After nearly two decades, World of Warcraft’s user interface has received a major facelift, making it both more modern in appearance and more customizable without the needing multiple fan-made mods. But even if the new UI options added as part of the Dragonflight pre-patch are a giant step in the right direction for Blizzard’s nearly 20-year-old MMORPG, players still have some feedback on how to make it even better.
The first phase of Dragonflight’s pre-patch dropped last night after an extended maintenance period, and in addition to new class talent trees, it added the new Edit Mode feature which allows players to (almost) fully customize the UI to their liking. Players have been sharing their new UI layouts on social media, and while the response to the changes have been largely positive, there are a few standout complaints.
For starters, there are a few pieces of the UI that can’t be moved. The vast majority of the UI can be scaled up or down and moved around the screen, but that’s not the case for the XP bar, which is still locked in place. While the mini-map can be moved around, it can’t be scaled up or down, much to the frustration of players. There have also been reports of a bug that is causing UI layouts to not save correctly, forcing some players who have spent hours customizing their UI to have to do it all over again.
Icons for bags and options like the group finder, character sheet, and the collections screen are now smaller and more uniform in appearance, and are also locked in place in the bottom right of the screen. They also can’t be scaled up and down. Players on Reddit have complained that they are having a hard time telling the various icons locked to the button right of the screen apart.
“Did they really have to make these all look the same?” Reddit user EvilSockLady writes on the game’s subreddit in regards to the small icons locked to the bottom right of the screen. “I have to mouse-over all of them each time to find what I want. I want color back.”
There have also been reports of a bug that is causing UI layouts and certain keybindings to not save correctly, forcing some players who have spent hours customizing their UI and controls to have to do it all over again.
Blizzard has noted that the UI changes that have come as part of the pre-patch are just “phase one” of the UI and HUD changes, and that more tweaks will be coming in the future. When exactly those additional changes will be coming remains to be seen, but Blizzard has emphasized that the game’s new UI will be an ongoing effort, rather than a one-and-done feature. Players, of course, still have the option of using various community made add-ons to further customize and improve their UI experience, but it’s nice to be able to at least customize most of the default UI without having to resort to third-party software.
The second phase of the Dragonflight pre-patch is coming November 15, and will introduce the game’s new playable dragon race, the Dracthyr, alongside a revamped version of a classic WoW dungeon and a Primal Storm event. Dragonflight proper, which introduces a new region of Azeroth to explore and more, will arrive on November 28.
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