f13.net

(http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2009/july/newraces.jpg)

News masks for this halloween.  A sign of random masks added or an indicator of two new races...

If the masks were random, why make a female worgen at all?

Also, if we're to assume horde gets goblins, then alliance gets badass worgen?

FFFFFFFFFFF UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

I'd rather have goblins.

Blizzard is spying on me if they are putting Goblins in as a playable race. Would mean they really want my sub money back.

Which I still doubt they would do unless they have them be faction-neutral.

Faction-neutral would suit both races and be very interesting but I'm not sure.  They'll probably be goblin-horde worgen-alliance.

Goblin racial "I got what you need" 10% more gold from monsters.
^ Would be awesome.

Fuck yes. They can keep their stupid yiffified wolf ladies.

Because if they didn't, there'd be players bitching about not having female mask to go with their female character body..?

shark.  jumped.

Worgen  :why_so_serious:

Worgen, meh. I want my furbolg.

Ogre.

I don't, only because they'll make the female ones "hot" and make me stabby. There are already lady furbolgs, but they look the same as gentleman furbolgs, and God Forbid that stay as-is.

If they stayed as-is how would they model their bikini armor?  C'mon now, priorities!

Maybe Blizzard is just trolling us all.


We can always hope!

That was my first thought.. but No, they're just not that creative and cocky anymore. 

This was said about the space goats as well.  Personally, I'll probably reroll goblin....but what class? Goblin pally, of course.

I dunno, there was the whole TWO JORMUGATANS thing that people bought into then "plus everyones favorite undead buglord" snuck in.

So it could be a trick!




I could also see them going in, quite easily.

The nation of Gilneas locked their gate not to abandon the alliance(because no player race is REALLY bad, it's because <something> made them do it  :why_so_serious: ), but hide their terrible secret plague/transformation and protect the rest of the alliance from Gilneas. Now the people of Gilneas have come to terms with their transformation and have regained some of their lost civility and seek to renew ties to the Alliance because <blah> is happening and they need our help or it will destroy the world.





Or they could continue the Scythe of Elune arc.

The savage but noble Worgen (  :why_so_serious: ), heeded Elunes call and came forth to Azeroth to defend Elune's chosen peoples, but some evil took the Scythe and corrupted the Worgen. Now as one of the few uncorrupted Worgen on Azeroth, your mission is to retrieve the Scythe and purify it, freeing your people from corruption so that they may fight along side the Kaledori and their allies.


Shit, that could be their starting area, similar to the DK zone. You deliver the Scythe to Tyrande at the temple of the moon and she accepts you as allies.




The Alliance could use a real 'bestial' race though, in appearance AND culture. Once you get over the goat legs on Draenei, they are pretty much just 'normal' people with accents as far as the Alliance is concerned. Devouted followers of the Light, Great reverence for the natural world, same base values.

Crazy wolf people though? That would stir things up.


I would just have to never use the Tram again. Ever.

Thing is, there's two types of Worgen.  One is a result of being cursed by Arugal; these are the ones in Silverpine.  But I don't see them starting out in Gilneas; that would A: put them right next to the Undercity, B: not make much sense from a lore point of view (Arugal didn't go to Silverpine until after Gilneas closed it's gates) and C: they can transform into humans, which would be cool, but seems like something Blizzard wouldn't implement in a player race.

The other type are from another dimension, and basically pure evil "we live for the suffering of small babies" type rampaging monsters.  They have no cities or buildings of any kind yet; I have no idea where their capital would be (linked to the Outlands, maybe?), and in any event, making them palatable for an Alliance race would require them to pull another "Space Goat" level lore rewrite.

Edit: although, looking through the Wiki, there has been some rumbling about Gilneas recently; Metzen saying in February that they have plans in mind for the area, and in 3.1 the boat from Menethil to Theramore has been changed so it doesn't go by Gilneas anymore.  Hmm.

What this game needs is a Richard Garriott mask (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxMpw_O-wZA).

Keep the gate close and ship them to Menethil once they hit 20.

Argugal derived his work from a previous mages research, are we to assume he's the only one who had access? Maybe some wacky Gilneas mage, desperate to protect his people summoned/transformed them. Maybe Argual did it himself before his demise, in a attempt to increase his power and influence. Maybe it's a scourge remnant that was planning on using the Gilneas population somehow.

They can't transform back to humans because the curse grew in power, or mutated, or some other force saturated them with Worgen energy.



The Extra-Dimensional Worgen are fighting something called "Lords of the Emerald Flame", which is probably our friends the Burning Legion, so obviously their long battle against the legion has corrupted them and made them vicious and col. Or the "Lords of the Emerald Flame" could also refer to the Nightmare in the Emerald Dream, and the Worgen are somehow battling whatever that force is. Clearly the the Scythe of Elune was a sign that the Elves should help them regain their sanity or whatever. The Worgen redeem themselves by <blah> and sign on with the people who helped them.



None of it is any different then the Orcs going from "rawr bloodlust kill" to "Noble Warrior Race" in my mind.

MMO-Champion mentions that several of the Emerald Dream placeholder files have had settings fiddled with.. so I'd go with the Scythe of Elune theory.

So alliance gets furries and horde gets shrek and fiona?

Keep in mind those are the Halloween Event masks, so they end up being super distorted.



But Yes.



-edit- http://www.wowhead.com/?search=Flimsy said masks.

Yeah, but it's for real this time. If they add furry races, seriously.

They added furries on opening day, lest we forget the tauren.  To me though this is a good direction at least from a business standpoint since both these races were widely requested.  It's not like they're adding something random like EQ2 and pixies.  Adding something like a murloc race would be out of left field and just be shark jumping.  To me this isn't so much a shark jump as a simpsons "even the kitchen sink" type deal.  The game has just been around so long, there's not much else TO do.

It's shark jumping if they're hot.


The Tauren's aren't trying to be sexy or anything, they aren't hideous either, they're just Tauren for the most part.


The Worgen, they are going to tart up the females and it is going to be  :ye_gods:

I have to say it'd be awesome if they just made the females slimmer and smaller with no discernable anatomy I.E boobs.  Goblins however...you're going to see lots of goblins in bikinis.

Yeah, if they were just more feminine looking without being, for lack of a better word, yiffy, I don't care if they add worgen or not. The tauren are a pretty good example, they're obviously female and cute (I'm sure some people think they're hot, but they don't seem designed as fap material like the lady draenei were). If it's something along those lines, woo! But the fuckin' eye shadow on the female worgen mask does not make me optimistic.

I bet they'll make them look, dare I say it..  foxy!  :why_so_serious:

Flag on the field!

5 yards.

Someone please give me hope that the goblins could be Alliance.

Doesn't make sense to have Goblins and Dwarves on the same side.

How was that? :why_so_serious:

I hate to say it, but if they DO make Worgen an alliance race, chances are, they might be able to be Druids.  And if that is true, there is about a 99% chance i may transfer my Tauren Druid into an Alliance Worgen Druid.

What makes you say that?  They don't seem particularly druidic to me... aside from having fur and wearing loincloths, I guess.  The thing about druids is that if Blizzard ever allows another race to be them, they have to do an additional five character models for the forms, and that seems to me like something they'd balance across the factions (which implies Goblin Druids, which doesn't seem like it would work to me).

Silverpine is one of my favorite zones in the game.  I love the Arugal lore, the worgen, SFK, and have liked Gilneas since WC 2.  So I'm pretty pumped about all this gossip!  OTOH, playable goblins would also be very cool.  I wish Horde would have had them at game start instead of the stupid-ass trolls.

But yeah, Gilneas is a perfect starting area for worgen.  They can graduate to 20 there and then move over to Hillsbrad and Southshore.  Drag and drop.

My Guesses:

Worgen classes: DK, War, Rogue, Shaman, Priest, Hunter - Possibly Mage

Goblin Classes: DK, War, Rogue, Pally, Mage, Hunter - Possibly Warlock

Out of interest, how do goblin paladins make any sense under lorelol?

The same sense space goats are shaman.

Goblin Pallies?  Really? (fake edit: beaten by K9)

I don't think they'd make worgen druids, because then there would be an imbalance: 2 alliance druid races, only one horde. I don't see goblin druids.  However making them shamans would go toward addressing the current imbalance.

My guesses would be:

Worgen: Shaman, DK, Rogue, Hunter, Warlock, Mage

Goblin: DK, Warrior, Rogue, Mage, Warlock, Priest

Any ideas about racials? I'd guess worgen could transform to wolves and run faster or something.  Goblins would have to have something regarding commerce.

If they did this, I'd have a conundrum as I'm not sure which I would want to play more.  Also making Goblins Horde-only would have interesting effects upon our guild.

/highfiveforbadhumor

There's an idea over on MMO-Champ to allow you to level to 20 (say) neutral in your starting zone, then choose Alliance or Horde when you exited.

This way, you could allow Worgen Druids on either side, or allow Goblins to either.

I want to be a goblin.  Bad.

Are you kidding? They need to be able to transform into bears, kitties, and large tentacle-cock monsters.

Srsly, that is the ONLY reason I would come back to WoW now, is to be a frickin gremlin.

Also, the neutral "up to a certain point then choose your faction" thing would be kinda cool for goblins.

Pointless speculation, yay! It wouldn't totally surprise me since nothing plotwise will really grab people in the next expansion since they decided to blow their wad with Arthas in expansion #2. If you don't have a setting or a big badguy -everyone- wants to kill, a new race or class would work pretty good for getting some resubs for a while.

More baseless speculation ftw.  If they do the pick a faction dealie, which would be pretty cool, how might they handle cross faction communication?  Making you forget how to talk to your mother, father, brother, sister, whathaveyou for just about reason would be a serious piece of lolore.

Cross faction communication is one of the few remaining gameplay elements that makes zero sense. There are a host of cross-faction quest givers and NPCs who seem to be perfectly able to speak cross-faction, not to mention faction leaders and bosses. It requires some significant cognitive dissonance to play the game and accept that the inability to communicate is in anyway realistic or sensible.

There's at least one more Old God, Azshara, plus the Emerald Nightmare to deal with, although all of that could be cleaned up in one expansion.  Not to mention Blizzard reps have said in the past that Sargeras might make another appearance.

Goblins will do anything if the price is right..?

Azshara isn't an old god.  She was a night elf queen that let the Burning Legion in the first time.

Really I think they can pull any old god out of their ass.  There isn't a final catalog of them anywhere that I know of.

Regarding choosing a faction at 20 - I doubt it will happen. Blizzard said somewhere that it would be a bad idea for friend or foe identification.

The Highborn who didn't end up Naga became High Elves.  The non-noble Elves became the Night Elves.  Azshara is supposedly more powerful than the Lich King, possibly the most powerful being currently on Azeroth, so it makes sense she'd be in a later expansion.

I believe there's only 5 old gods. 1 dead(in darkshore) and four imprisioned. so minus c'thun and yogg saron you still have two more to contend with. 

As someone astutely observed, C'thun is basically an eye, and Yogg Saron is more or less all mouth. So the next two Old Gods are probably going to be an ear and a nose respectively.

I still want Panderans.  :sad_panda:

It makes a shit ton more sense than Blood Elf Pallies harvesting energy from one of the Naru.

Also, it's called Lorelol for a reason.  I expect it to happen under the most roflostomplorelol of conditions just to expand the options of the Shaman/ Pally class on each side.  In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if there was no explanation given, just "hey, gobbos can be pallies."  

I know.. the Goblins bought a share of power  off of the Blood Elves.

Funny enough the blood elves don't have that naruu anymore.  If you beat kil'jaeden you see that the blood elves released it and gave it to the aldor.  it then proceeds to sacrifice itself to re-ignite the sunwell.  Supposedly the only reason belfs were able to use the light was the naruu let them, even though they thought they were stealing it.  So belf paladins are relatively good guys now thanks to the sunwell storyline, redemption blah blah blah.

It's all ret-conning sure but at least they wrapped it up.

Oh my God, yes. It drives me CRAZY.

I have no idea why you would want to talk to WoW players of the other faction. Talking to your own is painful enough.

Seriously.  Not allowing cross-faction communication was one of the smartest design decisions.  In some cases, it does suck.  But most people who have friends that play will play on the same side.  You already see the absolute worst in people in WoW and the internet in general, it would be a horrible idea to open the floodgates altogether.  A perfect example is how people take the time to reverse engineer the "language" to be able to macro "L O L N EW B ! 11" every 4 seconds in BG's.  More of that would be a bad thing.

Not only that but it was removed SPECIFICALLY because they saw it in action with Undead-Human in beta. Christ, it's one thing when a game with 1000 people per server can talk shit to you about teabagging your mom. Try 6k per server.

Just imagine Barrens chat 24/7 server wide.  :ye_gods:

I'm pretty sure Blizzard have said that they want the TF2 "identifiable by silhouette" thing to work in WoW as well, so the neutrality thing doesn't seem likely.
Anyway, the goblins will turn out to be from some_cartel_that_isn't_Steamwheedle and will swear undying* allegiance to the Horde in return for giant angry green men stomping on naga invaders from suddenly-surfaced Nazjatar or somesuch.


*Where undying means "until we get a better offer". Void where prohibited. The value of their loyalty may go down as well as up. Slippery when wet. Take two potions and call your shaman in the morning. Satisfaction is not guaranteed. No refunds. Time is money, friend.

Goblins will end up with the same classes gnomes get to use. If they want another Paladin race for horde, they'll let the Undead reclaim the light or something once Arthas is dead. Or, they'll expand that little bit of lore about that Tauren Druid discovering the 'Path of the Sun' and it turns out to be the light  :awesome_for_real:



Worgen will depend on if they go the "used to be humans but transformed" route or the "Sent by Elune from <wherever> to help us" route.

If it's the first one, they could just shove any random collection of classes really. Half clinging onto their old human roots, the other half being in touch with their new Worgen aspect.

If it's the second one, they may actually be the third druid race. War/Rog/Hun/Dru/Sha/Pri and maybe even no Worgen DKs. The new druid art forms might actually be coming about because they were also working on them for Worgen.

Either way, I fully expect them to be the "Noble Savage" race the alliance is lacking.

They might even just be something like a new racial hero class; like Goblin Tinkerer and Worgen, uhm, Crime Dog or something.  Gilneas being the doggie equivalent of New Hearthglen/Acherus.  After the introduction of the Death Knights, I'd say that Blizzard is cognizant that not everyone wants to start at level one every time they roll an expansion out (Stranglethorn AGAIN), and a lot of the old content is embarassingly bad.  Plus, a lot of the "hero classes" from Warcraft III would be weird if they were splashed among all the playable races the way DKs were.

I would give my left nut for a Goblin Engineer type class.

I would be surprised if they put in another class so "soon". DK's totally fucked everything up pretty much and while hugely popular with the droves of people who rolled them up, they are as equally unpopular with everyone ELSE.

Kind of like Blood Elves?  :grin:

Kind of, but even the Devs think it was a mistake, unlike the BEs. 

Read the GC interview on DKs.  There's little to no chance of them ever adding another class to the game, because it's fucked balance so hard in the dev's eyes.  All the 'roles' were filled with the original classes, and they realized what a nightmare they unleashed with the DK. In trying to force them as a viable hybrid of two distinct roles in all specs AND give them unique abilities so you'd want one on raids, they realize they broke their game badly.

Even people who "hate" BE's love to hate them, the way people love to hate NYC.


People just hate DK's, the end.





I think we'll eventually get a new class again, but like, they'll put it in after they make all the current class/specs not suck. It wouldn't have been bad at all if DK's weren't the Lords of Everything they do.

You can pretty much take any class ability, then compare it to the DK analogue and objectively say the DK version is flat out superior in almost every instance.



ps. is analogue the word I'm looking for in that sentence?

It helps that DK is generally a lot more fun to play than other classes, and that it starts at 55.  A lot of people want alts but can't stand the fucking hateful grind that the game is in old world.  The moment blizzard let's go of their hubris and actually lets the other classes start at 55 when making a new character, I promise that representation will shift away from being so heavily dominated by death knights.

DK was actually a really good fucking idea.  With all the DK's floating about, they erased the huge problem of finding a tank.  Finding a tank for a PUG (which is how most casuals operate) was a huge dagger for years.

I hope they one day do this, although I'm already at 5 characters past that threshhold.  Leveling pre-BC is total shit, no matter how fast it is.  They're cutting back on the insane-o travel times by lowering mount levels, but that doesn't address the horrible loot and the low level talents that really don't mean anything unless you have gear with actual stats that mean something.  There's a reason my next clump of characters all stalled out at around 20. It's just a horrible experience unless you're playing with 2-3 others, so you can at least break the tedium with some instances (having someone power you through instances is also a welcome relief).

The reason I liked my DK so much was the different mechanics and how well they all worked together.  I stopped playing through once I saw that I was the new Blood Elf paladin.

Actually, we don't have too much hate for them in raids or even in heroics\instances.  They can be pretty useful in most situations, most of the hate I experience with them from others (and my own personal hate) is just how retarded or dickheaded most of the people who play them are.  Definitely the 'tard class de jour (Rogues were at once, warlocks were once, etc).

Edit:

Yes.  No longer do we have to suffer through finding 1 warrior who was actually spec'd protection AND wasn't a complete idiot.

Ew. Snot and earwax attacks.  :uhrr:

I hated them because they really didn't add anything new to the group/raid game. They're just DPS/Tanks with a different skin. We already have issues with "Me too!" classes. Why add another?

Oh yeah. So people can get their Linkin Park on.  :oh_i_see:

So we've got another tank class, no big deal.  We've already got 4 people who can heal well depending on the different situations, why not have more than one tank?  Shaman don't count as valid tanks, so that leaves druids (who weren't great tanks until somewhat recently), warriors, and paladins (which Horde didn't have for 2 years).  One thing I hate is having a certain class be mandatory for an instance or raid - especially if it isn't a fun class to play.  Having another class being able to take on one of the 3 major roles is never a bad thing in my opinion.

CRAWWWWWWWLING IN MY SKIIIIIIIN!

Lol.

Did you ever stop to think that the mere fact Blizzard funneled the DARK PALADIN players to something that started at a high level and could tank was a coup of design? It's Psychology 101 and they are the only ones doing it. It's the exact same line of thought that got Horde belfs in order to even the populations.

Uh, who are the 'dark paladin players'?

Retribution, I guess.

I kinda guessed the same thing, but the era that spawned a billion death knights was also the golden age of ret pallies. Your average retnoob was a lot more likely to think "MY POWER LEVEL! IT'S OVER 9000!" and run off to PVP than reroll to play through Outland again. I know I sure did.

People were rerolling/respeccing TO ret at the time, not away from it. If I had to guess where most of the DK rerolls came from, I'd guess rogues and locks.

Prot Warriors.

Most Dk's I've run into have been former Rogues and Hunters.  Rogues because they were sick of being the squishy melee class, hunters because... well, look at the history of hunters in the game.   Funnily enough since Hunters are on an uptick as DKs get nerf after nerf I've seen a number begin to switch back.

Many people just want an easy class to farm/play with.  DK right now is an ultimate casual class since you can roll one on any server with a high level.  They're also superb gatherers and often used as such so your main can do double regular professions.

Awesome bank alts too.

Furries and short orcs wouldn't make me come back, but a class that isn't boring as shit might. I always liked the CONCEPT of the healer/mage class in Warhammer, and it probably makes sense for WoW's next class to be something along those lines. I'd consider coming back to play something like that. But only if both things were done at the same time and to some reasonable level of effectiveness.

Next class will be a shadow hunter,  think of a sort of healer/hunter hybrid.  Blizzard has already said they want to make the next class a healer to offset the need for them but arch druid just would be redundant.  Shadow hunter would make perfect sense, give them a resto tree, a ranged melee tree and a misc tree.

Like them or not, wouldn't this be redundant with shadow priests?

Similar to a monk class perhaps? I don't see blizzard adding another pet class.

I was actually thinking elemental shaman.. they don't even need to 'come out of shadowform' to heal. Boomkin are flexible too, I remember in BC in our hMGT runs we had a boomkin who'd stay in casterform and stack HOTs for the second boss, it made it MUCH easier (healer was a shaman, and back then they didn't have riptide).

I heard Mage/ Priest hybrid and I was thinking more like the Blood Priest as described by those who played Vanguard.   You stack your dots on an enemy and it life drains to a friendly target you've chosen.  Yeah, it's similar to Shadow Priests, but you can make it more efficient and give them multi-target heals and such.  Talents would decide which got better buffs, the healing or the damage end. 

A little more like the above.

From what I understood of the Warhammer class though, it was a Yin/Yang thing. You heal and build up points on the other side of the yin/yang, which allows you to drop a more and more powerful offensive spell. Etc. Or the other way around.

I would enjoy that.

Agree... BP was a neat class, but doesn't it really require dual targeting to make it as cool a Vanguard?  Without dual targeting Blood Priest would not work.  I suppose you could use Focus as the second target, but the game would not flow as well.

My vote is for a Warden class: Healer/Ranged Bow with a hint of Melee.

I'm not sure not letting people start any ol' class at 55 is just a matter of "eh, fuck 'em!" I get the feeling Blizzard realises hopping into a class like the druid at 55 cold would be overwhelming if you've never played a druid very high before (and you've presumably not done that if you're making one). I don't think they really want to spend time making DK-like starter zones for every class in order to teach someone how to play their class a little before unleashing them on the unsuspecting rest of the world when they have a hard enough time putting out an expansion in a reasonable amount of time. Hell, they have trouble putting out a CONTENT PATCH in a reasonable amount of time.

For new players, yeah, sure.  However, I don't know that vets would have the same problem.  Is anyone here really mystified about how, say, Rogues play?  Aside from a huge blinking "this one is important" indicator around Sinister Strike, everything else should be pretty easy to figure out.  I can see how newbies might be overwhelmed, but I've already got a fair handle on most of the classes, even the ones I haven't run to max, and I don't think that's unusual.  Most raiders have a pretty good working knowledge of what the other classes can do, in my experience.

And even if you don't want to make a level 55 starter zone for each class, it should at least be feasible to make one starter zone for all the classes combined, and just map out a "here's the order they'll learn their class skills in" overview for the individual classes.

What I'd like to see is an expansion that chops off the last 20 levels.  Go from 80 back to 60, dialing back the hps/mana/burst.

Maybe it's just the view from my rose-colored glasses.

Maybe that will be the big pull on the new races, their starting zones will be like the DK ones and you'll start at 55 or 65 or whatever.



Xanth: Those are just your glasses. The size of the numbers is fairly irrelevant, just their relation to each other. TBC was by far the most stable in terms of life expectancy in terms of Burst and the like. Both Vanilla and WotLK are just total gib fests.

There's your average dude who just wanted to fuck around with a DK and try out the new class.  Then there's every misunderstood teen who thinks R.A. Salvatore is the reincarnation of Charles Dickens.  There's possibly a lot of black clothes involved.  Maybe just a sprinkling of dude's wearing nail polish.  Very well could be a dusting of "Taking Back Sunday" and "Saves The Day."  Look for the word "scene" a lot.

Oh crap!  I actually like Taking Back Sunday.  That brings me one step closer to these tools.  Good thing I would never consider rolling a DK.

I think you are severely overestimating a lot of players. Shit, some people can't figure out a new SPEC if they didn't level with it.

Clueless players are clueless. A 79-level-long tutorial is absolutely unnecessary.

would blizzard really be able to retain people if they could roll an insta-80, as most of you are implying they are mean for not doing?  Honestly curious is anyone has thought about this for more than the two secrets it takes to say "GIMME NOW!"

I wasn't actually saying that 1-79 should be removed - just that they aren't necessary to learn a character.

Also, hate to be a pedant, but nobody implied that. 55 is not 80.

The priest "here's how you play" starter zone would be a hilarious multiple hour series of quests where you join amazingly stupid NPCs and try to heal them through raid encounters.

That said, the lowbie mounts Help, and they seem to be patching up content gaps relatively quickly. I got my lock from 1-36 this weekend, without just sitting down and grinding out the whole damned time. You know, actually getting a bit of sun while being sick as a dog.

30-40 is still kinda shitty due to having to travel so much, but I'm thinking 50-60 is still "blink and you're in outlands"

Addicts would take the needle out of their arm because new players and rerollers could skip vanilla content?  Or even BC as well?  Bullshit.

The only MMO-playing friends I have that aren't playing WoW atm are a couple that burnt out on the grind (trying to level up to 70 to play with friends and family, just before WotLK shipped).  People with jobs and families don't want to spend months leveling by themselves to play with capped folks.

Small sample, but yeah, the leveling curve is still way, way too long for some new players.

I agree. Even if it is fun for the first time, it still takes way to much time. I was never able to level an alliance character over 20 and I only have one Lvl 80. A DK, of course.  :awesome_for_real:

Recruit-a-friend helps this immensely, at least for 1-60.  I think this program may be one of the best ideas that Blizzard has had.

Tab Rasas cloning system was bloody brilliant. Basicly when you wanted you could split off a clone of yourself that was at the level you were at that point, and if you wanted to experiment you could hop back to the clone character and Take it a different direction without going though the grinding up to that point. It would not really work the same way in wow, but I can certanly see a "Congrats you finally got to level 55. Now that you have burned through all that grinding, you can create characters at lev 55 from now on, no matter what class."

If they felt more like a "dark paladin" aesthetically, as opposed to some chunky cartoon retard screaming "GRARH YOU DIDN'T THINK YOU'D GET TO BE ANYTHING BESIDES A GENERIC GOODGUY DID YOU?" from the bottom of a garbage can, maybe I would have played one for more than a day. The entire Scourge seems about as dark as Gargamel on the Smurfs.

laughed out loud at generic goodguy, et. al.

To ruin your sample, I know several people (4 off the top of my head) that never play at max-level for long. They spend 2-3 weeks and realize they are bored and would rather level an alt.  For those, leveling IS the game.  Take it away and you run the risk of losing them.

There are really two distinct types of players here, and both are very common.

So.... implement something akin to what GW did?

As a PvP and Raid Warlock since the game launched I finally broke down and just leveled my DK to 80 after watching my son roflstomp people on his. Oh Your God! The DK is faceroll easy... but fun as hell and as much as I hate them myself, I will keep playing him and loving it.

I think I would roll on a classic server limited 60 immediately. I have been scheduling and leading retro runs for our guild each week during U25 downtime and they have been a hit! I was shocked how many people have never seen MC, BWL, Kara or Sunwell.

Blizzard should create 2 servers, one classic 60 and one classic 70. That would be a blast.

40 man raids, class specific loot, long ass attunements and shitty offspecs that force classes to play one role in raids. much fun as i had then... pre-bc raiding can burn in hell.

You forgot ally-only pallies, limited number of debuff slots, "have a warrior tank or go fuck yourself" raiding, and the awesome scenario grinding for pvp gear. Also, pots, world buffs, reagent farming, etc.

Oh, and pvp one-shotting.

The only thing I miss from Pre-BC WoW is server specific BGs. Queues kinda sucked, but there was a much stronger sense of server communities.

On the other hand, the starting the DK was the most fun I've ever had with a new character; I actually don't think the zone "taught" me anything.  It struck me purely as a buffer area to get me geared and give me two free levels so I could hit TBC at 58.

I don't think it was substantially different than the easy design of the first Honor Hold or Borean Tundra quests... sure, it had a few whiz-bang gizmo quests that were part of the sizzle of the expansion budget, but flying an orb did not teach me about the intricacies of being a DK (if there are any, hur hur).

In fact, I would rather have started at level 66 since TBC was a fucking wasteland populated solely by other idiots leveling a DK... Forcing me to traverse dead content in the name of "teaching" me to play a solo-specced Blood Knight did nothing for their game.

The entire time I was playing the DK, I kept thinking, "Man, this is just the greatest fun I've ever had starting a new game/character."  Then I "graduated" to TBC and quit.

Exact same thing I did, got a few levels into Hellfire and haven't played the character again since.

The thing is, it still rations your abilities out a few at a time so you can get familiar with what they all do. That's the main thing, otherwise you get people who don't even know that they *have* a given ability in their spellbook at max level or whatever.

Tards will always be tards. A decent in game tutorial presenting all spells and their uses would last under 10 minutes, and would be far better than the "throw kid at pool" method used by all mmo's, and yet...

Swimming is usually more fun than attending a Powerpoint presentation about swimming.

Would it kill them to have a disembodied voice saying "this is Prayer of Mending. HIT THAT SHIT WITH THE TANK SELECTED AS SOON AS IT LEAVES COOLDOWN when healing a group"? Heck, "this is shadowstep. It generates tears.".

I'm not proposing a cutscene. You're free to have a room with some targetting dummies to fill those roles while training. Tie it to achievements.

Some classes, that may work. Others, not so much. There are a LOT of buttons on some classes, and that doesn't even take spec into account. Plus you'd need to redo the training rooms every patch when you change a skill.

My suggested list of opponents for an Emerald Dream style expansion, which appears to be what blizzard is going towards.
- As of yet unnamed Old God
- Azshara
- Sargeras
- Emerald Nightmare

I was recently reading up on the lolore, and apparently as the well of eternity was going KABOOM with great vigor, she was contacted by an Old God, and an offer of safety was made.  The end result is that she was transformed into some octopus monstrosity, and the other highborne were turned into Naga.

As was mentioned, Azshara is a being of nearly unmatched magical power, according to the lore.  Only the most powerful demons could stand against her when the invasion occured.

As for the Old Gods, their number is not really nailed down.  I think five is the most mentioned number, and as of yet, two have been dealt with recently, and another has a giant sword in its head, implying that at some point Blizzard could "ressurect" that one simply by having the Twilight Idiots manage to remove the sword, and viola!  New Old God!

Emerald Dream?  I thought all evidence pointed to a catacylsm expansion: goblins, islands, the high seas.

Because Azshara ties into both the Emerald Dream AND the high seas stuff, from what I understand the current best guess is the expansion will cover both.

mmo-champion has noticed some changes in maps for the emerald dream. (Source.) (http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?topic=79546.0) It's definitely possible that the following (i.e. 90-100) expansion will be dealing with the Emerald Nightmare, and its Old God instigator/creator.  This could mean the next expansion (i.e. 80-90) will be dealing with Azshara, and whatever Old God is behind her.  Or it could mean an all-in-one deal.

I'd guess all-in-one just because I know they want to get along to the Burning Legion homeworld thing or whatever.

Maybe they could nick Pirates of the Burning Seas' ship combat.  Arrr!

I did read something interesting when I recently dealt with the admiral of the Scarlet Onslaught, who then promptly turned into Mal'Ganis.  When defeated, he mentioned he was going to return to his homeworld, which I thought was confusing, as I was under the impression the Nathrezim didn't have a homeworld, but were living in the Twisting Nether.

I suppose there could be an expansion for Burning Legion/Twisting Nether, especially since Blizzard has hinted in the past that they felt there was more mileage to be gotten out of Sargeras.

Supposedly Turalyon and Alleria (I may have spelled something wrong there) are stuck on the Legion homeworld or whatever too.

Oh God would that rule.

No boats.  PLEASE, NO BOATS.

I always assumed Sargeras would be the last boss we ever fight.  After beating him on his homeworld, which is barren and desolate and has even taller and more pointy castles than the previously seen tall, pointy castles, a long cutscene voiced by Earl Boen comes on and and tells you that you've beaten the World of Warcraft.  There's nothing left to do.  Then your character is deleted and the game uninstalls itself.  :grin:

It could always pull a Pools of Radiance.

What happened at the end of that game? Party perma-died?

I assume he actually means it could pull a Curse of the Azure Bonds - you started that game naked and without gear, no matter how twinked out the group you imported in from Pools of Radiance was.

I think the remake of that game had the nasty side effect of sometimes formatting someone's hard drive.

Oh right, that. Yeah it blew away the hard drive if you installed it to somewhere other than the default location and then uninstalled it.

I find it unlikely that they'd combine a high seas expansion with the Emerald Dream.  It seem like they only have 3-4 obvious expansions left to do.  One would be high seas and the goblin isles, one would be going into the Emerald Dream/Nightmare, one would be the Sargeras stuff.  I guess the only argumentfor combining would be that they continually want to "up the ante" and they have the resources to do so.

The rumor going around, is that Aszhara found the Titans "water making" machine or whatever, and is going to flood the world, which would be bad since the world would implode or something, this in turn is what is causing the Nightmare in the dream, the imbalance (inbalance?) in the natural order.

It would be pretty funny if all that was over a Decanter of Endless Water. Funny in a "METZEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEN /facepalm" kind of way.

Minor wondrous items are all fun and games until the players start getting creative with them.

My DM regretted giving me a decanter.

Oddly, it was always the minor items he ended up regretting.  "What harm could they possibly do with a two foot long indestructable piece of rebar, which cannot do damage as a part of its enchantment?"

minor items are just daring the player to fuck you over with them.

I think the Mal'ganis thing ties a bit more directly in to the whole Lich King story currently going on.
The basic idea being that Kil'jaden(or possibly Sargeras) can REALLY hold a grudge, especially when it comes to the failure of his minions and their subsequent punishment.
From what I have picked up in the questing is that the sole purpose of the Scarlet Onslaught branch of the Scarlet Crusade is to punish Arthas (or more specificly, the Lich King) for his break to freedom from Legion Control.  Remember, his initial purpose was to serve as an agent of the Legion in bringing Azeroth under Legion control, and the Legion commanders are VERY pissed at him for breaking free and going his own way.

I seem to recall that when you defeat Mal'ganis in that Icecrown questline, he specificly states that things "are not over" and that you will need his help if you ever intend to defeat Arthas.   Basicly hinting that at some point, we may end up actually siding with / accepting help from the Legion in his defeat, and as part of their revenge on him.

I would hope the emerald dream and the maelstrom constitute two separate expansions. Both of them should have enough space to make an expansions worth of material and the character of each will be very different. The emerald dream especially is just such a wonderful blank canvas I can't imagine Blizzard not looking forward to filling it in.

I'll be disappointed if the horde race is goblins. I don't think they compete in the "cool" stakes with Worgen or that the horde really needs a gnome equivalent.

I seriously doubt that they're adding more races anytime soon.

EDIT: Likewise, I figure Worgen is pretty untenable as a race.  It makes space goats look like the sane option.

It would make sense if they added two new races with two new starting areas.  Like in TBC.  Easier than adding a class.

I'd kill for the option to convert one of my characters to a goblin.  Goblin engineering gone awry.  Alliance could just catch lycanthropy or something.

As much as I'd love a new race, it'll be a long time before I can stomach 1-58 again. Of course, "long time" is right about when the next expansion would be finished.  :oh_i_see:

Ugh.  I hope I never get the WoW bug again, but I have a feeling I'll be there too.

We got the best deals anywhere.

...did you just say Worgen are cooler than Goblins?  :mob:

Goblin as a playable race was a large factor in me playing WAR for as long as I did.

Wouldn't the introduction of new races also be the time to introduce Level 66 (assuming new level cap of 90) start for customers with a L.80 character?

Put a check-box on the creation screen for those who want to start a L.1 and punt those folks into the Draeni/BElf area.

Otherwise, just design a L.66 starting area like they did for DK's, but make the quests more generic like the starting quests of TBC/LK.  Viola... new races, minor cockblock of having to redo LK while everyone is doing the new expansion, and off we go.

Edit: Dude, I totally meant viola... get with it.   :oh_i_see:

Also have to consider that they'd probably reduce the xp requirements for 71-80. If BC=>WotLK is anything to go by, you'd have to clear the first two starter zones, a bit of the third zone, and voilà, 78-79.

Additionally, this (http://www.casamusical.com.br/foto_/23072008115400.JPG) is a viola.

I'm playing the smallest viola in the world for you people who can't be arsed to level.

I'm gonna guess they start adding five levels for the next expansion, so the new cap could be 85.  Like they did in EQ.  The exponential leveling curve is starting to get too rough for us.  Northrend takes forfuckingever.

Northrend really doesn't take that long. 70-72 takes for fucking ever. 73-80 is a breeze. About the only WTH is the horrible flight paths to the western side of the expansion. Sure, you let me magically teleport to sholozar ONCE, then it's a goddamned 15 minute flight.

I doubt we'll get 5 level expansions, the game pretty much runs on even numbered levels being Big Deals.

70-80 took 40 hours with a DK skipping the quest text and instancing a lot.
As comparison, you can do 60-70 in... 6-8 hours. Probably a lot less, I didn't remember the layout well.

I'm pretty sure the intent is that Northrend take as long as TBC leveling from 60-70 did.  It might not be exactly spot on, but I didn't notice a huge variance.


Edit: Kildorn hit the nail on the head, the time it's taken to level TBC has been drastically cut down.

You could not do 60-70 in 6-8 hours until post Wrath. Every expansion, the time to level in the prior expansion goes down. But it didn't take me 40 hours the second or third times I went through Northrend. Heck, my TBC 70s doing it never left rested.

No good once you've already done it, but you can do that whenever you want if you don't turn in the quest.  It's a breadcrumb quest anyway, minimal exp, doesn't count toward the achievements, and not a prerequisite for any other quests.

Instancing probably slowed you down overall. Quest xp is the fastest way to level in WoW unless you're doing the tag-and-zerg exploit.

452 combined levels on characters lvl 19 or higher on my account.  I'm also likely middle-low on the scale for that.  :oh_i_see:

I don't think TBC is going to be over within 6-8 hours for me on my most recent foray, but it was quick either way with a class that doesn't kill very fast (aff lock, no downtime at all, however).  My death knight absolutely flew through TBC.   

Northrend speeds up significantly after you can fly if you've got epic flight.  Before then it doesn't help that large areas of Dragonblight, Zul'drak, and Grizzly Hills are annoying to traverse on foot.

Nah, instanced quests gave good xp and far better loot. Also, after I began tanking and found a tree, we just started pulling 10% of the instances at a time. Could clear most of the regular ones in 15 minutes. Heavy unholy + a bit of frost was crazy good at the time.

Of course, that was compensated by the occasional terribad healer. DPS could be mocked into the point of usefulness by pointing out that the fucking tank was pulling 1k dps, so why the fuck weren't they. Good times  :oh_i_see:

Instanced quests give better XP and loot, but worse XP over time (unless you're leveling, like a holy pally, or in a stacked static group farming the instance repeatedly)

Rapid leveling isn't about finding a challenge and overcoming it, it's about finding things you can 2-3 shot and rolling over them. The aforementioned Affliction lock is actually a really good leveler in TBC if you ignore sanity and quad kite. Dark Pact, Lifetap and Siphon Life allows you to insta-dot 3-4 even cons and just wander around looking for more while they die.

I love instancing, but it stopped being a great source of XP in TBC. If you have a guaranteed 5 people ready and willing and level/class appropriate, you can shave some time of it if the instance is nearby, but I still consider instances to be loot pinatas, not rapid XP sources.

Well, it appears that goblins / worgen as playable races may have been a bit of a Jump The Gun there.  New datamained masks indicate that Murlocs, Ogres, Vyrkul and Naga are also getting masks.

That many?! OHGOD IT'S AN ENTIRELY NEW FACTION!

/lights fire and walks away

I KNEW it...

Midway through TBC they realized that normal sub-70 instances were not providing enough XP and buffed the XP from them generously making them more than worth doing while leveling.  They didn't make the same mistake with WoTLK and every sub-80 instance is worth doing at least once if you have the associated quests for it.

Counting XP from the associated quests you can easily get upwards of 50% a level from one run through them.  Assuming you can find a competent group that doesn't dick around you can steamroll through most of them in 30 min or so, some less, some slightly more.  That type of XP/hour is not really possible to match just from solo questing not to mention that the rewards from the "associated quests" are some of the best loot you'll have access to until 80.

On several classes I've leveled through WoTLK so far I usually hit 80 with mostly instance quest blues and group quest blues equipped and a few quest greens or instance drops in the other slots.  For whatever reason a lot of the pre-80 instance loot isn't itemized that great other than a few slots, so much so that I often found myself passing on drops because the quest reward blue (instance or group quest) I'd be wearing was better.

On the other hand, the new masks are either blatantly obvious re-use of existing textures (all except the female ogre) or just outright bad (female ogre). So it's not entirely outside of the realms of possibility that these are the result of Blizzard going "Oh fuck! Which retard leaked the...wait, wait, we can still salvage this. Throw some more masks together ASAP"

I COMPLETELY agree.

I seriously don't get what about the worgen are cool. And goblins are rad.

Don't you want to Howl at the Moon?


-edit- Where is that female ogre face from? I could have sworn I've seen it from some art book or fan art or something.

Goblins NAO!

Anyone have the actual Warcraft d20 RPG book? That's where the female ogre was apparently taken from.

Totally trying to cover for letting golins/worgen slip.  i doubt they'll even use those extra masks in game since they'll prolly start announcing the new expac pre halloween.

I figured they'd announce it in 2 weeks at Blizzcon.

What the hell is it about Goblins that turns you people into gibbering retards? :uhrr:

They want to be a shortie and realize that Gnomes are freaks that deserve to die.  Yes, even more so than elves.

People are just Jealous of Gnomes.

Loot drops in raids are actually determined by the number of gnomes you let die.

The REAL question is why you're NOT wanting to play a goblin.

Goblins 09
Greenskins for Greenbacks

Because they're dull.

I want a race of intelligent jellyfishes.

That is so last year.

(http://masseffect.bioware.com/_commonext/images/me/screenshots/x06/masseffect_11_745x440.jpg)

(http://us.blizzard.com/blizzcast/_images/episode1/pandaren_t.jpg)
Sigh.  :heartbreak:

Werewolves without the silly human limitations dragging you down.  Teeth and fangs in a savage display of terror.  What's not to love?

No Pandarens??

Damn Chinese and their communism

I just don't find that interesting in the least, personally. It may partly be because they're not exactly a three dimensional race at the moment. "Here are our version of werewolves" is pretty much it, it's not like there are interesting worgen NPCs, they're just mobs to be killed. It's like making boars a player race to me. But goblins, goblins have personalities.

I think the main reason they don't want to add pandaren is because it would break whichever side didn't get them.

Once again I say ogres.  So that we may all be able to do the Chris Farley dance.

They could do two-headed ogres and allow two players to play the same ogre, at the same time, for double the fun.

YES! My prediction is still alive then. I guessed Vykrul would be one of the next playable races (but I would prefer Ogres).

best. idea. ever.

Yes, yes it was:   http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/races/two-headed-ogre.shtml

 :awesome_for_real:

Murlocs or gtfo.

Murlocs would have overpowered.


I've seen Murlocs run faster then my epic mount.

Was this supposed to be in green?

I actually agree with duse; in Vanilla and BC, at least on my servers, finding a tank was always a nightmare for PUGs. It's much less of an issue in LK, even before the introduction of Dual Spec.

I agree as well. Back in TBC I finally embraced my inner tank with my druid and my warrior because it was so goddamn impossible to find a tank for a PUG. It was good training.  :awesome_for_real:  It doesn't seem to be nearly the problem it used to be. Hell, there might be too many tanks now. :P

I echo the others: Finding tanks is absurdly easy compared to pre-Wrath.  But it's not just due to the endless plague of DKs.

-It's easier to gear up a tank thanks to craftables and BOEs.  You no longer have the Catch-22 of needing gear to get gear.
-Tank play outside of groups is 100x better than BC.  Tanks can PVP and do dailies without difficulty (which is helped by most dailies not actually involving killing mobs with your typical gear) even in their tank sets.
-It's way the fuck easier to tank.  Everyone can faceroll their way through AOE pulls.  Plus, now I can carry baddie DPS when I pug.

Because they've got what you need!

lol. true.  they're like gnomes for cool people.

There are. I MTed everything for our alliance for 2 years as a warrior. This expansion finally hit, and there was no point anymore. Everybody wanted to give tanking a shot, they had the abilities in many cases to do more on their class, and warriors were rolling over everything with dual 2her dps. So the obvious role in the raid was for a lot of people to switch to something more useful.

Now with Dual specs, it's a total non-issue. I dps the raids, fill in when needed, and tank the 5 man pugs.

Maybe if they didn't spend so much effort to ensure Warriors were THE tank all through out Vanilla and TBC, there might've been more back then too!  :awesome_for_real:


That played just as big of a role in the Tank surge as DK's did. Blizzard actually going "All Tank specs will actually be real tanks, on purpose!"

Oh, it's much easier now for me to find a group now. Because my dual-spec is Protection. Now I just grab a guildie healer, pull 3 DPS DKs out of LFG and away I go.

I personally haven't seen a DK tank on my server in quite some time. Dual-spec did more for solving the tank shortage than the introduction of DKs did.

They also made it so warrior protection spec was not the cockstab for leveling/grinding/questing that it was previously.  That helped a lot too.

Yea, making it so every tank spec could "AE Tank" the way Paladins did in TBC was another big factor.

Warriors still don't AE well. They can do it if you know what you're doing and your teammates aren't dps whores.

I haven't really had any problems.

I'm a giant DPS whore and have a knockback to boot as well.  :grin:

Then you meet both of those requirements. Congratulations to you, and enjoy a cookie.

He qualifies for the first, but not the second. Our DPSers are GIANT whores.

Druids? DPS? Psh... spec resto, watch some bear ass, or gtfo  :why_so_serious:

I can't type.

our dps considers pulling threat to be a goal, not a bad thing.

I would routinely have DnD down the second Ingmar hit a pack, and would rarely if ever pull threat when going into my AE rotation.

All I know is I have a rogue with fan of knives that drives me nuts on 5 mans.

Has he not heard of Tricks of the Trade (http://www.wowhead.com/?spell=57934)?

Seriously, there's no reason for a rogue to bust out all threat happy in the first few seconds of a fight.

Locks are about the only class off the top of my head that should be riding anyone's threat heavily right now. Or if you don't wait at least until you see the thunderclap before your nuke hits.

Elemental shamans can have fairly silly up-front damage, but I don't have too many issues on mine.

Feral dps seems to generate a whole hell of a lot of threat.  Or maybe it's just the dual wielding DK tank isn't generating enough.  :raspberry:

Helps if you don't flame shock / lava burst / CL while the mobs are still incoming.  :awesome_for_real: I've never had issues unless I select the wrong target.  I can out single target DPS the tank's AE dps, but that's nothing unexpected.

Tricks of the Trade = I never, ever pull threat anymore even when I'm digging into the mobs with apeshit loads of dps in the first second after the tank engages. If I'm even close, it means that the tank is really terribad or it means the tank just died.

Yea, it totally depends on the tanks TPM.  I've run with monster tanks that I had no hope of catching on my cat who's currently doing 5k+ in a ten man.  Then I've run with some who just don't do as much.  It, of course, depends on whether the tank is busy threating multiple targets as well.

I think the biggest TPM mistake tanks make is forgetting about Heroic Strike/Maul/Rune Strike.  Queue it.  It's important.

Also it's one of the things that made me quit tanking full time. Spamming one button for an entire fight has never been fun for any class. Ask around.

Thus, the Blizzard reps hinting that they want to change that heroic strike spam in every Q&A they do.

Warrior tanking mechanics are inherently wonky because you go from "lol, no rage" in 5 mans, to "fuck, I can't shed this rage no matter how I try" in raids. Rage is a fun notion, but is probably the least intuitive or consistent combat resource in the game.

The change to shield spec in 3.2 should help - adds rage on dodge and parry on top of the rage from blocks.

I loved Vanilla/TBC era. Where the better geared your warrior was, the harder instances got. <3

Queue it?  I have a full set of macros made for my Raid bar that automatically queues Maul with every single other ability i use to generate threat.  In a raid situation with good old unlimited rage, i never even think about maul.

Right, well.  Alll I'm saying is that it's amazing to me how many people just don't get it.  And with wws/wmo it's really easy to figure out who's fucking it up.

I'm not saying it is fun, rage is a good mechanic, or anything like that.

I wish I could do that with heroic strike but there are too many situations where I don't have the rage income to do it every time.

Maybe you will with the new shield block!



Tank "Rotations" is where the Paladin definitely wins out. Exactly the right number of buttons to push at all times.

I was 2h tanking the times you got splatted, missy. ;)

And yeah, elemental shamans can puke up a lot of up front damage, but Ingmar has managed to be the only one in our guild, so HE doesn't have to worry about them too much.

Just need a tank who stayed in zerker and swapped an offhand for their shield in vanilla :D

Or in the case of one of our tanks in MC, sans-pants.

I preferred tanking in a pink festival dress in the vanilla days.

If you managed to figure out setting up an intercept macro on Ragnaros, everyone thought you were a god.

Yeah, for a warrior, it is probably different.  Druids only have 1 major threat dump (Frenzied Regen) on a 3 minute cooldown.  In any situation where we have something hitting us for decent amounts in a raid, it is generally impossible for us to drop below 70% rage.

More like if you managed to set up a stance dancing macro so you didn't eat fears from Ony/Nef, intercepting Rag is just icing on the cake.

Fuck, if you managed to allow dps to start before a full sunder stack, you were like a tiny threat god.

LOLHORDE

Frankly, playing a Shadowpriest having major issues gearing up, everytime I have to hit Fade in a 10man is a WIN moment in my book.

Damnit, you made me go look. Next time we're both on, I'm fixing your damned bracer. <3

At least he finally got a robe upgrade!  :awesome_for_real:

I want my old [Green Robe of Lawls] preserved. It has served dutifully for months!
Actually, considering how long Cat's worn it, you'd probably have to use a hammer to fold it anyway.

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

WoW Insider is now dropping this rumor as well.

So... quote speculations from random fansites and forums as proof?

Gaming journalism at it's finest.

Like "unnamed sources" are unique to gaming journalism.

I'd agree with everyone who doubts the truth of these claims, except the same mainstream fansites all called BE/Draenei early successfully.

Goblins, combined with cross-faction x-fers = Horde Pop overcrowding inc. 

You severely underestimate the popularity of furries.

Tauren aren't all that popular for that assumption.  Though people will probably think it's okay to let that repressed fur out with Worgen since claws and fangs are cooler than hooves and hippies.

There is a extremely large population of people wanting to be Worgens.


One of the longest running (if ridiculous) druid suggestions is "OMG WORGEN MOAD!!!"

A bigger factor, I think, will be the way the races are intentionally designed.

From looking at those Worgen females, I'd say they'll be probably be homofurrymagnets - Tauren women on the other hand, while hilarious especially in dance, just flat out aren't designed to be sexy to anyone in any way.

Tauren are far too muscular and brutish for most of the furdom.

They also called Pandaren Brewmasters for Brewfest.  If you throw enough shit at a wall some of it is sure to stick.


There aren't, in fact, any worgen female meshes or textures aside from that single mask, which would be useless to try to skew into a working face texture.  As such, it's unlikely to bear any resemblance to any character mesh that will ever exist.

But you doubt they'll be furry-friendly?

Like Tauren?

The Women Worgen will be hot, the Draenei woman were too successful for any female race to NOT be hot ever again.

The eyes on the mask alone are a dead giveaway, they're straight out of furry fantasyland.

Well to be fair, draenei women are probably the hottest looking race in wow bar none. Built in heels via the hooves, curves accentuated and a ridiculous posture coupled with sultry russian accent?

Not to mention some of the best /silly emotes, even after they had to ditch the more provocative ones from TBC beta.

Hearing "Yes, they are real,....and they cut glass." still cracks me up when I hear it.  :rofl:

So, we're back to the Halloween mask.  Can I just assume that half the people here are going to be incomprehensible until after Blizzcon?  I should have known that this would happen as soon as someone trotted out the "Blizzard is just concealing their intentions!  It's a rush job!" rebuttal to the explanation that not only worgen were added as masks.

Do I have to put "If it really is worgen" as a qualification before every post, just for you?

It couldn't hurt.  I'm having a lot of trouble keeping up with all the speculative crazy and which people have quaffed the Kool-Aid.

FWIW those are not the old goblin textures on the masks, they are actually new ones, similar though upgraded, this was not done with the other masks that were released afterwards.

1. Yeah, it was done with the others. (http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2009/july/10128masks.jpg)
2. You don't just copy game textures and drop them on a surface with a wildly different mesh.  Generally you don't even Photoshop it then drop it on another mesh, because that shit is incredibly hard.

So your proof about how it was done with the others as well is to link to the existing pic of the poorly-done "o shi-" masks.  :uhrr:
Why are you so adamant that it's not going to be worgen/goblins, anyway?

Well, I think the biggest clue would be if Blizzard hired Doug Winger.  We're safe for now.

I knew I shouldn't have googled that name but I did anyway.

1. His proof is that the pictures clearly showed some difference unique to the goblin masks.  My counterpoint is "fuck no, look again."
2. I'm adamant that supposition based on Halloween masks is stupid on a magnitude normally reserved for the Blizzard forums.
3. That being said, it takes a greater mind than mind to connect "giant hole in the ocean" to "werewolves."  Goblins at least aren't completely out there.

So you're saying I shouldn't?

Yeah, your point was "Look at the masks again" and...looking at the masks again the goblins and worgen are clearly new textures and every other one clearly isnt. Except the female ogre, which is a hasty scan of an illustration from an RPG sourcebook with the hed pastede on yey

So I'm not quite sure what your point is, here.

E: That depends if you're at work or not, Ingmar.  :awesome_for_real:

What he said.

Fake edit: I'll post again after they're announced at blizzcon to gloat.

You mean there's a whole generation of internet goers who don't instantly get creeped out by the name?  Well hell, that explains the resurgence of other old memes.

Wasn't familiar with that name, and am a bit impressed that furry futanari has been going on for so long.

I've been on ye olde interwebs since circa 1992, and the name isn't familiar. I try really hard not to click on anything furry-related, so that might explain it. Whoever he is, he doesn't have a Wikipedia entry!

The linkage for Worgen = Alliance = hole in ocean expansion I understand goes like this.

Theres the kingdom of Gilneas, which was around in WC1 or something, but noone has heard of since.  The closest you have in Wow is that big wall in silverpine forest, Gilneas is behind there.
Silverpine is full of worgen and stuff, sons of Arugal and the like.
Therefore, the retconned reason why noone has heard from Gilneas since they disappeared behind their wall, is that everyone has turned into Worgen.
And just in time for the new expansion (which is the rumors are true, is the big hole in the ocean, which is next door to Gilneas), something happens to make some of the Worgen become more 'human' and friendly to the Alliiance.  And probably add in that the place you set sail to the whirlpool thingy is somewhere in Gilneas.
Thus, new race!


Thats the logic I've heard anyway.

I didn't even think it was ret-conned, i just figured all the humans in gilneas were infected with something.

I would be astonished if this isn't 100% correct.

Is this one scanned as well?  You seem to be the expert on these things.

(http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/1143749/Tiki.png)

I'm sure that's either from a sourcebook, or a straight rip from the game going through several days worth of photoshop scripting in order to skew a 3D image into proper proportions for a 2D image, because it couldn't possibly just be new art.  That would be crazy talk.

EDIT: Slightly more snark.

EDIT2: They also all appeared in the same prepatch, I can't check the PTR versions though.

EDIT3:


I should probably point out that my argument isn't so much that it's inconceivable that Worgen is a race, it's that people are working themselves up into a righteous motherfucking froth because of the retarded Halloween masks.  However, it would be a retarded race.  Even the plausible retcon and reasoning behind such a decision is pretty bad (really?  You can't sail from anywhere else but Gilneas?  The werewolves are our friends in killing the brown green people?)

So yeah, call me a skeptic.

I just can't get my head around the goblins being a horde/alliance race.  It makes very poor sense from a lore perspective - they are making far too much money being the neutral party between the horde and the alliance. A sub-faction splitting off from the goblin neutrality just seems like it's bad for business.

That said, I'd resub to play a goblin.  Which could be the only point they need - "fuck the lore, we'd like to boost numbers again for a least another year".

There are several goblin factions. One of them could very well join the horde.

But yeah, doubt it's happening.

I've been reading wow.com/wowinsider for long enough that I have some confidence in their predictions.  The mask was one thing - it could go either way - but there is enough journalistic integrity there, in my estimation (I know, hur hur intarnet journalism), that I'll buy into it.

I guess we'll find out soon, when Blizzcon starts.  Let this thread stand as a monument to fanboish enthusiasm OR the triumph of skepticism.

Here (http://www.gasbanditry.com/Whamadoodles/gameprd1.html) is the piece of internet history that connects that name to otherwise furry-free mmo gaming interests. The "story" originally appeared on LtM, or possibly one of its descendents.

"Hey boss, half our island is underwater and the other half is on fire and crawling with rampaging naga killing everything. Oh, and a messenger from Thrall reminded us that we have a standing offer to join the Horde"

There's a more reasons goblins should join the horde than blood elves had.

It doesn't even have to be on fire.

<Blah Blah Faction> Signs exclusive contract with Horde, offering it's manpower and expertise for the next 100 years!.

Yeah, all they really need to say is the Horde ponied up enough money to one of the princes that THOSE goblins are exclusively working for the Horde. Could also do that for the Alliance, but it won't happen because Blizzard wants me to reroll Horde.

On the plus side, there should be people my level to adventure with.  At least for a week until you all out-level me again. :-P

 :grin:

I'd be quite impressed if, when they add new races (if they actually do that), they don't give you the option to just create a L65-70 of any class.

They keep saying that's only going to be for new classes, but I suppose they will change their mind eventually.

I'm going to cry if they make me do 1-58 again.  At least Outland doesn't feel like torture.

Kild doesn't count.

From someone who may or may not be trolling on the SA forums but does have contacts inside Blizzard: Goblins and Worgen will not need to level from 1. And that is somehow tied into the expansion's core concept in a fundamental way.

(No, I've got no idea either).  :uhrr:

Goblin experiment causes rift in dimensional fabric of universe, Worgen spill out.

Blizz doesn't write lore that good.

Worgen spaceship interdimensional craft shot down by goblins?

More likely that Stormwind gets hit with a worgen infection, imo.

Now THAT would be kind of interesting.  Also, I'd like to see Gilneas as a starting zone for both factions. Might be too crowded though. You can use Kul Tiras as a new Alliance base and Tomb of Sargeras as a new raid instance.  You can have a goblin island as the new Horde base. 

Haha, no, I was thinking lazier. "Add a goblin tower to Org and a new district to storwind" lazier.

Get the Heirloom shoulders and chest.  +20% xp on top of rested xp and the shortened xp curve = the "Kill Mistmantle" quest in Duskwood giving my L31 rogue 4 bubbles of xp.   

I could report more on how many quests per level, but after finishing out Duskwood I got disheartened as I remembered that level 31-40 quests till take fucking forever since that's the "Run here. NOW run two zones and a continent over. Ok NOW run back too the start" levels.

First thing I thought of is account bound XP, such that every daily quest I do at 80 can yield exp to go straight to an alt.

I would resub so fucking fast.

I hear that from a depressing number of women.

You can probably get pretty deep into the 30's just doing the racetrack quests with the heirloom method, which do not make you run all over until the last steps of  a few of the chains. After that I dunno, I honestly got through those levels really fast the last time I went through 'em. Maybe revamped Dustwallow?

I think I mostly did Hillsbrad, Alterac, and Arathi for those levels.  Completely skipped Stranglethorn.  It wasn't until the 40s or 50s that I started hitting the go everywhere stuff.  (Which contributed greatly to my burnout.)

WHY? I love love love Stranglethorn (horde).  For this last alt I almost completely skipped any Alterac/Arathi content.  Managed to skip most of the Plaguelands, Desolace, Silithius, etc.  I got to skip all of my least favorite zones.

Even with all of that skipping, old world leveling was incredibly boring and it just felt like it wouldn't end.  So much friggin' running and slow mount trotting.

And no, I'm not picking on you. :grin:

Had the shoulders for my warlock.  It was still terrible. I'm  :dead_horse: just a tad here.  Even the prospect of my 6th time through Outland is less nauseating than another run through the southern Barrens.

edit: Ohh god, another 5k gold+ on stupid riding skills.   :oops:

You can do outlands in three zones (Hellfire, Zangarmarsh, Terrokar or Nagrand)

As for Lanty's issues. 40-50 SUUUUUCKS. It's mind searing horrible running around running out of quests and the zones are all either slightly too hard or entirely green. 45-51 especially so.

Once you pass 51 or so, it's all clear skies and fast levels. With the exception of 61, which feels like it takes as long as 62-70.

I used Stranglethorn to level on four or five characters already.  The new northern flight point helps immensely, however I have spent a combined fity plus levels there.  (I'm obsessive about clearing a zone of quests once I start there.  Plus Goblin faction.)  I was already chaffing under leveling another character, so having someplace new was very important to not giving up completely.

Keep in mind I cannot power through these levels when going solo.  My new main is only 65 after starting her up at the end of January and I've been subbed the entire time.

Lanty's issue is she sees an adorable rabbit, then spends 30 minutes petting it.

Shit, I completely forgot about the racetrack.  Thanks!  I was dreading doing Hillsbrad, Arathi and Desolace.   I also forgot about Dustwallow.   I leave STV until late 30's, early 40's just because if you go there at 30 you're there a Long, Long, Long time and get sick of the damn zone.

Stranglethorn is a lot more pleasant as Horde than Alliance. Horde's base is really convenient there, Alliance used to only have a flight point in Booty Bay, with their faction specific base on the complete opposite end. Now that it has a flight point and mounts at that level, it's probably not as horrible, but STV suuuuuuuuuuuuucked back in the day. I skipped as much of it as I could after the first time through.

And Merusk, I am so totally with you on the Desolace hate. I fucking hate that zone with a burning passion. I haven't gone there willingly in years.

Desolace sure does have an obnoxiously high mob density for a zone that's supposed to be desolate.

No one goes there so the mobs are free to breed to excessive numbers.

Mob density is one of the reasons I avoid the place.  Can't walk five feet without aggroing something else.

HEY! DO YOU LIKE GREY? IF YOU LIKE GREY YOU'LL LIKE DESOLACE; DESOLACE IS GREY, REALLY GREY!

Still better than the unending burnt orange of Durotar at least.

Swamp of Sorrows sucks pretty hard in my book.

I liked Swamp of Sorrows and Durotar.  Desolace sucked ass though.

Durotar went by quick and wouldn't have been bad except it was followed by the barrens.

Blasted Fucking Lands. What the shit is the point of that zone.

The dark portal.

Is that a dinosaur in a dress?

So true.   No way I will ever go there again now that I don't need it to make leveling tolerable (less grind).  Also, Uldaman.

Yes.

I wish Horde had a zone as cool as Duskwood.  And for the record, I hate STV and don't like doing it (despite the leveling guides recommending it and it being quick).  In fact, the entire 35ish-45ish leveling process is still just awful (I've done 3 80's, 1 70, and a 50 just finishing up).  Once I get to Tanaris, Hinterlands, and Plaguelands I have considerably more fun.  I'd finish my rogue and warrior up too, but they are staring down The Barrens gun and the 35-45 run again.

I don't really have any zones that I hate.  Even Desolace is one nice tour around the zone, giving one level in one evening if you do it right.

I tend to avoid Stonetalon since while it has some potential, in general it's too spread out and aggro-y.  Darkshore is a lot of running back and forth, but you can stack quests to some degree at least.  The Wetlands and Arathi are kind of a pain too. 

All the above is now mitigated to some extent by having a mount at 20.  To me there is no excuse not to do one of the "new" well-designed starting zones (Draenei or Blood Elf), then upon dinging 20, get a mount and revel in the relative speed you get in the smaller zones designed for foot traffic.

I am one of those perennial levelers though, so I might be biased (or touched in the head). 

I hate Ashenvale, that blue that goes on and on.  It's madness I tell you!

New spells added, could be for an event but I also thought they might be new racials for the two new races in disguise.

So Mr. T is the new race?

Think of it as goblin/worgen racials and it makes sense.


Howl atk debuff.
Pummel.

Draenei-like group buff?
Create grenade

granted this could all be for an event but still they look like racials.

Dude.

Watch. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bsOKH3_DNo)

Were I a betting man, I'd guess that you'll face him in the Coliseum.

I know, i've seen them too. hence it's a joke but the question is are they for a joke event or are the names joke placeholder names? We already know what bosses will be in the coliseum though.  If they do introduce night elf mohawks it'll be for some joke event which i can also totally see happening.  Still though, those abilities smack of racials.

A pummel sounds like a racial to yall? What kind of crack are you smoking? The only racial that's remotely close to that is the Blood Elf silence, but it's for 8 seconds and it restores mana.

The pummel would be the shittiest racial ever. Hell, the warrior already has that standard.

I'd use an interrupt more than most of the specials I have.

BE racial is 2 seconds.  8 yard PBAoE with 6% mana restore.

War Stomp seems remotely close to it, too.

Or runic power  :awesome_for_real:

You also have to assume that if it is a racial then the 15dmg would scale with level making it, even on a timer a very good ability.

The third one on the list makes it very clear that its some kind of NPC pet type thing.

Blizzcon is next weekend, right?

Ayup.

Whee! http://bwtl.wordpress.com/2009/08/14/loresclusive-first-new-races-now-new-classes/

Was just about to post the same thing from http://www.wow.com/2009/08/14/new-race-class-combinations-datamined/

It does only say NPC combinations though. Or maybe I'm drunk and only imagined that.

Man, people here are just fucking crazy.

They explicitly typed, in bold, that this was just them speculating.  As opposed to the introduction of the Goblin and Worgen races, which they've confirmed through various unofficial forum and datamining sites which found the Halloween masks.  No word yet on what the Tiki mask race's racials are, or which faction they belong to.

Also, their speculation, it is retarded.  Tauren paladin?  The fuck?

http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=34528#comments:id=808661
That little conversation was patched in last week.  :awesome_for_real:

The new classes have been datamined from the newest patch, what i find most interesting is troll druid but no other alliance druid class.  This means worgen druid is most likely one of their classes.

And MMO-Champion finally gives up on getting that Blizzcon pass: http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?topic=92919
E: And there's absolutely bloody massive storyline spoilers leaking elsewhere -
  :ye_gods:

Which could indicate paladin, priest, or an itch that bovine ladies just don't scratch.


There is a single entry of Tauren paladin in the linked MMO-Champion mining database, it's an entry for an as of yet unnamed NPC.

Internet gaming journalism blog.  That pretty much explains it all, doesn't it?

As I said in the other thread:

In retrospect, this is a p. awesome thread.