Patch 9.1 - Sloot Interview With Morgan Day

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Patch 9.1 - Sloot Interview With Morgan Day
Sloot is sitting down with Morgan Day to discuss Patch 9.1 - Chains of Domination!



  • Torghast and Legendaries
    • There are quite a few new cosmetic rewards being added to Torghast in 9.1 with new achievements.
    • The team wants their to be layers of mastery in Torghast where it is more than just pass/fail.
    • There is more being added in the PTR this week, including some bonus objectives.
    • The torment that decreases max health over time has been cut internally.
    • It is hard to ignore speed as an element of mastery when dealing with success in runs, but it shouldn't be the only method of success.
    • You should be able to progress layers of Torghast at a reasonable pace.
    • There are no plans to have torments be opt-in.
    • Torments don't activate until layer 8 and slowly build up to layer 12.
    • There are no plans to add to Twisting Corridors in 9.1, but perhaps in future patches.
    • Leveling in Torghast is an idea the team likes a lot.
    • The Soul Ash cost for legendary ranks 1-4 are not being reduced, but you will be able to get more Soul Ash per week, and possibly earn soul ash on repeat runs.
    • The Covenant specific legendary memories are obtained from renown.
  • Class Balance
    • There are more PvP talent changes coming up on the PTR.
    • The team tries to be very careful with nerfs outside of the initial few weeks of a patch. They prefer to buff underperformers.
    • The team also doesn't want to always nerf classes just because they excel at one specific encounter in a raid.
    • The team realizes that they can't always just adjust numbers because all that does is push other specs out of their spot. They try to look at more design iterations such as with holy priests in 9.1 getting one of their abilities redesigned to fill a new niche.
    • Mistweaver monk tuning is coming soon.
    • Holy paladin damage tuning is coming soon as well. This is partly with their venthyr ability and also changes to their holy power generation.
    • The team wants every class to bring unique perks to parties. There is more work to be done on carving spaces out for classes on their end.
  • Conduits
    • There are a few new conduits, such as a tank potency one and a class agnostic defensive one.
    • Conduit ranks will increase as item level increases.
  • Raid Gear
    • There will still be BoEs in the new raid.
    • They will probably iterate on drop rates for BoEs and slot availability to avoid what happened during Nathria.
    • There will be 2 or 3 slots covered by BoEs next tier.
    • Weapon tokens were created to deal with the unique covenant models for each weapon in Castle Nathria.
    • Weapon tokens also caused the problem of having "weapon bosses" where you didn't have as many chances throughout the raid to get a weapon.
    • It makes sense to loot Sylvanas's bow from her "corpse".
    • The last few bosses should always have something exciting, whether it be a weapon or a trinket or something else.
    • They are pretty happy with amount of raid drops per boss now.
    • There are no plans right now to add more weapon drops to the final two bosses of Sanctum of Domination.
  • Raiding
    • No plans to change mythic raid sizes from 20 players.
    • There are no mini raids planned for this expansion as of now.
    • Mini raids are created based on what is needed for the story.
    • Who else would be the final boss at this point other than the Jailer?
    • There is no mythic-only phase for Sylvanas. There is a lot of cool stuff that happens during the encounter.
  • Domination Sockets
    • Some raid gear will have Domination Sockets in the raid.
    • You will be able to have a total of 5 domination sockets across your gear.
    • Domination sockets can be of three types - blood, frost and unholy.
    • Individual bonuses provided by the sockets will work outside the Maw.
    • Equipping 3 of the same type will provide you with an added bonus that only works in the raid/Maw.
  • Mythic Plus
    • The team is looking into making iterations on how to acquire keys.
    • Introducing the score system will create a way for adding new rewards and even things like the Hall of Fame.
    • Bonus valor will be rewarded to all players in a mythic + dungeon if anyone in the raid has a rating increase from the run.
    • Dungeon teleports are being added as a reward for doing high keys.
    • They have not changed their philosophy on having the item level of Mythic + gear rewards outside of the vault be slightly lower than mythic raiding gear.
  • Miscellaneous
    • There will be additional catch-up mechanics added to renown.
    • Patch 9.1 will release "soonish."
    • No updated heirloom levels for 9.1, but in the future.
    • The team walks a fine line of allowing people to catch-up, but also not undermining the time investment consistent people have put into the game.
    • They are trying to make the best game that they can, and are constantly listening to feedback and iterating overtime.
    • The team recognizes this development process hasn't been ideal, but they are excited to get the content into the hands of players.

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