The Dragon Isles Have Awakened—World of Warcraft: Dragonflight is Now Live

[TheLostSwede]

World of Warcraft : Dragonflight, the ninth expansion to Blizzard Entertainment's critically acclaimed massively multiplayer online role-playing game, is now live! Heroes of the Horde and Alliance are called back to Azeroth to explore the mystical Dragon Isles and its ancient secrets, where the dragon aspects have returned to reclaim their kingdom and ancestral home.

"Dragonflight goes to the heart of what players have always loved about World of Warcraft—exploration, customization, and the feeling of wonder as the world and its stories unfold," said Mike Ybarra, president of Blizzard Entertainment. "The updates to core systems, such as the new talent trees, build on the legacy of WoW for players of all types, allowing old friends and new to enjoy everything Azeroth has to offer for years to come."




The new Dragon Isles continent is comprised of five vibrant zones, which are some of the largest by area in the history of WoW: the Forbidden Reach, the new starting zone for the dracthyr race; the primordial Waking Shores, an untamed land brimming with elemental energies; the windswept Ohn'ahran Plains, home to proud centaur clans; the expansive Azure Span, where tuskarr fish amidst arcane ruins; and gleaming Thaldrazsus, the seat of power for the dragon aspects and home of the dragon capital city Valdrakken.

Dragonflight introduces the first ever race/class combo for World of Warcraft, the dracthyr Evoker. Featuring an abundance of character customization options and starting out at level 58, dracthyr Evokers are the first ranged damage class to be added to World of Warcraft since the game's launch 18 years ago. Players can channel the magics of the dragon flights, maneuvering across battlefields as they heal their allies or damage their foes while utilizing all-new Empowered spellcasting.

Take flight early on in Dragonflight with Dragonriding, an all-new and exhilarating means of aerial exploration, where adventurers can dive down from height on ridable Dragon Isles Drakes to gain speed before pulling up on the reigns to glide and swoop on built momentum. Besides competing in timed trials and multiplayers races, players can collect a bevy of account-wide appearance customizations and skill upgrades for four earnable drakes throughout the Dragon Isles on their journey to the new level cap of 70.

Core systems have been reimagined for Dragonflight, and each will see further updates through a phased approach throughout the expansion:

• An All-New Talent Tree System offers unprecedented control over gameplay, more impactful choices at every level, and new ability combinations. Starter talent builds are available to help new or returning adventurers, and talent builds can be saved, swapped, and shared with friends.
• The Redesigned Heads-Up Display (HUD) and User Interface looks great on modern displays and surfaces important gameplay info more effectively. The HUD UI is now easily customizable for all types of players with the addition of edit mode and allows for easily sharing loadouts.
• Enhanced Professions, now a pillar of gear acquisition, allow for living the fantasy of a master crafter or gatherer and building a clientele through new player-driven work orders, unlockable specializations, and the addition of a quality system for crafting and gathering.

Dragonflight is available digitally as a Base edition ($49.99 SRP), a Heroic edition ($69.99 SRP) that includes the new Murkastrasza pet, a Dragonflight-level character boost (level 60), and a new Tangled Dreamweaver flying mount, and as an Epic edition ($89.99) that includes all Heroic edition items plus the Timewalker's Hearthstone effect, the Diadem of the Spell-keeper head-slot transmog, the Wings of Awakening back-slot transmog in five color variants, and 30 days of game time.

A special 12-month subscription offer is currently available ($155.88 SRP, equivalent to $12.99 a month) which comes with the Nether-Gorged Greatwyrm flying mount and the Tabard of the Flame in WoW Classic from the current 6-month subscription offer plus the Telix the Stormhorn flying mount, the Gargantuan Grrloc ground mount, the Festering Emerald Drake mount in WoW Classic, and all to-be-announced items included with our upcoming 2023 6-month subscription offer—to be revealed in January.

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[Lycanwolfen]

Meh! WOW was nice for a while but I left it for FFXIV. I find more adults play it and the communuity is much better.

 

[Calenhad]

So far, so good. Enjoying the storyline. My character is level 66 by now

 

[TheDeeGee]

Impressed it's still going after so many years.

I played WoW for nearly 12 years myself, from February 2006 until August 2017. Last time i played was in December 2018.

 

[Dimitriman]

I've already played Wrath and Cataclysm, what motivation is there to go back to Dragonflights yet again? I hope M$ puts Activision to work on something new and exciting for MMO. Just write a new game based on a popular fantasy/sci-fi topics of late and implement it on the WoW engine but with updated textures. Is that so monumentally hard for the biggest subscriber cash cow ever?

 

[Guwapo77]

I've already played Wrath and Cataclysm, what motivation is there to go back to Dragonflights yet again? I hope M$ puts Activision to work on something new and exciting for MMO. Just write a new game based on a popular fantasy/sci-fi topics of late and implement it on the WoW engine but with updated textures. Is that so monumentally hard for the biggest subscriber cash cow ever?

I hear you there... I finally downloaded it again and the textures were the first thing to jump out at me. Even with all the new pretty sparkles, its hard to look at. That's for damn sure.

Impressed it's still going after so many years.

I played WoW for nearly 12 years myself, from February 2006 until August 2017. Last time i played was in December 2018.

Same here. I played for 12 years and couldn't continue on while I was in Germany (unstable DSL internet). I downloaded it again during the free weekend. ...I did purchase it. My only issue is that I hope I don't go semi-hardcore again aiming for server first guilds again.

 

[Space Lynx]

I played hardcore from 2004-2006.

then I woke up one day and realized I was wasting my life away, so I went to college and got in a life time of debt.

should have kept playing WoW in retrospect, I can't even get married with the payment plan I currently have for student loans, or I risk my payments going up. most girls aren't open to not getting married, so I am pretty much going to be alone anyway, hence, I should have just kept playing WoW anyway. lol, what a fucking joke life is

 

[Vayra86]

I've already played Wrath and Cataclysm, what motivation is there to go back to Dragonflights yet again? I hope M$ puts Activision to work on something new and exciting for MMO. Just write a new game based on a popular fantasy/sci-fi topics of late and implement it on the WoW engine but with updated textures. Is that so monumentally hard for the biggest subscriber cash cow ever?

A new project is going to run into two inevitable problems, the same ones that eventually presented a slow and agonizing death for dozens of MMO/WoW clones:

1. Content can never match WoW in sheer amount and overall quality, especially at launch but also for several years post launch. There is just no way, impossibru
2. A new MMO means a new time sink/investment for a playerbase. The existing WoW playerbase is already solid in the age group of 'ain't got time for grind' and they simply progress on top of their existing few hundred or thousand of hours, easy enough with an hour or two per day. But starting all over? Tall order!

I speak from experience... I tried re-entering the game and many other MMO's, and while some stuck with me for a while, none did like WoW. Its not just the nostalgia of Vanilla and TBC. Its just a fantastic open world game in every possible way. Locations, lore, flavor/humour, bad guys, good guys, and the execution of most things are all in good order. Not a single other MMO manages to tick that many boxes imho. Still. I want to say Guild Wars 2 comes close, but thinking about that longer, it really doesn't - gear progression doesn't even remotely present the same motivator to keep going, for example. A lot of systems in WoW are just entire games in their own right, or can be used as such. Crafting and selling, trading/AH, Arena tournament ladders... and that's not even mentioning dungeons altogether.

Look at New World. That was an attempt. Its part shameless copy and the rest is stuff you've already seen, generic as hell, soulless, and definitely not backed by the quality of lore that Blizzard created in its time of glory. Even if it gets content parity in amount, it never will in quality and execution. Last year november it already sank to 85K concurrent players online.


The MMO era is over. ....and here comes the rat Zuckerberg pushing his multiverse, that's worse in every possible way than everything it tries to replace, but incorporates all the psychological tricks in the MMO book to make it interesting. Offtopic, but the similarities just stand out to me, its doomed to fail.

 

[Space Lynx]

A new project is going to run into two inevitable problems, the same ones that eventually presented a slow and agonizing death for dozens of MMO/WoW clones:

1. Content can never match WoW in sheer amount and overall quality, especially at launch but also for several years post launch. There is just no way, impossibru
2. A new MMO means a new time sink/investment for a playerbase. The existing WoW playerbase is already solid in the age group of 'ain't got time for grind' and they simply progress on top of their existing few hundred or thousand of hours, easy enough with an hour or two per day. But starting all over? Tall order!

I speak from experience... I tried re-entering the game and many other MMO's, and while some stuck with me for a while, none did like WoW. Its not just the nostalgia of Vanilla and TBC. Its just a fantastic open world game in every possible way. Locations, lore, flavor/humour, bad guys, good guys, and the execution of most things are all in good order. Not a single other MMO manages to tick that many boxes imho. Still. I want to say Guild Wars 2 comes close, but thinking about that longer, it really doesn't - gear progression doesn't even remotely present the same motivator to keep going, for example. A lot of systems in WoW are just entire games in their own right, or can be used as such. Crafting and selling, trading/AH, Arena tournament ladders... and that's not even mentioning dungeons altogether.

Look at New World. That was an attempt. Its part shameless copy and the rest is stuff you've already seen, generic as hell, soulless, and definitely not backed by the quality of lore that Blizzard created in its time of glory. Even if it gets content parity in amount, it never will in quality and execution. Last year november it already sank to 85K concurrent players online.


The MMO era is over. ....and here comes the rat Zuckerberg pushing his multiverse, that's worse in every possible way than everything it tries to replace, but incorporates all the psychological tricks in the MMO book to make it interesting. Offtopic, but the similarities just stand out to me, its doomed to fail.

Quite a bit of going back to WoW recently for me was pure nostalgia, and with the way experience is done now, it did not dissapoint, I was able to go to Duskwood, Stranglethorn Vale, etc and do leveling/questing... it was a blast from the past and the most fun I have in years. Nostalgia is so powerful.

I didn't get Dragonflight yet. I might if it goes half price some day, but I am in no rush. The latest dungeons didn't look all that neat to me, and "Dragon Flying" doesn't really do anything for me personally. I probably will go back to FFXIV mmo in December or January, just for one month to catch up on all the latest story quests from patches.

Edit: looks like next big patch for FFXIV will be in early January. So yeah, I will probably go back in January, as I have about 10 months worth of story quest patches to catch up on, should be a good time for a one month sub, always is.

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

So does this one come with a new virtual contract where you have to praise xi pang? Or do you have to dox yourself with a selfie every time you login?

At this point I'm just curious how far activision will push it before their audience finally gives up.

 

[Dimitriman]

A new project is going to run into two inevitable problems, the same ones that eventually presented a slow and agonizing death for dozens of MMO/WoW clones:

1. Content can never match WoW in sheer amount and overall quality, especially at launch but also for several years post launch. There is just no way, impossibru
2. A new MMO means a new time sink/investment for a playerbase. The existing WoW playerbase is already solid in the age group of 'ain't got time for grind' and they simply progress on top of their existing few hundred or thousand of hours, easy enough with an hour or two per day. But starting all over? Tall order!
...

Point 1 is basically the key to success. The reason WoW was so successful is because it took an established old franchise (Warcraft 1-3) and relaunched it in the MMO format. Launching a new MMO IP from the ground up is much more difficult. But there is some hope that there will be such a thing again, which is the LoL MMO. It is taking the same steps as WoW and with its huge wealth of pre-existing content, it would probably capture a lot of interest from gamers.
League of Legends MMO - New Details Revealed! - (comicyears.com)
Not sure how the engine will be, but if I were them, I would copy a lot of WoW's strongest points. At least they got Ghostcrawler on board, so it doesn't hurt to dream.

 

[Verpal]

Haven't played since Legion, but I heard it is less annoying to raid this time around, and I got back in....

And yeah, profession seems more fun, story does make some sense, and less AP system to deal with.

Now I just need to convince higher end guild my ancient mythic log actually mean something lol

 

[Aquinus]

WoW has come a long way. I started on release day, took a break after doing 25 man heroic ICC, now I play it just to experience the new content. All in all, I think Blizzard has done a fine job.

Two points:

1. New talent system is pretty awesome.
2. Blizzard has been pretty good about supporting Mac and being tolerant of WINE and Proton. They deserve a +1 for that.

 

[Vayra86]

Point 1 is basically the key to success. The reason WoW was so successful is because it took an established old franchise (Warcraft 1-3) and relaunched it in the MMO format. Launching a new MMO IP from the ground up is much more difficult. But there is some hope that there will be such a thing again, which is the LoL MMO. It is taking the same steps as WoW and with its huge wealth of pre-existing content, it would probably capture a lot of interest from gamers.
League of Legends MMO - New Details Revealed! - (comicyears.com)
Not sure how the engine will be, but if I were them, I would copy a lot of WoW's strongest points. At least they got Ghostcrawler on board, so it doesn't hurt to dream.

Even if LoL does not appeal to me in any way, I would jump on such a project... but... scope... scope matters. A few concept arts aren't the real scope

 

[NC37]

I played hardcore from 2004-2006.

then I woke up one day and realized I was wasting my life away, so I went to college and got in a life time of debt.

should have kept playing WoW in retrospect, I can't even get married with the payment plan I currently have for student loans, or I risk my payments going up. most girls aren't open to not getting married, so I am pretty much going to be alone anyway, hence, I should have just kept playing WoW anyway. lol, what a fucking joke life is

Trade schools ftw. Course public schools won't tell you that. They only push you into college and more debt. Welcome to modern day debt slavery.

 

[CrAsHnBuRnXp]

The leveling experience was fantastic and so is the dragonriding. It's actually quite fun. Leveling is fast too. I had fun doing it with a buddy. Cant wait to hop back on tonight.

 

[Space Lynx]

Trade schools ftw. Course public schools won't tell you that. They only push you into college and more debt. Welcome to modern day debt slavery.

there are a couple for profit trade schools that will make you have sky high debt, most public community colleges can get you into the trades very cheaply though.

 

[Aquinus]

They only push you into college and more debt. Welcome to modern day debt slavery.

Well to be fair, students going on to higher education should know how interest works and should be able to do some quick math to see how badly they're going to get screwed. This is why I lived off campus for 2/3 of my time at university and worked while I did it to pay for it while going to a state school all because I know how to do math. Students in the US are just plain stupid and want an easy way out of their bad decisions. I digress though.

there are a couple for profit trade schools that will make you have sky high debt, most public community colleges can get you into the trades very cheaply though.

A buddy of mine went to school for HVAC, finished 3 years ahead of my college degree, paid 1/4 as much, and makes just about as much, and I have a degree in Computer Science. Trades are a very smart thing to go into if you're not lazy.

 

[Space Lynx]

Well to be fair, students going on to higher education should know how interest works and should be able to do some quick math to see how badly they're going to get screwed. This is why I lived off campus for 2/3 of my time at university and worked while I did it to pay for it while going to a state school all because I know how to do math. Students in the US are just plain stupid and want an easy way out of their bad decisions. I digress though.

A buddy of mine went to school for HVAC, finished 3 years ahead of my college degree, paid 1/4 as much, and makes just about as much, and I have a degree in Computer Science. Trades are a very smart thing to go into if you're not lazy.

trades can be tough on your body though too, I know a couple of electricians who hurt all the time. also, money isn't everything, one of my electrician friends has a 60k SUV thats get 10 mpg.... money clearly isn't everything... ;p

 

[Aquinus]

trades can be tough on your body though too, I know a couple of electricians who hurt all the time. also, money isn't everything, one of my electrician friends has a 60k SUV thats get 10 mpg.... money clearly isn't everything... ;p

The same can be said for jobs where you're mostly stagnant. The reality is that getting old sucks.

 

[CrAsHnBuRnXp]

How did a thread about Wold of Warcraft devulge into college vs trade?

 

[Aquinus]

How did a thread about Wold of Warcraft devulge into college vs trade?

Please see post #7.

 

[Aquinus]

Getting old sucks, indeed. I’m 22

Hah! Dude, I'm 34 and I can tell you that it doesn't get better. You can ask someone another 10 years older than me and I'm sure they'll agree with me. You're a youngin.

On a bright note now that my daughter is 10, I can let her do her own thing and I actually can sometimes find time to play a game. I used to go weeks, if not a month without touching a game. Also games aren't everything. I've gotten into photography and it helps me be physical more than a video game ever has. So it depends on priorities. I do like a good game though and WoW is a bit nostalgic for me. When I was a little younger than you I was doing heroic ICC raids. They were a lot of fun, but I can't do that kind of thing anymore.

 

[GotNoRice]

I notice that a lot of people on the internet have a lot of weird ideas about WoW. Many people jump to the conclusion that just because it's an 18 year old game, that means it's the same game that it was 18 years ago. It's not. Significant changes (to both content as well as the game engine) tend to come with almost every expansion. Each expansion lasts about 2 years, and the 9th expansion just launched a couple weeks ago. When the game was released, you could play it on cards like an Nvidia TNT2 or a 3dfx Voodoo3. Now it's a DirectX 12 game that supports Ray Tracing. I'm on the hunt for a new videocard because my poor old Geforce 2080 is pegged at 100% GPU usage pretty much the entire time I'm in-game.

It's also frustratingly difficult to find benchmarks for WoW. Since it's the game that I spend the most time playing, I want to know how each card performs in WoW. Cards like the 7900xtx vary considerably from game to game (immature drivers?). In some games it's slower than a 4080, in others it can almost match a 4090. So which of those categories does WoW fall into?