Project Lore

The info just keeps on rolling in today. A week out from the rockstar event that is Blizzcon and we might have our first major leaks. Heartbourne has already clued us in on potential new class combinations, but our friends over at MMO-Champion seem to have found a whole lot more. Boubouille absolutely insists that none of this is speculation, and while I remain skeptical about his sources, his track record is proven. This is as close to gospel as we're going to get until we hear something officially official. So keep on reading to find out what we know (or think we know) so far. Be warned, though, spoilers are abound if you want to keep your sense of surprise. SPOILER WARNING Herein is a rough list of major content changes that we can expect to see in the next expansion:

• New Class Combinations - No new classes will be added to the game. Instead, existing races will be given access to classes that they never had before. It is currently unknown what classes will be available to the new races, however.
• New Level Cap - Surprisingly, it's only 85. This may fit in with a new philosophy of improving characters through gear instead of pure XP. Likewise, if the end-goal for WoW is 100, it leaves a little more space for successive expansions to grow.
• Azshara, Queen of the Naga The Cataclysm - This titular event, set in motion by Deathwing and Queen Azshara, will bring many changes to the existing content in the game, as well as open up several new ones.  Their motivations for unleashing such destruction upon the world may be in part due to those pesky insanity-inducing Old Gods.
• New Horde Race: Goblins - The Goblins have found their island home virtually destroyed by the events of the Cataclysm. Washing up on the shores of The Barrens, a quest line involving Thrall's capture (and subsequent rescue by the Goblin race) will explain how they ended up as the new consorts of the Horde. With their homeland gone, it's unclear whether or not we will get to visit Kezan, the island where the Goblin capital of Undermine exists.
• New Alliance Race: Worgen - The Greymane Wall, which separates Gilneas from Silverpine Forest, has been shattered by the Cataclysm. Bewildered from their self-imposed exile, the Worgen venture forth and find friends in the Alliance. It is unclear what the Goblin starting area may entail, but the Worgen will be receiving the Death Knight treatment. Gilneas will be a heavily-phased zone that will shuttle your character through the nation's history before unleashing them on the rest of Azeroth. Did I mention that Worgen do get to transform? That's right, you'll be able to shift from Human to Worgen at the click of a button, though we don't know if it will afford you any special abilities to do so.
• Azeroth Remade - Goblins and Worgen aren't the only ones who have felt the impact of this catastrophic event. Existing zones will be remade or phased in order to accommodate the current state of the world. The examples given include remaking Azshara into a 10-20 level area and splitting the Barrens into two distinct zones for players of different levels.
• New Areas - There will be no new continents introduced in the expansion, but instead, unreleased content in Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms will finally be filled in. In addition to the aforementioned opening of Gilneas, you can also expect to see modern-day Hyjal and Uldum. These are only examples and do not represent the entire breadth of fresh content that will no doubt be introduced.
• Mainland Flight - Restructuring the two core continents has allowed Blizzard to add flight to those zones that never had it. Now you can ride all the way from the Plaguelands to Booty Bay on you very own flying mount. Presumably, you will still need to take a boat or zeppelin to go from one continent to the other.
• Dungeons Remade - Onyxia was only the beginning. This does not preclude the addition of new 5-man dungeons or raid content, but many of the old instances will be retrofitted for players progressing from Level 80-85. Reportedly, we'll also be seeing Ragnaros again. It is not known how extensive the changes will end up being (new bosses/new graphics or merely upgraded stats on mobs and items).

That's a lot to digest and I'm honestly eager to see how everything fits together. There are some controversial ideas in there, as well as changes that players have been clamoring for year after year. In fact, a lot of it sounds like the kind of stuff that Blizzard employees have wanted to implement themselves, but have repeatedly insisted they haven't been working on. Phasing, as I previously proposed, will play a large role in the recreation of mainland Azeroth (self high-five!). By treading this path, however, I'm afraid there is also the chance of alienating a certain portion of the  player base who see this as merely reusing old content. That may or may not be the case, and we may have to wait another week to find out. I think it really depends on how fresh the revamped content ends up feeling. Will the graphics of many areas be significantly improved or changed? Will the new quest lines make it worth adventuring through old zones? Is this the vanilla WoW that we always wanted? Or will the new Azeroth be a whole lot like the old Azeroth? A yet-to-be-confirmed post on the Something Awful forums indicated huge, sweeping changes for the landscape, though. Thousand Needles flooded, many zones in absolute ruins, Orgrimmar sundered in two (with the introduction of a new Orc main city). The forums are private, but the summary has be re-posted on MMO-Champion. I'm sure you all have a lot to say about these revelations, so feel free to strike up a conversation in our comments section. I know I'll be watching it closely!

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So by now we have all heard about the great stuff coming in patch 3.2. While mount changes, battlegrounds, and dailies are fun and all… I wanted to take a second to talk about what, to me, is the most exciting thing about any content patch. The new raid!

As many of you have figured out by now, raiding is really what I play this game for so naturally I want as many details on the new Crusaders Colosseum as possible. Unfortunately at this point, details are a bit lacking. So that just leaves me to do one thing: make wild assumptions based on too little information and discuss possibilities that may have no basis in fact!

So let me first say this. I am a bit skeptical about this whole “ring of blood, but more epic” thing. When we first heard about Ulduar the possibilities seemed limitless. It was a huge dungeon with a great story 14 bosses tons of hard modes. Sounded great! This on the other hand sounds like it could very well be a hole in the wall that bosses come out of.

Perhaps that is what some people want. No trash, no dungeons to walk through, just one room where bosses come and drop their loot. I honestly hope this isn’t the case. To me raiding a new dungeon is more about the experience than just the bosses. It’s no wonder some of my favorite raids of all time are the ones with story and tons of design like Karazhan, Black Temple, and even Ulduar.

In my mind the only basis for comparison I can even think for the new Colloseum would maybe be Violet Hold, or perhaps on a bigger scale Mount Hyjal. Those were both dungeons when the mobs and bosses came to you. But if Blizzard is comparing this to Ring of Blood (which we have already done 3 times by the way), then it makes me question if trash will even be in the equation. Seems a bit lazy from a design perspective.

I guess we can only hope for some really interesting boss fights to hold us over until Icecrown. While I’m not totally discouraged just yet, let me say I can only hope that Blizzard has some good tricks up their sleeve.

Until we get more details all we can do is wonder. So what do you guys think?

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A long, long time ago, in Stranglethorn Vale, our guild started Zul'Gurub. At the same time, the elite guilds had finished ZG, Molten Core, Black Wing Lair, and were doing AQ20, AQ40 and Naxxramas. We had Dungeon Set 0 and epic PvP gear, they were decked out in Tier 3. There was a huge chasm of raiding experience and gear-level between us and them. A long time ago, in the Caverns of Time, our guild finished Mount Hyjal. At the same time, the elite guilds had completed Black Temple and Sunwell. We had 4/5 Tier 5 and they were decked out in Tier 6. There was a significant difference in gear-level and raiding experience between us and them. As of this week, our guild has completed all 10- and 25-man raiding content in WotLK. The only challenges left in front of us are Sartharion with two and three drakes up, and some raiding achievements. The elite guilds have finished the "hard modes," but there is no raid-boss they've seen that we haven't. We are 13/15ths of the way to being totally decked-out in Tier 7.5 gear - they have a better necklace and trinket than we do. They also have the gun from Kel'Thuzad, those rotten {expletive (plural) deleted}. There is no real difference in gear-level, and while they have many more years of end-game content raiding experience than we do, we’ve walked where they've walked in the new expansion, and not years after they have. So what’s the deal? We've heard over and over that the content is easier. Bullpucky. We remember our first kills in Karazhan. We remember going to Maiden and being sure it was going to take many hours to kill her. We remember warning the guild that wipes were the price of success. Then, we one-shot her. /kapow! "Don't move when Flame Wreath is cast!" And if you didn't move, and you had the DPS, you'd beat Shade of Aran. Learning the skill took time, as did getting a high enough raid-DPS, but once the skill was learned, never again did a movement fight cause as much fear. Thaddius in Naxxramas is a movement fight, and people don't freak out about that guy nearly as much as they did about Shade of Aran. The problem with Karazhan was two-fold: First, an entirely new population of WoW-players suddenly had access to raiding content, and they weren't used to it. Second, in a 40-person raid, you can have a screw-up. In a 10-person raid, a single person could easily wipe everything. So in old-school raiding, the old-school raiders learned to raid as they were "carried" through Molten Core. They made mistakes, they were mostly hidden, and the raid kept on trucking. By the time they got to Karazhan, they knew how to raid and thus breezed through it. In contrast, a new generation of players learned to raid in 10-man Karazhan, and they learned to raid as they wiped. Karazhan was hard, not because of the difficulty of the content, but because individual mistakes were magnified and the results were much more severe. Was Gruul or Magtheridon much harder than Karazhan? No, because these 25-person raids required Karazhan-geared people to attempt them. And once you've gotten gear from Karazhan, you probably knew how to behave in a raid. The difference between 10- and 25-person raiding isn't much, the only difference is in specific people learning their specific roles. Once the trick of the boss is mastered, the basic raid skills needed are already known. (i.e. don't stand in the fire or the black circle, don't take aggro from the tank, etc.) Then we get to WotLK and the new Naxxramas. Is 10-person Naxx easier than Kara was? Yes. Is it because the content is easier? We say No. We say that people crushed Naxx with such relative ease because there were no new skills needed to defeat the place. If you raided Kara, you could raid Naxx. There is no skill needed for Naxx that was not taught in Kara. And who didn't raid Kara? What percentage of people who are raiding Naxx do you think didn't step foot in Kara? Five percent? That means ninety-five percent of the people with their eyes set on Naxxramas just had to level to 80, then they'd have the gear and the Kara-learned raiding knowledge to defeat the place. And they did, foshizzle. So now we have the promise of Ulduar. What's the big scary thing there? Vehicle-mounts for combat. /shudder What fight do we have right now with something like vehicle-mounts? Malygos. What raid boss do people dislike the most? Malygos. Why? Phase three - The drakes. People dislike the drakes because they don't get to play their own class, and because it's a new mechanic. We love Naxx because it's just an extension of Kara. We've mastered Kara, so Naxx is easy. We have never had a vehicle-mount boss before, so people hate learning Malygos. Defeating one, two, and three drakes-up Sartharion is a matter of gear, positioning, and DPS. All three of these things are easily comprehended by Kara-experienced raiders, and thus three drakes-up Sartharion, while technically a much greater challenge than Malygos, does not inspire the same dread and hostility as Malygos does. Ulduar is bringing vehicle-mount boss fights to an entire new level, like it or not. What are you going to do about it? Are you going to farm Naxx for fun and profit? Are you going to go for the hard-mode achievements and beat 10-person Sartharion with three drakes up? Or are you going to practice your vehicle-mount combat skills in Malygos? Just as the Aces High! daily is practice for Malygos, so is Malygos himself practice for Ulduar. If you have the choice, we recommend you get your happy little tuckus out to Borean Tundrea every week, do both 10- and 25-person Malygos, not so much for the gear, but to get used to the dynamic. The skills you learn in Malygos are going to prepare you Ulduar, just like Kara prepared you for Naxx.

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Ever feel like you found a dungeon, zone, or raid that was just made for you? Depending on your class, spec, and general play style some places just click with the way you play. As a protection paladin I've been close to experiencing this a few times. The Plaguelands were full of undead and great paladin lore. It was definitely one of the first places my tankadin felt at home. Further down the road there was Kara. A masterfully designed instance, and again crawling with undead. This had to be it right? Not quite. After all this time playing my Pally, I am proud to announce I have found my place. My "Zen" instance. The raid to end all raids for the protection paladin: Mount Hyjal. I zoned in there for the first time ever a few weeks ago, and it all just feels right. Waves of mobs just charging into my consecrate, piles of undead that I can blast with my Holy Wrath, and pulling stray mobs off an over zealous DPS is just an exorcism away. Even the bosses are all demons, sending our threat through the roof. I know we are designed for AOE tanking, and this instance seems to be designed for us. For those that have never seen the raid, Hyjal is set up much different than others. It is similar to the 5-man instance The Black Morass. You must survive waves of undead that descend upon various towns you must protect. Instead of pulling the instance, the mobs come to you. After you have downed 8 waves you get greeted by a boss. It can be rather hectic, but with all these mobs charging into your raid the Prot Paladin is invaluable for keeping everything under control. I have never had more fun in a raid than I did my first night in Hyjal. Not only did I get to tank in a way I never have before, I even showed up in the top 10 of the DPS chart! I think I am in love. We still have a ways to go, and I know there is an obstacle or two in our way, but I am thoroughly looking forward to working through this instance. I've heard from many people that this instance gets repetitive and tiresome after a while, but I have a feeling I will be enjoying it much longer than others. What about you guys? What zones seem designed for your class? Where are you in your element? Surely there are other zones that seem to be such a good fit for various classes and specs. So what are yours? If there isn't one, what would it take to make one? I'd be curious to know.

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Ah... when it's done, it's done. It's sad to see it go... but we'll all move on... What am I talking about? One of the worst things that could happen in-game: my guild disbanded. ( /cry ) Yes, a few weeks ago, maybe longer now since time has lost all meaning since I entered this state of mourning, the first guild I joined broke up over internal politics, RL issues, in-fighting, alleged favoritism and a few freakin' stupid idiot jerks ( different people depending on whom you ask ) brought about the final straw that broke the guild's back. I am talking of Midnight Run on Frostmane server. We were good. Really freakin' good. We were almost on farmin' status for Hyjal and BT, gathering mats for boss fights in BT and beginning our venture into Sun Well within a few weeks, but then it happened. On night I logged in at raid time, ready to kick the crap out of Vashj and maybe get a new chest piece, when the GM called all online people over to the Aldor bank. Then he dropped the bomb. It sucked. Really sucked. I meet some really cool people in the guild and had fun takin' down some of the hardest content in the game but now, as I stood at the Aldor bank getting my share of epic gems and wizard oil from the soon-to-be defunk guild bank, it was just dawning on me that I would probably never raid with most of these people again. A damn f'k shame. And I knew some of the reasons why it was disbanding were very legit. RL comes first no matter what anyone says. And the freakin' jerks who were making a mess of the guild's name really f'ked it for everyone. How just a few asses can come in and within a weekend f'k it up for everyone is just astounding to me. So to those who were in Midnight Run, thank you. Puffball, you are a great GM and I would join any guild you make in the future when you come back to the game. Hedone, you are an amazing healer and I look forward to raiding with you soon. Gomja, you rock as a Pali tank. Noodshot, Stings, Legendaryoda, and the rest of the MR crew, thanks for the fun. And now the guild is done. The fractured pieces split into two or three different guilds, each somewhat bashing the other for the downfall and how cool they are now. Whatever. My ego resides in myself and not in how much DPS I can do. That being said... If you have a guild on Frostmane server that raids after 9:30 server time that's lookin' for a raiding fire mage whose sustained DPS is always in the top 10, usually top 5, then give me a call. Loyalty is one thing while there's something to be loyal to, but when it''s done, it's done. Besides I want that freakin' chest to drop off Vashj! So if you need a raid savy fire mage, give me a call, but only if you raid after 9:30 server time on Frostmane. ( btw - The Armory says I'm in Divine Turtle Protectors but that's my alt's guild. And the gear I'm wearing is epic! lol )

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