Graphics issues in 9.0.x

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MacOS Catalina 10.15.6
iMac Retina 5K 27” Late 2015
4GHz Quad-Core i7
16Gb DDR3
AMD Radeon R9 M395X 4Gb

I don’t seem to be getting any traction in the beta forums as this issue has been around for at least 6 weeks - so posting it here.

I am getting lots of video ‘tearing’ moving around various zones. Ardenweald is the worst ‘outside’ zone. I’m not sure if it’s in anyway related to the “In Between” bug, I get tearing even when I have cleared the “In Between” issue. I haven’t been able to pin down exactly what’s triggering it but it seems to be related to particle effects near water and I get it frequently in the Night Fae covenant zone inside the tree.

The absolute worst location is in Spires of Ascension. 90% of this instance all I can see is hostile nameplates, everything else is flashing blue and white which makes it nearly impossible to do the instance due to the number of ground effects you have to dodge. I have tried this instance over multiple builds with no improvement. I have had other people in the instance also complain about the issue, so it’s not just me. It doesn’t seem to be solely Mac users (I have seen very few other Mac user in the wild on beta but know there are a few of us out there from the forums), but it might be related to the video chipset - I don’t know.

I’m hoping that raising this issue here will get someone looking into it. At the moment I have one dungeon which is unplayable and a number of areas that are unpleasant to move through and certainly don’t allow for fine movement control as you can’t see where you’re going. Certainly not an even playfield for world PVP if you had WM on.

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Hopefully they will display, but some screen shot so what I"m seeing (or not seeing, spending on your point of view).

While I’m running some mods in these screenshots, I get these issues with or without addons.





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My R9 280X does similar tearing on Retail. I run Mojave. I can temporary fix it by forcing the graphics system to reload in WoW (changing one of the advanced settings typically forces it to reload). Unfortunately for me, it’s been this way pretty much the entire expansion. Apple hasn’t provided any updated drivers for my machine in eons.

LOL, I have actually seen the tearing follow an in-game player once. Was in the bank and it was tearing right where the player was standing… as they exited the space the tear followed the character as if connected to them.

Fun times… out-dated card, out-dated-drivers, poorly supported Metal = total mess in WoW.

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Does it have to be a specific setting or any?

Additionally, do I need to do it every session ) and the fix will persist) or will a loading screen break it again? I’m assuming the fix won’t persist across sessions.

I tried changing a few settings in the advanced graphics settings and restoring to recommended - the tearing is still there (standing in Ardenweald now).

Note that I don’t have noticeable issues in retail currently.

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Any setting that forces the display to reload will do the trick… you will know you have selected one that forces this because the display will have to reset (I get a spinning wheel before I am able to do anything again).

On my machine I will go into Settings > Advanced > change Triple Buffering from Enabled to Disabled or vice-versa > click on Apply and wait for it to reload.

The tearing goes away.

It’s only a temporary fix as the issue which causes the tearing is still there, just not triggered yet. You basically have to keep doing this whenever you get annoyed by the tearing. Yes in some instances, it makes the game completely unplayable.

It’s a bug that has to be fixed by Apple. Blizzard can only attempt to avoid triggering it if they can, but in the end, it’s a combination of the GPU chipset, it’s drivers, and Metal.

This is why some systems are affected more than others, the GPU chipsets aren’t the same across all models, the version of the OS is not the same across all models (some are running Mojave, some Catalina, et al), and then Metal is not implemented the same across all models (due to GPU limitations).

Apple builds towards their most current configuration in a sort of cheap way to nudge you to replace your computer more frequently than you really need to. If a 2015 model has issues and the 2019 does not, people assume getting the later model solves the problem.

Well it does in a way, until it’s not the flagship model anymore and all the new features are being earmarked for the newest models and the cycle repeats itself all over again.

In reality, PC owners are their own Apple… they just swap components themselves to get a newer computer on the fly. They’re doing the same thing, albeit much cheaper than buying a new Mac every so often.

In a nutshell, in some cases, the problem will never get fixed for your specific computer setup short of getting a different set up. All you can do is wait it out and see if say Big Sur or another implementation of Metal fixes it. The likelihood that Apple is looking to fix issues in older GPU chipsets decreases exponentially as they release newer models.

Come ARM, kiss any sort of support for INTEL based GPUs goodbye forever.

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MacOS Mojave 10.14.6
Mac Pro (Mid 2012)
3.2 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
16 GB 1066 MHz DDR3
Radeon RX 560 4 GB

I’m having the same problem with extreme graphics tearing on the beta. No issues on retail. Changing graphics settings doesn’t really help; once the game reloads the glitches start occurring again within maybe a half second.

I’m really hoping there will be some kind of fix or workaround to this.

Only thing that really seems to help is keeping the camera focused straight down from above. It’s almost always the sky that’s the issue, as far as I’ve seen.

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The skybox definitely seems to be the most common trigger - which makes Spires especially hard as the narrow ‘islands’ can have skybox in view at ‘ground’ level. I’m not sure if there’s some particle effect involved in triggering it.

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Yeah, I’ve been dealing with this same issue in same locations. I am not sure how I managed running Spires with all the white tearing that was happening for me. I think I got lucky plus I was in a group with a guildie who was tanking so he was aware I may pull crap by accident. I’m good in Oribos, but if I go to Ardenweald I get the blue tearing thing going on. I’ve tried adjusting my graphics settings but nothing has worked for me so far.

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Have you tried enabling VSYNC?

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Having the same problem.

Hadn’t noticed this until I entered Spires of Ascension a day or two ago and the constantly shifting, flickering, flashing planes of white and blue nearly made me sick to my stomach. It was really strange. I had to zoom my camera in and pretty much stare at the floor to get through the dungeon.

After loading today’s patch, I’m having the same problem in Oribos now.

I’m on an iMac with Radeon Pro 570X 4 GB

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I just checked, vsync wasn’t enabled so I did prior to logging into my character. I went to Oribos and now I’ve got same issue in Oribos. Now I didn’t have any issues in Oribos but the new build may have done something to cause me to have the issue there as well now.

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VSYNC didn’t help.

As of build 9.0.2.35938 I am now seeing the tearing to an extreme degree in the following locations:

  • Oribos
  • Ardenweald, especially Heart of the Forest
  • Spires of Ascension

It seems to be related to either water or cloud/mist effects.

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this is my video of the graphics glitching out while on flight path. www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPLQeXJs5pM&feature=youtu.be

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Just a quick question.

Let’s say you are standing still in some location in which this glitch is happening. If you go into your advanced graphics settings and change one of the settings that forces the screen to reload, does the issue stop?

Not permanently stop, but immediately after you change the setting does it fix the problem? The tearing always will come back eventually, the question I am asking is if the switch in settings temporarily makes the issue stop.

This is an important distinction to note, because if a forced refresh of the interface does not cause the problem to stop, then it is something beyond the usual tearing that is seen. If it does fix the problem, then it’s your standard tearing problem. It’s worth noting if there is a distinction.

Also, I see that everyone thus far is on the AMD Radeon GPU family. I’m not in beta but get these issues on live and I am also on a AMD Radeon GPU.

It would makes sense that Shadowlands triggers it more frequently than retail as it uses those features which will likely trigger it more than current retail is likely using. It is also why the issue is literally non-existent in classic or the older zones… just Legion --> with it most prevalent for me in BFA zones. I think I’ve only seen it in new Dalaran in Legion.

Does support the theory that certain effects are triggering it… and Shadowlands likely uses these newer effects heavily.

Everyone should note what system they are running, OS and graphics GPU as well as whether resetting an advanced setting temporarily fixes the problem, albeit, only shortly.

The pictures all shown here is exactly what my machine does in BFA zones when triggered. It’s not a 100% triggered glitch, meaning that entering a specific zone at a specific location always causes the issue, it just randomly occurs throughout the zone. And yes, when it happens in an instance, it’s like navigating blind.

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Just chucking in my voice to this thread. It’s definitely happening since the last build and is… pretty bad.

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While I was getting some tearing before in zones, nothing that broke the game. With the latest build, the game is almost unplayable in Oribos and any flight paths.

I started a new toon last night, and discovered that the issues start immediately after taking the quest that opens the flightpath to Bastion - as soon as I completed that quest, everything was almost unplayable in the zone.

I had zero issues before that in BfA (briefly to clean out bags, and such when I initially logged in), SW for the intro quest parts, The Maw for the intro quests, and the intro quests for Oribos (before being sent to Bastion).

So something happens when opening the flight paths that is causing the tearing issue - whether it is the travel aura/animations or something else.

I have been questing in Bastion with minimal issues, but returning to Oribos creates the problems all over again.

Also, I tested this on a second character, exact same experience.

EDIT: Posting here because I cannot post in the Beta threads, even though I have had beta for a while now.

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Also having this issue. Also using macOS (Big Sur Beta) with a Radeon VII. Started only after yesterday’s patch. Oribos is the worst, although it seems to happen pretty much everywhere.

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In my experience, loading the system settings window typically causes the effect to stop (in some locations) for the duration of when the game menu (access by pressing escape) is open, and this stays open underneath the system settings window as far as I can tell. When you press the “return to game” button closing that window the tearing issues immediately resume.

I was planning on going through all the system setting slater and noting whether things improved.
As yet, in the limited number of non-Shadowlands locations I’ve been to, I haven’t experienced it anywhere else as yet.

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I looked into this today and figured out what’s going wrong. It should be fixed in a future build. Thanks for the reports!

For those curious, it was an issue with the anima beams in the sky.

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This would be amazing, I was beginning to wonder if either I wouldn’t be able to play or whether I would have to buy a new computer in the next month when we are on lockdown and curfew and would have to do it entirely by mail-order.