It doesn’t seem like much good efforts went into balancing. This isn’t just about the terrible talent tree, total lack of balance in classes but the pve design and dungeons.
Too many areas loaded with mobs that will kill you seconds, while quests have you look for things to click on in those same areas. What a pain. You get rez-locked/stuck as if you were in an opposing faction capital city, rezzing and running just a bit before dying again, until you are safe. Take Brakenhide Hollow for example.
Then there’s clownish “dungeons” like Nokhud Offensive, which is not a dungeon at all. It’s loaded with enemies but final area you have to fight through an army to get to the boss. I was recently in a group where an doofus pally decided he had a super genius plan that to fly right to the boss. He was our tank. Kept doing that. He kept pulling mobs. The rest of the party tried to follow. Kept pulling mobs. The prior group in this same dungeon simply charged forth, killed all the mobs, and made it to the boss. But yet there are ppl who think “Oh you can just fly there”, and keep trying, dying. Then they start booting everyone. Smartly, I stealthed (as my hunter) and having played rogue since WoW came out, was able to navigate. Meanwhile, dopey pally and his crew keep pulling everyone. Seeming out of jealous, they boot me. So all my time was just wasted. There should be an appeal system for stuff like this otherwise…it’s no fun. It’s no fun to be in a group and be at risk of randomly booted. Just dumb. Bottom line, the whole idea of “open world fly-around dungeon design” is utterly poor. It’s like inviting a bull into a glass shop. Defend it all you want, but bottom line it sucks unless you nerf the booting system. So stupid they get themselves killed, I have to make my pet tank, smashing the boss, oh but I get booted. Thanks for enabling clowns.
The dragon flying sucks. Dragons can’t hover? Why is that? They can’t flap their wings? Why is that? So if I need to find a spot on the ground to reach, I have to somehow try to orbit and look all around REAL FAST and DIZZY-like before I “run out of power” and plunge to the ground into some overpowered mob-infested clutter. What’s fun about this?
Finally, is there a way to make the dragon SHUT THE HECK UP?
When I’m landed, without doing anything, it just constantly roars very loud. Did the sound designers even notice this? “RWWAAR” and a few seconds later “RAWWARR!”
WTH. FFS. It’s like /mountspecial is set to go over every 5-10seconds. Why is it so loud? It drowns out all the ambient sound and music of the game. Why can’t it just stay still and be quiet? Why can’t we fly our normal mounts in Dragonflight? It should be an option. Oh wait, because then people would be using them all the time to hover over areas to better spot the POI or quest areas they need to land at.
Overall, not fun. Getting smashed by trash mobs, struggling with circus clown dungeon groups booting on a whim, massive lack of balance, and looking back at the 2-3hrs just spent in the game, and what is there to show for it? Not even leveled up 1 level. Not even any gear drops better than what I have. Nothing to advance or get stronger. Feels like a ripoff and time taken out of the day/night to play isn’t respected. The return on investment is way too low.
Lastly, lastly, all the different points/currencies/reps/special vendors with special items/gear/profession gear/this/that, it’s too complicated and too confusing. On another character I chance upon a vendor that sells an item my other character could use that has the rep points. Why not just centralize all this instead of spreading them out all over the place in obscurity? Anyways, it’s headache inducing to try and keep track, and headaches aren’t fun are they? Therefore, it’s not fun to deal with either.
Could literally just make vendors selling the same stuff in other areas, and that would be totally easy to do, for example. Make a “rep/vendor” district in each area, literally call it that, but make it clear and accessible. The accessibility in this expansion is poor.
Dragonflight is no fricken fun. 2-3hrs which were no fun, and no rewards to make any of that invested time worth it. What a shame.
Oh, as to why keep playing? The answer to that is obvious and easy to anyone with shared concerns or issues about the game: we love the game and support the devs, and…(oh no, drumroll)…want the game to be fun. Can anyone saying: “go play something else” say the same? I don’t think so. Telling players to uninstall and go away is not something anyone would say if they truly supported the game and the devs. With that said, let’s see who responds that way vs. those who empathize, have a different take, opinion about the gameplay, just want to make a joke, or anything that doesn’t involve “DON’T PLAY THEN!” as a recommendation. Imagine a restaurant. Put out bad food, bad reviews. Tell everyone to go away, go out of business. Imagine your an investor dumping money monthly and then some into such a restaurant. Would you keep quiet? Or speak up because you want it to become better and sustainable? Pretty simple concept. What say you?