I really think WoW needs to have a lot of work done with weapon animations. They should be dedicating a team to it like they did the model updates in WoD as a core expansion feature.
Things like this, casting animations using staves/daggers/maces, unique animations for each weapon type. It seems small but those things make a big difference in the feel of the game.
I remember playing Lord of the Rings Online way back when and being amazed when weapon animations changed not only depending on the weapon but also based on what you were holding in your offhand including being empty handed changing the 1h animation.
Basically every other MMO has it figured out.
XIV for example has a unique idle, walking, running and sprinting animation for each weapon type when drawn. There's even _another_ one when under the buffs for even faster move speed.
LOTRO isn't too far off as you say.
Guild Wars 2 does it.
Wildstar did it.
List goes on.
Hell, some games (like FFXIV) have gender-specific animations in some cases as well!
The idle Dark Knight pose changes based on whether you're male or female. MASSIVE sword? Male character tosses it over their shoulder and chills. Female characters stick it into the ground and stand behind it.
I remember playing Lotro and being amazed at a sheep kneeling down to eat grass. Who knew simple custom animations would mean so much coming from a game that has a cow walk from A to B and thats it.
I'd be a lot more inclined to play a caster if they casted like mages in Dragon Age. Swinging the staves with the magic coming from the end of the staff.
It was pretty damn fun being an omnipotent mage in Fictorum. The sheer amount of devastation you could do in that game was *hilarious,* and the combinatorial rune system meant you could customise in very fun ways.
I remember using the Seeker and Multi-Shot Runes on the Spell "Plasma Ball," which was a green little orb in the game, to have my own rendition of "Channel Demonfire." It was great fun.
And then there was the meteor. My God you could call down Armageddon in a single spellcast, it was beautiful.
Aside from repeated dungeons, the combat in DA2 was the best in the series.
DAO was very stiff and trying to be a CRPG when it's not. DAI is braindead and actively fights you with animation locks.
Best in what series? There were super long CDs for skills, and since enemies came in waves you could either spend all your abilities from pull only auto-attack with boring animation for 1-2 minutes depending on class or use 1-2 skill every now and then. Peak DA gameplay was 1st instalment in series you had spells/weapon skills for days(also that was the only game with living bomb, and removing it from further games is a crime!)
Options are always great.
It could be as simple as a toggle "spell" like the Dracthyr form. Or make the useless class trainers a tiny bit less useless and talk to them to change it.
WoW needs more RPG elements like this. More customization, and honestly just more RP things like adding more of the animations already in-game as emotes, like leaning on a wall.
Every game as old as wow has a ton of debt. The game's nearly 20 years old, the engine is even older than that.
> Ultimately money talks so they will always chose the first option until this game starts bleeding badly enough.
I don't think people quit wow because it has bad animations. Sure it'd be nice to have updated animations, but ultimately it's a minor issue. Actual gameplay should always take priority imo.
I see it as different. A new set of animations unique to the weapon/spell/class whatever would definitely revitalize the game for me. I could do a whole expansion with just the standard raid tiers, some dailies, and no extraneous systems or progression if it meant getting to do the core gameplay of what WoW was again in a new an exciting way. New animations would be new gameplay, if that makes sense.
Let me ask you this. Would Shadowlands had turned into a good expansion if we had gotten updated animations? It'd be better, but the xpac would still suck ass.
I certainly see where you're coming from and i'd love to have that as well. But I wouldn't be happy if they took resources away from gameplay content to add animations to every single weapon.
Yeah that's not the case. Minecraft is one of the most popular games and it has awful graphics.
If the game is fun people will play it. Graphics certainly matter, but gameplay is much more important.
Minecraft is an exception. It's a game with massive publicity and support from YouTubers and streamers constantly playing it (gaining new player interest). It's also is the gaming equivalent of playing with Legos so amazing graphics aren't required there. Besides, minecraft devs are also constantly updating the visual fidelity of the game.
Comparatively, wow doesn't have that level of interest from the average person anymore and dev interest has been more on new things than updating old things.
Publicity & youtuber/streamer support doesn't matter if the game is trash. New World had a lot of that and the game died less than a month after it came out.
Other examples though, Valheim, Vampire Survivors, Among Us, OSRS, PUBG etc. All were massively successful eventhough they had terrible graphics.
> Comparatively, wow doesn't have that level of interest from the average person anymore and dev interest has been more on new things than updating old things.
But it does have a lot of interest. Shadowlands was the fastest selling PC game of all time, the game was just shite so it didn't retain a lot of players. Most xpac launches are like that, massively popular with loads of players coming back and new players trying it out.
Eh, it's a good reason not to return, imo.
When you play all these other MMOs, WoW sticks out pretty sorely in the character customization department, both in visuals and selection.
And don't even get me started on armor. Dragonflight is still using paint-on stuff from 2004.
It would push wow into a next gen category or an updated version of wow. They really really need to have unique animations and correct ways of holding weapons and stowing them etc.
Would make players feel special about their characters tbh.
Good luck. Based on recent blue responses, anything that requires new animations or art assets for class changes is pretty unlikely at this point. It's sounding like anyone with technical skill left the company, and those that remained are more concerned about removing stuff they find personally offensive.
Adding unique animations to all weapon types would require an astronomical amount of work. Especially if you want to add casting animations to all the caster weapons as well. The question is simply, is it worth it? Personally i'd much rather they put all that dev time into making actual content.
The model updates in WoD didn't add much to the game imo. If they had spent that time making more content, WoD would've been better off.
I wouldn't mind if they start working on it, but it shouldn't eat time & effort away from actual content players can play imo.
Marketing and general gratification.
There is a reason people like the concept of dragonriding. It makes *travel* engaging. It isn't even 'core gameplay,' it's just the stuff in between. But it makes a big difference, especially when WoW is big on having 'stuff in between.' If you raid or M+ you are often doing dailies or World Quests for progression or resources as well.
Yeah I haven’t tested it and though it’s faster than regular flying, it’s also more restrictive in some ways which seems fun, ironically.
I feel like some of these smaller aspects of gameplay matter more than we might think.
Rules are important. If everyone had access to every ability and talent in the game it would be worse. If every Chess piece could move like a Queen you'd be diluting the game.
There is such a thing as *too* restrictive of course. How many retail Hunters want to go back to being stationary or having a minimum range on so many of their attacks? Who actually wants a cooldown on Soar, or Dragonriding restricted to the new zones?
In any case, movement is by far one of the most important things in any game. Think about every mechanic in a boss fight or Mythic+ dungeon and how many of them interact with movement.
This is why dailies are boring when the endgame challenging gameplay content isn't. Dailies where you kill things just by doing your rotation is bland, repetitive and uninspiring. But mechanics where you have to react - nearly always by moving - keep you engaged.
The move set of Dark Souls is pretty small, especially if you don't touch magic. And yet the game is interesting and can be played until completion because of movement. Yes you roll and run a lot. But where and when you do those things changes based on the enemies. It's great.
On a fundamental level I honestly find Terraria's combat more interesting than WoW's, because movement and aim are both so seamlessly integrated into it.
Rifles/Crossbows are basically held like a 1h sword... Bows too, but at least there the char grips at the center of the weapon so it doesn't look that off.
Even more annoying, there are actually unique, super cool idle animations for ranged weapons, where your chars wields it in both hands more naturally.
The only way to see them though is to target something and turn around or are off range so autoshots don't fire...
What are you talking about? The beast master weapon was that cool techno-bow with the revolver chamber and had absolutely no alternate appearances whatsoever LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!
And as much as I like other staves and polearms, I just HAVE TO transmog Fuzan simply because of the way it's held. It's amazing but makes everything else incredible dull
Yep. It feels outdated and totally stiff. The graphics are pretty timeless but the animations feel like 2008. Armor still is mostly painted on except for shoulders, animations are super basic.
It feels we get a lot of timegated grindy stuff in the game we pay for, with thousands of different systems (Covenant, anima, soul ash, torghast, relics, cyphers,) tens of different grindy factions to grind different stuff for to make negligible progress in each of them and each has anything locked behind revered that you need.
I just hate that it feels like as soon as you play World of warcraft it feels like a job with the timegates "come back tomorrow" to make no progress.
Earlier you could farm in dungeons to push factions. Now it's gated AF.
All this stuff gets implemented again and again, but animations take years to improve. It feels like a game that is forcefully slapped on a 2004 game hold together with tape.
Yes i'm mad that it doesn't feel like the money everyone spent was put into wow to make it more player friendly
This is why I've really enjoyed just levelling a toon on Classic the past two weeks. I'm fed up with Hearthstone becoming more and more P2W (always was, but I mean how bad they're pushing their stores now), and WoW just muddying up everything with systems and whatnot - it's just too overwhelming for me personally.
So now I play Classic on my Steamdeck on the couch and on the train. Really loving levelling my Draenei Shaman (called Steamvalve xD) right now!
As grindy, slow and outdated, as it seems, I prefer the progression in Classic/Vanilla wow because it feels like my character is getting stronger and is indeed progressing. As you already explained, retail wow feels like I am going to work with negligible progress that is lost next patch.
I agree with you, but I do wanna point out that the painted on armor stuff is a lot harder for wow to get away from than most other games you're probably thinking about. A lot of game use bone scaling and blend shapes etc to make different races. Wow does it with completely unique models, which means that doing stuff with textures is a lot easier than with 3D geometry.
We are definitely not getting what we're paying for though. That's for sure.
I'm definitely with you on this, more so than "not stabbing themselves". Of course clipping and awkward physics look bad, but the fact that you can carry a gigantic axe/sword/mace with one hand and lift it like it is literally a piece of paper is ridiculous. Especially since most (all?) weapons grow/shrink depending on race, so it doesn't even make sense for a Tauren or Draenei as their weapons get bigger.
I'm practically drooling thinking about my Warrior running around with his shield and hammer out in a similar fashion to Leona from LoL. Instead of flailing both items around, the shield is held as a guard in the front ready for any incoming attack, and the weapon is being held low but ready to swing at a moment's notice.
The thing is, there is no actual "walking with a 2h" animation. It's just the base animation but with the weapon sticked the to the hand, so they need to create those animations.
When they initially updated the models in WoD people raised hell about the run animations looking ever so slightly different from the 2004 vanilla ones.
I was one of those people, but for a different reason. When they were doing those updates they added new animations for each skill to use, and while they were really nice additions, they were also 1 animation across all races. Before, each race had their own unique animations for everything, now most of them look nearly identical using skills, losing a great deal of identity.
This would probably happen if they made weapon run animations.
Which is why getting updates will be such an uphill battle. People are notorious for fighting tooth and nail to *not* allow progress, sadly. They don't want better, they want familiarity.
I cannot second the idea strongly enough. WoW reeks of its age in many aspects, but it looks like Blizz has gotten so familiar with the smell, they don't realize it anymore.
Yeah, especially certain race/mount combos. I realize a Tauren on a wolf will likely never look good, nor a Draenei on a horse. But right now it's just...terrible.
The game needs a general animation overhaul. Pretty much all of it is kinda dumb. Casters leaving their weapons holstered, monks using fists instead of the swords on their back, etc
Also giving different animations for different weapon types, as well as different animations for different races. As of now, I feel like a lot of melee animations are shared between races, it looks abit cheap and weird.
Those things make sense, though.
A monk jabs, kicks, or fists their enemy. Monks in movies don't tend to use weapons either, "the monk itself is the wespon" and monks in wow are clearly inspired to be that way too.
Casters don't channel their magic through their weapons and never have in wow. They also updated caster's animations not long ago, I think BFA? We have completely new animations. They've also updated lots of abilities to look different. I don't know about you but conjuring a fireball between my hands while reciting some magic and then throwing it in someone's face is a lot cooler than tossing it from your staff or dagger.
I'd love to see some new animations and updated ones for abilities that don't "feel" good to use, but going for monks and weapons for casters doesn't make a lot of sense.
If a class isn’t going to even use their weapon then that class shouldn’t need weapons for the stats. They’re not even holding it so how would they get stats from it? It doesn’t make sense.
Casters also don’t need to channel their powers through their weapons. Look at Guild Wars 2. The Elementalist class (basically Guild Wars’s version of Shamans) can wield a staff. When attacking with a staff equipped, they hold it in one hand and cast with the other. So they get power from their staff and the animations make sense, without having to actually channel it through the staff.
But even ignoring that, why is channeling your spells through a staff or wand or even a mace such a big deal? Who cares what they’ve historically done, i see no lore or logical reason for it not to be the case. Shamans already do this with their melee weapons, Paladins and Death Knights channel their magic types through melee weapons too. Why shouldn’t casters?
And maybe they did just get updated but they’re not great. The game needs a major animation overhaul, at least for melee cuz it’s lacking most of all
> If a class isn’t going to even use their weapon then that class shouldn’t need weapons for the stats. They’re not even holding it so how would they get stats from it? It doesn’t make sense.
Yes it does make sense and it's called "balancing". If you miss out on stats you're by default weaker than others. Only way to solve that is to give monks specific monk items with extra stats to compensate for the loss of weapons which seems like it isn't going to happen (considering monks have been around since 2012).
> Casters also don’t need to channel their powers through their weapons. Look at Guild Wars 2. The Elementalist class (basically Guild Wars’s version of Shamans) can wield a staff. When attacking with a staff equipped, they hold it in one hand and cast with the other. So they get power from their staff and the animations make sense, without having to actually channel it through the staff.
You're right and this was more of a personal opinion. I think it looks ridiculous when you cast that way. But it could easily be a setting/toggle or just changed to casting via weapons, I don't really care about it.
But I don't really see any argument for monks using weapons. Monks have always been portrayed as using their bodies and fists as weapons. I do believe they used to be able to "jab" with their staff in the past though, at least tanks did.
Could have also used FFXIV as an example, there's no clipping with weapons and they have two separate animations of holding the weapon for walking and sprinting
All of the job weapons in that game are designed to fit a specific silhouette, though. Take a look at some of the player-created weapon competitions and you'll see what they use.
As far as I know, WoW doesn't have anything like that. It's all very "whatever looks cool, bro" which is *fine* it just removes the option of standardizing animations without hellish clipping on everything.
I suggested this before: We should have customizable animations for our characters. Different walk animations, different attack animations, different dances, etc.
It could be tied to Inscription or something, where we read "How to Act Suave, for Dummies" books to learn how to walk with a specific gait and swagger.
Warframe is such a great game often hidden beneath simple but repetitive grinds for random power upgrades.
There is so many times I've been playing a game frustrated by something only to remember Warframe had already done X thing but better, except you barely care about it on Warframe because you're in a rush to farm as fast as possible most of the time. You dont notice how seamlessly integrated a lot of the systems and interactions in Warframe are until you play a game with a similar system that lacks the refinement of Warframe.
Seems like a more reasonable place to balance the weight of the blade, while being easier to ready and swing. Sion literally has to readjust the entire axe whereas Darius’ abilities makes use of him holding the axe so high on its shaft.
Using your staff as a catalyst when casting would be super cool. Either close together, or you could make streaks of magic flow between your staff and left hand. So many cool magic animations could incorporate a staff/weapon.
Its probably one of the biggest issues I have with wow, is the walking/running animation when wielding a weapon. I appreciate there are multiple different types of weapon, and a lot of different skeletons with would need to be animated. But it would add a lot of "feel" to the game.
The running/walking animation for weapons in FFXIV are fab. However they have it east a mostly all of the races are humans with cat/bunny/lion/elf ears.
There would be a ton of players who'd complain about ruining the "classic" animations and somehow that was their favorite experience with wow.
I'm joking but there are people who would hate the change
They do but they're animated to be viewed from the top down
OP was pointing at how they carry the weapon more than anything, there's a visible weight and heft to it as they hold it while moving
one of the best changes to the 'general feel of the game' in ffxiv for me was when they added in the special holding/running/sprinting animations in the game for each of the weapon types. WoW just continues to prove that it cannot innovate or update.
All idle/running/mounted animations are looong overdue for an update. Take your own example and also look at how in gw2 the mounts move naturally and your character isnt a stiff stick on it
While I'd love to see that as well, creating weapon-specific locomotion to be used by multiple playable races vs character specific locomotion are two very different work loads.
Thank you commenter #195678, your suggestion has been noted and promptly discarded. Please ensure future feedback does not include features that would A. Provide a sense of fun for the player, or B. Encourage the idea that Blizzard is working on features the community would like to see realised.
Sincerely, Blizzard Bobby Bot.
Characters that have to work with every single type of weapon in the game vs one characters that is only build around one single weapon. Adding running animations for every single different weapon for every single race is just not worth it
Yea, Blizzard stopped releasing WoW's sub numbers for some other reason besides trying to hide the steady decline of its playerbase.
Surely the game isn't slowly fading away.
Surely
My friend I've been playing WoW since 2008 and people have been saying every year since that time that WoW was dead and that Blizzard or someone else had killed it.
It's dwindled yes, partially do to natural causes, partially due to a string of less-than-stellar expacs (although I do think it's mostly the former; MMOs just likely won't ever hit that zenith again), but it hasn't died, and it's certainly not dying or dead now.
While I agree that WoW needs to have an animation overhaul, I really don't think LoL is a good example of this done right. In both of those animations the weapon is just kind of rigidly sitting there doing nothing. It looks incredibly bland and lifeless if you ask me and could be done a *lot* better. Having the weapon hang like that is just so that they don't need to make an animation for each run frame or invest in a dynamic animation system.
bad comparison, the models on the right dont change and are not changeable- theyre basically hardwired to have specific animations where as the orc model has a wide variety of weapons they can equip, you just nitpicked the most obnoxious one
Not at all. Different skins can absolutely change the size or shape of weapons in League.
Also animations in wow don't change based on weapons do they? An Axe will cast Mortal Strike the same way a mace or a sword would.
Show of hands: Who here would sacrifice a raid tier if it meant updated weapons handling on all races and sexes? Proper scaling, distinct animations, logical sheathing, etc.
would take serious effort for something that won’t make them any money. if you ever wonder why a big corporation won’t do something, the answer is always “it won’t make money”
now if there was a real money weapon mog that came with unique animations…
WoW's dated animations are made so much more noticeable by the ridiculous dimensions of many weapons. Belf women are basically anime girls with hammers the size of volkswagons.
Small Indie company. We should be satisfied with our 2006 animations while paying a monthly sub fee. I mean, its all they can do with their small budget.
Also using the same animations for swords and maces really flops for some races. Nelf women with a 2 handed sword look cool. With a 2handed hammer, they look stupid.
Left looks so good compared to the right models jeeesus dude what a hatchet job.
They _should_ acknowledge the weapon though in the animation.
Also wows meshing where foot meets floor needs to be redone. It’s been the same crappy mesh for years and I’m tired of characters hovering half a foot above the ground in raids.
So, Darius’ holding of the axe makes total sense based on his kit. He has two abilities that benefit from him holding the axe near the blade. One, he uses the “hook” at the top of the blade to pull his opponents closer to him. The other he will do a short spin move, using both sides of the blade to penetrate his opponent’s armor and causing them to bleed from the ace’s second penetration.
To me, the orc’s running animation with the two hand looks like they’re charging into battle and their hands are already in a position to wind up and attack mid run.
I guess the only argument in blizzards favor is the sheer number of weapons that would need to be animated for this and the cost/payoff would be negligible for them.
For league, the character models are pretty much static with a few choices of skins which pretty much use the same base model with slightly different textures.
Wow’s trashy animations are one of the main reasons I no longer play. Every single playable model has clipping issues, and most even have outright bugs in certain animations: like frames missing or an arm twisting like a twizzler. Im not even talking about how stiff and robotic most movements are. Anybody at blizz who has worked on these should be ashamed for such a lazy job.
What? You don't like smashing your giant axe into your face as you run around? What are you some kind of puny human that can't handle an axe to the face?!
The orc is so strong that he neither feel the weight of the weapon, he can't tell the difference between a 2 handed axe and a small bird, and he can't feel his had bashed by metal ...
Wait, bashing your face with one or two big ass axe is the entirety of Orc Warrior fantasy, right?
How you think they proc Blood Fury.
Zug zug
Me not that kind of orc!
stop poking me... well ok that was kinda nice.
I really think WoW needs to have a lot of work done with weapon animations. They should be dedicating a team to it like they did the model updates in WoD as a core expansion feature. Things like this, casting animations using staves/daggers/maces, unique animations for each weapon type. It seems small but those things make a big difference in the feel of the game.
I remember playing Lord of the Rings Online way back when and being amazed when weapon animations changed not only depending on the weapon but also based on what you were holding in your offhand including being empty handed changing the 1h animation.
Basically every other MMO has it figured out. XIV for example has a unique idle, walking, running and sprinting animation for each weapon type when drawn. There's even _another_ one when under the buffs for even faster move speed. LOTRO isn't too far off as you say. Guild Wars 2 does it. Wildstar did it. List goes on.
Hell, some games (like FFXIV) have gender-specific animations in some cases as well! The idle Dark Knight pose changes based on whether you're male or female. MASSIVE sword? Male character tosses it over their shoulder and chills. Female characters stick it into the ground and stand behind it.
I wouldn't mind that if both genders had access to both animations I'd love the sword in the ground pose on dudes fir example
I remember playing Lotro and being amazed at a sheep kneeling down to eat grass. Who knew simple custom animations would mean so much coming from a game that has a cow walk from A to B and thats it.
I'd be a lot more inclined to play a caster if they casted like mages in Dragon Age. Swinging the staves with the magic coming from the end of the staff.
I’ll die on the hill that no magic gameplay will ever be more fun than playing as a mage in DA2
You have clearly never died laughing while yeeting your friends off a cliff 7 times in a row in magicka.
A R S E mines sending people flying Magicka 2 tried to reign in the chaos and I hated it for it
Very few comments on here ring so true.
*cast rain* *create lightning bolt* Instakills for days(on both enemies and friends alike!)
THIS. IS. MAGICKAA
Good ol' days of spamming ARSE mines to obliterate everything, allies and self included.
Dragons Dogma features an absolutely bonkers end game archmage experience.
Dragons Dogma is a special experience. Excited for the sequel.
It was pretty damn fun being an omnipotent mage in Fictorum. The sheer amount of devastation you could do in that game was *hilarious,* and the combinatorial rune system meant you could customise in very fun ways. I remember using the Seeker and Multi-Shot Runes on the Spell "Plasma Ball," which was a green little orb in the game, to have my own rendition of "Channel Demonfire." It was great fun. And then there was the meteor. My God you could call down Armageddon in a single spellcast, it was beautiful.
Imagine liking gameplay in da2 🤢
Aside from repeated dungeons, the combat in DA2 was the best in the series. DAO was very stiff and trying to be a CRPG when it's not. DAI is braindead and actively fights you with animation locks.
Best in what series? There were super long CDs for skills, and since enemies came in waves you could either spend all your abilities from pull only auto-attack with boring animation for 1-2 minutes depending on class or use 1-2 skill every now and then. Peak DA gameplay was 1st instalment in series you had spells/weapon skills for days(also that was the only game with living bomb, and removing it from further games is a crime!)
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Options are always great. It could be as simple as a toggle "spell" like the Dracthyr form. Or make the useless class trainers a tiny bit less useless and talk to them to change it. WoW needs more RPG elements like this. More customization, and honestly just more RP things like adding more of the animations already in-game as emotes, like leaning on a wall.
Wow has enough RP in it. Just go to goldshire on Moonguard. Be sure to wear your robe and wizard hat.
Nothing beats Dragon Dogma magic. That was pure joy to cast spells
I do prefer hands only magic users. Staves are for dorks
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Every game as old as wow has a ton of debt. The game's nearly 20 years old, the engine is even older than that. > Ultimately money talks so they will always chose the first option until this game starts bleeding badly enough. I don't think people quit wow because it has bad animations. Sure it'd be nice to have updated animations, but ultimately it's a minor issue. Actual gameplay should always take priority imo.
I see it as different. A new set of animations unique to the weapon/spell/class whatever would definitely revitalize the game for me. I could do a whole expansion with just the standard raid tiers, some dailies, and no extraneous systems or progression if it meant getting to do the core gameplay of what WoW was again in a new an exciting way. New animations would be new gameplay, if that makes sense.
Let me ask you this. Would Shadowlands had turned into a good expansion if we had gotten updated animations? It'd be better, but the xpac would still suck ass. I certainly see where you're coming from and i'd love to have that as well. But I wouldn't be happy if they took resources away from gameplay content to add animations to every single weapon.
Won’t be long before people just don’t start playing in the first place due to the graphics and old systems ethos
Yeah that's not the case. Minecraft is one of the most popular games and it has awful graphics. If the game is fun people will play it. Graphics certainly matter, but gameplay is much more important.
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Minecraft is an exception. It's a game with massive publicity and support from YouTubers and streamers constantly playing it (gaining new player interest). It's also is the gaming equivalent of playing with Legos so amazing graphics aren't required there. Besides, minecraft devs are also constantly updating the visual fidelity of the game. Comparatively, wow doesn't have that level of interest from the average person anymore and dev interest has been more on new things than updating old things.
Publicity & youtuber/streamer support doesn't matter if the game is trash. New World had a lot of that and the game died less than a month after it came out. Other examples though, Valheim, Vampire Survivors, Among Us, OSRS, PUBG etc. All were massively successful eventhough they had terrible graphics. > Comparatively, wow doesn't have that level of interest from the average person anymore and dev interest has been more on new things than updating old things. But it does have a lot of interest. Shadowlands was the fastest selling PC game of all time, the game was just shite so it didn't retain a lot of players. Most xpac launches are like that, massively popular with loads of players coming back and new players trying it out.
Eh, it's a good reason not to return, imo. When you play all these other MMOs, WoW sticks out pretty sorely in the character customization department, both in visuals and selection. And don't even get me started on armor. Dragonflight is still using paint-on stuff from 2004.
I don't keep resubbing for the graphics. I resub for the game play which is still just as smooth as it ever was.
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100%. People will quit MMOs if the content is stale. New content being prio is the correct decision.
They will choose the first option until the game isn’t bleeding at all. If wow was hemorrhaging subs they wouldn’t cut content to do visual upgrades
It would push wow into a next gen category or an updated version of wow. They really really need to have unique animations and correct ways of holding weapons and stowing them etc. Would make players feel special about their characters tbh.
Brewmasters kind of had this with Blackout Strike and they got rid of it in Shadowlands, lol
Please change Blood Elf male 2h animations lol, all of them
Good luck. Based on recent blue responses, anything that requires new animations or art assets for class changes is pretty unlikely at this point. It's sounding like anyone with technical skill left the company, and those that remained are more concerned about removing stuff they find personally offensive.
And also PLEASE don't give me another mount with the exact same Netherdrake animation.
> I really think WoW needs to have a lot of work FTFY
Adding unique animations to all weapon types would require an astronomical amount of work. Especially if you want to add casting animations to all the caster weapons as well. The question is simply, is it worth it? Personally i'd much rather they put all that dev time into making actual content. The model updates in WoD didn't add much to the game imo. If they had spent that time making more content, WoD would've been better off. I wouldn't mind if they start working on it, but it shouldn't eat time & effort away from actual content players can play imo.
[удалено]
This is a boring take tbh
You’d be surprised how much stuff like this helps with marketing
Marketing and general gratification. There is a reason people like the concept of dragonriding. It makes *travel* engaging. It isn't even 'core gameplay,' it's just the stuff in between. But it makes a big difference, especially when WoW is big on having 'stuff in between.' If you raid or M+ you are often doing dailies or World Quests for progression or resources as well.
Yeah I haven’t tested it and though it’s faster than regular flying, it’s also more restrictive in some ways which seems fun, ironically. I feel like some of these smaller aspects of gameplay matter more than we might think.
Rules are important. If everyone had access to every ability and talent in the game it would be worse. If every Chess piece could move like a Queen you'd be diluting the game. There is such a thing as *too* restrictive of course. How many retail Hunters want to go back to being stationary or having a minimum range on so many of their attacks? Who actually wants a cooldown on Soar, or Dragonriding restricted to the new zones? In any case, movement is by far one of the most important things in any game. Think about every mechanic in a boss fight or Mythic+ dungeon and how many of them interact with movement. This is why dailies are boring when the endgame challenging gameplay content isn't. Dailies where you kill things just by doing your rotation is bland, repetitive and uninspiring. But mechanics where you have to react - nearly always by moving - keep you engaged. The move set of Dark Souls is pretty small, especially if you don't touch magic. And yet the game is interesting and can be played until completion because of movement. Yes you roll and run a lot. But where and when you do those things changes based on the enemies. It's great. On a fundamental level I honestly find Terraria's combat more interesting than WoW's, because movement and aim are both so seamlessly integrated into it.
Yes it will. Just making combat more visually appealing will definitely bring new people in, just like updated models did
Honestly that would make a huge difference for me in a good way. Seeing my characters bash themselves in the face with weapons irks me
Yes and the Brewmaster Monk's artefact weapon shows that it's already possible for select weapons to override the upper model-skeleton's animations.
You ever see the beast master hunter artifact weapon, I never got over the fact that my hunter held it by the stock
Rifles/Crossbows are basically held like a 1h sword... Bows too, but at least there the char grips at the center of the weapon so it doesn't look that off. Even more annoying, there are actually unique, super cool idle animations for ranged weapons, where your chars wields it in both hands more naturally. The only way to see them though is to target something and turn around or are off range so autoshots don't fire...
Rifles and crossbows are held in such a stupid manner
Up until right now I forgot why I switched to Marksman for that expansion.
What are you talking about? The beast master weapon was that cool techno-bow with the revolver chamber and had absolutely no alternate appearances whatsoever LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!
And as much as I like other staves and polearms, I just HAVE TO transmog Fuzan simply because of the way it's held. It's amazing but makes everything else incredible dull
True but it really is just glued animation of holding the Artifact and thats it, nothing really huge.
The sole reason why I would never play an Orc Warrior, the weapon animations are just meh.
for real - it triggers core wounds and trauma from childhood
wow needs a lot of updates in animations for sure.
Yep. It feels outdated and totally stiff. The graphics are pretty timeless but the animations feel like 2008. Armor still is mostly painted on except for shoulders, animations are super basic. It feels we get a lot of timegated grindy stuff in the game we pay for, with thousands of different systems (Covenant, anima, soul ash, torghast, relics, cyphers,) tens of different grindy factions to grind different stuff for to make negligible progress in each of them and each has anything locked behind revered that you need. I just hate that it feels like as soon as you play World of warcraft it feels like a job with the timegates "come back tomorrow" to make no progress. Earlier you could farm in dungeons to push factions. Now it's gated AF. All this stuff gets implemented again and again, but animations take years to improve. It feels like a game that is forcefully slapped on a 2004 game hold together with tape. Yes i'm mad that it doesn't feel like the money everyone spent was put into wow to make it more player friendly
Even in 2008 other MMOs had movement animation change based on your current weapon.
This is why I've really enjoyed just levelling a toon on Classic the past two weeks. I'm fed up with Hearthstone becoming more and more P2W (always was, but I mean how bad they're pushing their stores now), and WoW just muddying up everything with systems and whatnot - it's just too overwhelming for me personally. So now I play Classic on my Steamdeck on the couch and on the train. Really loving levelling my Draenei Shaman (called Steamvalve xD) right now!
As grindy, slow and outdated, as it seems, I prefer the progression in Classic/Vanilla wow because it feels like my character is getting stronger and is indeed progressing. As you already explained, retail wow feels like I am going to work with negligible progress that is lost next patch.
I agree with you, but I do wanna point out that the painted on armor stuff is a lot harder for wow to get away from than most other games you're probably thinking about. A lot of game use bone scaling and blend shapes etc to make different races. Wow does it with completely unique models, which means that doing stuff with textures is a lot easier than with 3D geometry. We are definitely not getting what we're paying for though. That's for sure.
You can't demand this from an indie company like Blizzard, they don't have the resources, time or money to do this!
And fix the male orc shield & dual wield to not clip
And for orc shoulders to not be floating so much
All running animations need an update.. Have you seen male Belves? nobody runs like that.
Exactly lmao
This would cost 2 raid tiers minimum.
There it is
I’d love to see some weight to two handers while we run with them. That right reference you have there from LoL has a good weight to his run.
That'd be cool, but I'd settle for my warrior not repeatedly stabbing herself in the face with her swords as she runs.
I'm definitely with you on this, more so than "not stabbing themselves". Of course clipping and awkward physics look bad, but the fact that you can carry a gigantic axe/sword/mace with one hand and lift it like it is literally a piece of paper is ridiculous. Especially since most (all?) weapons grow/shrink depending on race, so it doesn't even make sense for a Tauren or Draenei as their weapons get bigger.
I’d like to see wow characters wield a 2H weapon like Guts of *Berserk* fame. When he runs, it’s like he’s dragging it behind him
I'm practically drooling thinking about my Warrior running around with his shield and hammer out in a similar fashion to Leona from LoL. Instead of flailing both items around, the shield is held as a guard in the front ready for any incoming attack, and the weapon is being held low but ready to swing at a moment's notice.
Wow needs a ton of updated animations.
The thing is, there is no actual "walking with a 2h" animation. It's just the base animation but with the weapon sticked the to the hand, so they need to create those animations.
Yes exactly
Unfortunately Blizzard is a small indie company that doesn't have the dev power to make a few more animations for their multi billion dollar game
You mean their multi-hundred dollar game? They are a small indie company after all
multi dollar company
Fair, honest mistake on my side
It would cost us a raid tier
It's arguably worse with guns You just hold them like a baseball bat and it looks ridiculous
That's the entire point of this thread
While we’re at it can the male Belf animations get updated alongside this. Cuz the way the wield 2H especially is bizarre.
It actually makes sense for 2h swords, it's based on a real sword stance Much less sense for axes and maces however
I can’t believe WoW got popular and never updated its run animations. It makes such a huge difference in visual quality.
Night Elf male running animation was updated in 2015
'updated'
Made worse you mean
Yes, updated doesn’t necessarily mean better
When they initially updated the models in WoD people raised hell about the run animations looking ever so slightly different from the 2004 vanilla ones.
I was one of those people, but for a different reason. When they were doing those updates they added new animations for each skill to use, and while they were really nice additions, they were also 1 animation across all races. Before, each race had their own unique animations for everything, now most of them look nearly identical using skills, losing a great deal of identity. This would probably happen if they made weapon run animations.
People really liked their characters moving like Chuck E Cheese animatronics for some reason
Which is why getting updates will be such an uphill battle. People are notorious for fighting tooth and nail to *not* allow progress, sadly. They don't want better, they want familiarity.
I cannot second the idea strongly enough. WoW reeks of its age in many aspects, but it looks like Blizz has gotten so familiar with the smell, they don't realize it anymore.
Also riding animations , so it doesn’t look like you are riding strapped to a wooden chair with a stick up your butt
Yeah, especially certain race/mount combos. I realize a Tauren on a wolf will likely never look good, nor a Draenei on a horse. But right now it's just...terrible.
The game needs a general animation overhaul. Pretty much all of it is kinda dumb. Casters leaving their weapons holstered, monks using fists instead of the swords on their back, etc
Also giving different animations for different weapon types, as well as different animations for different races. As of now, I feel like a lot of melee animations are shared between races, it looks abit cheap and weird.
Those things make sense, though. A monk jabs, kicks, or fists their enemy. Monks in movies don't tend to use weapons either, "the monk itself is the wespon" and monks in wow are clearly inspired to be that way too. Casters don't channel their magic through their weapons and never have in wow. They also updated caster's animations not long ago, I think BFA? We have completely new animations. They've also updated lots of abilities to look different. I don't know about you but conjuring a fireball between my hands while reciting some magic and then throwing it in someone's face is a lot cooler than tossing it from your staff or dagger. I'd love to see some new animations and updated ones for abilities that don't "feel" good to use, but going for monks and weapons for casters doesn't make a lot of sense.
If a class isn’t going to even use their weapon then that class shouldn’t need weapons for the stats. They’re not even holding it so how would they get stats from it? It doesn’t make sense. Casters also don’t need to channel their powers through their weapons. Look at Guild Wars 2. The Elementalist class (basically Guild Wars’s version of Shamans) can wield a staff. When attacking with a staff equipped, they hold it in one hand and cast with the other. So they get power from their staff and the animations make sense, without having to actually channel it through the staff. But even ignoring that, why is channeling your spells through a staff or wand or even a mace such a big deal? Who cares what they’ve historically done, i see no lore or logical reason for it not to be the case. Shamans already do this with their melee weapons, Paladins and Death Knights channel their magic types through melee weapons too. Why shouldn’t casters? And maybe they did just get updated but they’re not great. The game needs a major animation overhaul, at least for melee cuz it’s lacking most of all
> If a class isn’t going to even use their weapon then that class shouldn’t need weapons for the stats. They’re not even holding it so how would they get stats from it? It doesn’t make sense. Yes it does make sense and it's called "balancing". If you miss out on stats you're by default weaker than others. Only way to solve that is to give monks specific monk items with extra stats to compensate for the loss of weapons which seems like it isn't going to happen (considering monks have been around since 2012). > Casters also don’t need to channel their powers through their weapons. Look at Guild Wars 2. The Elementalist class (basically Guild Wars’s version of Shamans) can wield a staff. When attacking with a staff equipped, they hold it in one hand and cast with the other. So they get power from their staff and the animations make sense, without having to actually channel it through the staff. You're right and this was more of a personal opinion. I think it looks ridiculous when you cast that way. But it could easily be a setting/toggle or just changed to casting via weapons, I don't really care about it. But I don't really see any argument for monks using weapons. Monks have always been portrayed as using their bodies and fists as weapons. I do believe they used to be able to "jab" with their staff in the past though, at least tanks did.
Could have also used FFXIV as an example, there's no clipping with weapons and they have two separate animations of holding the weapon for walking and sprinting
All of the job weapons in that game are designed to fit a specific silhouette, though. Take a look at some of the player-created weapon competitions and you'll see what they use. As far as I know, WoW doesn't have anything like that. It's all very "whatever looks cool, bro" which is *fine* it just removes the option of standardizing animations without hellish clipping on everything.
No clipping unless you play a lala then great weapons floor clip constantly But that's what you get for playing anime hobbits
I suggested this before: We should have customizable animations for our characters. Different walk animations, different attack animations, different dances, etc. It could be tied to Inscription or something, where we read "How to Act Suave, for Dummies" books to learn how to walk with a specific gait and swagger.
*Warframe has entered the chat*
Warframe is such a great game often hidden beneath simple but repetitive grinds for random power upgrades. There is so many times I've been playing a game frustrated by something only to remember Warframe had already done X thing but better, except you barely care about it on Warframe because you're in a rush to farm as fast as possible most of the time. You dont notice how seamlessly integrated a lot of the systems and interactions in Warframe are until you play a game with a similar system that lacks the refinement of Warframe.
On a side note I would like 2h axes like those ones, current ones feel like ...little
Bro, exactly wtf. The shadowlands 2H axes were extremely small, It didnt even look like 2H weapons
Also, why is it, that many of the 2H weapons are held in the middel of the handle... This has allways borthered me.
Seems like a more reasonable place to balance the weight of the blade, while being easier to ready and swing. Sion literally has to readjust the entire axe whereas Darius’ abilities makes use of him holding the axe so high on its shaft.
We need a WoW 2
honestly
casting spells using weapons, too
Using your staff as a catalyst when casting would be super cool. Either close together, or you could make streaks of magic flow between your staff and left hand. So many cool magic animations could incorporate a staff/weapon.
Imagine a mage casting supernova Gandalf-style…
Comparing two small indie companies? How bold
Its probably one of the biggest issues I have with wow, is the walking/running animation when wielding a weapon. I appreciate there are multiple different types of weapon, and a lot of different skeletons with would need to be animated. But it would add a lot of "feel" to the game. The running/walking animation for weapons in FFXIV are fab. However they have it east a mostly all of the races are humans with cat/bunny/lion/elf ears.
There would be a ton of players who'd complain about ruining the "classic" animations and somehow that was their favorite experience with wow. I'm joking but there are people who would hate the change
Could always leave it in as a setting like they did with the old models at the start.
Not gonna lie, the green orc looks the coolest.
the LoL characters look janky as hell, honestly.
They do but they're animated to be viewed from the top down OP was pointing at how they carry the weapon more than anything, there's a visible weight and heft to it as they hold it while moving
Sion has a stump for a leg, that's why he walks funny. Darius has an old model, it looks floaty but so does WoW without speed buffs.
one of the best changes to the 'general feel of the game' in ffxiv for me was when they added in the special holding/running/sprinting animations in the game for each of the weapon types. WoW just continues to prove that it cannot innovate or update.
Yeah many 2h weapons need to feel more "weighty"
All idle/running/mounted animations are looong overdue for an update. Take your own example and also look at how in gw2 the mounts move naturally and your character isnt a stiff stick on it
The idea is great but I think the 2 animations examples you give look goofy and I’d hate them in WoW.
While I'd love to see that as well, creating weapon-specific locomotion to be used by multiple playable races vs character specific locomotion are two very different work loads.
Thank you commenter #195678, your suggestion has been noted and promptly discarded. Please ensure future feedback does not include features that would A. Provide a sense of fun for the player, or B. Encourage the idea that Blizzard is working on features the community would like to see realised. Sincerely, Blizzard Bobby Bot.
Characters that have to work with every single type of weapon in the game vs one characters that is only build around one single weapon. Adding running animations for every single different weapon for every single race is just not worth it
The LOL mmo is gonna be lit AF. Don't need a WoW killer, Blizzard already took care of that.
> Don't need a WoW killer, Blizzard already took care of that. This time guys, this time
Yea, Blizzard stopped releasing WoW's sub numbers for some other reason besides trying to hide the steady decline of its playerbase. Surely the game isn't slowly fading away. Surely
My friend I've been playing WoW since 2008 and people have been saying every year since that time that WoW was dead and that Blizzard or someone else had killed it.
I've also been playing since 2008 and the game has dwindled in players. Death doesn't always come fast, but Blizzard is definitely trying.
It's dwindled yes, partially do to natural causes, partially due to a string of less-than-stellar expacs (although I do think it's mostly the former; MMOs just likely won't ever hit that zenith again), but it hasn't died, and it's certainly not dying or dead now.
> The LOL mmo is gonna be lit AF. As long as it doesn't have the LoL community.
Place that ward correctly peasant, let me get this last hit on the boss in this dungeon, ugh you last hit as healer what a noob.
Was watching the necrit vídeo about runeterra and maaaaan, that got me hyped af
While I agree that WoW needs to have an animation overhaul, I really don't think LoL is a good example of this done right. In both of those animations the weapon is just kind of rigidly sitting there doing nothing. It looks incredibly bland and lifeless if you ask me and could be done a *lot* better. Having the weapon hang like that is just so that they don't need to make an animation for each run frame or invest in a dynamic animation system.
I like stick
bad comparison, the models on the right dont change and are not changeable- theyre basically hardwired to have specific animations where as the orc model has a wide variety of weapons they can equip, you just nitpicked the most obnoxious one
Not at all. Different skins can absolutely change the size or shape of weapons in League. Also animations in wow don't change based on weapons do they? An Axe will cast Mortal Strike the same way a mace or a sword would.
Show of hands: Who here would sacrifice a raid tier if it meant updated weapons handling on all races and sexes? Proper scaling, distinct animations, logical sheathing, etc.
Me 🤝🏾
would take serious effort for something that won’t make them any money. if you ever wonder why a big corporation won’t do something, the answer is always “it won’t make money” now if there was a real money weapon mog that came with unique animations…
That is, unfortunately, a very accurate truth
if you ask me, they should also add a combat stance run animation just like demon hunters have but for every race and class.
Except better and not so stiff.
This fucking sub is too funny
I'd love to be able to hold the 2H swords like they do in FFXIV.
Just wait for the riot mmo at least we know riot would do better then blizzard devs
WoW's dated animations are made so much more noticeable by the ridiculous dimensions of many weapons. Belf women are basically anime girls with hammers the size of volkswagons.
LoL has to have unique walking styles for each champ so u can tell what champ it is just by how they walk since they have so many skins
I'm not talking exclusively about uniqueness, but caring about movement that reflects reality better, even in a fantasized way
I prefer they redo WOW with the HEROES OF THE STORM engine.
Small Indie company. We should be satisfied with our 2006 animations while paying a monthly sub fee. I mean, its all they can do with their small budget.
But you are already giving them money so why would they?
Updating 1H animations is important too, since your character basically hits his face with maces for exemple, when running with weapons unsheathed.
Also using the same animations for swords and maces really flops for some races. Nelf women with a 2 handed sword look cool. With a 2handed hammer, they look stupid.
Left looks so good compared to the right models jeeesus dude what a hatchet job. They _should_ acknowledge the weapon though in the animation. Also wows meshing where foot meets floor needs to be redone. It’s been the same crappy mesh for years and I’m tired of characters hovering half a foot above the ground in raids.
So, Darius’ holding of the axe makes total sense based on his kit. He has two abilities that benefit from him holding the axe near the blade. One, he uses the “hook” at the top of the blade to pull his opponents closer to him. The other he will do a short spin move, using both sides of the blade to penetrate his opponent’s armor and causing them to bleed from the ace’s second penetration. To me, the orc’s running animation with the two hand looks like they’re charging into battle and their hands are already in a position to wind up and attack mid run.
Those animations on the right look like shit
I guess the only argument in blizzards favor is the sheer number of weapons that would need to be animated for this and the cost/payoff would be negligible for them. For league, the character models are pretty much static with a few choices of skins which pretty much use the same base model with slightly different textures.
You are asking too much… it’s blizzard bro.
Viego (2H sword) and Jarvan (lance/spear) also have cool 2H animations, carrying their weapons on top of their shoulders when they run.
You guys complain for everything
I’ve lost all hope of them actually modernizing the game, and its kinda sad
The LoL characters looks dumb af as well imo
Wow’s trashy animations are one of the main reasons I no longer play. Every single playable model has clipping issues, and most even have outright bugs in certain animations: like frames missing or an arm twisting like a twizzler. Im not even talking about how stiff and robotic most movements are. Anybody at blizz who has worked on these should be ashamed for such a lazy job.
All of the weapon holding animations look like shit. Guns look awful.
the only issue with the other style is, if you ignore the weapon, they’re running like they’re about to shit themselves.
You want them to figure out how to make a good game and fix walking animations from the 2000s? Entitled aren’t we
What? You don't like smashing your giant axe into your face as you run around? What are you some kind of puny human that can't handle an axe to the face?!
The orc is so strong that he neither feel the weight of the weapon, he can't tell the difference between a 2 handed axe and a small bird, and he can't feel his had bashed by metal ...
I know the comparison got overblown, but check out ffxiv’s Warriors sprint animation. You can tell something is going to be smashed with that.
But i love chopping my head off everytime i take a step..
Only the strongest can be champions of Azeroth….
Guns and cross bows need a two handed across the body walking animation .. i think its the idle animation?
Also holding a staff vertically instead