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WoW Cataclysm Expansion speculation
- Thread starter maniac-kun
- Start date
ZombieSupaStar said:
I came here to disagree with everyone posting the Wikis as the place to get caught up on the lore. '
There USED to be this guy on Youtube who has posted, in order, EVERY single cut scene and FMV in ORDER from every warcraft game. Every single FMV every single small cutscene in the games in between the individual battles, everything. It allowed you to learn the stories of everyone and everything. Amazing how much more you would like the game when you understand it all.
But I just checked the bookmarks, they were all taken down due to copyright stuff and I didnt save the guys username either.
The clips were setup like this guy has them http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udtmOQwGxUM&feature=channel_page
Except this guy only has the entire story of Arthas. The other link I had was ALL of WC lore
Well, it is worth checking out the Wiki if only to get details from outside of the Warcraft games. WoW has almost nothing for cutscenes or FMVs, but it has some 8000 quests, so that is a rather large chunk of the storyline. The Warcraft books also cover a lot of stuff not in the games.
StormyTheRabbit
Member
Speaking of WoW, look at this IM conversation I just got done with. I have to do this daily:
MattPeters
Member
:lol :lol
That was great Stormy.
That was great Stormy.
Aswankster
Neo Member
FUCK THE FUCK! :lol
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
From what people have said no phasing is involved. Azeroth is changed for everyone 1-85.TheOneGuy said:
I did only skim through the thread, but I know I read a couple things about phasing here and there. I'll take your word(s) for it, though, assuming you did more than skim! I stand corrected, etc. jibber jabber yadda.Number 2 said:
Phasing is one of the worse ideas Blizzard has had. It makes for a great single-player game (and in that way I loved WotLK), but a terrible MMO.
I think this is what will happen. Everything that happens to Azeroth within Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms will be what you get as if you just freshly installed vanilla WoW and updated all the patches.Tamanon said:
Anything that will contain an expansion section, such as the islands in the South Seas, will not be available to those without Cataclysm which means that in order to get to that content you need to buy Burning Crusade > Wrath of the Lich King > Cataclysm. You won't be able to enter Gilneas until you have it, so it'll just be like the instanced starter areas for the Blood Elves and Draenei.. or even the Dark Portal entrance where it was camped 24/7 on PVP servers by those who didn't have the expansion yet.
Everyone will see everything.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
I wonder if Blizzard will start offering an all-in-one pack or reduce the price of old expansions soon. At least they have been pretty good about not adding any really awesome features to their expansions that people outside of the level range can utilize so there really isn't much of an incentive to buy an expansion until you reach the appropriate level, but it is going to get pretty expensive to buy the game soon. Original for $19.99, Burning Crusade for $29.99, Wrath of the Lich King for $39.99 and most likely Cataclysm for $39.99 as well. You will soon be looking at spending well over $100 just to get the entire WoW game if you don't already have an account or want to start up a second account.
edit: I think it would be a very bad idea to use phasing for this new content. Sure people would be excited about it for the first couple of months, but it would do a lot of damage to the long term game. Imagine if they completely separated the worlds of all players who are lvl 80 and those who are not. With no one at max level running around and hanging out in the towns, the game would look a lot less populated to anyone who hadn't reached the end-game yet. All interaction between low levels players and high level players would be gone. That just isn't healthy for an MMORPG. Hell, doing "runs" of old instances to help out lower level friends or alts is what keeps a lot of high levels playing the game outside of raids. That just wouldn't be possible if they implemented the same kind of phasing that they did with Wrath of the Lich King.
edit: I think it would be a very bad idea to use phasing for this new content. Sure people would be excited about it for the first couple of months, but it would do a lot of damage to the long term game. Imagine if they completely separated the worlds of all players who are lvl 80 and those who are not. With no one at max level running around and hanging out in the towns, the game would look a lot less populated to anyone who hadn't reached the end-game yet. All interaction between low levels players and high level players would be gone. That just isn't healthy for an MMORPG. Hell, doing "runs" of old instances to help out lower level friends or alts is what keeps a lot of high levels playing the game outside of raids. That just wouldn't be possible if they implemented the same kind of phasing that they did with Wrath of the Lich King.
gottalovetheglove
Member
They have a $40 Battlechest with vanilla and BC, but only them. You have to buy WotLK separately. That's $80 USD just to keep up to date now.firex said:
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
I forgot how Everquest handled the expansion pricing early on. It is really the only other MMORPG that I can think of which actually continued to grow after launch in the western market (maybe Dark Ages of Camelot did too?). Did Ruins of Kunark include the original game? I know Scars of Velious was a stand-alone type of thing, but I seem to remember the prices for expansions being much more managable than what Blizzard is doing with WoW. Then again, with their popularity I'm sure they can get away with it.
do we really have faith that they can completely redo some 1100 quests for one continent and 800ish for the other that is required for the achievement for old world questing? Have it be good at the same time?
not unless we are talking 2+ years away for this. Surely not in the next 9-12 months.
color me skeptical.
Color me also not a fan of lets give every race every class. More mass market appeal to throw at everyone who QQs Hello activision thank you for marketing for everyone and making it all easy mode.
not unless we are talking 2+ years away for this. Surely not in the next 9-12 months.
color me skeptical.
Color me also not a fan of lets give every race every class. More mass market appeal to throw at everyone who QQs Hello activision thank you for marketing for everyone and making it all easy mode.
zugzug said:
I guess they'd just make the achievement into a feat of strength, and I don't think they have to redo that much quests. A lot of quest will probably just disapear.
edit: I like the idea that every race can roll every class. I don't really care about a the lore and they can always just retcon it in there. And how does that make the game any easier? I'd love to play an undead hunter, that'd look so awesome and much more so if your pet would look undead too.
Number 2 said:
But no phasing means zones/quests and 80% of the Cataclysm content will be aviable to non expansion players, since they said a lot of stuff that was in vanilla WoW will be remade in Cataclysm. Am I wrong? How can they prevent non expansion players to go into Azeroth since its the starting point?
How can they can Blizzard prevent you from visiting new content that is expansion only? This is why every expansion had its new continent, since you cant enter there without the Expansion, and the whole expansion content was in it. But now that the expansion content is in the very starting zones, what the hell is going to happen?
This is what concerns me the most...
maniac-kun
Member
there also is backup for the new class combinations at least for nightelfs and tauren:
both are from the actual test server of patch 3.2.2
the tauren are obviously talking about the way of the light (priest, and paladin)
and at the nightelf side the highborn magic knowing nightelfs are returning
both are from the actual test server of patch 3.2.2
the tauren are obviously talking about the way of the light (priest, and paladin)
and at the nightelf side the highborn magic knowing nightelfs are returning
AzureNightmare
Banned
ahem, There won't be any large scale phasing for this expansion. Starting areas and leveling zones will completely change with the expansion. the 4.0 patch for wrath of the lich king/ burning crusade/ vanilla wow will likely introduce a multi phase world event that changes the world day by day, week by week, eventually resulting in the final new world that we will all come to know. This also means that the world will change for people at low levels and people without one or more of the expansions, evidence of that is easily seen in both 2.0 and 3.0. In essence, what we high levels see, they will also see.Enkidu said:
I think you are confused with "instancing" and "phasing".Yazus said:
Phasing means certain quests are in a "timeline" of sorts. The best examples of this being the case are the entire Death Knight creation from lvls 55-58 where it is divided in sections, or the Wrathgate event. For example: before a player begins the Wrathgate event, they only see the armies of Alliance and Horde gather on either side of the gate in preparation of attack. When a certain quest begins and a cutscene ensues, it eventually leads to the entire entrance of the gate being covered in flames with Alexstrasza and a few of her brood standing over in dragon form. From then on, you see the dragons and flames and no evidence of the pre-Wrathgate event. Any player who has not done this quest yet will still see what you saw before it all happened.
That is phasing.
Instancing is an entirely different section where a certain part of the game is on another server, i.e. the portal leading you from the Plaguelands into Blood Elf territory of Ghostlands, or catching a ship from Auberdine to Azuremyst Isle. Unless you have the expansion to venture into these lands, you cannot enter. Trust me.. I tried to gain access to both (including the Dark Portal) the month before Burning Crusade hit in patch 2.0.1 and it stated I did not have the expansion available to enter.
Just because there is no central continent for Cataclysm does not mean that other non-expansion players will be able to access the content. The islands of the South Seas will all be instanced off, including Gilneas. Whatever else happens to Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms will be part of vanilla WoW regardless.
They're talking about Mu'sha, who is also called Elune to the Night Elves. The Moon Priestesses of the Night Elves consider Elune a deity and worship her - that is why they are all Priests.Tacitus_ said:
They're confused as to why Tauren are only being taught the ways of Cenarius, who is Elune's son. The Tauren take great stock in the Earthmother, NPC talkback is evident of that, and An'she & Mu'sha are the Earthmother's eyes; the sun and the moon respectively. What they're contemplating is the power the Night Elves have and why the Tauren do not have them as well, considering they are both supporting the same "god".
It's kinda confusing and all over the place.
I think the easiest example would be in a scenario such as the Romans worshiping Mars, therefore they are greater in battle. The Greeks worship Ares yet they are much weaker in battle. How can this be so when they are practically the same god in a sense?
It certainly allows for a much more personal effect in a questline than anything else. How many times have we done a quest where a certain situation escalates to something important, only for it to be finalized and have it all repeat itself for someone else when you waltz right past it? It's certainly a great effect for something important in lore so that everyone can see it.sprsk said:
How many here were able to witness the opening of the Ahn'Qiraj gates? The questline was immense and it required a lot of man-hours to do it, a shame then that some guilds wanted to be arsewipes and open the gates when everyone was asleep because they felt the other players didn't deserve to view it or participate. A phasing situation would've handled it so much better and I'm sure Blizzard may have done it provided they had the technology back then.
Why is this good for MMOs?speedpop said:
Why not just play a single-player game at that point?
I mean don't get me wrong. As I said earlier, I loved WotLK in large part because of the phasing. But, also as I said earlier, it was basically a single-player game. I just don't see the point of putting all this story crap in an MMO if you're going to take out the MM. Either make it player-driven, or make it unimportant and non-intrusive. Don't make it "personal".
I have a love/hate relationship with phasing. I love the idea and part of the execution but I also hate it.
Everytime I flew in icecrown, I would lose either my dk or my paladin that I put on follow because of those damn phased zones.
When I needed to do some quests, I couldn't get the help from anyone, I could only receive it from people on the same exact step, or we would simply be in different places.
I basically ended up soloing that elite dk bastard below icecrown citadel (luckily when my DK needed to do the quest, the paladin had already done it, so it was a breeze that time to do) since my tank friend hadn't done any of the icecrown quests and couldn't help me tank it.
I'd have more love and less hate for phasing if it treated groups as a single unit, allowing the people in the group to "access" the phased zone the leader has access to. Also because, otherwise, I could already see the annoyances powerleveling low level chars for people that, like me, have multiple accounts.
Everytime I flew in icecrown, I would lose either my dk or my paladin that I put on follow because of those damn phased zones.
When I needed to do some quests, I couldn't get the help from anyone, I could only receive it from people on the same exact step, or we would simply be in different places.
I basically ended up soloing that elite dk bastard below icecrown citadel (luckily when my DK needed to do the quest, the paladin had already done it, so it was a breeze that time to do) since my tank friend hadn't done any of the icecrown quests and couldn't help me tank it.
I'd have more love and less hate for phasing if it treated groups as a single unit, allowing the people in the group to "access" the phased zone the leader has access to. Also because, otherwise, I could already see the annoyances powerleveling low level chars for people that, like me, have multiple accounts.
I'm amused how everyone is saying "it will do that" and "it won't do that" when none of that is in any of the leaks. Assuming the leak is true, we "know" what's on MMO-Champion but we dont' know, eg, what "extensive use of phasing" means in this case. Chances are it does change the levelling world: Ashzara is 10-20 now so it can't be a new 80+ zone. I'd imagine there's one new 80+ zone for each level (off the top of my head it could be Hyjal, Kul'Tiras, Kezan, the unused zone to the east of Eastern Kingdoms, the tirsfal unused area, etc) and a lot of dungeons/etc (Grim Batol, Uldum, etc) that all could be new 81-85 content that's only available to expansion owners.
One of the biggest complaints about MMOs in general is that you never feel as if you're accomplishing anything. By providing phased content you can provide an MMO feel while still allowing accomplishments to change the world. Look at the Battle of Undercity for instance, you can do it with more people, it's just a regular zone, but it's only that zone for people on that part of the quest line.
TheOneGuy said:
One of the biggest complaints about MMOs in general is that you never feel as if you're accomplishing anything. By providing phased content you can provide an MMO feel while still allowing accomplishments to change the world. Look at the Battle of Undercity for instance, you can do it with more people, it's just a regular zone, but it's only that zone for people on that part of the quest line.
tadcalabash
Neo Member
TheOneGuy said:
Don't see why you can't have both. I know I sometimes play WoW like a huge single player game where I can play alongside a ton of other people and also group up and have a multiplayer experience with friends. WoW allows for both playstyles right next to each other.
I'm a huge fan of phasing, as it solves a big problem of the static MMO world. It's not perfect (getting off-phase with friends, not being able to group up with people out of phase) but the benefits far outweigh those (potentially solveable) problems.
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
And what would the best MMO platform be?Frenck said:
dave is ok
aztek is ok
The only areas guaranteed to have phasing for the next expansion are the Goblin and Worgen starting zones -while I'm sure there will be more, it won't be all over the place.
The Lamonster
Member
watFrenck said:
Tritroid
Member
Revamping all of Old Azeroth sounds incredible...and a lot of work.
I, and a lot of my friends, had automatically assumed that after Wrath Blizzard would begin to pump out smaller expansions with less amounts of time and effort, since they had a new MMO on the horizon to focus on.
I guess that isn't the case, or not yet anyway.
I, and a lot of my friends, had automatically assumed that after Wrath Blizzard would begin to pump out smaller expansions with less amounts of time and effort, since they had a new MMO on the horizon to focus on.
I guess that isn't the case, or not yet anyway.
The Lamonster
Member
You have no idea how excited I am to use flying mounts in AzerothTritroid said:
