Well, after a full week of 5.2, my server has completed stage one. Thus, with a little solo-scenario-ing, we now have our permanent base set up on the island.
The use of Scenarios to do those "big moments" in a server-wide progression is, I think, inspired. One of the problems with a game like this is the fear of missing out. In Skyrim, for example, you don't have to worry about missing out on the big Alduin raid, because it's a solo endeavor that waits for you. I remember doing the Isle of Quel'danas way back in the day, and it was pretty cool to see parts of the island open up as we progressed. If there was a big event to mark that, I surely missed it.
I have not done the Horde version yet (though I suspect Area 52 finished Stage One a while ago) but the Alliance scenario has you and Vareesa Windrunner prepare to mount a huge assault on the troll stronghold of Shao'ola or whatever it's called. When most of your squad inevitably gets blown out of the sky, you and Vareesa 2-man the trolls, rampaging through the place and climaxing in a fight against a priest guy with an enchanted tiki mask and a mechanic reminiscent of the first stage of Jin'do the Godbreaker in Zul'Gurub 85.
With the fortress unlocked, a new round of dailies opens. It's not a huge amount, pretty much just stuff in the Diremoor area, but you can also choose to do the PvP dailies now, which send you against the Sunreavers (or vice versa - I try not to be faction-biased, but I've grown more and more Alliance-aligned over the years.) I suspect we'll still have our three other hubs, but this means that rep is going to be coming at us at fire-hose levels. Jarsus and Oterro are already revered, and with more dailies per day, plus the Grand Commendation, I suspect getting a new toon exalted here will be pretty quick (especially as more stages unlock.)
Tomorrow the first wing of Throne of Thunder unlocks on LFR, so my focus will be reading up on those fights.
I've got to say, this patch is looking to be one of the better ones in a very long time. The gating does not feel as restrictive as it was at the Molten Front, and the solo scenarios could mean wonderful, fantastic things for the future (remember me talking about solo dungeon content in the past?)
Monday, March 11, 2013
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Shiny New Unannounced Feature
There seems to be a developing tradition among final patches in expansions. 3.3 brought us the Dungeon Finder, 4.3 brought us the Raid Finder, and it looks like 5.4 (or 5.5 or whatever winds up being Mists' last one) is going to bring us... something.
But we do actually have a bit of information, in that hints have been dropped. The thing is, WoW is by far the biggest and also one of the longest-lived MMOs out there (I believe Everquest is still up, which is where a lot of the older veterans of my guild started out.) The point is, there's a ton of content. Altogether, excluding those that have been shut down (and counting revamped ones as a single raid) there are twenty-nine raids in the game, with at least one more coming during Mists. And if you think that's something, consider that there are seventy-two 5-man dungeons.
When Burning Crusade was first released, I was a wee newbie, with hardly a character above level 30, walking around in "of the wolf" gear. I had heard about these new things called "heroic dungeons," which were lower-level dungeons re-tuned for level 70 (the max level at the time. Keep up, people.) What I thought was that this would apply to all the dungeons, but instead it only applied to BC-era ones, which in retrospect was fairly reasonable.
The new feature they're teasing us with is supposed to open up a lot of old content for players who are already at the cutting edge (or really just current.) Obviously, there are a numerous ways this could be applied, but here's a concept:
We know that Blizzard can futz with our iLevels, lowering them for challenge modes or even just testing on the PTR. We also know that they can futz with the iLevels of individual pieces of gear, thanks to the since-removed upgrade Ethereals.
So here's a radical idea: what if they could simply scale a dungeon and all of its rewards up to the max level?
Let's propose a fourth difficulty level for dungeons (or a third for raids,) a kind of "throwback heroic" difficulty. What this would mean is that the dungeon scales up to your level, and all the loot that drops off the bosses becomes the iLevel of whatever heroic dungeons ought to be dropping during the current expansion (so 463 today.)
This would vastly expand the options for people who might be tired of running the same nine dungeons over and over (though I have yet to get tired of the new Scholomance - love that place.) It also means you could pick up things like that trinket from ICC25 that turned you into a Vrykul and have it actually work well at level 90.
Even without the upgrading of loot off those instances, the ability to power yourself down and see the place as it was meant to be seen would be fantastic. It's pretty seriously hard to get ten level 70 people together to hit up Karazhan, and in fact, given the way talents, abilities, and mastery has shifted around, many people would not have a complete toolkit to be serious raiders at that level anymore. With a system like this, you could toss down your Hammer of Light to round up those dancing ghosts outside of Moroes' chamber.
One of the traditions my guild has is the old-school run. Back when we were a regular raiding guild (the glory days of ICC - a main run and an alt run each week) we did old-school runs every week, hitting up an old raid from the BC or Classic era just to see the place. It was great, because otherwise I'd have not been able to see those places until 5.1 lifted the requirement to be in a raid group in order to enter one. It also meant those bosses with mechanics that just plain needed multiple people would go down just as easy.
If the new feature is anything like what I described, it will make for an even better version of the old-school raid, in that you'll actually be able to experience the boss mechanics, rather than killing things in a matter of seconds.
Of course, the new feature could be totally different, so who knows?
But we do actually have a bit of information, in that hints have been dropped. The thing is, WoW is by far the biggest and also one of the longest-lived MMOs out there (I believe Everquest is still up, which is where a lot of the older veterans of my guild started out.) The point is, there's a ton of content. Altogether, excluding those that have been shut down (and counting revamped ones as a single raid) there are twenty-nine raids in the game, with at least one more coming during Mists. And if you think that's something, consider that there are seventy-two 5-man dungeons.
When Burning Crusade was first released, I was a wee newbie, with hardly a character above level 30, walking around in "of the wolf" gear. I had heard about these new things called "heroic dungeons," which were lower-level dungeons re-tuned for level 70 (the max level at the time. Keep up, people.) What I thought was that this would apply to all the dungeons, but instead it only applied to BC-era ones, which in retrospect was fairly reasonable.
The new feature they're teasing us with is supposed to open up a lot of old content for players who are already at the cutting edge (or really just current.) Obviously, there are a numerous ways this could be applied, but here's a concept:
We know that Blizzard can futz with our iLevels, lowering them for challenge modes or even just testing on the PTR. We also know that they can futz with the iLevels of individual pieces of gear, thanks to the since-removed upgrade Ethereals.
So here's a radical idea: what if they could simply scale a dungeon and all of its rewards up to the max level?
Let's propose a fourth difficulty level for dungeons (or a third for raids,) a kind of "throwback heroic" difficulty. What this would mean is that the dungeon scales up to your level, and all the loot that drops off the bosses becomes the iLevel of whatever heroic dungeons ought to be dropping during the current expansion (so 463 today.)
This would vastly expand the options for people who might be tired of running the same nine dungeons over and over (though I have yet to get tired of the new Scholomance - love that place.) It also means you could pick up things like that trinket from ICC25 that turned you into a Vrykul and have it actually work well at level 90.
Even without the upgrading of loot off those instances, the ability to power yourself down and see the place as it was meant to be seen would be fantastic. It's pretty seriously hard to get ten level 70 people together to hit up Karazhan, and in fact, given the way talents, abilities, and mastery has shifted around, many people would not have a complete toolkit to be serious raiders at that level anymore. With a system like this, you could toss down your Hammer of Light to round up those dancing ghosts outside of Moroes' chamber.
One of the traditions my guild has is the old-school run. Back when we were a regular raiding guild (the glory days of ICC - a main run and an alt run each week) we did old-school runs every week, hitting up an old raid from the BC or Classic era just to see the place. It was great, because otherwise I'd have not been able to see those places until 5.1 lifted the requirement to be in a raid group in order to enter one. It also meant those bosses with mechanics that just plain needed multiple people would go down just as easy.
If the new feature is anything like what I described, it will make for an even better version of the old-school raid, in that you'll actually be able to experience the boss mechanics, rather than killing things in a matter of seconds.
Of course, the new feature could be totally different, so who knows?
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
First Impressions of the Isle of Thunder
Well, 5.2 has now dropped. We still don't have Throne of Thunder via LFR yet, so the main event is yet to come (except for those who are actually ready to run a new raid on normal the first week of a patch.)
First of all, the island itself: I adore the place. It has that great spooky Gilneas/Darkmoon Isle vibe that Blizzard is really good at pulling off. Likewise, the new Zandalari troll models and overall style is fantastic - we've seen the various Troll Tribe stuff, but until now they've mainly looked somewhat ruined or worn down - the Zandalari have brought what the real troll empires ought to look like to the island.
The load of daily quests is somewhat large, but unlike Golden Lotus, you can switch up the order in which you complete them. Getting around the island, or really getting onto the island is a bit of a challenge because you have to go through the Troll area to do so, but you have quests there every day, so you'll be going there anyway. Once Stage 1 ends, we'll have hubs more conveniently placed, so while it's kind of cool hanging out on Jaina's ship, it'll be cooler to have a Kirin Tor base.
I've been able to run the Trove of the Thunder King twice now, once on Jarsus and once on Oterro. It's clear that at least for your first couple trips, you won't be able to get a ton out of it, but rewards I have come across include tons of Elder Charms (as we move out of the 5.0 raids, these are getting other uses) and a number of things to boost rep gains and valor points.
Right now my focus is on Jarsus (who finally got a 10th - and 11th - sigil of power in MSV, so hopefully he'll eventually get back on track with the Legendary chain. Still no Sha-touched weapon though.)
I'll be very curious to see the other parts of the island, but it will still be a couple more days to get the Kirin Tor (and Sunreaver) town, after which stage 3 I believe will open up the upper levels.
First of all, the island itself: I adore the place. It has that great spooky Gilneas/Darkmoon Isle vibe that Blizzard is really good at pulling off. Likewise, the new Zandalari troll models and overall style is fantastic - we've seen the various Troll Tribe stuff, but until now they've mainly looked somewhat ruined or worn down - the Zandalari have brought what the real troll empires ought to look like to the island.
The load of daily quests is somewhat large, but unlike Golden Lotus, you can switch up the order in which you complete them. Getting around the island, or really getting onto the island is a bit of a challenge because you have to go through the Troll area to do so, but you have quests there every day, so you'll be going there anyway. Once Stage 1 ends, we'll have hubs more conveniently placed, so while it's kind of cool hanging out on Jaina's ship, it'll be cooler to have a Kirin Tor base.
I've been able to run the Trove of the Thunder King twice now, once on Jarsus and once on Oterro. It's clear that at least for your first couple trips, you won't be able to get a ton out of it, but rewards I have come across include tons of Elder Charms (as we move out of the 5.0 raids, these are getting other uses) and a number of things to boost rep gains and valor points.
Right now my focus is on Jarsus (who finally got a 10th - and 11th - sigil of power in MSV, so hopefully he'll eventually get back on track with the Legendary chain. Still no Sha-touched weapon though.)
I'll be very curious to see the other parts of the island, but it will still be a couple more days to get the Kirin Tor (and Sunreaver) town, after which stage 3 I believe will open up the upper levels.
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Life Still in those 5.0 LFR Raids + a little ranting about Subtlety Rogues
I finally got my Undead Rogue, Darsino, up to LFR-levels, through a combination of finally realizing that I could replace those crappy boots of his simply by running the Sha of Anger once, dolling out over three and a half thousand gold for a new dagger, and getting really lucky on the aforementioned Sha and getting the normal-mode tier 14 gloves (I actually got the PvP gloves as the first drop, but decided to chance one of my three precious Charms.) So actually he's leapfrogged Ardten to become my #3 toon, but much as Jarsus and Oterro have been kind of jockeying this expansion, I expect Ardten and Darsino will do so as well (poor Tarbhad hasn't even run a heroic yet.)
Anyway, while the big news is that come tomorrow morning, 5.2 will be dropping, the LFR version of the raid will only open its first wing a week later. I'm as anxious as everyone to start downing some Mogu (or as the case may be, Trolls) right as the patch is released, but it looks like we're going to have a week to kill before we can start to scratch the surface of the raid (unless you have an actual raiding guild, which sadly mine does not seem to be these days - I partially blame myself, as I am a guild officer.)
This is actually good news for a guy who just barely got two toons geared for MSV, and needs to get them running to gear up. Hopefully we won't see a ridiculous jump in LFR queue times for the older raids, but if Blizz really wants alts and latecomers to gear up through LFR, they'd better have a plan if no one runs them anymore.
The rest of this post is me-stuff, if you're not interested in that.
It feels good to finally have Darsino on the road to better gear. He hit revered with Dominance Offensive today and he's done the first branch of MSV (no dagger yet from the first boss.) I'm committed to keeping Darsino specced as Sub this expansion, because it is my dream to see Sub work well, and I can't really see how well it works if I reforge and enchant for Assassination. I really do think Blizzard needs to examine the Rogue in a serious way. They've said they don't think it needs a Warlock-level revamp, but I disagree. This class is dying out, and if we ever get Demon Hunters (and yes, I do hope we do some day) they're going to be seriously endangered.
The things I'm noticing while playing on the rogue is that there's a lot of times when I think I can do something, but I can't yet. You might have enough energy for something, but then you won't have enough combo points, or sometimes it's the other way around. This would not be such a bad thing if finishing moves were simpler.
For example, on Oterro (and I realize that Frost DKs are not a terribly difficult spec to play) the biggest decision I have to make constantly is whether to hit Obliterate or Frost Strike when I have Killing Machine up. Sometimes, the runes for an Obliterate are right about to come up, and in that case I wait. But if my runes are all down, and I'm sitting on some runic power, I'll waste the proc on my Frost Strike to keep the momentum going, hopefully getting a Runic Empowerment proc, which will of course then feed me more runes and thus more Runic Power, etc.
On Darsino, first of all, I have a couple things to establish at the beginning - I need to Ambush out of Stealth for the Expose Weakness debuff, then I need to get Slice and Dice running for the Energy it provides Subtlety, then I need to get Rupture up for Sanguinary Vein, and then I need to squeeze in as many Eviscerates as I can before I need to refresh again. The durations of Rupture and Slice and Dice are such that they often fall off at the same time, so maybe I need to refresh them earlier or something. I don't know.
But we're not finished. Subtlety is also all about using Shadow Dance and Vanish to get more Ambushes in there (for the Expose Weakness, not to mention the damage from Ambush) and also get Shadow Power, which increases damage done while in Stealth and for a few seconds after breaking it.
OH, and don't let me forget - you have to be behind the target at all times because Backstab is your main CP generator. (But you also have to weave Hemorrhage in there even if you are behind them to keep that extra bleed ticking.)
Believe it or not, this is a simpler version than what we had in Cataclysm, where you had to maintain Recuperate as well, but while a little bit of juggling is ok, I think they have got to cut Subtlety some slack somewhere.
Barring some radical redesign (and frankly, it might not be a bad idea,) there are a couple things that could be done to make the spec less absurdly difficult to play well:
1. Do something about Backstab - I know Rogues Do It From Behind, but this positioning thing leaves you at the mercy of your tank and fight mechanics. Any time the boss spins around to cast a spell on a random person, your rotation (which as we just showed, is pretty damned complex) is interrupted. The most obvious but also most radical shift would be to rename it "Stab" and hopefully give it some mechanical difference to Sinister Strike so we don't have to use Sinister Strike. (Combat Rogues - go play a Warrior, amirite?) Dagger requirement! There we go.
2. Simplify Finishers - Assassination get to refresh their Slice and Dice to full with each Envenom. We should get a way to refresh either that or Rupture easily. I'd say every Eviscerate refreshes Rupture to its 5-point duration, plus a redesign that has Rupture's various combo-point levels only affect duration and not damage. With only Slice and Dice and Eviscerates, there's a lot more freedom to focus on the more interesting aspects of the spec.
3. Do something about Shadow Power - Vanish ought to be an escape or deception mechanism. You disappear, and then you can either flee, enjoy the drop in threat (not so much of an issue these days) or get a quick on-demand use of your openers while your enemies can't see you. It feels wrong to be blowing Vanish on cooldown in a boss fight, so I'd prefer they have something else proc Shadow Power, or perhaps allowing Shadow Dance to trigger it as well (though this starts to make Expose Weakness redundant. Is that such a bad thing?)
Now, I realize most of these things would make the spec more powerful, but all that would need is just a simple numbers nerfing.
I doubt Blizzard would implement all of these, even though I think the spec deserves all three, but I do hope that come the next expansion, when they see how low Rogue numbers have dropped, they'll really give the class a re-tooling like they did with Warlocks. Rogues used to be the most badass class in the game, and the underlying flavor of them remains pretty stone cold. Throw in a bit of decent Rogue lore (if that World of Cold Warcraft situation comes about, there'd be tons of potential for spy stuff) and most important: make the class easier to play.
Meanwhile, I'm happy to report that my Death Knight is absolutely destroying, and he's a lot of fun to play.
Anyway, while the big news is that come tomorrow morning, 5.2 will be dropping, the LFR version of the raid will only open its first wing a week later. I'm as anxious as everyone to start downing some Mogu (or as the case may be, Trolls) right as the patch is released, but it looks like we're going to have a week to kill before we can start to scratch the surface of the raid (unless you have an actual raiding guild, which sadly mine does not seem to be these days - I partially blame myself, as I am a guild officer.)
This is actually good news for a guy who just barely got two toons geared for MSV, and needs to get them running to gear up. Hopefully we won't see a ridiculous jump in LFR queue times for the older raids, but if Blizz really wants alts and latecomers to gear up through LFR, they'd better have a plan if no one runs them anymore.
The rest of this post is me-stuff, if you're not interested in that.
It feels good to finally have Darsino on the road to better gear. He hit revered with Dominance Offensive today and he's done the first branch of MSV (no dagger yet from the first boss.) I'm committed to keeping Darsino specced as Sub this expansion, because it is my dream to see Sub work well, and I can't really see how well it works if I reforge and enchant for Assassination. I really do think Blizzard needs to examine the Rogue in a serious way. They've said they don't think it needs a Warlock-level revamp, but I disagree. This class is dying out, and if we ever get Demon Hunters (and yes, I do hope we do some day) they're going to be seriously endangered.
The things I'm noticing while playing on the rogue is that there's a lot of times when I think I can do something, but I can't yet. You might have enough energy for something, but then you won't have enough combo points, or sometimes it's the other way around. This would not be such a bad thing if finishing moves were simpler.
For example, on Oterro (and I realize that Frost DKs are not a terribly difficult spec to play) the biggest decision I have to make constantly is whether to hit Obliterate or Frost Strike when I have Killing Machine up. Sometimes, the runes for an Obliterate are right about to come up, and in that case I wait. But if my runes are all down, and I'm sitting on some runic power, I'll waste the proc on my Frost Strike to keep the momentum going, hopefully getting a Runic Empowerment proc, which will of course then feed me more runes and thus more Runic Power, etc.
On Darsino, first of all, I have a couple things to establish at the beginning - I need to Ambush out of Stealth for the Expose Weakness debuff, then I need to get Slice and Dice running for the Energy it provides Subtlety, then I need to get Rupture up for Sanguinary Vein, and then I need to squeeze in as many Eviscerates as I can before I need to refresh again. The durations of Rupture and Slice and Dice are such that they often fall off at the same time, so maybe I need to refresh them earlier or something. I don't know.
But we're not finished. Subtlety is also all about using Shadow Dance and Vanish to get more Ambushes in there (for the Expose Weakness, not to mention the damage from Ambush) and also get Shadow Power, which increases damage done while in Stealth and for a few seconds after breaking it.
OH, and don't let me forget - you have to be behind the target at all times because Backstab is your main CP generator. (But you also have to weave Hemorrhage in there even if you are behind them to keep that extra bleed ticking.)
Believe it or not, this is a simpler version than what we had in Cataclysm, where you had to maintain Recuperate as well, but while a little bit of juggling is ok, I think they have got to cut Subtlety some slack somewhere.
Barring some radical redesign (and frankly, it might not be a bad idea,) there are a couple things that could be done to make the spec less absurdly difficult to play well:
1. Do something about Backstab - I know Rogues Do It From Behind, but this positioning thing leaves you at the mercy of your tank and fight mechanics. Any time the boss spins around to cast a spell on a random person, your rotation (which as we just showed, is pretty damned complex) is interrupted. The most obvious but also most radical shift would be to rename it "Stab" and hopefully give it some mechanical difference to Sinister Strike so we don't have to use Sinister Strike. (Combat Rogues - go play a Warrior, amirite?) Dagger requirement! There we go.
2. Simplify Finishers - Assassination get to refresh their Slice and Dice to full with each Envenom. We should get a way to refresh either that or Rupture easily. I'd say every Eviscerate refreshes Rupture to its 5-point duration, plus a redesign that has Rupture's various combo-point levels only affect duration and not damage. With only Slice and Dice and Eviscerates, there's a lot more freedom to focus on the more interesting aspects of the spec.
3. Do something about Shadow Power - Vanish ought to be an escape or deception mechanism. You disappear, and then you can either flee, enjoy the drop in threat (not so much of an issue these days) or get a quick on-demand use of your openers while your enemies can't see you. It feels wrong to be blowing Vanish on cooldown in a boss fight, so I'd prefer they have something else proc Shadow Power, or perhaps allowing Shadow Dance to trigger it as well (though this starts to make Expose Weakness redundant. Is that such a bad thing?)
Now, I realize most of these things would make the spec more powerful, but all that would need is just a simple numbers nerfing.
I doubt Blizzard would implement all of these, even though I think the spec deserves all three, but I do hope that come the next expansion, when they see how low Rogue numbers have dropped, they'll really give the class a re-tooling like they did with Warlocks. Rogues used to be the most badass class in the game, and the underlying flavor of them remains pretty stone cold. Throw in a bit of decent Rogue lore (if that World of Cold Warcraft situation comes about, there'd be tons of potential for spy stuff) and most important: make the class easier to play.
Meanwhile, I'm happy to report that my Death Knight is absolutely destroying, and he's a lot of fun to play.
Monday, March 4, 2013
The Thunder King Comes, The Thunder King Comes - Is the Hibernation of the Alts Over Yet?
With MMO-Champion calling it, and WoW Insider agreeing, and given the deluge of previews we've been getting from Blizzard, it's a pretty safe bet that tomorrow is when 5.2 drops.
I've already gone over a lot of the new content in previous articles, though I will point you to this official preview of the Isle of Thunder itself. It seems to me that Blizzard is trying very hard to create new world content that's different from what we've seen before.
I'm excited about the summonable bosses and such, though I hope there will be rewards compelling enough to do them.
The other thing I am excited for is the prospect of better drop rates in LFR for the 5.0 raids and the VP cost reduction for 5.0 and 5.1 gear (50% and 25%, respectively). While Oterro and Jarsus are at 484 and 481, respectively (and as soon as I get a new Valor piece on Jarsus, I'm sure he'll jump considerably, especially since I believe there are some VP pieces to get from the Shado-Pan Assault that are available at neutral,) everyone else is considerably lower. Only Ardten is geared to queue for MSV, and he's cheating a point with a piece of tanking gear in his inventory.
Mists is not as alt-friendly an expansion as previous ones have been, but I think a big part of that is simply the huge amount of work you need to put in just to qualify to spend your VP on something. Blizzard slowed down gains on VP (remember that by the end of Cataclysm, we were getting 140 VP every time we ran a random dungeon.) The weekly cap is the same, but the amount of content you need to run to hit that cap is pretty heavy, meaning alts get left by the wayside. Even when focusing on a single character, it's pretty hard to cap. Then again, it's called a cap because it's the maximum, not the minimum.
Still, the reduction of price for VP gear will make things a great deal easier, and the Grand Commendations introduced in 5.1 make getting up to revered with the various factions a somewhat less painful experience (especially as the one-off quests for those factions usually provide a pretty nice chunk of XP, which means fewer days doing dailies - this is why in some ways I REALLY wish I had waited on all my alts until 5.1, or at least held off on taking them through Townlong and Dread Wastes, which are awash in Shado-Pan and Klaxxi rep.)
The thing one can often forget is that the life of an altoholic (remember, that's the name of the blog!) gets easier the longer the expansion goes on. We can likely expect that with the drop rate changes and VP price reductions, getting a toon outfitted in such a way to not embarrass him or herself will be a far quicker process. If the usual pattern holds (and I know Blizzard would prefer that it did not) we will probably hit the final raid patch some time in the late fall or winter, and then we will likely have roughly a year before the next expansion comes out. During this latter-day part of the Mists life-cycle, I expect that the VP will be flowing freely, and the drop rates in Throne of Thunder will likely also have been enhanced.
It will still probably be unlikely that you'll have an easy time getting all of your toons geared up in tier 16 stuff, but I am cautiously optimistic that before too long, we're going to see a lot more people decked out in tier 14 sets with Sha-Touched weapons, ready to charge into Lei Shen's house.
Sunday, March 3, 2013
The Next Transitional Patch: 5.3
In the deluge of Blizzard interviews in the run-up to 5.2 (which I am pretty confident we'll see on Tuesday) there was a little talk about the remaining patches for Mists of Pandaria.
It's not like we're deep into the expansion at this point, but typically the final patch cycle tends to last a very long time - it was practically half the expansion's life cycle for the past two, after all.
5.2 will be bringing the final major threat discovered on Pandaria to a close. With the fall of Lei Shen and the Mogu, the story will turn more dramatically toward the Alliance and the Horde.
5.3 will be somewhat similar to 5.1 - a patch focusing on story, presumably with a new daily quest faction. There has not been talk about new 5-man dungeons, but it seems as if Blizzard is cutting down on 5-mans as a way to gear up. Grumble grumble, etc., but let's see where they go with the concept.
I have not yet done the Dominance Offensive grind (at least not the whole thing) but I do know that there's some serious stuff going down with the Horde at the moment. Garrosh has been using more and more brutal tactics against his enemies and in order to keep his people in line. Even Thrall, who held so much faith in the younger Hellscream, has realized he's gone too far. Vol'jin barely escaped an assassination attempt with his life, and Lor'themar was nearly ready to leave the Horde in favor of the Alliance, if it had not been for the affair with the Sunreavers and Dalaran.
As of yet, though, the Horde is still pretty much operating under Garrosh's direction. Some are too frightened to disobey, some are still inspired by his brash, might-makes-right philosophy. We don't know exactly how the Sunreaver Onslaught is going to go down (and it appears it will not have quite the same storytelling style as the 5.1 factions, which is a shame.) It's clear that the Horde is near a tipping point, and if there's one place for the Resistance to start up, it's 5.3. I expect we're going to see a lot of Vol'jin and Lor'themar, and hopefully see Baine get in on it too. Sylvanas even might play a role, though she's always acted somewhat independent of the Horde anyway.
The Alliance is not without its problems, either, even if the external Horde threat far overshadows the problems from within. The biggest new concern is that Jaina is off the chain. It's true that Jaina always had a little independence from the Alliance during her reign in Theramore. But in the past, she used that independence to seek some degree of peace with the Horde. Now, it's Varian who wants to deal with the Horde in a careful manner, to fight them in such a way that the war might end one day. Just as Varian is finally coming around, Jaina's gotten tired of waiting for a lasting peace that never seems to come, and she has become dedicated to devastating the Horde.
I don't know what is going to happen to Jaina, ultimately. While I doubt that she's going to sink to the depths that Garrosh has, I do think she needs to go take a trip to the Caverns of Time and see how horrified she was when Arthas started to go crazy.
The internal politics of the Alliance have not been touched on nearly as much this expansion, but I think 5.3 is an opportunity to get a good luck at all of it. Varian is attempting to become the High King of the Alliance, but I've got to imagine that would ruffle a few feathers. Tyrande's been leading her people for ten thousand years, and Genn Greymane is king of an entirely different nation (albeit one in exile.) Jaina could prove a rallying point for the more frustrated and angry leaders of the Alliance, and I could definitely see a political crisis if Varian is not able to rally the whole of the Alliance to his way of doing things.
Still, I'm not entirely sure what this will mean for the Alliance from a player's perspective. Horde players might have content where they work on an underground movement within Orgrimmar or the other capitals. If that's how the Horde goes down, I could see Alliance players trying to convince the various leaders of the Alliance to stand behind Varian and let him bring the hammer down.
These "story patches" could be a great tradition to continue for the rest of the game, coming out in between raid patches, to bring more variety to the game at a faster pace. I would love to see some big story moments covered in patches like this. Let me liberate Gilneas over the course of a faction grind, or let me help Sylvanas purge the Kor'kron from the Undercity. Engaging in the game is far more fun when you can feel part of the story.
It's not like we're deep into the expansion at this point, but typically the final patch cycle tends to last a very long time - it was practically half the expansion's life cycle for the past two, after all.
5.2 will be bringing the final major threat discovered on Pandaria to a close. With the fall of Lei Shen and the Mogu, the story will turn more dramatically toward the Alliance and the Horde.
5.3 will be somewhat similar to 5.1 - a patch focusing on story, presumably with a new daily quest faction. There has not been talk about new 5-man dungeons, but it seems as if Blizzard is cutting down on 5-mans as a way to gear up. Grumble grumble, etc., but let's see where they go with the concept.
I have not yet done the Dominance Offensive grind (at least not the whole thing) but I do know that there's some serious stuff going down with the Horde at the moment. Garrosh has been using more and more brutal tactics against his enemies and in order to keep his people in line. Even Thrall, who held so much faith in the younger Hellscream, has realized he's gone too far. Vol'jin barely escaped an assassination attempt with his life, and Lor'themar was nearly ready to leave the Horde in favor of the Alliance, if it had not been for the affair with the Sunreavers and Dalaran.
As of yet, though, the Horde is still pretty much operating under Garrosh's direction. Some are too frightened to disobey, some are still inspired by his brash, might-makes-right philosophy. We don't know exactly how the Sunreaver Onslaught is going to go down (and it appears it will not have quite the same storytelling style as the 5.1 factions, which is a shame.) It's clear that the Horde is near a tipping point, and if there's one place for the Resistance to start up, it's 5.3. I expect we're going to see a lot of Vol'jin and Lor'themar, and hopefully see Baine get in on it too. Sylvanas even might play a role, though she's always acted somewhat independent of the Horde anyway.
The Alliance is not without its problems, either, even if the external Horde threat far overshadows the problems from within. The biggest new concern is that Jaina is off the chain. It's true that Jaina always had a little independence from the Alliance during her reign in Theramore. But in the past, she used that independence to seek some degree of peace with the Horde. Now, it's Varian who wants to deal with the Horde in a careful manner, to fight them in such a way that the war might end one day. Just as Varian is finally coming around, Jaina's gotten tired of waiting for a lasting peace that never seems to come, and she has become dedicated to devastating the Horde.
I don't know what is going to happen to Jaina, ultimately. While I doubt that she's going to sink to the depths that Garrosh has, I do think she needs to go take a trip to the Caverns of Time and see how horrified she was when Arthas started to go crazy.
The internal politics of the Alliance have not been touched on nearly as much this expansion, but I think 5.3 is an opportunity to get a good luck at all of it. Varian is attempting to become the High King of the Alliance, but I've got to imagine that would ruffle a few feathers. Tyrande's been leading her people for ten thousand years, and Genn Greymane is king of an entirely different nation (albeit one in exile.) Jaina could prove a rallying point for the more frustrated and angry leaders of the Alliance, and I could definitely see a political crisis if Varian is not able to rally the whole of the Alliance to his way of doing things.
Still, I'm not entirely sure what this will mean for the Alliance from a player's perspective. Horde players might have content where they work on an underground movement within Orgrimmar or the other capitals. If that's how the Horde goes down, I could see Alliance players trying to convince the various leaders of the Alliance to stand behind Varian and let him bring the hammer down.
These "story patches" could be a great tradition to continue for the rest of the game, coming out in between raid patches, to bring more variety to the game at a faster pace. I would love to see some big story moments covered in patches like this. Let me liberate Gilneas over the course of a faction grind, or let me help Sylvanas purge the Kor'kron from the Undercity. Engaging in the game is far more fun when you can feel part of the story.
Friday, March 1, 2013
Hints in Pandaria of What's Happening in Expansion 5
We're now a few months in to Mists of Pandaria. Generally, the reception for the expansion has been good - there's a whole big continent to explore, satisfyingly large raid tiers, and a ton more story to sink our teeth into - story that we get to actually experience instead of hearing that it had been established in a tie-in book.
The Legendary quest chain throughout Mists of Pandaria is focused on Wrathion, the Black Prince, choosing you to serve as his champion as he attempts to create a united Azeroth. His methods are suspicious, and his ultimate vision for what this united Azeroth would look like are hazy, but nevertheless, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he probably does, legitimately want to save the world.
One of the constant themes of WoW is that Azeroth would be in amazingly better shape if the Horde and the Alliance buried the hatchet once and for all, but that the old wounds of past conflicts have, so far, made any coalition between the two a temporary affair at best.
The vision that Wrathion shows us of a destroyed Azeroth clearly implies that he thinks the Legion is coming to invade. It's not exactly a shocker - the Legion has been trying to invade for tens of thousands of years.
Mists of Pandaria is all about the Allliance/Horde conflict. Sure, Pandaria has a lot of its own identity, but after dealing with the Mantid and the Sha (though the Sha will probably never go away completely - especially as Garrosh attempts to weaponize it) and seeing as we're about to put down the Mogu threat in the next patch, the real focus and climax of the expansion will be the fall of Garrosh.
Blizzard people in various interviews have referred to a Horde coup d'etat. I expect we'll get a build-up to this in 5.3, and then 5.4's raid will of course make it official. The Alliance will of course also get in on the defeat of Garrosh, but this leaves an interesting question open - and one that will have huge ramifications for WoW going forward.
The question is whether the Alliance and the Horde Resistance work together to topple Garrosh, or simply come at him from different angles.
If it's the latter, then we will probably not see the status quo all that upset: the Alliance celebrates a victory against the Garrosh, but the conflict with the Horde could continue much as it had. The Horde would be in a weakened position, dealing with the aftermath of regime change - presumably needing to sort through the Kor'kron and figure out who was just loyally serving the office of the Warchief and who was a crazy evil bastard, all while trying to determine who, if anyone, should be Warchief now (and there's a whole other article right there.)
If it's the former, though, we might actually see a return to the uneasy cooperation between the factions we haven't seen since the Wrathgate. Before you scoff at this, think about something that Velen has been talking about: the Army of the Light. Velen (and really, it wouldn't hurt to give the Draenei some screen time) knows the Legion is destroying worlds constantly, but that we could stand up to them if we all formed one giant coalition (I'm avoiding the word alliance for reasons that I think should be obvious.) If we are going to face down the Legion, there could be some serious shift in 6.0.
With the full might of the Alliance storming Orgrimmar, it's hard to imagine the war as it is currently going will be able to just keep going.
I doubt we'll ever seen the two factions totally merge - the way that PvP and even just questing work would make that unfeasible - but I definitely think we'll see a cool-down in the conflict between the two sides and, if Blizzard wants to really play around with the fundamentals of the game, we could even see a relaxation of the restrictions against cross-faction cooperation in-game.
So, the expansion itself: I doubt we'll see another "remaking of Azeroth" expansion after Cataclysm taxed their resources so heavily. What that means is that we're probably going to have something like the Scourge Invasion that occurred pre-Wrath (and pre-Naxxramas 40, but that's beside the point.) We'll have an attack that really makes it clear we need to act. To do so, I expect we'll travel to the stars once more.
Will there be another fragment of Outland to explore? Perhaps. Or we might travel to other worlds.
In the faction leader short stories, we discovered that the Draenei have fixed the Exodar. Imagine, then, that Velen gets the thing flying and says "Alliance and Horde, all aboard, let's take out the Legion!" Most expansions have had a fairly epic introduction to bring you into the new world - I think taking off in the Exodar would qualify.
Assuming there is a Burning Legion expansion, we could also probably guess that we'd be seeing some kind of return of Illidan. Blizz has talked about bringing him back in some way or another to redeem him. In fairness, we don't know if they're just talking about redeeming him in the eyes of history (though the guy was far from blameless.) If Illidan does return, the manner of his return I would hope for would be as the new sort of class leader for Demon Hunters, which would be an awesome addition to the class roster (I'd make a Worgen Demon Hunter. Please let me make a Worgen Demon Hunter.)
Blizzcon is several months away still, but I'm confident we will find out about the next expansion there. Not that I'm tired of this one yet, mind you, but given how well the story is integrated into Mists, I'm extremely excited about where the game is going in the future.
The Legendary quest chain throughout Mists of Pandaria is focused on Wrathion, the Black Prince, choosing you to serve as his champion as he attempts to create a united Azeroth. His methods are suspicious, and his ultimate vision for what this united Azeroth would look like are hazy, but nevertheless, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he probably does, legitimately want to save the world.
One of the constant themes of WoW is that Azeroth would be in amazingly better shape if the Horde and the Alliance buried the hatchet once and for all, but that the old wounds of past conflicts have, so far, made any coalition between the two a temporary affair at best.
The vision that Wrathion shows us of a destroyed Azeroth clearly implies that he thinks the Legion is coming to invade. It's not exactly a shocker - the Legion has been trying to invade for tens of thousands of years.
Mists of Pandaria is all about the Allliance/Horde conflict. Sure, Pandaria has a lot of its own identity, but after dealing with the Mantid and the Sha (though the Sha will probably never go away completely - especially as Garrosh attempts to weaponize it) and seeing as we're about to put down the Mogu threat in the next patch, the real focus and climax of the expansion will be the fall of Garrosh.
Blizzard people in various interviews have referred to a Horde coup d'etat. I expect we'll get a build-up to this in 5.3, and then 5.4's raid will of course make it official. The Alliance will of course also get in on the defeat of Garrosh, but this leaves an interesting question open - and one that will have huge ramifications for WoW going forward.
The question is whether the Alliance and the Horde Resistance work together to topple Garrosh, or simply come at him from different angles.
If it's the latter, then we will probably not see the status quo all that upset: the Alliance celebrates a victory against the Garrosh, but the conflict with the Horde could continue much as it had. The Horde would be in a weakened position, dealing with the aftermath of regime change - presumably needing to sort through the Kor'kron and figure out who was just loyally serving the office of the Warchief and who was a crazy evil bastard, all while trying to determine who, if anyone, should be Warchief now (and there's a whole other article right there.)
If it's the former, though, we might actually see a return to the uneasy cooperation between the factions we haven't seen since the Wrathgate. Before you scoff at this, think about something that Velen has been talking about: the Army of the Light. Velen (and really, it wouldn't hurt to give the Draenei some screen time) knows the Legion is destroying worlds constantly, but that we could stand up to them if we all formed one giant coalition (I'm avoiding the word alliance for reasons that I think should be obvious.) If we are going to face down the Legion, there could be some serious shift in 6.0.
With the full might of the Alliance storming Orgrimmar, it's hard to imagine the war as it is currently going will be able to just keep going.
I doubt we'll ever seen the two factions totally merge - the way that PvP and even just questing work would make that unfeasible - but I definitely think we'll see a cool-down in the conflict between the two sides and, if Blizzard wants to really play around with the fundamentals of the game, we could even see a relaxation of the restrictions against cross-faction cooperation in-game.
So, the expansion itself: I doubt we'll see another "remaking of Azeroth" expansion after Cataclysm taxed their resources so heavily. What that means is that we're probably going to have something like the Scourge Invasion that occurred pre-Wrath (and pre-Naxxramas 40, but that's beside the point.) We'll have an attack that really makes it clear we need to act. To do so, I expect we'll travel to the stars once more.
Will there be another fragment of Outland to explore? Perhaps. Or we might travel to other worlds.
In the faction leader short stories, we discovered that the Draenei have fixed the Exodar. Imagine, then, that Velen gets the thing flying and says "Alliance and Horde, all aboard, let's take out the Legion!" Most expansions have had a fairly epic introduction to bring you into the new world - I think taking off in the Exodar would qualify.
Assuming there is a Burning Legion expansion, we could also probably guess that we'd be seeing some kind of return of Illidan. Blizz has talked about bringing him back in some way or another to redeem him. In fairness, we don't know if they're just talking about redeeming him in the eyes of history (though the guy was far from blameless.) If Illidan does return, the manner of his return I would hope for would be as the new sort of class leader for Demon Hunters, which would be an awesome addition to the class roster (I'd make a Worgen Demon Hunter. Please let me make a Worgen Demon Hunter.)
Blizzcon is several months away still, but I'm confident we will find out about the next expansion there. Not that I'm tired of this one yet, mind you, but given how well the story is integrated into Mists, I'm extremely excited about where the game is going in the future.
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