Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Lahis]

So the leaked schedule has been double confirmed now. The image in the previous post has been nuked from the internet.

And WotLK Classic prepatch has been confirmed for August 30th, just as the leaked schedule said.

[AngerFork]

Shit, leak got very credible just in few hours. Now I really want to know how they will deal with Season 1 if release is Nov 28th. I see 4 options (listed from least to most likely):

1) Move everything to January - very unlikely, but you know we thought 2022 release will be impossible as well. But I think 5+ weeks with just M0 would kill whole hype pretty fast.

2) Raid coming 13th December, Mythic 20th. I know they don't want to repeat Sepulcher sitution, but it's likely race will last more than 5 days. If affects like ~200 people at most, but still would be shitty thing to do from Blizzard.

3) Mythic difficulty coming on 13th December along Normal/Heroic, on 20th only first wing LFR. That would be my favourite solution, don't raid Mythic so I don't know how these guys react - still looks like better alternative than Christmas raiding though.

4) Imo most likely - we will have just 1 week of no season, raid coming 6th, mythic 13th. In this case expect many "do you neeeeed??" in mythic dungeons on first week.

But still, it's strange they would corner themselves so much with this date. Looks like there is no room for delay. Even slightest delay could cause 2023 release and missing Christmas season.

I don't know, this feels like they get a lot of room to move with these dates at least as far as releasing in 2022. If they don't hit 11/28, they still have 3 more pre-holiday weeks they can hit for the expansion to launch before it is into 2023. Any delay in start time & we probably are looking at scenario #1 you listed, it's otherwise just too narrow of a window to hit. If they can hit that date, I wouldn't be surprised to see Scenario #3 play out, possibly even with LFR being passed over until January or just released alongside everything else with the understanding that LFR 2 will take an extra week or two due to the holidays. Mythic over the holidays can definitely be a bit of a pain & they won't want to have all hands on deck bug-fixing in late December.

The longer we wait, the higher chance a world revamp is likely to happen. The game is getting older and while the new player experience is pretty good, so much of the old world is outdated and as time marches on it becomes much more obvious.

Agreed, and I still think 11.0 seems like a likely time for it to occur. 20th Anniversary of WoW, first expansion under Microsoft, plus probably a lot of the current crew at Blizzard kind of want to remove the influence of some of the earlier dev team after the recent controversies. A revamp allows everyone a fresh reset, especially if there has been any sort of underlying secretive engine reworks or the like under the surface.

[Gaidax]

I highly doubt DF will release Nov 29, maybe it's actually a plan - but I don't see how they gonna sort all the trees and stuff out for prepatch in 2 months from now, especially given they have to add 2 more classes, let alone all this NYI everywhere.

I bet they will do it like in Shlands with delay.

[Lahis]

I highly doubt DF will release Nov 29, maybe it's actually a plan - but I don't see how they gonna sort all the trees and stuff out for prepatch in 2 months from now, especially given they have to add 2 more classes, let alone all this NYI everywhere.

I bet they will do it like in Shlands with delay.

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 preorders get to play the Campaign week early on October 20th, confirming the 27th of October launch date for CoD: Cortez.

So the schedule looks very solid right now, all is left to see if they can stick to it.

[Gaidax]

So the schedule looks very solid right now, all is left to see if they can stick to it.

What I meant that the info might look legit, but I do think they will delay just like they did with Shadowlands. Given state of Alpha, I just don't see how they manage prepatch end of October, let alone full release end of November.

They probably indeed targeted those dates, but it just does not seem going there as I see it.

[enigma77]

gotta love the Blizzard leakers

[Atriel]

What I meant that the info might look legit, but I do think they will delay just like they did with Shadowlands. Given state of Alpha, I just don't see how they manage prepatch end of October, let alone full release end of November.

They probably indeed targeted those dates, but it just does not seem going there as I see it.

What is the "state of alpha", exactly? We absolutely do not have the same issues that we ran into with BfA and SL test periods. The hyper focused testing phases seemed to have helped a ton so far, and we will have nearly 2 months for beta if they release in September. A lot of the class trees are pretty solid, so they have time to iron out the ones that are not.

[Revamp Man]

Prepatch hits ptr end of this month
Beta within two weeks of now
Launch will be in November

Now give me my monk trees damn it

[enigma77]

Build later today boys...

[Tartys]

Shit, leak got very credible just in few hours. Now I really want to know how they will deal with Season 1 if release is Nov 28th. I see 4 options (listed from least to most likely):

1) Move everything to January - very unlikely, but you know we thought 2022 release will be impossible as well. But I think 5+ weeks with just M0 would kill whole hype pretty fast.

2) Raid coming 13th December, Mythic 20th. I know they don't want to repeat Sepulcher sitution, but it's likely race will last more than 5 days. If affects like ~200 people at most, but still would be shitty thing to do from Blizzard.

3) Mythic difficulty coming on 13th December along Normal/Heroic, on 20th only first wing LFR. That would be my favourite solution, don't raid Mythic so I don't know how these guys react - still looks like better alternative than Christmas raiding though.

4) Imo most likely - we will have just 1 week of no season, raid coming 6th, mythic 13th. In this case expect many "do you neeeeed??" in mythic dungeons on first week.

But still, it's strange they would corner themselves so much with this date. Looks like there is no room for delay. Even slightest delay could cause 2023 release and missing Christmas season.

Let the raid begin in Jenuary... they have a month to fix the talents from complaisn, in the meantime m+, dungeons, skill professions...

[Humek]

I barely use my ground mounts already even if some are really cool.

I feel you here.

I wonder if it will be possible to add wings equipment that would make all mounts act like dragonriding mounts in the future, even if some animation would look weird.

BUT HELL NO.

[Revamp Man]

What is the "state of alpha", exactly? We absolutely do not have the same issues that we ran into with BfA and SL test periods. The hyper focused testing phases seemed to have helped a ton so far, and we will have nearly 2 months for beta if they release in September. A lot of the class trees are pretty solid, so they have time to iron out the ones that are not.

The fact the zones that we test aren't half broken shows this isn't a repeat of the past
There's no overarching system that has them working on it every single patch for redesigns

The game will be fine

[Atriel]

The fact the zones that we test aren't half broken shows this isn't a repeat of the past
There's no overarching system that has them working on it every single patch for redesigns

The game will be fine

Exactly. I don't know whey people are so fervently calling things rushed or throwing things around like "state of alpha" when it's going smoothly. Anyone that believes wholeheartedly that they will delay the expansion launch like they did SL is more likely in for some disappointment when the game launches without that overarching system they complained about all this time.

[enigma77]

nooooooooooooooooooooo

[Marlamin]

Build cancelled, see y'all tomorrow!

https://www.bluetracker.gg/wow/topic...-august-16-17/

[Gurahk]

So no datamine until tomorrow, or just no testing?

[Lahis]

So no datamine until tomorrow, or just no testing?

They can't update the servers or clients yet.

Can you figure out what that means for datamining?

[Revamp Man]

Exactly. I don't know whey people are so fervently calling things rushed or throwing things around like "state of alpha" when it's going smoothly. Anyone that believes wholeheartedly that they will delay the expansion launch like they did SL is more likely in for some disappointment when the game launches without that overarching system they complained about all this time.

I'm ready for the late November launch
They did have to delay this week's build but I figured that would happen with 9.2.7 not really having actual testing

[Revamp Man]

So people are upset because the launch place rwf AROUND Christmas
I'm going to guess the tier finishes almost as quickly as EN for a few reasons
1. No extra systems means you just need gear for your character to be ready and the removal of loot trading restrictions means you will gear much faster
2. Talent builds that end up OP. Yeah laser bear got removed kinda but the nerds who go over these trees for hours will always find something like a shadow priest with warlock partner groups.
3. Professions....that's it just the professions as a whole because of the high ilvl crafted gear and extra effects to go along with all the other gear bonuses.

We also have to remember the first tier is also insanely easy compared to the rest I mean just look at S4 nathria where guilds face roll heroic and then hit walls in SoD.

[bruxx]

Feels like it's been so many expansions released terribly close to christmass, and every single time people worry about what that means for raiding, like it's not how it usually goes lol