Shadowlands Delayed -- What should be changed?

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

Shadowlands got further delayed to everyone's shock into late Q4.

To the WoW community,

I wanted to let you know that we’re delaying the release of Shadowlands to later this year—and while we’re still in the process of determining the right new date to launch, we felt it was important to let you know about this change in plans as soon as we could. This was an incredibly difficult decision for the team, as we’re as eager to get the expansion into your hands as you are to play it—but ultimately, we feel it’s the right decision for the game—and for our players.

Over the past several months of testing, we’ve made significant progress iterating on and polishing the core features and gameplay of Shadowlands. We’re at a point where the zones, the campaign, the level-up questing experience, and the story we have to tell are essentially ready to share. We’re excited by the Covenants at the heart of the expansion, and it’s been a thrill to see Torghast take shape into a fun new kind of WoW experience, thanks in no small part to your input.

However, as everything started coming together and we’ve been listening to and building upon your feedback, it’s become clear we need a little more time for additional polish, and to balance and iterate on some interlocking pieces—particularly those related to the endgame. Shadowlands is one of the most intricate expansions we’ve yet created, and while we’ve made great progress, the challenge of tuning the endgame was compounded by the team having to work from home.

Blizzard has a commitment to quality. We believe Shadowlands will be something special, and we’ve heard from many of you who feel the same. We need this extra time to ensure that Shadowlands lives up to its full potential.

In the meantime, we’re excited to announce that beginning October 13 we will be releasing the Shadowlands pre-patch, which lays a lot of the groundwork for the expansion and includes our revamped character leveling, new-player experience on Exile’s Reach, and a host of new character customization options. And once we get closer to Shadowlands’ release, you’ll be called upon to defend Azeroth against a resurgence of the Scourge during our pre-launch event.

Thanks for your support and passion, and for your continued help and feedback as we head toward the finish line.

We’ll see you in the Shadowlands soon,

John Hight, Executive Producer of World of Warcraft

What should be changed and what should be added to make the game better? Please avoid posting story-spoilers as this thread focuses on the other aspects of the expansion.



For me this is what I would have changed:

Major:
Easier and less punishing to swap covenants
Covenants made a more so a RPG/lore and cosmetic choice than PvE/PvP gameplay choice.
Certain and least-favored abilities like bloated abilities such as hunter's mark removed. Cool looking spells that people want to use but are stuck as a talent [ex. Arcane Supernova, Fire Meteor, Breath of Sindragosa, etc] made baseline and replaced with better talents.
Influence talents so that we aren't all stuck with the best builds and have builds we can choose from to play.
Update spell animations that are very old. [Ex. Holy Paladin, Resto Druid, Guardian Druid, etc.].
Certain specs still need to be reworked further and/or fixed... Survival Hunter, Guardian/Feral Druid, WW, Elemental/Enh, Arcane Mage, etc]
Fix the bugs. Level 1's in SL can use BFA gear and ROFL'stomp mobs. There's also several bugs in BFA that haven't been fixed where you can collide with doodads and be DC'd.
Remove more RNG in the game. It's unhealthy for the game.


Minor:
More customizations that can be added quickly with photoshop [Hair colors, eye colors, skin colors, etc]
Add a bit more flair to the login screen. I'm sure at least one of Sindragosa's brood still exists *hint hint*
Update character's models who are important to the story [Lillian, Rokhan, Ji, Aysa, etc]

[ReleaseDay]

People are just speculating as to why the delay, but none really no for sure..

[VinceVega]

It should be changed that i now have weak of useless vacation. Grand... fuck that. I see that i probably was needed but now i will not really have time to play it. It's fucked but that means probably goodbye shadowlands for me... sadly.. too many projects after that to really play.

[united]

YES! Thank you for doing the right thing.

[Dracullus]

In systems? Nothing, there is still little time. They should take all this time to get rid as many bugs as possible and balance game as close as they can.

[pawsz]

So I made this post explaining why SL is bad and I never hoped that blizzard will do a system overhaul, but they've listened ! OMG

GOOD! The game isnt ready, dont release it until it is

[pawsz]

It should be changed that i now have weak of useless vacation. Grand... fuck that. I see that i probably was needed but now i will not really have time to play it. It's fucked but that means probably goodbye shadowlands for me... sadly.. too many projects after that to really play.

GOOD! The game isnt ready, dont release it until it is. Id rather wait another 1-2 months than play a fucking shit show on release.

[RobertMugabe]

Shadowlands got further delayed to everyone's shock into later Q3 or Q4.

What should be changed and what should be added to make the game better? Please avoid posting story-spoilers as this thread focuses on the other aspects of the expansion.

The 50-60 leveling is pretty broken right now. Also there are just so many bugs with classes and conduits right now. Class Balancing is probably not the reason for the delay... this stuff is only really important in the so-called "heroic week" before they launch mythic and m+.

But yeah, bugs and broken leveling is 90% of the reason.

[Sondrelk]

Well seeing as they are actually delaying I would hope convincing players the classes are actually fixed, which is no mean feat. Other than that the thing they should try extra hard to ensure is parity between the various covenant abilities. Most reasonable players know that tuning will inevitably happen, but giving fuel to the crowd that believes choosing the BiS covenant is required isnt helping anybody.

[Nevcairiel]

later Q3 or Q4.

Q3 is July, August, September, just to make that clear. It was always Q4.

[Flubbzter]

Smart choice from Blizzard but also puts some more pressure for quality for the release.

[Mosha]

Do you actually believe a multi-billion dollar cooperation delayed one of their biggest releases and money makers because of a random forums post on MMO-champion?

[Thzz]

make any political discussions in trade chat a bannable offense.

politards gotta go. everything else ok.

oh wait. make holy priest meta in M+

[boyzma]

So I made this post explaining why SL is bad and I never hoped that blizzard will do a system overhaul, but they've listened ! OMG

No sweet cheeks...you don't get the credit...get out of your little bubble. Did you READ the announcement? They knew it wasn't what was wanted so they're going to try to mitigate the damages. I personally don't care...just hate to see people try to claim victory when it's not their's to claim.

[Ludvig]

well done sport

[Ludvig]

remove rapid fire tbh

[Flubbzter]

Sorry for asking and not beign realy up to date on the news but can someone post a short brief of what is broken etc?

[Mirishka]

So I made this post explaining why SL is bad and I never hoped that blizzard will do a system overhaul, but they've listened ! OMG

lol@you thinking that YOUR post is the reason they delayed SL.

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

Q3 is July, August, September, just to make that clear. It was always Q4.

sorry i thought Q3 was Sept, Oct, Nov and Q4 was Dec, Jan, Feb. Thanks for telling me.

[Magical Mudcrab]

:crab: Shadowlands Saved :crab: