New Affixes and Heroic Difficulty for Seasonal Dungeons in The War Within

Greetings!

With The War Within beta now underway, we are excited to share additional updates regarding dungeons and the affix system.

Heroic & Mythic Dungeons

In Dragonflight Season 4, we experimented with our existing dungeon difficulty progression to offer additional endgame options for players who enjoy more methodical dungeon gameplay. This updated dungeon difficulty progression is also an opportunity for players that do enjoy Mythic Keystones to have a place to build mastery over dungeons before the pressures of a timer kick in. You can read more about those changes in depth here 51. We plan to continue this model of progression into The War Within with some exciting updates!

• Normal
  • This difficulty is unchanged.
  • This difficulty always includes our 8 War Within dungeons.
• Heroic
  • The tuning and rewards of this difficulty are increasing to be equivalent to a baseline Mythic (Mythic 0) dungeon in the previous system.
  • New mechanics and other adjustments from Mythic will not be present in this difficulty.
  • This remains a queueable experience.
  • Starting with Season 1 of The War Within, Heroic dungeon difficulty will feature our roster of seasonal dungeons.
• Mythic
  • The tuning and rewards of this difficulty are increasing to the equivalent of a +10 dungeon with affixes in the previous system.
  • There are no timers, affixes, or limitations on changing specializations or talents while in the dungeon.
  • The goal is to create a mega-dungeon like difficulty for this experience. This difficulty should present a meaningful challenge and provide commensurate rewards without the pressure of the Mythic+ system.
  • Starting with Season 1 of The War Within, Mythic difficulty will feature our roster of seasonal dungeons.
  • Mythic difficulty will be unavailable until with the War Within Season 1 begins.
  • Mythic difficulty will now have a daily lockout, changed from weekly in the previous system.

The seasonal dungeon roster for Heroic, Mythic, and Mythic+ difficulties in Season 1 of The War Within includes the following dungeons:

• The Stonevault
• The Dawnbreaker
• Ara-Kara, City of Echoes
• City of Threads
• Grim Batol
• The Necrotic Wake
• Mists of Tirna Scithe
• Siege of Boralus

Mythic+

The Mythic Keystone system will carry forward changes from Dragonflight Season 4 with updates to the position of affixes in the system and updated affix buckets.

• The Mythic+ system will have rewards up to level 10, with +2 starting from what would have been a +11 in the previous Mythic+ system.
• A +5 should be as hard as a +15 and +10 should be as hard as a +20 in the previous Mythic+ system etc.
• We intend to better align reward and difficulty increases in the Mythic+ system by updating the introduction points of affixes in Season 1 of The War Within.
  • +2 – Fortified/Tyrannical
  • +4 – A new set of passive affixes
  • +7 – Bursting / Bolstering etc.
• Dungeon ratings should be equivalent to what they represent in the current system.
• There should be a smaller range of Keystone levels to find groups for, and more meaningful progression between each level.

Affixes

Before we dive into the specifics of the new affixes, we would like to outline our goals and the purpose these affixes serve. Our overarching goal is to minimize the mechanical overlap between affixes and dungeon trash design in the current +4 affix bucket. We aim to achieve this through a more passive approach, focusing on the following objectives:

• Shift the source of challenge to the dungeon itself by simplifying affix design and emphasizing creature abilities.
• Reduce visual noise, nameplate clutter, and the cognitive load on players during trash combat.
• Allow for varied and context-specific gameplay decisions depending on the dungeon they are applied to.

Additionally, these affixes will include a positive effect. The aim of these positive effects is to highlight different damage types each week, allowing each specialization additional opportunities to excel during the season.

• These effects should feel like a bonus, offering an advantage for different damage profiles each week without being essential to complete a dungeon.
• Players will have an opportunity to flex towards different talents, gearing options, and consumables to capitalize on these effects.

New Affixes

• Reckless
  • Non-boss enemies without mana ignore 20% armor with their attacks, but their armor is reduced by 30% and they take 10% increased Arcane damage.
• Thorned
  • Non-boss enemies without mana inflict Physical damage to their attackers when attacked, but take 10% increased Holy and Shadow damage.
• Attuned
  • Non-boss enemies with mana inflict 20% increased magic damage, but take 10% increased Nature damage and 30% increased damage from Bleed effects.
• Focused
  • Non-boss enemies with mana have 30% increased Haste, but take 10% increased Frost and Fire damage.

Note that these tooltips indicate whether the affixes apply to creatures with or without mana. These affixes will not affect every creature.

With our new passive affix bucket set to replace the current +4 affix bucket, the following affixes will be retired for Season 1 of The War Within:

• Afflicted
• Incorporeal
• Entangling
• Storming
• Volcanic

To match the number of affixes in our level 4 affix bucket and align with our affix goals in The War Within we will be retiring the Spiteful affix for Season 1 of The War Within. The +7 affix bucket includes the following:

• Raging
• Bolstering
• Bursting
• Sanguine

Tyrannical and Fortified Affixes

We are still experimenting with how these affixes fit in with our updates.

We believe these changes will offer a refreshing experience for players at all levels each season and redefine how the Mythic+ affix system influences dungeon gameplay. We look forward to your feedback and discussions on these topics and we’ll see you in dungeons!