WoW EU Content Creator Interview with Ion Hazzikostas on Patch 10.0.7

Patch 10.0.7 OverviewPrimordial Stone Guide

Thanks to CrossAlbeo for transcribing the interview and MrGM for providing a copy.

Highlights

Primordial Stones

• Ion reiterates that the goal for the Onyx Annulet is that it should be an upgrade for everyone, with players replacing it in Season 2.
• Some specs, such as BM hunters due to the way pet damage works and some bonuses not applying to pets, don’t have the Annulet as worth using over current items and they are digging into it. They are also looking for feedback on other specs that are currently saying it’s not currently an upgrade. They want to fix that since it’s meant to be an upgrade over current gear.
• If they need to buff things in order to make sure that it happens they will, and if Season 2 comes around and the ring is still Best-in-Slot, they will rein in the power accordingly.

Professions

• Catch up in Professions is something that they’re continuing to discuss. They want to make sure that someone who picks up a new profession doesn’t feel hopelessly behind and there is a reasonable path towards catch up.
• However, there is no catch up for the full suite of profession mastery, and the person who has been working on their profession since Day 1 will have more options at the max proficiency, but if you want to make a specific recipe, it is a readily achievable goal.
• It is important that there is some diversity in what crafters bring to the table which is what he thinks is a key part of specialization and an efficient market. If everyone can make everything then crafting is just how it was in the past, but there’s a middle ground.
• Work orders are server based is to allow for people to establish reputations and to specialize and diversify. Everyone knows who the first person who could make the Elemental Lariat on their server was. That person had a very good and profitable experience. If things were not server based, suddenly you don’t get that feeling of being special, or anyone knowing your name or giving you a personal order because the ecosystem is much larger.
• They are looking at solutions to the Work Order space and the leading contender is NPC Work Orders – NPCs periodically posting their profession work orders on the market, which aren’t going to be the very best, but a good baseline. If you want to fill a work order to get a skill up and complete your quest, there should be a way to do it, but right now the interface just being empty isn’t a good experience for everyone. It requires new technology, but it’s something they want to do in Dragonflight.

Class Balance and Tuning

• Shadow Priests have significant changes coming in Patch 10.1
• The level of rework that went into Ret Paladin is not something other specs are likely to see over the course of the rest of the expansion. Class changes will still occur alongside live tuning, but not necessarily an overhaul.
• Because Retribution is the only DPS option for Paladins, they want to make sure it’s solid.
• Ion thinks there is likely more tuning to go out alongside the 10.0.7 patch.
• There are no plans to standardize special items like the Evoker Staff, Kharnalex, The First Light. They do this where it makes sense to have bosses drop weapons or other things that are flavorful or themed to a single class like the Dagger or Legendary Bow from Sylvanas. Evokers will probably be interested in what Commander Sarkarth may have for them when we get there though.

Raids

• They think that Season 4 in Shadowlands was successful and they are likely to do something similar at the end of Dragonflight. They’re not sure if the Fated structure and affixes were necessary though and wants to hear discussion on that, as would just running the Grand Tour of all the expansion raids be better than just running Sepulcher for just three more months? The updates and reasons to revisit all raids with updated rewards felt like a nice alternative than just the final raid for several more months.
• They heard over the course of Shadowlands that some of the raid tiers were just exhausting partially due to tuning (Sepulcher) but progression through raids of a certain size starts to have diminishing returns and more isn’t always better.

PTR Testing and Secrets

• They have considered giving certain rewards to players who test things, but it would require a public beta. Currently, WoW betas are invite only and that feels unfair and wrong if they were to give special rewards. If they have something that requires a lot of testing on to make sure it’s going to be a good experience, then it’s something they definitely consider.
• There is content that is encrypted on the Patch 10.0.7 PTR.
• Blizzard trying to keep as much as they can secret (not necessarily in the Jeremy Feasel big “Secret” sense), even just things that are unexpected that haven’t been seen. They want every patch release to have some secrets and the Forbidden Reach is a place that is ripe for exploration and things to uncover.

Returning Cosmetic Items

• They want to add ways to get appearances that exist in the game that are no longer available / have never been available back into players’ hands. They want to hopefully get to a point where there are no remaining things in that backlog, other than ones that are very deliberately no longer available like Corrupted Ashbringer.
• Old Rewards for Recruit-A-Friend are “reasonably likely” to show up in the Trading Post. The Trading Post is a good outlet for old promotional assets and things that were available from other sources. If you already have them or they don’t interest you, you just spend your Trader’s Tender elsewhere.

Miscellaneous

• Character Customization is an ongoing project and they want to keep rolling out more options for all races.