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[traveler]

thats whats blizz does best, but unless they been playing stupid this whole time(which is a possibility)they said working flying mounts into Azeroth was just to much of a task and they rather use there time on new stuff. Well we will see at Blizzcon next year most likely :lol

Which is why it makes perfect sense as part of the next expansion. Allowing flying mounts in Old Azeroth when all eyes are on Outland or Northrend would be a waste of their time. Introducing them to Old Azeroth just as they're revamping Old Azeroth itself as the new main attraction, on the other hand, would be a logical move.

 

[Grampasso]

I just hope FFXIV or Kotor online comes first to divert my attention.

I don't think you should worry about that

Spoiler

Onyxia revamp has been announced for 3.2.2, and it won't happen for at least 3 months from now. Then Icecrown Citadel which will last at least 4 months before the release of the new exp, but I think there will be another patch before it, with another raid (a la Sunwell Plateau). So my bet is roughly 1 year before next expansion

And this^ yeah. The "Old" Azeroth would actually be a new zone, which would take the place of the old one. They wouldn't implement flying mounts in original zones.

 

[border]

The more recent blue post I can find on Azeroth remodeling is this one from June 2009:

http://wowraid.com/tracker/b3/t17899682265/why-wont-blizzard-finish-azeroth.html

Why won't Blizzard finish Azeroth?

With any design decision we make, time is ultimately the limiting factor... not money. One's development team can only be so big before it becomes bloated, unfocused, or immobile. We have a great team of employees working to develop World of Warcraft, and there's a good sense of community within the team even as big as it is.

Flying in Azeroth would be pretty awesome. There are almost limitless amounts of features we'd like to add to the game, and flying in the old world is certainly one of them. It all comes down to prioritizing as best as possible to keep the game appealing to as broad a population as possible. We try to keep all sub-communities and play styles in mind whenever working on content, and we're always looking at the big picture. Features being added in the next patch are features that were planned and in production months ago, just as features coming further down the road are in development right now.

Azeroth will never be "finished" in the sense that we want the world to continue to evolve and feel alive, so the player gets the feeling that he or she is a part of the continuing Warcraft storyline.

It kinda sounds like they have given the idea the brush off to me.

 

[critch]

If this is true, I'll come back.

Damn it :lol

 

[speedpop]

I fail to see a "we won't be developing Azeroth anymore".

 

[Jet Grind Radio!]

goblins where part of the horde in wc2

Iunno. Didn't play any of the RTS', but I'd still like a race that goes between the two factions. Hell, even a merchant class would kinda be awesome.

 

[HomShaBom]

I don't think you should worry about that

Spoiler

Onyxia revamp has been announced for 3.2.2, and it won't happen for at least 3 months from now. Then Icecrown Citadel which will last at least 4 months before the release of the new exp, but I think there will be another patch before it, with another raid (a la Sunwell Plateau). So my bet is roughly 1 year before next expansion

3 Months? It's already on PTR bro. Won't be that long at all.

 

[yankeeforever2]

Which is why it makes perfect sense as part of the next expansion. Allowing flying mounts in Old Azeroth when all eyes are on Outland or Northrend would be a waste of their time. Introducing them to Old Azeroth just as they're revamping Old Azeroth itself would make perfect sense.

yeah its does make perfect sense lore and development wise, but I just want to see how its done, really Azeroth is huge and there is alot they would have to do development wise to make this happen which means this isn't coming for a while or they been working on this for a long time.

 

[Kobe]

Wow i hope this is true. it sounds fantastic. the last xpac felt very rushed. made me quit unlike TBC.

 

[Deadly]

Still no playable Pandaren, huh?

All the lore stuff sounds great, but the new races definitely leave something to be desired.

EDIT: Actually, looking at that zone list, it would appear that Pandaria was at some point planned as a starting zone for the next expansion after this. Well, here's hoping that's still happening. Pandas are awesome.

Isn't there some rule made by China which prevents the use of pandas?

 

[gottalovetheglove]

Nah, we've been following this list almost to a tee ever since it leaked way back when:


It's gotten somewhat less accurate over time, but considering it's supposedly from 2003, it's been really solid so far.

I don't want to bring 'The List' back into debate, but I really wouldn't follow it too closely. Blizz mentioned that having 2 starting areas for Northrend was the result of Hellfire Peninsula being too crowded when the expansion was released. The first appearance of 'The List' that's still on the internet is from after WotLK was announced and Blizz mentioned that fact.

But yeah, I do want to see how Blizz handle the phasing that they'll have to do for this expansion. It'll put a strain on their servers if they do it the way people are describing here.

 

[cartoon_soldier]

I would really become very uninsterested in WoW with such Lore changes.

1. Malfurion has nothing to do with the Council or Trisfal.
2. The New Council of Trisfal was only recently formed and Thrall is not a member of it. If anything Med'an should be the next Guardian of Trisfal
3. Medivh was the LAST Guardian of Trisfal, as in he was supposed to be the last guardian Azeroth would ever need.
4. How the hell does Thrall a Shaman become the Guardian.

 

[falastini]

wow.com posted something similar a few days ago according to "multiple sources"... take it for what you will.

http://www.wow.com/2009/08/10/cataclysm-races-leaked/

They corroborate the races at least.

 

[Banana Kid]

Isn't there some rule made by China which prevents the use of pandas?

I don't think that's ever been confirmed. As far as we know, that's still just rumor.

The main example used against it is that you could totally kill pandas in Warcraft 3, and that game's still sold over there. It's still pretty unclear one way or the other.

 

[Grampasso]

3 Months? It's already on PTR bro. Won't be that long at all.

Well, there will be a 3.2.1 before the 3.2.2 And 3.2 is just out. Plus the 3.2 patch seems pretty much fucked up (and developers themselves admitted it was rushed)...

 

[cartoon_soldier]

wow.com posted something similar a few days ago according to "multiple sources"... take it for what you will.

http://www.wow.com/2009/08/10/cataclysm-races-leaked/

They corroborate the races at least.

Yea, I think the new races sound fine.

All the Lore changes identified in the mmo champion post sound very bad.

 

[gottalovetheglove]

3 Months? It's already on PTR bro. Won't be that long at all.

I would say ~2 months. This is meant to be the 5 year anniversary patch, which is why Ony is getting revamped. I would hate for it to be out early, but whatever, it's Blizz's choice.

 

[speedpop]

I would really become very uninsterested in WoW with such Lore changes.

1. Malfurion has nothing to do with the Council or Trisfal.
2. The New Council of Trisfal was only recently formed and Thrall is not a member of it. If anything Med'an should be the next Guardian of Trisfal
3. Medivh was the LAST Guardian of Trisfal, as in he was supposed to be the last guardian Azeroth would ever need.
4. How the hell does Thrall a Shaman become the Guardian.

1. Malfurion will have a lot to do with the new Council, due to the importance of the Emerald Dream's corruption by the Old Gods. I imagine everything will be detailed perfectly in the new Stormrage book due out early next year.

2. Med'an is too young, and is still learning.

3. Who stubbed the "Last" title on him though? Himself? Or other people due to the Council of Tirisfal being broken apart?

4. The last Council were a group of Mages. This new group not only consists of non-Humans and non-Elves who aren't even Mages, but it also contains Jaina Proudmoore who we know has close ties to Thrall. Plus you're contradicting yourself - you're questioning why a Shaman should become the Guardian when you stated previously that Med'an should be... yet he uses Shamanistic powers as well.

 

[johnsmith]

I don't think you should worry about that

Spoiler

Onyxia revamp has been announced for 3.2.2, and it won't happen for at least 3 months from now. Then Icecrown Citadel which will last at least 4 months before the release of the new exp, but I think there will be another patch before it, with another raid (a la Sunwell Plateau). So my bet is roughly 1 year before next expansion

And this^ yeah. The "Old" Azeroth would actually be a new zone, which would take the place of the old one. They wouldn't implement flying mounts in original zones.

3.2.2 is coming out a lot sooner than 3 months. The new raid is already on the PTR.

 

[Door2Dawn]

I would really become very uninsterested in WoW with such Lore changes.

1. Malfurion has nothing to do with the Council or Trisfal.
2. The New Council of Trisfal was only recently formed and Thrall is not a member of it. If anything Med'an should be the next Guardian of Trisfal
3. Medivh was the LAST Guardian of Trisfal, as in he was supposed to be the last guardian Azeroth would ever need.
4. How the hell does Thrall a Shaman become the Guardian.

The warcraft brand belongs to blizzard and only blizzard. They can do whatever the hell they want with it.

 

[border]

wow.com posted something similar a few days ago according to "multiple sources"... take it for what you will.

http://www.wow.com/2009/08/10/cataclysm-races-leaked/

They corroborate the races at least.

The two new races have already been previously speculated about, after Worgen/Goblin Halloween masks were found in the game's data files. Of course nobody said much when even more new masks were found for other races were also found in the data files.

I'm mostly just skeptical because Blizzard is usually mega-tight about their announcements and when they screw up it's mostly because of an internal error (WoW-Europe.com posting something too early) and not because of a deliberate leak.

I doubt WoW Insider or MMO-Champion would deliberately mislead people and they are clearly staking a lot of their reputation on this stuff, so who knows? It's obviously generating a ton of clicks and views for their advertisers, and it's worth considering that as well.

 

[Banana Kid]

The warcraft brand belongs to blizzard and only blizzard. They can do whatever the hell they want with it.

This pretty much sums it up. If Blizzard wants to do something with the lore, they'll fucking make it work. The Draenei were a huge stretch, but they came out awesome and the universe is better for it now. They'll figure it out.

 

[Alex]

You act as if they haven't run the existing lore through a paper shredder already. At least a world changing event would be awesome between the retcons and non-stop pop culture jokes.

Of course that's easier for me to say because I've never cared for Warcraft lore.

If I could have one feature in an expansion it would be:


Difficulty.

Somewhere, anywhere outside of hard mode raids. My main complaints about World of Warcraft and why even after three or four years of playing it that I don't find it very memorable is that:

1.) I've never once felt challenged by the game at all in PvE, even in hard mode raids I always felt like it was one of the twenty three (I perpetually duo'd with my best friend) other people. I'm not the best player in the world, and I'm getting old now! Almost 24! But I do play a damn fine Priest and I am good at blaming people.

2.) I dont like the story or characters, this is a personal thing that I don't put any blame on the game for.

I would sign right back on if they'd announce some systems to really make questing and small dungeons a progressive, challenging experience. Even if it was just silly shit like limiters from FFTA or Fable or what the fuck ever. I like hard games and I like team oriented games.

WoW is so easy to pick up, I just wish they could combine that ease in conjunction with systems or options that really made it feel meaningful to quest with a friend or do small dungeons when it wasn't raid time.

It just makes me sad that I have all these memories of really difficult situations from leveling in FFXI back around launch or playing two player Monster Hunter and beating insane encounters through pure skill, but I dont really have any memories like that of WoW. Just mow through quests to get to cap so it feels right to be in a team again.

Challenging RPGs where you just barely scrape by encounters by the skin of your teeth is my favorite thing in all of gaming.

 

[speedpop]

I doubt WoW Insider or MMO-Champion would deliberately mislead people and they are clearly staking a lot of their reputation on this stuff, so who knows? It's obviously generating a ton of clicks and views for their advertisers, and it's worth considering that as well.

Where does this put Blizzplanet.com then? They've been at the forefront of all of this speculation, at times pumping out information before any other WoW fansite. They have definite close ties to Blizzard themselves and the lore community as a whole, and this new information being sprouted by MMO-Champion is basically already known by anyone who regularly visits Blizzplanet. Heck I was making posts of this same nature on the WoW thread hours/days previously.

The only thing that comes as a surprise is Cairne Bloodhoof being off'd, and Thrall being designated as the next Guardian.

 

[Zaptruder]

If the entire population of people over level 80 are in a phased version of Azeroth, how are they going to interact with anyone besides people over 80?

Party flags? non phased areas of azeroth?

 

[speedpop]

Challenging RPGs where you just barely scrape by encounters by the skin of your teeth is my favorite thing in all of gaming.

Blizzard's never been one to add in difficulty levels in any of their games. In a sense they are the Nintendo of PC developers - each game is able to be played from start to completion by anyone.

 

[Alex]

Party flags? non phased areas of azeroth?

GHOSTS. All Lv 80's die in the Cataclysm and the version of Azeroth they play in is revealed to be hell at the end of the game!

This expansion is directed by M. Night Shyamalan

 

[border]

Party flags? non phased areas of azeroth?

I suspect that they can get away with having major cities unphased, and perhaps letting high level players phase-down to help lowbies that they are in a party with. But you'd still have 1 major segment of the population mostly cut off from the opposite segment.

I guess the original post is really too vague about how it would work. I don't think phasing would be the answer though -- more likely the whole world would have to change for the everyone whether or not they bought the expansion. Empty, outdated level 50-60 areas like EPL, Azshara, Silithus, Winterspring, etc would have to become 1-50 zones and some of the classic 1-40 zones would become 80-85 zones. They would accelerate the leveling curve even further so that someone would hit 58 by the time they get to Un'Goro, Badlands, Blasted Lands, etc. Those players would then go to Outland and therefore those zones would be converted to endgame stuff.

It's a really difficult and complex conundrum.....perhaps even moreso than simply reworking the geography to accomodate flying mounts.

Too be honest I wouldn't be surprised if the websites have it wrong, and this Cataclysm stuff is actually the "next gen MMO" that Blizzard is known to have been working on. If that were the case, then they can probably financially justify a massive scale reworking of the old world. Has Blizzard categorically said that their next MMO is a new IP?

 

[evlcookie]

Has Blizzard categorically said that their next MMO is a new IP?

They certainly have

 

[gottalovetheglove]

I suspect that they can get away with having major cities unphased, and perhaps letting high level players phase-down to help lowbies that they are in a party with. But you'd still have 1 major segment of the population mostly cut off from the opposite segment.

Well, aside from the part where

Spoiler

Orgrimmar is destroyed

in the expansion according to these reports. That sort of thing might just pose a problem to your plan.

 

[idlewild_]

exciting, quit WoW a few weeks back, but they seem to have a knack for drawing me back with the expansions :lol


only sad thing is, still no gnome druids

 

[border]

Pretty much all the old world dungeons need to be re-worked around their new style of dungeon design. Gnomeregan seems like a good choice for conversion to an 80+ dungeon, considering that it is completely ignored by all Horde members and probably hated by any of the Alliance that ends up stuck in that shit pit. Let the low-level people keep the instances that are good and short like Scarlet Monastery, Shadowfang Keep, Dire Maul, etc.....then take any of the ones that are a ridiculous 3-hour slog (Marudon, Blackrock Spire, etc) and turn them into smaller, faster dungeons.

 

[border]

1.) I've never once felt challenged by the game at all in PvE, even in hard mode raids I always felt like it was one of the twenty three (I perpetually duo'd with my best friend) other people. I'm not the best player in the world, and I'm getting old now! Almost 24! But I do play a damn fine Priest and I am good at blaming people.

You never felt challenged by WoW? Consider playing a tank.....warrior or druid being one of the more challenging ones at the moment.

Even as a Priest/healer, aren't there encounters in Ulduar or Naxxramas where you have little more than a split second to get off a heal or a dispell before the tank goes down and the raid wipes?

 

[ILOVEASIANS]

Might have to re-activate again once this comes out. I've quit and came back for the past two expansion packs, probably will for this, at least for a couple months anyway.

 

[sprsk]

I don't believe any of it. Would just be too cool.


Also I think the Worgen and Goblin stuff is like really obviously people running off the one kind of maybe tangible thing we might possibly know about the expansion.

 

[SatelliteOfLove]

Let me get this right...

they're still going to have the classic zones for the most part, but then once you get past a certain level and complete a certain quest line(s), you come back to the old zones they're completely changed, thanks to phasing?


I was thinking about this shit just last night! Goddamn.

I like this. ALOT. Just a few zones here and there. Good use of old world.

And WTF @

Spoiler

Garrosh's ass. Why is he still given responsibilty? He's like a goddamn Orc Sarah Palin.

I wonder how fast this will be made to be inhaled, though? The pace of obsolesence in this game is heady as-is.

EDIT: Oh yah, they'd actually have to create less actual new shit, as per their new methods. +1 point anecdotal evidence to truthery.

 

[scoobs]

sounds AWESOME, i might reactivate my account for this. I quit playing shortly after i hit 70 in the burning crusade and haven't really wanted to start up again, but this sounds really fun. I can't wait to get back into molten core to fight ragnaros again!

 

[border]

And WTF @

Spoiler

Garrosh's ass. Why is he still given responsibilty? He's like a goddamn Orc Sarah Palin.

I know basically nothing about THE LORE and even I would question this turn of events. If you go listen to the Thrall/Garosh NPCs at the Argent Tournament grounds Thrall says to Garosh, "Be tactful, we don't want another repeat of the Violet Citadel incident [where you nearly fought/killed several Alliance leaders]."

Garosh's response is something to the extent of "Fuck you, I wish I had killed King Varian right where he stood."

Why Thrall would hand over the reigns to some openly violent warmonger is kinda beyond me. My understanding is that he at least wants a truce, if not peaceful cooperation between the factions.....but then as I said I know little of THE LORE.

 

[Xiaoki]

I'm mostly just skeptical because Blizzard is usually mega-tight about their announcements and when they screw up it's mostly because of an internal error (WoW-Europe.com posting something too early) and not because of a deliberate leak.

I doubt WoW Insider or MMO-Champion would deliberately mislead people and they are clearly staking a lot of their reputation on this stuff, so who knows? It's obviously generating a ton of clicks and views for their advertisers, and it's worth considering that as well.

But all of this info isnt coming from MMO-Champion, WoW Insider or Blizz Planet. All these leaks are originating from a post on the Something Awful forums.

Do I really need to explain why it is suspect?

MMO-Champion an the others will issue an apology for jumping the gun and blame the hoaxsters at Something Awful.

Anyway, Blizzcon is in a week and there will be an official announcement made then because they will obviously be bombarded with questions about this.

 

[border]

Yeah my worry is that MMO-Champion and other blogs saw their pageviews and CPM go up by an order of magnitude when they started posting expansion speculation, and as long as they have a culpable scapegoat they'll continue to post rampant rumor/speculation.

The problem is that if none of this is true then it will be kind of damaging to the perception of the next expansion, when it is announced and the changes are not as radical and sweeping as what was previously rumored.

 

[Lostconfused]

Yeah my worry is that MMO-Champion and other blogs saw their pageviews and CPM go up by an order of magnitude when they started posting expansion speculation, and as long as they have a culpable scapegoat they'll continue to post rampant rumor/speculation.

The problem is that if none of this is true then it will be kind of damaging to the perception of the next expansion, when it is announced and the changes are not as radical and sweeping as what was previously rumored.

Well blizzcon is days away and the most recent expansion was rather stellar. I dont think it would hurt blizzard that much, if at all.

 

[markot]

MMO champ has a reputation, and I dont think they will risk it unless they are 99% sure.

Easiest way to lose page hits is to start making stuff up or being so very wrong >.<!

 

[Soule]

OK now this is the kind of stuff that really makes me want to come back. I haven't played for a damn long time and vanilla WoW holds the closest place to my heart so fuck yeah this sounds awesome to me, was trying never to go back but will most likely come back even if only for a little while to check it out.

 

[Shining Sunshine]

Every expansion is awesome.

It just keeps getting better.

 

[falastini]

Why Thrall would hand over the reigns to some openly violent warmonger is kinda beyond me. My understanding is that he at least wants a truce, if not peaceful cooperation between the factions.....but then as I said I know little of THE LORE.

It does sound sketchy. But then again, I'm sure Bliz would cook something like this up as an excuse for more PVP/BG... and I guess a counterpart to the Alliances' own violent leader (Varian) doesn't hurt.

 

[Xabora]

http://www.scrollsoflore.com/forums/showpost.php?p=135900&postcount=84
This is worth a look.

Apparently in Uldaur and HoL, the planets show azeroth in its sundered state before it is.
(Evil Foreshadowing Context Goes Here)

 

[maniac-kun]

i hope in the expansion after the new one the peace brabbling idiots get killed and we have a full scale war going on its still warcraft and not hugcraft

 

[GDJustin]

Nah, we've been following this list almost to a tee ever since it leaked way back when:


It's gotten somewhat less accurate over time, but considering it's supposedly from 2003, it's been really solid so far.

That list has been confirmed fake for some time. It claims to be from 03, but no one actually saw it turn up until after Northrend was announced.

Which makes sense, if you really think about it. Blizz has stated multiple times that they only decided to have two "entry level" zones in Northrend as a direct result of Hellfire overcrowding when BC launched. So to claim they had everything planned down to the individual level ranges for zones is pretty silly.

What IS true is that parts of Outland, Northrend, and Emerald Dream existed and were at least partially modeled even before vanilla WoW launched. Waaay back in the pre-alpha days, Northrend was going to exist as a landmass in launch WoW.

 

[Spire]

This sounds amazing, world-changing dynamic events are exactly what MMO's should be about.

 

[Nirolak]

That list has been confirmed fake for some time. It claims to be from 03, but no one actually saw it turn up until after Northrend was announced.

Which makes sense, if you really think about it. Blizz has stated multiple times that they only decided to have two "entry level" zones in Northrend as a direct result of Hellfire overcrowding when BC launched. So to claim they had everything planned down to the individual level ranges for zones is pretty silly.

What IS true is that parts of Outland, Northrend, and Emerald Dream existed and were at least partially modeled even before vanilla WoW launched. Waaay back in the pre-alpha days, Northrend was going to exist as a landmass in launch WoW.

Well we'll find out in about a week when Blizzcon sets off if it has any accuracy to it.