Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Forum Man]

The problem with gear progression is that it's boring.

Artifacts were cool because what you got was exciting, even when it was tiny nodes.

Azerite Armour was cool because most of them had cool effects.

Corruption was cool because of that.

Conduits were interesting as well because quite a few really changed how the spec plays.

People who were bitching about "borrowed power" will be in for a rude awakening.

sooooo
i agree with artifacts for at least the launch and first patch because golden traits and new traits
My spec got screwed on the azerite gear front because only like 2 traits did anything to my playstyle and we used only one of them
corruption was mostly just rng but it was cool seeing big numbers or getting huge stat boosts
and conduits are honestly boring but again it might just be my specs because a .01 second CD reduction and slight dps increase isnt fun

if all talent trees are like the ones we got to see so far then i will more than welcome them

[Nymrohd]

Plus more cantrip weapons like the Sylvanas' daggers or the Jailer mace. Some awesome weapons that have a cool lore background, look great and have a fancy effect.

Eh, only if we get a vendor like with S4. Transformative BiS weapons have the lovely feature of never dropping for some people. In two different expansions I spent an entire tier as a main tank without a shield upgrade. So many rogues never got the Sylvanas' daggers. You will eventually get tier.

[Lady Atia]

Eh, only if we get a vendor like with S4. Transformative BiS weapons have the lovely feature of never dropping for some people. In two different expansions I spent an entire tier as a main tank without a shield upgrade. So many rogues never got the Sylvanas' daggers. You will eventually get tier.

Yeah tbf the token system from S4 may be the answer to that. And a far better method than the CN weapon tokens because these weapons had 0 lore or connection to the raid which made them useless in my eyes.

[Makabreska]

The problem with gear progression is that it's boring.

Artifacts were cool because what you got was exciting, even when it was tiny nodes.

Azerite Armour was cool because most of them had cool effects.

Corruption was cool because of that.

Conduits were interesting as well because quite a few really changed how the spec plays.

People who were bitching about "borrowed power" will be in for a rude awakening.

Dunno, how much did they bitch in 9.2, because that's how it's gonna be in DF? Pretty sure people will be happy with not needing to grind anything beside tier sets in each patch, both on main and alts.

[Nymrohd]

Artifacts were nice the but constant AP farming was annoying.


Azerite armor might of had nice effects but it was annoying to make them an armor slot, should of just made it like the essences and even then they didn't totallly change at least to me how I played. Corruption.......not a fan but thematically it made sense. Conduits didn't really change much except one conduit I really loved but it wasn't really something that changed how I play. I'm fine with borrowed power going away but......

I dunno seems too rosy of a thought on borrowed power even though I didn't hate it.

Imo, Artifact traits WERE exciting. Many of them were just damn interesting, especially the single point ones and together created well rounded specs at the level of MoP which we have not had since. The artifact power grind was problematic for Emerald Nightmare but then the raid was undertuned; it was only ever a problem afterwards for World First Raiders who wanted to get high concordance; everyone else could still get to the raid with everything unlocked with minimal effort.
Azerite was just bad in so many ways. Many specs just had no good traits. Other specs had 1-2 transformative traits that got even better by stacking them which was extremely frustrating with how poorly conceived the concept was (I know I got Azerite gear I could not unlock so many times early on).
Essences are imo the best system by far. Modular, promoting doing all kind of content, with a good vanity system build in and with solid lateral progression that meant they could keep introducing essences and not run into trouble. Wish we had tier instead of Azerite gear and essences from the start.
Corruption could only ever work on a final patch. It was a crazy system meant to be broken.

As for conduits again some specs got nothing interesting out of it.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

As for conduits again some specs got nothing interesting out of it.

Thats my view on it but that is because as cool thematically as it was, it didn't pan out but I'm weird where I sometimes like getting non class specific abilities or a magial ability that doesn't pertain my class(Love my Kyrian Spear and its blue aoe thingie).

[Dracullus]

I don't think Blizzard will care that much about talents balance. It's not soulbind/relic/azerite that depend on your luck from drops (at least initially) or covenant on launch that you can't change on the fly.

Whole "will people pick interrupt" reminds me of fears before SL that people will be rejected based on their 'wrong' covenant. Looks like everyone that cares at least little bit about content harder than M0 or LFR will pick whatever needs to be picked, end of story. There will be tools to quickly check and switch to 'right' build, either made by Blizzard or addon creators.

Big win from this system is that it simplify progression, that was last major issue with core of game nowadays. And it's nice leveling will be closer to classic RPG experience where you get points and spend them.

People who were bitching about "borrowed power" will be in for a rude awakening.

It's impossible to implement borrowed power now, people would hate that expansion on the spot. And it's not certain we will repeat WoD scenario, nowadays we have shit ton of stuff to collect and casual side of game is growing, although too slow right now.

But if people will scream about "nothing to do" and return to borrowed power (of course packed differently), I hope this will be:

1) Completely account wide.
2) Without ANY choice. Any new system is like new dimension to game and overcomplicate it.
3) Maybe not grindy, but requiring from you to be active at least with one activity in game (raids, M+, PVP, world).

From Legion to SL they were making borrowed powers less and less grindy, but with more and more choices. So completely opposite of what I suggest. One good thing is that game become more alt friendly and some nice things like skiping alts directly to current patch, better leveling or smaller stuff like toys for exploring will carry to "4th iteration" of WoW.

[Arafal]

The problem with gear progression is that it's boring.

Artifacts were cool because what you got was exciting, even when it was tiny nodes.

Artifacts were liked because they were personalized items with lots of customization and story involvement.
Their actual progression, aka grinding AP, was boring and despised.

Azerite Armour was cool because most of them had cool effects.

A handful of those traits had actually meaningful effects, the majority of them added next to nothing meaningful to your character and were utterly uninteresting.
Its actual progression was even worse than the artifact grind, especially at the beginning before they fixed trait unlocks.

No comment on corruption, barely played when that was current.

Conduits were interesting as well because quite a few really changed how the spec plays.

Conduits are so unengaging that most players treat them like glyphs, just pop them in and then forget they even existed.

[Alanar]

Speaking of glyphs..

I hope one day.. they decide to get back to it and make it an allaround fun thing to toy around with. I am talking about bringing in forgotten spelleffects.. themes you like to dive into such as different priesthoods with spelleffects.

I think they should leave rotational things to the talent tree, but things like replacing abilities in a purely cosmetic way should hopefully feel like the transmog from cata.

Think about running older raids or dungeons were spellbooks can dropp that are used in that dung that you always wanted to have. Or hidden quest that leads to unlocking old mindflay animation. Big ui, mostly minor glyphs that do this.

Just took priest as an example.

[Skildar]

azerite armor traits weren't very exciting as the BiS combinations were either coming from raid, pvp or mm+ and at the time we relied on the weekly chest a lot for gearing our characters.

If they remove some layers (a single ring of 4-5 options to either give talent points or modify an ability) on the azerite armor they could very well make a comeback for the better. But if that were to happen, it should be on armor pieces that just don't matter today instead of major pieces : bel, boots, bracers

[Makorus]

Artifacts were liked because they were personalized items with lots of customization and story involvement.
Their actual progression, aka grinding AP, was boring and despised.


A handful of those traits had actually meaningful effects, the majority of them added next to nothing meaningful to your character and were utterly uninteresting.
Its actual progression was even worse than the artifact grind, especially at the beginning before they fixed trait unlocks.

No comment on corruption, barely played when that was current.



Conduits are so unengaging that most players treat them like glyphs, just pop them in and then forget they even existed.

I am not talking about the AP grind or anything.

Artifacts were satisfying.

Going from an empty Artifact to slowly unlocking more and more cool traits was cool. It was exciting. You could feel your character progressively get stronger, but not just numerically. Yes, it was ruined by the grind, but the Artifacts themselves were cool.

Same with Azerite Armour. Sure, there were a lot of bad/uninteresting ones, but most class ones were really fun and some cool interaction with your entire kit and drastically changed the playstyle of classes throughout the expansion. Once again, this is disregarding the grind for AP, which is entirely inconsequential to the point I am trying to make.

Conduits are the least interesting ones, but even then, there are some cool ones, like Icy Propulsion or Infernal Cascade for Mages, which actively make you feel more and more powerful throughout the expansion and change the way you play. Going from normal Icy Veins, to 100% Icy Veins uptime in AOE to 100% Icy Veins uptime in single target just by upgrading a conduit was fun.

While they are making more exciting weapons and some armour pieces with effects, it's still gonna be lame when the only difference in your character is gonna be numerical.

Hell, even most trinkets are boring as fuck since Legion. The Class trinket in WoD was the last time Blizzard really went balls to the wall with trinkets and made them extremely epic.

[micwini]

I think talents in combination with tier sets/trinkets and some special effects on rings/weapons is enough. We don't need 50 things to worry about when doing a rotation. I could see Glyphs as a patch feature, though (cosmetical effects only).

Artifacts were cool, but I didnt like the infinite grind thing they added later. Apart from that, It kind of sucked you went for all the cool traits first and the later ones, the one that took the most time to unlock, were the remainder of the boring/bad traits that were still left over.

[Shadochi]

Isnt that Thanksgiving week? When does that fall this year?

Not sure about US holidays as I am in Europe, but that is info I got from 1 source that at the time I wasn't sure about reliability before announcement but was sure in it afterwards, and then a second source about a week or two ago of that still being the target date.

[Santandame]

The problem with gear progression is that it's boring.

Artifacts were cool because what you got was exciting, even when it was tiny nodes.

Azerite Armour was cool because most of them had cool effects.

Corruption was cool because of that.

Conduits were interesting as well because quite a few really changed how the spec plays.

People who were bitching about "borrowed power" will be in for a rude awakening.

Agreed.

I feel the chickens will be coming home to roost in Dragonflight. It isn't looking hopeful.

Currently it's looking like a purchase in the last patch of the expansion when all content is released and play only for the story content, experience the dungeons once or twice and mess about with Evokers for a bit then unsub.

Which will be a first for me as I'm usually a person no lifing the game on launch.

Back to the WoD raid or die model. This won't be sustainable.

- - - Updated - - -

I don't think Blizzard will care that much about talents balance. It's not soulbind/relic/azerite that depend on your luck from drops (at least initially) or covenant on launch that you can't change on the fly.

Whole "will people pick interrupt" reminds me of fears before SL that people will be rejected based on their 'wrong' covenant. Looks like everyone that cares at least little bit about content harder than M0 or LFR will pick whatever needs to be picked, end of story. There will be tools to quickly check and switch to 'right' build, either made by Blizzard or addon creators.

Big win from this system is that it simplify progression, that was last major issue with core of game nowadays. And it's nice leveling will be closer to classic RPG experience where you get points and spend them.



It's impossible to implement borrowed power now, people would hate that expansion on the spot. And it's not certain we will repeat WoD scenario, nowadays we have shit ton of stuff to collect and casual side of game is growing, although too slow right now.

But if people will scream about "nothing to do" and return to borrowed power (of course packed differently), I hope this will be:

1) Completely account wide.
2) Without ANY choice. Any new system is like new dimension to game and overcomplicate it.
3) Maybe not grindy, but requiring from you to be active at least with one activity in game (raids, M+, PVP, world).

From Legion to SL they were making borrowed powers less and less grindy, but with more and more choices. So completely opposite of what I suggest. One good thing is that game become more alt friendly and some nice things like skiping alts directly to current patch, better leveling or smaller stuff like toys for exploring will carry to "4th iteration" of WoW.

We had stuff to collect in WoD too. Not as much as now but still a decent amount.

So far Dragonflight is looking most comparable to WoD, just with Mythic+ on top and Dragon riding being the niche expansion feature as opposed to Garrisons.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Oh yeah DF totally Wod @_@

[Santandame]

Oh yeah DF totally Wod @_@

How about for once you provide an actual counter argument instead of making pointless passive aggressive comments whenever someone has anything critical to say towards the game and company you clearly revere.

[The-Shan]

blizzard could convince me to pre-order by showing off the Dracthyr some more, what I see there will decide if I pre order now for the (anticipated) early access for them in pre-patch, or if I just wait for it to come out.

[Ferlion]

To be perfectly honest. Considering the sheer amount of side content that WoD had, at least in it's first patch I think comparing Dragonflight to WoD is a bit misguided in both ways.

The flaws of Warlords were that the expansion didn't really have much content from patches that kept people playing. Not a bunch of raids, the dungeon cycle was kind of dull without Mythic+.

But the strengths of it were that there were a tonne of side content. Treasures, unique zones, each faction had lots of rewards. A bunch of the rewards were behind daily content I.E the stables.

If Dragonflight factions have the same level of rewards and diversity as Warlords, this is absolutely a victory for the expansion.
If Dragonflights Dragonriding and Dragonriding related mini-games and quests (We have racing and some sort of great beast hunting mentioned in interviews so far) lead to varied rewards and mounts, this is a great thing.

If the expansion only gives us crap raids, and never expands on anything.. doesn't give us more zones to go to, and doesn't add anything new throughout the expansion, etc.

In short, it's too early to say it feels like WoD good or bad.

That being said. A release of stuff like Korthia or like Zereth Mortis is.. Absolutely new content, even when it is divorced from content, and people bitching that it isn't content is something that is mostly just complaining for the sake of complaining.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

To be perfectly honest. Considering the sheer amount of side content that WoD had, at least in it's first patch I think comparing Dragonflight to WoD is a bit misguided in both ways.

The flaws of Warlords were that the expansion didn't really have much content from patches that kept people playing. Not a bunch of raids, the dungeon cycle was kind of dull without Mythic+.

But the strengths of it were that there were a tonne of side content. Treasures, unique zones, each faction had lots of rewards. A bunch of the rewards were behind daily content I.E the stables.

If Dragonflight factions have the same level of rewards and diversity as Warlords, this is absolutely a victory for the expansion.
If Dragonflights Dragonriding and Dragonriding related mini-games and quests (We have racing and some sort of great beast hunting mentioned in interviews so far) lead to varied rewards and mounts, this is a great thing.

If the expansion only gives us crap raids, and never expands on anything.. doesn't give us more zones to go to, and doesn't add anything new throughout the expansion, etc.

In short, it's too early to say it feels like WoD good or bad.

That being said. A release of stuff like Korthia or like Zereth Mortis is.. Absolutely new content, even when it is divorced from content, and people bitching that it isn't content is something that is mostly just complaining for the sake of complaining.

And well there was only one of them. World content needs substancially more at endgame to do. I don't know what cause if I'm being honest I have no idea.

[Santandame]

To be perfectly honest. Considering the sheer amount of side content that WoD had, at least in it's first patch I think comparing Dragonflight to WoD is a bit misguided in both ways.

The flaws of Warlords were that the expansion didn't really have much content from patches that kept people playing. Not a bunch of raids, the dungeon cycle was kind of dull without Mythic+.

But the strengths of it were that there were a tonne of side content. Treasures, unique zones, each faction had lots of rewards. A bunch of the rewards were behind daily content I.E the stables.

If Dragonflight factions have the same level of rewards and diversity as Warlords, this is absolutely a victory for the expansion.
If Dragonflights Dragonriding and Dragonriding related mini-games and quests (We have racing and some sort of great beast hunting mentioned in interviews so far) lead to varied rewards and mounts, this is a great thing.

If the expansion only gives us crap raids, and never expands on anything.. doesn't give us more zones to go to, and doesn't add anything new throughout the expansion, etc.

In short, it's too early to say it feels like WoD good or bad.

That being said. A release of stuff like Korthia or like Zereth Mortis is.. Absolutely new content, even when it is divorced from content, and people bitching that it isn't content is something that is mostly just complaining for the sake of complaining.

Well, put it this way, of the modern expansions(Legion - Dragonflight), Dragonflight is easily the most content lite.

Dragonflight is offering us no big expansion features aside from Dragon Riding. Much like WoD only offered us Garrisons in ways of an expansion feature. Garrisons still offered us plenty of content, regardless of whether the content was perceived to be good. I feel like Dragon Riding will be much the same way in that regard.

The only leg up DF currently has over WoD is DF will have Mythic+, which WoD didn't. So whilst yes, that is technically more than WoD, it's still not a great deal amount.

I can't speak for world content because whilst WoD's was indeed poor, we don't know what world content Dragonflight has to offer outside of Dragon Riding and dailies yet. I can only assume, that with nothing being announced, that's what we'll be getting outside of the obvious and already implemented treasures and rares that WoD had too.

Dragonflight is much closer to being a WoD than a Legion, BfA or SL in terms of content.