After Blizzard soberly announced the deployment of new Twitch Drops on the occasion of the release of the World of Warcraft expansion Dragonflight, players are once again caught in the crossfire, further dividing the community: is it normal that the Fangredrake is obtainable for free, he who was once so prestigious?
A very questionable choice...
The least we can say is that the American publisher knows how to get noticed! While many players are unaware of where this controversy regarding the Feldrake comes from, others are well aware of the double problem that such a free and so accessible offer poses.
To understand the current debate regarding this mount, it is therefore necessary to know that this mount was until now one of the rarest in the game . And for good reason, it was actually one of the rewards of the World of Warcraft collectible card game whose edition stopped in 2013.
To get the Feldrake, you therefore had no choice but to get your hands on the card of the same name from the Timewalkers: War of the Ancients expansion released in 2012. Naturally, it was extremely rare, so rare even that it was estimated at one copy every 264 decks of cards on average. It is little, very little! Thus, and like all cards of the same kind (the famous Spectral Tiger for example), players who obtained it had two options: enter the in-game code associated with this card to ride this superb drake, or sell the card on certain auction sites, EBay in particular to name but one.
In the second case, prices quickly soared , and the end of the edition of the collectible card game did not help: the Feldrake, for example, is sold at $4,000 at the time of writing these lines . And if some would assume that no one buys a mount at this price, think again: a player, for example, recently acquired a Spectral Tiger for the modest sum of €4,300!
And this is where the appearance of such a mount among Dragonflight's Twitch Drops rewards list poses a problem: if the lucky little ones who had obtained it by chance by opening a pack of cards are disappointed to see their mount extremely rare to become a "common good", those who had spent thousands of euros to get their hands on it see red . And that's quite understandable!
The other issue with the Feldrake is Blizzard's lack of involvement in the loot drops offered through Twitch and Prime Gaming . If some games, Lost Ark for example, offer unique rewards in this way, the WoW publisher is content to throw in food rare and / or formerly paying objects already existing in the game. A laziness that some see from a evil eye since they expect a minimum of innovation, even if it is completely free content. Ah well we are demanding on WoW, yeah!
... But a fairly just cause?
However, Bizzard's position is not as dramatic as it seems for ordinary players. In fact, it's actually pretty good, provided you didn't spend a penny for the Feldrake a few years ago!
The World of Warcraft collectible card game is a real gold mine widely exploited by some players in search of a few thousand euros. Since the end of its edition in 2013, the prices of the rarest cards from which they come, often mounts, easily cross the bar of one thousand euros. A real parallel market over which Blizzard has absolutely no control , and which completely locks access to these prestigious rewards which are only "prestigious" in their astronomical value in reality. And that neither Blizzard nor players like: it's not house policy for an in-game item to be prestigious simply because of its real money prize .
Well, of course one could imagine that the publisher of WoW could ban the sale of such objects on parallel markets . It would surely happen elsewhere! But the other ready-made alternative, at a lower cost and which gives him the right role to prevent him from making money on the backs of his players (and himself eh), is quite simply to reclaim these extremely rare objects and offer them free of charge to its players . Two birds with one stone: we break the dark and unfair economy of these cards, and we please thousands (millions?) of players!
The only real problem with such an idea is once again on the side of those who got their hands on the Feldrake before the Twitch Drops and who spent at best a few tens of euros to obtain a package that contained one for in the end even their favorite mount to wander everywhere in Oribos, at worst downright thousands. And there... Blizzard's position is difficult to defend . Although... You could be told that these parallel markets are not reliable and sensible ways to obtain these mounts, and therefore the buyers are ultimately solely responsible for their purchase . That may even be the way Blizzard sees things, hence these seemingly thoughtless Twitch Drops! But hey... We still understand your frustration if you are one of the few to have obtained this mount this way.
In the end, the Feldrake is so rare and so unattainable for the overwhelming majority of players (and by far, far) that Blizzard's choice doesn't actually seem so absurd . In fact, it's probably even the best way to reclaim those relics of a bygone era without breaking the bank of players and giving them access to mounts they never would have had for lack of real money . And sincerely, we much prefer to have free Drop Twitchs that offer us mounts from the TCG rather than them being added at €50.00 in the shop . And they thought about it, that's for sure!
After that, once again in terms of good innovation... There is undoubtedly a little effort to be made, we grant you that. It sounds a bit like recycling, this way of bringing out already existing content to offer it to ordinary players... But it seems to us to be a good thing as it is!
A few days ago, hundreds of League of Legends players spoke out about being unjustly banned from the game. A bug related to the "Hearthsteel" item was pointed out, but in the end the explanation was been found elsewhere.
