The War Within 11.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Vakir]

Also - 8 months between launch and FIRST big patch. EIGHT. MONTHS. Then another another EIGHT with only QoL/Legion timewalking patch in between.

And I maintain that the first major content patch was almost worse than having nothing at all.

I'm reminded of, of all things, Superstar Limo at California Adventure - where statistics breakdown showed guests had a worse experience going on it than doing literally anything else at all.

Korthia was worse than nothing. It gave me a sense of existential dread and physical malaise that rivaled the Maw itself in-universe.

Sanctum was alright but holy shit.

I think the issue is we only got three raids and none of them were particularly large. The other three expansions that only had three raid tiers (and yes, introductory tiers are separate) all had at least one very large raid. I do raid with friends and I definitely felt the difference.

And that's fair, DF is the most blandly "safe" thing I think the game's ever tried and it's not exactly the best thing put out.

I just roll my eyes anytime someone puts Karasaang or Sholazar on the same level as literally any other modern zone. Or people who pretend that Tomb of Sargeras and the Broken Shore weren't terrible. Or people who insist that hundreds of treasures and rares are worth engaging with if they're attached to gameplay systems that make me actually feel less entertainment than playing something at a lower level with less content.

[Dracullus]

48h Alpha hype???

More like Wednesday/Thursday, Blizzard probably want all these interview launch same time it starts.

[Raetary]

48h Alpha hype???

They need a day or 2 for marketing, so dev update and press releases on tuesday/wednesday and alpha starting thursday/friday.

[Foreign Exchange Ztudent]

It's definitely going to be Wednesday/Thursday.

Honestly, I haven't been this excited for a Alpha in a long time.

[Reive]

max said on twitter he's not gonna stream till wednesday, so i guess that's the day alpha drops

[Nymrohd]

And that's fair, DF is the most blandly "safe" thing I think the game's ever tried and it's not exactly the best thing put out.

For me what DF did best was systems. And after multiple expansion in a row where systems made a mess of the game (Legion included), this was such a welcome change. The talent system, reward system and not M+ changes are all great changes. Professions need a lot of work but they are on the right track and more importantly they managed to make the code changes they needed to get them to work.

- - - Updated - - -

I do hope they do some extended Delve testing at the start similar to what they did with Torghast in SL. That's the big unknown for TWW

[Reive]

if we count plunderstorm and mop remix as their own thing, i think dragonflight was too safe in both content and story. they focused more on the core gameplay of wow and qol than new features. tww for now seems to be the same. unless they reveal something new, delves are the highlight of the expansion

[Lady Atia]

max said on twitter he's not gonna stream till wednesday, so i guess that's the day alpha drops

Well, tuesday is the event thing and we know it's a physical thing in London.

[Darkarath]

It would never cease to amaze me that people defend SL, the biggest turd that Blizzard has ever produced. What an absolute piece of shit. A sacrilege against WoW's lore. An expansion which has done irreparable damage to the game.

In two years people would claim that it was the best expansion ever

If DF had an epic story like Legion instead of the shitty main story that we got people would say that it was the best expansion in every way. Even with the shitty story, DF with a proper 10.3 patch would probably have been the top expansion of the game for most players.

[Nightshade711]

It would never cease to amaze me that people defend SL, the biggest turd that Blizzard has ever produced. What an absolute piece of shit. A sacrilege against WoW's lore. An expansion which has done irreparable damage to the game.

In two years people would claim that it was the best expansion ever

If DF had an epic story like Legion instead of the shitty main story that we got people would say that it was the best expansion in every way. Even with the shitty story, DF with a proper 10.3 patch would probably be the top expansion of the game for most players.

SL was better than WoD because SL actually had content patches where WoD only had one legitimate content patch.

[Makorus]

Well, we have to quantify it somehow & it doesn't help if you get that number wrong. Legion had at least 7 depending on how you quantify it. And even then the quality was better than dragonflight zones because they were more engaging.

I mean, I only counted launch, obviously, which probably comes in Legions favour because the Legion patch zones sucked really badly. Argus was a wasted opportunity and it being one zone split into three zones doesn't really help. Both Krokuun and Antoran Wastes are essentially corridors, and Eredath is an alright zone but half of it is a dungeon. Broken Shore LMAO.

It literally took a WHOLE YEAR before Legion got a new zone.

But yeah, I dunno how you can say the zones were "more engaging". What does that even mean?

[Eldryth]

But in actuality, now that we have post-legion subscription numbers, Shadowlands pulled in more subscribers than BFA. (Don't say it was all classic. The Shadowlands release spike was bigger than the classic release spike & BFA release spike combined.)

Sure, but that doesn't make Shadowlands good or liked no matter how many people misuse that statistic. Shadowlands did draw in a lot of people, but then what?

They left.

Shadowlands was hyped, but once people got in and got to actually try it, they were very disappointed, leading to the largest subscriber loss in WoW's history. Or, in other words, people came back because they expected Shadowlands to be good, then quickly left once they learned that it was not.

The one metric that actually gives any indication of an expansion's quality is retention. The initial peak just shows how many people are optimistic enough to try it in the first place, but retention shows how many people enjoyed it enough to stay. As such, an honest evaluation of the data points to Dragonflight being one of the best-liked expansions for the people who tried it. It had a lower peak- which is to be expected after Shadowlands convinced such a large portion of the playerbase that WoW will never be good again, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to earn back that goodwill- but a far bigger portion of that playerbase decided to keep playing compared to other recent expansions. Less people tried it in the first place, but most of the players who did liked it.

As for my personal opinion, the content itself wasn't the most exciting, but the major system changes (especially the new talents, Dragonriding, and gear upgrade system) were such massive improvements to the core experience that it ended up as some of the best time I've had in WoW so far, and I think this is the first time since Wrath I've stayed subscribed for an entire expansion. And with these features all getting carried forward... I'm really looking forward to seeing how great the Worldsoul Saga can be if they manage to mix this with more exciting raids and story.

[Raetary]

SL was better than WoD because SL actually had content patches where WoD only had one legitimate content patch.

Both were terrible.
I'd argue that SL was worse because it was an actively destructive influence on the franchise.

Whereas WoD was primarily just forgetable and boring.

SL having had more patches then doesn't really mean much, when said patch content made people wish said patch didn't exist in the first place.

[Makorus]

Both were terrible.
I'd argue that SL was worse because it was an actively destructive influence on the franchise.

Whereas WoD was primarily just forgetable and boring.

SL having had more patches then doesn't really mean much, when said patch content made people wish said patch didn't exist in the first place.

9.1/9.2 both were not bad patches though and actively improved the game outside of the story and fixed the complaints people had with the expansions to begin with.

Korthia might have been a meh zone but Zereth Mortis was great.

Meanwhile 6.1 literally added nothing.

[Nightshade711]

Meanwhile 6.1 literally added nothing.

What do you mean??? It added the selfie camera!!

- - - Updated - - -

Both were terrible.
I'd argue that SL was worse because it was an actively destructive influence on the franchise.

Whereas WoD was primarily just forgetable and boring.

SL having had more patches then doesn't really mean much, when said patch content made people wish said patch didn't exist in the first place.

SL had more content and more to do.
Gameplay wise except the need to grind choregast it was fine. I enjoyed M+ and raids in SL.

WoD basically had nothing to do and garrisons were terribly implemented. Not to mention all that was promised for the expansion that just never came to fruition.

[Khaza-R]

I enjoyed Nathria and overall I thought the M+ dungeons were better. But that's about the extent of the nice things I can say about SL.

The lore was insulting, Korthia was just a pure steaming pile and shards of domination might have been the worst design decision ever made.

[Makabreska]

Both were terrible.
I'd argue that SL was worse because it was an actively destructive influence on the franchise.

Whereas WoD was primarily just forgetable and boring.

SL having had more patches then doesn't really mean much, when said patch content made people wish said patch didn't exist in the first place.

I see we are doing the same thing again. Just like with WoD, people now treat SL as some kind of a traumatic experience that mentally scarred them for life, when in reality, it was simply a weak expansion. It still had great things like raids (mostly CN) and dungeons, but some people can't seem to look past Covs and Korthia (which grind was btw so much faster than abything in BfA).

[Vakir]

For me what DF did best was systems. And after multiple expansion in a row where systems made a mess of the game (Legion included), this was such a welcome change. The talent system, reward system and not M+ changes are all great changes. Professions need a lot of work but they are on the right track and more importantly they managed to make the code changes they needed to get them to work.

Yup - and sometimes backend things are better for the game then having more numbers of stuff. Everyone is complaining about Hero Talents, but nobody seems to understand that 1-2 more rows of talents as they stand are gonna create insane power creep which is what they had to avoid in regards to Mists.

Old games with lots of backlog can get real messy.

I do hope they do some extended Delve testing at the start similar to what they did with Torghast in SL. That's the big unknown for TWW

And I hope they don't take the absolute wrong lessons away from said testing, like what they did with Torghast. :/

I see we are doing the same thing again. Just like with WoD, people now treat SL as some kind of a traumatic experience that mentally scarred them for life, when in reality, it was simply a weak expansion. It still had great things like raids (mostly CN) and dungeons, but some people can't seem to look past Covs and Korthia (which grind was btw so much faster than abything in BfA).

I can't speak for anyone else, but I truly am not doing the 2008-angry-reviewer style hyperbole.

It was really, really that bad. Even if 9.2 was serviceable overall as a zone and full of content and mounts to craft and whatever, it doesn't change how much of a bad taste everything else still left, including the issues in 9.2 anyway in terms of the overall vibe and contentiousness of its lore/setting.

[Ersula]

Sure, but that doesn't make Shadowlands good or liked no matter how many people misuse that statistic. Shadowlands did draw in a lot of people, but then what?

They left.

Shadowlands was hyped, but once people got in and got to actually try it, they were very disappointed, leading to the largest subscriber loss in WoW's history. Or, in other words, people came back because they expected Shadowlands to be good, then quickly left once they learned that it was not.

"Shadowlands had the biggest loss of WoW subs ever" is a bit unfair for several reasons:

• We're actually in the most stable sub era in WoW's history. We've been fluctuating between 8 and 4 million for almost a decade.
• The only subscription figure we never got is what WoD was at it's lowest. (The end of Mop was 7.7 million & the height of Legion was about 7.5 million.)
• If Classic hadn't been released BFA's would have been way lower.
• BFA's loss of subs after launch is more severe than Shadowlands'. 9.1 actually caused a noticeable uptick in subscriptions while none of BFA's patches did.
• Dragonflight reveal & pre-order was 8 whole months later than an expansion reveal usually is. Shadowland's lowest point is past where there's usually a huge influx of renewed subscriptions in response to a new expansion. It would be as if they still hadn't revealed TWW or been non-committal if there even would be a new expansion on this very day, today.

It's just absurd to say Legion & Dragonflight are good while Shadowlands is bad based on subscription numbers....when Shadowlands & Dragonflight are closer to Legion in sub numbers than anything that came before WoD.

[Raetary]

I see we are doing the same thing again. Just like with WoD, people now treat SL as some kind of a traumatic experience that mentally scarred them for life, when in reality, it was simply a weak expansion. It still had great things like raids (mostly CN) and dungeons, but some people can't seem to look past Covs and Korthia (which grind was btw so much faster than abything in BfA).

I don't consider it some traumatic experience, no.

But i do consider it the one expansion that genuinely made me question whether i want to keep engaging with this franchise or not.
Something that not even wod managed to do.

And i will judge it accordingly.