Overall 90% of it is good, the place does feel a bit alien and a bit more modern than the 6 original starting zones but not to the point its extremely jarring. It reminded me a lot of TBC era Eversong Wood, which is a good place to be.
My biggest gripe is the ending.
First, i’m not a fan of the Highborne and Windshapers teaming up. Heck i feel the faction divide isn’t used enough in general as the story very quickly shifts to the conflict with the Al’aketh. I don’t know if its a necessary setup for the later parts of that story arc, if it is fine, but i would at least revisit the script and see if it is.
How i’d fix it is simply split the ending in 2 parts. The Highborne/Kirin Tor deal with Lorthuuna while the Windshapers/Earthen Ring deal with Baron Anvillaxx. No “power of friendship” required.
Secondly, the powerscale is way too high for a classic-style low level storyline. This is where people compare it to retail and i’m tempted to agree with them. Rohash (and eventually the rest of the Conclave of Winds) showing up during that storyline is great, keep that. But i’d move him much further down the line. Remember, the rest of the races are dealing with Hogger, Venture Co. Goblins, Harpies and such in their own starting zone, having the equivalent of Executus and Baron Geddon show up at the end of the new one feels completely out of scope.
How i would fix it? Make the Highborne fight Lorthuuna until like ~~90% then she flee’s (killing her off also seem like a mistake to me). Make the Windshapers fight Baron Anvilraxx until he’s at like 95% then Muln temporarily banishes it so the Windshapers and Earthen Ring can escape. Basically keep their power level relevant. This makes the urgency of the Highborne and Winshapers rejoining the rest of the world even clearer because of what one of their own (Lorthunna) unleashed on it.
Thirdly, the environment. I don’t think showing off Skywall just now is necessary, you already have a really cool temple asset to use, i’d probably stick to it. Again it’s a matter of scope. Us going to Skywall and dealing with all of that at 60 makes sense to me, sending a bunch of level 13s there doesn’t.
I remember it well because I’ve done it in the recent past. It is better than the other starting zones, but not by much. There’s a lot of running around, awkward quests, etc. Zephras Isle is ridiculously smooth. It might be my favorite questing zone in the entire game, which isn’t surprising given it was designed to be frictionless.
Either way this is more game design while my feedback is more focused on story anyway.
If i was to summarize my post it would be that i hope Blizzard just slows down the storytelling in general. Retail had the nasty habit of speedrunning through important chunks of lore starting specifically with Cata and Skywall itself. “Here’s a couple 5man dungeons, 20ish quests and a 2 boss raid to close an entire story arc”. This felt aweful, and they did it again and again and again, the other extremely egregious example i have in mind is the Emerald Nightmare who’s an insanely cool concept but was once again solved in a couple dungeons, a zone worth of quest, a cinematic and a forgetable raid.
I was one of the “Skyborne Hater” at first too, having playing through their zone (fully as hard about halfway as alliance), i don’t hate them as much anymore and see what Blizz doing with them.
I just don’t think they go hard enough on certain parts (customisation differences, faction divide) while others (like the end of the story) is out of scope.