Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Nymrohd]

I feel like ZL has is fittingly otherworldly. It's not completely beating you over the head with it, buy for the most part it's just otherworldly enough that you notice.

The issue I find is that we did not get Zereth Mortis foreshadowed enough to really make it all pay off. The first SL zones were not overtly artificial enough to really have it make sense when we learn that they are in fact artificial. Nor is the aesthetic hinted at enough to have it really make sense.

ZM needed to either be better foreshadowed to really be able to cash in on what little atmosphere it has. Or be even more "off", like having carnivorous stags hunting wolves and such.

I mean it doesn't even make sense to me. ZM is the printer that produces afterlifes. Why does it look like a printer for mortal worlds instead? Why do afterlives need fauna, flora and entire ecologies? Shadowlands in general just fails to make Death otherworldly. It's just a different life instead.

I don't know about it not getting enough foreshadowing. I remember catching one of the Opulences with their entourage traveling in Oribos with one of the attendants discussing the sepulcher and being sushed. It was immediately obvious tha the Sepulcher would be important. I don't think they failed to foreshadow ZM. What they failed to do is tie it better to the story. Firim and his expedition should have been more than a journal and Ve'nari and the Korthian attendants should have joined us in Zereth Mortis instead of or at least together with the Covenants.

[Sondrelk]

I mean it doesn't even make sense to me. ZM is the printer that produces afterlifes. Why does it look like a printer for mortal worlds instead? Why do afterlives need fauna, flora and entire ecologies? Shadowlands in general just fails to make Death otherworldly. It's just a different life instead.

I don't know about it not getting enough foreshadowing. I remember catching one of the Opulences with their entourage traveling in Oribos with one of the attendants discussing the sepulcher and being sushed. It was immediately obvious tha the Sepulcher would be important. I don't think they failed to foreshadow ZM. What they failed to do is tie it better to the story. Firim and his expedition should have been more than a journal and Ve'nari and the Korthian attendants should have joined us in Zereth Mortis instead of or at least together with the Covenants.

The factory aspect is probably where it fails the most. I am still not sure whether what we see is going to be an afterlife, whether it's there to produce raw materials for them, or if the appearance of ZM is entirely meaningless to the produced afterlives.
A better alternative in this respect would have been to either make ZM an amalgamation of the zones we have already been to, or just make it even more artificial looking.

As for foreshadowing. The Sepulcher was properly foreshadowed, but Zereth Mortis itself really wasn't, especially when you consider that it's supposed to be a factory for afterlives.
There should have been more tangible foreshadowing. The orbs for instance should have been found various places in the Shadowlands, and we should have seen more of the prototype flora before this, maybe even just one or two.

[Nymrohd]

There should have been more tangible foreshadowing. The orbs for instance should have been found various places in the Shadowlands, and we should have seen more of the prototype flora before this, maybe even just one or two.

Could really have just been in Korthia. While the Eternal ones are not supposed to enter Zereth Mortis (Primus still projects there . . .) the Korthian attendants seemed to know much more about it. I am not going to be convinced that this is all that was planned for Shadowlands no matter what Ion says (and if it really is, shame on them). If Korthia had actually been a city of secrets instead of the most drab outdoor area in wow with a few ruins in it, perhaps we'd have gotten more about Zereth Mortis there.

[Nyel]

Oof, this news drought since the announcement is really... bad. Like honestly, there has been almost zero news in the last four weeks which is a shame. The "Alpha soon" is still ringing in my ear (although nothing within a few weeks was expected anyway).

What I find concerning is that we haven't seen any detailed information about the new class yet. Wowhead ran an article about that 1.5 weeks ago and I was really excited just to find out all they did was put speculation in there and nothing new.

[Lahis]

Oof, this news drought since the announcement is really... bad. Like honestly, there has been almost zero news in the last four weeks which is a shame. The "Alpha soon" is still ringing in my ear (although nothing within a few weeks was expected anyway).

Soon™: Copyright 2004-2022 Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved. "Soon" does not imply any particular date, time, decade, century, or millennia in the past, present, and certainly not the future. "Soon" shall make no contract or warranty between Blizzard Entertainment and the end user. "Soon" will arrive some day, Blizzard does guarantee that "soon" will be here before the end of time. Maybe. Do not make plans based on "soon" as Blizzard will not be liable for any misuse, use, or even casual glancing at "soon."

[Dracullus]

Why is there no Beta yet? Why is Evoker no available in game for pre-order? Where is pre-order? Something is wrong with Bluzzard guys, when Legion (best) was revealed we had full Demon Hunter gameplay 2 hours before we knew about expansion.

[Nymrohd]

Soon™: Copyright 2004-2022 Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved. "Soon" does not imply any particular date, time, decade, century, or millennia in the past, present, and certainly not the future. "Soon" shall make no contract or warranty between Blizzard Entertainment and the end user. "Soon" will arrive some day, Blizzard does guarantee that "soon" will be here before the end of time. Maybe. Do not make plans based on "soon" as Blizzard will not be liable for any misuse, use, or even casual glancing at "soon."

It was specifically soon, no TM, which is quite notable..

- - - Updated - - -

Something is wrong with Bluzzard guys, when Legion (best) was revealed we had full Demon Hunter gameplay 2 hours before we knew about expansion.

You realise there was a demo with the Demon Hunter experience playable on the floor at Gamescom? https://www.wowhead.com/news/demon-h...atabase-249802 Heck in the speculation thread we had been talking about a demo the day before the announcement because we had a leak they had set things up there so that's more than two hours . . .

[Aeluron Lightsong]

lol that video was so strange and out of touch. I wasn't subscribed at the time, and when I finally came back a few weeks ago, I was expecting the water to have some significance at all, but nothing.

It really wasn't that enraging of a comment and man the hate for ZM is way overboard. Not a rant against specifically you Wowrefugee

You realise there was a demo with the Demon Hunter experience playable on the floor at Gamescom? https://www.wowhead.com/news/demon-h...atabase-249802 Heck in the speculation thread we had been talking about a demo the day before the announcement because we had a leak they had set things up there so that's more than two hours . . .

Yeah so what? This isn't Legion and we're still in a work from home world and still in a pandemic Expansion announcement and events related to it aren't going to play out the exact same way. Just be patient.

[Dracullus]

You realise there was a demo with the Demon Hunter experience playable on the floor at Gamescom? https://www.wowhead.com/news/demon-h...atabase-249802 Heck in the speculation thread we had been talking about a demo the day before the announcement because we had a leak they had set things up there so that's more than two hours . . .

Dude, you are messing with me or something? xD Legion reveal was on Gamescom - on August, 3 months before Blizzcon. This is 3rd time you give me articles from Blizzcon and pretend this is something released right after reveal.

[Lahis]

It was specifically soon, no TM, which is quite notable..

All Blizzard soons are Soon™s.

[Lady Atia]

All Blizzard soons are Soon™s.

Ion said it's soon, not soonTM though. Honestly, at this point they should just make an early build available for datamining similiar to 9.2. - aswell as posting a new blog post every 3 days or so.

[Dracullus]

Ion said it's soon, not soonTM though. Honestly, at this point they should just make an early build available for datamining similiar to 9.2. - aswell as posting a new blog post every 3 days or so.

3 days? This drought would be insufferable. I demand daily reports from each dev and current office build.

To be more serious, I expect next set of DF news when 9.2.5 launch. Clearly they hid something connected to pre-order there. So I'm looking for date reveal this Thursday, that would point to 8th June patch.

After that few weeks gap and build->Alpha, probably around early July. Alpha is usually 2 months after 10.0 build is sniffed if I remember it right.

[Lahis]

Ion said it's soon, not soonTM though. Honestly, at this point they should just make an early build available for datamining similiar to 9.2. - aswell as posting a new blog post every 3 days or so.

They won't do that. Their goal is to make datamining as hard as possible, releasing build just for datamining goes all against that philosophy.

[Lady Atia]

They won't do that. Their goal is to make datamining as hard as possible, releasing build just for datamining goes all against that philosophy.

Yet they did exactly that with 9.2. just to build up more hype. I don't think releasing stuff like the basic zone look, new models, transmog, pets and mounts would be "too spoilery".

[AngerFork]

It really wasn't that enraging of a comment and man the hate for ZM is way overboard. Not a rant against specifically you Wowrefugee

I feel like the ZM hate is more just the hate for Shadowlands boiling over as opposed to anything specific to ZM. ZM itself is fine as a zone & tells the tale it's trying to as well as it should, even if it isn't a perfect zone. But given the absolute hatred of anything Shadowlands, I can't say I'm surprised that ZM has been taking the brunt of it.

That's honestly one of the main reasons I wouldn't try to bring in Shadowlands Allied Races if I were at Blizz...because the opinions of Shadowlands are low enough that even new Allied Races from it would be hated by many of the fans simply for being there.

[rhorle]

They also said we should be amazed about walking on water in Zereth Mortis . . .

To be fair the implementation of the water and stuff is pretty cool compared to the rest of wow. Goes perfectly with the daily/quest to open up a portal in the magical barrier to get the jelly fish.

[Kiria]

They won't do that. Their goal is to make datamining as hard as possible, releasing build just for datamining goes all against that philosophy.

They should how ever start feeding us information, they need to gain goodwill and leaving the playerbase with complete radio silence is a huge red flag to many players.

[Makabreska]

Eh did the story "allow" for the Worgen heritage quest that pretty much gave us nothing? Or for the blood elf one? At least some of them actually gave some worldbuilding or even progress racial storylines. So nah, they can do them whenever they want to. What they say is irrelevant. They also said we should be amazed about walking on water in Zereth Mortis . . .

Nope. Direct quote from the Dev Preview: "It's actually unlike any other water we've seen before. This is actually water we can walk on.".

[Aeluron Lightsong]

They should how ever start feeding us information, they need to gain goodwill and leaving the playerbase with complete radio silence is a huge red flag to many players.

I think you mean this forum.

[Raetary]

Nope. Direct quote from the Dev Preview: "It's actually unlike any other water we've seen before. This is actually water we can walk on.".

Idk about you, but when someone tells me that something is "unlike anything we have seen before" i very much take it as request to feel amazed.