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[HarryDemeanor]

I still can't see them, but 4.3 is still far away, might be a placeholder model right?

Right?

They wouldn't have shown them off like that if they were placeholder.

Pretty damn disappointing.

 

[CarbonatedFalcon]

About the bear - the bronze drake may have required some skill early on, but certainly not for long with the abundance of epic weapons/armor available even in 3.0. It's the same effect of gear inflation/experience with the instance, just in a different context.

Nothing Blizzard ever puts in a 5-man can (or will ever be) exceedingly difficult to accomplish. You could send inexperienced (though level 85 and decently geared players) to take on Heroic Lich King (hell maybe even regular for him...) or Yogg + 0 or (maybe) Algalon and they'd certainly wipe multiple times, even if they did eventually down the boss. (Pretty sure Heroic Anub'Arak could be cheesed now, so that's not a good example.)

On the other hand - it would be difficult for someone to wipe in a level 70 or 80 5-man solo (and certainly with a group) unless they significantly overpulled or had a bad encounter with one of the rare (if they even exist) insta-death mechanics in 5-mans.

 

[davepoobond]

The exact same model as the human horses, but with a different color?

they are the clydesdales horse ones. so they're bigger... i would think.

also, looks like they're bareback and no armor? unless they're adding armor ones later

 

[Bisnic]

About the bear - the bronze drake may have required some skill early on, but certainly not for long with the abundance of epic weapons/armor available even in 3.0. It's the same effect of gear inflation/experience with the instance, just in a different context.

I'm pretty sure the bronze drake was very easy to obtain much earlier than the bear. Pug bear runs still fail nowadays, while im sure the bronze drake could be done by monkeys after a few months.

 

[Angry Grimace]

Here's my experience after 2 weeks back

last night ICC 25 led by someone I know in game.
everyone rolled need on everything including tokens (that were not for their classes). Leader did say earlier to roll need on everything to make it easier (at the time it was a green drop). but still, i expected common courtesy on tokens and gear pieces (specially with 4.3 in mind).

Group failed at least 6 times on Sindy heroic. People didn't know how to do the ice block when they are targeted. didn't know to break out the ice blocked people. 24 85s failing on that...

The bear tank constantly throwing out, hey, this should be easy, because, you got 2 tanks, and you have me, the awesome tank, because, I am awesome!. Hey, look, *self buff*, I am over 350k HP! Uh, I am dead under her...I don't like this, mostly because I have killed her (Sindy) 30 times back in the days...

This same leader guy (ex guildie) has been making pug for tier 11 10 man raids (normal). Been inviting me to this new guild he's in...but if you are raiding T11 normal raids...and have to pug for more than half others in the group, why would I want to join? I have been also randomly guild invited at least 3 times a day on average (I look at that as being rude to do so).

my first week back, In this pug, I won a roll on a tanking piece, the other tank was like, hey, you have the rep piece (or boe 359), mine is blue, yours is best in slot...Immediately I just passed it to him...I didn't mind really but I was also thinking, hey, this is a pug...and this is only T11.

I just don't enjoy the game anymore. Mostly it is because the community doesn't feel the same. I feel like playing with a bunch of idiots. It feels like a lot of people left for similar reasons. That, and the long grind for the rep and world trees. So, I went ahead and cancelled my sub.

Seeing people ninja TBC raid drops also was depressing...it's like, wow community is really this sad

Oh and the dailies. They are horrible! While easy, there are not many of them so mostly you end up with the same quests everyday. Did I mention they are horrible? None of them is fun and you want me to repeat them how many more days, Blizzard? WHY?

This is a totally amazing incoherent rant

 

[CarbonatedFalcon]

I'm pretty sure the bronze drake was very easy to obtain much earlier than the bear. Pug bear runs still fail nowadays, while im sure the bronze drake could be done by monkeys after a few months.

That's why I said it's the same effect in a different context. Same thing is happening, just the variables to make it happen occurred much quicker with the drake than with the bear. Though I haven't played since before 4.1 (or at least didn't queue up for any dungeons in the small overlap when I may have still been subscribed), so I'm not sure how much more objectively difficult the bosses in ZA now are.

 

[Angry Grimace]

That's why I said it's the same effect in a different context. Same thing is happening, just the variables to make it happen occurred much quicker with the drake than with the bear. Though I haven't played since before 4.1 (or at least didn't queue up for any dungeons in the small overlap when I may have still been subscribed), so I'm not sure how much more objectively difficult the bosses in ZA now are.

People die all the time to them.

It's hard to argue that this is due to [insert GAFfer]'s competence either since the groups are generally randomized.

 

[Subliminal]

The bears aren't being given away, It still requires effort to meet the timers, ALOT harder (>.>) than the drake, which I think I got on my First heroic culling run when I just hit 80!

 

[Bisnic]

The bears aren't being given away, It still requires effort to meet the timers, ALOT easier than the drake, which I think I got on my First heroic culling run when I just hit 80!

I think you meant "ALOT harder than the drake".

 

[Rambaldi]

I would love to be able to get a "normal" horse as a Horde toon. I still want the Headless Horseman's mount just so I can have a horse at all (I don't count my Zhevra...) but I logged into my old human mage just to ride her horse with the purple eyes the other night. Loved that mount for some reason.

 

[Thoraxes]

I still can't see them, but 4.3 is still far away, might be a placeholder model right?

Right?

I wish they would've kept the cool worgen-wolf mount that they had in the concept art for them. It's a lot better than another horse anyways.

 

[HarryDemeanor]

I wish they would've kept the cool worgen-wolf mount that they had in the concept art for them. It's a lot better than another horse anyways.

I agree. It's way better than the standard horses they're putting in 4.3.

 

[CarbonatedFalcon]

I forgot about that concept art (and I even have the art book from the CE!)

That style is definitely way better than just plain horses. Like a more savage/aerodynamic orc wolf.

 

[Bisnic]

I would love to be able to get a "normal" horse as a Horde toon. I still want the Headless Horseman's mount just so I can have a horse at all (I don't count my Zhevra...) but I logged into my old human mage just to ride her horse with the purple eyes the other night. Loved that mount for some reason.

You can get http://www.wowhead.com/item=47180, which is pretty much a paladin mount for horde and alliance, argent style.

 

[Rambaldi]

You can get http://www.wowhead.com/item=47180, which is pretty much a paladin mount for horde and alliance, argent style.

I had completely forgotten about this mount! Guess it's time to start doing another set of dailies. :|

thank you!

 

[Angry Grimace]

It's kind of funny to see someone actually wanting a horse. Like 50% of the alliance mounts are horses, or horses with wings. The only really cool one is the Headless Horseman's mount. That one is just badass. I've got it on one toon out of 10.

 

[Azwethinkweiz]

It's kind of funny to see someone actually wanting a horse. Like 50% of the alliance mounts are horses, or horses with wings. The only really cool one is the Headless Horseman's mount. That one is just badass. I've got it on one toon out of 10.

You don't like the mount Arthas drops?

 

[Angry Grimace]

You don't like the mount Arthas drops?

It's too large.

 

[devildog820]

So some WoW nerd has already come out with a web site where you can mix and match gear from all the tiers and see what it looks like, right? And tells you the drop location? Right?!

 

[Pollux]

I agree. It's way better than the standard horses they're putting in 4.3.

why the hell did we not get this. blizzard get on it.

 

[Angry Grimace]

So I got 150 marks for both Firelands factions, and the reward is...nothing?

FU Blizzard

(I knew it was coming, but it's still serious bullshit that you get a frontloaded reward with the first vendor, and then you get absolutely nothing for several weeks.)

 

[Alucrid]

Sometimes I feel bad about being a worgen hunter enslaving a wolf as a pet.

 

[Bisnic]

So some WoW nerd has already come out with a web site where you can mix and match gear from all the tiers and see what it looks like, right? And tells you the drop location? Right?!

Wowhead has something like that yeah.

So I got 150 marks for both Firelands factions, and the reward is...nothing?

FU Blizzard

(I knew it was coming, but it's still serious bullshit that you get a frontloaded reward with the first vendor, and then you get absolutely nothing for several weeks.)

"Several weeks" is a bit much, you can get more marks everyday after a while, and you only need 125 to unlock a new vendor and there is 3 of them. And with around 25 marks a day, it takes 5 days to complete one 125 marks quest.

I'd say it takes 1 month to unlock everything from the first time you start these dailies until you reach the last vendor and the fire hippogryph.

 

[Angry Grimace]

Wowhead has something like that yeah.



"Several weeks" is a bit much, you can get more marks everyday after a while, and you only need 125 to unlock a new vendor and there is 3 of them. And with around 25 marks a day, it takes 5 days to complete one 125 marks quest.

I'd say it takes 1 month to unlock everything from the first time you start these dailies until you reach the last vendor and the fire hippogryph.

Not a stretch at all. First off, you have to get the 150 without the benefit of the faction specific quests so you only get 14 marks a day for the first one. Then you have 25 a day to get the next 150, and then you need another 375 of them @ 25/day.

It takes 5 days to get 125 marks, so with three more vendors, it takes like what, 3 weeks or so to get em all. I suppose you could do it in 2, but that would mean I happened to log on and do every daily every day, which is unlikely. And you're forgetting you get acess to the

 

[Bisnic]

Not a stretch at all. First off, you have to get the 150 without the benefit of the faction specific quests so you only get 14 marks a day for the first one. Then you have 25 a day to get the next 150, and then you need another 375 of them @ 25/day.

It takes 5 days to get 125 marks, so with three more vendors, it takes like what, 3 weeks or so to get em all. I suppose you could do it in 2, but that would mean I happened to log on and do every daily every day, which is unlikely. And you're forgetting you get acess to the

15 days is more like 2 weeks than 3 weeks.

But yeah, the most painful part is the beginning since 14 marks a day when 150 is your goal feels like its taking forever. While 25 marks a day when 125 is your goal goes rather fast.

And what did i forget? :lol

 

[Angry Grimace]

15 days is more like 2 weeks than 3 weeks.

But yeah, the most painful part is the beginning since 14 marks a day when 150 is your goal feels like its taking forever. While 25 marks a day when 125 is your goal goes rather fast.

And what did i forget? :lol

That's only true if you forget the initial grind to even have the option to use the 125 marks on a vendor, and I added in that I rarely do all 15 quests EVERY day. More like I'll get it done 5 out of 7 days, or sometimes even 4.

 

[Xtyle]

While all these dailies are easy and can be done within an hour or so. They are a bore. I am on my second 150 marks and I am already annoyed that I have to log on to do these shitty same quests everyday. Imagine doing these for over a month..sure I don't have to do them if I don't want to, but these are "contents", right. And I am curious about the rewards.

 

[ampere]

The Molten Front dailies do get a bit old after a while, but they aren't nearly as tedious as the Argent Tournament dailies.

The phasing is neat too.

While all these dailies are easy and can be done within an hour or so. They are a bore. I am on my second 150 marks and I am already annoyed that I have to log on to do these shitty same quests everyday. Imagine doing these for over a month..sure I don't have to do them if I don't want to, but these are "contents", right. And I am curious about the rewards.

Personally I kept myself interested by trying to do all of the achievements for the dailies. It was decent fun.

 

[Bisnic]

The Molten Front dailies do get a bit old after a while, but they aren't nearly as tedious as the Argent Tournament dailies.

Ugh, don't remind me. They put so many mounts and companions in there to keep people doing these dailies literally for MONTHS. At least the Molten Front ones can be ignored after a month.

 

[TheYanger]

the only reason the tournament ones were worse was the jousting. Molten front is terrible as well, make no bones about it.

 

[Angry Grimace]

The Molten Front dailies do get a bit old after a while, but they aren't nearly as tedious as the Argent Tournament dailies.

The phasing is neat too.



Personally I kept myself interested by trying to do all of the achievements for the dailies. It was decent fun.

All I have left for Flamebreaker are the various named Elemental Elites and the "do a duel" part.

I may never get it since my mage can't solo the elites at all and due to Kelbnar spawning in the path of where every single person does the daily meaning you can virtually never successfully tag him.

 

[Xtyle]

The Molten Font dailies are concentrated to 1 zone so that's better in my opinion. The Argent Tournament ones had you travel to zones far away and such which was a huge time waste

 

[PhoenixDark]

The jousting was fun imo. Nice quick quests. I got my 125 marks for the molten front, then got...no reward. Just unlocked more quests. I stopped playing for a month after that shit.

 

[TheYanger]

All I have left for Flamebreaker are the various named Elemental Elites and the "do a duel" part.

I may never get it since my mage can't solo the elites at all and due to Kelbnar spawning in the path of where every single person does the daily meaning you can virtually never successfully tag him.

Go with your daily active so the druids will help, any class can solo the elites with them. Also, the way those mobs spawn makes it incredibly easy to camp (one after the other with a 2 hour respawn on the whole thing). Tagging the dog is easy, he's not really right in the middle there, and people that aren't ready for him and just tag willy nilly tend to die, he's the hardest one.

 

[TheYanger]

The jousting was fun imo. Nice quick quests. I got my 125 marks for the molten front, then got...no reward. Just unlocked more quests. I stopped playing for a month after that shit.

Any 125 mark unlock gets you rewards in the form of a vendor. All 3 of them, with seperate vendors. You did NOT just get 'more dailies'

 

[PhoenixDark]

Any 125 mark unlock gets you rewards in the form of a vendor. All 3 of them, with seperate vendors. You did NOT just get 'more dailies'

Where's the vendor?

 

[TheYanger]

Where's the vendor?

Depends on which one you did, they're all right there in the molten front though. Armaments vendor is inside the tree, moonwell vendor is by the moonwell, ancients vendor is standing by the ancients, also near the moonwell.

 

[Angry Grimace]

Go with your daily active so the druids will help, any class can solo the elites with them. Also, the way those mobs spawn makes it incredibly easy to camp (one after the other with a 2 hour respawn on the whole thing). Tagging the dog is easy, he's not really right in the middle there, and people that aren't ready for him and just tag willy nilly tend to die, he's the hardest one.

If I specced Frost for it, I probably could do better, but I couldn't burn through Searris fast enough to get him down even with a tanking npc + Chromie giving me heroism every minute.

The problem with the dog is that people will tag him and then others will help them down him because they don't realize you only get credit if you tag.

 

[Bisnic]

If I specced Frost for it, I probably could do better, but I couldn't burn through Searris fast enough to get him down even with a tanking npc + Chromie giving me heroism every minute.

The problem with the dog is that people will tag him and then others will help them down him because they don't realize you only get credit if you tag.

Yeah i wish Blizzard would change how those elites tagging works, its in pain in a game such as wow where everyone do quests alone. I had to get a small group of guildies to do it.

 

[Angry Grimace]

Yeah i wish Blizzard would change how those elites tagging works, its in pain in a game such as wow where everyone do quests alone. I had to get a small group of guildies to do it.

It isn't even labeled as a group quest. There's no real reason why it shouldn't operate on the same tagging system as you know, every other quest in that area.

 

[TheYanger]

Well I mean, it's an achievement, not a quest. It's entirely possible to solo (You can't tell me the tag is hard to get when you're CAMPING it, cause it's not), and if you can't solo it ti doesn't seem unreasonable to ask for a little help. There's no tangible reward for doing it, why should it be dirt easy?

 

[Angry Grimace]

Well I mean, it's an achievement, not a quest. It's entirely possible to solo (You can't tell me the tag is hard to get when you're CAMPING it, cause it's not), and if you can't solo it ti doesn't seem unreasonable to ask for a little help. There's no tangible reward for doing it, why should it be dirt easy?

Because the problem on populated servers is that Sethria's Roost has 10+ players in it at any given time and pretty much all of them will immediately tag the elites when they pop.

 

[TheYanger]

Because the problem on populated servers is that Sethria's Roost has 10+ players in it at any given time and pretty much all of them will immediately tag the elites when they pop.

If they're not actively camping them (and if they are, you should really group up) and you are, I have ZERO belief that you won't get a tag before them. People don't just happen to see something spawn while going about their business and beat you to a tag when you're camping the dang mob. He spawns on an exact spot, and it's not where anything else spawns (ONE molten giant spawns in its general vicinity, the rest is just in visual range, big difference).

 

[Bisnic]

Some stuff about 4.3 and what's after Cataclysm from interviews. Source MMO champion

Glad to see that the suppostion i had in mind months ago about the Deathwing fight being on his back appear to be real.

But what are WE going to fight on his back? Surely there will be more than attacking his scales while avoiding lava flowing through his body. If there is a lot of adds on his back, that will just be hilarious. Poor Deathwing.

Patch 4.3

If you add up all of the Deathwing encounter stages, it will be the longest fight in the game.
Each stage of the fight will take place in a different location and offer some loot.
The encounter starts at Wyrmrest Temple, progressing toward the players being on Deathwing's back while he is flying toward The Maelstrom.
The new five man encounters will build up to the Deathwing fight, similar to how the Icecrown five man instances built up to the Lich King.
To combat the complaints of armor always looking the same, there is a sub-lead who is in charge of guiding the art team to produce new styles not found in the game yet.


After Cataclysm

More armor customization could be coming in the future; Transmogrification was a solution that could be finished in time for Patch 4.3.
After Patch 4.3, and the world event, the team is going to focus on keeping players entertained and enjoying the game.
There are more people that played World of Warcraft, but no longer play World of Warcraft, than the number of people that currently play World of Warcraft. They want to lower the barrier to entry and find some way to bring back players that no longer play.
On Mists of Pandaria: "Most of the time when we do anything panda-related it's going to be a comic book or a figurine or something like that."
They realize some people quit because they made the content more accessible to everyone and it no longer felt elite.
Raids are significantly harder than they were in WotLK, but the rewards are not much better than heroic five man rewards. This causes a lack of motivation to raid.
They believe that each spec plays like a separate class, making the game feel as if there are 30 classes.
Player created content is still in the back of their minds because of how well it worked in Starcraft II. Developing tools for players would take a lot of work, but the reward would be great as well.

 

[markot]

>_<

So they dont know why wow is losing subs, too bad.

 

[CarbonatedFalcon]

So if the Deathwing Fight starts at Wyrmrest, then maybe the instance portal will be there? Unless they do something unconventional like having the portal be in a capital city or something (portal to Maelstrom, with portal to instance from there?)

Otherwise a raid portal in Deepholm would probably make the most sense (why they didn't put a raid in there, I won't understand - the zone has a great thematic.)

And I'm still curious as to how this is all going to work out if Deathwing is multiple phases with different phases dropping loot. Surely we won't be facing just him? If Deathwing counts as 3-4 encounters, I'd still like to face at least 6-7 other flunkies somewhere.

Other than that, I'm thankful that they're thinking about implementing a way for players to create content in WoW. It's something that needs to happen sooner or later and would be a reason to keep coming back to the game years down the road if the folks at Blizzard themselves had stopped fully supporting the game (we're talking post-subscription here probably). Could you just imagine in players had access to quest and encounter scripting tools? I'd love to get my hands on those.

 

[Rambaldi]

It's kind of funny to see someone actually wanting a horse. Like 50% of the alliance mounts are horses, or horses with wings. The only really cool one is the Headless Horseman's mount. That one is just badass. I've got it on one toon out of 10.

I don't really see how it's that funny. I just like horses and I play horde / collect mounts. :B

 

[wonderdung]

If you add up all of the Deathwing encounter stages, it will be the longest fight in the game.
Each stage of the fight will take place in a different location and offer some loot.

Cute. I was joking with some people in my guild who hadn't seen the fight that Sinestra drops loot every 30%... I guess Blizzard monitors guild chat for good ideas!

But uh... longest fight in the game? No thanks. 20 minute fights are really annoying... maybe there should be a holodeck or something where you can practice any phase of any boss fight with no loot drops or gear damage. Will never happen, probably not even a good idea. But 20 minute boss fights... I hate wiping after 15 minutes every pull.

 

[Mairu]

They want to lower the barrier to entry and find some way to bring back players that no longer play.

followed by

They realize some people quit because they made the content more accessible to everyone and it no longer felt elite.

What???????? :|

 

[CarbonatedFalcon]

They want to lower the barrier to entry and find some way to bring back players that no longer play.

followed by

They realize some people quit because they made the content more accessible to everyone and it no longer felt elite.

What???????? :|

Again, this is where something like heroic questing would come in. Have the base raid content being somewhat challenging especially early on in the lifecycle of a raid, but eventually doable by most competent raiders, with the heroic content stratifying guilds at different skill levels. I think it's difficult for them to change momentum and get it right now though after introducing heroic/bonus loot encounters with Wrath, especially after moving on from the modular format of Ulduar for heroic bosses (OH GOD PLEASE BRING THAT STYLE BACK).

Blizzard had raiding done right more often than not before heroic raids and up until Ulduar. After Ulduar, there has always been the issue of a couple bosses that everyone gets stuck on after breezing through everything else. This may be a side effect of just not having released a raid since that has rivaled Ulduar in overall quality (ICC was still good though and maybe an 8 to Ulduar's 10).

To make up for raids being initially a more challenging, you increase the gradation of challenge with heroic quests that teach raid (and dungeon) mechanics that aren't otherwise taught in the game without the chance of failure among peers.

Thinking a little bit more - Blizzard kind of set themselves up for this with the merging of 10 and 25 man difficulties. 10s were a testing or learning ground for more with (usually) more room for error that you could take someone new to without them feeling much pressure compared to 25s being the main "serious" affair. Merged lockouts sort of destroyed this as a (unintended?) side effect. 10s were filling a niche that Blizzard didn't realize it needed?

Other than that I think T11 was brutal on the average player for several reasons and overall a design flaw. You have the raids being pretty challenging on one hand: specifically, you have complicated introductory bosses (Omnotron with it's random nature, many abilities, and multi-targeting. Halfus with multi-targeting, random nature (weekly though! /ha) and somewhat high amount of abilities. And Conclave of Wind which might be objectively more confusing than the other two I already mentioned, with the need to split up and coordinate the raid delicately on different platforms - something pretty unconventional. Magmaw is the least complex out of all the first bosses you have access too, and while he's not as objectively difficult or complex as the other bosses, he's still not entirely a pushover.) Now I don't want to get into specifics here since I still have other things to address, but if you look at almost all raid tiers before T11 (certainly throughout Wrath), there is at least one intro boss in the tier that is pretty much a complete walkover.

Combined with difficult intro bosses in the raids, you have difficult heroics with loot of underwhelming value in comparison to their difficulty. Now I'm not sure how easy they've gotten with all the nerfs by now (and with inflating gear levels), but I completed all the heroics for the first time within 3 weeks of Cataclysm launching (most closer or less than two weeks) before a lot of the harder nerfs hit. Doing some of those dungeons in sub-heroic blues or greens was challenging for me at times (though I enjoy that kind of challenge), even with a group of trusted people. Certainly the average or below-average player would be absolutely struggling and would definitely be in a significantly worse situation with a dungeon finder group - especially coming off the dungeon finder during the Wrath era which wasn't even introduced until patch 3.3! So you have dungeons that across the board were closer to difficulty with the ICC 5-mans without providing any epic loot as a boost. Underwhelming craftables too with nothing as ubiquitous as the Titansteel Destroyer.

All in all we had a perfect storm of many elements at launch that ruined accessibility for most average players and the inexcusably langorous pace of content updates for all players is why they've had a subscriber drop.

TL,DR; I didn't even cover every single thing or summarize it properly (post was getting too long already), but I could write a fucking dissertation on where WoW has gone wrong in the past 9 months. Maybe I will and send it to Blizzard...

Maybe a lot of it's just hindsight now, but it's something for the developers to take into account in the future.