Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Cherry123]

Just did a world quest in Zereth Mortis where you need to throw some goop on Mawsworn so they get eaten by a giant worm. It was voiced by Taelia Fordragon who I don't think we've seen appear in 9.2 yet? Wonder if she'll be doing more in the story or if she's just there for world quests.

her model 9.2 is marked in 8 places

[Sondrelk]

Just did a world quest in Zereth Mortis where you need to throw some goop on Mawsworn so they get eaten by a giant worm. It was voiced by Taelia Fordragon who I don't think we've seen appear in 9.2 yet? Wonder if she'll be doing more in the story or if she's just there for world quests.

Nice, almost completely forgot Taelia was even in this expansion. Hopefully we actually get some forward momentum on her relationship with Bolvar.

For that matter, something decisive on whether she is the daughter of Calia would be nice. Could of course be a complete coincidence, but Calia missing a husband and daughter, along with Bolvar and Taelia missing a wife and mother is a bit too much of a perfect setup for my tastes.

[T-34]

A progression system with no player power or something that looks like "Cypher of the first ones" but power isn't involved. If that isn't anything to go by, well the covanent haters are probably cheering their butts off.

Covenants in themselves are no problem, the problem is that lore/aesthetics are mixed up with player power.
So I have to endure playing as a furry in order to be optimal, which pisses me of.
And others had to live with picking a suboptimal covenant because the liked that covenant more.

I have no problems with borrowed power or progression systems as long as gameplay choices aren't mixed up with lore/aesthetics.

[ExiHext]

Covenants in themselves are no problem, the problem is that lore/aesthetics are mixed up with player power.
So I have to endure playing as a furry in order to be optimal, which pisses me of.
And others had to live with picking a suboptimal covenant because the liked that covenant more.

I have no problems with borrowed power or progression systems as long as gameplay choices aren't mixed up with lore/aesthetics.

Yea, just tie the progression to the player directly (artifact weapons-like) and make the rest cosmetic.

[shoc]

Wow, they are really hurting the wrong one here. It's not the games fault that the studio had assholes in it ... that's just an example of wrong cancel culture.

Are you really anthropomorphising the game itself?

[Ersula]

Geoff Keighley removes Activision Blizzard from The Game Awards World Premiere presentations

What's the opposite of copium? Schadenfreude?

This tells us they absolutely were planning on teasing the next expansion at TGA after cancelling Blizzconline. Now what? Their only avenue now is to just dump it onto youtube in the coming weeks, with no fanfaire. How humiliating.

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Are you really anthropomorphising the game itself?

She means the developers, the ones that still work there. It does seem like they cleaned house but Ion & Dansuer are absolutely not the answer to saving this game. FF14 is only marginally superior but the one way they're soaring now is their content is actually fun. 9.2 still just looks like Korthia 2.0... Deciphering runes? Are they serious with this crap?

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Nice, almost completely forgot Taelia was even in this expansion. Hopefully we actually get some forward momentum on her relationship with Bolvar.

For that matter, something decisive on whether she is the daughter of Calia would be nice. Could of course be a complete coincidence, but Calia missing a husband and daughter, along with Bolvar and Taelia missing a wife and mother is a bit too much of a perfect setup for my tastes.

What, are they suggesting Calia doesn't recognize Bolvar being the father of her baby? What kind of depraved Lordaeron orgies were they having? If she's keeping it secret, why? There's no point anymore. And they already gave her a boyfriend in Jaina's brother. The only thing worse than Dansuer writing familial drama, is his handing of romance drama.

[shoc]

What's the opposite of copium? Schadenfreude?

This tells us they absolutely were planning on teasing the next expansion at TGA after cancelling Blizzconline. Now what? Their only avenue now is to just dump it onto youtube in the coming weeks, with no fanfaire. How humiliating.

- - - Updated - - -


She means the developers, the ones that still work there. It does seem like they cleaned house but Ion & Dansuer are absolutely not the answer to saving this game. FF14 is only marginally superior but the one way they're soaring now is their content is actually fun. 9.2 still just looks like Korthia 2.0... Deciphering runes? Are they serious with this crap?

If the bar for being a 'good employee' at Blizzard is just not being a criminal misogynist I don't see Ion and Danuser going anywhere. They both strike me as the kind of guys who silently stare unblinking at a blank spot on the wall whenever a woman enters the room. Quality of the game design, or the storytelling, is probably very very low on their list of priorities right now.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

If the bar for being a 'good employee' at Blizzard is just not being a criminal misogynist I don't see Ion and Danuser going anywhere. They both strike me as the kind of guys who silently stare unblinking at a blank spot on the wall whenever a woman enters the room. Quality of the game design, or the storytelling, is probably very very low on their list of priorities right now.

I wouldn't make stuff up like you are implying. We don't know the behaviors of Ion or Danuser.

[Ersula]

If the bar for being a 'good employee' at Blizzard is just not being a criminal misogynist I don't see Ion and Danuser going anywhere. They both strike me as the kind of guys who silently stare unblinking at a blank spot on the wall whenever a woman enters the room. Quality of the game design, or the storytelling, is probably very very low on their list of priorities right now.

Then what is at the top of Ion & Danuser's priorities? This specific game is their entire Job. They're probably entirely focused on 10.0 but based on the last 4 years I just expect it to be a poor scrambling of Legion systems, again.

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I wouldn't make stuff up like you are implying. We don't know the behaviors of Ion or Danuser.

Considering how instrumental Jeff Kaplan was, if there was any record of bad behavior from them, they would have been fired so fast. And Ion & Danuser aren't nearly as talented as Kaplan was. Ion doesn't even have programming experience.

[Hitei]

This tells us they absolutely were planning on teasing the next expansion at TGA after cancelling Blizzconline.

Pretty huge leap.

[Ersula]

Pretty huge leap.

If not, why would he say "We're not taking sides" then later "On second thought, we're removing Activision Blizzard products from announcement"?

Unless you're saying they originally had some other product to announce & considering all major Activision franchises just had major releases & Blizzard doesn't keep its projects secret & I can't imagine what that would be. It was absolutely either the cinematic teaser for the next wow expansion or an Overwatch 2 video. And considering Overwatch 2 was just delayed It wouldn't be that.

[Foreign Exchange Ztudent]

The writing of the Campaign needs to be levelled up or completely scrapped for a better narrative storytelling. The one line sentence writing that is currently going on where major lore characters are written into the events of the Campaign solely to be a "Hi do you remember me" or in the case of Baine to scratch his butt.

I still don't know what the fuck that Mal'ganis writing was supposed to convey, did they really have to narratively explain what Dreadlords functionality is in such a pettant way or was it an awkward attempt at 4th wall breaking. I don't get it anymore, Danuser is too complex with his high IQ hint hint narrative.

[Sondrelk]

What's the opposite of copium? Schadenfreude?

This tells us they absolutely were planning on teasing the next expansion at TGA after cancelling Blizzconline. Now what? Their only avenue now is to just dump it onto youtube in the coming weeks, with no fanfaire. How humiliating.

- - - Updated - - -


She means the developers, the ones that still work there. It does seem like they cleaned house but Ion & Dansuer are absolutely not the answer to saving this game. FF14 is only marginally superior but the one way they're soaring now is their content is actually fun. 9.2 still just looks like Korthia 2.0... Deciphering runes? Are they serious with this crap?

- - - Updated - - -

What, are they suggesting Calia doesn't recognize Bolvar being the father of her baby? What kind of depraved Lordaeron orgies were they having? If she's keeping it secret, why? There's no point anymore. And they already gave her a boyfriend in Jaina's brother. The only thing worse than Dansuer writing familial drama, is his handing of romance drama.

There is no good reason why Calia wouldn't recognize Bolvar except maybe that they didn't want to make their reunion into a big thing when other stuff was happening.

Them being the parents of Taelia meanwhile is only based on the soap opera quality to having a parent with a missing child, and a child with a missing parent meeting suddenly.

Taelia being the daughter of Calia would tie up a lot of plotthreads into one neat bow that can then be used for further storytelling, being a true royal, and heir to the Lordaeron throne for living Lordaeronians to rally behind, whether fanatics or otherwise.
It would give a reasonable romance plotline with Anduin since they are close in age, and their union would in many ways unify all the remaining human kingdoms.
And finally it would give Taelia a good reason to stick around in the plot.


But again, as for tangible proof of the theory there isn't really any. It's solely on how oddly coincidental it is that Calia mentions a missing daughter who was with her husband, as Bolvar mentioning having to leave his wife in Lordaeron when the Scourge attack.

Using real life logic it would be wildly out there that they would be related, but in stories it's close to 100% chance they are related.

[Ersula]

Call of Duty Devs were promised raises in 2022, now they're being layed off

And the hits keep comin & they don't stop comin & they don't stop comin & they don't stop comin & they don't stop comin

[Hitei]

If not, why would he say "We're not taking sides" then later "On second thought, we're removing Activision Blizzard products from announcement"?

Unless you're saying they originally had some other product to announce & considering all major Activision franchises just had major releases & Blizzard doesn't keep its projects secret & I can't imagine what that would be. It was absolutely either the cinematic teaser for the next wow expansion or an Overwatch 2 video. And considering Overwatch 2 was just delayed It wouldn't be that.

1) He didn't. He said that they weren't going to be part of TGA beyond their nominations, not that they were "being removed from the announcement".

2) You are 100% fucking wrong, and Blizzard often keeps its projects secret until they are either announced or canceled. There are other mobile games in development besides Immortal, Diablo just had some other off-series game under development that was axed, there are several large still unannounced projects in development based on job hirings over the past 2-3 years.

3) The fact that major IPs don't have an iteration coming (an already questionable claim when many of those franchises, like CoD, have multiple sub-franchise games a year and other franchises, like Crash, are absolutely in the window for an announcement ) does not somehow mean there are not other games in the works. Activision often handles movie games, publishes secondary developer games, has a massive catalog of older games they have been remastering recently, like Spyro and Tony Hawk 1/2, which were both announced at a Gamescom.

[Ersula]

Using real life logic it would be wildly out there that they would be related, but in stories it's close to 100% chance they are related.

These are the sort of things that they keep vague because they're not set in stone on what they want to be canon. But it's big "we have no idea what we're doing" energy. Do they want Lordaeron to be in dispute? Because they certainly tying it to Alliance characters despite being Horde territory since this game began.

[Foreign Exchange Ztudent]

This company has nothing going for it for the next 4 Financial Quarters. Their bet is that their new Mobile Games can generate enough revenue for their Blizzard Branch. Q4 2022 is the next "good times" for Activision Blizzard with MW2 and WoW 10.0.

They have to make a big splash next year with unannounced stuff.

[Therougetitan]

If not, why would he say "We're not taking sides" then later "On second thought, we're removing Activision Blizzard products from announcement"?

Unless you're saying they originally had some other product to announce & considering all major Activision franchises just had major releases & Blizzard doesn't keep its projects secret & I can't imagine what that would be. It was absolutely either the cinematic teaser for the next wow expansion or an Overwatch 2 video. And considering Overwatch 2 was just delayed It wouldn't be that.

Said it before Blizzard gave a weeks heads up on its Legion being announced. Told everyone on July 29 2015 to expect an expac announcement on August 6 at Gamescom. There hasn't been such a thing for the game awards.

Blizzard also has other products. They have had two warcraft themed phone games being worked on for awhile. They have some unknown fps game being worked on.

[Ersula]

You are 100% fucking wrong, and Blizzard often keeps its projects secret until they are either announced or canceled. There are other mobile games in development besides Immortal, Diablo just had some other off-series game under development that was axed, there are several large still unannounced projects in development based on job hirings over the past 2-3 years.

Yes, and Blizzard's version of "announced" would not be in a state worthy of a cinematic trailer at the game awards. (Unlike a wow expansion, whos development doesn't need to be announced; its just presumed) And they certainly don't show off mobile games at the game awards. Considering both Overwatch & Diablo are both way behind schedule I doubt they have been starting entirely new IPs. Any unannounced projects are absolutely not in a state that would warrant a world premiere, like I said.

And if Activision Blizzard was never supposed to be part of the presentation, they would have just said that on Thursday, & not amend the statement a day later.

[Raetary]

Considering how its set up, it wouldn't surprise me if they very much intended for Bolvar and Calia to be a thing but scrapped that idea later on.