WoW devs on new features for 10.2: "It can be extremely overwhelming"

The latest patch for World of Warcraft is soon to be heading into the PTR for players to experiment and see what is in store for them in-game as part of update 10.2.

After sitting down and talking with Josh Augustine, Lead Quest Designer and Allison Steele, Senior Game Designer, we discussed what's coming in the update, as well as how the release cadence is determined for a sizeable patch such as this.

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'Extremely Overwhelming'

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It goes without saying that patch day can be overwhelming to many players. You get pop-ups on pop-ups telling you that there is so much new content for you to explore, and it can be hard to know where to start. Especially when it’s a new major content patch, it can be even harder to know where you’re meant to begin. However, some players don’t share the same values, prefer to rush head-on into the content, and prefer to have it all available to them from the get-go.

“This content update is jam-packed, it’s gonna be a little spread out. We know if we give everything in an update all at once, it’s gonna be extremely overwhelming," Augustine admits.

"So we’re spreading things out a little bit, like we’ve done in the past.”

The LFR wings will arrive at a scheduled time, just as they always have, so players will have to wait to be able to jump into the raid and go through all of it if you are wanting to play it on the lowest difficulty.

After all, there is a lot being added to this new patch, with new Dragonriding Glyphs, a new Mythic+ season, a new nine-boss raid for players to learn, and new Campaign chapters. That's just the tip of the iceberg on the content they have planned for Guardians of the Dream, too.

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“The campaign will also not be all [available] at once," he explains. "Some of the stuff makes sense not to be out on day one."

"It makes sense to come later in the story of the timeline of events.”

Whilst it won’t be as dramatically handled as it was in Shadowlands, the bulk of the content will still be available to those who want to play it, even if it isn’t the entire story.

The first four chapters of the Campaign will be available on the PTR to those who have access to the Public Test Realm and are able to explore it as much as they want to find all of the secrets they can. 

For more on World of Warcraft, keep reading GGRecon. Check out our interview with the WoW devs on how they keep the narrative fresh to this day.