Oof I REALLY don’t like the lightning bolt animation. That’s actually such a huge turn off… It doesn’t even look like a lightning bolt… That’s a lightning ball/spear. I always liked lightning bolt because of how unique it was, an actual long bolt of lightning instantly from you to the target… This new one is like a spear that has to travel… If they kept the same appearance but made it instantly connect the distance from cast to target it would legit be perfect.
On the other hand, crash lightning looks good, that’s exactly what it should be.
I think it does honestly, I mean maybe its just the wording for me but when I think of Lightning bolt I think of a fast moving projectile, I always have especially since that was its initial iteration. The current animation on live makes me think of a Lightning strike from the sky, kind of like Lightning Rod.
I mean yeah I get it, dont think current animation looks like that at all though on live either. Again if we look at Lightning rods animation, that is what an actual (real life) lightning bolt/strike looks like. Kind of glad we got something a little different though and in terms of WoW it reminds me of the OG lightning bolt, so feels closer to what it should be to me. Though could use a bit more of an extended trail effect if that makes sense, to make it a bit longer.
Lightning Bolt has definitely lost some character.
It should retain the “connective beam” feel that it currently has. Right now it’s just the Electric version of Shadow Bolt, Fire Ball, Frost Bolt, etc.
Generic.
Okay I will say after looking at it more while I do like the animation a lot, I also agree it should be a connective beam still and also retain the “boom” sound that current lightning bolt has.
7.3 ptr had a great looking version of Lightning bolt, I think just modernizing that a little bit more and making that the new animation would be great. Plus it doesn’t really make sense for lightning bolt to have a travel time.
Maybe this new animation can be used for something else? Because it looks amazing, just doesnt retain the beam from you to the enemy and that’s an important feel of lightning bolt.
edit- I would not be upset at all though if this is the animation that stays as I really do like it in general, but the #1 thing I really want for this new lightning bolt is the “boom” sound, the cast is static-y and then theres no real oomph when you said out this huge bolt, a boom once the bolt is sent out would be really nice similar to current Lightning bolt.
I would honestly love it if it was like the 7.3 one a bit more, but actually just make like 3-5 random path animations so it’s sorta squiggly like real lightning and then becomes solid when it connects.
I like what it is now, but that would be the most ideal
Now Chain Lightning seems to be the odd one out. While Chain Lightning did look different from live Lightning Bolt and I thought it was odd but now it seems Chain Lightning needs a slight visual change. I kinda miss old Earthquake because you had the rumble visual and having only the lines on the ground, tanks absolutely love to pull out of that because they don’t always see it. I don’t see a new EQ visual happening but at this point we might as well.
Yeah of course, its all specs. There is no new stormstrike animation, but there is a new Crash Lightning animation that is extremely good, and there is a new frost shock animation when buffed by ice strike for enhance. Primordial Storm is also a new button for enhance that came with a new animation.
I definitely think the new lightning bolt looks cool and it does reflect what it used to look back in vanilla as well Cataclysm when it got its’ first graphical update, but as some say, I’ll still miss the 7.3 version of LB and wish we did get that.
Crash Lightning looks cool, reminds me of old storm strikes’ animation.
other Idk what the other new effects or Primordial storm looks like.
New Lighting Rod animation looks really really cool, awesome job on that. Basically like a Lightning Strike from the sky, comes down from much higher up and looks cleaner, its sick.
I didn’t like this one. They made the lightning thinner and almost imperceptible. This is the only spell update that I found worse than what we currently have.
I liked it mostly because it now looks like an actual strike of lightning to me. It is thinner than the current one, but as I got used to it more I started really liking it, especially love how it comes from so high up now. You see it really well when you have multiple out. I do think instead of 1 strike of lightning maybe each one could have had 2 but i think its still an upgrade.
the new lightning bolt looks and sounds terrible. there is no bolt of lightning. its a fat cloud of blue firework sparkles. it looks like someone tied a bunch of blue sparklers to the end of a bottle rocket and shot it out and the sound effect is also awful, it sounds like TV static and grease in a frying pan, not a thunderbolt. you no longer have a bolt of lightning, you now have “generic static particle blob #1”
awful, two thumbs down. i hope they implement a glyph to keep the old lightning bolt animation and sound effect or i may drop my shaman all together its that bad.
the new crash lightning is alright. fire nova is a good effect and sound but they should rename it to like fire eruption or something since its not actually a nova anymore.
