Bad News, Bears?
Tyranis
"Am I level 10 or 80? Who knows!"Blizzard just slipped us a sneak preview of the long-awaited updated models for the druid animal forms. Currently, the preview only shows the tauren bear form, but they announced that the night elf bear form will be revealed by the end of the week.
They mention that there are five different skins for each animal form per faction. In other words, each druid will have access to five unique bear forms and five unique cat forms, which will differ from druids of the opposing faction. The various skins are chosen and changed in the barbershop.
I don't play a druid, but I wonder how I would feel if I waited this long for a new look to accompany my feral side. All the other classes have been able to improve their gear and change their appearances drastically, but the poor bears and cats have been looking at the same models for over four years. There must be throngs of druids jumping up and down at this announcement.
For some reason, I was expecting more than just a simple cosmetic change via the barbershop. How long will these new forms be interesting or exciting? Don't get me wrong, the screenshots of the tauren bear forms look awesome, but I think the issue is deeper than that. The problem is, these new models are still static. They don't change as your character improves or gets new gear. Unless they plan on implementing new skins on a regular basis, they, too, will get stale. These changes also do nothing for our healing druids in tree form.
I can sympathize with the complexity of trying to integrate item upgrades onto multiple animal forms. As it is, when they create a new item they have to make sure it looks right on twenty different models representing both genders of each race. Adding item textures for the bear, cat and tree forms of both factions would be a huge drain of time and resources. However, I can't help thinking there would be some way to at least have some visual representation of how well-geared you were while in these forms.
Perhaps they could use the average item level of the equipped gear to determine how ferocious or predatory your toon looks. They have similar technology already coded. For example, the Flame Leviathan vehicles check the average item level of their driver to determine how powerful they should be. How amazing would it be to have the top gear from Ulduar hard modes and strut around Dalaran in animal forms few others could duplicate? A few glow and particle effects could easily differentiate a druid in heroic blues versus a druid decked out in tier 8. Glowing eyes, saliva-dripping maws and bristling fur embody the druid's natural fury a bit better than a trip to the hair salon for a fur-frosting and dye job.
Let us assume they added three visual upgrades with each raiding tier and included the neglected tree form as well. Then for the 3.1 patch, they would have needed to design a total of eighteen new models, which includes different models for both the Horde and the Alliance. This sounds reasonable to me and would certainly give druids of all types something to look forward to as they geared up and progressed through content. In any case, I'm going to head over the official WoW forums so I can watch the shadow priests crying over not having new models for their shadowform!
What do you think of Blizzard's announcement? Are you satisfied or were you also hoping for something that scaled with gear?
Reader Comments (39)
the old night elf bear SUCKED but the new ones arent ne better ive always loved the cat form look and i cannot wait to see the new ones (espiecally tuaren cats loins ftw)
I'm a bit let down by the fact that you'll need to change your 'toon's hair color (if night elf) or skin tone (if tauren) to effect a change in animal form appearance. It's still neat, but not really a great 'customization' option, especially if you are happy with your 'toon's appearance otherwise.
I'm a raiding Druid, Bear and Tree.
I've read pretty much all of the blue posts on the forums about this and as far as I can tell they have plans to update trees when they get around to it and would like to implement a gear grade=new skin system but that takes time/effort which they are spending elsewhere. This is fine with me....I never really expected to get THIS!
So I'll take what I'm being given, Thankyou Very much Blizzard :) and I'll be looking forward to them giving me a new Tree form when they can.
Sure, it might be a bit weird changing my skin tone to fit my new form but I can live with it...ts not like i can see myself under all my fancy pants armor anyway.
Ok! so then so the new skins are nice, not great (i expected at least some reprepesentation of the gear or level u got) but nice, at long last there will NOT be another 4 guys looking IDENTICALY to me in raids (sory for warriors who only get to change their weaps inbetween specs or raiding level :P all northrend plate looks the same)
But what people dont seem to notice much (must allies) is the fact that this change will now make the taurens the ONLY race that can change their skin tone post creation without having to pay IRL for it wich is fantastic news for me having rolled an albino bull thinking it would fit the roll of a peacefull grovetender and keeper of balance only to find that the end game gear looks 10x better on a black bull (and almost gay on a white one :( )
Horde model = Tears of joy
Alliance model = Tears of unBEARable suffering
I am a female NE Druid. I do not have sideburns. Give me sideburns I will cut you with my pointy claws.
For the love of all that is holy, make the forms gender-specific. I hate looking like some stinky gross man-bear or man-cat. It should not be hard. Even if you just did different colors or more jewelry for the females I would be happy.
I do understand that if you make the models smaller, then the hit-box might be smaller and that would cause PvPers to flood the world with tears of anguish.
I know that our friends at blizzard are really smart and really talented artists and that they would never want to disenfranchise the few female druid players they have left.
Come on Blizzard - as long as you are changing the models - do the right thing...
As your gear gets better the game should scan your gear level and add differant amrmour for your bear like in the golden compass.
Um... I play dr00d all the time. And I have to say I am disappointed as Hell. Hell hath no furry as the wrath of a bear? Quite so.
First of all it looks like they played in freakin Paintbrush for like 10 minutes. Same weird big-butt model with the moving head, the lovely bear with the down syndrome... O wait! Now we got 4 other colors. Big deal. Try HARDER.
Tree form is horrible still. The design seems to try and ridicule an otherwise quite powerful healer.
The only ok design is the cat. And they WILL mess with it also...
I know that a fancy aura or other visual effects are hard, such as gear scaling. Too much effort? Don't duu eet. But c'mon peeps, what gives? Same 5-poly mesh wrapped around a different skin? The same big butts and weird beard (a bear with a goddam beard... sheesh). At least make it look like its meant to stop an axe. Armor would be nice and for crying out loud A DIFFERENT BODY RATIO!! Make us have pecks or something.
ive been a tanking druid for like 4 years now and i only care about my stats than my looks.
So i dont care the skinchanges from bears...
Bears and trees, bears and trees, bears and trees...
As usual all the talk is about decorating the bears, and support for the trees, but the Moonkins are forgotten by the developers and, apparently, the players too.
i wnet tanky just for this......
Well since this post, Blizzard has made several comments on the subject:
"We do understand that it's taken us a long time to get out some updates for druid forms. Like anything else that has time to sit and be digested, we understand that most people want nothing less than everything they've ever dreamed or desired on an individual level. From a design stand point though, we have to make decisions we feel will have a moderately low negative impact, with a relatively high positive impact. We feel providing five different color schemes for two of the most outdated models for druids is a huge bonus. We feel strongly that druids will be happy to look at any of the five different color schemes for each form over the ones that currently exist once they see them in-game and have a chance to grow used to them."
"Much in the way specific physical features (i.e. horns, eyes, facial shape, etc.) found on bear and cat forms resemble the races to which they are linked, we feel it makes sense to tie the color schemes of these forms to the most identifiable coloring options of their respective races: hair color for night elves, and skin tone for tauren. "
"Potentially more changes to forms in the future
Definitely. They just won't be done for the next major content patch. We plan to revamp all of the forms, and may continue to iterate upon the new forms coming out with additional color schemes, adding armor or additional customization, etc. "
So it may take a while to see some of these changes, but at least it looks like they are keeping the options open for the future.
Mabe Blizz should give us the option to turn off stance form like hide helm or cloak then we could see are leet armor while we tanked/dps'd/or healed. Most of the arguments about forms would be solved don't ya think?
and horde get the cool looks again i paly a 56 night elf druid and i love my current cat and bear form i love all my forms when in a city i dont even use my mound just dash or travel form though i do think that adding some bad ass armor to damn would make am totaly well bedass but the think with that is you turn into that metal best and that just isnt what druids are about i think the glowing eyes are really cool an the balck bars warent looking to bad them selfs but i think teh forms looks cool enough though some improvements would not hert