fun area within a patch or two. The only thing that makes the Maw acceptable is the fact they just didn't have enough time to develope it. You can see that in every corner of it's gameplay.
Thorgast I can't really tell much about. I don't really like it and it just doesn't interest me at all.

What would I rate it? That's a difficult choice. The expansion could really rate itself high but end of the day, we got really limited content. Very few dungeons mainly because of Thorgast and all the unneeded systems on top systems balancing. For me and a lot of other people one fifth of the game is unplayable (The Maw) and the time-gating is something I can work around if it was not so present. PvP is it's saving grace tho. If it was not for PvP, the game would receive a 6, but I'll give it a 7 for now.

[Theosis]

Yawn, Torgast isn't very fun as a tank. I do everything solo but I'm kinda forced to find a healer if I want to get any higher than level 4.

[Wilfire]

All people talking about how people has been "improved" haven't played a single RBG. Kot'mogu is outright broken because it was never intended for orb carriers to be instagibbed with 40k crits.

[ashblond]

All people talking about how people has been "improved" haven't played a single RBG. Kot'mogu is outright broken because it was never intended for orb carriers to be instagibbed with 40k crits.

I can understand players enjoy the pvp badge gear system coming back.

But the pvp balance and situation itself is one of the worst in wow history, totally 1 shot bursting fiasco.

[Ticj]

Nobody struggles to get 1k anima a week.

But we don't like to have our covenant campaigns gated behind this anima farming quest every week.

Who's we? If nobody struggles, how in the world is this even an issue? Are you complaining just to complain?

[Toybox]

All people talking about how people has been "improved" haven't played a single RBG. Kot'mogu is outright broken because it was never intended for orb carriers to be instagibbed with 40k crits.

It's daft, but daft is alright sometimes.

[Hellobolis]

i want to rate it okay because less chores makes me enjoy the game more, but i feel like i should rate it as bad because torghast being a failure immediately after warfronts/islands being a failure isn't something you should overlook.

[Wilfire]

Here's the thing. WoW has excellent endgame content in M+, raiding and PvP. No one was asking for all these extra, primarily single-player features. People want tight balance and fun encounters, not a million side activities to distract from the game's core features.

[DeltrusDisc]

Good - potential to be excellent, we need to see the next content update or two to be sure.

It's definitely a strong good though. I've had more fun so far this expansion than I have in a longggg time.

[Rageadon]

Here's the thing. WoW has excellent endgame content in M+, raiding and PvP. No one was asking for all these extra, primarily single-player features. People want tight balance and fun encounters, not a million side activities to distract from the game's core features.

Thats why people love vanilla, tbc and wotlk

Why is it hard for people on this site to understand that people dont like shadowlands?

[Toybox]

Here's the thing. WoW has excellent endgame content in M+, raiding and PvP. No one was asking for all these extra, primarily single-player features. People want tight balance and fun encounters, not a million side activities to distract from the game's core features.

WoW has good PvE still. WoW PvP isn't particularly special anymore but is still doing relatively well. The other content is pretty much just a bonus, no?

[Smash Adams]

It’s a solid good. My biggest gripe has been the ridiculous amount of mobs to the point it’s damn near impossible to walk three feet in SL without pulling at least four mobs. It gets really irritating really fast. Especially when you’re doing WQ’s which are already tedious and you just want to finish. It’s not fun, it doesn’t add to the world or to the difficulty.

[Dalheim]

It's a 3-4 for me atm.. Everything just feels slow, and I'm currently trying out classes just to see which one I can enjoy. :/