WoW devs confirm huge Heroic & Mythic dungeon changes in Dragonflight Season 4

The developers behind World of Warcraft have been asking the community for feedback on the current dungeon systems. As a result, they have announced a raft of changes that will overhaul the way Heroic and Mythic dungeons work.

In recent months, calls for certain changes to dungeons in WoW have grown louder. The relative unimportance of Heroic Difficulty has been a particular point of contention, thanks to the fact that players very quickly out scale the rewards on offer.

Additionally, there are concerns about the progression to higher-difficulty Mythic+ dungeons being restrictive. All of that in mind, Blizzard is instituting several significant changes that will alter the way many dungeons function in Season 4.

Read on for everything you need to know about what’s to come.

Dungeon difficulty restructuring is the biggest update

In an official post on the World of Warcraft website, the developer detailed how dungeons would be adjusted. Specifically, this means the following tangible alterations will occur:

• Heroic difficulty and rewards will move up to roughly the current level of Mythic 0. These dungeons will remain available to queue into via Group Finder (default hotkey: “I”), though the item level requirement to queue will also go up accordingly.
• Mythic 0 difficulty and rewards will move up to roughly the current level of Mythic 8-10. This is a bit hand-wavy but numerically, it’s close to M10. Not having a timer at all or affixes really offsets that quite a bit).
• The existing Mythic+ system will pick up where that leaves off, such that a Mythic 5 in Season 4 is roughly equivalent in difficulty, rewards, and M+ Rating awarded, to a Mythic 15 today.

These changes should bring Heroic dungeons back to prolonged relevance. Additionally, some significant alterations to Mythics make them significantly harder. How this will affect the levels that players can push keys to is unclear, but it’s likely that numbers in the late 20s and early 30s will be near impossible.

Mythic+ timer changes should allow for class experimentation

The mitigation for the above is that the timer is technically being removed from some Mythics. Up to the equivalent of current +10s the timer will no longer play a role. Though Mythic +1 and beyond will have a timer in Season 4, this is the equivalent of a +10 if you log in today and it should take longer to get to this point.

This is detailed by the developer as follows:

• Mythic
  • The tuning and rewards of this difficulty are increasing to the equivalent of a +10 dungeon with affixes in the current 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 pressures of the current Mythic+ system.
  • Mythic 0 is still on a weekly lockout under this model.
• Mythic+
  • The Mythic+ system will have rewards up to level 10, with +2 starting from what would regularly be a +11 in the current Mythic+ system.
    • A +5 should be as hard as a +15, and a +10 should be as hard as a +20 in the current Mythic+ system etc.
  • Affixes would slot in at +2, +5, and +10
    • +2 – Fortified/Tyrannical
    • +5 – Entangling / Incorporeal etc.
    • +10 – 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.

That is all a little confusing but they also offer a helpful visual aid designed to clarify the situation somewhat.

That’s the complete list of changes at the time of writing. Additionally, it’s important to note that Blizzard has confirmed that this will be the system in place when The War Within launches later in 2024.