World of Warcraft Patch 8.1 Livestream Transcript

SYSTEM IMPROVEMENTS & MORE

Ion: Now, of course, aside from the big pieces of content… our first major content update also gives us a chance to really dig into various systems updates and improvements. This is a lot of the stuff that we’ve been discussing, that was touched on in the AMA on Reddit, last week.

We’ve been doing some class tuning via hotfix. That is still very much ongoing. We have a couple more passes based on all the robust data that we’ve been seeing on the live servers; but a patch represents a chance for us to really dig into talent trees and rotations a bit more, and look at a handful of specs that still have some significant problems based on our own perspective, based on feedback we’ve heard from the community, and try to address those more directly.

As well as, ongoing numerical balancing that we’ll be doing to Azerite traits that will continue; we’re also going to add a bunch of new Azerite traits that will be found on gear from the Zuldazar raid, and more. As well as, just some general replacements for Azerite traits that have been less interesting, or less effective on some specs, so far.

And again, the goal is to learn from what the most successful, the most interesting ones have been, and continue to raise the bar there; and I think what we’ve seen in the first wave of traits is something of a floor in terms of overall complexity, and overall level of engagement.

We’re looking to continue to add depth, and expand, and grow from there. That’s not too different from how set bonuses used to work in the past where often the first tier set bonuses were relatively simple, because classes had changed, people were still figuring things out, and we weren’t looking to layer on too much complexity right away.

There’ll be new profession recipes, a number of new pet battle dungeons — for pet battle enthusiasts out there who’ve been wondering when the next chapter in that dungeon saga is going to be; and varied additional improvements. Everything from map improvements, to actually reputations… something that has been touched on a lot in discussion recently.

We already had plans in the works to make the Champions of Azeroth reputation effectively account-wide when it comes to the upgrades to your Heart of Azeroth itself. So in Tides of Vengeance, you’ll be able to just log in, and if you have an alt that’s already Revered with Magni, you can just go get those upgrades right away when you hit 120.

And we’ve also been hearing a lot of feedback, especially in the last few days, about some of the things that make reputation inconvenient when you’re playing alts. as well as looking at switching characters. I think one of the big ones there is Transmog actually. There are a number of reputation-restricted items on vendors and other sources around the world, or if you mean I think the almost silly ironic example is if you are Exalted with the Highmountain tauren, and you unlock and make a Highmountain Allied Race, your new Highmountain tauren can’t use that Tabard because they’re not yet exalted with Highmountain; and it has that requirement.

So we’re actually going to be making a change to pretty much remove those restrictions on faction-based transmogs across the game. Once you’ve earned it, everyone on your account can use it. You don’t have to worry about having to re-earn that.

Separately, another pain point has been for completionists who are working towards the big achievements like 60, 70, 80 Exalted Reputations, we’re going to make progress towards that achievement truly account-wide.

So if you have 70 reps on character A and 20 different reps on character B that’ll actually add up to the 90 and you don’t have to worry about being unable to switch characters because of your past investment; and you’ll be able to make sure that Horde and Alliance exclusive reputations don’t double count. So it’s not nerfing achievement. It’s more just raising accessibility as a whole.

NEXT: ALLIED RACES: KUL TIRAN & ZANDALARI

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