Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Sondrelk]

I don't think it will be successful myself... it's an inferior form of flying. It's better then the usual locked out flying but it's still an annoyance when it doesn't bug out and put itself on cd.

Old flying is barely even a gameplay element. It's a button to remove gameplay and reduce open world exploration to its most basic version, as in you move completely free from restrictions, away from danger, and with none of the actual moment to moment gameplay offered by other movement options.

Flying has lacked any actual gameplay ever since it was added in TBC, and it's clear that Blizzard has been in a constant battle to actually prevent it from just making the open world gameplay collapse in on itself.
They tried to make the zone larger in Cata, didn't work.
They tried making the endgame questing areas in elevated areas, didn't work.
They tried removing flight entirely in WoD, didn't work because they didn't have open world content worth mentioning.
In Legion they finally managed to get open world content to work, and they did so by not having flying.

DF is adding Dragonriding to try to give a new version of flying that can actually enhance gameplay, and not just reduce it.


Besides, everyone seems to love it, so unless Blizzard shits the bed with its implementation, then I imagine it will be carried forwards, and likely even expanded on.

- - - Updated - - -

Modern UIX design principle for anything is Minimalist White so I doubt they'll be adding any visual elements for the UI.

There are some visual elements. The gryphons on the side of the action bar are still there, even if they look a bit different.

Personally i think my biggest gripe are the UI elements in the bottom right corner (dungeon journal, collections, etc.)
Feels like they are likely to just disappear into the background without any defining coloration to make them visible at a glance.

[Nymrohd]

There are some visual elements. The gryphons on the side of the action bar are still there, even if they look a bit different.

To be fair, that's not some. That's one. There isn't another.

[Sondrelk]

To be fair, that's not some. That's one. There isn't another.

There isn't exactly that many visual elements that stand out in the current one either though. It's mainly the colour scheme that is a bit more colorful, as well as the tiny border around things.

[Nymrohd]

There isn't exactly that many visual elements that stand out in the current one either though. It's mainly the colour scheme that is a bit more colorful, as well as the tiny border around things.

The border helps though. I mean just look at the menu and bag UI, without the border all the empty space makes them fade in the background and makes choosing the right choice on the menu harder. I think they should have offered options for background and borders for at least the action bar UI and the minimap UI.

Oh have to add, I don't see any ability to move quest/achievement tracking either.

[Sondrelk]

The border helps though. I mean just look at the menu and bag UI, without the border all the empty space makes them fade in the background and makes choosing the right choice on the menu harder. I think they should have offered options for background and borders for at least the action bar UI and the minimap UI.

Oh have to add, I don't see any ability to move quest/achievement tracking either.

That's true. There are definitely a lack of clear option for different version of the UI as far as I can see.

[Nymrohd]

That's true. There are definitely a lack of clear option for different version of the UI as far as I can see.

And to an extent I always considered visually pleasing UIs to be a big strength of blizzard. Their Icons are so crisp (I'm actually annoyed we don't get to see most quest items anymore which go into an invisible bag of sorts because they DO have icons in the data and someone actually makes the effort to pick something fitting) and the UI usually frames their games well.

Moving to a lightweight UI effectively just gives me a WORSE version of what I can get with addons. If I am getting it from Blizzard with much less options I'd at least like to get better visuals

[Avikur]

Does anyone know if it's worth me saving my sandworn relics to kit my Evoker out in starter 246 gear when the prepatch launches or will they get better from the starter area?

[Sondrelk]

Does anyone know if it's worth me saving my sandworn relics to kit my Evoker out in starter 246 gear when the prepatch launches or will they get better from the starter area?

You'll almost certainly get better gear from the Pre-patch events. Usually it's at least LFR quality, if not NM quality. Not to mention easily gatherable.

[Berkilak]

I like cosmic lore when it consists of 5 adventurers discovering an ancient Titanic artifact in Uldaman.

When Elves dwelling on the slopes of a massive tree worship a mysterious moon goddess.

When stalwart defenders of a kingdom wield the Light to smite their undead foes into dust.

I absolutely loathe cosmic lore when it sends us to meet the robotic progenitors of Death, or has us imprison gargantuan Lord of the Burning Legion inside a space station, or explains to us the physical properties of magic and why it's all really just some kind of artificial battery juice.

Yep. It's great when it's used for background world-building. When it takes center stage, as it did with Legion, it should still be mostly unknowable with the actual main narrative thread starring, as it did with Legion. We got character moments with Alleria, Illidan, Velen, and more. We didn't get diatribes on the true nature of chaos and its essential nature as a cog in the cosmic machine and tripe like that. Character moments are interesting - revealing the mechanics of the mystery completely robs those mysterious elements of their potency as there is simply no way that WarCraft-grade writing (even at its best) can ever measure up to the potency of mystery.

[Lady Atia]

Yep. It's great when it's used for background world-building. When it takes center stage, as it did with Legion, it should still be mostly unknowable with the actual main narrative thread starring, as it did with Legion. We got character moments with Alleria, Illidan, Velen, and more. We didn't get diatribes on the true nature of chaos and its essential nature as a cog in the cosmic machine and tripe like that. Character moments are interesting - revealing the mechanics of the mystery completely robs those mysterious elements of their potency as there is simply no way that WarCraft-grade writing (even at its best) can ever measure up to the potency of mystery.

Nope. Mysteries are there to be explored. It was super cool to actually see the Shadowlands and get to know how they work, you simply disliked it. That said, I think we need ~2 grounded expansions between the cosmic ones, aswell as maybe a breather patch that takes us back to Azeroth during the next Lifelands/Twisting Nether/Light&Void/Arcane Expansion.

While TBC lore was pretty bad, atleast the way patches played out and connected Outlands and the Legion to Azeroth should be used as a template rather than Shadowlands.

[Nebron]

The main thing I wanted to try out is the new UI. It's obviously VERY much a "work in progress", but needs a lot of tweaks, like individual scaling on things like the minimap. I scale my UI up quite a bit (bad eyes) and many elements simply don't scale at all, or are too large and unable to be scaled. A few initial views:

An option to show class power more like the new unitframe does with health/power:



If you hide the buffs, the arrow should recede to the minimap bar for less clutter:



You STILL can't move the chat box to the bottom edge of the screen. Minor but has always bugged me.



Need a way to fade/on mouseover these, like Bartender; just more visual clutter, especially the bags.

Looks good, though the default color values for the unit frames are a bit too saturated.

[Black Rider]

The main thing I wanted to try out is the new UI. It's obviously VERY much a "work in progress", but needs a lot of tweaks, like individual scaling on things like the minimap. I scale my UI up quite a bit (bad eyes) and many elements simply don't scale at all, or are too large and unable to be scaled. A few initial views:

An option to show class power more like the new unitframe does with health/power:



If you hide the buffs, the arrow should recede to the minimap bar for less clutter:



You STILL can't move the chat box to the bottom edge of the screen. Minor but has always bugged me.



Need a way to fade/on mouseover these, like Bartender; just more visual clutter, especially the bags.

Minimalist dosing of icons is not cool.

[Skildar]

Nope. Mysteries are there to be explored. It was super cool to actually see the Shadowlands and get to know how they work, you simply disliked it. That said, I think we need ~2 grounded expansions between the cosmic ones, aswell as maybe a breather patch that takes us back to Azeroth during the next Lifelands/Twisting Nether/Light&Void/Arcane Expansion.

While TBC lore was pretty bad, atleast the way patches played out and connected Outlands and the Legion to Azeroth should be used as a template rather than Shadowlands.

I fully agree that shadowlands was lacking a patch on Azeroth. Even if our only motor this expansion is that we know the Jailer's plan includes to reduce every being to a slave state, it never felt impending or dangerous.

They could have done many different things for this menace to get real like instead of Anduin, Jaina, Thrall, and Baine to get kidnapped in the intro video and us going directly into the shadowlands, we live this escalation in the first patch. Or midway we go to Quel'Thalas searching for domination magic traces and artefacts that the Primus could use to protect us from the jailer, as we investigate we could also fight off the scourge remnants in various scenari

[Kiriastrasza]

You'll almost certainly get better gear from the Pre-patch events. Usually it's at least LFR quality, if not NM quality. Not to mention easily gatherable.

I read somewhere (WoWhead I think) that pre patch gear will be 280, so you're right in there's no point in gearing rn.

[Berkilak]

Mysteries are there to be explored.

Explored? Sure. Explained? Not necessarily. Unless that mystery is the actual central driving force of your narrative. There's a reason we'll never go to Akavir or learn the true fate of the Dwemer in Elder Scrolls. The mystery is what gives those elements its appeal.

Having all these cosmic elements in the background of WoW lore, with little tidbits hinting at them here and there with characters like Brann - that is how you use these elements properly. Mete out answers, but ensure that those answers only create more questions. The second you define it all is the second you've lost the core appeal. And if you feel the need to detail the minutiae of the cosmic inner workings of your universe? You're probably doing so in lieu of an actual narrative. World building for world building's sake is not how you tell a story.

[Lady Atia]

Explored? Sure. Explained? Not necessarily. Unless that mystery is the actual central driving force of your narrative. There's a reason we'll never go to Akavir or learn the true fate of the Dwemer in Elder Scrolls. The mystery is what gives those elements its appeal.

Having all these cosmic elements in the background of WoW lore, with little tidbits hinting at them here and there with characters like Brann - that is how you use these elements properly. Mete out answers, but ensure that those answers only create more questions. The second you define it all is the second you've lost the core appeal. And if you feel the need to detail the minutiae of the cosmic inner workings of your universe? You're probably doing so in lieu of an actual narrative. World building for world building's sake is not how you tell a story.

Well you are just wrong imo. No need to discuss this even further, can we just agree to disagree?

(also, aren't the Dwemer in the newest upcoming ES game?)

[Berkilak]

Well you are just wrong imo. No need to discuss this even further, can we just agree to disagree?

(also, aren't the Dwemer in the newest upcoming ES game?)

We can agree to disagree if you actually make a statement along the lines of, "I prefer when all the mysteries of a setting are fully explained," or something similar to that. That's not how you've come at this discussion, though - you've simply been combative and patronizing. And we know nothing about the next Elder Scrolls - but even if a Dwemer or two are present, that doesn't necessarily mean that everything about them is going to be explained.

Even Tolkien places mysteries into his world, like Tom Bombadil, Ungoliant or other "nameless things" that go entirely unexplained, even within his own supplemental material. Why is this? Because the existence of these mysteries expand the bounds of a fictional universe far beyond what an author can establish themselves.

[Lady Atia]

We can agree to disagree if you actually make a statement along the lines of, "I prefer when all the mysteries of a setting are fully explained," or something similar to that. That's not how you've come at this discussion, though - you've simply been combative and patronizing. And we know nothing about the next Elder Scrolls - but even if a Dwemer or two are present, that doesn't necessarily mean that everything about them is going to be explained.

Even Tolkien places mysteries into his world, like Tom Bombadil, Ungoliant or other "nameless things" that go entirely unexplained, even within his own supplemental material. Why is this? Because the existence of these mysteries expand the bounds of a fictional universe far beyond what an author can establish themselves.

And they established exactly what you want with the First Ones just this Expansion.

[huth]

Minimalist dosing of icons is not cool.

Do remember the game retains the current addon options. You could theoretically even rebuild the old UI.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Explored? Sure. Explained? Not necessarily. Unless that mystery is the actual central driving force of your narrative. There's a reason we'll never go to Akavir or learn the true fate of the Dwemer in Elder Scrolls. The mystery is what gives those elements its appeal.

Having all these cosmic elements in the background of WoW lore, with little tidbits hinting at them here and there with characters like Brann - that is how you use these elements properly. Mete out answers, but ensure that those answers only create more questions. The second you define it all is the second you've lost the core appeal. And if you feel the need to detail the minutiae of the cosmic inner workings of your universe? You're probably doing so in lieu of an actual narrative. World building for world building's sake is not how you tell a story.

You need world building though so its needed and just ignoring the Dwemer in your reason is just lost potential. Eventually people will want to know so no. The fact we explored the Shadowlands isn't a bad thing

There's a reason we'll never go to Akavir or learn the true fate of the Dwemer in Elder Scrolls. The mystery is what gives those elements its appeal.

Yet, mysteries eventually have to be solved, its not just there just for "OOOOH wonder what it is." Whenever we discover it yes I'm going to be curious about what it is not hiding behind this weird keep it mysterious nonsense.