Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Hitei]

I would love to see Dragonsworn actualized as wild class with a single spec that encompasses all 5 flights. Capable of every role (but not at once).

It could function in a way there they channel up to 3 flights at once to give a ton of combos for different playstyles rather than having dictated specs. Primary -> Secondary -> Tertiary flights they drawn power from and adapt their playstyle accordingly.

This sounds like a balancing nightmare, and I have to imagine that even if you could get all.. 125? combinations reasonably close, you'd run into the same issue as release DKs and covenants, where even though theoretically the specs can do the different roles, community discourse basically just comes down to: "Black > Green > Bronze will provide you with the most comprehensive defensive toolkit, so that is ideal for tanking".

[Nymrohd]

Kind of why I would prefer it be something unique. Nothing against concepts with each flight having its own spec but as you said, a lot of them are redundant probably other than bronze and black.

I totally get people wanting the class fantasy. I don't see why a dragon class couldn't implore heavy racial aesthetics like DHs do. I'm guessing the story arc of Dragonflight is going to be unity over division anyway.

I think it makes sense to me for it not to be a dragon class but to just be a dragon. Probably because I am a TTRPG player first and foremost and that's how it has been done in tabletop in the past; just made it a class of its own. I could see Draconid as a race but I just don't know why it would ever join either faction.

[Zankai27]

This sounds like a balancing nightmare, and I have to imagine that even if you could get all.. 125? combinations reasonably close, you'd run into the same issue as release DKs and covenants, where even though theoretically the specs can do the different roles, community discourse basically just comes down to: "Black > Green > Bronze will provide you with the most comprehensive defensive toolkit, so that is ideal for tanking".

So when I was trying to work out a concept for my Chromatic melee spec, I first had an insane idea to make it a melee/phys ranged hybrid. After realizing that was a nightmare, I thought:

“What if using certain Flights moves would combine them into a new move?”

Ex: Black = “Stalactite” into Green = “Dream Venom” turns both buttons into “Caustic Mire” or something before it’s used.

After trying to actually get that to work, I gave up and settled for a simpler rotation system because that’s just too much damn work and it’d be hella confusing for players.

Less is more, in class design.

[Ferlion]

The problems with the writing really all stem from BfA, the lack of Jailer foreshadowing notwithstanding.
BfA came out at the tail-end, and by that consequence was likely written in the middle of the "Mystery Box" writing craze that died an ignoble death once GoT Season 8 and Star Wars 8 came out, when everyone realized that you cannot always expect to write yourself out of a hole you have made if you never considered how this would work to begin with.

BfA started with the whole Teldrassil thing, and if we (I think quite rightly) assume that this was done solely for the promotional materials, then everything fall,s into place.
Blizzard didnt properly think the logistics of this event through, not in-game, nor on a meta level. It seemed to have been intended as Theramore 2.0, just with even more opportunities for players to get invested. However because it's a character action that's wildly reprehensible the story essentially ended up falling in on itself when any morally grey undertone couldnt quite support the whole "Horde are willing participants in genocide, and don't seem interested in doing anything about it."
On a Meta level however the problem becomes how do you reconcile the player engagement into player satisfaction and catharsis? In the end nothing could quite live up to all that buildup.

In the end everything ended up being pinned on Sylvanas, which is narratively unsatisfactory, but also probably the only reasonable option the writers had left at that point. Logically the story should have ended with the Horde being forcibly dismantled, but this is clearly impossible in an MMO.
This problem ended up being carried over into SL, where Blizzard tried their damndest to finally rid themselves of the stench of BfA, but because there was nothing the story really had to sink it's teeth into the probably figured Sylvanas was the only marketable character, and they didnt seem interested in rocking the boat by taking a firm stance on whether she was reprehensible or not, which ended up with this weak ending.

SL was in many ways doomed from the start, since just like BfA, the story hinges on Sylvanas, and nothing could pick up the pieces her shattered character left after Legion and BfA.

Teldrassil is an interesting one because Blizzard finally just pulled the trigger on it. They've been trying to destroy Teldrassil, or at least Darnassus, since pre-Cataclysm. It almost happened in MoP.

[Nymrohd]

Teldrassil is an interesting one because Blizzard finally just pulled the trigger on it. They've been trying to destroy Teldrassil, or at least Darnassus, since pre-Cataclysm. It almost happened in MoP.

Honestly I think they might have wanted to destroy Teldrassil because it is unsalvageable when it comes to a revamp. If they want to revamp the world at some point (hopefully now) while keeping the original geography (so mostly retexturing, replacing doodads with HD versions and perhaps sculpting territory that is not used) Teldrassil just cannot be saved. It was far too ambitious for what they could do with the engine at the time and it would just have to be replaced completely with a different concept.

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This sounds like a balancing nightmare, and I have to imagine that even if you could get all.. 125? combinations reasonably close, you'd run into the same issue as release DKs and covenants, where even though theoretically the specs can do the different roles, community discourse basically just comes down to: "Black > Green > Bronze will provide you with the most comprehensive defensive toolkit, so that is ideal for tanking".

What if you are chromatic though and you can switch colors but with a cooldown? It would create a two-tier tactic choice throughout the fight where you'd have to choose WHEN to switch so you could utilize an ability of a different flight, knowing you'd be locked in that flight for some of the encounter.

[Jokubas]

Teldrassil is an interesting one because Blizzard finally just pulled the trigger on it. They've been trying to destroy Teldrassil, or at least Darnassus, since pre-Cataclysm. It almost happened in MoP.

I am crossing my fingers so hard that they let it stay destroyed.

I'm really curious as to what the thought process behind Teldrassil/Darnassus was from a development point of view, because it's always been super weird lore-wise. Before World of Warcraft, the night elves were implied to live around Hyjal and I think one source even cited Moonglade as their capital? Growing another World Tree overnight is already a little weird when Nordrassil was supposed to be healing and shouldn't take any less time to return to normal than a whole new tree, but uprooting their entire civilization and moving it off the mainland to this new place is just really, really strange, and that's not even getting into the ambiguity of the night elf language being called Darnassian (sure, realistically a shared root is more than possible, but in a meta sense it feels like it was designed by someone who just assumed their massive capital tree was ancient and not no more than four years old).

I would much prefer the night elves have a proper mainland capital, and then maybe the ashes of Teldrassil can be visited in a new Kalidar zone. If they can ever match the concept art of Teldrassil in game, just do it on Nordrassil.

[Raetary]

Eh, a simple chromatic dragon class with multiple specs for each flight power would be better for everyone involved, than some weird single spec stance thing on a cooldown.

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Teldrassil is an interesting one because Blizzard finally just pulled the trigger on it. They've been trying to destroy Teldrassil, or at least Darnassus, since pre-Cataclysm. It almost happened in MoP.

Can you blame them?
While the concept and fantasy of it is great, it's just a big ugly stump in execution.

[Catastrophy349]

Can't believe how close we are getting! Almost there! This week is going to be so HYPE and lots of speculation. Then, the Monday before is going to be so interesting. Tuesday the 19th is going to be a fun day. So excited for everyone to see what's coming next!

[Raetary]

If they do really want to revitalize Teldrassil, they'll probably do it by instancing the zone and keep the 2D background image in Darkshore.

[Jokubas]

Can't believe how close we are getting! Almost there! This week is going to be so HYPE and lots of speculation. Then, the Monday before is going to be so interesting. Tuesday the 19th is going to be a fun day. So excited for everyone to see what's coming next!

Right now I'm really torn between wanting something new to talk about, like a bigger leak than just the name, but also thinking that maybe I should just walk away for a bit because I kinda hate to get it spoiled this close. It's just that things are in a kind of lull for me in real life right now so these last couple of weeks are taking forever. I'm fairly optimistic though. I'm planning on having fun with the day even if I end up hating the announcement.

[Master Factician]

I'm actually hoping their new experimental gameplay team was founded based on some sort of idea they'll hopefully start exploring in 10.0 that isn't borrowed power for a single expansion. It's obviously a big "dose of hopium" but I hope that Blizzard has finally figured out that borrowed power (and by extension garrison systems) is something they've gotten away with a few too many times now.

Every person on Twitter I've seen mentioning being on that team is, or was on the Classic WoW team. Could be a coincidence? Maybe they had less work to do on WoTLK so were offered a place on this team? Idk.

[SniperCT]

I am crossing my fingers so hard that they let it stay destroyed.

I'm really curious as to what the thought process behind Teldrassil/Darnassus was from a development point of view, because it's always been super weird lore-wise. Before World of Warcraft, the night elves were implied to live around Hyjal and I think one source even cited Moonglade as their capital? Growing another World Tree overnight is already a little weird when Nordrassil was supposed to be healing and shouldn't take any less time to return to normal than a whole new tree, but uprooting their entire civilization and moving it off the mainland to this new place is just really, really strange, and that's not even getting into the ambiguity of the night elf language being called Darnassian (sure, realistically a shared root is more than possible, but in a meta sense it feels like it was designed by someone who just assumed their massive capital tree was ancient and not no more than four years old).

I would much prefer the night elves have a proper mainland capital, and then maybe the ashes of Teldrassil can be visited in a new Kalidar zone. If they can ever match the concept art of Teldrassil in game, just do it on Nordrassil.

Honestly the two best options for a new nelf capital is hyjal, or growing a new tree on or near gilneas.

If they ARE revamping Lordaeron, the latter would be a good place for it and solidify the friendship between the two.

[Hitei]

What if you are chromatic though and you can switch colors but with a cooldown? It would create a two-tier tactic choice throughout the fight where you'd have to choose WHEN to switch so you could utilize an ability of a different flight, knowing you'd be locked in that flight for some of the encounter.

The CD ability in the other flight would have to be completely broken to warrant you switching off your highest DPS/HPS/survivability flight. And then you'd just be stuck doing lower output until you could switch back in. Sounds very frustrating.

If you're going that route you might as well just make the flights old style stances rather than a locking CD, and then force stance dancing to switch to say, black to apply/reapply shadowflame dot, then bronze to use some ability that hastens you, then to red for main DPS abilities.

But that sounds pretty exhausting. Stance dancing is already rather taxing just when working with ~2 stances, let alone five.

-

Your best hypothetical from a chromatic spec would probably be something where your resource bar is instead five chromatic bars that fill from abilities and naturally at different rates. And then when full you can activate some "draconic ascension" ability to temporarily shift into a drake/dragon/whelp of that flight and use some hard hitting/healing/defensey abilities for a brief bit. With the filler between that being a mix of attacks and spells from all the flights.

But this seems rather silly imho. You're pursuing "uniqueness" at the cost of watering down each flight into a tiny minor aspect and in doing so fail to actually capture the identity of any of them, because you're ending up with a handful of bronze abilities, no different than a mage, instead of a whole bronze kit. You're better off just doing the five specs. You're not going to run into problems with other classes unless you deliberately do so.

•Black melee DPS with shadowflame and magma, maybe a touch of void. Maybe take this chance to make a sword and board DPS spec gladiator.
•Blue tanking spec, your gish spellbreaker/spellblade, using a spear or staff and a bunch of arcane and arcane-frost infused attacks.
•Green ranged DPS using poisons and nature damage, no need for "druidic" aesthetics, lean into the Vanilla era green flight of swamps and marshlands.
•Red healer spec, using revitalizing/cauterizing flames, built to feel like "attacking" your friendly targets rather than the typical heals.
•Bronze ranged DPS using damaging temporal and sand spells, hastening and duplicating yourself, infinite effects in its cooldowns, etc.

[therumblings]

A dragon class has so many spec possibilities which is why I am excited and hoping they do it. You could easily have 5 specs or more, and maybe even the first class with two different tanking specs.

[Zankai27]

A dragon class has so many spec possibilities which is why I am excited and hoping they do it. You could easily have 5 specs or more, and maybe even the first class with two different tanking specs.

It’s such an amazing idea I’m glad it’s finally getting more popular. Dragons have so much to offer as a class identity that I just really hope it happens.

Part of me is hoping a dragon class is why Alexstrasza has a spear/staff in that key art, as she’s never been depicted with a weapon before. Fingers crossed!

[Jokubas]

•Blue tanking spec, your gish spellbreaker/spellblade, using a spear or staff and a bunch of arcane and arcane-frost infused attacks.

If I could finally play this:
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/wo...20050515012903
I'd be happy.

[Nibelheimy]

Just gunna throw out my personal opinion on this.

I don't mind the idea of a dragon related class, but mixing the flights in one spec is gunna make me enjoy them less.

Personally, I'd love a chi'ji styled monk, but I can't really make that. Even with glyphs and specific abilities it doesn't quite cut it for me for mist weaver. Now I'm not saying that a 5 spec class is the answer to this..

I love the idea of playing a shaman, but whenever I try I can never stick with them regardless of spec. Maybe restoration is more specific, I've never played a healer spec max level so I wouldn't know, but I would much rather a spec focused on each element.

Fire for elemental, wind for enhancement, water for resto and an earth tank spec. I understand that may never happen, but thats just why I can't stick with shamans. I make my characters with specs in mind, not classes as a whole.

If I wanted to play a dps dragon related class and It was a mixture of black, blue and bronze flight themed abilities, or a healer mixed red, green and bronze, it would really throw off my fantasy with the spec. Maybe that's just a me issue however.

[therumblings]

Just gunna throw out my personal opinion on this.

I don't mind the idea of a dragon related class, but mixing the flights in one spec is gunna make me enjoy them less.

Personally, I'd love a chi'ji styled monk, but I can't really make that. Even with glyphs and specific abilities it doesn't quite cut it for me for mist weaver. Now I'm not saying that a 5 spec class is the answer to this..

I love the idea of playing a shaman, but whenever I try I can never stick with them regardless of spec. Maybe restoration is more specific, I've never played a healer spec max level so I wouldn't know, but I would much rather a spec focused on each element.

Fire for elemental, wind for enhancement, water for resto and an earth tank spec. I understand that may never happen, but thats just why I can't stick with shamans. I make my characters with specs in mind, not classes as a whole.

If I wanted to play a dps dragon related class and It was a mixture of black, blue and bronze flight themed abilities, or a healer mixed red, green and bronze, it would really throw off my fantasy with the spec. Maybe that's just a me issue however.

I agree, anything less than a 5 spec class would surely be disappointing, but at the bare minimum I'd expect a 3 spec class and two dragonflights are just left out or merged.

[Zankai27]

Making a Chromatic dragon class that uses them all is a perfectly fine way to represent them and mixing them in specs while focusing on a particular thing is the most authentic way to do it with today’s class design.

5 specs is just too much to ask for and the point of a class is to mix elements while specializing in others.

Ex: Black Dragonflight inspired tank spec heavily leans into fire, big weapons, armor plates, but can still use various base abilities from other specs, and talents allow them to use them better, etc.

I like to think I created a good basis for this idea

[Khaza-R]

This sounds like a balancing nightmare, and I have to imagine that even if you could get all.. 125? combinations reasonably close, you'd run into the same issue as release DKs and covenants, where even though theoretically the specs can do the different roles, community discourse basically just comes down to: "Black > Green > Bronze will provide you with the most comprehensive defensive toolkit, so that is ideal for tanking".

Good points. I don't think every combination needs to be balanced. That's sort of the point of a radial class. There's always a best solutions for a given scenario, the skill cap is knowing when to employ that specific combination.

Alternatively, I think the idea you posts a few comments down also a good solution. A sort of chromatic weaving could be very different and interesting. The issue there is that its innately a build up spec and those tend to terribly outside of long boss fights. As others have said, there's a lot of iterations of how a hypothetical dragon class could go. Its exciting to speculate at least, even if we don't get one come April 19th.