The Queue: Twitterpated

Welcome back to The Queue, our daily Q&A feature for all of Blizzard’s games! Have a question for the Blizzard Watch staff? Leave it in the comments!

Do you think Azuregos knew about the whole Shadowlands thing when he fell in love with a spirit healer? Like did he know where she came from, did she tell him stories about the Shadowlands and what went on there? Do you think we’ll find him somewhere in the next expansion hanging out with her, maybe even having actually taken some kind of mortal-looking form? I wouldn’t mind seeing our blue dragon buddy again, you know? But enough of my questions — let’s get to yours!

I mean, we have quests like that already — quests where we have to fly over a zone and take stock of what’s going on, quests where we simply have to travel to another area and talk to an innkeeper, quests where we have to deliver something or other. Heck, even most of the holiday gathering quests don’t really require combat so much as a lot of traveling.

I don’t mind quests like that, but I think if that was all that was offered, I’d get bored pretty quickly. I mean, we’ve been given all these abilities and buttons to push over the years. What would be the point of having them if we didn’t use them at all?

That said, I hope we do get some of those kind of quests in the next expansion. The Shadowlands are a complete mystery — we’ve never been there before, other than in passing (no pun intended). I’m looking forward to seeing what we’ll uncover, lore-wise — although I don’t think I care if it’s an exploration quest or a combat quest. I just want to learn about what’s out there!

That’s an excellent question. I imagine there’s still some residual something left behind — I mean, Bolvar learned a lot while he had that helm on, and just because the helm is gone, it doesn’t mean he can’t use what he learned. Since we’re getting new Death Knights, I suspect we’ll learn more about that, and see that he hasn’t lost everything. But I doubt he has anywhere near the power or control he did while the helm was on, though. And I’m kind of wondering what that means for the leftover remnants of Scourge on Azeroth.

Unfortunately, I don’t know how much we’ll be dealing with that possibility, what with, you know, the giant freaking hole ripped in the sky. I do suspect we’ll end up learning more about Bolvar and what he was doing up on that throne all those years we left him to his own devices. I’m particularly interested in what he has to say in regards to the Red Dragonflight and all those mounts he’s had people making.

That, and the reformation of the Four Horsemen. Are they still loyal to Bolvar without the Helm? Is Darion still peachy keen with allying with Bolvar, or was it a compulsory thing? Do the Four Horseman now lead, or what exactly happens to the Ebon Blade now?

I suppose I haven’t exactly answered your question so much as given you more questions to think about. Sorry about that!

Good question! There’s actually a new set of death effects in play. So when you die, you’ll see a different animation, and you’ll look a bit different than you’re used to — you aren’t ghostly copy of your own body, you’re something a little different. The screen isn’t exactly that familiar blue-grey either — instead, your screen is blurred and darkened a bit around the edges.

It’s pretty cool to see in action, although…well, I still don’t really recommend just keeling over in the Shadowlands for the sole purpose of checking it out. Repair bills are still very much a thing, even in a different realm of reality!

The problem with that is a pretty big one: Most people that actively engage in PVP aren’t terribly interested in quests. Most people that actively go after quests and story aren’t really necessarily interested in PVP. So if you start throwing PVP-only story quests out there, the people that like stories but don’t care for PVP are going to be annoyed that they’re missing out on something because they don’t care to PVP. Meanwhile, the people that just want to PVP may be annoyed that they suddenly have to do quests, when that’s not what they want to play the game for.

Mind you, I don’t think there’s a problem with having, you know, extra rewards for kill counts or taking objectives in Battlegrounds or the like. But I think War Mode has struck that kind of perfect balance — people that want to PVP can flag and absolutely do so in a world with people that want to do the same. People that want to just quest undisturbed? They can go do that to their heart’s content, without worrying about being ganked.

It’s a good balance, and I don’t think they necessarily need to do a lot of tweaking to it. But that’s just my opinion, of course — I suspect we may hear some other opinions down in the comments, which is perfectly fine too!

Currently, they aren’t on the PTR to my knowledge — I’m not sure if they’ll be added to the PTR before it goes live. I think it depends on whether or not they have the new starting zone to implement. I suspect if that’s going to also be available in 8.3, they’ll want to test it on the PTR first. If not, then it’s just a matter of new models being implemented, which may not require so much in the way of testing.

Still, it’s worth keeping an eye on — and if they introduce a new Death Knight starting experience in 8.3, I’m pretty sure we’ll have some people on staff checking that out immediately. I mean…we all kind of want to know what Bolvar’s up to, right?

I suspect that the majority of these new character customizations, if not all of them, are going to be available on the Barber Shop. When they added Orcish-spine-straightening, it went on the Barber Shop. I can’t imagine them saying “Hello, now you can look like how you’ve always wanted to look and create a character that’s a reflection of who you are in the real world for the low-low-price of $15!”

That just wouldn’t feel right. Given that we’ve been given other new character customization options through the Barber Shop, I feel like that’s the logical place for these to go as well. …mind you, this is only one person’s opinion, and I don’t really have a direct line to the devs to ask them about that one. But let’s just keep our fingers crossed, shall we?

That’s it for today’s Queue — if you have any questions you’d like to see answered, be sure to leave them in the comments below!