World of Warcraftis well into its alpha testing period forDragonflight, meaning players have had the opportunity to take to the skies as the new draconic dracthyr race. Unfortunately,World of Warcrafthas made the difficult decision to nerf the maximum speed of the dracthyr’s Dragon Riding Soar ability to ensure balance outside the Dragon Isles.
Dragonflightis introducing a new form of reactive flying called Dragon Riding. Though Dragon Riding is only available on the Dragon Isles, thenew winged dracthyr race inDragonflightcan use the Soar ability to access a limited form of Dragon Riding on a five-minute cooldown in any zone.
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World of Warcraftmade this decision mostly due to balance concerns outside the Dragon Isles. Dragon Riding can allow skilled players to reach speeds 930% faster than ground speed, whereas normal flying can only reach speeds of 410%. This meant dracthyr could speed around old areas twice as fast as other characters. Starting in the next alpha build in early August, the dracthyr’s maximum speed with Soar will be capped at 640% speed, thoughnormal Dragon Riding inDragonflightwill be unaffected.
Dragon Riding is one of the most exciting parts ofDragonflight.World of Warcraftput a great deal of effort into the physics and reactivity of the system, and has already been further-refined during alpha and beta. Players have also had a great deal of fun using Soar to explore oldWorld of Warcraftzones. Many fans are already hopingWoWwill keep Dragon Riding in future expansions, and possibly replace the old flying system with it entirely.
From a balance perspective,World of Warcraft’sdecision to nerf the dracthyr top flying speed makes sense. It gave the new race an unfair speed advantage in older areas–albeit on a cooldown–which could cause problems, especially for rare spawns and limited-time events. Soar can also still reach speeds faster than normal flying, so it shouldn’t cripple the fun players have with the ability.
However, dracthyr players are still understandably upset about the nerf. Because of the cooldown on the ability, dracthyr are still pretty limited in using Soar, and few think giving them access to that kind of speed would actually be a problem for most players. Many thinkWorld of Warcraftshould at least reduce the cooldown of Soar by a few minutes to compensate for the reduced speed. In any case, if this nerf does stick through the alpha and make it into launch, many hope the dracthyr will get their speed back if Dragon Ridingmakes it to otherWorld of WarcraftzonesafterDragonflight.
World of Warcraftis available now on PC. TheDragonflightexpansion is set to launch later this year.
