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Roundup of All The Shadowlands Announcements from the Press Event This Week
Shadowlands
Опубликовано
13.07.2020 в 12:12
Paryah
This week Blizzard followed up a Developer Update with a few informational blogs and a Press Event which included a round of interviews with prominent fan sites and community figures. Here's a recap of what was talked about and all of Wowhead's coverage linked on one page. Thanks to
u/derbon_erlab on Reddit
for the idea.
Note: Datamining hit in the middle of the Press Event, and may have got lost in all the new information we got this week. If you're curious about those updates check them out here:
Build 35078 - July 8th
Announcements
The Developer Update with World of Warcraft Executive Producer, John Hight, and Game Director, Ion Hazzikostas started out with a few announcements:
Shadowlands Developer Update with John Hight and Ion Hazzikostas Liveblog
Shadowlands Beta Testing starts the week of July 13th, 2020
Beta Testing starts next week.
Beta Testers will be able to able to test the Max Level (60) Experience, The Maw.
Beta Testing will include Covenants, Soulbinds, Raids, Max-Level dungeons and more.
A new wave of invitations will happen next week.
Shadowlands Beta Starts Next Week
Shadowlands launches Fall 2020
This is in keeping with previous statements that Shadowlands will launch before the end of the year
Fall is a generous timeframe, running from September 22 through December 21st in the Northern hemisphere.
Battle for Azeroth purposefully avoided launching a raid tier during the winter holidays so it seems likely that the first raid tier will not launch until sometime in late January or early February.
We should have receive more information as we approach the launch window.
World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Launches Fall 2020
The World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Physical Collectors Edition has been revealed.
The spine boasts 4 Covenant logos
The front is a colorful rendering of the breach between Azeroth and the Shadowlands.
In addition to the digital extras that came with the Digital Collectors Edition, it will include:
A full color
Art Book
A
Mousepad
A 4
Pin Collection
including a pin for each Covenant
Shadowlands
Soundtrack
Shadowlands Physical Collector's Edition Announced
Covenants
Blizzard has published several blogs this week. Four of them are previews of the four Covenants and the features that we can expect with them and a fifth covered Covenants Systems. Some of the information gathered from these blogs was also mentioned and expanded on in the Developer Update.
At level 60 you can choose a Covenant, Kyrian, Venthyr, Necrolord, or Night Fae. The four Covenants have a host of features.
A
Covenant Sanctum
that you gain access to if you choose them.
You’ll be able to upgrade Sanctum features as you play the game.
This is your base of operations.
A
Transport Network
within their Zone.
This allows you to get around more quickly in the zone of the Covenant of your choice.
An
Anima Conductor
You can send anima to an area to open up dailies etc.
As you send Anima to areas, they will revive, the World changes around you.
Eventually this change becomes permanent.
Advancement in your chosen Covenant involves gaining
Renown
.
Gaining Renown with your Covenant will garner you rewards:
Cosmetics including back attachments, a mount, a pet, and transmog sets.
Legendary recipes.
Increased levels for World Quest gear.
Sanctum upgrades.
Unlocking a new powers for Soulbind characters.
Adventures
This is the next iteration of Missions.
This is a system for offline progression
The Missions concept has been re-envisioned into an abstracted turn based combat system.
It will be available on mobile.
Soulbinds
You bind your soul with another person.
This gives you access to your Soulbind's abilities through a Talent Tree that you can customize to your need.
Soulbinds have abilities that are available to any character who binds with them.
There are also Conduits that are class specific and allow you a more granular customization.
One
Signature Ability
.
One
Class Ability
.
They also each have a
Unique Feature
.
Blizzard's Shadowlands Covenants System Preview
Blizzard's Shadowlands Soulbinds and Conduits System Preview
Shadowlands Developer Update with John Hight and Ion Hazzikostas Liveblog
Kyrian Covenant
The Covenant Sanctum is
Elysian Hold
Unique Feature, the
Path of Ascension
The Path of Ascension is a combat arena where you can inhabit one of three Soulbinds to combat a boss.
To open up a boss, you must first capture their memory in a soul mirror.
Once you have a boss’s memory, you can challenge them in the arena as many times as you wish.
This is a very Combat Heavy choice.
If you win you can be rewarded with blueprints to craft improved gear, signature ability upgrades, and cosmetics.
There are challenges that you can find and complete to unlock special rewards, including mounts.
The Transport Network is
Kyrian Gateways
The Kyrian Soulbinds are
Pelagos, Kleia, and Forgelite Prime Mikanikos
.
Blizzard's Kyrian Covenant Preview and Path of Ascension
Venthyr Covenant
The Covenant Sanctum is
Sinfall
Unique Feature, the
The Ember Court
The Ember Court is a self-contained minigame.
The Venthyr need to show off their influence.
You get to invite guests, arrange services, fend off party crashers, and get loot.
The Transport Network is
Blood Mirrors
The Venthyr Soulbinds are Nadjia the Mistblade, General Draven, and Theotar the Mad Duke.
Blizzard's Venthyr Covenant Preview and Ember Court
Necrolord Covenant
The Covenant Sanctum is
The Seat of Primus
Unique Feature, the
Abomination Factory
You will learn a new crafting system, Abominable Stitching.
You will gather resources to build constructs which will be to be housing for souls.
You can unlock perks by adventuring with them, taking quests from them, etc.
All players who have chosen Necrolord will work together to take buckets of sile to the Mixing Pool to summon a repeatable boss event.
Abominable Stitching Recipes from the Necrolord Covenant
The Transport Network is
Abominable Transportation
The Venthyr Soulbinds are Plague Deviser Marileth, Emeni, the Slaughter Daughter, and Bonesmith Heirmir.
Blizzard's Necrolord Covenant Preview and Abomination Factory
Night Fae Covenant
The Covenant Sanctum is
Heart of the Forest
Unique Feature, the
Queen’s Conservatory
The Queen’s Conservatory is somewhat reminicent of an evolved version of the Farm in Pandaria.
This is where souls are prepared for rebirth.
You will tend plots and nurture souls.
The Transport Network is
Fae Circles
The Venthyr Soulbinds are Niya, Dreamweaver, and Korayn.
Blizzard's Night Fae Covenant Preview and Queen's Conservatory
Check out everything we know about Covenants
Kyrian Covenant Venthyr Covenant Necrolord Covenant Night Fae Covenant
Covenant Systems
Adventures
For more information on
Covenant Adventures
, check out our feature,
Shadowlands Covenant Adventures: Missions Evolved
.
Renown
They want something that more resembles a soft-cap.
There should be some method (e.g. additional weekly quest, or attached to a daily calling) that does require effort (won't be free) to help catch up.
Check out everything we know about Covenant Renown
Soulbinds and Conduits
Customization
Soulbinds and Conduits are designed to be highly customizable and easy to change:
If you go into a dungeon, you pick the AoE conduits and the AoE Soulbind.
Nadjia (the example in the Dev Update) is more single target focused, you can socket single target Conduits and use that for single target content.
Currently you need to be in your Covenant Sanctum to change Soulbinds, though that might change based on feedback.
Respeccing the Soulbind path will be done for a minimal Anima cost.
Conduits are relatively straightforward modifications to class abilities.
Conduits aren't awarded exactly like relics, which competed with drops on loot tables.
Conduits will drop in the places that loot drops.
Conduits will have item levels.
Conduits are like gems, where you put a physical item into your soul bind device. If you want to replace one, that will destroy the existing one. This is actively still being discussed.
Conduits stacking does create some problems and with no stacking it does incentivize more variety.
They want to make sure that specialists do have a small edge. They think that there's something of value in that specialization, but they know some people disagree.
Check out everything we know about Soulbinds and Conduits
Switching Covenants
There's anxiety that players will choose a covenant because it's cool, and then they'll be rejected from a PUG for the wrong choice, and that is something Blizzard has to work on. The ability to swap covenants freely is something Blizzard will consider, but only as a last-resort. They want covenants to feel like a nuanced package of many abilities, similar to Artifact weapons offering unique sets of perks in Legion.
WoW is a series of interesting choices -- from buttons to gear and talents to class and faction. Covenants are intended to be part of your identity.
Covenants are not on the same level choicewise as specs and talents. The choice is on the same level as choosing your class.
Initially switching a Covenant should be able to be achieved with little to no penalty. There is a quest to leave a Covenant.
If you want to switch back to a Covenant that you have already left there will be a penalty - you will have to spend time to win their trust back.
The specific penalty has not yet been determined.
They don't want you to be able to switch Covenants from activity to activity, or even between raid bosses.
They want to avoid Covenants being labled as best for a certain type of content, but are fine with them being strong at a certain kind of fight (eg. single target damage and a lot of movement).
Choosing a Covenant because you feel it's optimal and you want to play optimally is a vaid reason for your choice, as are roleplaying reasons, cosmetic reasons, etc.
Tuning
The goal will be to launch with systems that don't have the problems that systems like Essences were created to fix.
The goal will be to improve the existing features: more Covenant Sanctum unlocks, more Soulbinds, more things in Torghast.
The Sources:
Paul Kubit on Covenant Swapping - Changing Should be Easy, Changing Back Should be Hard
Shadowlands Interview with Sloot and Paul Kubit
Shadowlands Interview with PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Tonton - Open World Lag, Swapping Covenants, PvP Power
Highlights of the Ion Hazzikostas Shadowlands Group Interview
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Lapi Liveblog
Lore
No confirmation, but it's likely that Warbringer-type cinematics will be present in Shadowlands.
Pantheons
The story of the First Ones will unfold over the course of the Shadowlands expansion.
They are tied into the other Pantheons we have seen before like the Titans, and in Shadowlands, we will meet the Pantheon of Death.
They are on par with Titans.
They were part of a group that lead and established the Shadowlands.
The Arbiter is part of the Pantheon of Death.
They are part of a council that "grease the wheels" of the Machine of Death.
Void and Light Beings in Shadowlands
You'll see Void and the Light "visitors" in Maldraxxus.
They are there in Maldraxxus because its forces are the military might, the protectors of Shadowlands, they fight those that shouldn't be there. We might see more about this later on the expansion.
No confirmation if we are seeing the Void Lords in Shadowlands, but us killing the Void Lords has not escaped their notice and it will be interesting to see how our actions have ramifications in the cosmos.
Familiar Faces
The sword that Mograine is holding in the models is not the Ashbringer, it's actually a sword called Fatebringer.
There are quests in Ardenweald that wouldn't make sense if we assume that you knew some of those story beats in Legion. They revisit some of those questlines in a way that felt meaningful and caught you up on the story while still very much keeping the focus on Shadowlands.
Some of the familiar characters we are seeing in the Alpha are just just some early content blockouts. There will be adjustments.
Calia is not leader of the Forsaken, but there is a reason that she is there.
Calia and Lilian Voss are both in the prepatch.
The Night Warrior
You will find out that reverence for Elune is not unique to Azeroth.
You will encounter other people who have been the Night Warrior on their world.
New leveling experience
When you have new players coming into the game, there's a danger of them being overwhelmed by too much story, that's why there's different approaches for whether it’s the first time for you playing the game, versus if you've played it before.
Anyone who's just coming in for the first time does get guided through Exile’s Reach. If you're an experienced player, we don't need to put those rails around you.
On Everyone getting to experience all of the storylines:
They want to tell stories that that everyone will experience.
The overarching story the Jailor and Sylvanas and the Maw.
The four zones that we level up in before choosing a Covenant.
They did want the Covenants to each have their own distinctive storyline as well.
It's an opportunity for players to have those alt storylines that they jump into.
It is distinctive so that you're not just repeating the same things each time.
Sylvanas
The Sylvanas storyline will uncover some new truths about her and the things that have motivated her.
It isn't as simple as saying will she or won't she be redeemed.
We will learn more things about her, and a lot of people might change their point of view. Some people won't.
Their job as storytellers is to continue to evolve these characters and show new sides of them.
It'll definitely give fans of Sylvanas is more things to think about.
Odyn
His story doesn't directly on the surface tie into some of the events of Shadowlands
There are hints about the bargains that he made in the past.
They'd like to revisit Odyn’s storyline in the future.
Diversity
One of the things they've done in Shadowlands is try to really show that Azeroth as a whole represents the inclusiveness and diversity of the real world.
Now that players will be able to create characters that more represent themselves, or the diversity of the world, we'll see that woven into the populations of places.
Part of that also includes the representation for other perspectives on gender or sexuality.
Warcraft is not a game that's about those things, but they want players to be able to see themselves reflected in these characters.
It's an opportunity to see the world through someone else's eyes, rather than just your own.
Azeroth is a world of magic and a world of possibilities, and in Azeroth, you can love who you want, you can identify yourself the way that you want, and all of those things are possibilities.
Meeting Famous Dead People
They didn’t want to make the expansion just about a checklist of “Who are these famous people I can meet with and interact with?”
They wanted to choose characters that they felt best fit the themes of the zones.
Shadowlands represents an eternity.
No spoiler, but there is a very high chance Arthas was sent to the Maw.
The Jailer is confirmed to be the final boss in Shadowlands, with a power level which exceeds that of the Titans.
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Lordmons Interview with Morgan Day Highlights - Pantheon of Death, Legendary Power Unlock
The Final Boss of Shadowlands
Shadowlands Lore Interview with Lead Narrative Designer Steve Danuser - Elune, Sylvanas, Calia
Art and Visuals
Character Customization
They are looking for opportunities to add diversity and player choice for all races. There's a lot more work to make all people feel welcome in game. Choosing pronouns NPCs address you by is a topic that has come up. Due to a massive engineering process reinventing how character customizations work, there are fewer limitations now as far as character options. Many customization options are on the table now and Blizzard is excited by the passion the community has.
They try to make choices that are appropriate for each race, eg. for Night Elf players, having a skin to represent you are a survivor of Teldrassil. They feel that was important and are happy at the positive responses.
They are trying to get as many customizations ready for ship as possible but that doesn't rule out the possibility that more may be finished later.
After a great deal of discussion, they decided to provide the option to have a few High Elf customizations available. There are no plans to have mini-questlines to explain the presence of sub-races in Shadowlands, like High Elves or Sandfury Trolls.
They felt that the bald haircut for both genders provided a powerful choice and added it to more races.
You will be able to change your gender at the barber shop in Shadowlands.
Blizzard will continue to look at customization options, as well as looking at feedback to see what players want.
They are still working on reward systems and where cosmetics fit into that. The team is also always thinking about more class-specific customization options.
Character customization improvements are an ongoing system, they are never done.
Environment, NPC, and SFX Look and Feel
Shadowlands feels more linear than Battle for Azeroth, but Blizzard is unsure if that story direction will continue in future expansion. One advantage is that they can tell a broader progressive narrative when zones are encountered in a specific order. In a non-linear world where everything scales, you lose a sense of power progression and accomplishment felt when you're strong enough to enter a dangerous new zone.
Creating zones with otherworldly vibe is the thing that's the most challenging.
One of the big challenges with Maldraxxus is that there aren't any trees in the zone so they had to find elements that served that same purpose.
One core concept for Ardenweald was a celestial treescape with stars.
They pull ideas from all sorts of places, ideas that weren't used, previous zones, real life places. They always wants fresh ideas for their dungeons. For the Theater of Pain, they were inspired by Hunger Games--a real arena, with competing enemy forces, and choosing to work with one against the other, and then swap forces.
They are using a gateway animation to transition from Oribos to another zone to get rid of a loading screen and keep the player engaged.
They are using a new tech called SKyScenes which allows them to throw 3D objects into the sky - this is how they did the exterior of Torghast.
Sylvanas' new armor has to represent her coming into her power, moving on from the Banshee Queen and the Dark Ranger. But they were cognisent of the fact that she still needed to be recognizable as Sylvanas.
Now that they have the tools, we can expect to see more diversity and customization represented in the world going forward. They are using the new customization options as an opportunity to update the appearance of guards and civilians, correcting an oversight on their part over the years and improving representation.
Uther's Tomb received visual updates in Legion but nothing came of it. This was quite possibly a side-project or passion project. However, Blizzard plans several expansions ahead and knew that Uther would play a prominent role in Shadowlands, which probably prompted the team to touch up his tomb.
Shadowlands didn't focus on visual effect upgrades (ie glyph customization) because the team was focused on making new spell visuals for every class and covenant. They do want diversity in glyphs to continue in the future.
Covenant Armor
For Covenant Armor they pulled ideas from the zones themselves.
There's are very epic weapons that match your Covenant Armor. You obtain them by defeating Sire Denatrius in Castle Nathria. Doing so will reward you with a token that you can bring back to your Covenant Sanctum to unlock this weapon.
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Lordmons Interview with Morgan Day Highlights - Pantheon of Death, Legendary Power Unlock
Highlights of the Ion Hazzikostas Shadowlands Group Interview
Shadowlands Zones, Covenant Armor, and Character Customization Interview with Art Director Ely Cannon
Barber Shops Will Be Able to Change Your Gender in Shadowlands - No Longer a Paid Service
Zones
Endgame Zone: The Maw
The Maw is the endgame zone for Shadowlands
They are taking the Tanaan concept from Warlords where the starting zone is also the endgame zone - so you go back to the beginning.
You will enter The Maw to investige, explore, look into the Jailor, and figure out how to defeat him.
The Maw is a sandbox, like Mechagon and the Timeless Isle with discoverable gameplay.
There's a currency that you use in the Maw called Stygia. You may lose up to half of your Stygia when you die. The team is still thinking about how to balance that in War Mode.
You are not welcome here, you are under the eye of the Jailor, if you make too much noise you attract the attention of the Jailor and have to get out.
Mounting in the Maw
They want this area to feel dangerous and deadly has been the prime directive
Mounting up and running through the danger can actually be the best defense, so they wanted to find ways around it.
One problem is that it's not very well explained, it looks like you can mount but you can't mount.
A second problem is that the Maw is very large and some places are empty.
They're considering adding flight paths or fast travel and making sure that things don't feel empty.
There's a lot of options, but if the final design decision is no mounts, then mounts will likely not be allowed ever in the Maw.
You will likely never be able to fly in the Maw.
Maybe mounting adds to the Eye of the Jailer mechanics.
The Maw in Beta
Loot is going to drop off regular mobs in the Maw, it currently doesn't but that's a beta thing.
Some creatures need tuning, players need some tuning as well, but it is supposed to be dangerous.
The Maw Environment
Different Maw areas are not supposed to be explored by players too early. There's some debuffs and other things that will likely tell you that you shouldn't be there yet.
There might be some reason to come back later to this empty regions that are more rewarding.
World Quests in the Maw don't show up on the map but stuff shows up on the minimap.
The first few times you explore the Maw, you might be going in a little blind, but as you explore it more, you might remember some vignette stuff locations that you've found before and can create your own routes.
A journey into the maw will likely take somewhere around 25-30 minutes, maximum 40 minutes if you're super careful.
You probably don't need to enter every day, maybe 2-3 times a week
Resetting Eye of the Jailer Debuff
Current plan is to head back to your Covenant Sanctum and you can spend some Anima to clear your debuff.
If your friend logs on and you want to clear your debuff to play with them, that should be possible, but they want to make sure they make sure it's not super optimal to keep resetting it.
What is the point of the Maw?
Fantasy wise: you're removing a cosmic wrong. Souls are not supposed to be here and were supposed to be part of your Covenant.
There are also some important people who we need to save.
Gameplay wise: You need souls to upgrade your Renown. Certain rows of Soulbinds requires certain levels of Renown.
The Broker Vin'ari is your one friendly face in the Maw
Vin'ari may sell some cool items like one that shows up objectives in the nearby area, but it's likely that the Maw will not just be another zone of world quests.
But Vin'ari will have lots of cool toys and you'll want to befriend them.
Some of these cool toys affect Torghast. One of the cool things that you can get from Vin'ari is to make Torghast Anima Powers no longer give you an option of only 1 choice.
There are plans for the future of the Maw after 9.0
For a look at who you might encounter in The Maw, check out
Blizzard's The Maw Shadowlands Zone Preview
The Maw: Zone Preview
Torghast
Torghast is the replayable endgame scenario.
Originally Torghast required a key but they heard feedback that players wanted to run Torghast as much as they want.
All keys have been removed from Torghast.
You'll be able to play Torghast as much as you want to because it's fun.
Rewards will be adjusted so that you won't be encouraged to grind endlessly.
The Torghast tutorial makes you unlock 36 floors and will be account-wide.
Tuning
Tuning problems in Torghast are due to them counting floors linearly. They're planning on making the difficulty scale faster on each floor but take a "step down" after every 6th floor so the difficulty looks more like a Sawtooth. This will make it so that the enemies scale better with your power.
The difficulty level of Torghast will be tweaked in future builds, so later floors don't feel easier.
Solo tanks and healers shouldn't feel forced to respec because they have Anima Powers in Torghast
Solo players shouldn't feel like they are forced to group up with other players.
They learned a lot from Horrific Visions.
Torghast Challenges
There will be some things for some very difficult accomplishments in the Tower. They're being worked on right now, and should see them soon.
Blizzard is interested to have different modes with Torghast in the future, maybe seeded runs to see who clears it quickly, or leaderboards to show how far people go. They want to know what the community wants from Torghast in future patches.
Torghast Design
Torghast went through a lot of iterations and seeing the design twists it took would be a fun retrospective to feature at a BlizzCon.
Battle for Azeroth had a lot of experimental end-game content like Warfronts, Islands, and player choice in Warfronts. Blizzard has learned a lot, such as dynamic spawns from Islands informed the replayable design of Torghast.
There are a lot of different layouts of floors, many dynamic spawns of mobs. There's a lot of replayability.
The Torghast minimap is unique as they needed to come up with a solution for some technical issues. Their solution also created fog of war in the minimap.
Will Torghast be a feature in future expacs?
Some form of it can be -- Torghast itself is in the Maw
If the players like Torghast and players demand it, then parts of it can carry on to future expansions.
Torghast, Tower of the Damned Overview
Castle Nathria
Castle Nathria is the First Raid
Lots of compelling stuff in the new raid.
Castle Nathria was built with a purpose, it should feel like people live there.
There's a portal boss, portaling players all over the place.
One of the bosses takes place on a large dance floor.
The final boss has multiple floors, but he also has mirrors.
More Shadowlands Zones
Are there more pieces of Shadowlands coming to the future besides the 5 current zones? There are infinite spaces in Shadowlands that souls can be sorted and we might visit those in other patches.
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with Morgan Day and MrGM - Class-Wide Artifact Transmog, Experience Removed from Heirlooms
Shadowlands Interview with Sloot and Paul Kubit
Highlights of the Ion Hazzikostas Shadowlands Group Interview
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Lapi Liveblog
Lordmons Interview with Morgan Day Highlights - Pantheon of Death, Legendary Power Unlock
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Shadowlands Developer Update with John Hight and Ion Hazzikostas
Legendaries
The biggest difference between "traditional" and crafted Legendaries is player agency. The Shadowlands legendary system feels like an improvement over the Legion legendary system because players control their legendary acquisition--the legendaries are crafted vs pure RNG. Blizzard is also trying to make the utility perks feel powerful.
They haven't figured out the exact acquisition rate yet but some of it will depend on how much and how successfully you play. They should be earned at a faster pace than when Legion Legendaires launched.
Maybe you'll be able to equip more than one legendary later on the expansion, but only one to start out with.
The Legendary Rune Carving UI is mostly intended for testing and they're still working on the UI.
Legendary power recipes will have unlocks similar to Essences, so you know exactly what you need to do to unlock that power for crafting legendaries.
You're unlocking a recipe by taking it to the Runeforger
Recipes are account-wide.
The base item will come from crafters.
The recipe will come from a known source in the world:
Sephuz triggered off CCs, dispels and interrupts which seems more like a PvP thing, so that recipe might drop from PvP.
Fire Mages had a Legendary that required a 4 second cast which seems more like PvE thing, so that recipe might drop from PvE content.
Legendaries and Torghast
When you complete a high Torghast floor, you'll get the Legendary materials for all floors below it as well.
You do Torghast, and you know which wings are open that week. Then you craft your Legendary.
Legendary Items Overview
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Shadowlands Interview with Sloot and Paul Kubit
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Lapi Liveblog
Lordmons Interview with Morgan Day Highlights - Pantheon of Death, Legendary Power Unlock
Ion Hazzikostas on Shadowlands End-Game Loot - Utility Legendaries and "Loot is Loot" Droprates
Loot Drops
Regarding the amount of loot that drops changing: exact quantities are still undecided but for example for m+, it will be something like:
One item from the end-of-run chest that is repeatable.
One item from the weekly loot chest. You'll be rewarded for running more than one Mythic+ dungeon a week to get more options when you loot your Weekly Chest. That way you don't feel like you're at the mercy of RNG. That should be a more reliable source of upgrades since you can best pick the one that suits your needs out of a wider range of things that you've earned. If none of the options are enticing, you will be able to instead pick an important currency.
Personal loot and tradability will not be changing.
Without the random factor that Warforged/Titanforging added, personal loot should be more consistent in terms of distributing upgrades.
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Shadowlands Interview with Sloot and Paul Kubit
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Lapi Liveblog
Lordmons Interview with Morgan Day Highlights - Pantheon of Death, Legendary Power Unlock
Ion Hazzikostas on Shadowlands End-Game Loot - Utility Legendaries and "Loot is Loot" Droprates
Current Systems
Transmog
Artifact Appearances: They're looking for Artifact Appearances to be used for every spec of the class rather than for the specific spec. They will still be restricted to their class.
Different Shoulder Transmogs: There's been some concerns that Shoulders were designed as a pair, where the shoulders are not the same on each side, where they would clip or something similar. It's something that they want to keep pursuing.
Flying
Pathfinder Will be Based on Covenant Renown Instead of Reputation in Shadowlands
Mounts
There are lots of cool ideas that they have for mounts but have no idea where to put them.
They'll be peppered all over the place including Torghast and the Maw.
Updating the Game World
The original starting experiences weren’t really designed for new players in mind and reflected game mentalities from a decade ago. Blizzard wanted to create a modern introductory experience with Exile’s Reach, highlighting treasures, rare enemies, and a mini-dungeon.
The Horde is in for a period of rebuilding, moving into a leadership council. There are more stories to tell about factions rebuilding, but it's not the focus of the start of Shadowlands.
Looking for Group
Will be updated, but not at Shadowlands launch
Used heavily for many Mythic+ dungeons and they will update the UI
You'll hopefully be able to search by the dungeon and key level instead of what people listed the dungeon as.
Mythic+
New Seasonal Affixes in Shadowlands - They might test a couple of them on beta and see what people are most excited about. First one will probably be a little easier since everyone is learning the dungeons.
They're pretty happy with the current set of affixes.
They've taken a look at some affixes which don't scale with gear or scale with max health.
They don't want to add too many more affixes, because it allows for certain combos to repeat frequently you can fine-tune strats for.
Bursting and Volcanic have been adjusted to scale with key level instead of health.
Mythic+ gear swapping will be limited to Weapon swapping. It's essentially a big Raid encounter.
There's a big scary elemental in the maw and the Shadowlands Season 1 Mythic +15 mount will look like that.
Legion Timewalking
They've been releasing timewalking dungeons from an expansion on a cadence.
It probably won't come out at launch but eventually.
Miscellaneous
There are currently no plans for Heritage Weapons in Shadowlands, but that's something really cool they might explore in the future.
There are no plans to change legacy loot at this time.
Collector's Achievements: There is always a plan to add more. However, they know that if they add new mounts, some people feel forced to do things they'd prefer not to, on the other hand, they also don't want to make it feel out of reach for other players.
Pet Battles: The team has discussed bringing pet battles to the companion app several times but there are some challenges with that.
Technical Issues: There are a lot of complications preventing US and EU servers from being merged from a technical perspective and international exchange rates.
Heirlooms: They removed the experience bonus from heirlooms. They're looking to replace it with something that is not just extra experience that will be equally as beneficial and unique.
Class / Race Combinations: Not for Shadowlands, but something that they're always willing to explore.
Archaeology is entirely linked to the artifacts of Azeroth. Expect othing new for this secondary profession in Shadowlands.
Blizzard has no plans to port World of Warcraft to consoles or Stadia.
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with HazelNuttyGames and John Hight - Pathfinder Requires Covenant Renown
Shadowlands Interview with PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Highlights of the Ion Hazzikostas Shadowlands Group Interview
Shadowlands Interview with Morgan Day and MrGM - Class-Wide Artifact Transmog, Experience Removed from Heirlooms
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Lapi Liveblog
Highlights of the Ion Hazzikostas Shadowlands Group Interview
Judgehype Interview with Patrick Dawson - Shadowlands Content, Lore, & Prepatch
Prepatch
The Shadowlands pre-event will likely start a few weeks before the expansion, and will go up on the PTR for testing.
The level squish and systems will be live at that point.
Corruption is going away in the 9.0 pre-patch because N'Zoth is dead.
Essences and Azerite Armor will continue to work on Azeroth but not in the Shadowlands.
They're going to tell the story of how the Heroes of Azeroth are gathering in Icecrown and preparing for the Assault, inspired by the Scourge event from WoTLK.
A large blog post will be coming out likely next week detailing what will be going away and what won't. They don't know if the Brutosaur mount is removed from the vendor in the pre-patch or launch date but that should be in the blog.
Blizzard is already looking at the health of realms in time for Shadowlands launch and an engineering team has started to look at realm stability improvements for launch.
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Tonton - Open World Lag, Swapping Covenants, PvP Power
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Classes
There was very little talk about classes, but a few things were touched on.
Because they're moving into Beta, it doesn't mean that they're done with class design and they're only doing numbers.
However, don't expect a fundamental overhaul.
They can still change interactions between abilities, talents and adding abilities.
Certain classes may feel underpowered now until things like soulbinds and legendary systems are in. Once those are in and tested, fine-tuning can occur.
Melee will be kept as the unique identity of Survival Hunters in Shadowlands, but Blizzard doesn't want them to feel like their melee strength comes at the expense of the core Hunter fantasy.
No new classes for Shadowlands.
Class Changes Coming in Shadowlands
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Shadowlands Interview with PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Highlights of the Ion Hazzikostas Shadowlands Group Interview
Judgehype Interview with Patrick Dawson - Shadowlands Content, Lore, & Prepatch
PvP
PvP item acquisition will be very similar to WoD, with a weekly Conquest cap, vendor, and unlimited Honor gain.
Covenant Abilities in PvP
They have the ability to have custom tuning in PvP.
The last thing they want to do is disable something completely.
Will Covenants become the new factions?
The Covenants aren't exactly enemies against each other.
The can occasionally come into conflicts; there may be some PvP stuff that might be Covenants v. Covenants when it makes sense, but only when it makes sense.
PvP Problems
BFA was systems on top of systems and created some pretty broken systems and complexity.
They're learned from some tuning mistakes from things like corruption and essences -- passive dots or effects aren't exactly a reflection of skill.
Larger Rewards for Mythic+/PvP
A portion of the reward is ego.
They don't want to push the reward ladder too high - every class can complete a +20 in time, every class can get 2400 in time.
They admit that they're not perfectly balanced but they don't want people to have a pressure there for in-game rewards.
PvP Power
PvP Power was an internal experiment that was datamined.
There are no plans to add a stat like that -- they want to make sure that it's clear what spells perform best.
They've decided that PvP only stats are not the right thing for the game at this time.
Battleground and Arenas: There is a new Arena in Bastion, but no new Battleground.
Tertiary Stats: Tertiary stats will probably be about how they are now.
Lag in Open World Battles
It's been going back all the way to WoTLK and Wintergrasp.
They've been working on it over the past year.
The problem is the game is more complicated, there was a preach video that speculated what was going on and he wasn't too far off.
However, it's an explanation, not an excuse. Ion knows it feels terrible and they've been working on many optimizations.
The Sources:
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Tonton - Open World Lag, Swapping Covenants, PvP Power
Lordmons Interview with Morgan Day Highlights - Pantheon of Death, Legendary Power Unlock
The Interviews
Video Interviews
Alveona and Paul Kubit
(in English and Russian)
Paul Kubit on Covenant Swapping - Changing Should be Easy, Changing Back Should be Hard
Morgan Day and MrGM
Liveblog:
Shadowlands Interview with Morgan Day and MrGM - Class-Wide Artifact Transmog, Experience Removed from Heirlooms
Sloot and Paul Kubit
Liveblog:
Shadowlands Interview with Sloot and Paul Kubit
PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Liveblog:
Shadowlands Interview with PandaTV and Ion Hazzikostas
Ion Hazzikostas and Tonton
Liveblog:
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Tonton - Open World Lag, Swapping Covenants, PvP Power
Ion Hazzikostas and Lapi
Liveblog:
Shadowlands Interview with Ion Hazzikostas and Lapi Liveblog
WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
Liveblog:
Shadowlands Interview with WarcraftRadio and Patrick Dawson
]
Lordmons and Morgan Day
Lordmons Interview with Morgan Day Highlights - Pantheon of Death, Legendary Power Unlock
HazelNuttyGames and John Hight
Liveblog:
Shadowlands Interview with HazelNuttyGames and John Hight - Pathfinder Requires Covenant Renown
Written Interviews
Highlights of the Ion Hazzikostas Shadowlands Group Interview
Shadowlands Zones, Covenant Armor, and Character Customization Interview with Art Director Ely Cannon
Judgehype Interview with Patrick Dawson - Shadowlands Content, Lore, & Prepatch
Shadowlands Lore Interview with Lead Narrative Designer Steve Danuser - Elune, Sylvanas, Calia
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