Patch 9.1.5 PTR - PvP Item Level Table Updated, Ion Hazzikostas Tweets

[Lumy]

Patch 9.1.5 PTR - PvP Item Level Table Updated
Blizzard has updated the PvP item level table from the PTR 9.1.5 Development Notes to include the ilvl in PvP situations and unranked PvP item levels.

New Rating	Rated PvP Title	Item Level	iLvl in PvP
	Rank 1 Unranked	220	233
1000	Rank 2 Combatant I	226	239
1200	Rank 3 Combatant II	229	242
1400	Rank 4 Challenger I	233	246
1600	Rank 5 Challenger II	236	249
1800	Rank 6 Rival I	239	252
1950	Rank 7 Rival II	242	255
2100	Rank 8 Duelist	246	259
2400	Rank 9 Elite	249	259

Unrated PvP Step	Item Level	iLvl in PvP
Vendor	177	213
Step 1	184	216
Step 2	190	220
Step 3 (Renown 44)	197	223
Step 4	203	226
Step 5 (Renown 59)	210	229
Step 6	216	233

New Druid Travel Form Appearances

The four new Druid Travel Forms now have two color variations each.

Updated note:

Classes

• Druid
  
  • Discover 4 new Travel Form appearances with 2 color variations each.

Ion Hazzikostas Tweets
Game Director Ion Hazzikostas has recently commented about the conduit energy change, cross faction gameplay, and progression in the outdoor world.

[Biomega]

It makes sense, but it's interesting how quickly they effectively abandoned the idea of Covenants as flavor/story vehicles. If the idea was to have a strong identity for players by making a "meaningful" choice of Covenant, it's a bit weird that the FIRST new tier already did away completely with Covenant-specific stories and had everyone do the same thing.

That seems to me a stark contrast to the initial rationale behind Covenants during SL reveal/early SL, which is weird considering that at that point the Korthia story would probably already have been developed. So they knew from the start that the very first big patch they'd abandon the idea of separate Covenant stories, which makes their insistence upon strong Covenant identity during early SL a bit suspect.

Don't get me wrong - I'm happy with the 9.1.5 changes. It's just a little strange that they'd apparently planned for this direction from the start.

[OrangeJuice]

Every interview, every response, every time he speaks; "We hear you, we're listening. We agree. We can do better. We're working on it". That is all he ever says. Nothing direct, no real answers and no specific dates. This guy must have a world record for using the most words to say nothing.

[TyloBedo]

Glad they fixed the conquest gear ilvls. The base honor set changes (and the base increase to 213) is huge too.

[Tarba]

Ho my god...

-We want covenant to be a meaningfull choice
Well it's stupid gameplay wise
-No it's meaningfull, it's important for the fantasy to have those kind of restrictions.
Remember you are the maw walker, the one who will help saving the universe. All covenants are allied and facing the same problems so you will help them all, but you have to chose only one and help only that one, and all the others won't help you. So... gameplay restriction because of lore!

First patch happen

- Well no, it's based on the story; the story progressed, now it does not need to be meaningfull.


So let's rephrasing a bit:
-We have a stupid idea because of stupid reasons.
it's stupid
-No
First patch happen
-It was stupid no more restrictions!

And in one sentence:
-We needed a carrot for the next patch, so we put those restrictions at start so we could remove them later. We do that every expansion. Be ready for the next stupid idea for the next patch !

[Quaade]

This series of Tweets is like listening to someone pouring a drink, a perfectly normal activity that's done all the time while explaining exactly the reason they're justified in pouring the drink.

[bluesock]

It's astonishing that in four tweets, after doing the thing the community has been asking to do for a year, he didn't say a single word to admitting he's wrong and instead just doubled down that he knew better from the start and that this decision now has got nothing to do with the community but instead that he deemed appropriate.

Absolutely amazing Ion, keep being you.

[OrangeJuice]

Glad they fixed the conquest gear ilvls. The base honor set changes (and the base increase to 213) is huge too.

Until you realize that you'll need double the amount of honor to upgrade through all these additional ranks, which everyone will complain about and they'll just ignore for a month or two.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I read basically everything that crosses my feed and often spin up conversations within the team based on thoughtful feedback I see here. 100% agreed that we can and should do more to add depth and progression in the outdoor world.

You say you're listening, but your actions suggest otherwise. We're still waiting for:

• Alliance High Elves (NOT purple abominations with tentacle hair nobody asked for. I mean fair skinned, blonde haired, blue eyed, non-tentacled haired legit Alliance High Elves).

• Player housing.

• Reputation storylines to return. Nobody asked for world quest grinds.

• Mage Tower.

• Better transmog system.

• Actual content, not grinds.

Etc.

We've been asking for these things for years and years, and yet you don't give what your paying customers want. We are unpaid beta testers who test your shitty Artifact grinds and RNGendaries and Azerite power and Chorghast and tell you that they are not fun in the hopes that you will change it before launch (that's the whole point of PTR and beta testing, right?), and when the expansion launches, lo and behold the systems are still shitty and nobody likes them and people quit the game and you wonder "why didn't people like shit we shoved down their throat? No, it's not us who are wrong" and you wait a year before you find make a little tweak. Too little, too late. You plug your fingers into your ears and pretend that all is well and that it isn't you who is the problem, but "entitled customers who don't understand that we know better than them!".

This guy said it best:



- - - Updated - - -

And for goodness sake, can you guys actually TALK to your paying customers again? Remember when Honlika or Ghostcrawler used to reply to people on the forums? The devs were actually talking on the same level as their customers. But you guys only ever give press releases and interviews every few months that show just how utterly divorced you are from the desires and feelings of your customers.

[Thelxi]

glad they fixed the conquest gear ilvls

lol .

[Raetary]

• Alliance High Elves (NOT purple abominations with tentacle hair nobody asked for. I mean fair skinned, blonde haired, blue eyed, non-tentacled haired legit Alliance High Elves).

*ahem*

All that's left is hair color and a few extra hair style options, both of which are coming in this next patch.

Rest i mostly agree with.

[Thelxi]

The pvp gearing changes are a joke. I don't think they could've made the change smaller or more inconsequential if they tried. Big fat double down on the current state of PvP and their design direction.

I'm genuinely a bit surprised at just how minor this is. This is a bad omen for the future if anyone still held out some hope.

[Gadzooks]

It's astonishing that in four tweets, after doing the thing the community has been asking to do for a year, he didn't say a single word to admitting he's wrong and instead just doubled down that he knew better from the start and that this decision now has got nothing to do with the community but instead that he deemed appropriate.

Absolutely amazing Ion, keep being you.

Classic Ion, really, which leans this for me towards 'We haven't learned a damned thing, the new bosses told us to lighten up for this patch, but we're gonna do it all again." And finishes with his standard "We need to do better" nonsense. I don't even have the energy to be mad at him anymore, lol. He's just a spreadsheet with legs.

For everyone who is hoping 9.2 and 10.0 will be a fresh, exciting sea change for the dev team...I'm sorry. I really feel for you.

[MakeMeLaugh]

I'm so sick and tired of the same excuses again and again, ffs Ion...

[OokOok]

AAAAAAAAHAHAHHA OMFG sheep still falling for this exodus damage control, as if they finally care. Lose your money sheep

[Garretdejiko]

If those twits weren't bs enough, the amount of people gobbling them up is astonishing.
The "I'm right, you're wrong" mentality will never leave this game as long as he's in charge.

[DazManianDevil]

AAAAAAAAHAHAHHA OMFG sheep still falling for this exodus damage control, as if they finally care. Lose your money sheep

This is the quality insight I come for on MMO-C.
/Popcorn
That being said, I'm at least interested in the new Druid travel forms. Sounds like they're Cov based given the snippet of info.

[Fabled]

Every interview, every response, every time he speaks; "We hear you, we're listening. We agree. We can do better. We're working on it". That is all he ever says. Nothing direct, no real answers and no specific dates. This guy must have a world record for using the most words to say nothing.

Well, he used to be a lawyer, it makes sense he's good at spinning nothing.

[aceperson]

i call bs on this. lore was one of the main reasons for making people choose covenants cause "it's an rpg! cause lore!"...



a lesson that should've been learned 3 and a half years ago with bfa. either ion and his team are extremely slow learners or this is lip service. once again, i call bs.



this issue wasn't one made by ion and his team since the issue started in wod and snowballed from there. that said, we already have cross faction pvp ques. might as well let people pick a faction to represent and use those cities, but still allow everyone to play together just for gameplay reasons. without going ham on a faction divide (like they should've with bfa), i don't think this is solvable otherwise.



i call bs on this one too. people were giving the same feedback for almost a year regarding covenants before shadowlands even launched and it was justified with lore and MeaNInGfUl DeCIsOnS. if twitter if where you go to listen, then why the heck does the forums exist? the people who use the forums are the passionate players. the people on twitter are usually slack-tivists and people who don't actually think ideas through. there are those on the forum but twitter is far worse.

i also call bs on wanting to provide more meaningful and in-depth world content. the world has only gotten smaller and smaller under ion. this is blatant lip service too.

so in all, ion gave 4 lies/deflections and has a pass on the fifth because he didn't actually cause it. at least admitting some fault would've earned some kind of praise from me but he did not.

[Empower]

Progression from the open world sounds terrible. Didn't we learn from isle of giants onwards that any " hard" world content always ends in raid groups aoe farming it?