The team responsible for World of Warcraft: Dragonflight has committed to releasing six new content patches in 2023, which will include new quests, zones, raids, as well as trading posts.
Dragonflight brought with it a number of new features, from new zones and quests to the noble art of dragon riding. However, developer Blizzard Entertainment knows he has a way to elevate the expansion to 2016’s Legion prestige level. In the official announcement (opens in a new tab)Blizzard says it intends to “cherish” the “living world” of Azeroth in 2023 with six new content patches as part of a structured update system.
In addition to “new zones, raids and seasonal rewards”, we can expect to see the introduction of new trading posts where players can earn cosmetic rewards for completing monthly tasks. A new quest campaign is also in the works, set in the Forbidden Reach, which will give us the story of the rise of Dragonflight’s new hybrid race of dragons and humanoids, the Dracthyr.
“We know the value of an expansion depends on maintaining the quality of the overall story,” Blizzard Entertainment Executive Producer Holly Longdale wrote in the announcement. “We were aware of the duty we owed our players to nurture this living world and, quite frankly, the need to do better than in the recent past.”
Christmas all year round
World of Warcraft has been around since 2004, so it’s only natural that it’s had to evolve over the last 18 years. Dragonflight, the newest addition to the game that launched in November 2022, bringing with it this possibility finally visit the Dragon IslandsRide dragons, play as the new Dracthyr race, and enjoy a brand new class: Conjurer.
Of the six patches that Dragonflight will receive in 2023, only two are intended to be major updates. These will include raids and new zones previously mentioned in Blizzard’s announcement, but that doesn’t mean the other four updates will be empty, no fillers.
In between these major content drops, Londgale shares plans for “new narrative chapters and cutscenes that can serve as epilogues or prologues to the next major step in the adventure.” This means we can expect a greater emphasis on world building in the future.
The first update, 10.0.5, is due to be released in early 2023, and with it, Trading Posts. In addition to a selection of cosmetic rewards, players will be able to grant low-quality or low-quality items as transmog looks – this means you can replace the shining armor with something a bit more discreet and discreet if you’re looking for a more down-to-earth look.
Shortly after the release of this patch, its successor, 10.0.7, will be made available on the Public Test Realm (PTR) and will feature a new mission set in the Forbidden Reach that aims to provide historical texture and history to the Dracthyr race. In the upcoming PTR beta, new questlines for Human and Orc Legacy Armor will also be added.
There will be two more content drops in the second half of 2023. “We don’t want there to be any particular formula for the size or shape of these updates,” Longdale says, “But the goal is just more Warcraft: more story, more content, more rewards, more events, more tech upgrades, with less downtime in between “.
While Longdale’s statement doesn’t explicitly mention the class system, it shares the team’s desire to “respond to feedback and change or add items based on what our players need most.” Hopefully this means that Dracthyr players will be able to access more than just the Evoker class in the future. After all, it doesn’t do much justice playing a dragon now.