Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[huth]

The new zones/lvl scales/stuff...

Which would be hidden from your addon as well.

[Cosmic Janitor]

I would be very much surprised if the game had a data model that allowed for addons to browse intended level ranges. I'm not even sure if displaying those was ever part of the base game or only ever an addon added features, which in turn would suggest that the underlying table was part of the addons as well. Certainly now it would be obsolete with scaling of zones to player level.

[DiscipleofCazicThule]

It is interesting that the add-on pointed to an area that is being heavily speculated on and it's sending a human paladin there. It's probably nothing but it is interesting to say the least.

[Vakir]

Very true, but given that the epilogue content so far seems to be centered in the Old World, I doubt that we're going to the Maw just to check up on Anduin and Sylvanas. The Judgement cutscene wrapped up that plotline pretty satisfyingly if you ask me.

Secondly, if we were to see them in the Maw, wouldn't there be a new Sylvanas model too? Even if it was the same model, just with conversation animations, you'd think the two would be paired, no?

That's true.

Flashback Anduin model? Anduin in a cool cloak showing him entering to help Sylvanas to explain to non book owners? Idk

[Syegfryed]

Wait, its serious that Anduin went with Sylvanus to the Maw?

Tell me its an elaborated joke

[Vakir]

Wait, its serious that Anduin went with Sylvanus to the Maw?

Tell me its an elaborated joke

It's almost a certainty. They describe the clanging of armor that she hears suddenly and it echoes an earlier chapter that describes his plate in that way. And it's not gonna be Nathanos (not the least of which because he wears leather) because it's described as unexpected, but that immediately follows her explicitly stating that she WILL find him, which would make it...expected. She even reflects on his bullshit about the light of hope just following the reveal of the mysterious figure.

Anduin showed up to help Sylvanas. Really. And while it's great that he fucks off for a bit, the biggest problem with that is it means they'll be done sooner.

The only other thing I can imagine is...Arthas, but they pretty explicitly never sundered his soul, or the meme'd Garithos joke. But it's gotta be Anduin unless Golden is so incompetent to have her go "man, I'm gonna find my love---OH HEY THERE HE IS."

[Vynestra]

It's almost a certainty. They describe the clanging of armor that she hears suddenly and it echoes an earlier chapter that describes his plate in that way. And it's not gonna be Nathanos (not the least of which because he wears leather) because it's described as unexpected, but that immediately follows her explicitly stating that she WILL find him, which would make it...expected. She even reflects on his bullshit about the light of hope just following the reveal of the mysterious figure.

Anduin showed up to help Sylvanas. Really. And while it's great that he fucks off for a bit, the biggest problem with that is it means they'll be done sooner.

The only other thing I can imagine is...Arthas, but they pretty explicitly never sundered his soul, or the meme'd Garithos joke. But it's gotta be Anduin unless Golden is so incompetent to go "man, I'm gonna find my love---OH HEY THERE HE IS."

I'm not so sure he's staying down there until she's finished, but honestly, it's kind of a fitting temporary end to their story together. And maybe he will stay until they're finished, and it will be sooner than expected.

I was hoping for at least two expansions without Anduin. But how can Anduin leave his entire kingdom in someone elses hands and just..expect it back when he returns? Very much a garrosh blaming thrall for leaving him his mess type situation.

I also don't think turalyon will make any bad decisions this xpac, but if the xpac following this one is light vs. void, then maybe. But then again, the turalyon alleria combo makes me think light vs. void wouldn't quite happen as we anticipate if ever. It may just be light ie: yrel invading, and the void not being involved.

[Hitei]

I'm not so sure he's staying down there until she's finished, but honestly, it's kind of a fitting temporary end to their story together. And maybe he will stay until they're finished, and it will be sooner than expected.

I was hoping for at least two expansions without Anduin. But how can Anduin leave his entire kingdom in someone elses hands and just..expect it back when he returns?

Because that's how hereditary monarchies work unless the person acting as a steward decides they want power.

[Vakir]

I was hoping for at least two expansions without Anduin. But how can Anduin leave his entire kingdom in someone elses hands and just..expect it back when he returns? Very much a garrosh blaming thrall for leaving him his mess type situation.

He shouldn't from a narrative standpoint, and frankly having him be in charge with one of the two factions makes for a conflict killer anyway. If he's going to remain the protagonist, begrudgingly, he should work outside of the Alliance/Horde dichotomy if they intend it to continue in-story, even if it's eventually going to be purely symbolic in gameplay systems. I'm not saying there should be a mega-war again, I hate that shit, but there should be some tension.

I also don't think turalyon will make any bad decisions this xpac, but if the xpac following this one is light vs. void, then maybe. But then again, the turalyon alleria combo makes me think light vs. void wouldn't quite happen as we anticipate if ever. It may just be light ie: yrel invading, and the void not being involved.

Having Turalyon pivot that soon is silly, agreed. I think it would make sense for the decisions and tension to build up for an expansion or so before Yrel shows up and if we get Lightbound/God-King Turalyon at all, we get him in 11.0.

[Polybius]

Hidden somewhere within game files, doh?

By any chance, do you have any undead characters, even ones you've deleted? Do your folders still contain old character data?

[Vynestra]

He shouldn't from a narrative standpoint, and frankly having him be in charge with one of the two factions makes for a conflict killer anyway. If he's going to remain the protagonist, begrudgingly, he should work outside of the Alliance/Horde dichotomy if they intend it to continue in-story, even if it's eventually going to be purely symbolic in gameplay systems.



Having Turalyon pivot that soon is silly, agreed. I think it would make sense for the decisions and tension to build up for an expansion or so before Yrel shows up and if we get Lightbound/God-King Turalyon at all, we get him in 11.0.

Turalyon's character just doesn't fit the whisper about him, he's a 1k+ year old human who the "craziest" recent thing he did was attack illidan after he blew up his mommy xe'ra, which is kind of a fitting reaction. He just doesn't seem like he'd bring the alliance to ruin based on his own decisions. I really am not sure I buy that he'll ever be a villain.

I could see yrel coming to this timeline with the light and him being sympathetic to their cause, and allying the alliance with them, but then it ends up being a bad decision down the line (cause obviously). But I don't see him leading the alliance into a holy crusade to light forge everyone, unless he somehow is convinced that it's the -only- way to beat, say an incoming impending void doom or some crap which is what Xe'ra was leading him on with illidan essentially.

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Yeah, I agree. I'm not against squish sometimes, but doing it on every expansion is getting ridiculous.

I don't particularly care about a number squish every expansion, just not a level one every expansion. We adjust to squishes so quickly it's not the concern it used to be for them. You forget pretty quickly how insane your damage was the previous expansion after a number squish. It's really based on how quickly a mob dies, not how big the numbers are.

[Vakir]

Turalyon's character just doesn't fit the whisper about him, he's a 1k+ year old human who the "craziest" recent thing he did was attack illidan after he blew up his mommy xe'ra, which is kind of a fitting reaction. He just doesn't seem like he'd bring the alliance to ruin based on his own decisions. I really am not sure I buy that he'll ever be a villain.

I could see yrel coming to this timeline with the light and him being sympathetic to their cause, and allying the alliance with them, but then it ends up being a bad decision down the line (cause obviously). But I don't see him leading the alliance into a holy crusade to light forge everyone, unless he somehow is convinced that it's the -only- way to beat, say an incoming impending void doom or some crap which is what Xe'ra was leading him on with illidan essentially.

Hell, I'd argue his reaction to Illidan was incredibly subdued relative to the crime. He eats a bare-handed block from someone too exhausted to fight back and he just kinda gives up there. But the idea of Legion's story was that we were always facing down an apocalypse that required compromise.

And like I said - IF they do it, it would take an entire expansion at least. Not when, just "if." He could just as easily be a reasonable Light figure to counterpoint Scarlets, Yrel, etc.

I think we're all also tired of killing old characters for no fucking reason. It was bad starting in TBC with the Illidari, Bladefist, Zul'jin, etc. and it just kept going.

[Vynestra]

While I agree that overall the contribution of leveling to endgame is miniscule if you look at the expansion as a whole, there is ceraintly a not insignificant portion of the playerbase that very much cares about it and bases a $40-$70 purchase on it. A massive amount of resources are also used for the leveling content each expansion, even though they have become "better" at reusing parts of it for endgame systems (dungeons, quests becoming wold quests, reoptainable treasures etc.).

Even then, there are massive parts, especially when it comes to story and discovery, that are burned through just to get to endgame. So a discussion is warranted if the current implementation is actually a good use of those afore mentioned resources, especially from a developer's point of view, which in turn is what we use to extrapolate what Blizzard might do in the future and estimate the veracity of "leaks".

I do think re: the no leveling, it would be something blizzard would gather information well ahead of time to gauge feedback. And I also think it would feel really weird to do all the quest zones without leveling, I mean 5 zereth-mortis esque end game zones sounds fun but also like idk they already turn leveling zones into endgame zones via world quests so unless it allows them to focus a lot more on the end game aspect of the zone (which it shouldn't since the storylines would still exist) then I don't see a benefit of having no levels added. If the only difference is, you don't gain xp, and instead it gives you progress towards endgame, then it seems pointless to not just make them leveling.

At the core, it's just a matter of "do the quests give xp" or not, and do you add 10 levels. It really seems like it'd be -more- work to have no leveling, as they'd need to add extra rewards/incentive to do the zone storyline, since there's no xp to be gained. And then they'd also need to add more end game content to the zone.

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Hell, I'd argue his reaction to Illidan was incredibly subdued relative to the crime. He eats a bare-handed block from someone too exhausted to fight back and he just kinda gives up there. But the idea of Legion's story was that we were always facing down an apocalypse that required compromise.

And like I said - IF they do it, it would take an entire expansion at least. Not when, just "if." He could just as easily be a reasonable Light figure to counterpoint Scarlets, Yrel, etc.

I think we're all also tired of killing old characters for no fucking reason. It was bad starting in TBC with the Illidari, Bladefist, Zul'jin, etc. and it just kept going.

I definitely think he'd be a main character like tyrande in slands with his own major story arc in a light-themed expansion, but I don't think he'd become a total baddie.

Definitely more to explore in terms of how willing he is to go for the light.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

It goes both ways. I also don't understand why everything dark or deep gets minimized into the label of "edgy" and other similar memes. The whole idea is that fighting fire with fire is the pragmatic approach which is essentially the only way in a universe that wants to be stern about its threats.

The point is that under the worst circumstances, you need to get your hands dirty. If the character is afforded the luxury of being the shiny hero, it tends to show how low the bar is set.

Now, if you want to establish a character that ends up being devoid of "dark" qualities as a result of certain growth, of course, that can be deep without going into darker territory. In our case, I just can't take the notion of being baptized by the Red Dragonflight as a compelling approach to any established or speculated threat to the WoW universe.

I'm going to go ahead and dramatically overanalyze the situation and go ahead and share a few explanation for why I think the whole "dark and deep" angle doesn't work anymore from a few perspectives—firstly the Watsonian (i.e. why it doesn't really make sense in-universe), secondly the Doylist (i.e. why it's generally lost its luster artistically).

Firstly, let's go for the whole idea of using fire to fight fire from a Watsonian perspective—firstly, why? The Dragonflights we know have done pretty well and effective. I've never really seen them be ineffective in any given situation—if anything, they're some of the few "heroic" factions in WoW with their heads out of their asses alongside the Army of the Light and Quel'Thalas under Lor'Themar (whose competence is conditional on Lor'Themar, I must add). The Red Dragonflight are surprisingly effective wherever they pop up, and their capacities are generally useful. They've shown their competence in regards to Bolvar, solving Deathwing (even if that also came with making the Titans themselves look a tad daft based on establishing a defense force against ... the corrupted version of that defense force, which only needs to exist assuming that defense force exists to get corrupted in the first place) and helping us out with the whole timeways mess.

I think the Bronze Dragonflight are one of the few factions in WoW whose effectual nature are more shown than told, which is a shame because they're not really that relevant in current lore. Arguably, they're the most powerful force that currently exists based on their ability to alter the past in ways that actually stick, seemingly without creating alternate timelines. This essentially means any event in WarCraft lore is wholly open to them and anything that has or ever will exist in some way accessible to them. Time is essentially one of the most powerful forces in any setting, including real life—if you have a lot of folks whose entire shtick is giving the finger to things like "permanence of consequences", "ignorance of the future", "inaccessibility to anything and anyone" and "dying", it definitely indicates a degree of power. In fact, even without their original powers, the Bronze Dragonflight are extremely powerful simply because they still can travel through time, even if it's not with nearly as much clarity or skill as they used to—with this, we've also seen the Timewalkers pop up, who can do everything the Bronze Dragonflight can and ever could do albeit without the additional stipulation of "being actual fucking Dragons". I'd consider that even the Void Elves don't really have as much of an ace in their sleeve as the Bronze Dragonflight and the Timewalkers do. Even in terms of predicting the future, the Void only shows a variety of possibly-unreliable possibilities whereas the Bronze Dragonflight can access, experience, and research every possible outcome of any given action thoroughly and effectively with full reliability and a complete awareness of the circumstances that would lead to that outcome.

Secondly, and somewhat more underwhelmingly, the Red Dragonflight are still plenty effective at what they do. As I said, they're actually pretty consistently good at it, which is shocking a setting where good and being downright braindead go together hand-in-hand—firstly, they've consistently been useful leaders, effective combatants, and usually very helpful. We've seen their usefulness in clearing the Blight (otherwise a monumental task, as we've seen with the Plaguelands and Tirisfal) at Wrathgate, effectively combating the Black Dragonflight (though that also does relate to the Titan's braindeadedness, as was aforementioned) and in fighting against the Legion during the War of the Ancients.

The Blue Dragonflight aren't quite as self-evidently powerful—however, keep in mind that their whole shtick is "le arcane". "Le arcane" also conveniently happens to be the constituent force of the Titans, one of which is our whole objective. Generally, discounting the always-useful elements of "high intelligence" and "powerful Arcane magic", they also have access to something which is particularly important. If you recall from Chronicles, the reason why Malygos redirecting the Ley Lines was a bad idea was because it would euthanize the Titan inside Azeroth in the process. This essentially means that they are a perpetual "in case of disaster" button with some of the infrastructure that Malygos established still remaining. They may not have absolute power over magic, but they still have plenty of very dangerous relics, arcane magic, and the infrastructure from the Nexus War to exploit.

The Green Dragonflight have access to the nascent Titan's internal reality, default state, and considerable experience in contending with the Void and the way it corrupts the Titan's consciousness. This should be self-evidently useful.

The Black Dragonflight have Wrathion. They also have several conveniently cleansed and resistant eggs which could theoretically be used to restart the flight with great effectiveness. Other than that, they've been one of the most consistently intelligent and effective villains in WoW right up until they suddenly took a nosedive into stupidland with Cataclysm. With preexisting knowledge of the Old Gods that doesn't necessitate perpetually jumping around insanityland and the use of their own, extremely dangerous abilities against them, they already have everything they need to be an effective bulwark. Adding their seemingly inherently-manipulative (going off Wrathion) nature to the mix, this also means that they would be very effective at curtailing (or, where necessary, inciting) planetary conflict with minimal difficulty and ensuring compliance and cohesion from their confederates.

Conversely, what would Twilight Dragons really offer us? Aside from the aesthetic, they don't actually seem to have much in the way of Void-related power and any resistance they have is pretty plainly within the abilities of the Black Dragonflight. They're generally unproven, have historically been effortlessly-butchered by every wayward adventurer they come across, and they don't really have any actually useful abilities save for, as aforementioned, the same abilities that the Black Dragonflight except with the stipulation they have to make that their entire identity.


Now, for the Doylist objection, I simply don't see how "dark" and "deep" go hand-in-hand anymore. Depth necessitates profundity, and profundity necessitates nuance. Going around using your cool powers but being super-troubled about it isn't really dark nor deep. Perhaps if the Twilight Dragonflight made their shtick be more about resilience, austerity and resisting corruption on its own, that could be very interesting because it would explore how much resisting temptation helps in preventing evil from coming about, or it could simply give them a shtick that isn't really used. Although the Void Elves have something about resisting corruption in there, it isn't their central identity beyond some funny blurbs about "LE WHISPERS!!!" which we've never seen in action and the danger is more physical than moral, the resistance of moral corruption and the value of tenacity would be far more interesting to see from the Twilight Dragonflight than yet another (out of several—Demon Hunters, Warlocks, Death Knights, Void Elves, some Shadow Priests) coterie of bulging-eyed lunatics insisting that eating that guy's soul was absolutely necessary to protect us all from the evil vague threat that we defeated two expansions ago.

Ultimately, "using the bad guy's powers!!!" isn't really new or cutting-edge as an idea at all. In fact, I'd say the dark, deep antihero has been done to death. It's as much as a worn trope as any other which can be bad or good depending on execution, and most often the edgy antihero loses its appeal when exposed to a more cynical, nuanced audience who will eventually start to ask as many questions about Edgy McKillStab as they do about Glorious McBlondeAbs. A nuanced modern audience needs exactly that—nuance. We already have seen that the antihero trope in decline since the 90s, when it started to lose its appeal because it started to seem as one-dimensional as any knight in shining armor. The tropes have been explored, the potential has been exhausted.

If I were to draw it back to any particular source, the last time we really saw a fascinating and interesting "fight fire with fire" protagonist was Elric of Melnibone. What a lot of people forget was that Elric was more than just his edgy powers—he had a full character arc, the ways in which he was troubled were more than just his dark backstory and the powers he wielded, and the reason he was reliant on dark magic wasn't some kind of self-defeating "the only way to be evil is with evil" mindset but because of his weaknesses demanding desperate action. His desperation was interesting because it made his power seem necessary, even when we could see Hawkwood or Jerry Cornelius defeat the forces of Chaos and out-of-control Order with very traditionally heroic means. That, and Elric was meant to not be seen as a gritty anti-hero who was doing what all those preps didn't have the guts to do—he was very much evil, in fact. He was a hero, but he was also still evil by any account. He would engage in selfish or depraved behavior, he would torture a man simply because he didn't like the thought of his soul being part of his, and he would proudly work with demons to achieve his ends. Elric was less evil than other Melniboneans, but that's just saying "Rommel was less evil that Oskar Dirlewagner", because that's precisely the moral comparison to think of. Finally, the best part of Elric was that he showed that using evil to achieve your ends doesn't pay. The end result of a troubled antihero going around using evil, inherently corruptive powers is to be corrupted and turned from a troubled antihero to a troubled villain. That's nuance, profundity and depth—it shows you the psychology, growth and ultimate unsustainability of evil. Whereas a traditional hero may have cast off his temptations, Elric of Melnibone stood with them to the end—and he subsequently payed for it. His ultimate fate is to suffer from the inevitable result of his failures and perceived pragmatism, directly at the hands of the tool he used. Stormbringer strikes him down, metaphorically showing his own evil consuming his soul and killing him through those very actions in a literal, embodied sense.

Similarly, Arthas was a nuanced and interesting anti-hero before his corruption because he showed precisely why those traits were worth exploring—he gradually became increasingly convinced that the ends justified the means, but the interesting part of WarCraft III's story – which also set it apart from every edgy 90s antihero ever – was that it, like Elric's saga, showed precisely why the ends sometimes can't justify the means, why trying to practice utilitarianism without a balanced understanding of what constitutes a good decision in a utilitarian framework. The Culling of Stratholme was, by all means, a logical approach—it was not a bad idea at all, and it's very easy to understand that anyone could commit an action like that in desperation. Sure, perhaps there was an easier way—destroy the bridge and any exits, have the Lordaeron fleet blockade and open fire on the ships to trap the people of Stratholme in, and track and destroy any supplies previously procured from Stratholme. This was the rational utilitarian decision, but Arthas was desperate and made the wrong one—this shows us what unchecked pragmatism does. Sometimes, pragmatism isn't pragmatic. Even then, he could've turned back then, but he instead decided to set off to Northrend. When he reached Northrend, he was given several opportunities to turn back—his father's summons, the burning of the ships, and even before he picked up Frostmourne. If he'd listened to his father, his conscience, or Muradin, he could've saved several lives, including his own. It was through his consistent sequence of "fighting fire with fire" and doing what needed to be done that got him into his position. What started out as gritty pragmatism gradually became increasingly irrational until it was simply Arthas letting himself become the very kind of grimderp antihero that the Demon Hunters and Void Elves became, but then experienced something they (sadly) never experienced—eventually, the ends stopped justifying the means. His ends became increasingly selfish and prideful until he no longer was an anti-hero but a villain. Sure, Frostmourne helped, but he was ultimately responsible for his own downfall from the beginning. Everything up to his absolute corruption at the hands of Ner'zhul could've been prevented.

This also sort of relates to my idea on how to make the Twilight Dragonflight more interesting as antiheroes, too, as avoiding this could be their big shtick—they could be all about how they do remain honorable, fair and just in spite of their pragmatism and dark past.

Ultimately, people prefer Batman to Punisher for a reason—one has gritty, dark depth and the other is just a grimderp killfest who ultimately comes off as no different than the villains he fights unless he's contending with unironically over-the-top one-dimensional killpeopleists.

From an out-of-universe perspective, it also doesn't really work with being interesting because it doesn't subvert modern values. Previously, the "mainstream" was to be conformist, black-and-white and to respect authority. The counterculture of the time was to be nonconformist, to see things in shades of grey, and to question authority. Nowadays, the mainstream is to be excessively nonconformist to such an extent you just become conformist again, so gray-and-gray (or rather gray-and-absolute-evil-abyss) that you end up justifying anything so long as the baddie is worse than you, and always question traditional authority (at the behest of your authority figures). Consequently, the cool new counterculture is to oppose these things—thus, the interesting and nuanced thing that deviates from the norm now is to be collectivist, make nuanced but traditionally-inspired and stringent moral decisions, and to respect authority within reason even when providing healthy skepticism. Consequently, the idea of the edgy anti-hero simply is no longer needed on a societal level because of the changes in how society works and is perceived.

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Hell, I'd argue his reaction to Illidan was incredibly subdued relative to the crime. He eats a bare-handed block from someone too exhausted to fight back and he just kinda gives up there. But the idea of Legion's story was that we were always facing down an apocalypse that required compromise.

And like I said - IF they do it, it would take an entire expansion at least. Not when, just "if." He could just as easily be a reasonable Light figure to counterpoint Scarlets, Yrel, etc.

I think we're all also tired of killing old characters for no fucking reason. It was bad starting in TBC with the Illidari, Bladefist, Zul'jin, etc. and it just kept going.

Agreed. I'd prefer to have a good, effective authority figure who is generally pragmatic and reasonable but not a complete and absolute lunatic nor someone who just makes their doormat-esque nature their personality and substitutes turning the other cheek with offering your whole face up to people's shoes.

[delphiskye]

hmmm you cant acess the dragonflight source code anymore that page is not accessible anymore

[Vakir]

hmmm you cant acess the dragonflight source code anymore that page is not accessible anymore

They pulled it about a day later.

Streisand Effect is a hell of a drug, though.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

They pulled it about a day later.

Streisand Effect is a hell of a drug, though.

How to confirm a leak 101

[delphiskye]

i did have a random shower thought and a giggle what if dragonflight was the WoW mobile game i could hear this thread screaming for eons

[ercarp]

i did have a random shower thought and a giggle what if dragonflight was the WoW mobile game i could hear this thread screaming for eons

Mobile games don't usually have multiple different editions, including a Collector's Edition. The chances of it being a mobile game are about 0.5%.

[Local Ardenweald Faerie]

Mobile games don't usually have multiple different editions, including a Collector's Edition. The chances of it being a mobile game are about 0.5%.

So you're saying there's a chance...