Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[therumblings]

A new dragon race and class in the same expansion would be awesome

[Marlamin]

So I wonder if the gap in new customizations appears to be new races because of how many options there are, and it would be unlikely that existing races would get that many new options at once. Is there any evidence of allied races like there was in 7.3.2 or did they change how that works?

They have gotten significantly less leaky over the last two expansions.

[Shadochi]

Yeah, especially with wisps being a thing she definitely can directly influence the cycle to some capacity.

Perhaps Teldrassils massive influx of souls was just too many for her handle and she couldn't keep them from crossing the veil, so she (tried to) send them to Ardenweald instead.

I was more under the impression after the convo between the Winter Queen and Elune that she let them go to the Shadowlands,knowing most would go to the Winter Queen to help the drought.
If she could just send them to Ardenweald then they wouldn't end up in the maw

[Santandame]

If we are indeed getting new races, and 10.0 is Cataclysm 2.0 then I'm calling Dragonkin for Alliance and Ogres for Horde. Ogres would also play into my idea that we're going to see Ogrezonia as a new zone, to help explain female Ogres.

If however we're getting Allied Races, then I see us getting them in batches of two pairs of three again like with BfA launch. For Alliance I can see: Jinyu/Ankoan, Sethrak and Botani. Horde would get Lightforged Undead, Mogu and Saberon.

If Blizz really want the good will, give us both Allied Races and Core Races.

Alternatively, add a toggle to races like Draenei, Trolls, Orcs etc so we can have Broken, Amani, Fel Orcs etc.

[PhillyCheese]

On the topic of stuff in the files, this was added in 9.2.5:

New encrypted mounts and pets were also added in this build:
1 battle pet using bear cub sounds
1 battle pet using harvest golem sounds
2 mounts using serpert sounds

I'm guessing one of the pets may be from the Tirisfal thing, maybe the golem. Goblin shredder pet maybe? They were tied closely to Forsaken in Darkshore.

The bear cub could be from an opposing Nelf event.

No idea what mounts use serpent sounds, the only thing I can think off is the Nzoth serpents and I don't know why they would be relevant to 9.2.5 unless there's a void tease. Maybe it's a Season 4 reward?

Also remember that not only is an Emerald Drake in the 10.0 bundle but also a creature using Vulpera animations, which could be a little Dragonkin type creature. Consider that it probably has a tail...

- - - Updated - - -

If we are indeed getting new races, and 10.0 is Cataclysm 2.0 then I'm calling Dragonkin for Alliance and Ogres for Horde. Ogres would also play into my idea that we're going to see Ogrezonia as a new zone, to help explain female Ogres.

There's no way the Dragonkin would pick a side. I can see them doing it like Pandaria where they are netural but also like BFA so we get some faction spice with new races but the "big race" can be either.

As for your AR choices I doubt Lightforged Undead will ever be a real thing and Botani are super duper evil and crazy. But Jinyu/Saberon/Mogu/Sethrak are very possible.

[Santandame]

On the topic of stuff in the files, this was added in 9.2.5:



I'm guessing one of the pets may be from the Tirisfal thing, maybe the golem. Goblin shredder pet maybe? They were tied closely to Forsaken in Darkshore.

The bear cub could be from an opposing Nelf event.

No idea what mounts use serpent sounds, the only thing I can think off is the Nzoth serpents and I don't know why they would be relevant to 9.2.5 unless there's a void tease.

Also remember that not only is an Emerald Drake in the 10.0 bundle but also a creature using Vulpera animations, which could be a little Dragonkin type creature. Consider that it probably has a tail...

Could be Dragonkin. Could also be a new type of creature from say Undermine/Kezan, or Tel'Abim. Anything goes with 10.0 atm and its exciting.

I legit see us getting a combination of Cataclysm, MoP and Classic.

[ercarp]

I mentioned this in another thread, but...

Am I the only one who feels like a new race no longer counts as an "exciting new expansion feature"? When they introduced the concept of Allied Races and showed us they can churn out as many new races as they want as patch content, what makes adding a new race as a baseline expansion feature exciting?

And I'm well aware that most of the Allied Races were just reskins using the skeletons of older races, but that's not true for all of them. Kul Tirans had completely unique skeletons.

[PhillyCheese]

I mentioned this in another thread, but...

Am I the only one who feels like a new race no longer counts as an "exciting new expansion feature"? When they introduced the concept of Allied Races and showed us they can churn out as many new races as they want as patch content, what makes adding a new race as a baseline expansion feature exciting?

And I'm well aware that most of the Allied Races were just reskins using the skeletons of older races, but that's not true for all of them. Kul Tirans had completely unique skeletons.

Does it not depend on the race? Kul Tirans are very cool mechanically but are unpopular because le fat human.

If a race is a green human with giant mustaches and people love them they would be an "exciting new expansion feature".

[draugril]

A new dragon race and class in the same expansion would be awesome

I'd love that. I'm trying my best not to have any hopes or expectations whatsoever for 10.0... but this is becoming increasingly more difficult as the announcement approaches. Try as I might, a little hype is unavoidable.

- - - Updated - - -

Am I the only one who feels like a new race no longer counts as an "exciting new expansion feature"? When they introduced the concept of Allied Races and showed us they can churn out as many new races as they want as patch content, what makes adding a new race as a baseline expansion feature exciting?

If they were able to keep up that pace, I'd agree. But they haven't. It seems to have been a concerted effort of the BfA team to churn them out to the degree they did, and even then, the vast majority of development was dedicated to recycling assets in a new context, so the amount of development wasn't all that mind-blowing.

Honestly, I'd love for them to continue to put out Allied Races as patch content, adding stuff like Dragonmaw Orcs and Wildhammer Dwarves, whereas core races are treated as tentpole expansion features, like ogres and arrakoa would be.

[Alanar]

Personally I am still holding out hope for an Ankoan AR. My disappointment was immeasurable when we got trashgnomes instead of amazing samurai fish.

They seemed to have a number issue as they were the last, if that really would be an issue, the jinju could connect to them and make it one race, with both options. Scales etc, but also the numbers. Mop jinju feel more like the caster types and ankoan the warrior type, but they look really simmilar.

[ercarp]

Does it not depend on the race?

Not necessarily. Before Allied Races, adding a new race had this air of being an incredibly time-consuming process that required a shit ton of resources from Blizzard. So whenever a new race was added, it felt like a lot of care must have gone into their development. Then they went ahead and added like 237821058 races in one expansion.

If they were to add a new race now, I'd obviously play it, but it doesn't carry the same kind of excitement for me anymore. I'd just be left wondering why they didn't add it in a patch instead of trying to market it as a big new expansion feature.

[draugril]

They seemed to have a number issue as they were the last, if that really would be an issue, the jinju could connect to them and make it one race, with both options. Scales etc, but also the numbers.

I think any argument about population went out the window when we got Void Elves.

[therumblings]

Not necessarily. Before Allied Races, adding a new race had this air of being an incredibly time-consuming process that required a shit ton of resources from Blizzard.

That's community perception, and players who didn't know how game development worked, but that was never actually the case. And I don't think allied races diminished that, it just gave players incentive to beg for races more since now there is no confusion.

[Alanar]

I mentioned this in another thread, but...

Am I the only one who feels like a new race no longer counts as an "exciting new expansion feature"? When they introduced the concept of Allied Races and showed us they can churn out as many new races as they want as patch content, what makes adding a new race as a baseline expansion feature exciting?

And I'm well aware that most of the Allied Races were just reskins using the skeletons of older races, but that's not true for all of them. Kul Tirans had completely unique skeletons.

I think it depends. Many hope races such as Ogres or Vrykul would realy benefit having their own unique starting zone, starting lvl 1 and get the full new race package in that sense. I believe these races deserve such thing. But races such as gil goblins or taunka fit the allied race theme more as they use exciting skeletons, but on top of that they are still just goblins and tauren.

I agree, Zandalari and KUl tiran don't fit either... and makes it little harder. There was obviously more work done to these. But as many speculate, Kul tirans were the reason the zandalari trolls were delayed. I truly believe there was some switching with AR and maybe we should have gotten something else.

[Sondrelk]

Does it not depend on the race? Kul Tirans are very cool mechanically but are unpopular because le fat human.

If a race is a green human with giant mustaches and people love them they would be an "exciting new expansion feature".

I wouldnt say the problem with KT is that they are fat, but rather that the game isnt designed with taht body type in mind. They look damn good in robes, and their Heritage armor that hangs more off them instead of sticking to them looks fantastic. The problem is just that the gear in WoW has always been designed to mosstly just replace teh skin texture, rather than actually hanging of characters realistically.

[therumblings]

I think any argument about population went out the window when we got Void Elves.

As well as the argument against some races because they can't equip and transmog gear, but then Mechagnomes happened.

[Fahrad Wagner]

I feel like there's a lot of evidence that Blizzard is working on more character customization, be it in the form of allied races/subraces or just more customization for existing races. No pointers to which of the two, though.

There are some pretty big ID jumps in the character customization database tables that imply there's likely a lot of customization not currently released that was worked on before/at the same time as the customization for 9.1.5/9.2.0, so we might be seeing some of that in 10.0.

That would be most welcome. I love what they have done so far, and would love to see more!

[Alanar]

I think any argument about population went out the window when we got Void Elves.

Fair enough, but nonetheless they specifically told us that bit of information. They were the last of it's kind, therefor I just tried to find a solution and besides the jinji are just to close to not make use of that. Would also help with class options, just something I though about.

What you said is still true but, we never even heard of void elves. They were just.. there, we are talking about options who are long and forgotten almost;p

[therumblings]

They seemed to have a number issue as they were the last, if that really would be an issue, the jinju could connect to them and make it one race, with both options. Scales etc, but also the numbers. Mop jinju feel more like the caster types and ankoan the warrior type, but they look really simmilar.

Ankoan would most likely be considered just a clan of Jinyu if they ever became playable, just like Wildhammer Dwarves for regular Dwarf characters.

[Fahrad Wagner]

Maybe they'll fix their 5 different generations of character customization and categorization? Even as a dev from another field I take a look at that GUI and can't help but feel shivers run down my spine. One race has 3 things bundled into a single slider, while another an pick 2 and 1 seperately and another has each seperate and additional options on top of it. Feels like something that begs for a major design pass to bring all races to the same fidelity.

I'm glad to read I'm not the only one thinking the split of customizations is an utter mess. It's like there is no continuity/homogeneity between has been "enabled" for races apart from skin, hair, face, and eyes. All the rest is scattered sometimes in one tab, sometimes in another, sometimes available, sometimes not... it is just begging for a smooth rework.