World of Warcraft: Legion discussion

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  • RahnalH102RahnalH102 the Green Devout, Veteran Monster Hunter, Creature Enthusiast New Mexico Icrontian

    Was able to watch the reveal despite being in boonier boondocks at the time.

    Glad to see they are using the new systems they've developed for other features to expand and improve upon other features (separate PvP balance.)

    I'm a visual customization nut so improvements to transmog, and new specializing features are always nice. I don't even play Druid and I'm happy to see that bear and cat forms will have their own "weapons" on display.

    Demon Hunter seems nice thematically and the like. Raid comp wise I don't think it matters much, personal opinion of course.

    Thing I'm most curious about is that during the presentation they went over the artifact for Survival Hunters, a spear. That of course implies that hunters will be able to wield melee again. Or is this spear a thrown weapon like a javelin. and I care so much about this particular topic not because of "hurr durr hunter weapon" or using melee on a hunter, but that I can have my favorite transmog set complete again.

    primesuspect
  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian

    @RahnalH102 said:

    Thing I'm most curious about is that during the presentation they went over the artifact for Survival Hunters, a spear. That of course implies that hunters will be able to wield melee again. Or is this spear a thrown weapon like a javelin. and I care so much about this particular topic not because of "hurr durr hunter weapon" or using melee on a hunter, but that I can have my favorite transmog set complete again.

    From the link at Icy veins:
    "As an example of class changes, the Survival Hunter 'spear' Artifact was brought up. In Legion, Survival Hunters will be a melee spec that utilizes a pet. To differentiate specializations, the developers will try to de-homogenize the classes. Further to this, Beast Mastery Hunters will fight at range with a pet, while Marksmanship Hunters will fight at range with NO PET."
    http://www.icy-veins.com/forums/topic/13199-wow-legion-interview-with-tom-chilton-ion-hazzikostas/

    primesuspectRahnalH102Strikes
  • RahnalH102RahnalH102 the Green Devout, Veteran Monster Hunter, Creature Enthusiast New Mexico Icrontian

    That was a possibility I had thought of. I'm okay with that. It still breaks my favorite transmog but it's still interesting.

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    I also noticed that the Enhancement Shaman footage concerning Doomhamer depicted the Shaman wielding it 2H. RETURN OF DIRE MAUL ENH SHM TANK?!

  • ChoochChooch K-Pop authority™, Pho King Madison Heights, MI Icrontian

    Survival Hunter = Rexxar the Warcraft character.

    primesuspectRahnalH102
  • RexxarRexxar Maryland Icrontian

    That's me!

  • RexxarRexxar Maryland Icrontian

    In all seriousness, I will probably buy the expansion again. Just cause I am a lore junkie, I enjoy the quests, and I want to level as a Demon Hunter. As much as I am psyched for this new hero class I'm disappointed Blizzard took the Burning Legion route again and I'm curious why they did. Usually they try to balance it out and I half expected them to toss Azshara at us.

    I wonder how they are going to flesh out the demon hunter. When the Death Knights first arrived the first two months the class was a unstoppable force and Blizzard had to balance them out fast. Overall I'll probably play the new class, get one of my mains to the cap then leave and I am totally okay with that.

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    They are tossing Azshara at us. There's a whole zone dedicated to the Highborne Elves.

  • RahnalH102RahnalH102 the Green Devout, Veteran Monster Hunter, Creature Enthusiast New Mexico Icrontian

    We're not going to Nazjatar though so I doubt we'll even see Azshara herself, at least not in person.

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1837894-Dev-Interviews

    Eventually you will be able to unlock every trait in the Artifact weapon tree. You may be able to take different paths to unlocking them all though.

  • Creeperbane2Creeperbane2 Victorian Scoundrel Indianapolis, IN Icrontian

    Azshara? Isn't that just the area behind Orgrimmar?

  • RahnalH102RahnalH102 the Green Devout, Veteran Monster Hunter, Creature Enthusiast New Mexico Icrontian

    @Creeperbane2 said:
    Azshara? Isn't that just the area behind Orgrimmar?

    It's named after Queen Azshara, formerly of the Night Elves, now leader of the Naga.

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    @RahnalH102 said:
    We're not going to Nazjatar though so I doubt we'll even see Azshara herself, at least not in person.

    We are not going to Nazjatar, but you can meet Azshara in Well of Eternity, and devs have confirmed you will somehow encounter her again in Legion.

  • RahnalH102RahnalH102 the Green Devout, Veteran Monster Hunter, Creature Enthusiast New Mexico Icrontian

    I should have clarified with "I doubt we'll see her in person in this expansion."

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    • The team has known Legion would be the next expansion back when they started coming up of the Warlords of Draenor concepts.
    • We are back in the normal Azeroth, no alternative universe.
    • Why does the Legion keep trying to take over Azeroth? The expansion will reveal this over time.
    • Illidan is a really important part of Gul'dan's plans.
    • Illidan is not pleased with us after Black Temple. Who knows how he will react if and when we come across him to ask for help.
    • 12,000 years ago there was a festering wound in The Broken Isles. The Pillars of Creation were used to seal the wound. The Temple of Elune was built on top. The wound was opened again and an infinite number of demons is coming through.
    • The Dalaran in Broken Isles has been updated, with a few changes and texture updates.
    • Eventually you will be able to fly in Legion, but not right away, similar to Warlords. Starting in Patch 7.0 the first steps towards the flying achievement will be available.
    • The DPS and item level are determined by the Relics, as well as modifiers to traits. (This was covered in a little more detail in interviews)
    • The team wants to make sure it isn't 2x the work to maintain 2x artifacts. You will need to earn separate relics for your other Artifacts though.
    • There will be a quest line for each profession.
    • There will be some system changes to professions as a whole to improve the UI and add new functionality.
    • One more character slot will be added.
    • People that are playing Demon Hunters would likely be playing a melee spec anyway, so it shouldn't add too many more melee.
    • There won't be another filler patch between Warlords and the Legion invasion, other than the flying patch.
    • Ruby Sanctum didn't work out well. It was entertaining for a week or so, as there was one boss to kill and then you were done.
    • In Warlords, the team didn't do enough to express the story through in-game content. The garrison campaign wasn't enough.
    • One more character slot is being added.
    • Having one artifact per spec will help to focus the specs. Right now Frost Death Knights can use a two-hand weapon or dual wield, but their artifact is two runeblades, so they will focus on dual-wielding in Legion and Unholy will focus on two-hand weapons.
    • The new Honor system allows for some new abilities to be added that would have been cut in the past, as they were PvP only.
    • Draenor's forces are busy rebuilding Draenor, so they are not going to come and help with the Burning Legion.
    • Illidan's storyline will span the entire expansion.
    • Only allowing elves to be Demon Hunters fits the lore and is the right choice for Legion.
    • One of the social features under development is notifying you when friends join a queue and allowing you to queue with them.
    • The team would also like to improve communication across groups. If you have a group of friends you raid with or PvP with there should be a better way to communicate with them.
    • Older time limited legendary items, such as the Mists of Pandaria cape, may become transmogable.
    • The sewers of Dalaran were mentioned as an Order Hall for Rogues again.
    • Champions will unlock or complement content rather than doing content for you
    primesuspectRyder
  • RexxarRexxar Maryland Icrontian

    Illidan waking up to Gul'Dan is going to be quite an experience. He absorbed the power of our Gul'Dan and decided to have a chat with him here and there through the artifact.

    primesuspect
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited August 2015

    More. Some of it might be a repeat from above:

    Demon Hunters

    • Demon Hunters will start somewhere around level 95 to 100.
    • Glaives are a new type of weapon that Demon Hunters use. They are a pair that comes together and fills both slots. In the future, Demon Hunters might dual wield the standard agility weapons. (Currently the class page has different information)
    • The Demon Hunter Artifact glaives can be see in some of the character creation screenshots for Demon Hunters.
    • The team talked about having the Demon Hunter wear mail, but it didn't fit the class identity.
    • Demon Hunters are agile, so they will be wearing leather. This isn't a huge problem now that Personal Loot is used in most places.
    • The Demon Hunter is going to be a very agile class, so tanks may have lots of Dodge and Parry mechanics for their tanking style.
    • For now, Demon Hunters are the only ones who get tattoos.
    • Demon Hunter has been considered since Wrath of the Lich King. It finally fit the expansion's story and theme, which is why it can be added now.
    • In order to fight demons, Illidan had to partner with demons. He had to sacrifice many things for great power and so do the Illidari, which is why Demon Hunters look somewhat like Illidan.

    Classes

    • No stat squish is planned for this expansion.
    • The team hasn't decided if there will be another talent row or not, as the Artifact weapon will have a decent number of choices for you to make.
    • Survival Hunters will be a melee class with pet going forward.
    • Beast Mastery Hunters will fight at range with a pet.
    • Marksmanship Hunters will fight at range with no pet.
    • Survival and Marksmanship have been too similar in the past, which is why they are being changed in Legion.
    • Demonology Warlocks will also be getting some bigger changes, focusing more on their demons.
    • Demonology Warlocks will be refocused on summoning and controlling demons rather than having Metamorphosis dominate. Other specs will still have access to demons.
    • Disc Priests are going to be a much more offensive healer after another pass on Atonement which will make it more interactive.
    • They will still have heals and PW:S, but they will sustain their healing through doing DPS.
    • Closer to 50% damage and 50% healing spec.
    • In the past, when Atonement was popular you would just spam Smite and Holy Fire all fight long and use the smart healing, which wasn't very interactive. This time, you may throw out some single target heals giving players a buff. Next time you Smite, people who have that buff will get your healing, and you will have to refresh the buff periodically.
    • These changes should fix the absorb heavy nature of Discipline Priests.
    • Holy Priests will still be all about healing.
    • The team has learned some lessons from how Fistweaving works now and will talk about what they are doing to solve the problems with it in the future.

    Dungeons

    • The team isn't sure how exactly they will incentivize players to keep going back to dungeons yet. Once you started to raid in Draenor, you had no reason to go back to a dungeon, which is not good. Mists of Pandaria was a better model, where you had a reward for doing a dungeon every day.
      Normal and Heroic dungeons will exist in Legion, but the team isn't sure if they will do Mythic at the start. They haven't decided when they will add Mythic, but they do like it.

    • The team likes challenge modes and wants to try and make them more accessible. They aren't guaranteed to be added to Legion.

    Artifacts and Items

    • You will not loot weapons in Legion.
    • The item bonus system (Warforged, sockets, and extra stats) worked out well, so it could be extended to have even more bonuses.
    • Your Artifact will start at epic and then there will be some way for it to become legendary over time.
    • Your Artifact will start as legendary.
    • Your artifact may not have a quality, it could just be its own thing.
    • The goal is for players to have an item that they are working on powering up and it can become a legendary, rewarding players who do all of the expansion's content, similar to Mists of Pandaria and Warlords.
    • There will be no catch up mechanics for Artifact weapons on alts.
    • The team doesn't want it to be too painful if you want to change specs, so there might be some kind of catch up mechanic for getting the Artifact weapon for another spec.
    • How we actually get the Artifact weapons from the characters currently wielding them will be revealed in the future.
    • Eventually you will be able to unlock every trait in the Artifact weapon tree. You may be able to take different paths to unlocking them all though.
    • You will be leveling the Artifact weapon throughout the entire expansion.
    • The Artifact weapons have Relic slots, which will determine its raw item stats (DPS, ilvl, etc.) and modifiers to the traits you've chosen, so the Artifact's stats will still improve as you defeat bosses.
    • Relics are things you can socket into the artifact and are rewarded from completing major quest lines, dungeons, and raids. This way you still get weapon upgrades from the same sources, but keep the same weapon.
    • Artifact weapons can be transmoged into other weapons, but not the other way around.
    • There are weapons cooler than Benediction and Anathema for Priest Artifact weapons.
    • Earning the Artifact has a class and spec specific quest, but it isn't anywhere near the green fire quest in terms of scale and difficulty.

    Raids

    • Raids today are harder than they have ever been.
    • Raids worked out well for the most part in Warlords, but the team has talked about how to make loot better and how to improve personal loot for Legion.
    • Having some encounters that favor melee and some that favor ranged is not a problem, as long as there isn't a huge gap between the two.
    • On rumors that Sylvanas might be a raid boss: "That's interesting".
    Ryder
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited August 2015

    Order Halls

    • Order Halls won't have an auction house or bank.
    • You will spend less time in your Order Hall than you did in your Garrison. You go back to do quests, work on your artifact, and interact with your champions. You will likely spend a lot of your downtime in Dalaran. (#RAVENHOLDTORRIOT)
    • The Dalaran Sewers were mentioned as being associated with rogues when providing context for an Order Hall question.
    • The Order Halls may have different sections. For example, in the Paladin's Order Hall, the Blood Elf Paladins may be in a different section from The Sunwalkers, as well as the Humans and Dwarves.
    • The fantasy in Draenor was collecting followers to raise an army. In Legion, you are the leader of your class order and you have a smaller number of elite heroes by your side. They should complement and enhance your gameplay rather than compete with you.

    PvP

    • The Conquest system is going away.
    • The goals is to remove PvP gear. There will be PvP ways to obtain gear, but the power in PvP will be about the gear you obtain and the PvP talents that you unlock.

    World

    • The location of the Broken Isles will be revealed in the future.
    • The team isn't sure how they will handle Dalaran yet. They could do sanctuary areas again or split it up.
    • Only the raid takes place in the Emerald Nightmare, but it could be expanded on in the future.
    • Karazhan is an important place.

    Flying

    • The team is happy with how flying worked out in Draenor. You will have to level up and explore the land before you are able to fly, similar to what is coming in Patch 6.2.1.

    Future

    • The team still wants to release expansions faster.
    • Legion will release next year, but no specific date has been set yet.
    • There isn't a solid patch schedule plan for Legion yet.
    • The expansion after Legion is already being planned.
    • The cinematic isn't complete just yet.
    • The transmog overhaul should make it easier to use. You should be able to browse through what you have unlocked and what you could unlock for each slot, more like a dressing room than the current system.
    • As far as the listed social improvements go, the team has ideas on how to bring different servers together, different ways to connect to your friends, and on how to match-make friends better. Keep in mind that these are just ideas at this point.
    • The team strongly believes that WoW is best played with friends. It is the most fun when you can make connections with other players in game or bring in friends from outside the game and play together.

    Misc

    • The professions team for Legion is the largest that Blizzard has ever had for WoW and lots of new things are coming. The team heard the feedback about Warlords professions.
    • There are a lot of surprises in store for players in Legion and the team doesn't want players to think we are just going back to the same stuff.
    • Patch 6.1 was not named correctly and they could have done better.
    • Garrisons are staying in Draenor, so you can go back and visit them if you want.
    • The subscriber count is more volatile than it used to be because players have gotten older and don't have as much free time anymore. As long as players are happy and enjoy the game, the team doesn't mind extreme peaks and valleys. They just want to ensure you have a great experience and feel like you got your money's worth.
    • The team doesn't focus on or make decisions based on what their subscriber count is. They focus on making the best game they can, learn some lessons, and keep moving forward.
    • Focusing an expansion on new places and characters, such as Mists of Pandaria is not a mistake. It was a nice break from having one big bad guy, with a focus on exploration and adventure.
    primesuspectRyder
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    Please note that these comments are collated from developer interviews. I made no effort to interpret or reconcile some obvious inconsistencies.

    primesuspectRyder
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    The TL;DR is very much appreciated. Thank you.

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited August 2015

    Some more interviews were conducted recently.

    Yogscast

    • The Demon Hunter was considered for the Burning Crusade, but the team wasn't ready to add another class to the game at that point.
    • Distinguishing the Demon Hunter from Monks and Rogues will be important. Rogues are about stealth and crowd control, whereas the Demon Hunter is about in your face mobility and getting out when they are in trouble. Monks are a little more of a hybrid, with some self healing.
    • The Eye Beam for Demon Hunter is a skillshot, as it is a narrow cone attack.
    • Dalaran has some modifications for the storyline, changes to the center area, changes to the Underbelly, as well as updated textures.
    • The current plan is for Dalaran is to have a free for all PvP area in the Underbelly. You can bribe the guards to make them go away for a while.
    • It would be hard to eliminate existing talent trees, as some players would be upset of the removal of a spec they really liked. If the team could go back in time, there might have been a few that never got added, but now that those trees exist they will try to make them more distinct.
    • Subtlety Rogues will keep going down the ninja route, Combat will be a little more like a Pirate Swashbuckler, and Assassination will be about poisons and Damage over Time.
    • The Honor system is changing from a currency style system to an experience style system. You get benefits from the honor levels such as opportunities to get loot or gold.
    • The Prestige system will give hardcore players a reason to keep playing, even if their power doesn't increase.
    • Gear will have less of an impact in PvP. There is no such thing as PvP gear anymore, so no Resilience,PvP specific stats, or sets. Beyond a commonly available item level, you will get drastically diminishing returns from increasing your item level. Somewhere between 5 to 1 and 10 to 1 diminishing returns. The best raider in the game might have a 7% advantage over a player that just hit the level cap.
    • The team is considering allowing players to transmog their Mists of Pandaria legendary cloak and Warlords legendary ring, as they were available for a limited time. They want to avoid a situation like everyone farming Warglaives for transmog.
    • It is possible that in a future expansion more races could become Demon Hunters, but for now it is only Blood Elves and Night Elves.
    • You can use the double jump in battlegrounds and dungeons. The team will be careful to avoid breaking the game with Demon Hunters using double jump current content, such as groups that only want Demon Hunters to skip things in dungeons.
    • Tanaan is a big and awesome zone with a lot of cool spawns. It has generated a lot of engagement with the player base. There are a lot of players doing it every day. The team wants to continue to evolve the endgame world content model though, as they aren't happy with the combination of daily quests and bonus objectives. They are two pieces of the puzzle, but larger ongoing story development is also important, similar to what was in Patch 5.1. Other mechanics to add more replayability and variation would also be good additions and there are plans for Legion to make better endgame world content.
    • Gul'dan is the instigator in Legion, but not the big bad guy. He is a raid boss in the raids at launch, but not the final boss of the expansion.

    Millenium

    • Legion may be shorter than other expansion names, but it describes the expansion perfectly, especially if you understand the context of the word in Warcraft history.
    • Azeroth is the only world (that we know of) that the Legion hasn't conquered yet.
    • We will discover the motivations of the Burning Legion. They aren't just going throughout the universe causing chaos.
    • The Broken Isles has been pretty quiet as of late, until the Tomb of Sargeras was activated. People knew it was there before, but there was no real motivation to go there.
    • Tension between the Horde and Alliance is an important part of the game and this expansion.

    Tweakers.net

    • The team hasn't decided if Blacksmiths or Jewelcrafters will be able to make items that modify your Artifact.

    4Player.de

    • All Druid forms connected with the Artifact weapon will be updated. (Keep in mind this is a translated summary, Moonkin was not specifically mentioned)
  • KoreishKoreish I'm a penguin, deal with it. KCMO Icrontian

    The demon hunter is a tank? That's unexpected.

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    Unexpected, but not surprising. WoW is always critically short of tanks, so adding another class to the list of tanks should help that issue a bit.

  • RyanFodderRyanFodder Detroit, MI Icrontian

    actual 50/50 healer / dps?

    Color me intrigued.

    Still not into holy.

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited August 2015

    Interview content with Game Guide.

    Pre-Expansion Invasion Event

    • The invasion hits all of Azeroth, so we will see invasions in many different zones throughout the world.
    • We are seeing new demons and engines of war that we have never seen before.
    • There will be some period of time over weeks that Azeorth is being invaded and the various factions will decide how they are going to handle it.
    • Players will have demon invasions they need to fight against, all leading up to the launch of the expansion.
    • The Broken Shore will be part of this launch event.

    Other Stuff

    • The developers can't talk about their favorite feature of Legion yet. They are still working on lots of super cool secret stuff!
    • The team would love to do something with Karazhan. There is a lot of great lore there. There aren't any plans to announce yet, but the team is discussing what they can do with it.
    • Owning a piece of Draenor that you could customize worked out well. (The Garrison)
    • The team is not talking about doing a player or guild housing system right now.
    • Having an Artifact weapon makes sense for this expansion. The weapons we have now aren't enough for us to even stand a chance against the invasion.
    • Flying mounts feel awesome, so as much as the team wants players to explore the world from the ground, there needs to be a way to unlock flying later in the expansion.
    • There are plans for itemization and having to share Leather loot between classes that the team isn't ready to talk about yet.
    • Demon Hunters being able to see other players through walls is really cool and fits the class.
    • The team isn't sure how matchmaking and the Prestige system will interact. They can't completely split people up by Prestige rank, as that would result in very long queue times.
    • You didn't see more Horde than Alliance in Warlords, you saw more Orcs. Those Orcs were Iron Horde, not Horde. They were the enemy of everyone. We also saw both Horde and Alliance heroes, so there wasn't a huge disparity. Legion will have both Alliance and Horde heroes and stories.
    primesuspect
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    I love the revisionism: "You didn't see more Horde than Alliance in Warlords, you saw more Orcs."

    No, bros, we're specifically complaining about everything being all Orc all the time.

  • Please keep doing these.

    primesuspectRexxarDocFrazier
  • RahnalH102RahnalH102 the Green Devout, Veteran Monster Hunter, Creature Enthusiast New Mexico Icrontian

    I've never understood the "Too much of [insert race]!" complaint that has been so common.

  • I don't see race. I just pretend everyone is bear and it's all good.

    RahnalH102MyrmidonprimesuspectRexxar
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