Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Lady Atia]

World of Warcraft 10.0: Return to Azeroth

+Five years have passed since the veil between Azeroth and the Shadowlands was shattered. After the Jailer's assault on Azeroth, the heroes rush back to their wounded homeworld.

+Setting: Revamped Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms. Certain zones, such as Ashenvale, Tanaris, and Tirisfal Glades, have seen significant changes while others only receive minor changes along with graphical updates. Azuremyst Isle and Bloodmyst Isle have been added to the same instance with Kalimdor, and Quel'Thalas has been added to Eastern Kingdoms.

+New level cap: 80

+Leveling: New primary way to level from 10 to 60 is doing zones in Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms. Some zones are reserved for lower levels but most are designed to work for any level between 10 and 80. The intent is to allow you to make meaningful progress with professions and factions right from the get-go as well as having more freedom to play with higher-level friends. Level 60 characters coming from the Shadowlands have a lot of choice where to do their journey to 80. There is a main storyline that you unlock quests for every few levels.

+Story: Heavy focus on racial storylines at launch, including but not limited to: Turalyon refusing to yield the throne back to Anduin, night elves relocating to Nordrassil, the Forsaken rebuilding Lordaeron Keep, and gnomes retaking Gnomeregan. There is no main antagonist, but the Scarlet Brotherhood is present in multiple zones. The Void is also causing mayhem in several zones on Kalimdor and will feature more prominently with later patches as the heroes' focus shifts to attempting to heal the world with the help of the dragonflights. Main protagonists include on the Alliance side Mathias Shaw, Flynn Fairwind, Anduin, and Tyrande. Mayla Highmountain and Calia Menethil become more prominent within Horde, although Thrall returns as leader.

+Systems:
-More dynamic world with events, updates to zones in patches, and faster day/night cycles with more extreme weather effects.
-Profession revamp with a greater variety of powerful items to craft, expansive quest chains, and specializations within each profession.
-The Forgotten Crypt: An evergreen evolution of Torghast with its own expansive progression system and cosmetic rewards. The Crypt will receive updates in each patch.
-Timewalking expanded: One Timewalking event will always be active. Mythic+ is being added to MoP and WoD Timewalking. Outdoor Timewalking adds world quests and events with relevant rewards to older zones. Most dungeons will be included in the Timewalking dungeon pool, and there will be a Mythic mode for many dungeons.
-New Game+ type Timewalking mode for completing old expansion zones. For example, you can start Outland questing from the beginning, and once you have completed all the zones you receive a high-resolution version of the tier 4 set of your class together with a mount. The updated tier sets are cosmetic-only, no player power is tied to this feature.
-Mount customization will be expanded with mounts receiving their own talent trees. Mounts also receive mechanical updates to add depth to the gameplay and customization. There will be world quests where you race across the continents against NPCs. There will also be events where players can race against each other.
-Shadowlands class-specific covenant abilities become a new talent row, and there will be another new talent row at level 80.
-Zone attunements. Most zones will have their own talent trees that unlock fun perks for the zone and cosmetic rewards. Progress is account-wide.
-Gear acquisition is being made more deterministic. Justice points return as a universal currency that can be used to buy basic gear along with a host of other things. Valor upgrading is expanded. The Great Vault is gone.
-Master loot returns but for guild groups only.
-More customization options are being added for each race.
-Player housing. There will be houses all across Azeroth that you can buy and customize. You can acquire items from both current and older content.
-Musical instruments are being added.
-The Hearth Tavern is an inn where you can challenge other players to Hearthstone matches.

+Many old dungeons are being updated. There will be more than 20 dungeons in at launch. Maraudon and Blackrock Depths will feature as mega-dungeons. The pre-tier raid is a newly-built Scarlet Brotherhood monastery in Eastern Plaguelands. There is also a dragon-themed raid with a single difficulty mode and no trash mobs. It replaces world bosses. The first raid tier is Siege of Stormwind where the heroes battle against the forces of the Light.

+Announcement is currently planned for early summer along with 9.2.5 launch, but delaying it for an in-person event at Gamescom is still on the table. The cinematic trailer is a throwback to the original WoW trailer. The expansion is planned to launch in the first half of 2023 for PC and Xbox. WotLK Classic will launch at the end of this year, and it will feature loads of changes. WotLK Classic will be used as a starting point for a Classic+ experience.

I actually wouldn't mind this but two things that mark it as "wishlist-sold-as-lEaK" - level cap of 80 and announcement in early summer - lmao, nope, they will announce the new expansion shortly after the Zooval cinematic.

[Shadochi]

8 hours sleep, 8 hours work, and 8 hours that is likely to include waking up, preparing for work, travelling to and from work, grocery shopping, making dinner, and miscellaneous odds and ends like tidying up and such.

Even just 5 straight hours of free time is a luxury if you live alone, let alone with someone. With a child that free time gets taken even more.

I agree with you to start off before my tangent.

(This is a sarcastic response, adding it here so people don't miss /s at the end)
I propose to you the day of a WFH Insomniac. 3-4 hours of sleep MAX, 8 hour work day from home where 2-3 hours are spent on useless meetings so I play games while attending, 1-3 hours of actual work (sometimes none needed), ordering food delivery. Leaves with most of the day to play games (tho in truth I spend most of it reading, going out with friends, spending time with my partner, gym and other stuff).

That being said I am trying to cut back on food delivery.

But in reality yes I know WFH is gradually ending (I am fully remote regardless of the situation) and especially in some other countries commutes can be 30min-1h long which takes away a lot of time. Factor in that people don't usually clock in at exactly 9 and clock out at exactly 5 that is even less time.

So having 5 hours of INITIAL content + 3 day repeatable quest + WQ (thorghast new mode to try out and other stuff) this patch has plenty to cover just from the surface stuff for the casual 1.5-3 h/day person. And next week new seasons and raid.

Just taking the main story, speedrunning it and calling that all available week 1 is false

[Kiivar86]

^ sounds like an amalgamation of other leaks, I think we just had something very similar to this leak some days ago. Doesn't sound bad per se, but the "features" are all meh. There's nothing that stands out like a new class or artifact weapons.

Yeah the start of it is so similar to a previous recent "leak" that I almost thought it was that one for a moment.

Also no way we're going to do 20 levels in an expansion.

[huth]

That's exactly my point, though. Your original comment made out that casuals wouldn't be able to complete the content offered in the free time that they have, so there's no issue with the time gating. I would argue that it's exactly because casual player's free-time is so precious that there shouldn't be any time gating, they should be able to complete as much of the content as they want to in the time that they have, rather than being forced to wait for yet another period of free time that they might not have for days or weeks.

Uh, no. That's a completely different point. The problem generally isn't that they don't have free time regularly, but that they don't have much time per session, and especially with families, there may be unplanned interruptions.

I'm not sure what kind of weird schedule you're thinking off, but that's not really all that common. It's also not a major issue even with timegating, since by their next session, they'll have plenty of stuff to do.

So not only are you presenting a constructed issue, it doesn't even work the way you claim.

[Zulggun]

Not if the sweaty raiders have a say about it.

There's a huge gap between hardcore raiding and farming simulator.

[Frood]

I want to hear some speculation! What do people think will happen during the Jailer fight?

I suspect it's super lore relevant considering how eager they've been to keep it all secret.

[Arcinatoss]

what if it's like when argus appeared in the sky but it's to instead tease the next expansion

[Shadochi]

what if it's like when argus appeared in the sky but it's to instead tease the next expansion

An Explosion of Dragons (TM) appears in the sky

[Fahrad Wagner]

an explosion of dragons (tm) appears in the sky

kaboom! Kshhhh

[TheFirstOnes]

I want to hear some speculation! What do people think will happen during the Jailer fight?

I suspect it's super lore relevant considering how eager they've been to keep it all secret.

We battle the Jailer and defeat him? Seems bout right LOL

Oh, and some BS with Sylvanas, hope she doesn’t kill him tho, and we do

[Grimbold21]

What I want to know is how much work/grind is ahead of someone that quit like a year ago, especially systems wise. We're talking about pre 9.1, pre Korthia

[Ersula]

What I want to know is how much work/grind is ahead of someone that quit like a year ago, especially systems wise. We're talking about pre 9.1, pre Korthia

You can start the new zone immediately at level 60. The enemies in it are pretty tough, but if you have anima on any other characters a vendor right at the start of ZM sells 226 gear for 500 anima for each piece, and theres a vendor in Oribos that lets you move anima to any of your alts.

[Grimbold21]

You can start the new zone immediately at level 60. The enemies in it are pretty tough, but if you have anima on any other characters a vendor right at the start of ZM sells 226 gear for 500 anima for each piece, and theres a vendor in Oribos that lets you move anima to any of your alts.

I aint starting now, but in a month or so, perhaps.

I'm not interested that much in the content itself, but since Blizzard has reverted some past class changes, and enhancement can once again spread FS, who knows.

[huth]

I aint starting now, but in a month or so, perhaps.

I'm not interested that much in the content itself, but since Blizzard has reverted some past class changes, and enhancement can once again spread FS, who knows.

It'll still be the same in one month. There's an item to give you all conduits for your class at 226 as well, and once you got one char up to revered, one to bring them all to 239 that is accountbound.

[Polybius]

Might mean someone petitioned to take your name and due to inactivity blizz freed it up.

Can one still petition? They need to do something about trial characters, or go the way of adding the bnet ID number to characters (this would clear the way for merging realm names).

[Akta]

What I want to know is how much work/grind is ahead of someone that quit like a year ago, especially systems wise. We're talking about pre 9.1, pre Korthia

not much grinding needed

[Kiria]

Can one still petition? They need to do something about trial characters, or go the way of adding the bnet ID number to characters (this would clear the way for merging realm names).

I'm not entirely sure, but I do believe it's still possible.

[Sondrelk]

You know, the more I play, the more I love this new zone. It's a good example of making something feel alien despite cursory similarities, an uncanny valley effect for areas rather than humanoids.

I just cannot help but wish this was set up better. Some discussion on why the Shadowlands exists, and for what purpose. Whether we knew someone created it, perhaps seeing the cracks form at times. Hints that maybe this is the great question Zovaal obsessed over, and which caused him to turn.

The zone does a great job of giving the players questions to ponder without feeling like it needs to answer them. I just wish the existence of Zereth Mortis actually answered some questions by its existence, rather than seemingly coming out of nowhere to not do much more than be a suitable place to fight the Jailer in a climactic showdown.

[TriHard]

I'm not playing Shadowlands myself but the latest zone does look very Wildstar-ish to me

[Santandame]

It'll still be the same in one month. There's an item to give you all conduits for your class at 226 as well, and once you got one char up to revered, one to bring them all to 239 that is accountbound.

Where is this item sold and what are the requirements?