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

[Fahrad Wagner]

I do hope they make an effort with the mogs. Wish they used better mogs for NPCs in general.

It's crazy to me with the number of armor items out there and the quality mogs ensembles we see created by players left and right that Blizzard keeps doing this to NPCs. Like, they don't need to all be extra-shiny, but a little originality wouldn't kill anyone. That and HD "toned down" armor sets would be appreciated (I think they're taking a step in this direction as they've recently produced many items that are quite simple but very nice).

[loras]

What was so likeable about the guy so hungry for war and violence that he got easily tricked 2/3 times into killing and conquering other nations/worlds?

To be fair: Wars and conquest are pretty much a necessity at various points in life if you're unlucky, history tells as much even if people would rather sew their eyes shut than consider that.

Genocide on the other hands is hugely counterproductive even to the perpetrator, barring one that quite literally feeds off death as is possible in fiction.

Thus the former is a moral grey character, the latter is just pitch black.

[Nymrohd]

It's crazy to me with the number of armor items out there and the quality mogs ensembles we see created by players left and right that Blizzard keeps doing this to NPCs. Like, they don't need to all be extra-shiny, but a little originality wouldn't kill anyone. That and HD "toned down" armor sets would be appreciated (I think they're taking a step in this direction as they've recently produced many items that are quite simple but very nice).

The fact that they showed Malygos' and Neltharion's visages in the Silver Purpose and no one bothered to make some decent looking mogs for them just drives me crazy

[Sondrelk]

The fact that they showed Malygos' and Neltharion's visages in the Silver Purpose and no one bothered to make some decent looking mogs for them just drives me crazy

They also had a new Ysera model, and still didn't use it.

[Darkarath]

After playing DF for a month and a half, I have to say that I am enjoying it very much. IMO DF has the potential to be the best expansion. We will have to see how the patch cycle goes, but it looks promising.

I am shocked to see players complaining about the lack of a mission table, about the lack of daily WQs, and about how alt-unfriendly DF is. Bi-weekly WQs IMO is vital for WoWs future. I actually enjoy doing WQs now, is not amazing content, but just twice a week for some quick rewards feels ok. Getting rid of chores like the mission table is good too, as even if they do not have player power attached to them, many will feel the need to do it.

But we cannot deny that WoW's future is worrying. We know that it will always have a decent playerbase, but we also know that WoW's playerbase is old and is getting older. I LOVE the game but I just cannot play as much as before and chances are that I will play less as time passes. I am sure that a lot of players are in the same situation. It is inevitable that WoW, as it is today, will keep losing players. Less players, less updates, will lead to even less players and shitty microtransactions.

WoW needs new players, and it is actually terrible for new players. It has almost 20 years. Its graphics looks outdated, it is a VERY complicated game for new players, it also needs quite a bit of time to get to the "good" content, systems are not explained at all, there is so much content that it can feel overwhelming, and also most of that content is useless for most players (I love doing old content, though).

I like the new talent system, and supposedly it has been created as a evergreen system, but I find disturbing that they keep adding active skills. I know that people will disagree but IMO WoW classes need less skills, it needs to be simpler to attract new players.

DF is a step in the right direction but they have to make practically everything account wide, including reps (although the new renown system boost is fine but needs to work with past expansions), secondary professions, most of the achievements (not just the blue ones), lift current pointless limitations like not being able to gain transmog appearances of other armor or weapon types not used by your class, etc.

And even if they do all these changes and future content is amazing, it will not be enough. I will keep playing it for sure, and I know that a lot of people too. But current WoW even at its best will not attract a significant amount of new, younger players. At this point is WoW 2.0 or current WoW with massive changes in every system, a kind of reset in everything, from story to how classes work, to PvP...

I was amazed to see how much SL sold, but I am also amazed to see how WoW popularity has fallen. I am sure that DF has sold millions, but probably way less than expected as they have not said anything about it. The expansion has not been out for 2 months and already they are setting incentives to buy it. WoW youtubers that used to have hundreds of thousands of views in few days are not able to reach 100 k views in weeks, same goes for Blizzard's Warcraft related videos. Even this forum has way less activity than it used to have.

I am really curious to see how Blizzard is going to tackle all these issues, as I have no doubt that they are well aware of them. I will be surprised if the next expansion is not the long awaited world revamp but done in a way beyond our wildest expectations.

[Makorus]

They also had a new Ysera model, and still didn't use it.

I mean, the new Ysera model does have Ardenweald-influences in design so it wouldn't make much sense to use it.

[Gurahk]

I mean, the new Ysera model does have Ardenweald-influences in design so it wouldn't make much sense to use it.

There's a version without the fancy effects.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

After playing DF for a month and a half, I have to say that I am enjoying it very much. IMO DF has the potential to be the best expansion. We will have to see how the patch cycle goes, but it looks promising.

I am shocked to see players complaining about the lack of a mission table, about the lack of daily WQs, and about how alt-unfriendly DF is. Bi-weekly WQs IMO is vital for WoWs future. I actually enjoy doing WQs now, is not amazing content, but just twice a week for some quick rewards feels ok. Getting rid of chores like the mission table is good too, as even if they do not have player power attached to them, many will feel the need to do it.

But we cannot deny that WoW's future is worrying. We know that it will always have a decent playerbase, but we also know that WoW's playerbase is old and is getting older. I LOVE the game but I just cannot play as much as before and chances are that I will play less as time passes. I am sure that a lot of players are in the same situation. It is inevitable that WoW, as it is today, will keep losing players. Less players, less updates, will lead to even less players and shitty microtransactions.

WoW needs new players, and it is actually terrible for new players. It has almost 20 years. Its graphics looks outdated, it is a VERY complicated game for new players, it also needs quite a bit of time to get to the "good" content, systems are not explained at all, there is so much content that it can feel overwhelming, and also most of that content is useless for most players (I love doing old content, though).

I like the new talent system, and supposedly it has been created as a evergreen system, but I find disturbing that they keep adding active skills. I know that people will disagree but IMO WoW classes need less skills, it needs to be simpler to attract new players.

DF is a step in the right direction but they have to make practically everything account wide, including reps (although the new renown system boost is fine but needs to work with past expansions), secondary professions, most of the achievements (not just the blue ones), lift current pointless limitations like not being able to gain transmog appearances of other armor or weapon types not used by your class, etc.

And even if they do all these changes and future content is amazing, it will not be enough. I will keep playing it for sure, and I know that a lot of people too. But current WoW even at its best will not attract a significant amount of new, younger players. At this point is WoW 2.0 or current WoW with massive changes in every system, a kind of reset in everything, from story to how classes work, to PvP...

I was amazed to see how much SL sold, but I am also amazed to see how WoW popularity has fallen. I am sure that DF has sold millions, but probably way less than expected as they have not said anything about it. The expansion has not been out for 2 months and already they are setting incentives to buy it. WoW youtubers that used to have hundreds of thousands of views in few days are not able to reach 100 k views in weeks, same goes for Blizzard's Warcraft related videos. Even this forum has way less activity than it used to have.

I am really curious to see how Blizzard is going to tackle all these issues, as I have no doubt that they are well aware of them. I will be surprised if the next expansion is not the long awaited world revamp but done in a way beyond our wildest expectations.

I think you are way overworrying over Wow's future, take a breather.

[Nathanyel]

I've thought of this but instead of going to AU Draenor I would have had Yrel or whoever find a way to merge AU Draenor with our Outland. So you'd have a mix of ravaged Draenor zones and revamped Outland zones.

I keep saying that WoD shouldn't have been about time travel, but about Outland, with phased zones and additional ones that are shards of Draenor floating back (either by the equivalent of 'gravity' eventually overcoming the force of the 'explosion', or by actions of the inhabitants) and we still could have had most of the story beats: war-hungry orcs invading through the Dark Portal, mostly from the returning shards, with Garrosh, the Dragonmaw, the Blackrock and Blackfuse's Goblins siding with them, two major factions of Orcs, the hostile Orcs being corrupted by Fel eventually, side stories about the Draenei and Arakkoa, Highmaul might have been full-on Goria instead...

The only major thing that would need to be dropped would be having the "Warlords" as in the original clan chieftains, and even that not completely.
The WoD incarnations were significantly different from the MU ones anyway, so equivalent characters could have been descendants (e.g. another son of Blackhand) or plain pretenders just using the name. Thrall & Aggra would have filled the roles of Durotan & Draka.
Others, especially Gul'dan, would have been resurrected - an Azerothian Warlock tries to funnel power from Gul'dan's remains (Illidan only got the skull), but surprise, here's a Dreadlord that instead shoves Gul'dan's soul into him, creating a new version of the original Death Knights.
This Gul'dan, now fully under the thumb of the Legion, corrupts the "Iron Horde", leading to the 6.2 stories and eventually, the Legion expansion.

[Sylvanas] actually going through the stages of atonement would require a massive tonal shift for her character to be plagued with shame and guilt and basically never being the same even if her victims forgave her.

I feel like you never watched a certain 9.2 cinematic... which of course only hints at the beginning of that arc, I don't want to overstate it, but that's probably much of what we can expect in a video game where she isn't the main player character.
A book would be way more fitting to explore that.

[Khaza-R]

I feel like you never watched a certain 9.2 cinematic... which of course only hints at the beginning of that arc, I don't want to overstate it, but that's probably much of what we can expect in a video game where she isn't the main player character.
A book would be way more fitting to explore that.

I've seen them. Her "guilt" is nothing but performative trash.

The whole thing cheapened by the "it wasn't really me" plot line they felt necessary to try and salvage the character. If she were a steak, she'd be so overdone it would be nothing but an ashy pile that some careless chef tries poring demi-glace over and tries to convince you its still appetizing.

[The Stormbringer]

I hope they fix Chromie Time in an upcoming patch. I was leveling my Warlock up through Shadowlands (was level 50, needed level 60 to go to DF) and it gave me the, "Hey, you can leave now, there's an urgent thing for you!" at Level 59. I teleport back and find out... no, no there isn't. So I have to go back to the Shadowlands, only to realize once I get there that I'm no longer sync'd properly with it, and not getting XP, so I have to go back to Stormwind again to re-sync with it. Then I level up just before starting an Elite Quest and don't even get to finish it because I get teleported out after 60 seconds. Sigh...

[Imotbh]

Does anyone have pictures/videos of this place or know how to get there (Dracthyr intro after freeing her I suppose?) :

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comment...eb2x&context=3

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Does anyone have pictures/videos of this place or know how to get there (Dracthyr intro after freeing her I suppose?) :

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comment...eb2x&context=3

We're not supposed to go there just yet. We will in some future patch(Not the major content one but soon). Its the Forbidden Reach.

[Sondrelk]

Does anyone have pictures/videos of this place or know how to get there (Dracthyr intro after freeing her I suppose?) :

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comment...eb2x&context=3

I don't think Dracthyr have any means of glitching through walls, so I doubt it's done in the intro. The guy mentions taking constant damage anyways, so it's probably the version of the Forbidden Reach off teh coast of the Dragon Isles we can technically visit right now. Probably difficult to get pictures when you have to constantly heal while flitching through walls.

[Nathanyel]

Keep forgetting to do it myself, but Far Sight and Eagle Eye should allow you to explore there safely, albeit with the limitation of having to recast it regularly.

[Dracullus]

This renown stuff is pretty well calculated. I'm clearing world quests and finish events once every week (so no farming treasures) and will get 4x max renown on last week of 10.0.

[Sondrelk]

This renown stuff is pretty well calculated. I'm clearing world quests and finish events once every week (so no farming treasures) and will get 4x max renown on last week of 10.0.

The Repuations being changes to Renown, or at least how Renown works n DF, s probably what I would say is the biggest base system improvement the Dragonflight has, closely followed by Dragonriding. It just feels so much better to have granular rewards, rather than large grinds for singular breakpoints. The way Renown allows world content to ope ngradually is definitely a massive improvement on what we used to have.

[Foolicious]

Does anyone have pictures/videos of this place or know how to get there (Dracthyr intro after freeing her I suppose?) :

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comment...eb2x&context=3

I don't know if you can simply walk into the prison or have to glitch yourself through a wall or something, but any decently geared pala tank should be able to explore the forbidden reach.

[Nyel]

The Repuations being changes to Renown, or at least how Renown works n DF, s probably what I would say is the biggest base system improvement the Dragonflight has, closely followed by Dragonriding. It just feels so much better to have granular rewards, rather than large grinds for singular breakpoints. The way Renown allows world content to ope ngradually is definitely a massive improvement on what we used to have.

It's absolutely not unless with each major content patch they automatically advance one's renown to the previous max level or something like that (when they increase renown levels). Someone like me who's not grinding this nonsense could still progress by the unlocks that happened weekly when returning later on, but if it stays like it is, I'll never progress the main storyline because I can't and won't grind renown. It's a terrible system for players like me who leave early and come back later on to experience the story. I hope renown was a one-time experiment and they get rid of this in the next expansion. It's also very, very alt-unfriendly.

[Sondrelk]

It's absolutely not unless with each major content patch they automatically advance one's renown to the previous max level or something like that (when they increase renown levels). Someone like me who's not grinding this nonsense could still progress by the unlocks that happened weekly when returning later on, but if it stays like it is, I'll never progress the main storyline because I can't and won't grind renown. It's a terrible system for players like me who leave early and come back later on to experience the story. I hope renown was a one-time experiment and they get rid of this in the next expansion. It's also very, very alt-unfriendly.

Do you strictly need the main storyline though? Only Valdrakken and Dragonscale Expedition gives actual endgame storylines, and both are easy to gain passively. Valdrakken only requiring Renown 19, and Dragonscale Expedition gaining rep from the raid.

Also how is it alt-unfriendly? If anything it's main character unfriendly given the massive buff you get at Renown 10 and 20.