Updated druid forms coming with next WoW patch
by Lesley Smith 
May 26th 2009 at 2:30PM
Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Patches, News items
The development page also explains how the new forms will work: "In our next major content patch, druids will find a host of new textures for two major forms, cat and bear. There will be five different designs for each of these forms for the Horde and Alliance. Night elves can choose to change their cat and bear look at any time by visiting the barber shop and changing their character's hair color, while tauren will be able to change which look they use by switching skin tones in the barber shop -- a new feature for tauren in the next major content patch. Given that there are more hair colors and skin tones than unique form looks, some colors and tones will overlap with these new textures. The hair and skin colors chosen will, in most cases, correspond with the color seen in the look of each form. Some similar colors that may share a particular cat texture will not necessarily share the same bear texture."
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
obsolete said on 2:45PM 5-26-2009
I got excited and then saw it was just new textures not new forms.
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Halldorr said on 4:51PM 5-26-2009
While they are only SLIGHTLY different, I agree that it's *yawn*. All this talk about new form and they recolor the existing models with some very minimal details added.
tanek said on 3:02PM 5-26-2009
"revealing the first look at the six choices tauren will have for their bears"
I think it is really 5 choices, since the middle one on the bottom (aka Ye Olde Bear) is the current model in the game.
I like the update and the smoother look to the new models (I'm colorblind, so can't really appreciate the colors of the skins...some look a bit jarring to me), but the aspect I'm looking forward to? Having a bear that will finally be able to close its mouth. :)
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PeterD said on 3:18PM 5-26-2009
Except there's no evidence the bear will be able to close it's mouth in those screens. Those are all the same base model with a palette swap and minor textural changes. It's taken 4 1/2 years for Blizzard to do this, and all they do is swap some colors around?! If I hadn't quit ages ago anyway I'd be pissed :p
RogueJedi86 said on 3:58PM 5-26-2009
A Blizzard poster confirmed that they close, they're just roaring in the screenshots for dramatic effect.
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=17367879395&sid=1&pageNo=3#50
"Also, in the screenshots the bears are roaring, but when just sitting normally, their mouths will close in a toothy grin so to speak. "
crsh said on 3:23PM 5-26-2009
Nice, new skins for World of My Little Poneycraft.
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Holgar said on 4:54PM 5-26-2009
Go back to Darkfall
Neurotic said on 5:01PM 5-26-2009
"World of My Little Ponycraft", ha, I hadn't heard that one before.
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Neurotic said on 5:01PM 5-26-2009
Not that there's anything wrong with it of course.
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Russell Clarke said on 5:03PM 5-26-2009
Ooh! A ginger bear!
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Rhaegar said on 5:16PM 5-26-2009
Great...for feral druids. Give me a balance form that doesn't look like an obese jackalope and I might consider speccing balance. Better yet, give me a tree form that doesn't look like a crusty old man and I might be able to stand looking at my character for long periods of time.
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Myria said on 5:16PM 5-26-2009
Wow, seriously underwhelming. Four years and the best they can come up with is recoloured skins over the same old ultra-low poly hideous models? A new paintjob on a Yugo doesn't make it worth anything. The forms needed to to go back to the drawing board entirely, starting with don't make them bloody obviously male when a goodly percentage of characters shifting into them and people playing those characters are female. How frelling hard is that one to figure out?
The only consolation is there's so few ferals left after all of the gear nerfs (green armor and BoT, how I miss thee...) that no one's seen a bear in so long it doesn't matter what they spew out, it'll seem new. I could log on now, stand in the middle of Dalaran, shapeshift to bear, tell everyone I'm in one of the new forms, and good luck finding anyone who'd know differently.
Admittedly in general the inhabitants of my server aren't blessed with much in the way of brights or long memories, but still...
After this I'm almost afraid to see what they're going to do with tree and lazer chicken, though I'm guessing it'll be another couple of years before they manage to recolour their skins and call it new and exciting. For that matter, what about the four-year-old placeholder that is cheetah, or the *shudder* swim form?
They should have done swim form first. No matter what they did to that abomination it'd be an improvement.
My druid was my second seventy and first eighty, I've played every class in the game (five of them to eighty) except hunter, by far my favorite for pure unadulterated fun is my tauren druid. The hideous forms, especially tauren kitty, have long been a blight on the class, big improvements on that front might just have been enough to draw me back into the game for something other then once-a-week egg checks. This, though, this ain't it, this is just another reason to cancel and be done with it for a good long while.
Epic flight form is one of the most beautiful and detailed models in the game, just awesome work. The rest of the forms should be like that, not this... Ugh, did somebody spill hair dye on the retarded bear again?
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obsolete said on 6:25PM 5-26-2009
I was interested but then you hit your 140 character limit :(.
Russell Clarke said on 7:39PM 5-26-2009
Wow, you got to 140?
Tom said on 10:01PM 5-26-2009
As it happens, I have a 68 tauren druid and, while the bear form is kind of meh on both night elves and taurens (I have always hated the gaping mouth), the cat form for taurens is a mutant abomination of the highest order. Yet, because I mostly solo the druid, the hideous cat form is just about all I ever see.
If the "new" tauren cat form is simply different colors of the previous horrific model, I'm going to be extremely disappointed.
Hunters can tame any cat or bear they like as a pet; it's a pity WoW doesn't offer druids the power go go "meld" with the cat or bear form of their choice. There are much better cat and bear models in WoW than the ones currently used for druids.
-Drexel- said on 6:04PM 5-26-2009
Underwhelming...like really, really underwhelming. I could have done that in paint shop.
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kia said on 11:34PM 5-26-2009
I agree this is underwhelming, to say the least. Given how desired new forms are by the druid community, how long Blizzard supposedly worked on this and how they promised the new FORMS would be amazing, to see some different skins with a couple stripes is... just lame. And while they *say* the mouths shut, I don't see the evidence of this. I don't trust Blizzard saying "just wait!!! The mouths will shut" as proof. Maybe if they hadn't blatantly lied about aerial combat and dance studios in the expansion, I'd be more inclined to believe them.
I used to be 100% supportive of Blizzard, but the bigger the game gets the more disappointing it is.
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Schmidt said on 4:10AM 5-27-2009
Is that the best thing they can do? Sheesh. Call me uncontented but I believe they can do more than this. Please no disappointmens, I've had tons of this. Sad to say my Rogue and Death Knight doesn't have the best gears and mounts yet since I didn't have enough gold. So, I tried my luck and I submitted an entry for a contest that can win me 500,000 gold just by simply giving a name to the twitter pig! You can try your luck as well, just visit: wowgoldpig.blogspot.com
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Cicadymn said on 3:14PM 5-27-2009
I'd consider coming back. But I really want them to make it so every class can start at 55. You can learn to play a class fine from 55 to 70 and you'll be more then ready by the time you're eighty. Death Knights are the new Night Elf Hunters so it doesn't encourage me to come back for that. But I'd really like a priest or a pally or maybe even a druid, but to grind 80 levels rather then 25 just sounds like a nightmare.
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Stan said on 10:47PM 5-27-2009
Why don't they just allow druids to shapeshift based on ingame animals? They could make it very similar to how hunters get different pets. If I'm a druid that prefers the arctic I could mimic a polar bear or if I favor the plains I could mimic a lion, etc. There would be a ton of different skins to choose from then. The arm ties and ornaments just seems silly to me.
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