Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Sondrelk]

Yeah, there's some roleplay servers :^) that do this, with full customizability from rotating to recolouring to resizing and I think it's going to have completely spoiled me on player housing in WoW, I just can't imagine a world where blizzard player housing is not just swapping out items in pre-defined slots. Maybe that's just me being too cynical, though.

Player housing I think can be best equated to pet battles.
It was based on an extremely limited and niche reward system that got fleshed out into something that really doesn't do much more for the average player than give an extra collection tab.

I imagine it's also similar in that while it was okay when it first came out, it still needed several expansions before it became closer to what it could be with the dungeons and raiding with leashes achievements.
And even with all that it's still extremely niche, and likely only still supported because it's an addition that uses assets the game already has.

Wow does have a whole load of assets being made for every patch, but it would still require a framework that might not really gel with the game as a whole.
Pet battles are afterall tied to the open world, whereas housing would by design be removed from it. It would possibly have a similar reward system, but you can't really show off your cool unique house doodad like you can with the cool pet from the new raid for instance.

[Shadochi]

It's perfectly possible to do this in WoW, just needs some UI programmers (and obviously client/server devs to implement tranmission/saving of it) to work on it.

Or you know, they could hire Peter who already made this in his addon.

Oh I know its possible, I was just thinking of how blizz would do it with existing systems. Ideal would be to implement that system or a variation, my question is for what else would they use it?

[Marlamin]

Oh I know its possible, I was just thinking of how blizz would do it with existing systems. Ideal would be to implement that system or a variation, my question is for what else would they use it?

I don't think they could/would do it with only existing systems. They could theoretically have set locations for props as someone mentioned and have them pickable through the NPC gossip (e.g. guard menus) system also used for garrison monuments, but it'd be a pretty annoying user experience.

[Shadochi]

Player housing I think can be best equated to pet battles.
It was based on an extremely limited and niche reward system that got fleshed out into something that really doesn't do much more for the average player than give an extra collection tab.

I imagine it's also similar in that while it was okay when it first came out, it still needed several expansions before it became closer to what it could be with the dungeons and raiding with leashes achievements.
And even with all that it's still extremely niche, and likely only still supported because it's an addition that uses assets the game already has.

Wow does have a whole load of assets being made for every patch, but it would still require a framework that might not really gel with the game as a whole.
Pet battles are afterall tied to the open world, whereas housing would by design be removed from it. It would possibly have a similar reward system, but you can't really show off your cool unique house doodad like you can with the cool pet from the new raid for instance.

I really wish the new mobile game is pet battles. SO i can do them on the toilet/in the bus.

And while I feel like player housing is not what we need right now to save the game and the effort would be better suited on other stuff, housing could very well can be integrated in every existing system. Achievements, questing, WQ (some resource), professions, pvp, raiding, m+, thorghast like expansion system... just like pet battles have rewards from almost all systems.

Thats the beauty with an evergreen disconnected system.

[Zulggun]

Yeah we have option to fight dragons, demons, conquer and defend land but no, let's rotate a chair for ten hours straight and move a cabinet from one wall to another over and over again. Jesus Christ.

[Marlamin]

I really wish the new mobile game is pet battles. SO i can do them on the toilet/in the bus.

And while I feel like player housing is not what we need right now to save the game and the effort would be better suited on other stuff, housing could very well can be integrated in every existing system. Achievements, questing, WQ (some resource), professions, pvp, raiding, m+, thorghast like expansion system... just like pet battles have rewards from almost all systems.

Thats the beauty with an evergreen disconnected system.

It definitely shouldn't be the #1 priority given the current issues the game has, but I do think there's something more they can explore in player housing or a related system, at least in terms of character identity which is something WoW's been increasingly lacking at over the years.

Yeah we have option to fight dragons, demons, conquer and defend land but no, let's rotate a chair for ten hours straight and move a cabinet from one wall to another over and over again. Jesus Christ.

Different people enjoy different things.

[Zulggun]

Yeah well sure, some people love racing, and other enjoy snooker. Doesn't mean these things have to be available in WoW.

[Marlamin]

Yeah well sure, some people love racing, and other enjoy snooker. Doesn't mean these things have to be available in WoW.

You could say that for a lot of things in WoW. Without knowing how it would be implemented in the game, it is hard to claim it'd be out of place. Things like pet battles, Torghast, etc sound like pretty foreign concepts if you look at their feature sets, but if integrated into the game properly fit perfectly fine (and to an extent are actually fun).

[Raetary]

Yeah we have option to fight dragons, demons, conquer and defend land but no, let's rotate a chair for ten hours straight and move a cabinet from one wall to another over and over again. Jesus Christ.

No different than spending hours to create a matching transmog.

Strangely enough, i don't see anyone complain about that.

[SunspotAnims]

I've long argued that any form of creative player-driven content, such as housing, can only be good for the game at this point. Like with transmog, giving room for player expression helps build a stronger, more positive community.

I do also believe that housing could only be the tip of the iceberg. If the goal is to let players go nuts with world customization tools, why stop at housing? Let players have sandbox instances or even own their own sandbox servers where they can do so much more than just decorate a house.

[Marlamin]

I've long argued that any form of creative player-driven content, such as housing, can only be good for the game at this point. Like transmog, giving room for player expression helps build a stronger, more positive community.

I do also believe that housing could only be the tip of the iceberg. If the goal is to let players go nuts with world customization tools, which I believe would be good for the game, why stop at housing? Let players have sandbox instances or even own their own sandbox servers where they can do so much more than just decorate a house.

This is something that's been brought up on the council forums as well, although it was in an RP-specific thread, many of such features would benefit the game as a whole.

[Zulggun]

You could say that for a lot of things in WoW. Without knowing how it would be implemented in the game, it is hard to claim it'd be out of place. Things like pet battles, Torghast, etc sound like pretty foreign concepts if you look at their feature sets, but if integrated into the game properly fit perfectly fine (and to an extent are actually fun).

Pet battles I agree, out of place. But Tohrgast, how so? It's a glorified dungeon with a gimmick.

No different than spending hours to create a matching transmog.

Strangely enough, i don't see anyone complain about that.

Sure, that being said housing it's a way bigger undertaking for blizzard which makes it far more time consuming and will take more resources from other things that are more important in WoW.

[Marlamin]

Pet battles I agree, out of place. But Tohrgast, how so? It's a glorified dungeon with a gimmick.

Torghast as a concept alone is a roguelike, not something that'd 1:1 fit into WoW on the concepts definition, but the way it's integrated into WoW (e.g. garrison talents as well as enhancing existing abilities) makes it feel much more as a part of the game (like you said, a dungeon with gimmicks) even though they had to develop quite a few new systems to make it work. Whether or not it could still be called a roguelike experience is definitely up for debate since people have different definitions for the word as well as it having gone through quite a few changes since early 9.0, but I digress.

Sure, that being said housing it's a way bigger undertaking for blizzard which makes it far more time consuming and will take more resources from other things that are more important in WoW.

This is definitely true and has always been something Blizzard struggles with. It'd be a bigger undertaking than Torghast was for example, but if integrated well, e.g. with the upcoming profession revamp, it could be something they should put some time into at least exploring.

[Raetary]

I mean lol, some people spend hours calculating gold on the AH.
Others RP.
Some more plan their mount and pet collection.
Some spend hours doing pet battles.
Some work on their achievements, of which a ton of them don't even involve fighting.
Professions? Spending hours collecting ores and herbs? standing around for an hour waiting for the crafting bar to tick?
World events? "You could be killing ÜBER-GODS but instead you chose to collect chocolate eggs for the easter bunny!"

It's almost as if you don't fight dragons, demons, etc. all the time.

Sure, that being said housing it's a way bigger undertaking for blizzard which makes it far more time consuming and will take more resources from other things that are more important in WoW.

Which is a fair argument, but its not the one you made earlier.

"You could fight demons instead!" is just a ridiculous stance.

[Nymrohd]

This is something that's been brought up on the council forums as well, although it was in an RP-specific thread, many of such features would benefit the game as a whole.

I honestly feel that if they where to ever do a revamp, a great way to do zone content that lasts months instead of days is a server or region wide events about building new towns or rebuilding any number of places destroyed over the Cataclysm, factions wars etc. Now that would not be housing; it would be something in between Garrisons, Broken Isles contributions and Isle of Quel'Danas/Isle of Thunder. A zone wide event with dailies/world quests where players get to choose individually to contribute to different buildings and each unlock adds more dailies with possible events happening at different stages of completion. Once done, you can keep contributing for gold or even a local paragon-style rep or Renown system that grants collectibles. And you could have a local chronicler (the innkeeper, a librarian, the town mayor) who lets you relive the scenarios from the different progression events for people who join in late. This would let people contribute to building back the world, even if the choice would be entirely illusory.

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This is definitely true and has always been something Blizzard struggles with. It'd be a bigger undertaking than Torghast was for example, but if integrated well, e.g. with the upcoming profession revamp, it could be something they should put some time into at least exploring.

I think a crucial part is that much of what keeps the system alive after release is done anyway. They will still keep making new doodads and WMOs for zones/dungeons/raids that can be repurposed as furnishing and housing. So while the initial investment in building the system is significant, maintaining the system will require far less work since it feeds of assets required to be built for other content anyway. And it allows them to monetize such assets more deeply than they can now.

[Zulggun]

I mean lol, some people spend hours calculating gold on the AH.
Others RP.
Some more plan their mount and pet collection.
Some spend hours doing pet battles.
Some work on their achievements, of which a ton of them don't even involve fighting.
Professions? Spending hours collecting ores and herbs? standing around for an hour waiting for the crafting bar to tick?
World events? "You could be killing ÜBER-GODS but instead you chose to collect chocolate eggs for the easter bunny!"

It's almost as if you don't fight dragons, demons, etc. all the time.




Which is a fair argument, but its not the one you made earlier.

"You could fight demons instead!" is just a ridiculous stance.

I don't think it's ridiculous at all. Combat, adventure and overcoming enemies is the core of the game, always has been. I don't think we should dilute the game too much with weird side tasks, otherwise as I said earlier we gonna have racing or snooker as a expansion features.

[Wangming]

I don't think it's ridiculous at all. Combat, adventure and overcoming enemies is the core of the game, always has been. I don't think we should dilute the game too much with weird side tasks, otherwise as I said earlier we gonna have racing or snooker as a expansion features.

And would that be such a bad thing? Side content is what you entertain yourself with, between patches. Otherwise, you unsub. Just look at what WoW streamers do when they aren't streaming WoW. Asmon spent hours doing dungeons and lottery in the Gold Saucer. And there was a pretty long period of time when all he did was breed racing chocobos.

Shit, it isn't exclusive to multiplayer games either. Gwent in Witcher 3 got so popular it got its own game.
Just because the core gameplay is griefing low-level players, and grinding mythic+, it does not mean that's all it can or should be.

[draugril]

Or it could reward customization options (Red eyes and undead skin) to finally be able to look like one.

Seems quite plausible. These sorts of additions used to be pipe dreams, but the Night Warrior questline opened up a world of possibilities. This would be a very logical place to begin to expand on that type of reward.

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I honestly feel that if they where to ever do a revamp, a great way to do zone content that lasts months instead of days is a server or region wide events about building new towns or rebuilding any number of places destroyed over the Cataclysm, factions wars etc. Now that would not be housing; it would be something in between Garrisons, Broken Isles contributions and Isle of Quel'Danas/Isle of Thunder. A zone wide event with dailies/world quests where players get to choose individually to contribute to different buildings and each unlock adds more dailies with possible events happening at different stages of completion. Once done, you can keep contributing for gold or even a local paragon-style rep or Renown system that grants collectibles. And you could have a local chronicler (the innkeeper, a librarian, the town mayor) who lets you relive the scenarios from the different progression events for people who join in late. This would let people contribute to building back the world, even if the choice would be entirely illusory.

I would love to see a smaller-scale AQ40/Firmament/Garrisons hybrid system, allowing the players to rebuild certain areas, and allowing their collective choices to ultimately decide what buildings are chosen and where they're placed. Alas, server identity has more-or-less been hardcoded out of the game, so this sort of system wouldn't work anymore.

[Nymrohd]

Seems quite plausible. These sorts of additions used to be pipe dreams, but the Night Warrior questline opened up a world of possibilities. This would be a very logical place to begin to expand on that type of reward.

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I would love to see a smaller-scale AQ40/Firmament/Garrisons hybrid system, allowing the players to rebuild certain areas, and allowing their collective choices to ultimately decide what buildings are chosen and where they're placed. Alas, server identity has more-or-less been hardcoded out of the game, so this sort of system wouldn't work anymore.

I mean the only choice could be what gets built first. And as we saw during Legion if you give people the choice to contribute to one of several buildings, there is no way to control what gets built first; people will do whatever they want. Which would not make the locations unique but it would make the progression different in each region (and even create a bit of competition between regions on who finishes first).

[Wangming]

I would love to see a smaller-scale AQ40/Firmament/Garrisons hybrid system, allowing the players to rebuild certain areas, and allowing their collective choices to ultimately decide what buildings are chosen and where they're placed. Alas, server identity has more-or-less been hardcoded out of the game, so this sort of system wouldn't work anymore.

Well assuming they don't want to hardcode server identity back in, they can always track popular choices across ALL servers. We figure out the layout for them and they can pretend they listen to players. It's a win-win situation