Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Khaza-R]

If we get cross-faction play I hope it isn't just limited to raids, as they've sort of implied recently.

The story has been leaning toward cross-faction play fairly hard since the end of Battle for Azeroth and Saurfang's speech about breaking the cycle, but the story has been capable of cross-faction since launch. The whole point of Warcraft III was to move the evil of the Orcish Horde into the Burning Legion, leaving the Horde as good guys alongside the Alliance and new Night Elven faction. Also, basically every expansion at some point has culminated in the factions working together, and the most heroic characters have tended to be effectively neutral for their relevant plot or outright neutral all along. It's even been a theme before, like in Mists of Pandaria, which had an epilogue that basically said we have learned our lesson now and shouldn't have any more wars.

PvP is the only place where a complete lack of cross-faction options has made sense (and even then, hard-coded teams is a bad thing for PvP balance which is why Mercenary Mode happened).

The main reason to feel this time is different is the way Ion and co. have been talking about it, but in game the story's been ready for it for a long time.

I think its something that's only going to be enabled for certain areas. Instances and probably the new zones in the next expansion.

That would be the easiest way to add it without having to worry about retrofitting old content. What will be interesting is to see how they handle guilds which will need a major overhaul regardless of how co-faction grouping pans out.

[Revamp Man]

Most likely April-ish.

Blizzard is nothing if not predictable, which is great because Square Enix is nothing but predictable.

We will be getting something around the start of April, either 9.2 (heaven forbid) or 10.0 reveal.

Wel we will get 9.2 late February or whenever the time matches up with end of season

Then we have a week before the raid and a week before mythic which also unlocks the final three bosses
Two weeks for RWF
Livestream the following Thursday

[Wharren]

I think its something that's only going to be enabled for certain areas. Instances and probably the new zones in the next expansion.

That would be the easiest way to add it without having to worry about retrofitting old content. What will be interesting is to see how they handle guilds which will need a major overhaul regardless of how co-faction grouping pans out.

Easy way to do it will be to make new EK/Kalimdors cross faction, and then all new areas after that. Move BFA and SL to timewalking.

Timewalking will ban it unless they do a merc mode for timewalking coop.

[Jokubas]

So, after mulling over this a bit, I think that WoW honestly does not need a new class at this point, or ever really, but could clearly use something that freshens up the current class gameplay. However, I don't think something like an additional specialization for each class is feasible either.

Mechanically I agree, but flavor-wise there are so many untapped ideas. It's why I'm rooting for some sort of "class skin" system, where we can get the flavor of a new class without disrupting anything about the current balance.

I still really want Spellbreaker or some sort of spellsword class (we have magic/melee classes, but they're heavily themed). I still feel Necromancer has a place in this game. Death Knights not only have too much of their own flavor and very specific history, but the heavily armored mounted warrior is a very different theme than Necromancer, but Necromancers are still a widespread concept in Warcraft. I think others are right in that it would be hard to justify Dark Rangers from now on, but it's still a fairly popular concept that I think is only fair to them to be handled in some way. We also have a notable lack of things like a Light-themed DPS spec for Priest, or an actual nature (instead of astral) themed caster spec for Druids.

A lot of these could be handled through some sort of reflavoring and I'm fine with that. Necromancer could perhaps be a Warlock skin. A pet spec (Demonology) and debuff spec (Affliction) are good fits for Necromancer, they just need the flavor changed. I think Dark Ranger might even be best as just a reskin of a Hunter spec, since it is a fairly narrow theme, but it's still distinct (although it would be best with Demon Hunter-style class-specific customizations). A Light-themed DPS spec should be fairly easy to make as just a reskin of Shadow.

Those are things that 100% would get me excited about a new expansion, even in that form.

[Harbour]

The reason why i think its not going to be the Dragon Isles EXPANSION is that there are already way too many built up plot lines, related to Light/Void confrontation.
And even if Yrel's Light Crusade can wait for whatever more years, Turalyon and Alleria Alliance plot, as well as Scarlet Crusade new movement, demand the immediate continuation starting with 10.0 pre-patch.
Of course Blizzard may tie them to distant Dragon Isles, but how much more fitting it would be for Light (Void) expansion, especially if they pair it with Yrel's invasion?

Also i remember Blizzard adressing the complaints about Horde being the focal point for many expansions, promising Alliance to take some more focus in the future. The whole Light Is Bad theme fits the Allaince focus narrative perfectly.

Dragon Isles may be part of 10.0, but they would not be the main theme of expansion, in Emerald Dream/Legion fashion. Like, 10.0 would be Dragon Isles, with Yrel Army taking them hostage and us freeing it, and then 10.1/2/3 would be full blown Light (vs Void) expansion where we take on Yrel herself, Garrosh, various Naaru etc.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

The reason why i think its not going to be the Dragon Isles EXPANSION is that there are already way too many built up plot lines, related to Light/Void confrontation.
And even if Yrel's Light Crusade can wait for whatever more years, Turalyon and Alleria Alliance plot, as well as Scarlet Crusade new movement, demand the immediate continuation starting with 10.0 pre-patch.
Of course Blizzard may tie them to distant Dragon Isles, but how much more fitting it would be for Light (Void) expansion, especially if they pair it with Yrel's invasion?

Also i remember Blizzard adressing the complaints about Horde being the focal point for many expansions, promising Alliance to take some more focus in the future. The whole Light Is Bad theme fits the Allaince focus narrative perfectly.

Dragon Isles may be part of 10.0, but they would not be the main theme of expansion, in Emerald Dream/Legion fashion. Like, 10.0 would be Dragon Isles, with Yrel Army taking them hostage and us freeing it, and then 10.1/2/3 would be full blown Light (vs Void) expansion where we take on Yrel herself, Garrosh, various Naaru etc.

If there's any alliance focus, no Blue Horde(Trying to make the Alliance look bad). As for the Light and Void, I don't think thats going to be relevant at least based on the hints we've seen in 9.2. Turalyon being on the throne though is definitely suspect though as I said all the way the start of SL, they are prepping Turalyon for something.

[huth]

Right, that’s the primary reason, but they didn’t have to alter the setting and story so hard, implying it will be more than just a gameplay feature and may be around forever/the new status quo.

They don't have to change the story at all. There was never a lore reason for the split to begin with, and NPCs have been able to ignore the faction barriers since 1.0.

[Black Rider]

IMHO reveal will be sooner than April, April is too WTF

[TheFirstOnes]

The reason why i think its not going to be the Dragon Isles EXPANSION is that there are already way too many built up plot lines, related to Light/Void confrontation.
And even if Yrel's Light Crusade can wait for whatever more years, Turalyon and Alleria Alliance plot, as well as Scarlet Crusade new movement, demand the immediate continuation starting with 10.0 pre-patch.
Of course Blizzard may tie them to distant Dragon Isles, but how much more fitting it would be for Light (Void) expansion, especially if they pair it with Yrel's invasion?

Also i remember Blizzard adressing the complaints about Horde being the focal point for many expansions, promising Alliance to take some more focus in the future. The whole Light Is Bad theme fits the Allaince focus narrative perfectly.

Dragon Isles may be part of 10.0, but they would not be the main theme of expansion, in Emerald Dream/Legion fashion. Like, 10.0 would be Dragon Isles, with Yrel Army taking them hostage and us freeing it, and then 10.1/2/3 would be full blown Light (vs Void) expansion where we take on Yrel herself, Garrosh, various Naaru etc.

Thought this too, but tbh I would NOT be against a revamp akin to Cata + Dragon Isles with a build up to a grander Cosmic story. This arc kinda ends the Death plotline, but not so much Life or the other parts of the Cosmic Pattern, and we were JUST introduced to a power that designed these forces, and architected the pattern, the laws, the realms, rules, concepts, and fabric of existence, while their workshops bring about the realms, and their workshops caretakers build protoforms of the design and keep the pattern and the song of existence together

[Makorus]

I feel like the expansion reveal is gonna happen the week of/after the last LFR wing opens. Just makes the most sense, because at that point, everyone will have seen the whole story.

So depending on when the patch gets released, end of March, early April.

[BaumanKing]

IMHO reveal will be sooner than April, April is too WTF

Sylvanas book comes out March 29th tho.

[Holdodlig]

Was the Deluxe Edition added in a recent hotfix or was that In Game since 9.1.5 ? Because I could easily see the announcement in the end of January / early days of Febuary. If it was meant to be revealed after 9.2, they would have not added it in the 9.1.5 data.

[Makabreska]

If that game was great, it would create a continous stream of income rather than just the initial expac sales. So it is still illogical to create shit if you can create a fun game with the same effort.

Oh ye? Go check what EA is doing, making same crappy sport games for cheap year after year and still raking huge profit due to MT's.

[Raetary]

Imo, we'll get the patch early feb (seeing how the ptr is going, i don't see why it would be any later) and we get the reveal roughly a month later.

[Revamp Man]

No he actually is responsible for all of that, but in which way was gear acquisition in BFA more fun than nowadays in open world content? Actually, BFA had way better rewards for normal players than nowadays, but the fun was as lacking as it is now.

Even if you complain about certain implementations, you at least still have an ongoing character progression in raids and compelling gameplay. The problem is you find none of that outside of raids or mythic+ in pve. Other than those two pve gameplay is dull, not engaging and just not fun.

The problem is you say the guy is designing the game around just raiding and m+ ignoring the fact that the last two expansions have had nothing but negative changes

If you’re arguing about how open world gear acquisition is so bad let’s keep in mind you can get normal raid level gear doing nothing but WQs and some BiS trinkets are from WQ and you could start a character right now and once you hit 60 you’ll be geared to almost normal raid full set in less than a week

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Now imagine those games would be fun as well. How much more successfull would they be then?

Not much
The game has to be just fun enough to keep you playing but not so fun that you won’t pay to get stuff

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Was the Deluxe Edition added in a recent hotfix or was that In Game since 9.1.5 ? Because I could easily see the announcement in the end of January / early days of Febuary. If it was meant to be revealed after 9.2, they would have not added it in the 9.1.5 data.

There was a February event planned that ended up canceled
It had multiple in person locations and was supposed to be an event stream likely being the reveal

If I have to guess I’d say they will hold the reveal until after the story hits

[Makabreska]

Now imagine those games would be fun as well. How much more successfull would they be then?

But they don't have to be for the CEOs, they still rake in record profit with minimal production costs.

[Revamp Man]

And what is the reason fun games like FFXIV sell way better and have way longer subscriptions than World of Warcraft?

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They could make much more profit if they actually managed to keep players playing with fun games for more than one month.

Got the numbers to back that up??
No ya don’t and both games have completely different shops wher FF14 is removed cosmetics and a lot of the in game grind is mini games while WoW is unique cosmetics and the gold to remove a grind

It’s not even a new concept heck it was mentioned in South Park at one point lol I mean let’s look at the lifetime of BfA
8.0 & 8.1was essentially a time sink with multiple systems requiring constant play that nobody would say was especially engaging or exciting BUT doing it with friends would lessen the annoyance thus leading to a sub then 8.1 removed the most tedious aspect of the grinds while also extending them

[Revamp Man]

Oh please we actually witness the loss of 80% subs of WoW due to bad design, and yet you argue that is successfull. I said that it would be way more successfull if it actually created a fun experience for its players. And yes, it would without doubt, as the current market leader shows.

And really, someone must be illusioned beyond belief if he wants to pretend it is all a big masterplan of the developers to let subs drop for 80%.

It is simply incompetence. The developers do not know how to create a fun experience for their players. It is really as simple as that.

1. I agree the game would be better if it was designed better but the devs are egotistical retards
2. Link the source for the 80% drop because we never see that in the earnings calls
3. Using basic math a $20 token bought by little jimmy is more valuable than a $15 sub by Timmy. A 6 month sub with a free $25 mount is worth more than a 3 month sub before they leave from lack of content.

I honestly think you’ve lost whatever point you think you are arguing because nobody is arguing the game is amazing we are just saying they are making it to maximize profits and they do that through minimum design effort.

[Revamp Man]

1.) To solve that problem the management would have to replace Hazzikostas / Danuser. Hazzkostas focuses entirely on raids and dungeons and does not know how to design anything else, and Danuser is retconning the lore to death. Unfortunately, the management is as incompetent as Danuser and Hazzikostas and they believe their lies the game could never perform better as it does now.
2.) I gave you sources to monitor the players and sub development. Mythic dungeons participation went down from 1,5 mio to 380k regarding https://benched.me/activity , which is 25% of the initial participation. Raid participation on wowprogress shows a similar development. Regarding https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToaLY0DF2gY&t=0s WoW went down from 13 million Shadowlands sales to not even 2 million active subs. Do the math yourself.
3.) Now imagine 10 million players would buy tokens, and not just 2 million players.

It wasn’t watcher telling players that they already changed the 8.0 chest weeks before launch and anyone complaining don’t really play the game

It wasn’t watcher calling players toxic garbage humans

Bellular doesn’t have the numbers raid participation and m+ participation aren’t accurate measurements because those players are the minority aren’t they??

Whales are the main income for tons of games I’m surprised you didn’t realize that

[Buliwyf the Omen]

1.) To solve that problem the management would have to replace Hazzikostas / Danuser. Hazzkostas focuses entirely on raids and dungeons and does not know how to design anything else, and Danuser is retconning the lore to death. Unfortunately, the management is as incompetent as Danuser and Hazzikostas and they believe their lies the game could never perform better as it does now.
2.) I gave you sources to monitor the players and sub development. Mythic dungeons participation went down from 1,5 mio to 380k, which is 25% of the initial participation. Raid participation on wowprogress shows a similar development. Regarding https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToaLY0DF2gY&t=0s WoW went down from 13 million Shadowlands sales to not even 2 million active subs. Do the math yourself.
3.) Now imagine 10 million players would buy tokens, and not just 2 million players.

Changing either of the two would do nothing. The Game is going downhill heavily ever since WoD already. Lore can be mildly uninteresting for all I care but if the Gameplay is poor, there is no incentive to play.

So long as they dont get rid of the "stretch the Gametime the utmost way" method, they'll never get rid of their current Systemcraft.

Regarding Patches 9.2 and 10.0 respectively, the first has to carry the Game into the next Expansion and do that decently well, because if 10.0 is a letdown as the Battle for Azeroth were and the Shadowlands are the Game will ultimately not survive. It will already struggle heavily in the 9.2 content drought we have ahead of us because the next Expansion is definitely not releasing earlier than Q4 2022 and that could already be very well generous. I smell a one year 9.2 ahead of us since I dont think a January release is plausible.

10.0 also needs to tidy up all their issues because I do not think this Game can take 3 bad expansions in a row. The Game has never been this dry and barebones before and we are just in patch 9.1 when it comes to its dwindling Playerbase.

For 10.0 to be a success they need to bring in something that gains a lot of people. A new class here comes to mind, aswell as potentially new Races. They need a big banger that attracts sales aswell as keeps players motivated. Which means less chores that are absolutely horrendous and no fun to play like Korthia, Choreghast, or the Maw in general, better, improved and in-depth Class Design aswell as fun, engaging Content that does not force you to be online, but rather makes you want to stay online.

But afterall, this is Activison Blizzard we are speaking about.

Everything that should have been at Launch for Shadowlands from patches 9.1 & 9.1.5, that a big portion of the entire Playerbase screeched about during pre-release Stages (be it Covenant pull the Ripcord or other things), to an absolute lack of care about any Balance whatsoever in the PvP section, you truly have to wonder where their development money goes into. Even if they only have one to two million subs, some token players included, where are the ten million going into every month? Definitely not the Game.

Its pretty obvious how this will end and potentially also WoW.

Its just alpha, beta will get it right. Its just beta, they have time till Launch. Its launch month, they have other things to work on. They need to focus on 10.1, it will fix the issues.

Either 10.0 will be a big blast because Shadowlands is irredeemable, or the whole Game seems to be very likely at its maintenance mode until it gets even less content until it is done for the next couple years. But judging what for an absolute joke Shadowlands thus far is, and what for an absolute letdown the Community Council is, I think we can already foretell the future by just looking at the Expansion Reveal the next weeks.