Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Hitei]

Yeah its pretty blatant, isn't it?

I looked up the questgiver and stuff on Bloodmyst and there isn't much about this dragon rider stuff either, that I can find anyway (brief glance, admittedly).

https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Pri..._Prince_Toreth

Yeah, as far as I know that wasn't pre-existing lore (though I'll admit I had to look up the island names that do exist because it's been so long since I did the draenei starting stuff). It's also interesting in that it also involves the night elves again. I'm still betting on Elune being important even if it is a "dragon expansion."

It was pre-existing.

Are you mad? Look around you, mortal. Do you not see that you stand upon sundered earth? Leave this place lest you suffer as my people and I have...
Why do you suffer?

Are you blind as well as insane?
I am a ghost - a cruel reminder of a civilization that has long ceased to exist - anchored to a land that I failed to protect.
Long ago - ten-thousand years past - I was flesh and bone, just like you. I was prince of this land and a dragon rider, blessed by Ysera of the Dream.

What is Ysera and how were you blessed?
Have you not heard of Ysera? Guardian of nature? Aspect of the Dream? She is the matron of all green dragons! Aye, it was Ysera herself that gifted my kingdom with her brood. We stood shoulder to shoulder with the noble creatures and they allowed us to ride them into battle against our enemies. All was well for many centuries... until...

Until what?
Deathwing's brood... Ysera's benevolence raised the ire of Deathwing - patron of the black dragonflight. They attacked us in our sleep! Many died on the initial surge but the greens rose to protect us.
<Prince Toreth points around the island.>
The bones are all that remains of the once great dragons. None were spared.

So why are you still here?
I was the last to die. As I felt my spirit leaving my mortal shell, I swore a blood oath.
<Prince Toreth shakes his head.>
A pact was made between this land and I: My blood for this world. I became the sole keeper of the history of my people.
I cannot rest until I am secure in knowing that the story of the dragon riders of Loreth'Aran is not lost in the passages of time.

[Teriz]

Lemme guess, not enough Tinkers on the borders?

Nope, simply a terrible color scheme.



I prefer that one quite a bit more.

[Jokubas]

They were the only team to have HotS abilities, and HotS abilities have traditionally wound up in the class lineup.

I still remember hoping that Illidan's very unique abilities in HotS (they weren't just translating his Warcraft III abilities, as otherwise tradition for MOBAs) meant we were getting a Demon Hunter class in WoW. I don't know how related those two things actually were, but it was nice to be vindicated for the hope at least.

It was pre-existing.

There you go then. I used to consider myself a lore expert, but these sort of obscure one-off things definitely slip off my radar (and I'll admit I got sloppy here I didn't check the link to the Dragon Riders when I looked up Loreth'Aran because I think I just subconsciously assumed it would be a page about the new book). ;P

Not really surprised to learn it's pre-existing though. That's part of the reason I wasn't interested in picking up the book to begin with. They used to be a lot more open with their world-building, or even letting things be teased a bit, but hold everything a lot closer to their chest now. I think it's more for a refusal to commit than to avoid spoilers though. That's good for some things, but a huge problem for others. It's been said that the lack of a status quo change in the book means we can't be getting a world revamp, but I think they'd do this either way to avoid any chance of changes in the future being contradicted by the book's version of those changes.

It's still interesting to call attention to it in a new book though, especially considering that obscurity.

[Ersula]

Saw this on reddit, the Exploring Azeroth: Kalimdor book has this bit on Bloodmyst that hints at a dragon homeland.

The 'legendary dragon islands' would be cool but it would need some pretty big story contrivences. It constantly feels like the story tries to ignore the reality of having characters who are 10,000+ years old. Did they try asking the Dragons about it? We have all this information about the War of the Ancients & the War of the Aqir but this more recent thing is beyond living memory?? And if there is a supposed Dragon Homeland why do none of the Dragonflights live there???

[Jokubas]

The 'legendary dragon islands' would be cool but it would need some pretty big story contrivences. It constantly feels like the story tries to ignore the reality of having characters who are 10,000+ years old. Did they try asking the Dragons about it? We have all this information about the War of the Ancients & the War of the Aqir but this more recent thing is beyond living memory?? And if there is a supposed Dragon Homeland why do none of the Dragonflights live there???

I was actually going to say, but I forgot, that if this excerpt does end up mattering next expansion, then I'd bet that the "myths" would suddenly become common knowledge, not because we'd be going to this place, obviously, but because we'd suddenly be dealing with the characters who remember this history and have a connection to it. The "myths" thing is just being done for now to avoid spoilers, but wouldn't make any sense in hindsight.

That might sound like it's contradicting my point about the book playing it safe to not be contradicted later, but I'm just not articulating my argument quite right.

On a different note, it occurred to me that a mechanic in such a dragon homeland could be some sort of mounted combat while flying. We could get flying early on in an expansion for the first time since Cataclysm, in exchange for the flying itself being "content." It could be interesting, although the execution could also just make it annoying instead.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Pri..._Prince_Toreth



It was pre-existing.

Huh.... thats a lot of connections to Dragons...that is when I put my tinfoil hat on. :P

[ro9ue]

• Tinkers and Dragons hinted during Exile's Reach (some rumor that Exile Reach is possibly part of Dragon Isles)
• Island Expedition Teams in BFA had Tinker abilities from HotS. They were the only team to have HotS abilities, and HotS abilities have traditionally wound up in the class lineup.
• Steamscale Incinerator and its companion pet, the Timeless Mechanical Dragonling. Both items link the concepts of technology and dragons together
• Mekkatorque getting the "Spark Reactor' at the end of BFA, a reference to Marvel's Iron Man series
• Wrathion discovers a clutch of dragons under N'Zoth and uncorrupts them. These dragons are Voidwings, apparently a new (or lost) flight of dragons.

Also more from BFA:
- Every mission table follower had a corresponding class and spec, except the two with the Engineering icon.
- Engineering had their own specific set of Azerite traits, almost as if it was to future proof the expansion for a class that would need their own set.
- Adding a ton of new tinker-like assets via Mechagon and MOTHERLODE

[Hitei]

The 'legendary dragon islands' would be cool but it would need some pretty big story contrivences. It constantly feels like the story tries to ignore the reality of having characters who are 10,000+ years old. Did they try asking the Dragons about it? We have all this information about the War of the Ancients & the War of the Aqir but this more recent thing is beyond living memory?? And if there is a supposed Dragon Homeland why do none of the Dragonflights live there???

The pre-WotA timeframe gets fairly unclear, but we also have no real reference point for a hypothetical Dragon Isles so it's impossible to say. The Dragonflights don't live there because they are described as being from the North to begin with and have the temple there after Galakrond's defeat, and then spread out to their own individual clutches and holdings. Maybe none of them remember where the isles were because they haven't been to them since they were young proto-drakes, or because the isles move and they lost track of them long ago. Maybe the isles predate the prot-aspects entirely and the era they were lost from is the initial re-shaping of the planet. There is a period just described as "ages" after the titans left before Galakrond arose. It doesn't explain where the proto-dragons actually came form, just that they lived in the North.

So maybe proto-dragons were initially from the Islands and then migrated to Kalimdor proper and the proto-drakes who would have remembered where they were have been dead 20,000 years.

[Super Dickmann]

Don't you mean

Finally, a real leak. Outdated though, we all know it's called Explosion of Dragons.

[Relapses]

Finally, a real leak. Outdated though, we all know it's called Explosion of Dragons.

At this point if this years April Fool's joke doesn't include a reference to Explosion of Dragons I will be very disappointed. The meme potential is limitless.

[Sondrelk]

Finally, a real leak. Outdated though, we all know it's called Explosion of Dragons.

Clearly this leak is superior to your supposed Explosive Dragons.
The red colour fits nicely with the dragon theme, and the icy particles creates a nice contrast with Wrath of the Lich King, hinting at the dragons link to Northrend.
Also how the abbreviation is WotA, which leads nicely into the fitting War of the Ancients subplot we have been expecting for ages.
Only a complete idiot would believe something as stupid as Explosion of Dragons over this vastly superior leaked name.

- - - Updated - - -

At this point if this years April Fool's joke doesn't include a reference to Explosion of Dragons I will be very disappointed. The meme potential is limitless.

I think you meant to say references to an angry Alexstrasza.

[Hitei]

- Engineering had their own specific set of Azerite traits, almost as if it was to future proof the expansion for a class that would need their own set.

That makes no sense at all.

1) The traits are entirely class non-specific and few in number. You might as well use the generic azerite powers to fill in pieces for a hypothetical new class, because that's what the engineering ones are anyway, just generic azerite traits but with engineering themes. Like they don't work for a new class, because none of them modify a class spell, they're just procs.

2) Because they're few in number and generic, you'd need to make a bunch of new ones that actually interact with the specific toolkit of a Tinker class and modify their actual spells and stuff anyway.

3) They've never bothered to do this anyway. DKs didn't suddenly get a T1-6 made because they were missing it, DH didn't suddenly get sha-touched glaives or AQ assigned gear. Basically the only thing they bother retroactively updating is the neferian callout abilities as a bit of a clever wink.

Like if they were going to be worried about a system missing for a new class' implementation. It would be the fact that they're completely missing a class hall and campaign and three artifact weapons for Legion, not that they don't have azerite traits for armor pieces in BfA, where they can easily just plug in some of the generic traits for missing class ones.

[Jokubas]

Also more from BFA:
- Every mission table follower had a corresponding class and spec, except the two with the Engineering icon.
- Engineering had their own specific set of Azerite traits, almost as if it was to future proof the expansion for a class that would need their own set.
- Adding a ton of new tinker-like assets via Mechagon and MOTHERLODE

It doesn't really compare at all, but in the interest of not getting hopes up, strange things have happened before. After Warlords of Draenor introduced the ogre "Magic Breakers" and Legion implied through the Felborne that Spell Breakers were an ancient thing and not a modern blood elf thing after all, I legitimately thought we might be getting a Spell Breaker class in what would become Battle for Azeroth. It just seemed like a weirdly specific thing to expand on the lore for without calling any attention to it.

That looks like vomit.

Yeah, I really can't stand it. I thought everyone was liking it as a joke, but the logo itself (not the name, which is obviously silly) gives me the same reaction I do when someone cranks up a Sharpen filter too far on an image.

Basically the only thing they bother retroactively updating is the neferian callout abilities as a bit of a clever wink.

If we ever get a new class (which I personally hope we do), I think the biggest question is how Legion will be handled. They don't have a history of caring about updating class stuff in older content, but Legion leaned so heavily on the classes a big chunk will be missing if it doesn't address that.

[Raetary]

Why are people taking a literal meme logo seriously?

but the logo itself (not the name, which is obviously silly) gives me the same reaction I do when someone cranks up a Sharpen filter too far on an image.

Its just a low res wotlk logo that is hued red.
This one to be precise.

You and Teriz are looking too much into a meme image, and its fucking with by brain as i can't comprehend why on earth anyone would do that.

[Teriz]

It doesn't really compare at all, but in the interest of not getting hopes up, strange things have happened before. After Warlords of Draenor introduced the ogre "Magic Breakers" and Legion implied through the Felborne that Spell Breakers were an ancient thing and not a modern blood elf thing after all, I legitimately thought we might be getting a Spell Breaker class in what would become Battle for Azeroth. It just seemed like a weirdly specific thing to expand on the lore for without calling any attention to it.

I think the biggest difference between Spellbreakers and Tinkers is that one was a hero unit with an attached lore figure while the other was just a generic unit. Tinkers align with the previous class inclusions (DK, Monk, DH) while Spellbreakers don’t. I do believe that Spellbreaker would be a good 3rd spec for demon hunters.

Yeah, I really can't stand it. I thought everyone was liking it as a joke, but the logo itself (not the name, which is obviously silly) gives me the same reaction I do when someone cranks up a Sharpen filter too far on an image.

Thank you! Glad I’m not the only one.

If we ever get a new class (which I personally hope we do), I think the biggest question is how Legion will be handled. They don't have a history of caring about updating class stuff in older content, but Legion leaned so heavily on the classes a big chunk will be missing if it doesn't address that.

Legion is optional content at this point. Players can skip it entirely. If a future class wants to do the storyline, it’ll probably be just some introductory quest that gets you into the story with all the artifact stuff removed.

[Sondrelk]

It doesn't really compare at all, but in the interest of not getting hopes up, strange things have happened before. After Warlords of Draenor introduced the ogre "Magic Breakers" and Legion implied through the Felborne that Spell Breakers were an ancient thing and not a modern blood elf thing after all, I legitimately thought we might be getting a Spell Breaker class in what would become Battle for Azeroth. It just seemed like a weirdly specific thing to expand on the lore for without calling any attention to it.

Yeah, I really can't stand it. I thought everyone was liking it as a joke, but the logo itself (not the name, which is obviously silly) gives me the same reaction I do when someone cranks up a Sharpen filter too far on an image.

If we ever get a new class (which I personally hope we do), I think the biggest question is how Legion will be handled. They don't have a history of caring about updating class stuff in older content, but Legion leaned so heavily on the classes a big chunk will be missing if it doesn't address that.

A new class could get the proper Legion experience with a table to pick the next zone in Dalaran, and three generic weapons with three random artifact sockets.

The class unique stuff in Legion were essentially just the class hall, 5 unique weapons per spec, a questline and a mount. The mission table followers were also unique, but mostly just flavoring.

Of these things you can skip the unique questline since it's mostly redundant, the class hall was mostly just a vehicle for said questline and a place to put the mission table from a gameplay perspective.
As for the weapons and mounts it would be something you strictly most likely don't get, but it's also hardly something that is needed for Legion to function.

[Jokubas]

The 'legendary dragon islands' would be cool but it would need some pretty big story contrivences. It constantly feels like the story tries to ignore the reality of having characters who are 10,000+ years old. Did they try asking the Dragons about it? We have all this information about the War of the Ancients & the War of the Aqir but this more recent thing is beyond living memory?? And if there is a supposed Dragon Homeland why do none of the Dragonflights live there???

I already said something about this, but in the interest of articulating myself better I realized there is a better way I can put something I said before.

The reason I don't like new lost continents isn't so much about "believability" as it is worldbuilding.

I maintain that the weakest part of Blizzard's storytelling is their willingness to treat every story as a perpetual rough draft. There's something to be said for being able to adjust when needed, but Blizzard goes way beyond that. Yeah, worldbuilding creates boundaries for yourself, but those boundaries aren't chains, they're your foundation. They're where dramatic moments get the context for their drama and emotion from.

"Wouldn't it be nice to get something completely new and never established before" is how we get things like the Jailer. If in the final major patch of the expansion they still can't settle on what to call him (a few builds back they changed new references to Zovaal back to just "The Jailer"), how is the audience ever supposed to care about the plot themselves?

There's a weird sort of irony in the fact that the continents are the one place Blizzard hasn't been doing this (at least on a macro level, of course the details are often either entirely new or heavily altered from early lore). We have yet to visit a "continent" that was established later than the RPG books. I think that's why fans pushing a new lost continent bothers me so much. It's basically the same thing we complain about everywhere else in the story, but in this one particular place so many people beg for it.

It's not that you can't tell a good story that didn't build upon the past at all. I'm sure they could do something fascinating with the concept in a vacuum. World of Warcraft has a lot of little great stories. The problem is that they exist in this web of Venn diagrams rather than a coherent whole. In that way, it's not even so much the continent itself that bothers me as much as what it represents. Doing that once in a blue moon is fine, but World of Warcraft does it regularly, and it makes everything disjointed and often hard to be invested in, like a mystery story you couldn't possibly guess because the who that dunnit was retconned into the story at the moment of the reveal.

For the record, the previously-established thing means I wouldn't necessarily consider the Dragon Isles a problem. While they didn't become canonical until recently, they've been a long-established piece of cutting room floor trivia. Also, the floating islands hidden in the clouds interpretation of the Dragon Isles is a thematically relevant and understandable excuse as to why they could go unnoticed and not casually stumbled upon.

[ro9ue]

That makes no sense at all.

1) The traits are entirely class non-specific and few in number. You might as well use the generic azerite powers to fill in pieces for a hypothetical new class, because that's what the engineering ones are anyway, just generic azerite traits but with engineering themes. Like they don't work for a new class, because none of them modify a class spell, they're just procs.

2) Because they're few in number and generic, you'd need to make a bunch of new ones that actually interact with the specific toolkit of a Tinker class and modify their actual spells and stuff anyway.

3) They've never bothered to do this anyway. DKs didn't suddenly get a T1-6 made because they were missing it, DH didn't suddenly get sha-touched glaives or AQ assigned gear. Basically the only thing they bother retroactively updating is the neferian callout abilities as a bit of a clever wink.

Like if they were going to be worried about a system missing for a new class' implementation. It would be the fact that they're completely missing a class hall and campaign and three artifact weapons for Legion, not that they don't have azerite traits for armor pieces in BfA, where they can easily just plug in some of the generic traits for missing class ones.

They wouldn't have to though because they can just put in the Engineering traits that would share the same theme. The point isn't that it would be on par with other class traits, the point is that it justifies doing a unique set of traits for a single profession if you think you might also be able to also throw them on some BFA gear in the future for another class. Leveling through an era doesn't really involve a lot of time, so they don't need to be gameplay altering, but it would be cool to have stuff that felt Tinkery instead of not having any BFA traits at all.

[Jokubas]

A new class could get the proper Legion experience with a table to pick the next zone in Dalaran, and three generic weapons with three random artifact sockets.

That's a good point. I mean, there are several (if not most) potential future classes that would make sense to retroactively assume were contributing at the time and I'd love to see them put in the full effort in Legion, but it's not something I'd expect and it's not a burden I'd want to bind to every future class idea.

I think the biggest difference between Spellbreakers and Tinkers is that one was a hero unit with an attached lore figure while the other was just a generic unit. Tinkers align with the previous class inclusions (DK, Monk, DH) while Spellbreakers don’t. I do believe that Spellbreaker would be a good 3rd spec for demon hunters.

Well, that's why those things stood out so much to me. Spellbreakers were previously just a single unit with extremely specific lore, and at one point I believe we were even told that they had been wiped out. Then suddenly they exist outside blood elves and are implied to have a much longer and wider history.

Overall though, I agree, Tinkers have significantly more established presence.

I'm still really curious about the real life history of the ogre Magic Breakers though. That's a bit of Warlords of Draenor development trivia I haven't managed to dredge up. There were strings for many more of these breakers including in the pre-patch army, but in game there are only a handful present and with very little context (most of it's just in Code of Rule). Also, the textures and armor designs that mostly ended up present only on Ko'ragh have conspicuously strong Demon Hunter vibes, despite having absolutely nothing to do with them lore or concept wise. I'm legitimately curious if it is all just a coincidence, or if it was part of another scrapped plot of Warlords of Draenor, like foreshadowing to getting playable Demon Hunters in Legion that got retooled into something else last minute.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

I was having a conversation with a friend on Discord about cool story/lore details that would be neat for a dragon based expansion.


One of his thoughts were that it would be cool if a bunch of minor characters who have popped up in the past couple of expansions (on both factions) turned out to be dragons in disguise, sowing mayhem and distrust. I agreed thinking that would be neat since the Black Dragonflight in particular likes doing that. Although it would be unlikely the Black Dragonflight would do that now, any other antagonistic dragon force could.