Vanion.eu Q&A with Ion Hazzikostas - Negativity, Itemization, Rise of Azshara Plans

Blizzard Posted 2019/01/27 at 9:08 PM by Archimtiros

Greek Community last monthHighlightsIt's no secret that the current mood of the community is not the best, and as a fansite we've seen negative comments about almost every aspect of the game. Why do you think it has gotten so extreme since the release of Battle for Azeroth?recent Q&AOne of the bigger community complaints is with end-game itemization; on the one hand there needs to be catch up mechanics for new players and alts, on the other it feels like there are no advantages for intense day to day players. Why so much change between early expansion itemization and today's?Why aren't there more currencies and vendors for gear, similar to buying Azerite?If you could change two or three things prior to Battle for Azeroth release, what would they be?There are a lot of new and interesting raid mechanics in Battle of Dazar'alor, what's your favorite fight in the new raid?What can you tell us about the smaller Crucible of Storms raid, can we expect it to open with patch 8.1.5, and what can we expect out of the rewards since it's not a higher raid tier?Faction Assaults combined with War Mode are really fun, and prior to 8.1, War Mode wasn't very fun. There are still issues like sharding, not being able to filter Looking for Group by War Mode, or summon friends who are/not in War Mode. Any further plans to improve the system?Legion focused on class identity, order halls, legendaries, artifacts, and many players were pretty happy about it. There's little like it in Battle for Azeroth, a lack of the identity and character development. Why did you decide to change this between Legion and Battle for Azeroth?From Warlords to Legion, a lot of talent trees changed from utility rows based on player preference to throughput rows with fewer utility. How has that worked out as a design decision and is it something you'd consider revisiting?Speaking of talents, why were so many baseline abilities and passives made into talents?Can you tell us more about Mechagon in patch 8.2, is it a new mega-dungeon, or zone, or what can we do there?Can we talk about Mechagnomes and allied races?At BlizzCon it sounded like Nazjatar will include something new every day, could you give us some examples?Treasure chests and rares in Battle for Azeroth are boring and not really rare as they were in previous expansions. Will there be any more "real" rares in the future that will be more exciting?Are we going to see something like the class-specific solo challenges from the Mage Tower again in the future?Heroic Warfronts were announced at BlizzCon for 8.2, can you tell us more about the differences? Warfronts are an interesting concept, but too easy and straightforward to be fun, we don't think it's even possible to lose!Will there be a new Warfront in Patch 8.2?What about the Barrens Warfront speculation?Any further plans for crafting? We've never heard a player say World of Warcraft has a good crafting system. It's kind of boring and useless without many perks or rare recipes.Zone design in Kul Tiras and Zandalar is beautiful, but traveling back to the old zones feels like a completely different game. Arathi and Darkshore overhauls were nice, can we get more?

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Comment by LockewoodReally? Then leave in touch on the fact that they give Alliance free gear and made it horde turn off for mode in order to level or do any kind of progression? Everywhere you land as horde you instantly die.Comment by LittlepinkI don't understand why people who moan so much keep playing, if you don't like the game go find something else, no one is forcing you to stay. I for one am happy with BFA, it's still early in the expansion and yes we have the odd bugs, but it sometimes feels like people play just to have something to moan about.Comment by TehLucarioNo new Warfronts is disappointing. I'm now afraid they're going to leave the system "unfinished" in the sense that the original non-allied races won't all get a full arsenal of thematic weapons and armor. Heritage armor is cool, but I really like having the variety of a set for each weight class of gear and a wide variety of matching weapons, since there's no such thing as heritage weapons.Comment by MsDirectionIf you can get crafted gear better or equal to raid gear, there's not much point to raiding; if it's weaker, then crafting feels useless.Comment by MaXiiczek
NO one asked for GCD and NO one think it was a good changeComment by DhrallRegarding war mode: I have been on a PvP server since early WotLK and turned warmode on the secone I logged on at launch. Yesterday I turned it off on all chars. 40+ alliance at Tol Dagor flight path/sum stone, 40+ alliance in every assault that cause lag and obviously makes it impossible to do the quests. And if I try to group up to fight back I'll get sharded to a shard where the tables are turned. 40+ horde vs 5 alliance. And the fact that Blizzars gives alliance a 30% bonus and their 400 ilvl quest is just insane. And when I heard the reason: to get Horde players to turn off warmode, that was it.Comment by PeredhilRegarding war mode: I have been on a PvP server since early WotLK and turned warmode on the secone I logged on at launch. Yesterday I turned it off on all chars. 40+ alliance at Tol Dagor flight path/sum stone, 40+ alliance in every assault that cause lag and obviously makes it impossible to do the quests. And if I try to group up to fight back I'll get sharded to a shard where the tables are turned. 40+ horde vs 5 alliance. And the fact that Blizzars gives alliance a 30% bonus and their 400 ilvl quest is just insane. And when I heard the reason: to get Horde players to turn off warmode, that was it.Comment by guitar92I think that putting some of the new assets aka the new style buildings etc in the old zones would greatly spruse up the old world and I think that shouldn't be too time consumingComment by Pyrite13I think we can all agree that the narrative about Blizzard not communicating with the players is bogus. It's simply a matter of them not telling you what you want to hear. Two Q&As in a week and not a single wasted question about pet battles or toys.Comment by Wombat62
NO one asked for GCD and NO one think it was a good changeComment by LGraf1I'm probably going to be lost in all of the voices and topics in the replies here, but I for one disagree heavily with "...but it's hard to imagine deciding to update old zones over creating new ones; it wouldn't be in players best interests overall.". VERY heavily disagree! I would LOVE it if the older areas of Azeroth were utterly redone! Yes, I fully get and understand about taking resources from current and future for the past, but if it could be done, oh...that'd be so wonderful.

Whenever I make a new alt, I rather cringe as I go through the levels, looking forward to the onces which have better backgrounds, flora, fauna. For me it's not the quests I cringe at, I like lore and will revisit an area I've not leveled through in some time, what I cringe at is the art of the maps.

Just something putting out there for some possible consideration by any Blizz devs who read these: yes, there are those who'd really, truly, honestly LOVE it if maps were redone with current graphics power.

/adds two copperComment by HexelyionThe problem of adding new abilities to classes with each expansion over 10+ years is that classes end up having 30-40 abilities in their spellbook, that players didn't have keybindings for, and were often very niche.Comment by Heatsink98The guy seriously needs to assign a halfway competent person to the crafting department. Current vision? You can get gear from running a dungeon. Want to craft your gear instead? You'll need to run a dungeon for that. At least he realizes that crafters need a way to differentiate themselves from other crafters, but beyond that, he's lost in the fog.Comment by KOL2024The problem of adding new abilities to classes with each expansion over 10+ years is that classes end up having 30-40 abilities in their spellbook, that players didn't have keybindings for, and were often very niche.Comment by AinarikAbout crafting, I'd love to see craft being used to improve people existing gear rather than creating some. For example, a jeweller could add 5 or 10 ilvl to a trinket I like in exchange for a sum of gold or some rare materials, or add a socket to it, or both. A blacksmith could reforge some of my plate gear to replace a secondary stat by another that I find more useful for my spec, or make it indestructible, or both. That kind of things.Comment by RaybezeI don't understand why people who moan so much keep playing, if you don't like the game go find something else, no one is forcing you to stay. I for one am happy with BFA, it's still early in the expansion and yes we have the odd bugs, but it sometimes feels like people play just to have something to moan about.Comment by FleckerManNO one asked for GCD and NO one think it was a good change
I never understood this about Blizzard (post MoP i would say) where they make apparently bad calls and stick to them, refusing to acknowledge that was an obvious mistake like GCD
What is wrong with accepting that you've made a mistake, fix or revert it and move on?
When you say "I made a mistake" it will only show your human side, because the only side i can see of Blizzard now is of greedy and arrogant company that try makes out of players, mindless payersComment by FleckerManI'm probably going to be lost in all of the voices and topics in the replies here, but I for one disagree heavily with "...but it's hard to imagine deciding to update old zones over creating new ones; it wouldn't be in players best interests overall.". VERY heavily disagree! I would LOVE it if the older areas of Azeroth were utterly redone! Yes, I fully get and understand about taking resources from current and future for the past, but if it could be done, oh...that'd be so wonderful.

Whenever I make a new alt, I rather cringe as I go through the levels, looking forward to the onces which have better backgrounds, flora, fauna. For me it's not the quests I cringe at, I like lore and will revisit an area I've not leveled through in some time, what I cringe at is the art of the maps.

Just something putting out there for some possible consideration by any Blizz devs who read these: yes, there are those who'd really, truly, honestly LOVE it if maps were redone with current graphics power.

/adds two copperComment by keeszI think BFA has a serious problem, that none of other expansion has. The gearing System is the worst in history. I played the begining of BFA. My main was 370+, alts around 340. Literally yesterday I hit max lvl with my DK and under 3 hour I got 360+ ilvl whitout buying anything from AH or raiding or even run a single M+. Is this legit? Whats the point of gearing any character like this? After a month New patch comes out and your gear and played hours worth nothing. The starting items under 3 hours are much more better than your current gear..
And the items overall are ugly, boring and meaningless..Comment by PalewindMany of these are seriously loaded questions. "This part of the game sucks. What do you have to say about that?" Ion shows a lot of restraint and professionalism handling them when he's probably thinking "Really? Eff you."

I spent years as a sports journalist and it was always funny to watch some kid fresh out of college ask similarly-loaded questions and watch the athletes put them in their places.

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