You’re casually sitting around in Valdrakken minding your own business, when all of a sudden one of many Mythic+ groups you’ve been signing up for decides you’re one of the lucky ones and invites you to join their forces and clear the Azure Vault with them. You hop onto your Dragonriding drake and, after feeling the wind in your hair and seeing all the Dragon Isles beneath your feet, you’re at the dungeon entrance. But when you get there, you realize you actually applied for Algeth’ar Academy and your Restoration Shaman is waiting for the party there. Not a problem—after a couple of flaps of the wings, you’re at Algeth’ar Academy and you’re summoning your team, fired up and ready for that sweet Mythic+ action.
That’s Dragonriding in a nutshell—lightning-fast, and, most importantly, a more fun iteration of regular flying currently only accessible on the Dragon Isles. Released at the beginning of Dragonflight on Nov. 28, 2022, Dragonriding instantly became everyone’s favorite feature.
Although Dragonriding breathed new life into flying over Azeroth, this exciting feature also has a dark side—rendering years of design obsolete. Since Valdrakken has everything you might possibly need, from transmogrification to haircuts, you don’t have a reason to ever leave the seat of Dragon Aspects, let alone use the old and boring ground and flying mounts. So, while Dragonriding may initially seem like one of the best things to happen to World of Warcraft, it’s also one of the worst.
Dragonriding breathed new life into flying
From the moment WoW players first logged in Dragonflight, completed the introductory scenario, and unlocked Dragonriding drakes, they were completely mesmerized by Dragonriding. Not only did it enable you to soar the skies of the Dragon Isles, it also came with special abilities, customizations, and a fun glyph-hunting game. In addition to that, everything tied to Dragonriding has been account-wide from the very beginning and you could easily hop on your alts and continue your adventures without the need to do the same grind all over again.
Dragonriding also comes with special passives that increase your Vigor recharge depending on the type of activity you enjoy in the open world. So if you’re more of a friend to flowers and woods and prefer gathering goods from the Dragon Isles, you can opt for Dragonrider’s Cultivation and speed up Vigor regeneration after gathering herbs and ores. On the other hand, players that actively work on reducing the enemy forces can choose Dragonrider’s Hunt and quickly recharge their Vigor after defeating enemies of the isles.
And the cherry on the cake? Dragonriding races. You have two different types of courses, regular and advanced, if you’re feeling more daring. You’re able to go back to Dragonriding races and complete them as world quests and earn special rewards whenever you want.
The positives of Dragonriding are promising. First and foremost, flying with Dragonriding is far more fun than with regular mounts because of the special abilites. It’s also faster. All your progress is saved and you don’t have to repeat the grind with your alts. Dragonriding mounts are also not your average Joe mounts; they have their own unique abilities and passives, special customizations, and races to make time spent on the Dragon Isles even more exciting.
It’s not all drakes and sunshine
Although everyone is having a blast with their new and shiny Dragonriding drakes, Dragonriding has a dark side. Since we’re spending most of our time exploring the Dragon Isles or the Forbidden Reach—and you can find anything you need, from transmogrifiers to hair stylists—regular ground and flying mounts have become obsolete. In fact, they are only used in Mythic+ dungeons when you have to run from one boss to the other. Even the newer mounts, like Tangled Dreamweaver, are just gathering dust in your collection tabs, rarely seeing any action these days.
Besides, returning to the old world and using your regular mounts now feels dull and mundane as you’re back to square one of WoW flying—steady, slow, and non-interactive. How can we go back to normal flying now that we’ve felt the thrill of the sky and conquered the highest peaks of the Dragon Isles?
What should be next for Dragonriding?
Although Dragonriding has been in the game for only a couple of months, it’s the feature most representative of Dragonflight. It’s fresh, exciting, and gives a new spin on the old WoW feature. What’s next for Dragonriding now that we’ve become accustomed to both the speed and the excitement of Dragonriding, but still want to find use for our old ground and flying mounts?
The first step Blizzard Entertainment needs to make is to allow Dragonriding across all zones and not only the Dragon Isles. But if Blizzard makes Dragonriding available outside the isles, no one will ever want to use their regular old mounts. If Blizzard were to add more movement speed to regular flying mounts while allowing Dragonriding mounts to leave the Dragon Isles, this wouldn’t be such an issue and players would have a real choice on their hands. Do I take the cool drake or ol’ reliable? If both are fast and fun, both can be enjoyed.
Final thoughts on Dragonriding
From the moment WoW players first picked up their Dragonriding drake and saw it spread its wings over the Dragon Isles, there was no force in the world that could separate them, as you could always reach your desired location in an instant. Amazing as it is, this feature has rendered regular ground and flying mounts obsolete on the Dragon Isles, and once it comes to the rest of the game, the old mounts will be completely forgotten. To avoid that, Blizzard need to buff the movement speed of old mounts, leaving us with two equally fun and useful options for flying.
Published: Apr 28, 2023 05:27 am