Thoughts on War Within so far?

Wyrmrest Accord
1

Hello Wyrmrest.

It’s me, guy who shows up every few months to make 2-3 comments on a random thread before going away again. That said, since FF14 is going to release a patch I’m not particularly invested in as an endgame savage/ultimate raider (FRU was great and the savage tiers have been delightful), I’ve decided to finally take what I’ve been meaning to do and play WoW’s apparently new direction of storytelling.

Mind you I have absolutely NO information on what has happened so far after Dragonflight 10.1 until I watched a video since I sort of crashed out of WoW realizing I didn’t quite enjoy the story Dragonflight was telling, and the gameplay loop couldn’t hold me. That said, I want to see what this new ‘War Within’ is about, and going in blind to really experience it feels appropriate considering they are saying this will be the storytelling method from here on out. I am also keeping in mind that this is a part one of three, so the story won’t really have any resolutions and is mostly here to set things up for the next two expansions.

That being said, with 11.2(?) right around the corner, what have been everyone’s thoughts so far on the story? Has anything absolutely gripped you and make you want to scream about how good it is? Is it absolutely terrible and everyone who wrote it should be fired and then sent to the moon for transgressions against humanity? Is it just a resounding okay lead up?

And for that matter, how’s the game actually been? Is it still the same ol’ same ol’? I’m not planning to get too serious into the WoW gameplay loop because I’ve simply fallen out of this game for that kind of content, but is it at least enjoyable? Tell me, Wyrmrest.

Also, if you’re going to say story spoilers you can at least spoiler text it for me or you’ll make me cry and won’t that just be embarrassing for everyone involved.

7 Likes
2

War Within is without wins.

3 Likes
3

Nice to see you, Wolf.

It’s an adequate video game, I suppose. I went ultra-casual this season and will continue to do so for a while.

I wouldn’t say the story is great, and I will not be surprised if Sylvanas is in the cinematic for Midnight that’ll be revealed in August at Gamescon… but I AM intrigued by Midnight.

Warband bank and warbound gear have been nice as an altoholic. I’ve liked some of the xmog that’s been released in various ways these past 2 expacs. My Paladin fights with a rowing oar, so that’s nice (that was from Plunderstorm, though).

I did LFR on all 3 rogue specs while grinding alts for the red jetpack xmog. Sub was surprisingly fun.

3 Likes
4

Howdy Wolf.

Gameplay wise, it’s alright. Currently running an event that increases drop rates on transmog items and mounts from legacy raids, so that’s nice. Hasn’t really seen a major shakeup since Dragonflight, except now all mounts do the Skyflying crap (There’s a toggle for it). I suppose the One Button Rotation qualifies as a shakeup, but as I am not invalid yet, I don’t see a reason to turn the game into a clicker.

Story is…I’m going to be real with you. I checked out of the story during Shadowlands and nothing’s really gotten me back to caring about it. It’s a Transformers fan fic. Primus is waking up, the current Big Bad is aware of Primus/Azeroth and trying to kill her/steal her power for themselves. Rinse, Repeat, we’ve seriously been banging on this drum for 9 years.

1 Like
5

So is that like a thumbs down from Graves? Real anti-win kind of agenda?

Also thank you Sef and Vanndrel, nice to see you too. I figured there wasn’t THAT many shakeups from the game but I thought I’d ask, haven’t played in awhile but people SEEMED to be enjoying themselves for the most part. But also the WoW crowd has gotten significantly more quiet since the bygone eras for understandable reasons, so temperature checks are harder.

6

It’s mid at best. It feels like Blizzard is still trying to play it safe. The highest praise I can give is that it’s less cringe than Dragonflight… but only slightly less. Undermine was a high point in the story (if you like goblins), but it was followed by more cringe. Dunno how the next patch will shake out, but overall, I’d say it’s about a 6… and that’s generous, mostly because delves were a good addition to the game.

4 Likes
7

Just the usual, gameplay feels good but the plot is overall… mixed.
Maybe it’s just me just everything felt like it was building up to what Beledar is but now, we have totally forgotten Beledar so we can nostalgia dump the Scarlet Crusade into the plot and have a change of scenery.

Delves are the most contentious part of TWW because, the argument goes, that you can gear faster and easier than finishing a M+7 keystone.

I enjoyed delves but got bored of the loop, they are just so easy and short.

3 Likes
8

In my opinion, the story is decidedly okay. So far I’ve enjoyed what’s been presented, the narrative has been solid enough to serve the gameplay for the past couple of seasons with some decent highpoints, although I’d say as whole it’s kinda mid?

WoW’s storytelling has always shined through its worldbuilding and zone-based stories and that continues to be the case, and honestly from a gameplay standpoint, WoW’s probably in the best state its ever been I think. Some classes and specs still continue to have issues from time to time, but everything is viable for most of the community’s level of gameplay, so now isn’t a bad time to hop in if you want to catch up and play for a bit. The hero specs talent trees add something fun for most specs, but not all. Your mileage may vary a little, depending on if you vibe with them or not.

I’m personally excited to see where things go from here, though I will usually temper my expectations when it comes to Blizzard’s greater narratives. I’d say to give the expansion a shot and see what’s fun for you!

7 Likes
9

The fact that we got Undermine and yet did not get a trike as a mount ruined the entire expansion for me.

4 Likes
10

I got a trike… you just have to play for the good guys!

11

Heeeeeeey I know this guy! Good to have you back – I’ll be buggin’ you on discord later! >:3

Okay, so storywise? TWW is… alright. Dragonflight’s storytelling was just kind of okay for me, but considering what it followed, anything would be a marked improvement. That said, Khaz Algar has been very, very enjoyable with some of my favorite zone quests added in the game in years.

As for the gameplay itself, this is probably the best casual WoW has been in ages. I have had more alts at the level cap this expansion than any previously simply because there are so many different avenues of going about it these days. This expansion is a lot more respectful of your time with more varied ways to approach the content. Class design is some of my personal favorite in a long time with the only spec I’ve been pretty iffy about this time around being Frost DK.

All of the raid content has been enjoyable so far. I missed early prog for S2, but Undermine had a lot of fun fights and Manaforge Omega is looking good too.

Hit me up sometime, dude! My guild would love to have you along for raids sometime! :smiley:

7 Likes
12

This is why I love them. Most of my guys are around 650 to 660. I haven’t felt a need to push past because they wreck everything that I run now. It’s so nice. I love delves.

8 Likes
13

Previous trikes don’t count.

There are literally thousands of trikes just laying around UM and this team that developed it never thought to give us one.

What does Blizz even do?

14

Anti-fun? I think? Assassins of Joy?

1 Like
15

I picked it up pretty late too (as in last month) and after giving it a try over the past few weeks I think its kinda bad.

Like, not offensively bad like Shadowlands, which was so riddled with grindy systems and jailer-related retcons that it succeeded in making other expansions seem worse if you take it at canon. Just really mediocre, which is kinda more boring than a big wreck like Shadowlands.

We’ve got a new dwarf, which is sort of humorless and robotic and sort of misses the charm of dwarves, which is to be greedy little Wario’s digging around for minerals or hollering warriors shooting lightning. These guys are just sorta… stoic. There’s one Dwarf who was sort of memorable for me in the Ringing Deeps but he didn’t do that much.

We’ve got a new villain in Xalatath, who is a pretty basic villain. She’s got schemes, she uses dark magic, she jeers at the heroes. The Void is not really trying for Lovecraftian Cosmic Horror nowadays, its just a pretty straightforward magical floating person. I don’t hate a smug floating elf for a villain but she’s not exactly breaking new ground.

The Arathi are probably the most interesting bit, but more for what they suggest about the future than what they do in TWW. Hey, there’s an Empire of half-elf flame worshippers out there. That’s kinda cool? But that Empire is not gonna appear in this expansion so don’t get your hopes up too much.

Faerin was the most notable Arathi and she seems very nice. Like really probably one of the sweetest battle-scarred one-armed people I’ve ever met in fantasy. She doesn’t do that much other than be nice to Anduin and listen to his problems though, but I guess it is nice to have a new character from a playable race who doesn’t have a 1000 page in-universe backstory dragging along behind them, so maybe she can do something in the future.

There are also some spiders, who have spidery personalities and don’t even get names. If grinding out friendships with, “the weaver”, and “the general” sounds fun to you, well, you’re frankly weird.

Undermine has a really really good soundtrack, so there’s that, and playing crazy taxi in WoW is novel. I haven’t totally completed the Undermine quests though so I can’t comment on the whole arc there.

4 Likes
16

Oh right.

Latest narrative bit has us fighting against an alliance between the Scarlet Crusade, Defias, and Syndicate that have rebranded themselves as the Red Dawn.

WOLVERINES

5 Likes
17

… Scarlet Crusade again?

How many times do we have to teach you this lesson old man?

4 Likes
18

Not even going to bother spoiling it for you -

Literally 3 times in the new narrative bit.

You have to kick in a Scarlet Crusade Paladin’s teeth three times in a quest chain that takes less than an hour.

There’s a reason I didn’t mention it. It didn’t exactly inspire confidence…or sense. There’s plenty of existing TWW plot threads to pick at, but no…we had to go pick nostalgia berries.

3 Likes
19

The cinematics are noticeably badly animated too.
I felt like I was on a beta test for the entire quest chain.

I don’t want to double post but also someone made a macro that makes the Xal’atath model appear on the very top of your screen.
Only her feet though, so you have these feet floating and moving with the camera and it’s hilarious for a little while.

https://www.icy-veins.com/wow/news/someone-made-a-macro-so-good-xalatath-herself-shows-up/

We’re also getting a /lean emote that works.

1 Like
20

Mechanically it is fun : ) art direction and music continues to be very good

Base Story was alright, I had fun, but as patches came out currently it feels very cluttered. We’ve gone from a 4 zone underground adventure to an ocean island, back underground, and now into spaaaaaaaace. People I know feel it’s very random and I agree

7 Likes