When will 9.1 Drop?

[garicasha]

It is not on the PTR as I type this April 7 but should be shortly. https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...ination/922677

Patch includes a new raid, new zone (or city?), and flying.

Previous patches have been on the PTR for about 75-90 days. https://www.icy-veins.com/forums/top...e-speculation/

Burning Crusade for Classic drops May 18. (Or at least that's the expected date for the pre-patch or something via datamined strings.)

Also Keystone Master goes away the day of the patch right? I'm trying to decide if I want to get it on my brand-new tank or keep working on my AotC disc priest. Unfortunately these GD pug Demon Hunters don't understand that my priest's wheelchair doesn't roll that fast...so I wind up arriving at the fight when they're at 25% health and I have 4% mana...then they wonder why we wipe on trash.

[Mask]

I expect June. 8-10 weeks after the PTR goes up next week.

[darklogrus]

Probably June 21st or June 28th for 9.1 and either 1-2 weeks they will drop the raid. Thats if PTR isn't a bug filled mess and Raid testing inst 500 iterations of a Boss fight like Alpha and Beta were..

[garicasha]

After thinking about it a bit I think I'm gonna go with July 20.

That would be PTR April 13.
75 days later would be roughly July 1. However they never release anything on a holiday weekend (4th of July) so I'm gonna go a little later.

But for some reason July 13 just doesn't sound right...so I'm going with July 20.

[tomten]

Anything before August and im shocked.

[Cosmic Janitor]

If it drops next week then I'd asume something like 2 months of actual testing. Unless the patch ends up being a giant nothingburger and they are already finished testing after 4-6 weeks. So mid of june to mid july imho. The latest being 13th of july.

[garicasha]

It's a new raid, flying, and a whole new zone so there's gonna be quite a bit to do hopefully.

[Nyel]

June 22 to July 13 is my range for the release date. The notice for the 4th of July Holiday makes sense as 6th July is pretty much not going to happen.

I‘d say June 22 is very optimistic and July 13 the most reasonable date.

- - - Updated - - -

Probably June 21st or June 28th for 9.1 and either 1-2 weeks they will drop the raid. Thats if PTR isn't a bug filled mess and Raid testing inst 500 iterations of a Boss fight like Alpha and Beta were..

If they delay the raid release, I think this is reasonable. Patch release end of June, raid release mid July.

By the way, we still have to fit TBC launch into this. And I still expect TBC to launch in June, which moves 9.1 to July.

[callipygoustp]

This Tuesday.

[WowIsDead64]

It is not on the PTR as I type this April 7 but should be shortly. https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...ination/922677

Patch includes a new raid, new zone (or city?), and flying.

Previous patches have been on the PTR for about 75-90 days. https://www.icy-veins.com/forums/top...e-speculation/

Burning Crusade for Classic drops May 18. (Or at least that's the expected date for the pre-patch or something via datamined strings.)

Also Keystone Master goes away the day of the patch right? I'm trying to decide if I want to get it on my brand-new tank or keep working on my AotC disc priest. Unfortunately these GD pug Demon Hunters don't understand that my priest's wheelchair doesn't roll that fast...so I wind up arriving at the fight when they're at 25% health and I have 4% mana...then they wonder why we wipe on trash.

Unfortunately Blizzard are in bad shape now, so nobody knows, if PTR won't take more time and if all content will be released with 9.1 and won't be delayed even further till some 9.1.5. Despite of all that "pandemia is good time for game developers", Blizzard seem to fail to adapt to this concept. They think, that TBC Classic is more important, as Wow Classic was easy and cheap way to double sub numbers for short period of time and get large amount of money, while retail fails no matter what, so Blizzard started to think, that it's doomed anyway and will never be able to keep players playing or retain them. They don't even take into account, that they constantly do it wrong and according to "silicone girls'" principle, i.e. "bigger = better". I.e. "more grind = better for players". Everything has it's threshold. You just can't stretch content endlessly. It's reward/effort ratio aspires to zero. There are "lots" of content, but they're not worth doing. For example sometimes I really want to return to game, but when I think about "endless" anima grind and being unable to do it on alts, it kills my desire to play instantly.

P.S. Voted for July 6, because, I guess, anima grind is intended for players, who play one character only and grind around 10k per week. So, 7.5 months since release.

[Lochton]

I'd rather keep my speculations to a month setting, and not specific dates. I believe from mid-June to late July.

The ones who believes past September are a bit weird view.

[Dracullus]

PTR start on April 13th + 10 weeks = June 22th. And it gives them room for week delay for some last minute fuck ups, I assume pressure to release it Q2 is hard.

Raid 2 weeks after launch, dungeon available day 1.

[lolmmofuture]

lol, imagine it drops, and its even worse.


RIP

[ercarp]

June seems reasonable to me. Early July at the very latest.

[slime]

Too late for me, dead xpac is dead.

[Kralljin]

PTR start on April 13th + 10 weeks = June 22th. And it gives them room for week delay for some last minute fuck ups, I assume pressure to release it Q2 is hard.

Doubt there is any pressure from a quarterly PoV, as general speculation is that TBC will hit in June, which is quite likely when looking at the progress the Beta is making and the datamined date of 18th May for Pre patch + 1 month of pre patch itself.

Bigger issue is in my opinion that a patch doesn't have the same pull as a expansion release, so when people now drop off, which is quite likely during a content drought, then some of them might not bother to come back for 9.1.
The churn rate seems to be the bigger enemy here than the quarterly results.

[Dracullus]

Bigger issue is in my opinion that a patch doesn't have the same pull as a expansion release, so when people now drop off, which is quite likely during a content drought, then some of them might not bother to come back for 9.1.

How it would be issue is it's same cycle every expac? Blizzard is not this forum where people are surprised every time. They plan around this stuff.

[Kralljin]

How it would be issue is it's same cycle every expac? Blizzard is not this forum where people are surprised every time. They plan around this stuff.

The issue is that a content drought within an expansion is pretty much the exception, usually it was the time between the last Patch and the next expansion that faced a drought.
The big problem is, once people leave, they're not as likely to come back, which then affects the subs for the remainder of this expansion.

You could say that Blizzard plans around content droughts, but only one at the end of an expansion, not right at the start, but there they'll have the expansion sales to make a huge profit to pick it up right once the content drought ends.
None of the SL patches will have any additional pricetag attached to them, so unless they really bring back players in droves, that's not very good for Blizzards bottomline.

Disregarding that this delay has a massive tail and naturally also delays any future patches, 9.2 is unlikely to happen in 2021 unless it's a really small patch, the same is true for 9.3 and the next expansion.
For comparison, 8.2 came out in late june and 8.3 still came out in 2020 and that's before the pandemic.

If Blizzard intents to carry SL all the way to 9.3, they either have to produce content really quick or the next expansion won't happen until 2023, assuming all those patches are full fledged ones and not just minor patches like 6.1.

[Nyel]

The issue is that a content drought within an expansion is pretty much the exception, usually it was the time between the last Patch and the next expansion that faced a drought.
The big problem is, once people leave, they're not as likely to come back, which then affects the subs for the remainder of this expansion.

You could say that Blizzard plans around content droughts, but only one at the end of an expansion, not right at the start, but there they'll have the expansion sales to make a huge profit to pick it up right once the content drought ends.
None of the SL patches will have any additional pricetag attached to them, so unless they really bring back players in droves, that's not very good for Blizzards bottomline.

Disregarding that this delay has a massive tail and naturally also delays any future patches, 9.2 is unlikely to happen in 2021 unless it's a really small patch, the same is true for 9.3 and the next expansion.
For comparison, 8.2 came out in late june and 8.3 still came out in 2020 and that's before the pandemic.

If Blizzard intents to carry SL all the way to 9.3, they either have to produce content really quick or the next expansion won't happen until 2023, assuming all those patches are full fledged ones and not just minor patches like 6.1.

So much common sense in this post, just wait to see it disregarded within the next hours.

Everything what you’ve said is spot on.

Unfortunately, TBC will counter the massive sub drops - I’d be very curious to see how Blizzard is doing during the ongoing drag that Shadowlands will be for all of its lifetime without TBC subs factored in.

[dope_danny]

When does endwalker drop? assuming tbc classic is dropped around the elder scrolls update.