General WoD Alpha/Beta Discussion

[wych]

While garrisons seem to be a huge part of wod I don't see why they would delay everything for it. And what I mean by that is there is a lot of beta testing that could be done without garrisons so that when they are ready to be tested most of the other work needed is done. It makes no sense to hold off testing everything else if it was one thing so my thoughts is its something more that caused this.

Yeah I think it's too simple to blame it on an individual feature like that.

It'd have been very simple to have beta run for 3 months without it being ready.


I think this is another case of Blizzard biting off more than they can chew, but having watched pretty much all of Blizzcon, I just can't comprehend how it's such a huge task, on the surface at least.

[Methusula]

It's the item squish. They had the illusion of a working item squish in the playable demos, but in reality it is giving them hell.

[Haven2011]

I think the delay is all about the models cause I think there going release them all at once instead of over time and that would cause a delay a big one

[Flutterguy]

While garrisons seem to be a huge part of wod I don't see why they would delay everything for it. And what I mean by that is there is a lot of beta testing that could be done without garrisons so that when they are ready to be tested most of the other work needed is done. It makes no sense to hold off testing everything else if it was one thing so my thoughts is its something more that caused this.

They're doing plenty of internal testing, enough so that they really don't do alphas anymore. Given how big of a feature Garrisons is supposed to me, especially when it comes to reworking professions, I could see it being something that might hang up beta if they are having too many problems and have to go backwards in the design philosophy. Much of everything else already works, hence the playable demo, but we haven't seen anything of garrisons other than a few UI screenshots and some art assets. There's no demo of how a base NPC is going to function within the garrison or a demonstration of what you can do at a more active building within the garrison and I think that feature will be a big testing point in beta. If it's not even ready for beta, I could see them holding off until they got something they can work with.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

It's the item squish. They had the illusion of a working item squish in the playable demos, but in reality it is giving them hell.

Thing is they already had it inhouse by MoP so I don't think it's that.

[Tiberria]

While garrisons seem to be a huge part of wod I don't see why they would delay everything for it. And what I mean by that is there is a lot of beta testing that could be done without garrisons so that when they are ready to be tested most of the other work needed is done. It makes no sense to hold off testing everything else if it was one thing so my thoughts is its something more that caused this.

Because they can't justify releasing the expansion without garrisons. It is the only real new major feature being added in the expansion, and has previously been hyped up as integral to the entire gameplay, and there has already been a lot of concern about how thin WoD is on actual new features to begin with. If they were to remove that, they would effectively be charging us $50 for a glorified content patch.

[wych]

I think the delay is all about the models cause I think there going release them all at once instead of over time and that would cause a delay a big one

They already said though that they might not all be ready for launch and people in general were pretty understanding, compared to most reactions.

Surely delaying the expac for months costs them more money than just staggering the release of models?

Delaying the expac another 2-3 months probably causes a loss of 500k subs at this point i'd estimate

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Because they can't justify releasing the expansion without garrisons. It is the only real new major feature being added in the expansion, and has previously been hyped up as integral to the entire gameplay, and there has already been a lot of concern about how thin WoD is on actual new features to begin with. If they were to remove that, they would effectively be charging us $50 for a glorified content patch.

I think he's talking about releasing Beta without garrisons not WoD

[Wow]

Because they can't justify releasing the expansion without garrisons.

I didn't say to do that I said there's no reason to hold off on testing other things for one thing you can still do garrisons and test other things until they are ready for other testing.


But I don't think garrisons are the reason given that.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Garrisons being disabled during Beta wouldn't be shocking because they did the same with Pet Battles(Albeit it's a smaller feature but still).

[Haven2011]

Yea but think about this those models are put as a selling point so I think that they decide to finish them all. I mean right now from what we have seen there isn't a reason to delay release and beta

[Prode]

and there has already been a lot of concern about how thin WoD is on actual new features to begin with. If they were to remove that, they would effectively be charging us $50 for a glorified content patch.

What huge features did other expansions have ? WoD is full of.

[Chickat]

I'm absolutely fine with a longer wait if it means more and or better content. We were going to have 16 raid bosses. Now we know we are getting 17. I'm hoping they increase the dungeons from 7-9 or 10. If they do that ill be happy. I don't even care if they are remakes, or even just up scaled versions of existing ones. I just want more dungeons to run, and I want dungeons to be meaningful content again like they were in Cataclysm or wrath.

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Wod has the new questing system, and garrisons. Thats enough new features. They are updating all the old features like pet battles,scenarios,achievements,dungeons,raids,zones,challenge modes,pvp is practically being revamped.

[wych]

What huge features did other expansions have ? WoD is full of.

TBC:
First expac
Heroics
Dailies
Flying
Draenei and Blood Elves
jewelcrafting

WOTLK:
New class
Siege weapons
Phasing
Dungeon finder

Cata:
Azeroth flying and old world updated
Worgen and Goblins
archaeology

MoP:
Pet battles
Monk
Pandaren


Sure i've forgotten some.

I don't particularly agree that expansions NEED new features, but they're a great selling point

[Chickat]

TBC:
First expac
Heroics
Dailies
Flying
Draenei and Blood Elves
jewelcrafting

WOTLK:
New class
Siege weapons
Phasing
Dungeon finder

Cata:
Azeroth flying and old world updated
Worgen and Goblins
archaeology

MoP:
Pet battles
Monk
Pandaren


Sure i've forgotten some.

I don't particularly agree that expansions NEED new features, but they're a great selling point

You cant count the dungeon finder in wrath. It didn't launch with it. Also first xpac isnt a feature.
As for MoP you missed challenge modes. Im not sure whether talents 2.0 counts, but it was radically different. World bosses also made a return in MoP, and werent seen in years, so thats a half feature. You missed guild leveling in cata.

Wod has updated versions of all major features plus a few new ones. WoD will NOT be lacking in content. I know you didn't say that, but im making that clear.

[Tiberria]

Watcher said on Twitter that the plan is for there to be a "few weeks" of 20 man Mythic SoO when 6.0 goes live. That pretty much confirms that we can expect the standard 3-5 week time frame before the WoD release for the pre-patch and pretty much means we can also dismiss the theories about 6.0 going live 2-3 months ahead of time to give more content through the pre-expansion event.

Chances are probably about 99.9% that we are just not going to see anything new on live servers until 6.0 goes live, which we now know is late August at the absolute earliest.

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You cant count the dungeon finder in wrath. It didn't launch with it. Also first xpac isnt a feature.
As for MoP you missed challenge modes. Im not sure whether talents 2.0 counts, but it was radically different. World bosses also made a return in MoP, and werent seen in years, so thats a half feature. You missed guild leveling in cata.

Wod has updated versions of all major features plus a few new ones. WoD will NOT be lacking in content. I know you didn't say that, but im making that clear.

Remember that WoTLK also brought 10 and 25 man versions of all raids into place for the first time, as well as the first iteration of "casual/PvP bosses" (i.e. Vault of Archavon/Baradin Hold which later was changed to world bosses), and Wintergrasp - the first PvP only end game zone.

[Prode]

TBC:
Sure i've forgotten some.

I don't particularly agree that expansions NEED new features, but they're a great selling point

WoD's features r Garrison, Group finder, new Raid type, Character models, Ashran, Skirmish, Spectator invite, alleged New questing system, massive healing/health changes, cd stacking/CC/instant casting/mana efficiency reduction, ability pruning, disabled flying.

Wouldn't say it's 'thin' in features.

[Flutterguy]

Technically, LFR was supposed to be a feature of MoP but they launched it early for DS.

[Aspen]

WoD's features r Garrison, Group finder, new Raid type, Character models, Ashran, Skirmish, Spectator invite, alleged New questing system, massive healing/health changes, cd stacking/CC/instant casting/mana efficiency reduction, ability pruning, disabled flying.

Wouldn't say it's 'thin' in features.

Group finder is already in the game. Healing and health changes is not a feature. And I wouldn't consider REMOVING abilities and flying a feature.... I'd consider it .... well.... removing things >.> But theres plenty of other threads on this debate we don't need to bring it here.

[blackblade]

WoD's features r Garrison, Group finder, new Raid type, Character models, Ashran, Skirmish, Spectator invite, alleged New questing system, massive healing/health changes, cd stacking/CC/instant casting/mana efficiency reduction, ability pruning, disabled flying.

Wouldn't say it's 'thin' in features.

I just think they haven't done a great job of showing some of these features off. They're sort of getting buried by the constant updates re: garrisons and new models.

It'll be better once we get some more spectator previews, and ashran previews.

[Redwyrm]

Missed Inscription, Glyph system and Achievements with WotLK

Missed Guild Leveling with Cata