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

[Makabreska]

No way they are doing another underwater thing after Vashjir, sadly. And thanks to Afrasiabi they wasted Nazjatar already.

They could do water zone easily. Main issue with Vashj'ir (which, mind you, was released 14y ago) was it's huge size. This time they can make a smaller zone with more air pocket places.

[Dracullus]

Underwater zone could work if they make some dynamic method of transportation similar to Skyriding. Maybe in Midnight, we need candidate for 4th zone (beside Eversong, Ghostlands, Amani) and at this point people will be fed up with underground themes.

[huth]

They could do water zone easily. Main issue with Vashj'ir (which, mind you, was released 14y ago) was it's huge size. This time they can make a smaller zone with more air pocket places.

I'd say the biggest issue was melee range being a cylinder instead of a sphere.

[Viridiel]

Underwater zone could work if they make some dynamic method of transportation similar to Skyriding. Maybe in Midnight, we need candidate for 4th zone (beside Eversong, Ghostlands, Amani) and at this point people will be fed up with underground themes.

That's exactly what I think will happen. The main issues with Vashj'ir are all related to technology limitations at the time. The underwater delve uses a different system to Vashj'ir where it's basically just moon gravity rather than actual swimming, so it just feels like a bouncier, more floaty version of a regular ground zone with no frustrating accidental swimming that massively slows you down. It feels great and still distinctly underwater, and if you add dynamic swimming mounts to function as the flying analogue then it would feel like any other zone, just underwater.

[Magistrate]

No way they are doing another underwater thing after Vashjir, sadly. And thanks to Afrasiabi they wasted Nazjatar already.

Vashj'ir was almost 15 years ago. The technology and design advantages they have now are different than back then. The biggest issues as far as I remember were:

1. Targeting
2. Melee range
3. Movement
4. I *think* there may have been a distortion effect they shortly thereafter removed
5. It was very large with no good hubs for MMO interactions-it felt like three zones you couldn't easily break out of once you started

All of these are easily fixable and avoidable. Dynamic flying could also easily be adapted to work really well under water. They would need to do a pass on some skills to make sure they function usefully/correctly underwater, which is currently not the case with some abilities, but again all doable.

But I do think since they wasted Nazjatar, finding the right moment to do it is, imo, the bigger issue.

[Xilurm]

I know this is a stupid question, but am I seriously the only one who liked Vash'jir?

It's like flying. You just press tab when looking at the target and there you go. What's the big issue? If people hate Vash'jir so much then asking for flying combat is going to lead to the same complaints.

[Jolly Roger]

vashjr was the best zone
fast quests
faster seahorse
giant bodies
giant skeletons

[Raetary]

We have that one Kobyss Delve that is entirely underwater but locks you to the ground.

If they do an underwater zone, they could do that to a major chunk of the zone.

[KainneAbsolute]

One of the First Ones likely has their own design with their own stuff in mind. I imagine this "unknown First One" is gonna end up being the final boss of Warcraft, assuming Blizzard doesn't pull anymore bullshit out their ass, of course.

I wouldn't say I like that a rebel or fallen first one is the ultimate evil. It was similar in Starcraft, Amon was a fallen Xel Naga that betrayed the rest.

However it can happen: the first one versus the last one hehe

[meroes]

Underwater zone could work if they make some dynamic method of transportation similar to Skyriding. Maybe in Midnight, we need candidate for 4th zone (beside Eversong, Ghostlands, Amani) and at this point people will be fed up with underground themes.

I would love to see a graph of those who like water zones vs what class they play mostly in said water zones when the content is fresh. I’m up for another shot but I can imagine for some classes it’s better/worse.

[Alanar]

I know this is a stupid question, but am I seriously the only one who liked Vash'jir?
.

No you are obviously not.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I thought Vashj'r was very unique and was disappointed that the long awaited Azshara zone was not underwater (even though the end result we got was kinda creative). Underwater combat in GW2 was also novel and spruced up adventuring in the vanilla maps. Sadly underwater gameplay was jetissoned in the expansions. In the HoT expansion there is a hero point you have to travel through a shark infested underwater tunnel to reach, and then that's it. The End of Dragons expansion about the last Elder Dragon, the ED of water, didn't even have any underwater content in it! It climaxes in you fight the water dragon on a tower in the middle of dry land! WTF? I also really liked the underwater Japanese kingdom of Sui-no-Sato from FF14, and the underwater City of Raging Tides from Perfect World.

[Golden Yak]

What I always thought was neat about Vashj'ir was how it was divided up into three sub-zones. I don't know why they did that, or why it never happened again.

[Lady Atia]

What I always thought was neat about Vashj'ir was how it was divided up into three sub-zones. I don't know why they did that, or why it never happened again.

Well they kinda did that with Argus?^^

[Golden Yak]

That's right.

They should do that more often, it's neat.

[Lady Atia]

That's right.

They should do that more often, it's neat.

Yeah it kinda helped to sell it as a mini-Expansion.

*Still Argus should have been it's own Expansion and WoD-Legion-Argus should just have been the Felstorm Saga*

Who said that? Actually, that sounds great.

[Xilurm]

Is there any new Titan artwork in the new Chronicles?

[SkyTides]

I liked Vashjir but played ranged so didn't notice any targeting issues.

The main thing I'm a bit worried about in TWW is underground-fatigue. If the speculation of the patches being goblin and rootland themed are right, then that would be all the expac content also underground. I'm thinking its more likely that Karesh will be a patch in order to get us out in the open for a while

[Enrif]

Is there any new Titan artwork in the new Chronicles?

Nope. The closest is the image of a few keepers holding the pillars of creation

[shanthi]

I don't think locking characters to the seafloor would work for an underwater zone. It's fine for a delve, which is a short, largely scripted affair but the entire point of an underwater zone is that it's three-dimensional to explore--that you can swim up and actually interact with things higher up (unlike with flight in normal zones, with rare exceptions like flying through an orb or ring or whatever).

I do think that Blizzard could do an underwater zone, like Vashj'ir, much better today. They have Vashj'ir to learn from as well as better game tech. I wouldn't mind them taking another swing at it.