Article: Patch 10.1 PTR - New Werebear Druid Skin Animations

[Stoy]

Patch 10.1 PTR - New Werebear Druid Skin Animations
The latest update to the Patch 10.1 Embers of Neltharion PTR has added several new animations for the "werebear" druid skins.

• Moonfire now has the druid slam one hand to the ground.
• Swipe and Thrash do an uppercut.
• Maul and Pulverize bring both hands down on the target.

[salate]

Unexpected.
But amazing.

[BB8]

I like all these small extra's
Wish they had more people working on these small improvements.

[Yooginava182]

I really hope this is a hint at a lot of new animations coming for all classes and races.

[Eapoe]

Hunter weapon enchantment appearances when?

Happy for Druids. This is nice.

[Gimlix]

Hunter weapon enchantment appearances when?

Happy for Druids. This is nice.

What exactly? Bow or Melee and what kind like arrows?

[kamuimac]

what is the point wasting resources like this for skin that isnt even baseline for druids ?

no wonder nobody wants to play retail anymore.

[Fabled]

what is the point wasting resources like this for skin that isnt even baseline for druids ?

no wonder nobody wants to play retail anymore.

This is easily something someone, or maybe two people tops, could have done on their off time just to add some flavor for a skin. It isn't as big as you're making it out to be.

[Forgottenone]

what is the point wasting resources like this for skin that isnt even baseline for druids ?

no wonder nobody wants to play retail anymore.

Do you just wake up and find reasons to hate retail? Lol.

Little quality of life improvements are always welcomed in every game. I dislike what Blizzard-Activison has done in the past and some things they still do. This is NOT one of those things.

[Oneirophobia]

what is the point wasting resources like this for skin that isnt even baseline for druids ?

no wonder nobody wants to play retail anymore.

So, rubbing our collective MMOC 1.3 brain cells real damn hard, we can determine that the werebear skin is based on the Drogbar model - a recycling of already in-use assets from the Legion expansion that actually save resources. It was already a reused asset in Legion at the time it was released in the first place.

If we overclock our brain cell passed MMOC regulation standards, we can see that the next patch features a lot of Drogbar. Some are even raid bosses!

So, it is in theory very possible that these animations have literally nothing to do with druids or wasting resources whatsoever and is entirely related to the upcoming patch!

They've only been doing stuff like this for looks at watch over 15 years straight, so I completely understand the confusion and rage. They could be wasting resources on yet another iteration of classic that only gets played for ~5 months before having an extreme user drop off, which I've gathered is your preferred method of resource waste.

[Yakut]

what is the point wasting resources like this for skin that isnt even baseline for druids ?

no wonder nobody wants to play retail anymore.

Well, I would argue that those of us who spent time to get this in the mage tower (which appears to still be open) in Shadowlands will enjoy this sort of benefit even if it isn't necessarily for players specifically (as another poster pointed out).

It becomes account-wide when you do the challenge for it, meaning every druid on your account (even on other servers) would have this form as an option. But, based on your comment, you either didn't know it and/or didn't succeed in the challenge.

What is the point in wasting resources commenting on something that you haven't done?

[Oneirophobia]

I really hope this is a hint at a lot of new animations coming for all classes and races.

It is entirely coincidental. Werebear shares animations with Drogbar, who are a major feature of the upcoming patch. These animations were applied to the rig (as is standard) and therefore inherited by everything that uses them. Maybe coincidental isn't the right term, a "side effect" would probably be better.

A good example of this is probably the Dracthyr. They share a rig with the Warlock Succubus/Incubus pet, ergo the pet has most of the animations available to the Dracthyr despite not being playable. You never see most these animations in game because the pet does not mount, do deep breaths, etc. but on 3rd party model viewing programs you can see they're all there.

[Unlimited Power]

Guessing this only happened because Blizzard made the fel werebear skin available indefinitely from the Mage Tower.

No way Blizzard would've put the effort in to make new animations for the werebear form if it was entirely unavailable.

A delightful and appreciated change regardless though. The animations were definitely one of the worse aspects of the werebear form.

Now I just need Blizzard to make Mage Tower alternative colour appearance unlock requirements account wide. They've made the Balance of Power unlock account wide, so it should definitely be possible.

Having to do 10 different legion dungeons and kill heroic Kil'jaeden on every character with Mage Tower artifact appearances unlocked is annoying to say the least, but 10 RBG wins is another hell entirely.

[Yakut]

Guessing this only happened because Blizzard made the fel werebear skin available indefinitely from the Mage Tower.

No way Blizzard would've put the effort in to make new animations for the werebear form if it was entirely unavailable.

A delightful and appreciated change regardless though. The animations were definitely one of the worse aspects of the werebear form.

Now I just need Blizzard to make Mage Tower alternative colour appearance unlock requirements account wide. They've made the Balance of Power unlock account wide, so it should definitely be possible.

Having to do 10 different legion dungeons and kill heroic Kil'jaeden on every character with Mage Tower artifact appearances unlocked is annoying to say the least, but 10 RBG wins is another hell entirely.

I'm not entirely convinced. I mean Legion did have a white version of this same model from the Mage Tower. So it isn't just this one skin players have that can be affected.

[threads]

still waiting for wod saber cat form to come back

[Aleksej89]

those look great but holy f how did that maul animation remain like that ever since vanilla?!

i mean the butt-ugly vanilla brown bear popping out of the druids body whenever they do maul (or w/e its called in retail).

jesus it looked bad back in 2006, today its a crime.

[Unlimited Power]

I'm not entirely convinced. I mean Legion did have a white version of this same model from the Mage Tower. So it isn't just this one skin players have that can be affected.

That's entirely the point though? The skins have not been available since Legion ended. That's what, more than 4 years at this point?

If not for the existence and continued availability of the fel werebear skin from the more recent timewalking Mage Tower challenge, Blizzard would've never put in the effort to create these new animations.

[Bwgmon]

Guessing this only happened because Blizzard made the fel werebear skin available indefinitely from the Mage Tower.

No way Blizzard would've put the effort in to make new animations for the werebear form if it was entirely unavailable.

To be fair on this point, we're talking about the company that made a new Qiraji Battle Tank model and then gave the only permanent version to people who rang the scarab gong like 15 years prior to its implementation.

[gd8]

those look great but holy f how did that maul animation remain like that ever since vanilla?!

i mean the butt-ugly vanilla brown bear popping out of the druids body whenever they do maul (or w/e its called in retail).

jesus it looked bad back in 2006, today its a crime.

I like the idea of the animation but yeah they need to update the model of the spirit bear thing

[Eapoe]

What exactly? Bow or Melee and what kind like arrows?

Didn’t want to derail the thread. Mainly the weapon enchants you can put on every melee weapon, like Mongoose, Landslide, and stuff that puts crackling lightning or rocks dropping effects type of stuff.