A cry goes through the community of World of Warcraft again. Blizzard is said to be ready to “pull the ripcord” – the voices are getting louder.
With the release of the last story chapter of Patch 9.1 Chains of Domination, the new content in World of Warcraft is temporarily completed. In the coming months, everything will revolve around revisiting already known content – namely PvP, raids, and dungeons on Mythic+.
What is the “ripcord”? The ripcord is a metaphor introduced by Game Director Ion Hazzikostas before the release of WoW: Shadowlands. When asked whether Blizzard could eventually make all covenants purely cosmetic and allow players to belong to all covenants, the Game Director stated at the time: “If we really had to make that decision, the ripcord would be there.”
Since then, this has been demanded again and again.
Why is this issue so relevant right now? There are several reasons. On the one hand, with Patch 9.1 Chains of Domination, the covenants and their abilities have changed. There has been a lot of balancing, and what was previously considered the strongest covenant for a class has changed for many. Affected players are now frustrated that they have to choose between their unlocked content – such as the upgraded covenant sanctum – or the best covenant ability. Because after switching covenants, all of that is lost.
At the same time, many are disturbed by the system, as they now want to play second characters. It feels bad for many players to have unlocked so much transmog and mounts that cannot be used on twinks because they do not belong to the right covenant. There is a desire here to lift the limitation.
There is also a continuous demand for the elimination of conduit energy, without which one cannot switch conduits. Especially druids, who have four specializations but can only rely on three soul bonds, suffer from being unable to play their fourth specialization.
What do the players say? In a post on reddit discussing the topic, over 4,500 players agreed and contributed their own ideas and suggestions on how Blizzard can make the “rest of Shadowlands” more bearable. Some of their ideas we present here.
Stone-Bear writes:
GET RID OF CONDUIT ENERGY.
I am a druid with 4 specializations. I want to play them all. I don’t want to feel like I “could” be better just because my fourth specialization is locked behind three soul bonds.
Desdenova32 wishes for something entirely different:
A way to skip the intro experience of Shadowlands and you have my approval. It brings me down every time I want to play a new character.
Other players want the “party sync” feature at level 60 and for all old content. Horror_Distribution writes:
Sync to old content: Party sync is wonderful. A great technique. But why is it so limited? Let me go to the adventure board and scale down to the level of The Burning Crusade or Legion or Mists of Pandaria. I don’t want to one-shot everything when I play old content and want to experience the story. I want to feel like I’m really playing it.
What do you think of the whole “ripcord” demand? Would it be the best for Shadowlands? Or are the covenants good as they are?
