So, the big PAX East announcement from Blizzard has arrived, and it appears that they are coming out with a side-project based on the Warcraft universe that is a collectable card game. Much like the older members of Blizzard, I was an avid player of Magic the Gathering both when I was in elementary school and the game was still new (I came in around Fallen Empires, and played through Tempest) and later on in college through Magic Online (which I had to use a PC Emulator for) during the Kamigawa, Ravnica, and a bit of the Time Spiral blocks. (Ravnica has got to be the best block they ever did. Wonder how Return to Ravnica is.)
Anyway, even though there is already a CCG for Warcraft, Hearthstone appears to be a fully-digital version. It's free to play, operating by having people buy card packs to build their decks. It actually appears that you can earn more cards simply by playing the game.
One could argue that as a "free to play" game with "microtransactions," Blizzard is dipping their toes into a business model that we all kind of dread WoW would wind up with. On the other hand, an online CCG kind of makes the most sense as a FTP set-up.
I only ever really played Magic as my CCG, so I don't know much about other styles. However, given Blizzard's talent for polish and balance, I think this could prove to be a fun little diversion (though of course there will be some people who get super hardcore about it.)
The emphasis on this game seems to be for casual fun, as embodied by a drunken dwarf who seems to be the game's mascot. I'm sure it will find a place on my dock and see play when I don't feel like logging in to the real WoW.
Friday, March 22, 2013
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
The Drunken Master: Leveling Up my Monk Tank
Mists hasn't been really alt-friendly, though one could argue that the only real reason for this is that gearing up is a more complicated process, and that there is more to do on one's main. I imagine that once I've completed a Test of Valor (the 5.1-phase part of the Legendary chain) on Oterro and Jarsus, I might put more effort into gearing alts.
As soon as they announced the Monk as a class, I knew I was going to have to try Brewmaster. Sure, I'm not tanking on as many toons as I used to (partially just because Oterro's switched, and he was the toon on which I tanked the second-most,) but while Windwalkers have some interesting fluidity to the way they work, I figured it would be interesting to try the tank class that had active mitigation built in from the get-go.
Also, you tank by getting your enemies drunk.
Gaotso (named for the two most common variation of that General's chicken dish's name) is now level 86, and I've tanked Temple of the Jade Serpent, as well as a ton of earlier dungeons. Tanking on a Monk is an interesting affair, though having gotten used to AM-tanking, it's not terribly difficult to pick up.
There are two kind of "maintenance" things you have to keep an eye on - putting up Guard on cooldown (and powering it via your wonderfully free Tiger Strikes, which thankfully only need a single stack now) and maintaining Shuffle, which increases Stagger amount and Parry chance by 10%. Unlike, say, Shield of the Righteous, you can keep Shuffle up pretty much all the time, but I recommend an animated Weak Aura to make sure you're maintaining it (I don't know if Blizzard is adding auras just for add-ons to use, but the ones I've got running on Gaotso are really looking good.)
With both of those going, you'll probably have survival covered, though some of your cooldowns can be blown more frequently than you might typically use them on another tank. Elusive Brew, in particular, seems to be something you should use whenever you see any slight increase in incoming damage, because you build charges pretty quickly. Purifying Brew is pretty nice as well, but at least for now, it's rare that I'm taking enough damage to make it worth the Chi. I'm sure that as mastery goes up and I put Gaotso into more challenging content, this ability is going to see far more use.
For threat, Keg Smash is your best friend, doing massive damage to both single and AoE targets, applying Weakened Blows, Dizzying Haze, and generating two Chi. It's got a cooldown, though. In single-target situations, Jab and Expel Harm will do enough, but in AoE, you can either toss barrels via Dizzying Haze, or if you're in range, I recommend a Spinning Crane Kick, which will also generate Chi and does actual damage, which I believe is better for threat than Dizzying Haze's damage-less threat.
Blackout Kicks will be your main expenditure of Chi, and cause Shuffle. If you desperately need some extra threat, Breath of Fire is an option, but I almost never use it.
Meanwhile, as you get crits, you'll create little healing spheres that only you can take. These actually heal for a good chunk of health, so moving around to pick those up is not a bad idea. The Ox statue itself is mainly there to help protect your group, though I wonder if in a raid situation the Ox casts Guard on your co-tanks. It can also be used to pick up adds, but so far I've yet to have the need or the target-clicking time to do so.
Mastery seems like the clear winner for stats here, even though without Purifying Brew it doesn't actually reduce the amount of damage you take at all. Actually, I imagine that mastery is probably the best stat for every tank, but I can't say that with great authority.
The Forgotten Depths
Today the second wing of Throne of Thunder opened up on LFR, and I have to say I'm liking it a lot.
One could call the Forgotten Depths the "beast wing" of the raid. This isn't an area fortified by trolls or mogu. It very much feels like a ruined part of the castle that you're sneaking your way through.
Difficulty-wise, I definitely noticed that demands on the tanks are much simpler, which was honestly a nice break after the craziness of the Last Stand of the Zandalari.
Initial Trash:
The trash leading up to the first boss is actually very simple, yet due to our ignorance, we did manage to wipe on them. Basically, you start in a cave, where there's a measly three pulls of bats, all of whom are in Tortos' room. The bigger bats will periodically silence anyone nearby, so tanks should hold them away from healers.
Tortos:
Tortos is an enormous turtle/tortoise who has become so encrusted with minerals that he actually blocks the path forward. Tortos doesn't move during the encounter, but has one of those mechanics that forces you to have a tank on him lest he does raidwide aoe. The main tank needs to get their active mitigation up every time Tortos bites, because this hits very hard.
The off-tank spends the fight gathering bat adds that don't have a huge amount of health, but can be a threat to healers.
Anyway, the main mechanic here is that periodically he'll summon three spinning turtles that do damage to anyone they spin into. DPSing these guys down to 10% will turn them inert, and you'll be able to perform a special action that kicks the turtle in the direction across from where you're standing in relation to them. This will both interrupt the enemies it hits and also increase the damage they take.
Tortos has a raidwide AoE (whose name I can't quite recall) that needs to be interrupted in this manner.
The other mechanics are that over the course of the fight, more and more stalactites fall from the ceiling, and you need to dodge them. Tortos will also occasionally stun the raid (not sure if this is the thing you need to interrupt or something different,) which of course makes dodging stalactites harder.
This is not a terribly complex fight, but it's in a relatively small room, so it can feel a bit crowded. On the other hand, the small room does make it easier for the off-tank to pick up adds. DPS should prioritize little turtles, then bats, and then Tortos himself.
Trash before Megaera:
After defeating Tortos, you need to make your way through a giant cavern filled with various fungal elementals and bog beasts, as well as shale spiders and those ring-based tunnelers. This can be a huge slog, but I'm sure we'll find efficient paths as we get familiar with the area.
Anyway, what you need to do is find the various Bell Guardians - ghostly Mogu who guard bells that you need to hit and destroy. Once all the bells are gone, you'll be able to fight Megaera, who is at the far end of the cavern.
Megaera:
Ironic that in a China-themed expansion we get a classic Greek monster, but this fight is cool enough that it's fine.
Megaera has three kinds of heads, each of which pop up at set slots along the shore of an underground lake (Fire, Frost, and Venom from left to right.) At any given time, two heads are active while others remain at the back of the cave, damaging from afar.
In LFR at least, tanks can simply take one head each cycle and let the debuff stack up (it shouldn't get higher than 3.) These debuffs are dealt in an AoE cone, so tanks should face their bosses away from each other.
Meanwhile, dps is going to work on a single head at a given time. Once a head is killed, the other heals to full and Megaera takes about a seventh of her health in damage. After this happens, two of the same kind of head grow back, but for now they stay at the back of the cave.
After the new head comes in, Megaera does a raidwide AoE that people should stack up for and use raid cooldowns to deal with. When this AoE is finished, you return to the normal phase.
My raid kept the Frost head alive, as supposedly the Frost abilities in the back of the cave are hardest to deal with. Meanwhile, while I swapped between Frost and Fire each phase, my co-tank swapped between Venom and Frost, which seemed to work out once we knew where they were popping up and which way to face them.
The heads at the back of the cave will shoot various abilities at random raid members. The Frost and Fire abilities will leave patches that cancel each other out, but presumably this is not something one needs to use on LFR, as we never killed a Frost head.
Once seven heads have been killed, Megaera dies.
Trash before Ji-Kun:
Now we get into what appears to be the palace's sewer system. This is a really cool area where you climb the drainage system up to Ji-kun's nest. Along the way, some of the trash is a little tough to deal with. Little packs of flies will summon worms that burrow to become immune to damage (not sure if you just have to wait them out or what.) Spiders will also descend from the ceiling and create patches of deadly gas (unless that's the flies.) But by far the most dangerous things here are the Gastropods - giant snails that will auto-kill anyone within melee range. Obviously, this means that ranged dps needs to kite these things and burn them very quickly. When you reach the top of the massive climb, you'll be able to jump far across to the central platform in an enormous, cylindrical room, where Ji-Kun's eggs are. Breaking the eggs will summon the boss.
Ji-Kun:
I should note that as a tank, I am very ill-equipped to describe this fight, as the tanks really simply stand there and swap the boss.
However, my understanding of how the rest of the fight works is this: a small group of dps and a healer need to jump down to the lower platforms, where some of Ji-Kun's eggs sit. Killing the eggs will prevent hatchlings from appearing, though if they do hatch, you can kill them as well. At some point after killing one of these things, you can grab the feathers they drop and thus gain the ability to fly. You can now get back up to the main platform, and you can also fly up to the higher nests.
I wish I could say more about the mechanics here, but there's something to do with getting in the way of the food Ji-Kun gives to her chicks, taking some damage but also getting a buff. Also, if you don't deal with the adds, things will escalate and get pretty crazy, with hatchlings and such creating their own adds or something.
It seems very complex, but a tank basically just needs to deal with the boss and not get blown off the platform.
In Conclusion:
Throne of Thunder continues to seem pretty darned epic, and some of the environments in this segment are really awe-inspiring (particularly Ji-Kun's area.) I've generally been a fan of Mists' raids so far, but if tier 14 was a set of solid, if not superlative instances, Throne of Thunder really does seem like it might be one of those raids we look back on with great nostalgia and hold up as an example of how to do a raid in World of Warcraft.
We've now seen half of it on LFR. Here's hoping parts 3 and 4 keep up in quality! (Super excited about the next segment, as both Durumu and Dark Animus, at least by their models, look incredible.)
One could call the Forgotten Depths the "beast wing" of the raid. This isn't an area fortified by trolls or mogu. It very much feels like a ruined part of the castle that you're sneaking your way through.
Difficulty-wise, I definitely noticed that demands on the tanks are much simpler, which was honestly a nice break after the craziness of the Last Stand of the Zandalari.
Initial Trash:
The trash leading up to the first boss is actually very simple, yet due to our ignorance, we did manage to wipe on them. Basically, you start in a cave, where there's a measly three pulls of bats, all of whom are in Tortos' room. The bigger bats will periodically silence anyone nearby, so tanks should hold them away from healers.
Tortos:
Tortos is an enormous turtle/tortoise who has become so encrusted with minerals that he actually blocks the path forward. Tortos doesn't move during the encounter, but has one of those mechanics that forces you to have a tank on him lest he does raidwide aoe. The main tank needs to get their active mitigation up every time Tortos bites, because this hits very hard.
The off-tank spends the fight gathering bat adds that don't have a huge amount of health, but can be a threat to healers.
Anyway, the main mechanic here is that periodically he'll summon three spinning turtles that do damage to anyone they spin into. DPSing these guys down to 10% will turn them inert, and you'll be able to perform a special action that kicks the turtle in the direction across from where you're standing in relation to them. This will both interrupt the enemies it hits and also increase the damage they take.
Tortos has a raidwide AoE (whose name I can't quite recall) that needs to be interrupted in this manner.
The other mechanics are that over the course of the fight, more and more stalactites fall from the ceiling, and you need to dodge them. Tortos will also occasionally stun the raid (not sure if this is the thing you need to interrupt or something different,) which of course makes dodging stalactites harder.
This is not a terribly complex fight, but it's in a relatively small room, so it can feel a bit crowded. On the other hand, the small room does make it easier for the off-tank to pick up adds. DPS should prioritize little turtles, then bats, and then Tortos himself.
Trash before Megaera:
After defeating Tortos, you need to make your way through a giant cavern filled with various fungal elementals and bog beasts, as well as shale spiders and those ring-based tunnelers. This can be a huge slog, but I'm sure we'll find efficient paths as we get familiar with the area.
Anyway, what you need to do is find the various Bell Guardians - ghostly Mogu who guard bells that you need to hit and destroy. Once all the bells are gone, you'll be able to fight Megaera, who is at the far end of the cavern.
Megaera:
Ironic that in a China-themed expansion we get a classic Greek monster, but this fight is cool enough that it's fine.
Megaera has three kinds of heads, each of which pop up at set slots along the shore of an underground lake (Fire, Frost, and Venom from left to right.) At any given time, two heads are active while others remain at the back of the cave, damaging from afar.
In LFR at least, tanks can simply take one head each cycle and let the debuff stack up (it shouldn't get higher than 3.) These debuffs are dealt in an AoE cone, so tanks should face their bosses away from each other.
Meanwhile, dps is going to work on a single head at a given time. Once a head is killed, the other heals to full and Megaera takes about a seventh of her health in damage. After this happens, two of the same kind of head grow back, but for now they stay at the back of the cave.
After the new head comes in, Megaera does a raidwide AoE that people should stack up for and use raid cooldowns to deal with. When this AoE is finished, you return to the normal phase.
My raid kept the Frost head alive, as supposedly the Frost abilities in the back of the cave are hardest to deal with. Meanwhile, while I swapped between Frost and Fire each phase, my co-tank swapped between Venom and Frost, which seemed to work out once we knew where they were popping up and which way to face them.
The heads at the back of the cave will shoot various abilities at random raid members. The Frost and Fire abilities will leave patches that cancel each other out, but presumably this is not something one needs to use on LFR, as we never killed a Frost head.
Once seven heads have been killed, Megaera dies.
Trash before Ji-Kun:
Now we get into what appears to be the palace's sewer system. This is a really cool area where you climb the drainage system up to Ji-kun's nest. Along the way, some of the trash is a little tough to deal with. Little packs of flies will summon worms that burrow to become immune to damage (not sure if you just have to wait them out or what.) Spiders will also descend from the ceiling and create patches of deadly gas (unless that's the flies.) But by far the most dangerous things here are the Gastropods - giant snails that will auto-kill anyone within melee range. Obviously, this means that ranged dps needs to kite these things and burn them very quickly. When you reach the top of the massive climb, you'll be able to jump far across to the central platform in an enormous, cylindrical room, where Ji-Kun's eggs are. Breaking the eggs will summon the boss.
Ji-Kun:
I should note that as a tank, I am very ill-equipped to describe this fight, as the tanks really simply stand there and swap the boss.
However, my understanding of how the rest of the fight works is this: a small group of dps and a healer need to jump down to the lower platforms, where some of Ji-Kun's eggs sit. Killing the eggs will prevent hatchlings from appearing, though if they do hatch, you can kill them as well. At some point after killing one of these things, you can grab the feathers they drop and thus gain the ability to fly. You can now get back up to the main platform, and you can also fly up to the higher nests.
I wish I could say more about the mechanics here, but there's something to do with getting in the way of the food Ji-Kun gives to her chicks, taking some damage but also getting a buff. Also, if you don't deal with the adds, things will escalate and get pretty crazy, with hatchlings and such creating their own adds or something.
It seems very complex, but a tank basically just needs to deal with the boss and not get blown off the platform.
In Conclusion:
Throne of Thunder continues to seem pretty darned epic, and some of the environments in this segment are really awe-inspiring (particularly Ji-Kun's area.) I've generally been a fan of Mists' raids so far, but if tier 14 was a set of solid, if not superlative instances, Throne of Thunder really does seem like it might be one of those raids we look back on with great nostalgia and hold up as an example of how to do a raid in World of Warcraft.
We've now seen half of it on LFR. Here's hoping parts 3 and 4 keep up in quality! (Super excited about the next segment, as both Durumu and Dark Animus, at least by their models, look incredible.)
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Galakrond, the Scourge, and the Titans
There's a strange irony in Warcraft. Some of the most influential players in the cosmos are the Old Gods - beings inspired by HP Lovecraft that are continent-sized monsters with incredible psychic powers and that seem to exist in a strange state that is neither life nor death.
One of the catchphrases of the Faceless creations of the Old Gods is "they do not live, they do not die. They are outside the cycle."
Yet as mysterious as these beings are, we actually interact with them fairly directly relatively often. We've fought both C'Thun and Yogg-Saron, and even if we were only fighting their heads - one projection on a much larger body, we do seem to have faced them down and beaten them in one way or another. These malevolent creatures, who even drove Neltharion to madness, are actually not the most difficult adversary to subdue indeed, it was Deathwing, once a repository of Titanic power, who seemed to have a much larger impact on the world than any of the Old Gods accomplished on their own.
If you want awe-inspiring mystery, look to the "good" guys, the Titans. We've heard tons and tons about them, and we've seen evidence of their works from Storm Peaks to Uldum to the Vale of Eternal Blossoms, but we still haven't seen one and we've never been able to talk to them about just what they mean to do with us.
I always thought it was interesting that an Orc shaman who had been transformed by the Fel magics of an Eredar demon would become so affiliated with ice and undeath. The Lich King is a strange creature, and despite the well-known origins of the Scourge, there are a few things that don't really add up. Was the Lich King truly Ner'zhul, and then Arthas? (And then Bolvar?) Why did the Lich King suddenly gain powers over the dead, unlike, say, simply summoning a ton of demons to Northrend or calling down fel fire from the sky?
I've often put forth that somehow, the Lich King drew on a separate source of power, fusing the demonic fel magic with, perhaps, the power of Yogg-Saron to become a wholly new entity. The Lich King may have been defeated, but the Scourge remains, and even though the army of the damned is a relatively recent thing on Azeroth, it's already become so ingrained that it can no longer be destroyed - only controlled and leashed by the Jailor of the Damned (which is a hell of a thing to put on a resume, Bolvar.) Much as the Titans felt they couldn't kill the Old Gods (stuff like the Sha being the result,) we are warned after killing Arthas that there still has to be someone to take on the Crown of Domination, lest the Scourge become even worse that it otherwise would be.
There's something odd about Northrend that seems to make the dead come back to life.
The Scourge, at this point in-game, is only a little over a decade old, yet thousands and thousands and thousands of years ago, when the War of the Ancients was still in the distant future, there was Galakrond.
We only heard a bit about Galakrond in Wrath - we knew he was the father of all dragons, and that the aspects were somehow derived or descended from him. He was also the biggest dragon or proto-dragon to exist.
We knew that the Scourge was trying to raise him, but I imagine most people simply wrote that off as the fact that the Scourge would obviously want the largest Frostwyrm they could get their hands on.
But in the recent series, Dawn of the Aspects (which I should note here that I have not actually read,) we learn some interesting things. Kalecgos has found a mysterious artifact from Northrend that allows him to see far into the past through the eyes of Malygos. The events Kalec witnesses are from before the aspects were aspects, and Malygos was still a proto-dragon.
Galakrond was not the benevolent father figure to the original dragons - he was an immense beast, eating his fellow dragonkin and, far more horrifically, his victims were coming back from the dead.
Why would the Titans select such a monster on which to base their key protectors?
Let's talk about another thing: the Curse of Flesh.
We're first introduced to the concept of the Curse of Flesh in Borean Tundra, where the gnomes get the first evidence that they were descended from essentially Titan-build robots. This curse explains what happened to make the Earthen turn into the Dwarves, likewise the early origins of the humans, tol'vir, and even the mogu.
Yet there's someone else who talks about the Curse of Flesh - Lady Deathwhisper in Icecrown Citadel. The Lady offers to free her subjects from the curse by turning them into the undead. No longer bound by mortality, the Scourge is allowed to function as a single-minded machine. Kind of like the creations of the Titans...
Meanwhile, we see the Mogu have been pretty successful at re-activating Titan technology, like the construct machine in Mogu'shan Vaults. The line between living and artificial Mogu is a very blurred one, and the Mogu are also masters of trading out bodies and spirits - living forever through a kind of spirit-transfer that, when you think about it, is actually pretty much just necromancy.
The Titans are strange beings with unknowable minds. We've projected benevolent psychologies onto them, but we have very little evidence to support what we think their motives are. The Titans create order, almost like machines. What if they are, in some way, machine-like themselves? They may see organic life as simply a chemical and mechanical process. But think about this: what if that catchphrase from before isn't talking about the Old Gods, and it isn't talking about the Scourge?
What if it's the Titans? They do not live, they do not die - they are immortal and ageless, but exist on a level so far removed from what we think of as life that, perhaps, they do not comprehend it in the way that we do. They are outside the cycle. What cycle? The cycle of life and death? Of corruption and redemption? Of creation and destruction?
Whatever cycle we're talking about, clearly the Titans saw something in Galakrond that they wished to recreate. Perhaps it was not Yogg-Saron's power that caused Ner'zhul to become something utterly different than what the Burning Legion represented, but rather it was Titanic power that gave him the ability to reshape and recreate life.
Perhaps the Titans are the ultimate necromancers?
One of the catchphrases of the Faceless creations of the Old Gods is "they do not live, they do not die. They are outside the cycle."
Yet as mysterious as these beings are, we actually interact with them fairly directly relatively often. We've fought both C'Thun and Yogg-Saron, and even if we were only fighting their heads - one projection on a much larger body, we do seem to have faced them down and beaten them in one way or another. These malevolent creatures, who even drove Neltharion to madness, are actually not the most difficult adversary to subdue indeed, it was Deathwing, once a repository of Titanic power, who seemed to have a much larger impact on the world than any of the Old Gods accomplished on their own.
If you want awe-inspiring mystery, look to the "good" guys, the Titans. We've heard tons and tons about them, and we've seen evidence of their works from Storm Peaks to Uldum to the Vale of Eternal Blossoms, but we still haven't seen one and we've never been able to talk to them about just what they mean to do with us.
I always thought it was interesting that an Orc shaman who had been transformed by the Fel magics of an Eredar demon would become so affiliated with ice and undeath. The Lich King is a strange creature, and despite the well-known origins of the Scourge, there are a few things that don't really add up. Was the Lich King truly Ner'zhul, and then Arthas? (And then Bolvar?) Why did the Lich King suddenly gain powers over the dead, unlike, say, simply summoning a ton of demons to Northrend or calling down fel fire from the sky?
I've often put forth that somehow, the Lich King drew on a separate source of power, fusing the demonic fel magic with, perhaps, the power of Yogg-Saron to become a wholly new entity. The Lich King may have been defeated, but the Scourge remains, and even though the army of the damned is a relatively recent thing on Azeroth, it's already become so ingrained that it can no longer be destroyed - only controlled and leashed by the Jailor of the Damned (which is a hell of a thing to put on a resume, Bolvar.) Much as the Titans felt they couldn't kill the Old Gods (stuff like the Sha being the result,) we are warned after killing Arthas that there still has to be someone to take on the Crown of Domination, lest the Scourge become even worse that it otherwise would be.
There's something odd about Northrend that seems to make the dead come back to life.
The Scourge, at this point in-game, is only a little over a decade old, yet thousands and thousands and thousands of years ago, when the War of the Ancients was still in the distant future, there was Galakrond.
We only heard a bit about Galakrond in Wrath - we knew he was the father of all dragons, and that the aspects were somehow derived or descended from him. He was also the biggest dragon or proto-dragon to exist.
We knew that the Scourge was trying to raise him, but I imagine most people simply wrote that off as the fact that the Scourge would obviously want the largest Frostwyrm they could get their hands on.
But in the recent series, Dawn of the Aspects (which I should note here that I have not actually read,) we learn some interesting things. Kalecgos has found a mysterious artifact from Northrend that allows him to see far into the past through the eyes of Malygos. The events Kalec witnesses are from before the aspects were aspects, and Malygos was still a proto-dragon.
Galakrond was not the benevolent father figure to the original dragons - he was an immense beast, eating his fellow dragonkin and, far more horrifically, his victims were coming back from the dead.
Why would the Titans select such a monster on which to base their key protectors?
Let's talk about another thing: the Curse of Flesh.
We're first introduced to the concept of the Curse of Flesh in Borean Tundra, where the gnomes get the first evidence that they were descended from essentially Titan-build robots. This curse explains what happened to make the Earthen turn into the Dwarves, likewise the early origins of the humans, tol'vir, and even the mogu.
Yet there's someone else who talks about the Curse of Flesh - Lady Deathwhisper in Icecrown Citadel. The Lady offers to free her subjects from the curse by turning them into the undead. No longer bound by mortality, the Scourge is allowed to function as a single-minded machine. Kind of like the creations of the Titans...
Meanwhile, we see the Mogu have been pretty successful at re-activating Titan technology, like the construct machine in Mogu'shan Vaults. The line between living and artificial Mogu is a very blurred one, and the Mogu are also masters of trading out bodies and spirits - living forever through a kind of spirit-transfer that, when you think about it, is actually pretty much just necromancy.
The Titans are strange beings with unknowable minds. We've projected benevolent psychologies onto them, but we have very little evidence to support what we think their motives are. The Titans create order, almost like machines. What if they are, in some way, machine-like themselves? They may see organic life as simply a chemical and mechanical process. But think about this: what if that catchphrase from before isn't talking about the Old Gods, and it isn't talking about the Scourge?
What if it's the Titans? They do not live, they do not die - they are immortal and ageless, but exist on a level so far removed from what we think of as life that, perhaps, they do not comprehend it in the way that we do. They are outside the cycle. What cycle? The cycle of life and death? Of corruption and redemption? Of creation and destruction?
Whatever cycle we're talking about, clearly the Titans saw something in Galakrond that they wished to recreate. Perhaps it was not Yogg-Saron's power that caused Ner'zhul to become something utterly different than what the Burning Legion represented, but rather it was Titanic power that gave him the ability to reshape and recreate life.
Perhaps the Titans are the ultimate necromancers?
More Speculation on Expansion Five!
Ok, so I know that we're a mere two weeks through 5.2, and there's still a whole raid tier (and a whole story-patch) coming that will still be Mists-era, but it's always fun to open things up to speculation.
I tend to be a bit conservative when it comes to making predictions about future content (it helps the big surprises shock me more!) but what we've seen in Mists has upset the pattern.
As expansions go, first we got two new races, then a new class, then another two races, and then Mists did a very odd thing and introduced a new class and a single new race (the unfortunate consequence here is that the vast majority of monks are pandaren and the vast majority of pandaren are monks.)
So we can't really hold to the pattern anymore. Here's a handful of predictions:
Prediction One:
There will be no new race, but instead, we're going to get the new models for the older races.
This is one of those things that Blizzard's been talking about for a long time, and when you put a human next to a worgen, goblin, or pandaren, they do look kind of awful. Now, there are different ways they might go about this: the problem is that people like me have been playing for a very long time, and we have a connection to our characters. The old models are based on an earlier generation of gaming (technically they're two console-generations behind at this point,) and what flew in 2004 is looking very blocky and unimpressive in 2013.
Yet these are our characters, and we still want them to be recognizably ours. I still want Jarsus to have his hippie braids and tired bags under his eyes (wow, now that I describe him that way, it makes him seem like a stoner. He's not meant to be.) So clearly the new facial options have to correspond with the old ones. Still, with greater fidelity, we might decide one look isn't really what we remembered it being, so I think character re-designs should be an option, at least as a one-time thing (and as a paid service after that.)
Then there are animations and wireframes. Personally, I like the way armor sits on a human male, and draenei males have an awesomely intimidating look to them, except when they're running. Ironically, as one of the two races who can't be rogues, draenei have one of the coolest stealth-crouches.
Yet not all animations are great. The way our characters move are probably more iconic to us than the looks of their faces. If Jarsus doesn't do the John Travolta Saturday Night Fever dance when I type /dance, I'll be very sad.
Likewise, they're going to have to keep the old voice acting. Sure, some of it's kind of ridiculous, but nothing would break the sense of continuity more than having them sound different. Even if they could round up the same voice actors, it would be very strange.
But new models - bring them on. And then maybe some helmet models that let us see their faces - though transmog can always solve that.
Prediction Two:
A new class is unlikely.
As much as I'd love to play a Demon Hunter (though I still think I'd prefer DKs as the badass antihero class) I don't think we should expect to see a new class this coming expansion. Monks have been better-balanced than DKs were during Wrath, but I imagine that new classes mean a COLOSSAL amount of effort on the design side of things, especially when you consider how much redesigning is needed for the old classes each expansion cycle.
This is the thing I'd most like to be wrong about.
Prediction Three:
We're going to deal with a very big threat, and we might have another ten-level expansion.
Expansion five, assuming it holds to the usual pattern, will come out in 2014 - the tenth anniversary of World of Warcraft. Consider that and the fact that we're within spitting distance of level 100, and throw in the fact that the Alliance and Horde are going to have a reckoning at the end of this expansion, and you've set the stage for a super-epic.
If we have our big confrontation with Sargeras, it will be a risky endeavor, and could be seen as a shark-jumping moment for the game. Sure, there's still the Old Gods, and Blizzard could do plenty of things to bring in new villains, but if we take down the S-man, questions will be raised as to what the hell we can't do. It's weird enough now after beating the Lich King and Deathwing (never occurred to me that they had rhyming names) that people still ask us to do their chores, but after killing Sargeras? "No, lady who wants me to kill five goats for your stew - I saved the universe. Do it yourself."
Granted, Kil'jaeden was left conveniently alive at the end of Burning Crusade, and I imagine he's super-pissed at us and wants a rematch. A Legion expansion could have us finally take down KJ for real, and potentially give us awesome draenei lore along the way. Still, not to say that Blizzard ever really "aims low" for an expansion (Mists has proven far more epic than "that place with the panda-people") but I think that for their tenth anniversary expansion, we should expect something really big.
Prediction Four:
Something I haven't come up with yet that's super-epic-awesome.
I'm not saying that I lack for imagination, but when it comes to predictions, I like to get things right. As I said, this tends to make me a bit more conservative in my brand of meteorology, but one thing I can definitely put my money on is that there's going to be something crazy that I haven't yet listed.
What could it be? Some kind of new feature? A reworking of the core structure of the game?
I'm very curious to see what happens to the Alliance/Horde war after Garrosh gets deposed. It's not like the two sides were best buddies before he became Warchief, but I can't see the war continuing as it is. The question, then, becomes how that will be reflected mechanically. Granted, the only "mechanical" difference since the war started is that we don't get neutral capital cities anymore (the Shrines barely count as cities anyway,) so there might not be much to change.
We could also see something akin to Path of the Titans - the strange and ill-defined thing that they talked about in the run-up to Cataclysm. I still don't quite know what the hell it was supposed to be or do, but if we explain it as a bit of character-development for your toons and a way to specialize in ways that didn't tie into the normal means of progression, that would be cool.
Likewise, it would be interesting to add more depth to the classes and their mechanics, though I don't really know what that would entail. If a druid were to become an archdruid, what would that mean?
We're still several months from Blizzcon, but if there's one thing I'm totally confident about, it's that we are going to see the next expansion announced.
I only hope that we get a bit more info than they did with Mists - where we got just the title, the new race and the new class and that was it until a media blitz months later. Blizzcon should be big, and with Heart of the Swarm already out, I think WoW is going to be center-stage (ok, we'll probably also hear about a Diablo 3 expansion.)
I tend to be a bit conservative when it comes to making predictions about future content (it helps the big surprises shock me more!) but what we've seen in Mists has upset the pattern.
As expansions go, first we got two new races, then a new class, then another two races, and then Mists did a very odd thing and introduced a new class and a single new race (the unfortunate consequence here is that the vast majority of monks are pandaren and the vast majority of pandaren are monks.)
So we can't really hold to the pattern anymore. Here's a handful of predictions:
Prediction One:
There will be no new race, but instead, we're going to get the new models for the older races.
This is one of those things that Blizzard's been talking about for a long time, and when you put a human next to a worgen, goblin, or pandaren, they do look kind of awful. Now, there are different ways they might go about this: the problem is that people like me have been playing for a very long time, and we have a connection to our characters. The old models are based on an earlier generation of gaming (technically they're two console-generations behind at this point,) and what flew in 2004 is looking very blocky and unimpressive in 2013.
Yet these are our characters, and we still want them to be recognizably ours. I still want Jarsus to have his hippie braids and tired bags under his eyes (wow, now that I describe him that way, it makes him seem like a stoner. He's not meant to be.) So clearly the new facial options have to correspond with the old ones. Still, with greater fidelity, we might decide one look isn't really what we remembered it being, so I think character re-designs should be an option, at least as a one-time thing (and as a paid service after that.)
Then there are animations and wireframes. Personally, I like the way armor sits on a human male, and draenei males have an awesomely intimidating look to them, except when they're running. Ironically, as one of the two races who can't be rogues, draenei have one of the coolest stealth-crouches.
Yet not all animations are great. The way our characters move are probably more iconic to us than the looks of their faces. If Jarsus doesn't do the John Travolta Saturday Night Fever dance when I type /dance, I'll be very sad.
Likewise, they're going to have to keep the old voice acting. Sure, some of it's kind of ridiculous, but nothing would break the sense of continuity more than having them sound different. Even if they could round up the same voice actors, it would be very strange.
But new models - bring them on. And then maybe some helmet models that let us see their faces - though transmog can always solve that.
Prediction Two:
A new class is unlikely.
As much as I'd love to play a Demon Hunter (though I still think I'd prefer DKs as the badass antihero class) I don't think we should expect to see a new class this coming expansion. Monks have been better-balanced than DKs were during Wrath, but I imagine that new classes mean a COLOSSAL amount of effort on the design side of things, especially when you consider how much redesigning is needed for the old classes each expansion cycle.
This is the thing I'd most like to be wrong about.
Prediction Three:
We're going to deal with a very big threat, and we might have another ten-level expansion.
Expansion five, assuming it holds to the usual pattern, will come out in 2014 - the tenth anniversary of World of Warcraft. Consider that and the fact that we're within spitting distance of level 100, and throw in the fact that the Alliance and Horde are going to have a reckoning at the end of this expansion, and you've set the stage for a super-epic.
If we have our big confrontation with Sargeras, it will be a risky endeavor, and could be seen as a shark-jumping moment for the game. Sure, there's still the Old Gods, and Blizzard could do plenty of things to bring in new villains, but if we take down the S-man, questions will be raised as to what the hell we can't do. It's weird enough now after beating the Lich King and Deathwing (never occurred to me that they had rhyming names) that people still ask us to do their chores, but after killing Sargeras? "No, lady who wants me to kill five goats for your stew - I saved the universe. Do it yourself."
Granted, Kil'jaeden was left conveniently alive at the end of Burning Crusade, and I imagine he's super-pissed at us and wants a rematch. A Legion expansion could have us finally take down KJ for real, and potentially give us awesome draenei lore along the way. Still, not to say that Blizzard ever really "aims low" for an expansion (Mists has proven far more epic than "that place with the panda-people") but I think that for their tenth anniversary expansion, we should expect something really big.
Prediction Four:
Something I haven't come up with yet that's super-epic-awesome.
I'm not saying that I lack for imagination, but when it comes to predictions, I like to get things right. As I said, this tends to make me a bit more conservative in my brand of meteorology, but one thing I can definitely put my money on is that there's going to be something crazy that I haven't yet listed.
What could it be? Some kind of new feature? A reworking of the core structure of the game?
I'm very curious to see what happens to the Alliance/Horde war after Garrosh gets deposed. It's not like the two sides were best buddies before he became Warchief, but I can't see the war continuing as it is. The question, then, becomes how that will be reflected mechanically. Granted, the only "mechanical" difference since the war started is that we don't get neutral capital cities anymore (the Shrines barely count as cities anyway,) so there might not be much to change.
We could also see something akin to Path of the Titans - the strange and ill-defined thing that they talked about in the run-up to Cataclysm. I still don't quite know what the hell it was supposed to be or do, but if we explain it as a bit of character-development for your toons and a way to specialize in ways that didn't tie into the normal means of progression, that would be cool.
Likewise, it would be interesting to add more depth to the classes and their mechanics, though I don't really know what that would entail. If a druid were to become an archdruid, what would that mean?
We're still several months from Blizzcon, but if there's one thing I'm totally confident about, it's that we are going to see the next expansion announced.
I only hope that we get a bit more info than they did with Mists - where we got just the title, the new race and the new class and that was it until a media blitz months later. Blizzcon should be big, and with Heart of the Swarm already out, I think WoW is going to be center-stage (ok, we'll probably also hear about a Diablo 3 expansion.)
Monday, March 18, 2013
Foreshadowing and Expansion Five
Blizzard's PR Blitz has been going on for a good while now. They're clearly proud of 5.2 (as they should be) and trying to drum up excitement (and probably entice lapsed players.) The thing that struck me was a recent interview with Ghostcrawler on MMORPG.com, particularly the discussion of WoW's future.
For much of WoW's lifetime, new content was not planned very far in advance, but today, it appears that they've got the whole expansion cycle and indeed the next expansion is in the works. So far, we've seen content in Mists come at a pretty healthy pace. 5.1 came pretty shortly after the expansion dropped, and I, for one, had just gotten pretty satisfactorily geared up in raid finder by the time 5.2 hit, allowing my two top toons to head in there and start smashing some Troll and Mogu heads.
Anyway, GC talks about the way that they're able to hint at the next expansion because it was planned out so early. Not only are we getting a single, cohesive story in Mists (even as recent as Cataclysm, there were some things that seemed to have been pulled out of thin air, like the Zandalari turning out to be evil or the de-powering of the Aspects after Deathwing's demise) but we're also getting some serious lore reveals that could mean big things for the next expansion.
So here's the thing: I've been talking about the Burning Legion a lot in my speculations. We haven't heard much about them since BC, other than the now-defunct Battle of Undercity quest and a couple of sort of sad Terrorfiends up in Hyjal, being pushed out by Twilight's Hammer.
And we haven't heard much about them in Mists. What we have heard about a bit is the Titans. The Mogu are Titan constructs, much like the ancestors of the humans, dwarfs, gnomes, and tol'vir (hey, remember the Tol'vir? No?) There's still a great deal of mystery as to what, exactly, Pandaria and the Vale of Eternal Blossoms are, but it's clear that the Titans had a great stake in the place. The Mogu also demonstrate how Titan agents can go bad even without being corrupted (well, ok, there was the Curse of Flesh, but that afflicted everyone else and most of those guys turned out decently, with some exceptions, of course.)
BC was a kinda-sorta Legion-themed expansion. Ironically, the name of the expansion better fit what turned out to be a sort of bonus-raid at the end of the expansion, even though Illidan was supposed to be the big bad.
One thing that Blizzard has said in the past is that, no, we have not yet met a true Titan. Figures like Thorim or Hodir (or Ammunae or Isiset, or finally, Ra-Den) are certainly powerful, but they are only constructs - presumably beings like the mortal Titanic races were once, but the Watchers seem to have escaped the Curse of Flesh for some reason.
The Titans are a pretty interesting group of movers and shakers in the Warcraft universe. They're theoretically good guys, attempting to bring order to the cosmos, but they are beset by two very powerful foes - the Old Gods and the Burning Legion.
We've been dealing with Old Gods and Old-God-affiliates a whole lot lately, what with C'thun and Yogg-Saron, Deathwing's madness, and the Sha. Unless the Old Gods were instrumental in causing Sargeras to turn (and please, let's not make that the case - Sargeras shouldn't just be Deathwing on a larger scale) we can probably afford to leave them off for a bit.
One of the tidbits from the Warlock Green Fire chain that I find fascinating is the fact that Doomguards were originally kind of "bad magic detectors" for the Titans, who were attuned or designed to seek out sacrificial magics so that the Titans could put a stop to it. This would seem to suggest that, in a lot of cases, the Titans themselves may have not just locked away, but actually created the demons who now form the Burning Legion. The Legion may be less of a universe-spanning prison revolt and more of a radical splinter group from the Titan hierarchy.
Burning Crusade was during an era when Blizzard was not quite as adept at presenting the story of the game through the gameplay. We actually didn't get much about the inner workings of the Legion, as the focus was more on the Illidari's desperate bid to hold onto Outland.
So it would be cool to have a Legion expansion that delves farther into the depths of the Legion's history and how the whole thing works. And if most of these demons are, in fact, former Titan constructs, it would be fascinating to see what they were before, and what has changed.
And of course, this would open up some new opportunities to get at the real motivations of the Titans. We think of them as benevolent figures, creating worlds where life can thrive, but these are the guys who created the Mogu, and left our world with a giant self-destruct mechanism. They might be well-intentioned, but there's a kind of Lovecraftian creepiness to the way that they seem to see us mere mortals as insignificant - that our individuality and free will is a strange malfunction in what is meant to be an automated system.
What is Azeroth for? Why did the Titans come here at all? What was here before?
Why is there a little girl in Blade's Edge Mountains who claims to be from "Eng-land?"
For much of WoW's lifetime, new content was not planned very far in advance, but today, it appears that they've got the whole expansion cycle and indeed the next expansion is in the works. So far, we've seen content in Mists come at a pretty healthy pace. 5.1 came pretty shortly after the expansion dropped, and I, for one, had just gotten pretty satisfactorily geared up in raid finder by the time 5.2 hit, allowing my two top toons to head in there and start smashing some Troll and Mogu heads.
Anyway, GC talks about the way that they're able to hint at the next expansion because it was planned out so early. Not only are we getting a single, cohesive story in Mists (even as recent as Cataclysm, there were some things that seemed to have been pulled out of thin air, like the Zandalari turning out to be evil or the de-powering of the Aspects after Deathwing's demise) but we're also getting some serious lore reveals that could mean big things for the next expansion.
So here's the thing: I've been talking about the Burning Legion a lot in my speculations. We haven't heard much about them since BC, other than the now-defunct Battle of Undercity quest and a couple of sort of sad Terrorfiends up in Hyjal, being pushed out by Twilight's Hammer.
And we haven't heard much about them in Mists. What we have heard about a bit is the Titans. The Mogu are Titan constructs, much like the ancestors of the humans, dwarfs, gnomes, and tol'vir (hey, remember the Tol'vir? No?) There's still a great deal of mystery as to what, exactly, Pandaria and the Vale of Eternal Blossoms are, but it's clear that the Titans had a great stake in the place. The Mogu also demonstrate how Titan agents can go bad even without being corrupted (well, ok, there was the Curse of Flesh, but that afflicted everyone else and most of those guys turned out decently, with some exceptions, of course.)
BC was a kinda-sorta Legion-themed expansion. Ironically, the name of the expansion better fit what turned out to be a sort of bonus-raid at the end of the expansion, even though Illidan was supposed to be the big bad.
One thing that Blizzard has said in the past is that, no, we have not yet met a true Titan. Figures like Thorim or Hodir (or Ammunae or Isiset, or finally, Ra-Den) are certainly powerful, but they are only constructs - presumably beings like the mortal Titanic races were once, but the Watchers seem to have escaped the Curse of Flesh for some reason.
The Titans are a pretty interesting group of movers and shakers in the Warcraft universe. They're theoretically good guys, attempting to bring order to the cosmos, but they are beset by two very powerful foes - the Old Gods and the Burning Legion.
We've been dealing with Old Gods and Old-God-affiliates a whole lot lately, what with C'thun and Yogg-Saron, Deathwing's madness, and the Sha. Unless the Old Gods were instrumental in causing Sargeras to turn (and please, let's not make that the case - Sargeras shouldn't just be Deathwing on a larger scale) we can probably afford to leave them off for a bit.
One of the tidbits from the Warlock Green Fire chain that I find fascinating is the fact that Doomguards were originally kind of "bad magic detectors" for the Titans, who were attuned or designed to seek out sacrificial magics so that the Titans could put a stop to it. This would seem to suggest that, in a lot of cases, the Titans themselves may have not just locked away, but actually created the demons who now form the Burning Legion. The Legion may be less of a universe-spanning prison revolt and more of a radical splinter group from the Titan hierarchy.
Burning Crusade was during an era when Blizzard was not quite as adept at presenting the story of the game through the gameplay. We actually didn't get much about the inner workings of the Legion, as the focus was more on the Illidari's desperate bid to hold onto Outland.
So it would be cool to have a Legion expansion that delves farther into the depths of the Legion's history and how the whole thing works. And if most of these demons are, in fact, former Titan constructs, it would be fascinating to see what they were before, and what has changed.
And of course, this would open up some new opportunities to get at the real motivations of the Titans. We think of them as benevolent figures, creating worlds where life can thrive, but these are the guys who created the Mogu, and left our world with a giant self-destruct mechanism. They might be well-intentioned, but there's a kind of Lovecraftian creepiness to the way that they seem to see us mere mortals as insignificant - that our individuality and free will is a strange malfunction in what is meant to be an automated system.
What is Azeroth for? Why did the Titans come here at all? What was here before?
Why is there a little girl in Blade's Edge Mountains who claims to be from "Eng-land?"
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Class Specific Content
I'm taking a break from working on the Green Fire chain (to both gear up a little more and maybe see a therapist after the Kanathred fight) but it got me thinking: This chain (most of which is part of the scenario) is pretty darn epic. The scenario itself is quite different from what we've been trained to think of scenarios being, in that it's less of a quick mini-dungeon and more like an epic one-man raid (taking place in one of WoW's greatest raid instances, too.)
The other thing that's pretty exciting (and super challenging) is that, because it's designed for a specific class, they can force you to use your whole Warlock toolbox without worrying that some Hunter isn't going to be able to do the same.
This is the strength of class-specific content: you can create challenges specially tailored to those who will be doing it.
I never got to do the Rogue legendary chain (Dragon Soul is not yet soloable, but once it is, you can bet I'll be doing that) but I understand that there were some nice Rogue-specific challenges there as well. This is good stuff, but understandably hard to do as there are now eleven classes (and if Santa Claus listens to me, hopefully soon twelve! C'mon, Demon Hunters!)
The other thing is that the Green Fire chain has a great cosmetic reward that is something people have been asking for for ages. Most other classes don't really have such an iconic thing to seek out, so the reward for such content is an unknown.
But just for the hell of it, let's try to imagine what kind of content and potential rewards one could get for various classes:
Death Knight:
DKs already have a ton of cool stuff - glowing blue eyes, class-specific and free weapon enchants, deep, echoing voices and the potential for creepy, half-decomposed skin options. The one option I could think of for DKs as a reward would be to have an epic chain in which they craft their own runeblade, which would then become a transmogrifiable weapon. Another option would be to let their eye color change depending on spec (again, my Frost DK, who is a Draenei, would once again not really benefit, though when he's in his Blood spec, that would be pretty badass/terrifying.)
In terms of stories and content, I think this would be a good opportunity to rescue Koltira from Sylvanas' dungeons, acting as a representative of the Ebon Blade, which is none too pleased about one of their knights getting brainwashed. One could also deal with the shards of Frostmourne, or possibly delve into the history of the pre-Scourge Death Knights of the Old Horde.
Druid:
Well, we already have new druid animal forms (as of Cataclysm... or was it 3.3?) We also have armored animal forms through talents... I suppose one option would to gain Malfurion-like permanent animal attributes. This guy has antlers and wings even in his Night Elf form... Not sure here.
Druids have had plenty of exposure over the last few expansions, but I think these class-specific things should always try to go to the very core of the class' identity. So presumably, the Druid chain would have to take you into the Emerald Dream and possibly expose the corruption of the Nightmare and N'zoth. Actually, this would be a great opportunity to have our first confrontation with N'Zoth. I'd like to see one of the Old Gods display a little more personality before we go into their lair and chop some tentacles.
Hunter:
Hunters are one of the classes that suffers a little from being too general a class. While DKs or Druids have a lot of very specific lore, Hunters are just anyone who gets really good with a gun or bow and likes to hang out with animals. Rewards for a Hunter would probably be something like a unique pet, but there are already a bunch of "challenge pets" out there. Another option is that a hunter could track down a mythical beast, perhaps learning more about the history of the world in this way. Actually, if I could get an awesome reward, it would be the ability to tame Dragonkin.
Mage:
Mages are pretty cool, and recent events in Dalaran have some serious implications for the class, but like Hunters, Mages are not a terribly centralized class, nor is there much I can think of for cosmetic rewards. On one hand, I'd say you could deal with the aftermath of Malygos' death, but... oh yeah, we did that one. In many ways, the Dragonwrath chain was really best suited for Mages.
Monk:
Monks have not yet really been able to develop their lore beyond "this is what all Pandaren basically are." Ok, in fairness, there is a lot of Monk lore, but we're pretty much playing through it this entire expansion. The only reward I could think of is the option to have your monk constantly carrying a barrel of brew on their back.
Paladin:
Almost as long as people have been asking for Green Fire, people have been asking for visible Librams. We don't even use Librams anymore, but Paladins are all about books and hammers (see the Draenei guy in the BC cinematic.) Also, because Paladins don't dual-wield, our right hip is always free of hanging weapons, so there's a place to put it, too. Another, crazier option, would be to get glowing golden eyes, but we can hold off on that for now...
On one hand, Paladins have tons of lore, but it's not exactly focused. The class came about originally to fight off the Horde's Warlocks, but they've also been aligned against the Burning Legion and the Scourge. The Scourge tends to be the most iconic Paladin villain, but I feel like the post-Arthas Scourge is really more a matter for Death Knights to settle than Paladins. Not sure about this one.
Priest:
Priests have some of the same problem as Hunters, in that there's not a specific way all Priests come to their calling in WoW. I don't know what Priests would want for a cosmetic reward. So... um.
Rogue:
Well, we just had a prettyepic Legendary Rogue-only chain, and it had you assassinating the entirety the Black Dragonflight (save Wrathion and anyone who was in Outland,) with plenty of intrigue and sneaking around, so I think Rogues are probably going to need to sit on the bench for a bit.
Shaman:
There was a lot of Shaman stuff in the previous expansion, and arguably the Thrall chain in 4.2 was very Shaman-appropriate. There also aren't a ton of cosmetic rewards I can currently think of for them, though I always thought Shamans should get a ghost-wolf mount, or the ability to turn into some kind of ghost-raven.
Warlocks:
You just got yours! Sit down.
Warriors:
Ah yes, if you thought Hunters, Mages and Priests lacked for specificity in lore, this is the once class that every single race can be (even Blood Elves now!) and the class' lore is just: "this is a person who hits things and gets angry." Granted, some kind of gladiatorial event would be pretty Warrior-specific, but I also really don't know what cosmetic reward these guys would get (that hasn't been covered by glyphs.)
I would love to see lots of class-specific content, and I hope we continue to see the stuff at the quality of the Green Fire chain, but I can totally sympathize with reluctant designers who fear it would be a ton of work for a fraction of the player-base.
The other thing that's pretty exciting (and super challenging) is that, because it's designed for a specific class, they can force you to use your whole Warlock toolbox without worrying that some Hunter isn't going to be able to do the same.
This is the strength of class-specific content: you can create challenges specially tailored to those who will be doing it.
I never got to do the Rogue legendary chain (Dragon Soul is not yet soloable, but once it is, you can bet I'll be doing that) but I understand that there were some nice Rogue-specific challenges there as well. This is good stuff, but understandably hard to do as there are now eleven classes (and if Santa Claus listens to me, hopefully soon twelve! C'mon, Demon Hunters!)
The other thing is that the Green Fire chain has a great cosmetic reward that is something people have been asking for for ages. Most other classes don't really have such an iconic thing to seek out, so the reward for such content is an unknown.
But just for the hell of it, let's try to imagine what kind of content and potential rewards one could get for various classes:
Death Knight:
DKs already have a ton of cool stuff - glowing blue eyes, class-specific and free weapon enchants, deep, echoing voices and the potential for creepy, half-decomposed skin options. The one option I could think of for DKs as a reward would be to have an epic chain in which they craft their own runeblade, which would then become a transmogrifiable weapon. Another option would be to let their eye color change depending on spec (again, my Frost DK, who is a Draenei, would once again not really benefit, though when he's in his Blood spec, that would be pretty badass/terrifying.)
In terms of stories and content, I think this would be a good opportunity to rescue Koltira from Sylvanas' dungeons, acting as a representative of the Ebon Blade, which is none too pleased about one of their knights getting brainwashed. One could also deal with the shards of Frostmourne, or possibly delve into the history of the pre-Scourge Death Knights of the Old Horde.
Druid:
Well, we already have new druid animal forms (as of Cataclysm... or was it 3.3?) We also have armored animal forms through talents... I suppose one option would to gain Malfurion-like permanent animal attributes. This guy has antlers and wings even in his Night Elf form... Not sure here.
Druids have had plenty of exposure over the last few expansions, but I think these class-specific things should always try to go to the very core of the class' identity. So presumably, the Druid chain would have to take you into the Emerald Dream and possibly expose the corruption of the Nightmare and N'zoth. Actually, this would be a great opportunity to have our first confrontation with N'Zoth. I'd like to see one of the Old Gods display a little more personality before we go into their lair and chop some tentacles.
Hunter:
Hunters are one of the classes that suffers a little from being too general a class. While DKs or Druids have a lot of very specific lore, Hunters are just anyone who gets really good with a gun or bow and likes to hang out with animals. Rewards for a Hunter would probably be something like a unique pet, but there are already a bunch of "challenge pets" out there. Another option is that a hunter could track down a mythical beast, perhaps learning more about the history of the world in this way. Actually, if I could get an awesome reward, it would be the ability to tame Dragonkin.
Mage:
Mages are pretty cool, and recent events in Dalaran have some serious implications for the class, but like Hunters, Mages are not a terribly centralized class, nor is there much I can think of for cosmetic rewards. On one hand, I'd say you could deal with the aftermath of Malygos' death, but... oh yeah, we did that one. In many ways, the Dragonwrath chain was really best suited for Mages.
Monk:
Monks have not yet really been able to develop their lore beyond "this is what all Pandaren basically are." Ok, in fairness, there is a lot of Monk lore, but we're pretty much playing through it this entire expansion. The only reward I could think of is the option to have your monk constantly carrying a barrel of brew on their back.
Paladin:
Almost as long as people have been asking for Green Fire, people have been asking for visible Librams. We don't even use Librams anymore, but Paladins are all about books and hammers (see the Draenei guy in the BC cinematic.) Also, because Paladins don't dual-wield, our right hip is always free of hanging weapons, so there's a place to put it, too. Another, crazier option, would be to get glowing golden eyes, but we can hold off on that for now...
On one hand, Paladins have tons of lore, but it's not exactly focused. The class came about originally to fight off the Horde's Warlocks, but they've also been aligned against the Burning Legion and the Scourge. The Scourge tends to be the most iconic Paladin villain, but I feel like the post-Arthas Scourge is really more a matter for Death Knights to settle than Paladins. Not sure about this one.
Priest:
Priests have some of the same problem as Hunters, in that there's not a specific way all Priests come to their calling in WoW. I don't know what Priests would want for a cosmetic reward. So... um.
Rogue:
Well, we just had a pretty
Shaman:
There was a lot of Shaman stuff in the previous expansion, and arguably the Thrall chain in 4.2 was very Shaman-appropriate. There also aren't a ton of cosmetic rewards I can currently think of for them, though I always thought Shamans should get a ghost-wolf mount, or the ability to turn into some kind of ghost-raven.
Warlocks:
You just got yours! Sit down.
Warriors:
Ah yes, if you thought Hunters, Mages and Priests lacked for specificity in lore, this is the once class that every single race can be (even Blood Elves now!) and the class' lore is just: "this is a person who hits things and gets angry." Granted, some kind of gladiatorial event would be pretty Warrior-specific, but I also really don't know what cosmetic reward these guys would get (that hasn't been covered by glyphs.)
I would love to see lots of class-specific content, and I hope we continue to see the stuff at the quality of the Green Fire chain, but I can totally sympathize with reluctant designers who fear it would be a ton of work for a fraction of the player-base.
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