Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Revamp Man]

Sneaky, now you try to narrow it. All I said Preach put stupid predictions like SL will be 2021 or 9.1 August and later people take them as gospel. And @Makabreska above gave even more examples of stuff like that.

There you go.

2'50'' "This patch is long long away. I would expect towards August before we actually see anything."

So it's even better, he expected PTR in August xD.

he expected it in august and was wrong
happened with launch too lol
if people take his words as fact thats on them lol he aint towellie

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Interesting, Primus at the end of chapter say he already called covenants to bring sigils to Korthia.

yeah the final chapter is going to have some form of reveal of "oh my god this is what we do in 9.2 instead of attacking the jailer himself??"

[Luck4]

I think the only Blizzard could do a proper World Revamp would be if they took one continent at a time, Kalimdor expansion than Eastern Kingdoms or vice versa, maybe even making some maps from scratch while merging multiple others into one.

But even this way I doubt they'll do it.

[Revamp Man]

So next week is the end of the campaign
We then have about 10 weeks until renown cap
That places us at November
9.1.5 ptr or 9.2 info dump

[Cosmic Janitor]

I think the only Blizzard could do a proper World Revamp would be if they took one continent at a time, Kalimdor expansion than Eastern Kingdoms or vice versa, maybe even making some maps from scratch while merging multiple others into one.

But even this way I doubt they'll do it.

The only way they would be able to with their current creative output is by picking a campaign path that includes 5-10 more or less adjecent maps, redo them and visually and write new quests for them and sprinkle new dungeons here and there. Doing a whole continent would already be overkill, given their meager last showings.

The thing then is what exactly would we be doing there and how would a compelling grounded experience look like? Getting a sense of adventure again would require some clever writing, alot of shifts in local politics and powers but also exclude the horde and alliance as much as possible, or we'd just be retreading another pointless faction war that never goes anywhere. As much as I hate the world ending sylvanas fanfic we currently play through, fighting some centaurs isn't going to be very exciting or believable and a decent political plot with local stakes (think Suramar, Drustvar, Dazar'alor) is pearl before the swine given the majrotiy of remaining WoW players. Also hard to pull off without establishing new hierarchies that make sense in old zones whose story so far is a bunch of outposts with 3 huts.

[Luck4]

The only way they would be able to with their current creative output is by picking a campaign path that includes 5-10 more or less adjecent maps, redo them and visually and write new quests for them and sprinkle new dungeons here and there. Doing a whole continent would already be overkill, given their meager last showings.

Yeah, for sure, they can skip zones here and there, Kalimdor has nearly 23 zones, but they can skip Uldum and Silithus easily, they can leave Mount Hyjal for a patch, etc. Since they're not making everything from scratch I think they can pull 15 zones, the terrain is there they only need to change the assets and make new quests, which are not many since it's not meant for leveling.

[Xorzor]

I'm looking foward to next week's secret quest, the only thing we know is that Anduin's compass gives an in-game cutscene of him talking with Sylvanas... though we have no idea what was said because the datamined cutscene had no dialogue. And barely any animations.

Though judging by the party's eyes in the last few seconds, he says something surprising. Maybe "Azeroth"? Check 1:17... Bolar's eyebrows go way up.

It is curious that Anduin, even when allegedly mind-controlled, would just drop the compass and forget about it. Unless doing so was deliberate?

An older cutscene where Sylvanas threatens Anduin with Kingsmourne may have had additional dialogue towards the end before it cut to black. I'm not saying they forgot to add it in, but that it was intentionally left out, and could be revealed at a later time. In that cutscene it did seem that Sylvanas faltered a little, as if Anduin's words were getting to her. Perhaps the two of them came up with a plan to screw over Zovaal?

[Sondrelk]

The only way they would be able to with their current creative output is by picking a campaign path that includes 5-10 more or less adjecent maps, redo them and visually and write new quests for them and sprinkle new dungeons here and there. Doing a whole continent would already be overkill, given their meager last showings.

The thing then is what exactly would we be doing there and how would a compelling grounded experience look like? Getting a sense of adventure again would require some clever writing, alot of shifts in local politics and powers but also exclude the horde and alliance as much as possible, or we'd just be retreading another pointless faction war that never goes anywhere. As much as I hate the world ending sylvanas fanfic we currently play through, fighting some centaurs isn't going to be very exciting or believable and a decent political plot with local stakes (think Suramar, Drustvar, Dazar'alor) is pearl before the swine given the majrotiy of remaining WoW players. Also hard to pull off without establishing new hierarchies that make sense in old zones whose story so far is a bunch of outposts with 3 huts.

The way I would personally go about it is to consider zones not as insular, but rather as greater parts of some theoretical mega-zone. Most zones in EK/Kalimdor are afterall mosly barren, a far cry from the densely packed zones of today.
You could for instance easily combine Elwynn, Westfall, Redridge, Duskwood and Deadwind Pass into a greater "human" zone that deals with a single evolving plotline and comprises a single reputation, similar to how Bastion only deals with Kyrian related things and reputations. Same for Dwarf zones like Dun Morogh, Loch Modan, Twilight Highlands, Wetlands and the Dark Iron zones.
Combining zones in this way would essentially shrink the amount of zones from the myriad we have now down to a more reasonable 4-5, and that is without counting potential insular zones that could be dedicated PvP areas, or low level, or even high level only zones.

For writing I imagine there is a lot of story to glean solely from going back to EK or Kalimdor and simply seeing whatever is going on there. And given the amount of time since Cata, we should be seeing some serious progress in whatever the zones were on about.

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It is curious that Anduin, even when allegedly mind-controlled, would just drop the compass and forget about it. Unless doing so was deliberate?

An older cutscene where Sylvanas threatens Anduin with Kingsmourne may have had additional dialogue towards the end before it cut to black. I'm not saying they forgot to add it in, but that it was intentionally left out, and could be revealed at a later time. In that cutscene it did seem that Sylvanas faltered a little, as if Anduin's words were getting to her. Perhaps the two of them came up with a plan to screw over Zovaal?

I really hope that isnt the what they are going for, it really would just suck the last remaining scraps of pathos from Sylvanas.

As for the compass we have seen how Anduin does have some autonomy when the Jailer isnt actively controlling him. It isnt that far fetched to assume he mustered the willpower to drop the compass before he walked through the portal.

[Cosmic Janitor]

The way I would personally go about it is to consider zones not as insular, but rather as greater parts of some theoretical mega-zone. Most zones in EK/Kalimdor are afterall mosly barren, a far cry from the densely packed zones of today.
You could for instance easily combine Elwynn, Westfall, Redridge, Duskwood and Deadwind Pass into a greater "human" zone that deals with a single evolving plotline and comprises a single reputation, similar to how Bastion only deals with Kyrian related things and reputations. Same for Dwarf zones like Dun Morogh, Loch Modan, Twilight Highlands, Wetlands and the Dark Iron zones.
Combining zones in this way would essentially shrink the amount of zones from the myriad we have now down to a more reasonable 4-5, and that is without counting potential insular zones that could be dedicated PvP areas, or low level, or even high level only zones.

Oh, I absolutely agree. The reason why I mentioned 5-10 zones is because they will need more to (hopefully) avoid hyper-dense packing of zones. There also aren't enough current hooks in zones to fit all the usual content of one modern zone into one of the original zones. They will need to tell them over a couple and that would probably make a more satisfying experience as well.

That being said, I just don't see Blizzard actually doing that. It seems such a major departure from their cosmic BS hype-train that they've all seem to have boarded as the only passengers. I just wish they had a small side team that would keep redoing zones one at a time and release them outside of the usual expansion content cylce. Same for Shadowlands, I wish we could start to do little side adventures in some of the other afterlives.

[Varodoc]

Thematically the next expansion will obviously, undoubtedly be about the Void. But it's unclear if it will be a world revamp, it is a coin flip at this point.

It's unlikely that it will be a world revamp because it would take a lot of work to update the entire world and ActiBlizzard always choose the quickest and cheapest path.

It's likely that it will be a world revamp because they need to reinvent the game after all the mess they've been in since 2019 (with the Hong Kong player drama which gave them a ton of bad press). It's clear that another expansion like Shadowlands won't work. They need another Legion or another Cataclysm, either way they need to make 10.0 as big as possible.

[Nyel]

I really don’t think where tackling the Void theme yet. What I think could happen is that they indeed stretch the Jailer storyline over two expansions. 9.2 will end with us freeing Anduin and 10.0 then will be the battle against the Jailer, wherever he is headed. This would give his story way more room to breathe and unfold because as of now it’s incredibly shallow. Sure, this all could be part of 9.2 and the story gets so minimized and trivialized that it can work as the final content patch, but for sure this way it will forever taint the Warcraft lore, more so than WoD ever could.

The outcome at this point for sure is a race against time. They’ve been far behind schedule before the lawsuit and for two weeks now they basically seized work on WoW. With all the people leaving and major changes in management and team happening I’m not sure if they’re able to just continue their usual work as nothing has happened. And the more things interfere even more with the schedule, the more I fear the outcome.

[Sondrelk]

Thematically the next expansion will obviously, undoubtedly be about the Void. But it's unclear if it will be a world revamp, it is a coin flip at this point.

It's unlikely that it will be a world revamp because it would take a lot of work to update the entire world and ActiBlizzard always choose the quickest and cheapest path.

It's likely that it will be a world revamp because they need to reinvent the game after all the mess they've been in since 2019 (with the Hong Kong player drama which gave them a ton of bad press). It's clear that another expansion like Shadowlands won't work. They need another Legion or another Cataclysm, either way they need to make 10.0 as big as possible.

Or it could be Dragons.
I have pointed out before that the theme for a given expansion has been a seemingly consistent pattern of expansions being teased 2 in advance, with the seemingly most obvious choice for expansion only coming 2 expansions after.
It happened with WoD not being Burning Legion themed, in spite of Wrathion mentioning the return of the Burning Legion as the most pressing matter.
Legion was the odd one out, in that respect, but BfA right after was Faction War themed despite Legion seemingly heavily teasing a death themed expansion.
Then lastly we have Shadowlands, despite BfA very heavily teasing dragons in the final patches.

Going by this pattern then 10.0 should be Dragon themed, and 11.0 be Void themed. Not of course that you cannot have a combination of themes, but from what I have seen the obvious choice rarely comes true, instead we are given the obvious choice from the last expansion.

[Varodoc]

For once the Jailer fanboy is right, there will never be an expansion "about Dragons". There will be an expansion "about the Void", "featuring Dragons".

The Dragons are literally some Titan-enhanced beasts, they're not carrying an expansion. Especially after they lost whatever power they had.

I don't know why people here have this fascination for "omg dragons!! dragon isles!!" but realistically Alexstrasza's bikini armor can only carry an expansion so much. If the dragons ever become relevant again it will be because the Void Lords have found a way into reality or N'Zoth has returned.

[Nagawithlegs]

Light and Void are being teased in equal amounts IMO. War of Light and Void on Azeroth with the dragons being the neutral party makes the most sense, especially if they are going for a Cata 2 theme.

[therumblings]

All I'm asking for is an Azeroth expansion to take a break from the cosmic crap, even if it's just one expac in between.

[Varodoc]

This is the same company that put Faction War (Fourth War and Warfronts), Old Gods, Naga, and South Isles (Pirates, Kul Tiras, Zandalar, Island Expeditions) in the same expansion.

Why exactly do people think they'll dedicate an entire expansion to a very niche faction in the lore? The Dragon Aspects are not so important lorewise.

[Nagawithlegs]

All I'm asking for is an Azeroth expansion to take a break from the cosmic crap, even if it's just one expac in between.

We’ve never had two cosmic expansions back to back, we always return to Azeroth. People are just being hysterically negative if they think we aren’t going back to Azeroth.

[therumblings]

For once the Jailer fanboy is right, there will never be an expansion "about Dragons". There will be an expansion "about the Void", "featuring Dragons".

The Dragons are literally some Titan-enhanced beasts, they're not carrying an expansion. Especially after they lost whatever power they had.

I don't know why people here have this fascination for "omg dragons!! dragon isles!!" but realistically Alexstrasza's bikini armor can only carry an expansion so much. If the dragons ever become relevant again it will be because the Void Lords have found a way into reality or N'Zoth has returned.

Blizzard made an expansion about Pandas, and also stretched tiny islands into full on expansion continents, to say that Dragons and the Dragon Isles couldn't carry their own expansion is just not true considering Blizzard's past.

[Nagawithlegs]

This is the same company that put Faction War (Fourth War), Old Gods, Naga, and South Isles (Pirates, Kul Tiras, Zandalar) in the same expansion.

Why exactly do people think they'll dedicate an entire expansion to a very niche faction in the lore? The Dragon Aspects are not so important lorewise.

The Dragons likely won’t be the main theme, but Shadowlands were not important and had little lore before this expansion. They introduce new lore all the time.

[therumblings]

This is the same company that put Faction War (Fourth War and Warfronts), Old Gods, Naga, and South Isles (Pirates, Kul Tiras, Zandalar, Island Expeditions) in the same expansion.

Why exactly do people think they'll dedicate an entire expansion to a very niche faction in the lore? The Dragon Aspects are not so important lorewise.

Well, the main plot could be about the dragons, or the void, blizzard never dedicates 100% of the plot to one theme.

[Valysar]

I just hope that the Jailer wins