Classic Flight Style, Classic Mounts – Let Them Fly Right!

In Development Mists of Pandaria Classic Beta
1

Hey everyone,
I’ve noticed something in the MoP Beta and Cataclysm Classic that’s really been bothering me — the updated flight animations for the cloud serpents.

Back in MoP (and still today in Retail), cloud serpents have a smooth, flowing flight animation when using the classic flying system (i.e., not dragonriding). They glide through the air with elegance and grace, which always made them some of my favorite mounts.

In Cataclysm Classic, though, things are different. The Sha-touched Cloud Serpent that comes with the pre-order bonus uses a completely different animation — and, frankly, it looks terrible. It feels stiff, unnatural, and just… wrong compared to the original.

If Blizzard wants to give the pre-order mount a unique look, fine. But if this new animation is going to be applied to all MoP cloud serpents, I’ll be really disappointed. No matter how beautiful or rare they are, I honestly wouldn’t want to use them with this clunky new flight style.

Don’t get me wrong — I’m not against changes in Classic. I welcome QoL improvements, new mounts, toys, TCG items, and all that good stuff. But changing the entire flight style of an iconic mount? That’s a bit too much in my opinion. I really hope Blizzard reconsiders and restores the original cloud serpent animations — at least for the classic MoP versions.

What do you all think? Am I the only one bothered by this?

2

Are you sure you’re referring to both Cataclysm and MoP beta? In the beta there’s a known bug with cloud serpents using swimming animation instead of flying one, but in live Cata I don’t see any animation differences from cloud serpents on retail (yes, I do have the Sha-Touched one).

3

I just did a quick test, and it looks like the current state is that the cloud serpents now have the correct flying animation. Up until recently, they still used the swimming animation you described. However, this seems to have been fixed, as the Sha mount in Cataclysm Classic is now flying properly as well. I will test this further on the beta as soon as it’s back up.