Just a quick thought about this. Aren’t Earthen a different race entirely? Sort of like how we have Night/Blood/Void Elves that all look very similar, but aren’t actually the same.
1 Like
I might be a bit rusty on that front but I think they’re like ancestors to the dwarves, since they weren’t afflicted by the curse of flesh. The only thing that throws me off about them being among the Horde is simply the same thing as human dracthyr visages, it’s putting an alliance race, well, among the Horde haha. Might be a bit pedantic, I guess! To me it’s different from void elves and blood elves because the Alliance does have a precedent with having elves among them (which is to say void elves may as well just have been high elves).
2 Likes
I believe all elves used to be night elves (according to Wowpedia at least), yet blood elves are part of the Horde. To me it’s similar to that relationship.
1 Like
Cross Realm guilds are a MASSIVE win.
8 Likes
Deep Dive initial Thoughts:
Warbands are looking really awesome. I can’t wait to select which 4 of my many characters will be huddled around the fire together. And then be able to see all of my other characters together without having to bounce between realms will be such a QoL improvement.
Delves are just getting even more intriguing. I can’t wait to experience them. The outdoor world experience getting a vault treatment equivalent to Mythic+ and raiding is such an awesome thing.
I can’t wait to see more about the different Hero talent trees and what they are for each class. All of the Warlock ones sound awesome. Soul Harvester, Hellcaller, and Diabolist are just awesome. I can’t wait to see what they entail.
The Allied race being unlockable just by doing the campaign is so nice. The past experiences with allied races have kinda been not fun with having to do so much just to unlock them, that sometimes by the time you do… You just don’t want to level them. This new race just being unlocked by doing the campaign should enable more people to just start playing them instead of the long time between seeing them, and then finally unlocking.
Edit: I am also very glad and appreciative that you are enabling players to choose between Dynamic Flying and TBC flying. Though, I wish you’d just enable both from the start just like you’re doing with Dynamic. Forcing players who physically cannot, or with limitations, or those who simply do not like the system to do an entire expansions campaign before getting the option… While better than Dragonflights wait until 10.2… is still a little too long. Using “TBC Flying” while Dynamic flying is available does nothing to the players using Dynamic, and thusly nothing to those who use Dynamic over those using “TBC flying”. Both should unlock at the same time, with the option given to the player of which they wish to use.
Questions that arose or were not answered:
*Moved to post down below
8 Likes
We’re looking everywhere for
Please keep ‘em coming!
4 Likes
So much info to unpack!
Im really excited for the refresh of quest Icons, specifically weekly and hopefully annual quests getting their own icon! =D
Ive also been seeing a lot of hype in the collecting discords about the lifting of transmog learning
Questions:
Is the transmog learning specific to looted items? or does it go for quest rewards, ensembles etc as well?
Account wide achievements, how will this effect achievements like the seeker, (complete 3000 quests on one character)?
With all the attention on the sword in silithus, is there any chance of getting the disabled sections of the “Silithus: The Wound” quest chain reenabled?
2 Likes
Further Questions based upon second watch of Deep Dive Video:
End of Dragonflight:
Will there be a Catchup mechanism provided for the dragonflight professions? Given that it’s taken an entire year for some just to get maxed out, and on some professions still have a ways to go before they’re maxed out a new player returning will feel very very behind in professions should they wish to do them before Dragonflight ends or if they go back to dragonflight within The War Within.
Will a Toy map be provided for alts to learn all of the zones within Dragonflight? Much like all the other expansions have a toy map that does this, alongwith learning all the FPs?
What is the timeline for the upcoming 10.2.5? Will 10.2.5 be the final patch? Will this be the “Pre-release” to 11.0 patch with whatever that event will look like be within?
The War Within Beginning:
Will there be an option for players bringing alts to the new expansion after another character has gone through the expansion to participate in a “Threads of Fate” type experience? Or will it be like Dragonflight where the open world quests will be available from the moment you arrive?
Open world:
Will the Dragonflight way of “Bi-weekly” quests be returning, or will we be returning to the Daily quest way? During the beginning of Dragonflight the Bi-weekly way made the world feel really empty upon hitting max level, and you’d quickly run out of things to do. Whereas dailies provided something to the player every day.
What type of outdoor “World Activity” would give players a completion item for the great vault?
Is there a future where Chromie Time could be utilized by max-level characters to bring the previous expansions up to max level, or bring the max level character down to the level of the expansion? This way when replaying, or playing thru initially said expansions campaign it isn’t just a game of Wack-a-mole?
Delves:
Will Delves only be an endgame event for participation, or will they be open to the leveling characters as they are encountered during the leveling experience?
How many keys will be, at max, available to a player to unlock? What is an example of a quest that would provide a key for delves for one of the “resplendent chests”?
Edit: Addition:
If in a group, and you go do a delve, will there be multiple “Brans” within, or only 1 “Bran”? How will the level/Progression of your “Bran” work within a group?
Dynamic Flight:
Will druids Flight form be included within the expanded “Dynamic Flying” coming? - Edit: Answered by a developer on “X”, Aka Twitter. Answer is “Yes, 11.0”. – Further answered again within Blizzard Q&A Video, Answer is still Yes. All Current Flight forms will work.
What is the leveling experience going to look like in regards to unlocking the dynamic flight abilities? Wiil players innately have the max vigor with max regeneration, or will this be learned throughout leveling? If so, what levels will that unlock at?
With “TBC Flying” being an option given to players, will they be stuck at the 310% speed, or is there a speed increase possibly coming?
Do you have a list of all the mounts that will be getting the upgrade to be “dynamic flying” capable? Is there a road forward to get those who can’t out the door get there? Seems bad that you’re upgrading to make this the new standard, but cannot provide every mount to be capable. – Edit: Answered within Blizzard Q&A Video, They do not have a list at this time. Looking at getting to 100%, but at launch it will not be 100%. There will be “hundreds” available, with more coming over time to get to 100%.
What will that toggle look like to go from Dynamic to TBC? Will this toggle be open to players leveling?
Warbands:
Is there a plan in the works to make the “Campfire” that the 4 characters are huddled around being increased to possibly being campfires for 4 alts at a time? As in, if I have 8 characters I’d have 2 different campgrounds to cycle between?
Will all character contribute to the “Renown” tracks, As in If I do the same daily or weekly on my main and then an Alt… Will I only receive renown for the first time it was accomplished, or both times?
Will “Warbound Until Equipped” be replacing all “Soulbound when Equipped” items? Will this be supplemental gear that drops? Will it include normally only “Soulbound” items but reduced in ILvl to make it “WArbound when Equipped”?
To Clarify: Is the Warband only the 4 characters sitting around the campfire, or ALL characters on the account? --Edit: Question Answered in a Q&A session, Entire account roster will be apart of the warband. – Further Answered within Q&A video posted by Blizzard. It will be your ENTIRE Battle.net account, including all other licenses on your account, but due to limitations can only display characters on the license you’re logging into, but everything will be shared across the entire battle.net account.
Is there a future possibility where your alts within your Warband become some of those “NPCs” You see doing Delves? Maybe if you do a solo Delve they join you?
With Flight paths being unlocked across the Warband, Does this include the exploration of said area? Or will the warbands alts that havn’t gone that direction have the Blank map?
Is the setting the 4 characters are sitting around customizable? As in, if I have mostly Blood Elfs, can they be sitting around Silvermoon? – Edit: Answered in Q&A Video posted by Blizzard, There will only be 1 background at launch of The War Within, but they see feedback in this and are looking into expanding it.
For complexity: When Warbands shared reputation hits, in the future, Shadowlands… Does that mean if I have all the covenants maxed out that all of my characters will have every covenant maxed? – Edit: Quasi answered within Blizzard Q&A Video, Reputations where it is a character choice will most likely remain a character choice. But all things unlocked across the account should be accessible to all regardless of choice.
Hero Talents:
Warlock Tank? Did someone say MoP glyph to Metamorphasis?
Edit: Addition: As another funny Question: If a Paladin chooses the “Templar” hero talent tree, do they turn into a Protoss?
Druids = So complex they are used as the “Lol, if we can do it here, we can do it anywhere”?
Are hero Talents mostly passive, as to alleviate the button bloat that would have occurred had you added 5 more talents per row? – Edit: Question answered within a Q&A session with Ion. Answer: Yes, most are mostly passive.
Questions previously posted consolidated here
What is the new pacing going to look like for the upcoming Expansions? Were all 3 announced to be what some have akinned to the “Phases” of the marvel movies? That the pacing will stay the same, or slightly increased, but overall nothing should be impacted? Edit: Will we still be getting the same amount of content we currently experience in the current pacing, or will there be an increase or reduction? **Aka, should we expect to ever see an 11.2 or 11.3, etc. – Edit: Answered within Blizzard Q&A video: Expansions will remain the same as they’ve always been. Just trying to decrease time between content being released. Not as many lulls, but still same amount of content expansion have historically had.
Will there be another stat squish? If so, what does that look like this time? If another stat squish is enacted, will the team be looking into the after effects that occur in regards to legacy content? – Edit: Answered within Blizzard Q&A Video YAY I WAS CALLED OUT WHOO - Answer: There will be no stat squish for The War Within, However we will have a stat squish coming in Midnight as values will be “Akin to Legion” at the end of The War Within. They believe they’ve gotten good at doing these stat squishs over time and the impact to legacy scaling shouldn’t be affected, but iterated that it will be available in the very early days of the alpha for Midnight for testing to provide feedback for fixes.
Speaking of legacy content, What is the teams way forward to make legacy content… actually legacy content? Currently you cannot solo raids within Battle for Azeroth, even though our characters are 20 levels higher, and upwards of 300 iLvls. This is a significant “feels bad”.
With guilds being Crossrealm, crossfaction, and even player select screens being “crossrealm and crossfaction” now, can players from the opposite factions join instanced content together now?
Is there a reason as to why Transmog is still being limited to armor types? It is a great awesome amazing step forward for me to be able to unlock everything, but why can’t I wear everything on any character?
With Dynamic flying now being the baseline, and what is now being referred to as “TBC Flying” already being given to players will players unlock the Dynamic Flight regardless of which expansion they choose to play through if utilizing “Chromie Time”?
Is The War Within going to continue down the road for professions that Dragonflight initiated? If so, will there be a reduction in the bag bloat of reagents that Dragonflight has? *Aka, will The War Within not have as many reagents required as Dragonflight does. Dragonfligh requires so many reagents you were compelled to give us an entirely new bag just to accommodate them, and even then it overspills into the conventional bag. – Edit: Question Answered within Blizzard Q&A: Professions are going to utilize the way Dragonflight initiated for The War Within, and for Bag Bloat they are looking into this and are constantly working ways of reducing the amount of stuff they throw into our bags.
Will the War Within’s currencies be relegated to the currency tab? Or will we encounter another Dragonflight experience of having most of my bags full of the various currencies enacted for the expansion? – Edit: Answer Quasi answered within Blizzard Q&A video - Answer: They did state that they’re looking at making more currency subtabs for The War Within, eluding to the fact that more items that they’d normally have thrown into our bags are now going into the currency tab.
6 Likes
Warbands are a huge quality of life improvement. No more mailing items to yourself.
Are we allowed to have only 1 warband? What will be the limitations on adding and removing characters from it?
Aren’t the 3 days early access of the Epic Edition of The War Within pay to win? A player could get much ahead in their professions and gearing in these 3 days. The launch of new expansion is the most exciting time to play because all the zones are full of life. And vast majority of players will be deprived of this experience.
5 Likes
In a Q&A interview they answered your first question. The Warband is your entire account. 
2 Likes
Not trying to specifically call you out on this, but I would be completely against this.
I am thrilled you can collect all appearances on 1 character, but your character should still be limited to what they CAN wear to what is transmoggable. Removing that barrier just eliminates all the fantasy of armor types.
5 Likes
Yeah I think that despite the trend in the gaming world of early releases for extra money, this is a terrible idea in an MMO. The ONLY silver lining I see to this is de-cluttering the number of players at launch. Everything else about it is bad.
4 Likes
Piggybacking off of this to ask, is the work order system being carried over, and could we potentially see it applied to the content of older expansions?
And on the topic of transmog, could we finally see the profession gear become eligible for transmog? 
I disagree entirely, as opening up transmog across armor types would expand the options immensely. Cosmetic-type items have been really, really good for offering new options for looks to every armor type, and it combined with the ability to hide almost every slot has basically thrown out the argument of keeping certain silhouettes or looks. That’s why I’m very curious to hear if there’s any particular reason to keep it locked down still.
3 Likes
I was glad to hear that the accessability issues of dragon riding had been heard. The one question/concern I have is the point regular flying becomes available within dynamic flying, both dragon riding and regular flying should be accessable to all at the same point.
Though some may not of realised but war bands had a slight accessability solution for blind/VI players. Removing the need to change server for characters in your war band also removes the need for blind/VI having to use OCR or require sighted assistance to change server in order to get to other toons. I’m not sure if this was a known intentional change but it is good to see.
I was, again, disappointed to hear nothing about TTS and keyboard navigation support of the character creation screens and in game UI. Nearly 2 years I’ve been advocating for this now and not even a hint that it’s being looked at. I hope that something comes out in a dev interview over the next few days but at this point I’m very disappointed.
Accessability aside the expansion looks ok. I see it as a quality of life expansion due to the things war bands bring and the fixes to cross faction/server guilds, brilliant quality of life changes I can’t wait to see in live. Outside of thoes changes there really wasn’t much tbh, delves isn’t something I think I’ll do instead of M+. Don’t get me wrong, they sound brilliant for thoes who don’t do M+ or raid but it’s not something I would do in place of what I already do.
We didn’t hear anything about proffessions, it would be good if a dev could say a thing or two on them as I’m sure there are some players who want to know more, is the new system we got in DF staying? Are any changes coming to what we saw in DF?
6 Likes
I love all the things that has been announced, but interviews ans announcements are contradicting eachother.
As example: https://www.wowhead.com/news/blizzcon-2023-developer-interview-with-maria-hamilton-and-kristy-moret-335919
Here it says that there is nothing announced for the Dynamic flying for the druid flightform.
But on Twitter this developer says this https://twitter.com/KarazaaCodes/status/1720897806330933535?t=O9L-tGhQ8t74mkAgWB75pg&s=19
Seems like a miscommunication.
4 Likes
In the near future, will a 2024 roadmap be revealed?
2 Likes
Same thing with “Fated”, where this interview says nothing to announce and this one says it’s coming.
1 Like
I really don’t like these style of Q&A, literally have to scour the internet finding information… Almost feels like they should’ve announced the expansion to the press, NDA style and let them ask their questions but answer them live at Blizzcon.
Or, record and broadcast all these interviews during Blizzcon itself so we can see it. As well because we’re relying on the interpretations of the people interviewing.
9 Likes
I’ve been editting my questions everytime I see a new Q&A pop up that answers a question I had. I’ll try to keep on top of it, but something will eventually most likely fall thru the cracks.
I also agree that this way of diseminating information isn’t ideal. I wish if they discussed something in a Q&A they’d post that Q&A here on the official forums, even if it’s just like how WoWhead does it with question asked and response given.
3 Likes
Or at least post a thread/article for each of the interviews on the official site instead of relying on Wowhead to do the aggregation for them.
6 Likes