I want to know who thought it's fun to be on foot for 6 months until you can mount.

[Azerate]

i only know of hunt and tc, what was third?

There's a craftable/riddle style mount you can make in the maw. Mostly requires collecting materials from randomly spawning nodes.

https://www.wowhead.com/news/bound-s...h-9-0-5-320988

[Lochton]

There's a craftable/riddle style mount you can make in the maw. Mostly requires collecting materials from randomly spawning nodes.

https://www.wowhead.com/news/bound-s...h-9-0-5-320988

And then the additional factors of Druids and Worgen.

[Lolites]

There's a craftable/riddle style mount you can make in the maw. Mostly requires collecting materials from randomly spawning nodes.

https://www.wowhead.com/news/bound-s...h-9-0-5-320988

ah, forgot about this one, but thats kinda "late" addition compared to the two

- - - Updated - - -

And then the additional factors of Druids and Worgen.

and to lesser extend shamans, and partialy nightfae

[GreenJesus]

If you're talking about the Maw you can mount pretty easily early on by either getting lucky or just playing through Twisting Corridors. I was able to mount less than 2 months after the expansion started.

Wow.. only took 2 months to be able to use a ground mount! Thank you Ion for peeing on my face! Can you shit on it too next time?

[Paperfox]

Just be a druid. They can use their travel form.

[clevin]

<sigh>
Whether you agree with it or not, you do know why they made this choice.

The players wanted a more immersive questing experience, and were complaining that most quests were trivial. The designers realized they had not that many option if flying made most of the terrain obstacles and mobs trivial and skippable. So they decided to force ground mounted for the leveling experience, which gave them the freedom to create much more challenging leveling experiences. And a large amount of people are just fine with this. Another large, and very vocal part, think it's their god-given right to fly and feel personally slighted to endure the humiliation of leveling on foot. These same people would be the first to complain once you could fly when leveling again and they'd be out of pve content in a day...

None of that is true.

[darklogrus]

I remember arguing with the Anti Flyers about taking their ground mounts away. Its kinda funny to see their logic turned against them and to see them whine worse then the pro flyers. Its just sad that the MAW wasnt fleshed out enough to really drive them insane.

[Ivarr]

Its just sad that the MAW wasnt fleshed out enough to really drive them insane.

But this, genuinely. An actual zone that would drive players insane would have added so much depth to not just the setting but also the game. A zone that would take months to fully figure out would keep gnawing at the back of the player's mind while playing the rest of the game. Everything you do out of the Maw would contribute to your chances within the maw.

The Maw is a great idea, the problem is that Blizzard didn't go far enough in it.

[Kauko]

Big True. Burning Crusade and Wrath allowed you to fly right when you hit 70 and 77 (Storm Peaks). I don’t know why Blizzard ever deviated away from that. I think their reasoning was something like immersion with the world, and it makes zones artificially feel bigger.

Because some players spammed the official forums that blizz has to remove flying... just like before SL some players wanted a meaningful choice of covenants... and when they did it in WOD, shit hit the fan and just like now players realised this choice is one big NO NO, back then they realised flying should come back.

And we saw what happened with WOD when they had to rework the whole zones because of flying... they had to cut whole regions from the game because there was not enough time to finish them.

[muto]

<sigh>
Whether you agree with it or not, you do know why they made this choice.

The players wanted a more immersive questing experience, and were complaining that most quests were trivial. The designers realized they had not that many option if flying made most of the terrain obstacles and mobs trivial and skippable. So they decided to force ground mounted for the leveling experience, which gave them the freedom to create much more challenging leveling experiences. And a large amount of people are just fine with this. Another large, and very vocal part, think it's their god-given right to fly and feel personally slighted to endure the humiliation of leveling on foot. These same people would be the first to complain once you could fly when leveling again and they'd be out of pve content in a day...

I mean that’s just on Blizzard to be more creative then. You can make an immersive questing experience with flying. They can make flying mobs with bigger aggro ranges that can dismount you for example as well as build up, and make questing areas you can only reach with flying such as in Storm Peaks. Bastion would have been a good opportunity to do this as would have been Ardenweald with all the trees or Maldraxxus with the giant mushrooms, and floating necropolis.

[sam86]

They wanted to do something, but that something probably did not play out.

IMO, it's ok to experiment, because they occasionally do discover good stuff that they keep around in their bag of tricks for reuse later.

and then they don't keep it
artifact design was overwhelming positive (not talking about AP farm, but artifact idea itself) and most beloved part of Legion, never repeated
CGI cinematics in BFA were beloved (not talking about story, but quality of cinematics itself), never repeated
I wonder what are they even trying? Maw is supposed to be equal to Suramar as end-game zone, yet it is one of worst zones in wow ever
It doesn't make zone dangerous, just real pita, specially if u did dailies there, then discover that ur covenant new quest requires u to go to maw.. fuck

- - - Updated - - -

I mean that’s just on Blizzard to be more creative then. You can make an immersive questing experience with flying.

blizz did before great flying zones for end-game, heck even Stonecore (or what was its name? underground zone in cata) is great and designed for flying
why did they cancel it? because 360% movement speed is way faster than 100% ever will be, that simple
on personal note my most fav flying zone is Icecrown, even if u afk a Frost Wrynn will kill u mid-air

[Ivarr]

Yeah I'm worried Blizzard takes the feedback as their idea being an abject failure. We don't know how close the Maw got to being a truly spectacular piece of content, but I'd like them to take the idea and further experiment with it in future expansions.

on personal note my most fav flying zone is Icecrown, even if u afk a Frost Wrynn will kill u mid-air

Indeed flying needs more obstacles. Thunder, jet streams, winged beasts, flocks of flying critters, toxic gas, warp rifts. Ground mobs being able to net you down. Players get the experience of flying but not necessarily the convenience. Flying needs to feel like taking a risk for the advantage of speed.

And if they want safe travel, they can take a flight master still. Obviously these flights shouldn't have these obstacles.

[TEHPALLYTANK]

Isn't there like a wormhole type active loading screen, kinda like elevators in mass effect? I quit before I hit max lvl so I can't remember.

No, that was just the transition animation as part of the flight path. It is all within the same zone, no loading screen. The only loading screen for zone transitions was between Oribos and the Maw (there may be more now, I last played back in January so I don't know anything firsthand about the new zones/content).

[Pakheth]

The reason flying is not allowed earlier is usually because they simply have not finished the world and it would become very obvious from the air.

This is not always the case. I was very active using abilities like Far Sight and Eagle Eye to see on top and behind stuff and in some expansions like WoD for sure, but in expansions like Legion definitely not. World was done, they just spaced it out.

[Lane]

"Who thought this was fun?" is a question I asked myself a lot throughout SL.

[Kaleredar]

Listen, I'm an ardent supporter of "flying should be obtainable immediately at max level and Blizzard should design zones around flying." I think it's a rather obvious benefit for the game, as MOST of the game world is not supposed to be challenging

But at least The Maw's lack of flying (and mounting) made sense, in a way. It was basically designed to be a dark souls zone, what with the potential loss of stygia if you died before recovering it. The Maw was supposed to be a challenging zone where it was difficult to move around and you had to think and act intelligently or else you'd get bodied. The resources that spawn in the maw are otherwise rare and completing tasks rather directly limits the amount of time you're able to spend there by merit of the ticking clock the jailer's eye puts on you. They could have pushed this design further by putting in more dailies, not all of which you could feasibly complete in a day, and making activities that drew the jailer's eye, like killing rares or saving souls, more lucrative, but at least I understand what they were going for.

But again, the outside world writ large should NOT be like this. There is nothing to be gained in the A to B travel in doing rote dailies and making it take longer doesn't add to the gameplay experience. Blizzard understood this in BC and WOtLK, Cata and MOP. The change since WoD has really only served to artificially lengthen the amount of time it takes to do these things.

[Echo of Soul]

No, that was just the transition animation as part of the flight path. It is all within the same zone, no loading screen. The only loading screen for zone transitions was between Oribos and the Maw (there may be more now, I last played back in January so I don't know anything firsthand about the new zones/content).

Yeah but I mean a transition animation is literally a loading screen (same as elevators in Mass Effect) it's just disguised to make you not realize that it's a loading screen.

[Dhrizzle]

The reason flying is not allowed earlier is usually because they simply have not finished the world and it would become very obvious from the air.

No it isn't.

- - - Updated - - -

This just does not play out for stuff you have to do daily. And frankly being mythic raider and all, I certainly don't want to have to go through slog like Maw every day just to be optimal.

IMO, if they would go for some super uber hostile toxic place, it also should be completely and totally optional one for vanity/convenience only. Transmogs, toys, mounts, expansion benefits (like secret travel points unlocks), heck maybe even early flying unlock as ultimate reward or such.

The issue here is the way players perceive content based on its rewards. If the rewards are good enough players complaint that it is mandatory. If they're not good enough players complain it is pointless.

[Queen of Hamsters]

Did we somehow miss the 10+ years of people hailing the Vanilla days as the pinnacle gameplay of a "dangerous world" where you were on foot for a huge swat of time?

Because that's what inspired the devs to create a zone that in the end only managed to be annoying. Same as Classic leveling to anyone capable of pressing more than 1 button on a keyboard.

[Dhrizzle]

and then they don't keep it
artifact design was overwhelming positive (not talking about AP farm, but artifact idea itself) and most beloved part of Legion, never repeated
CGI cinematics in BFA were beloved (not talking about story, but quality of cinematics itself), never repeated
I wonder what are they even trying? Maw is supposed to be equal to Suramar as end-game zone, yet it is one of worst zones in wow ever
It doesn't make zone dangerous, just real pita, specially if u did dailies there, then discover that ur covenant new quest requires u to go to maw.. fuck

- - - Updated - - -


blizz did before great flying zones for end-game, heck even Stonecore (or what was its name? underground zone in cata) is great and designed for flying
why did they cancel it? because 360% movement speed is way faster than 100% ever will be, that simple
on personal note my most fav flying zone is Icecrown, even if u afk a Frost Wrynn will kill u mid-air

I always felt Icecrown showcased the worst of flying. Here you are at the centre of the Lich King's power where the Scourge should be at their most threatening and you can just mount up, fly over the suckers and snipe or collect whatever the quest needs you to do. The zone even had Alliance and Horde airships cruising around sightseeing.