Cataclysm

[Paelos]

Yes, well dick-grating aside, I think this move completely fucks over raiding alliances and PuGs. If anything this is reverting us back to the old days of the uber-guild poaching everyone. There is no reason why points shouldn't be equalled alotted to any raid regardless of the guild affiliation.

[kaid]

Well currently at least on my server guilds especially the raiding ones don't seem to have much longevity. They start off they raid stuff drama ensues guild collapses and reforms and begins the cycle again.

Its kinda funny but my family guild I am in probably has a better long term chance of gaining high guild levels just due to stability of membership. We have existed since shortly after wow was released.

Guild levels may be one way of making guilds a bit less of a disposable commodity for raiders than it currently is but I am guessing the drama will still cause the raiding guilds to explode and reform as they currently do.

[Malakili]

Well currently at least on my server guilds especially the raiding ones don't seem to have much longevity. They start off they raid stuff drama ensues guild collapses and reforms and begins the cycle again.

Its kinda funny but my family guild I am in probably has a better long term chance of gaining high guild levels just due to stability of membership. We have existed since shortly after wow was released.

Guild levels may be one way of making guilds a bit less of a disposable commodity for raiders than it currently is but I am guessing the drama will still cause the raiding guilds to explode and reform as they currently do.

Yeah, guild drama is an issue, it comes from the mentality that progression > all.  Gotta find a raiding guild that admits people (player skill AND player quality as a person, not either or) rather than classes, and it goes a long way to helping.  Sure, you probably won't get a lot of server firsts, but you will see all the content, even when its on its current tier.  I think being in a great guild that has been around since literally day 3 of WoW(though I didn't join it until 2006, if I recall correctly) and is still going (funny how I consider myself a member even though I don't play) and has consistently been at the top 5 or so in terms of server progression has spoiled me.  Even though a lot of the members than made the guild are gone now, they started it with a certain mentality that has lasted through 3 or 4 GMs.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Maybe I'm not privy to the knowledge but I don't see where it says you'll need to raid to gain guild levels. Afaik they have stated only the top ten earners in points would contribute to guild level anyways.   So while your raiding won't count if you're in a pug, that won't be gating your guild as far as levelling.

[Rendakor]

Where has it said that your raiding won't count if you're in a PUG? Furthermore, what counts as a PUG for that system? If we can only field 24/25 and have to PUG 1, does that make the raid not worth XP? 

Also, where did it say you had to raid to earn guild XP? Everything I've read suggests that raiding is one way to level the guild, along with dungeons, quests and PVP.

[Ingmar]

For people concerned that larger guilds will have an advantage, last I heard one way they were considering to deal with that was that only the top 10 or so contributors in a given week would actually count towards leveling the guild up regardless of guild size. Don't know if that is final or not or if they're going to do something else entirely, since they were still considering a guild talent tree at the time too.

[Paelos]

Where has it said that your raiding won't count if you're in a PUG? Furthermore, what counts as a PUG for that system? If we can only field 24/25 and have to PUG 1, does that make the raid not worth XP? 

Also, where did it say you had to raid to earn guild XP? Everything I've read suggests that raiding is one way to level the guild, along with dungeons, quests and PVP.

I believe the number is <75%. So you can basically pug 2 people in a 10 man, or 6 in a 25. Also, nobody is suggesting that it's the only way, I'm just suggesting that it may be the fastest way given the emphasis they put on raiding anyway. If it's not, the point is moot. If, however, a full clear of a raid nets 10x the points that clearing out 5 dungeons gives you, then I believe you are unnecessarily punishing raidng alliances and pugs by not allowing them any credit for the exact same effort.

[Ingmar]

Hm, my recollection was that the %-of-members-in-the-raid thing was just for determining if a guild would get the guild achievement associated with the raid in question, not for guild XP - the XP are determined on a per-character basis last we heard (hence the 'top 10 contributors' thing) and they should still be earning some for doing PUG content I think.

The details we have on this stuff are really spotty though, you may end up being right about how it works.

[Rendakor]

I just had assumed it worked the way Ingmar suggests, not the way you read it Paelos. You'd level FASTER if the raid was all guild, because you'd get 10x the points, but it'd still be doable if it was just 3 of you in a PUG. We'll see, I guess.

[Ingmar]

The other bit is there may also be specific rewards associated with specific guild achievements, so if that is the case it is possible that a guild that never does content all by themselves could get left out of something or another even if it doesn't directly affect their leveling.

[Rendakor]

Are guild achievements even still in? And have they said there will be any tangible rewards available from them?

[Ingmar]

Dunno, I am just speculating. They haven't said that guild achievements are back out, so I expect they are still in, but any conjecturing about rewards and such is just conjecturing. It wouldn't surprise me to see things like the Ulduar proto-drakes of the future be available for purchase by people in the guild if the guild completes certain achievements, etc., though.

[Morfiend]

Are guild achievements even still in? And have they said there will be any tangible rewards available from them?

I believe they got replaced with the Guild Perks.

[Ingmar]

Are guild achievements even still in? And have they said there will be any tangible rewards available from them?

I believe they got replaced with the Guild Perks.

No, the talent tree got replaced with the perks. Achievements are something different - like regular achievements, but for the guild. Stuff like "Have 10 maxed crafters" or "kill Deathwing" or whatever.

[El Gallo]

The entire system is fucking retarded.  The last thing the game needs is more power in the hands of tinpot dictator guild leaders.  This is a solution is search of a problem.  All this shit should be available to everyone.

[Merusk]

They want guilds to matter more, and for folks to stop guild hopping/ creating useless bank guilds.  This is their solution to that, combined with the usual ripping off what was a feature of a few (or was it just WAR) new games that have come out in the last few years.

[Fordel]

So I've been leveling a NE Mage up, to take a gander at the new zones and one thing that I am very pleased with, is all my quest reward armor matches.

It took Blizzard 6 years to figure this out, but you don't look like a god damn clown anymore while leveling! It isn't like wotlk matching either, where everything is just grey skulls on gray skulls. They've just taken already existing armor sets and just made sure all the quest rewards from a zone follow that pattern. They've even gone so far as to make sure that pieces like belts and gloves, can transition between the zone sets and still look like they belong.



I've gotten to 35ish so far and my rough zone per zone impressions are:


Teldrassil - This zone is basically the same story wise, but all the quests have been streamlined and made much less retarded in actual requirements. The quest givers are all in far more useful places and they'll even show up at points right near your current quest area, so you don't have to run back and forth all across the island to hand in your Moonwell water and stuff. The NPC's will write it off as "I've heard the news of <blah happening> and came as quickly as I could!". They even give you a Sentinel tour guide for the barrow den here. She's a big help in the tight quarters, has a root, will tank furbolgs for you and does decent enough damage. She even literally lights a path to all the various objectives in the barrow den, so newbies stop getting lost in there.


Darkshore - This zone is exploding, sinking, on fire and being sucked into space all at the same time. It's also the zone most likely to depress the shit out of you story wise if you've done the old one. Quest layout wise it is roughly 10,000,000 times better then the original, with the quests being fun, inventive and climatic. The zone has standard flight paths and it has DaoC style horse routes (well, NE riding cat routes), which makes its unique geography much less of a headache. It's currently the zone where Worgens get dumped into after finishing their own starting area, if anyone was trying to join/avoid the worgen leveling wave. It's also the first zone as a NE that you get into The War with The Horde. Actually fighting random Horde NPCs instead of random Murlocs and Naga really does add an extra layer of incentive or whatever you want to call it. This is also the first zone where you see the new quest path play out. Where you start off with usual tasks, then as you progress deeper into chains, the tasks get more inventive and elaborate, with you riding/driving/bombing/exploding something dramatically as a climax. Lots of cinematic in the quests. Deep Ocean, Vast Sea - Has a sequel 


Ashenvale - Just like Darkshore, its getting shit rained down on it from every direction and faction imaginable. Lots of the physical geography is different as well. First thing I noticed, is you know all those sub-zones like Maestra's Post or Bathars Haunt? Those people the zones are named after, are actually THERE now, which I found highly amusing! As a NE, first thing you'll note is all your stuff is on fire. The Screenshots you saw for Cata previews were not misleading you, shit is bad for the elves in the forest. Quest wise, its currently a little awkward, in that instead of you slowing spanning across the zone from left to right, the entire zone is more homogeneous level wise. You get another DaoC style horse path between Astrannar (which is on fire, literally, one of the first quests is putting the fires out) and the Crappy Draenei town on the other end of the forest (crappy Draenei town is still crappy which is kinda sad). There are lots of flight paths, but it isn't 100% intuitive that you can start from the eastern hub as well as the western ones. The quests are much like darkshore, start off with the standard fare, then you build up into some kind of climatic encounter or event. There's even more Horde/Alliance questing, where your objectives are to kill Horde NPCs instead of random furbolgs or whatever. They've done a rather clever job of blending the Faction Quest hubs INTO the Faction Quest Mobs. So like, as a NE I am killing the horde forces in one area, while the horde have an actual 'town' inside this area, with their own quests presumably 'countering' what I am doing in my quests. I'm sure this ends hilariously in PvP servers. 


Stonetalon - This is the real warzone between the Sentinel's and the Horde. You can't throw a rock without it bouncing off half a dozen battles. It isn't just a couple of NPCs randomly beating on each other, its full blown warfare, with hundreds of NPCs, Tanks, Glaives, Ancients of War etc... It's a hoot. This zone is almost entirely based around Horde vs Alliance conflict and it's a blast because of it. The entire zone is one massive scouting/sabotage effort from the NE players point of view, you are like the special forces for your regular army units fighting in the field. It's also the zone where the alliance really sees what kind of problems the goblins are going to give them in the long run story wise. Most of the horde pushes and advancements are a end result of goblin tech. One of the sub-themes of the zone is the goblin/gnome rivalry, and how the NE's are suddenly at a major tech disadvantage in this theater. The zones main plot ends in a bang just like Ashenvale and Darkshore. From stonetalon you can go to the southern barrens or desolace.


Desolace - I went to desolace to keep my NE mage theme going. Desolace is mostly the same, even with its new forest oasis in the middle. The quests are fun enough mechanically, but after the roller coaster ride from darkshore to ashenvale to stonetalon, you really don't give a shit about what some centaurs are doing, or how the Cenarion Circle is planting flowers everywhere. The quest NPCs and zone/level layout is vastly improved, but its still a larger pain to get around compared to the other zones. Maybe it's better for the horde side, but for the alliance, its at best a intermission.


Southern Barrens - I've backtracked here after I finished Desolace (they are both the same level range) and haven't finished it, but first impressions so far are that it just continues the all out warfare theme from stonetalon, with a side-plot of "why the fuck is there a jungle in the middle of the barrens?". Like Stonetalon and Ashenvale, lots of the Faction Quest Hubs are also Enemy Faction Quest Mobs, which gives the zone a real sense of battle to it. This is the first zone that I've seen as a leveling NE where it's the Alliance proper fighting it out, instead of the Sentinel Army. Humans/Dwarves/Gnomes and all that they bring architecture and siege wise. Northwatch is a proper alliance quest hub town finally, since that always frustrated me in Vanilla, that we have this giant keep in the barrens that only exists for the Horde players to farm for linen or whatever.


General Sentiments - Quests are just so much better in terms of layout and positioning it isn't even funny. Cata OldWorld compared to Vanilla OldWorld makes Vanilla look like DaoC or something with equally shitty PvE. Lots of showing, a lot less 'telling'. You could skip all the quest log text entirely and still follow the story as it all happens in real time as well as in the log.

Item rewards from quests are actually decent, even GOOD. It's mind blowing! Plus the already mentioned it all matches and looks good cosmetically.

They've taken the good parts of vehicle combat and ditched most of the bad. They've also taken my advice of "Every questline should end with riding a stormgiant and slaughtering hundreds of peons under your feet while punching a enemy giant in the balls" to heart. Lots of bombing runs. Some siege engine driving where the engine is all powerful, usually the engine is also your mode of transportation to another quest hub, literally carving a path through the enemy zerg. There are a few "put on this disguise and use these special powers" quests, but they are very brief and simple, so you won't pull your hair out in rage over not being able to use your own spells. Also a few quests where you get a temporary henchman npc as a pet, lets you mix up your own tactics.

The quest mobs themselves actually DO STUFF, instead of just being punching bags. Like, a fire elemental will charge you and leave a trail of fire behind it that will hurt you if you stand in it. Some warlock type mobs will use the "Shadow Crash" attack, that you have to dodge. Mobs will setup lava burst style attacks, or have special attacks that hit for shitloads or rapidly, but cause the mob to be rooted or snared heavily so you can run away for the duration. It's like raid training, don't stand in the fire 101. They are still quest mobs though for the most part, you don't HAVE to avoid every single attack, but you'll certainly be better off if you do.


Everything between the vehicles and the quests mobs is setup so that you almost never get into a rut of "frostbolt, frostbolt, frostbolt, loot, next" for longer then a couple of minutes at worst.


Once the Beta is done patching, I'll finish up south barrens and probably head into Feralas. I did a little ride around tour in Feralas, and it's probably the first NE zone I've seen that is NOT on fire! How Novel! 

The New Feathermoon Stronghold is bloody enormous too!.

[Triforcer]

I'll resub when there are pandarens, and not a moment before.

[angry.bob]

outlands takes a week tops and wotlk is fast enough not to mention that they are going to give it an exp boost like they did with bc. it's not the roadblock people seem to think it is.

Leveling is really fast now using PvP. As long as you do the Call to Arms BG you can do level 70 to 80 in a weekend and have earned enough Honor to buy most of the gear you might need from the quartermaster. The downside is that you have to win the bulk of the time to do it, but even losing is faster than quests or grinding.

[Hawkbit]

Actually, Fordel's post got me a bit excited to see this all from scratch again.  Sounds like rolling a new toon will be a new experience.

[sickrubik]

Deep Ocean, Vast Sea - Has a sequel

Is it any of the following?

• Indigo Eyes
• Strange Kind of Love
• Cuts You Up

[Fordel]

-edit- New Beta Patch : http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/

Deep Ocean, Vast Sea - Has a sequel

Is it any of the following?

• Indigo Eyes
• Strange Kind of Love
• Cuts You Up

Nope.

[Simond]

That new worgen looks better.

[sickrubik]

That new worgen looks better.

Much, much better. Really like the changes.

[AutomaticZen]

Yeah.  They should redo the classic races.

[Paelos]

It does look more defined and slightly more pissed off. Is that a huge leap? I think it's just a nice tweaking, personally.

[Malakili]

It does look more defined and slightly more pissed off. Is that a huge leap? I think it's just a nice tweaking, personally.

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing, its certainly better, but drastically better? 

[sickrubik]

To me it is, and I'm not even talking about the snarl. The work on the nose and ears make it a lot better for me. That is just an opinion obviously, but yes, it's a lot better.

[Ingmar]

Yeah it is much more detailed around the snout, the teeth are a huge improvement too.

[Lakov_Sanite]

One is a furry. The other is a werewolf. Big difference.

[Ingmar]

One is a furry. The other is a werewolf. Big difference.

Yeah, that is a good summary.

[Sjofn]

I will only reeeeally like it if the ladies are also more werewolfy once they finally appear. They matched the boys pretty well before, now they're too nice (for lack of a better word) compared to 'em.

It doesn't super matter from a personal standpoint though, I'm not sure I'm actually going to have a worgen at all at this point.

[Mattemeo]

The new Worgen male head is bereft of any hairstyle or facial hair at the moment, unlike the old model which was stuck with a 'one size fits all' non-option. So whenever the hair/beard styles go into beta, I expect there will be a fair few 'maney' options. Overall, I think it's a good model change. I don't care quite so much for the savage face above but obviously there will be other ones to choose from; the one on MMOChamp is a little nobler looking, for example. Either way, they don't look so much like lions now, which is a big improvement.

My main concern with the model still doesn't seem to have been addressed, and likely never will - the rather silly plate-like feet. Don't look so bad from the front, but you watch any male Worgen run from behind and their feet look ridiculous. Worse even than male Draenei.

Whatever happens - they really have to update the older races now. The sheer facial detail on both Worgens and Goblins make them look exactly what they are - an entire generation or more advanced than the old races.

[Ratman_tf]

So I've been leveling a NE Mage up, to take a gander at the new zones and one thing that I am very pleased with, is all my quest reward armor matches.

It took Blizzard 6 years to figure this out, but you don't look like a god damn clown anymore while leveling! It isn't like wotlk matching either, where everything is just grey skulls on gray skulls. They've just taken already existing armor sets and just made sure all the quest rewards from a zone follow that pattern. They've even gone so far as to make sure that pieces like belts and gloves, can transition between the zone sets and still look like they belong.

This is the most interesting and exciting thing I've heard about Cata. 

[Fordel]

-edit- New Beta Patch : http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/

Yet another new patch is up! Lots of changes.

-edit-

Notably:

    * Cloth Specialization - Increases your Intellect by 5% while wearing only Cloth armor.
    * Leather Specialization - Increases your Agility by 5% while wearing only Leather armor.
    * Wild Leather Specialization - Increases your Stamina in Bear Form by 5% while wearing only Leather armor.
    * Wild Leather Specialization - Increases your Agility in Cat Form by 5% while wearing only Leather armor.
    * Mail Specialization - Increases your Agility by 5% while wearing only Mail armor.
    * Tribal Mail Specialization - Increases your Intellect by 5% while wearing only Mail armor.
    * Plate Specialization - Increases your Strength by 5% while wearing only Plate armor.
    * Defender's Plate Specialization - Increases your Stamina by 5% while wearing only Plate armor.
    * Blessed Plate Specialization - Increases your Intellect by 5% while wearing only Plate armor.
    * Astral Leather Specialization - Increases your Intellect by 5% while wearing only Leather armor.
    * Elemental Mail Specialization - Increases your Intellect by 5% while wearing only Mail armor.
    * Furious Plate Specialization - Increases your Strength by 5% while wearing only Plate armor.