A new chapter has begun rolling out in World of Warcraft, as phase one of the Dragonflight pre-patch is now live. The update brings the new talent system to the game, an overhauled, more flexible UI and HUD, Rated Solo Shuffle, and new class and race combinations.
With the release of this patch, there’s just over a month to go until the release of the full Dragonflight expansion, but with these huge changes to talents, specializations, and the look and feel of practical stuff like the UI, the timing is needed. This is the first of the Dragonflight pre patch updates, and the next is scheduled for November 15th.
The new talent trees are designed with flexibility in mind, with talents now split into class talents and specialization talents. The class talents are those utility skills you need to know, and the specialization talents give you the skills for your chosen path and more control over the build you create for your playstyle. To ease people into these new options, changing talents will be free and available anywhere, so there’s no penalty for exploring the system and trying out options. Once you’ve discovered the builds you like, you can now save them as loadouts for whatever activities you do, like a PvP loadout or a raid loadout.
The new UI and HUD changes might be striking, especially if you haven’t been testing Dragonflight on the PTR. Like the talent trees, this redesign is intended to make everything more flexible and customizable for every individual player. Maybe you want your minimap on one particular side or maybe you don't want to see certain things on the HUD. Now you have more control over options.
Another change available in this pre-patch is the availability to play as a Mage, Rogue, or Priest of any race. So if you’ve really been wanting to be a stealthy Tauren Rogue, now’s your chance.
Some of Dragonflight’s other standout features, like the Dracthyr Evoker and their starting zone, The Forbidden Reach, will be in that November 15th patch, along with dungeons, new events, and much more. For now, it’s time to make sense of the new talent trees and see if you can decide on the best HUD layouts.
For more, read the patch notes over at World of Warcraft.
