Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Nymrohd]

Shadowlands had 4 distinct covenants, with unique abilities, plus one generic ability, with one armour set per armour type, as well as an unique storyline for each covenant. They had four distinct mini games for each covenant (even if Necrolord and Nightfae were less involved).

Also: it was like $20 cheaper than BfA.

It's incredibly stupid and reductive to count the zones and just say "Yep, less content!", just like counting raid bosses nowadays and comparing them to TBC is insanely idiotic.

Honestly, the only outlier in terms of content is Legion, and that cost us a whole expansion.

Seriously? Do you want to count systems in a comparison vs BfA? Because Azerite Armor, however poorly balanced it was, had more abilities by far than covenants did. And if we are talking storylines, BfA added 5941 quests, SL added 3437.

[Reive]

I sincerely hope that is the case and Midnight is gonna blow us ALL away. But TWW in it's current state is so pathetic.

For min. €49,99 you get:
- Dynamic Flight is Dragonriding for everything. It isn't new, should be a patch.
- Warbonds aren't new content, it's just QoL features. Nothing you can really "play".
- Hero Talents will be just color skins for spells or smth.
- Earthen are reskin of Dwarves.

+ Delves is the only "new feature". And even that sounds like smaller Torghast or something.
+ New continent (only 4 new zones)

How everyone is okay with this is beyond me.

On the other hand, there is Dawntrail for FFXIV (€34,99):
+ 2 completely new jobs (classes) and 1 limited job.
+ Female Hrothgar
+ Graphical Update
+ New continent (5 new zones)
+ Cosmic Exploration

The War Within expac is just a paid season patch. Change my mind.

sounds like you should play dawntrail then

[Makabreska]

The War Within expac is just a paid season patch. Change my mind.

I don't think anyone really cares about it to seriously try to change your mind.

You think TWW is bad? Ok.

[Dracullus]

sounds like you should play dawntrail then

Imagine TWW list with this level of fanboyism xD.

+ New dwarfs
+ Underground exploration
+ Female Alleria
+ Male Anduin
+ Vertical continent
+ New assets look nice

[Ochinko]

There's really no need to either argue semantics or cry over the feeling of lacking content. Just do what you are supposed to do with every game being released nowadays. If the game supplied at least one (1) currency (e.g. Dollars / Euro / etc..) per hour played, its worth it. So depending on your choice of version, if you get more than 70 hours of playtime out of TWW, its been worth it as a game. Easy enough to do the math.

[micwini]

Imagine TWW list with this level of fanboyism xD.

+ New dwarfs
+ Underground exploration
+ Female Alleria
+ Male Anduin
+ Vertical continent
+ New assets look nice

Not even to mention the patches that add content for 0€

[Woggmer]

I have to laugh if you guys think there's gonna be more features than those announced at Blizzcon.

That depends on what amount of content people are referring to. Are we talking at launch with the baseline patch or are we talking until the final major patch?

And even then, the amount of content doesn't mean jack if it isn't GOOD content. Otherwise you'll get stuff like Shadowlands where it has (on paper) a ton of content, but it's AWFUL content that people don't like doing. DF has a ton content, but it's too much that it makes previous content items completely obsolete. Don't need to do elemental storms or Zaralekk so long as you do Time Rifts.. don't need to do Time Rifts when you can do Emerald Dream content.

- - - Updated - - -

Not even to mention the patches that add content for 0€

Not to mention there's also Classic, SoD, and whatever sort of experimental game mode Blizzard cooks up like Plunderstorm.

[Ersula]

I don't see how 9.0 was smaller than 8.0, or how 10.0 was smaller than 9.0.

Shadowlands had 3 raids with 35 raid bosses total. Dragonflight had 28 and it's last raid was released less than a year after the expansion's original release date.

Now, after giving early access for a price tag of 90 gd dollars they're also saying the subsequent expansions will be shorter than the 24 month average like that's supposed to be a feature. This might mean that the content drought is shorter, but based on Blizzard's history (namely dragonflight, wrath & WoD) it's more likely that the seasonal content is just going to end sooner.

They pretty much lucked out with Plunderstorm & Remix because they're really fun, but they're hardly substantive content. You'd think they'd follow the 2023 model to prevent a content drought but that doesn't seem to be the developer's goal; instead just frontloading an expansion & then just giving us some sort of rehashed minigame & keep saying "don't worry, the expansion is coming" after a blizzcon where they showed zero gameplay footage.

These are all red flags.

That depends on what amount of content people are referring to. Are we talking at launch with the baseline patch or are we talking until the final major patch?

Stop trying to frame content updates in a subscription based game like they're free. The patches are part of the expansion pricetag. If you start thinking that way then WoD was their ideal business model.

Not to mention there's also Classic, SoD, and whatever sort of experimental game mode Blizzard cooks up like Plunderstorm.

Blizzard might as well just delete retail now if the players consider old content with a minor facelift as something worth between 15 to 90 dollars.

[Albertillo]

Shadowlands had 3 raids with 35 raid bosses total. Dragonflight had 28 and it's last raid was released less than a year than the expansion's original release date.

Now, after giving early access for a price tag of 90 gd dollars they're also saying the subsequent expansions will be shorter than the 24 month average like that's supposed to be a feature.

They pretty much lucked out with Plunderstorm & Remix because they're really fun, but they're hardly substantive content. You'd think they'd follow the 2023 model to prevent a content drought but that doesn't seem to be the developer's goal; instead just frontloading an expansion & then just giving us some sort of rehashed minigame & keep saying "don't worry, the expansion is coming" after a blizzcon where they showed zero gameplay footage.

These are all red flags.Stop trying to frame content updates in a subscription based game like they're free. The patches are part of the expansion pricetag. If you start thinking that way then WoD was their ideal business model.

Number of raid bosses doesn't say anything about more or less content. If we were talking about a raid with only one boss, alright. But 28 bosses in 3 raids is pretty good, actually. You can also see how the bosses are very different with each other, there's a lot of work in them. Look at Naxxramas, it has a lot of bosses, but the complexity is super low in each of them, for me that's less work than any raid in Dragonflight (of course this is an extreme example, we cannot compare WOTLK or classic with the technology we have now).

Dragonflight has had the most updates ever inside an expansion, and they have proven that they're working a lot to deliver as much content as possible, wether you like it or not. Plunderstorm & Remix could not mean substantive content to you, but it can be to a lot of players. There are a lot of xmog to collect and is a fresh game mode. If you think that this is a red flag, I cannot really relate to that.

[Ersula]

Dragonflight has had the most updates ever inside an expansion, and they have proven that they're working a lot to deliver as much content as possible, wether you like it or not. Plunderstorm & Remix could not mean substantive content to you, but it can be to a lot of players. There are a lot of xmog to collect and is a fresh game mode. If you think that this is a red flag, I cannot really relate to that.

Take off your rose-colored glasses. Did you know all those xmogs are old assets that were in the game for nearly 10 years & they're just recycling them? You're acting like you didn't know that.

I really like Plunderstorm & Remix, but lets not lose perspective: Plunderstorm is a minigame conceptually stolen from one of their competitors set in an old zone & Remix is the same thing for Progression servers from Everquest.

Dragonflight only has "the most updates" because they took minor features that are usually in major patches & moved them to more frequent minor patches: 10.2 was pretty much the most barebones major patch ever because all its other features were moved into the minor patches. I do think Dragonflight is a major step up from Shadowlands in terms of communication, but you can see them taking these things for granted based on people having positive reactions to what is essentially a matter of presentation instead of substantive content: We're seeing shrinkflation in action here.

My point is Blizzard is becoming accustomed to repackaging existing content & while raising prices. You all need to push back against this more.

[Cheezits]

There is a set amount of content they have planned for expansions barring any emergency fixes for failed systems (BFA essences and corruptions) or apologies (SL AR customizations). And even then those expansions had big gaps between patches.

Spacing out content to minor patches (DF) or large gaps in patches (Mists, WoD, Legion, BFA, SL) that causes players to get antsy and angry when they run out of stuff to do? What's the call?

[Dracullus]

Oh, looks like we are in the "let's pretend only raids and their rewards are content" part of cycle in this thread.

[Nymrohd]

Number of raid bosses doesn't say anything about more or less content. If we were talking about a raid with only one boss, alright. But 28 bosses in 3 raids is pretty good, actually. You can also see how the bosses are very different with each other, there's a lot of work in them. Look at Naxxramas, it has a lot of bosses, but the complexity is super low in each of them, for me that's less work than any raid in Dragonflight (of course this is an extreme example, we cannot compare WOTLK or classic with the technology we have now).

Can you bring another example then where the bosses were just too similar or simple from the past 3-4 expansions so that it is relevant? Imo you'll struggle to find an example from Cata onward. Less bosses is less bosses. less time spend doing progression, more time in farm.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh, looks like we are in the "let's pretend only raids and their rewards are content" part of cycle in this thread.

Of course they are not. But they are part of the package. DF gave less than even SL, WoD and Cata when it comes to raids. I am confident in saying that DF had less content than BfA or Legion. I think at the end of the day it did have more content than SL though not by that wide a margin but it also delivered it at a vastly better pace. DF is certainly a better expansion than average with very successful systems which is what WoW has done consistently bad on for a fairly long time now but I do feel the idea that it has tons of content is an illusion because of the very good pacing.

- - - Updated - - -

There is a set amount of content they have planned for expansions barring any emergency fixes for failed systems (BFA essences and corruptions) or apologies (SL AR customizations). And even then those expansions had big gaps between patches.

Spacing out content to minor patches (DF) or large gaps in patches (Mists, WoD, Legion, BFA, SL) that causes players to get antsy and angry when they run out of stuff to do? What's the call?

Did Legion and BfA really have content droughts outside maybe the tail end? Mists did in the end but that is entirely because WoD had a longer development cycle than usual because of a serious miscalculation in development. And barring emergency seems weird to say given that almost every other expansion was affected by something going wrong. Emergency is the average state.

[Jastall]

Can you bring another example then where the bosses were just too similar or simple from the past 3-4 expansions so that it is relevant? Imo you'll struggle to find an example from Cata onward. Less bosses is less bosses. less time spend doing progression, more time in farm.

Blizzard has also clearly moved away from raids being the game's only major content releases like they often were in earlier expansions. They now launch patches with a bevy of open world stuff to do, following the trend that loads of WoW players are more casual collectors than sweaty raiders. Versions like Classic or events like Plunderstorm and Remix are also there to bring added value to the sub.

They look at WoW as one great ecosystem now, I'd wager. Nothing offered exists in isolation, and time not spent making giant raids is spent making other content that appeals to other players. Many people will buy TWW because it's the next expansion and that's the end of that. Some won't because it has X% less features or something, that's OK, they might play Classic or something instead.

[Ersula]

Oh, looks like we are in the "let's pretend only raids and their rewards are content" part of cycle in this thread.

Are we at the pretend patch zones that become dead content almost immediately are something to look forward to part of the release cycle?

I just think 90 dollars for a wow expansion regardless of how much cosmetics come with it, Holly teasing impressive new content that turns out to be largely old content while we still know basically nothing about delves, while the community cheers on 'shorter expansions' as if that's a good thing & not the game's biggest problem, are all ridiculous situations.

Blizzard has also clearly moved away from raids being the game's only major content releases like they often were in earlier expansions. They now launch patches with a bevy of open world stuff to do, following the trend that loads of WoW players are more casual collectors than sweaty raiders. Versions like Classic or events like Plunderstorm and Remix are also there to bring added value to the sub.

You seem to be excited that blizzard is moving away from creating entirely new content & toward repackaging old content, though I can't imagine why. Although maybe its because they constantly underdeliver & abandon their new content: I'd remind everyone they promoted the new profession system as being "the 4th pillar" of endgame content during Dragonflight. Because it supposedly was an independent feature that could produce the strongest gear in the game. This turned out to be a lie because you need to do non-crafting content in order to do that & while being a reskin of FFXIV's system its not much different from what came before.

Now in TWW, they described delves are also the new "4th pillar" of endgame content at Blizzcon while showing us nothing about it even though it's apparently getting added to the game in less than 12 weeks. It's like they're treating us as fish with no long term memory.

[Raetary]

I just think 90 dollars for a wow expansion

It's not 90 dollars.
It's 50.

Which has been the standard US price since 2014.

90 dollars is the epic edition, which is a purely optional bonus purchase.

[Jastall]

Are we at the pretend patch zones that become dead content almost immediately are something to look forward to part of the release cycle?

I just think 90 dollars for a wow expansion regardless of how much cosmetics come with it, Holly teasing impressive new content that turns out to be largely old content while we still know basically nothing about delves, while the community cheers on 'shorter expansions' as if that's a good thing & not the game's biggest problem, are all ridiculous situations.You seem to be excited that blizzard is moving away from creating entirely new content & toward repackaging old content, though I can't imagine why. Although maybe its because they constantly underdeliver & abandon their new content: I'd remind everyone they promoted the new profession system as being "the 4th pillar" of endgame content during Dragonflight. Because it supposedly was an independent feature that could produce the strongest gear in the game. This turned out to be a lie because you need to do non-crafting content in order to do that & while being a reskin of FFXIV's system its not much different from what came before.

Now in TWW, they described delves are also the new "4th pillar" of endgame content at Blizzcon while showing us nothing about it even though it's apparently getting added to the game in less than 12 weeks. It's like they're treating us as fish with no long term memory.

90 dollars is for the epic edition tho, not the standard one. Here in Canada it's 65 CND which has been the same price since I think BfA, give or take 5$. Combined with the sub price staying almost the same here since 2004 (it had one bump around Legion if memory serves) and WoW has been fairly inflation-proof over the years unlike a load of other hobbies I participate in.

Anyway, I'm not "excited" for it, that's just you inferring my state of mind. My post was more matter-of-fact as to how Blizzard sees and does things nowadays, as much as I can anyway. Delves might be cool, might not be, we'll have to see during Alpha, you know, the time when they actually start showing the details of the next expansion. I'm probably not going to do them a lot since I'm more of a M+ guy nowadays but we never know.

Let's also not pretend that raids don't become "dead content" only a couple weeks after said pretend patch zones of yours do, and only become relevant again when they -what was the word?- ah yes, repackage them afterwards, such as during an expansion's final season, a Classic outing or Remix.

[Makorus]

Shadowlands had 3 raids with 35 raid bosses total. Dragonflight had 28 and it's last raid was released less than a year after the expansion's original release date.

Now, after giving early access for a price tag of 90 gd dollars they're also saying the subsequent expansions will be shorter than the 24 month average like that's supposed to be a feature. This might mean that the content drought is shorter, but based on Blizzard's history (namely dragonflight, wrath & WoD) it's more likely that the seasonal content is just going to end sooner.

They pretty much lucked out with Plunderstorm & Remix because they're really fun, but they're hardly substantive content. You'd think they'd follow the 2023 model to prevent a content drought but that doesn't seem to be the developer's goal; instead just frontloading an expansion & then just giving us some sort of rehashed minigame & keep saying "don't worry, the expansion is coming" after a blizzcon where they showed zero gameplay footage.

These are all red flags.Stop trying to frame content updates in a subscription based game like they're free. The patches are part of the expansion pricetag. If you start thinking that way then WoD was their ideal business model.Blizzard might as well just delete retail now if the players consider old content with a minor facelift as something worth between 15 to 90 dollars.

There we go again with the number of raid bosses, or number of zones as if that means anything.

Yeah, they could make a raid with 100 bosses, all of the bosses only cast Fireball, but who cares because the only thing that matters if the quantity!

Here's a new continent, it has 500 zones, they are all incredibly small and have subpar storylines, but it's the quantity baybeeeeee!

Here are 10 systems that are going to be universally hated, what a great content-filled expansions, I really got my money worth!

Wrath was better for raids than WoD because it had a higher number of raid instances and bosses! Duh! Legion is a worse expansion because it only has 5 zones compared to 6!

Numbers mean everything!

[Dracullus]

Of course they are not. But they are part of the package. DF gave less than even SL, WoD and Cata when it comes to raids. I am confident in saying that DF had less content than BfA or Legion. I think at the end of the day it did have more content than SL though not by that wide a margin but it also delivered it at a vastly better pace. DF is certainly a better expansion than average with very successful systems which is what WoW has done consistently bad on for a fairly long time now but I do feel the idea that it has tons of content is an illusion because of the very good pacing.

With current system raids simply lost special status they had for most of WoW lifespan. We no longer get initial raid that had no tier and was shorter (in MoP only few weeks, in WoD 2 months, in Legion/BfA 4 months - you see where trend was going), we straight up start with seasonal tier raids that last 5-6 months.

Instead DF got more world content, we never got 2 big zones before (+1 revamp Broken Shore style) in patches, simple as that. Legion that you bring up for some reason (cause I agree that BfA could be bigger than DF, but Legion?) had Broken Shore (almost devoid of any story I remind) and 1 big zone (split into 3 minizones), not too mention 4/5 Legion zones are not really big. DF has 4 Suramars.

Legion is often inflated in our minds because of class campaigns - but I suggest to look at them once again, they all follow model: unique prologue -> farm shit/mission table -> unique chapter -> farm shit/mission table -> unique epilogue -> 7.2 chapter. When we put all stuff together, it's substantial piece of content, but you can counter it with all story questlines from just minor patches of DF (blue dragonflight + forbidden reach + eons fringe + tauren/centaur + several minor like 1.7 or Valdrakken rebels stuff).

Overall I think either BfA or DF is biggest (of course not with raids where DF is smallest), but obviously DF uses existing content smarter (changing M+ pool, remix) and has many version of classic to fill remaining gaps.

Are we at the pretend patch zones that become dead content almost immediately are something to look forward to part of the release cycle?

Are we at the pretend raids that become dead content almost immediately are something to look forward to part of the release cycle? You see, I can play this game too, pretending stuff I don't like doesn't exist.

You think I'm exaggerating? Then what is raid for folks who just do LFR once and focus on collecting/achievements or M+ players who just storm through heroic once for curve and never go back? Same thing that open world zone is for mythic raider.

[Makorus]

Are we at the pretend raids that become dead content almost immediately are something to look forward to part of the release cycle? You see, I can play this game too, pretending stuff I don't like doesn't exist.

You think I'm exaggerating? Then what is raid for folks who just do LFR once and focus on collecting/achievements or M+ players who just storm through heroic once for curve and never go back? Same thing that open world zone is for mythic raider.

I mean, raid is the content that lasts the longest without being artificially inflated, along with M+. People genuinely like to raid, and Mythic raiders have been raiding with no real rewards for the last two seasons now.

Would anyone do storms or whatever if there wasn't an achievement behind it for killing 200 mobs?