Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Nymrohd]

They said nothing about alpha or beta did they? Not even a "Stay tuned"?

Evoker is just not for me. First off, no tank spec so no way I'd ever main it. And the race just doesn't look that great to me; the male humanoid form is cool I suppose and I will definitely roll one but doubt I'll focus on it.
On one hand that's not good but on the other hand as we had discussed, if we had gotten a multispec dragon race/class that actually was a dragon maybe that would just be too cool and harmful for the game.

UI Revamp is . . . OK? Rift let you move the UI around with no addons how many years ago? Ofc will check it and it could be interesting, especially if its not just about utility but also about cosmetics. Heck maybe they could let you earn cosmetic UI elements for in game activities down the line?

Talent revamp I have no comment until beta. Could be good, could be a pointless. Definitely has potential and they let us have multiple loadouts changeable easily which is what's important. On one hand I'd love if we could have all 36 specs have more than one way to play them, on the other hand that's one tall order.

Profession revamp is probably the one feature I'm excited about. My main is a blacksmith who became a paladin, not a paladin who just learned blacksmithing so I love that part. I do hope that specializations are not mutually exclusive. Let me grind all expansion long to learn both armorsmithing and weaponsmithing!

[Golden Yak]

So, I had a dream last night that the reveal was going to be called World of Warcraft: Boughs of Nordrassil, referring to the world tree in Mount Hyjal. I can't recall much beyond that, but there was a scene that looked like a bunch of Titan-architecture pillars and platforms underneath a sky that was just filled with giant roots, like we were in a Titan facility beneath the world tree. Also, the Constellar were there, we were gonna visit their city. That's all I remember.

I think I was more excited for that than what we actually got.

[Makabreska]

Gamescom legion presentation wasn't blizzcon and had the slides. They could and should have showed this expansion better.

And Gamescom was STILL a stage presentation. This was not.

[Nyel]

I love it. It doesnt have any massive selling points like BfA or Legion did, but in return it has loads of small imrpovements that the game desperately needed.
I understand it's a hard sell for the players who want a box fature in big letters, but for my money I am absolutely stoked with just having a revamped flying.

But is that enough? I‘m happy about flying. And talent trees. But again, is that enough and what WoW needed right now?

[Chickat]

So far, only the open plains zone and the mountain zone seem somewhat cool. The red dragonflight zone and the bronze one feel and look pretty weird imo. Like there's no real strong theme there, just random assets that look pretty dull.

Also why are there only 4 zones? Not even an end game zone like the maw? Maybe the drakthyr zone will become end game at some point?

[Jodmos]

So… I took some hours to comprehend stuff.

Anyone just whelmed by this expansion? It’s so… boring ? Lacking? I don’t know. It’s just way less what I expected and so basic. Nothing special, nothing fresh, nothing unexpected. It’s just so generic.

I don't think it's an uncommon feeling after the reveal.

It looks nice as you would expect from Blizzard but things like the class/race link and the limited visage forms strike me as really odd choices, particularly the visage form as I've seen a lot of interest in being other races when not in dragon form running up to the reveal. It was even joked that it was bound to be dragonelves earlier in this thread.

[Chickat]

Hell yeah can do em all

That's sounds really cool tbh.

[Nymrohd]

It didn’t have a playable race… but the Covenants seem way more ambitious than anything in Dragonflight. If Shadowlands wouldn’t feel like WoD 2.0 I’d definitely say DF feels like that. It‘s so lacking.

And the Covenants ended up being massive grinds that constrained the way you played more than they augmented it. Did they really have the wow factor of Artifacts or Garrisons??? not for me.
Dragonflight might go back to basics. Maybe that's good. If it keeps the content cycle running at good speed, it has every shot of being a good expansion. I mean, MoP promised far less.

Honestly

[Buliwyf the Omen]

They said nothing about alpha or beta did they? Not even a "Stay tuned"?

Evoker is just not for me. First off, no tank spec so no way I'd ever main it. And the race just doesn't look that great to me; the male humanoid form is cool I suppose and I will definitely roll one but doubt I'll focus on it.
On one hand that's not good but on the other hand as we had discussed, if we had gotten a multispec dragon race/class that actually was a dragon maybe that would just be too cool and harmful for the game.

UI Revamp is . . . OK? Rift let you move the UI around with no addons how many years ago? Ofc will check it and it could be interesting, especially if its not just about utility but also about cosmetics. Heck maybe they could let you earn cosmetic UI elements for in game activities down the line?

Talent revamp I have no comment until beta. Could be good, could be a pointless. Definitely has potential and they let us have multiple loadouts changeable easily which is what's important. On one hand I'd love if we could have all 36 specs have more than one way to play them, on the other hand that's one tall order.

Profession revamp is probably the one feature I'm excited about. My main is a blacksmith who became a paladin, not a paladin who just learned blacksmithing so I love that part. I do hope that specializations are not mutually exclusive. Let me grind all expansion long to learn both armorsmithing and weaponsmithing!

They said "Alpha is soon" (TM)

I agree about the UI revamp, not sure how I feel about it.

I think I just end up downloading a pre-Dragonflight UI. I just got used to the nice basicness of Shadowlands and then they do that.

Talent Revamp looks very questionable still for me tbh. Super basic, basic'st of the basic'st abilities like Rake are not even normal to your class anymore, unless I understand class points wrong.

[Makabreska]

But is that enough? I‘m happy about flying. And talent trees. But again, is that enough and what WoW needed right now?

Sitting here and worrying about it solves nothing. Especially when we only got base info right now. It is still usual "wait and see."

[JDBlou]

Except Druid and Rogue are very clearly wind.

The sarcasm that it was obviously not each armour type to an element clearly didn't translate well into text.

[Shadochi]

Ok i'm back home so I'll give my opinion on this:

I liked what I saw, only a bit saddened about the dracthyr exclusivity, also happy that they are keeping tier sets and bringing back talent trees. I like the new zones and I'm happy for dragons.

What I'm annoyed about is what didn't get shown, we got no info about endgame content (pvp, pve or open world). While im really glad there isn't any borrowed power system, there doesn't seem to be a cosmetic only substitute for covenants for each flight, as well as an evolution to the Expedition/Thorghast system. They also gave very little info in general. So right now with the info we have (and we are definitely missing a lot) I have a bit of a harder time imagining what my daily wow sessions will look like.

I'm not saying this is bad as they definitely decided to show less than they plan to have in the expansion, which might end up being good. Hope for a fast alpha. It also might be a fact that systems they didn't mention is because they will stay the same (raiding, mythic+, leveling alts in threads of fate).

BUT ARE WE NOT GETTING A MAX LEVEL ZONE?

In general, I am still really excited for the expansion. Returning to azeroth, beautiful zones, dragonriding looks dope and all else. I'm also very curious about the various foes we will face in Dragon Isles.

My guess for alpha would be shortly after the last announcement they teased last month (mobile game), so second half of may. Starting out in second half of may with the Dracthyr starting zone and maybe The Waking shore and then new zone every 2 weeks.

Based on amount of new systems I guess it might be a shorter alpha/beta cycle.
@Scaleface said that the release date would be 22.11. but I kinda doubt it, not impossible but not probable since they would state on or before Dec 31 (or does that go up with preorderd, the on or before)

[Nymrohd]

But is that enough? I‘m happy about flying. And talent trees. But again, is that enough and what WoW needed right now?

What WoW needs is content delivered regularly without artificial systems stopping you from experiencing content imo.

I'd absolutely love for something to get me hyped but what I mostly need is for the game to give me gameplay.

[Sondrelk]

It didn’t have a playable race… but the Covenants seem way more ambitious than anything in Dragonflight. If Shadowlands wouldn’t feel like WoD 2.0 I’d definitely say DF feels like that. It‘s so lacking.

Well yes, but we have also gotten away from 3 expansions where one of the main criticisms each time was that Blizzard was overambitious and just needed to focus on making the game good instead of trying to distract players by giving them a new shiny toy to play with.

And for that matter, we still technically have covenants. They will probably not have as many cosmetics to unlock, but they are still there giving endgame progression. We still have M+, which has been slowly bubbling away getting better each expansion. We have raids, which will likely become more versatile with Raids+.

The announcement is definitely light on actual tangible announcements like Torghast the Roguelike dungeon, or Islands the exploration mode. But on the flipside it also won't run into any of the pitfalls of those systems.

[Chickat]

Doubt it just because I'm sure people will figure out a bunch of different builds for various activities and which point you would set multiple and then just choose which you want for any given activity. I personally don't care about that stuff so I would probably just pick one that I find most fun and never really touch it again for the most part

Yeah I'll probably have 4 or 5 builds for each spec. You could have a multiple good builds for different raid bosses and mythic dungeons. Also pvp could have multiple good builds for each spec. It seems like it COULD allow for so many new playstyles. Let's see what happens.

[Nyel]

I don't think it's an uncommon feeling after the reveal.

It looks nice as you would expect from Blizzard but things like the class/race link and the limited visage forms strike me as really odd choices, particularly the visage form as I've seen a lot of interest in being other races when not in dragon form running up to the reveal.

I don’t know. Funny enough, I loved the trailer. It was based and I really dig the story. But the features? The content? It’s just… another boring expansion. Five zones. An unexplored continent. Sigh. New UI? Nobody (!) cares. Really. Raceclass? Nice I guess. Flying? I like it.

But it’s so… underwhelming. So boring. It’s so light on new stuff.

I mean what players expected here in the lasts weeks and what we’ve got is like 25% of that. Everybody should be disappointed by this expansion. It’s so lacking.

[Jodmos]

And the Covenants ended up being massive grinds that constrained the way you played more than they augmented it. Did they really have the wow factor of Artifacts or Garrisons??? not for me.
Dragonflight might go back to basics. Maybe that's good. If it keeps the content cycle running at good speed, it has every shot of being a good expansion. I mean, MoP promised far less.

Honestly

I liked the covenants. I think Blizzard just misjudged how many people would min-max. Always a problem when power is tied to choices though.

[Nymrohd]

They said "Alpha is soon" (TM)

I agree about the UI revamp, not sure how I feel about it.

I think I just end up downloading a pre-Dragonflight UI. I just got used to the nice basicness of Shadowlands and then they do that.

Talent Revamp looks very questionable still for me tbh. Super basic, basic'st of the basic'st abilities like Rake are not even normal to your class anymore, unless I understand class points wrong.

I mean that deep dive did not even paddle. We learned nothing of value.

[Alanar]

The 17 year vet in me says this is all we're gonna get and... "welp I'll be bored in 2 months".

Same feeling here and sad part is that the vet in us is pretty much always right.
Right now I am hoping, we DO get some more playable races, but the vet in me says dude stfu this is it.

[Chickat]

My god. Either I am prescient, or someone at blizzard is reading my comments and making an expansion based on it. This is basically exactly what I said Covenants should have been all along.

Yep I remember. Good call.