Patch 10.1.7 has just been released in World of Warcraft: Dragonflight, but the next milestone on the roadmap is here WoW patch 10.2 already in the starting blocks after it was officially unveiled on Thursday (September 7, 2023). We already had the opportunity to talk to Josh Augustine (Lead Quest Designer) and Allison Steele (Senior Game Designer) about the keeper of the dream, the Emerald Dream, Season 3 etc. and also learned what happens when you fall asleep in the Emerald Dream. As always, we have summarized the most interesting information from the interview for you below.
New Zone: Emerald Dream
- In Patch 10.2, players will not visit the “entire” Emerald Dream, as its dimensions are enormous, but only a small part of it, focusing on the area around the young world tree Amirdrassil.
- The new zone in the Emerald Dream is roughly the same size as the Plains of Ohn’ahra.
- In the Emerald Dream, players can expect a new main campaign told in six chapters. The focus is on Fyrakk and his hunger for power after the new world tree Amirdrassil as well as the efforts of the united dragons and their allies – including Verknot – to stop Fyrakk.
- In Emerald Dream, players can participate in a new public event that is essentially three events (Super Bloom, Emerald Frenzy, and Emerald Abundance) that merge into one another. First, in “Super Bloom,” players help the ancient “Sprucecrown” spread the bloom by fending off enemies, solving various tasks, and triggering the “Emerald Frenzy.” Players are then encouraged to collect items and complete tasks to initiate the “Emerald Abundance” of an emerging sapling, which will eventually grow into a treasure chest with great rewards based on players’ efforts. .
- “Aurostor the Hibernate” is the new world boss who was awakened in the Emerald Dream.
- The “Dream Guardians” based in the Emerald Dream are a new glory faction that offers great rewards such as equipment, cosmetic items, new titles, mounts, pets, etc.
- The Dream’s denizens include Wardens, Dryads, Druids, Runebears, the Green Dragonflight, and more.
- Patch 10.2 Guardian of the Dream was the perfect opportunity to delve deeper into the Dream. Accordingly, there is a lot of lore to discover, but the driving force of the story in “Guardian of the Dream” are the characters.
- There will be a reunion with many well-known characters such as Merithra, Malfurion and Tyrande. Additional characters will only be revealed in the later campaign chapters, but if you ask yourself which characters will drop everything to protect Amirdrassil, you can imagine who you’ll see again.
- When designing a new zone like the Emerald Dream, developers ask themselves, among other things, “what makes the zone unique, what can only happen here and nowhere else?” In the case of the Emerald Dream, this raises the question “what happens if you fall asleep in the Emerald Dream, since you are already in a dream?” The answer is a mechanic where a ghost version of the sleeping character appears, which can move around the Emerald Dream and interact with things (like treasure chests) that only exist in the dream-dream world.
- When developing important characters (like Tyrande), several teams work together (e.g. lore team, narrative team) so that the backstory is correct and the character can develop accordingly. The team doesn’t focus on short-term developments, but rather on big epic story arcs and where the character will be in two or three years. This foresight then helps in developing actions in the here and now. For less important characters whose story only develops in a limited space (like in The Emerald Dream), the developers have much more leeway because they don’t have to deal with the long-term effects.
Season 3 (New Raid, M+, PvP)
- Amirdrassil, Hope of the Dream is the new raid.
- There are 9 bosses including a boss fight during dragon riding. The final boss is Fyrakk
- There are new class sets and a new legendary weapon (2H axe): Fyr’alath, the Dreamrender (drops from Fyrakk)
- The new raid (like previous raids) only opens after a pre-weak so that players can prepare.
- Normally the maximum item level of equipment is increased by +26 levels with a new raid, but this time the Ilvl cap increases by +39. The reason for this is the new upgrade system and the subsequently added Mythic Path, which allowed players to achieve a whole new level of equipment. To ensure that the new items feel like real upgrades, the lvl cap has been increased by 39 points.
- The dungeons “Dawn of the Eternal: Galakrond’s Fall”, “Dawn of the Eternal: Murozond’s Rising”, “Crownslope Manor (Battle for Azeroth)”, “Atal’Dazar (Battle for Azeroth)”, “Darkheart Thicket (Legion)”, “The Raven Ward (Legion)”, “The Everbloom (Warlords of Draenor)” and “Throne of the Tides (Cataclysm)” are in the new rotation for Mythic+ dungeons.
- Seasonal affixes are not returning
- For PvP players there is the new “Battleground Blitz” which will be included in the rotation of the brawls. It is an 8v8 battlefield (ranked battle) for which you can register individually (solo queue) or as a duo – as long as one player is a healer. You can find out more about this in the Blizzard Forum.
Quality of life improvements and UI updates
- Shadow Flame Emblems will be a currency in the future and will be moved to the badge tab so that they don’t take up space in your pockets.
- Shadowflame Crest shards will be removed from the game entirely. Instead, you will now always receive full shadowflame crests. Adjusted the amount of crests required for upgrades accordingly.
- Shadow Flame Crests can also be exchanged “upwards” with Patch 10.2 (i.e. for the next better version). The prerequisite for this is that all of the character’s equipment corresponds to the maximum level of the respective dragon flame emblem. For example, as of this writing, you would not be able to trade “Dragon’s Shadowflame Crest” to “Wyrm’s Shadowflame Crest” until all of your character’s equipment is 424.
- There are many small updates to the interface (improved dropdown menus, class resource indicators, HUD, etc.)
