Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Sondrelk]

Let’s have a healthy conversation/speculation session:

Answer one or both of these questions:

1). What is something you “hope” we get or is better explained during the Alpha/Beta cycle of Dragonflight?

2). What are you “most” worried about for Dragonflight?

I’ll start.

1). I would like to know/see a deeper explanation of what Dragonriding entails (blog post similar to Profession one or some gameplay ASAP).

2). That Dragonflight will be too similar to WoD in terms of content to do outside of the norm. (Personally, I don’t see this happening based on what “I” have read/seen. However, I know it’s a large concern for many folks)

I hope for a really in-depth dragonriding system, specifically in terms of rewards and challenges in the open world.

I am most worried about the opposite, a lack of open world content to really fuel the Dragonriding mechanic. Flying around should be inherently fun and rewarding, but I fear that it will be a once and done thing that the game quickly has you abandon outside simple movement.


Beyond that I would be quite disappointed if the "Bad choices" the developers talked about in regards to talent trees ended up essentially being only one or two predetermined paths being "accepted", instead of a variety of builds being possible with hotfixes being somewhat frequent to allow interesting combinations. (As an example. MM currently has the ability to completely omit Rapid Fire from their build in favor of going all-in on Aimed Shot. It would be a crying shame if this ended up being an unintentional build that Blizzard assumes is just inherently bad).

[Aeluron Lightsong]

More worried and patch content schedule(I prefer a the whole 3 content tiers(Or haha raid tiers). But its a low amount of worry since I can't predict the future and well worrying over something I barely know anything about isn't healthy. Any hope I have is mostly class related to what I want in terms of how I play but its not a overall design decision more like a class decision.

As usual though outdoor content needs to be added more then what we expect(World quests treasures etc). Its nice that its there but it needs more, I've said this for years though so this is just ad nauseum.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

Would also make sense from a lore standpoint, even before he became Deathwing Neltharian was arrogant as hell and a bit of a supremacist, it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility that Black Flight was the base of their magic, then the capability for the other four flights on the side.

Add to that the practical necessity of it—he likely would have to use the Black Dragonflight as a base for his new invention.

[Teriz]

Would also make sense from a lore standpoint, even before he became Deathwing Neltharian was arrogant as hell and a bit of a supremacist, it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility that Black Flight was the base of their magic, then the capability for the other four flights on the side.

Well based on that, the core abilities will more than likely be coming from the following characters;

Deathwing WoW
Deathwing HotS
Onyxia
Sintharia
Neferian
Wrathion
Nyxondra
Ebyssian

Might be more, but that's where I would look. Especially under Deathwing HotS.

[Catastrophy349]

Makes sense with Towelliee taking off stream Tuesday/Wednesday before Thursday’s Alpha launch (for us plebs).

https://twitter.com/marlamin/status/...9OV1gAGP8X6E6w

[Nightshade711]

Ah yeah these are way better, the cromie one reads similar to current Fae Guardians but the Alex one is perfect for a healing CD (to compete with disc/paladin)!

Also I'm looking forward to seeing how they implement the black dragonflight into the trees (probably defensives) since they said it was so important to incorporate all 5 flights.

Oh yeah I guarantee that the black flight will be represented in the class trees.

Though we have seen one black dragon ability already, but it is a DPS ability from what it seems.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Since we're talking about Black Dragons IMO we should see a mostly wise and benevolent Neltharion but very obvious nods to his future corruption I.E. Small things, not blatent, just very small moments that he's already being poked and prodded. That is if the Drac'thyr starting area even witnesses him.

[therumblings]

Since we're talking about Black Dragons IMO we should see a mostly wise and benevolent Neltharion but very obvious nods to his future corruption I.E. Small things, not blatent, just very small moments that he's already being poked and prodded. That is if the Drac'thyr starting area even witnesses him.

It never even occurred to me that the Dracthyr starting zone could take place thousands of years ago, then end waking up at present day, similar to DH. That's a ton of story potential.

[Nightshade711]

Since we're talking about Black Dragons IMO we should see a mostly wise and benevolent Neltharion but very obvious nods to his future corruption I.E. Small things, not blatent, just very small moments that he's already being poked and prodded. That is if the Drac'thyr starting area even witnesses him.

Part of me hopes that we’d get something akin to the DH starting zone where we start in the past then go through the “big battle” that Blizzard talked about that put the Dracthyr in stasis… then we wake up in present day.

Or they could do something similar as a “memory” because supposedly the starting zone will have us all having amnesia and finding their story/what happened along the way.

[rhorle]

The more choices the better. Let people play however they want. If someone isn't good enough they can be let go from the group.

That doesn't work for a mass market game. Toxicity won't be dealt with as its own problem because it would be linked directly to the talent choices a person picks. If they have X, Y, Z that are known bad choices that don't produce viable performance for that spec then they won't be invited or kicked out of any group they do get it. If you don't see how balance contributes to toxicity in the game then you don't understand much about the design of the game.

Choice just for the sake of choice isn't better. Good choices is better but we know that bad choices will exist and then we fall back in to the illusion of choice. Something you may be fine with because you get "tricked" into thinking you have a real choice. But something that won't really be a choice for the performance-gated game that WoW is.

[therumblings]

Illusion of choice with 61 talent points gained every level > Illusion of choice with only 7 talent points gained every 15 levels

[Catastrophy349]

Everything I have seen for Dragonflight so far is a HUGE + for me. Obviously, many will disagree and that's fine. Fortunately, Alpha is next week (and weeks to come) so we should get a better idea of how it looks "in real time" very soon.

[Khaza-R]

Illusion of choice with 61 talent points gained every level > Illusion of choice with only 7 talent points gained every 15 levels

At the very least, it should improve the leveling experience.

The issue with leveling post-scaling is that effectively there were vast swathes where no progression happened.. You gained power but so did the mobs. You might get a few new abilities hitting a certain milestone but then get nothing else for 10 more levels. It ultimately made leveling just a pointless waste of time to fill up some arbitrary bar and that's terrible design.

The squish partially helped but there's still smaller increments where no progression is actually happening. At least with the new talents you will have actual progression every level. That and lets hope they are implementing this system with future expansions and leveling in mind.

[ZyntosAran]

That doesn't work for a mass market game. Toxicity won't be dealt with as its own problem because it would be linked directly to the talent choices a person picks. If they have X, Y, Z that are known bad choices that don't produce viable performance for that spec then they won't be invited or kicked out of any group they do get it. If you don't see how balance contributes to toxicity in the game then you don't understand much about the design of the game.

Choice just for the sake of choice isn't better. Good choices is better but we know that bad choices will exist and then we fall back in to the illusion of choice. Something you may be fine with because you get "tricked" into thinking you have a real choice. But something that won't really be a choice for the performance-gated game that WoW is.

I am mostly a Open World player. I cant wait to get my hands on the talent trees. fuck the meta, i just want to have fun with stupid builds.

[enigma77]

Illusion of choice with 61 talent points gained every level > Illusion of choice with only 7 talent points gained every 15 levels

So true, there is no real choice with the current talent "tree". You only ever change maybe 3 or 4 talents, if that.

[Catastrophy349]

I am mostly a Open World player. I cant wait to get my hands on the talent trees. fuck the meta, i just want to have fun with stupid builds.

I really want to know what that "separate team" is working on for outdoor content. HYPE

[Nymrohd]

So true, there is no real choice with the current talent "tree". You only ever change maybe 3 or 4 talents, if that.

I mean if you change 4 out of 7, that's a solid percentage.

[ZyntosAran]

I really want to know what that "separate team" is working on for outdoor content. HYPE

Me too. But if the outdoor content is anything like I hope it is (Zereth Mortis but times 10), the package we know of right now is a unreal dream for me. Talent trees back, deep Professions, Dragonriding. This exp could be huge for outdoor content enthusiasts.

[Xofoo]

While there will be "the best" talent builds for all classes and you will probably play that while doing regular content, what really excites me about the new talents is the ability to create builds for other activiteis. For exmaple building a movement speed build on my hunter for old raid farming. Or a build that beefs up my pet for soloing harder stuff. That is what I'm really looking forward to.

[Mekkle]

i just want evoker talents, but i wouldnt be suprised if that was last