World of Warcraft: Dragonflight is hitting the servers of the veteran MMO before year’s end. As such, the second half of the year promises to be an exciting time for World of Warcraft fans. Dragonflight just kicked off its closed alpha testing program, promising focused testing which will flow into the beta, prepatch, and finally the full launch. With new areas, game mechanics, and a UI overhaul–not to mention a slew of datamining–World of Warcraft players have a lot to look forward to. But perhaps the most exciting new feature coming in Dragonflight is the new Dracthyr Evoker race-class combo.
Game Rant participated in a group interview with Ion Hazzikostas, game director for World of Warcraft. During the interview, Hazzikostas spoke on the new race and its massive options for character customizations. However, he also talked about the importance of gamers playing World of Warcraft the way they want to play it while fulfilling their perfect character fantasy.
Making the Perfect Character in Dragonflight and Beyond
Shortly before the Dragonflight alpha kickoff, World of Warcraft showed off just how robust the character customizations for the Dracthyr race is. It claimed to have eight octillion different customization combinations available across the race; a number that is virtually impossible to comprehend.
With the Dragonflight alpha now live, players can now experience the Dracthyr character customization for themselves. True to form, the variety of customizations available to Dracthyr is staggering. Both the Dracthyr and Visage forms individually have more customization options than most other World of Warcraft races. Beyond simple quantity, the quality of the hairstyles, scale patterns, and accessories the Dracthyr have is impressive, and the scope of control players have over minute details of their character–from blind eyes to underwear style and color–is unprecedented in World of Warcraft.
While exciting for Dracthyr players, many others had concerns over whether this impressive scope of customizations would make its way to older player races. While World of Warcraft previously said it had no plans to do so, Hazzikostas said otherwise. “Every new class, new race, everything we do we want to set a new standard for fidelity,” he said. Though a monumental undertaking, he confirmed World of Warcraft wanted to bring that level of customization to all of its player races eventually. “ I think that giving people more ability to express and customize their avatars in our world is fundamental to what an MMO is all about.”
“That should be the connection that everyone feels to their character, that truly feels like it’s theirs. Potentially, your character will literally not look like any other you’re going to meet no matter how much WoW you play.”
It seems World of Warcraft is truly doubling down on the ability to play any character–the Dragonflight alpha also changed the male and female icons to Body Type 1 and Body Type 2 on all races–a small, but important change that will mean little to many, but a lot to some. Additionally, Hazzikostas said World of Warcraft had plans to allow players to select their voice and pronouns in the future as well. Some day, players may be able to truly play their World of Warcraft characters exactly the way they want to.
Choosing How to Play Dragonflight
The Evoker is the new hero class coming to Dragonflight. Specific to the new draconic Dracthyr, the class uses the powers of the five major dragonflights in World of Warcraft to fight. The highly-mobile class relies on the dragon-like abilities of the Dracthyr, acting in many ways like a class designed around racial abilities.
World of Warcraft does not add new classes to the game lightly–indeed, it has only done so three other times in the past 18 years of WoW with the Death Knight, Monk, and Demon Hunter. Not only do the developers have to update and maintain the class and its specializations from then on, but players have another class to understand and master aspects of the game like raiding or PvP.
But, in spite of being the shiny new thing, Hazzikostas doesn’t think the Evoker will throw off class balance in the long term “We expect the same to be the case with the Evoker as with the Demon Hunter,” he explained. “Nearly everyone will make the new class, check out its starting experience, get a feel for it. Most people will go back to what their traditional main was. Many will play the new thing as a main or primary character. And that’s great.”
World of Warcraft is, at its core, a game about fighting monsters, and Dragonflight seeks to make sure players can do so with any of its soon-to-be 38 specs across its classes. The revamped talent trees are one big way WoW is making class fantasy a reality in the way players want. “We want to offer as many options as possible that can co-exist in this space. That’s a conscious part of our class design.” This will allow players to customize how they play individually, with meaningful choices on how they develop their character and interact with the World of Warcraft.
“[We hope] everyone can find the one that feels like the best fit for them, since your class and your spec are a relatable lens through which you view and experience everything else that’s going on in Azeroth. We want to make sure everyone has a home there.”
One major concern in many MMORPGs is being forced to grind to reach endgame content. Since 9.2, World of Warcraft has tried to return to the sandbox experience of the MMO. The endgame Zereth Mortis zone has plenty of places to explore and uncover between rare spawns and the Cypher system, but none of it is required for endgame raids or even flying. “We wanted to get away from the sense of a checklist of weekly or daily chores, of alright, I have to do this thing, or I’m going to fall behind or let my raid group down,” Hazzikostas said. Dragonflight seeks to continue the trend towards letting players decide how they play the game.
“If you want to hit max level and then spend most of your time pushing Mythic+ keys and not worry about getting your Renown levels up in the different zone factions, ok. You’ll miss out on some cool cosmetics and rewards and items, but you’ll have better or equal items from Mythic dungeons, and that’s fine. Choose your path.”
Between faction Renown, rare spawns, side quests, the professions overhaul, and more, players will have a lot of different ways they can interact with World of Warcraft. The new Dragonriding system alone is sure to give players hours of enjoyment as they master the intricacies of the dynamic system, customize their perfect drake companion, and beat their high scores in Dragon Racing challenges. It truly seems Hazzikostas and his dev team have listened to much of the criticism received over the past years and are working to create an authentic-yet-modern World of Warcraft experience with Dragonflight.
World of Warcraft is available now on PC. Dragonflight plans to launch later this year.