Cataclysm

[Sjofn]

Yeah, that change is pretty "What? What?! Fuck you!"

[Lakov_Sanite]

I'm not sure it really matters does it? Once you're in old world where else do you really need to go? you have your AH right there in whatever city you pick. I mean there's no need to go immediately from UC if you're already in org or vice versa and dalaran portals didn't take you anywhere else in northrend to make travelling to dungeons/zones faster.

It's a minor inconvenience if anything but I can't say it's surprising.

[SurfD]

Ohh, new video up of the scorpion mount:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHzTfx46kdQ

That thing is going to be HUGE.  I can just picture what a group of Tauren riding around on them is going to be like 

[Soulflame]

The thing is, I don't give a shit if Blizzard wants the old world to feel "lived in".  Dalaran was extremely convenient, not just for my main, but my alts as well.  Being able to hop to a city, then port to any number of places, is really goddamn handy.

If they take that away, it's one more reason for me to not re-up.

[SurfD]

Kind of makes me happy that I have my Expensive "teleport to dalaran ring" and the "teleport to black temple neck" on my druid.  Gives these things a bit more value now.

[Fordel]

Teleport Moonglade and Hearthstone Ironforge is all you need!

[Merusk]

Or Deathgate/ Hearthstone Darnassus.

Also; yet another reason to level a mage.

[Fordel]

I'm half laughing at all the poor bastards that hearth to Dalaran not knowing about this change. Dalaran without the portals is about as far from anything you would want/need a 80-85 as you can get.

[K9]

Unnecessary change is unnecessary; what are they expecting, that everyone will stick around Dal once Cataclysm hits? Or maybe it will end up as a ghost-town, much like Shatt. Shatt would be even more of a ghost town without the portals too.

[Simond]

Good. Faction-neutral cities were the worst idea ever, and portals shrank the world even more than flying mounts did.

[WoopeeTuralyon]

Valithria was not going to be enslaved; she was going to be killed and raised.

I know. I just meant enslaved as in being forced to serve, dead or alive.

[K9]

Faction-neutral cities were the worst idea ever

I agree wholeheartedly, but given the fact of their existence, portals were a necessary evil. Go back and do Shattrath to any city on Kalimdor without using the portal and see how much it sucks.

[SurfD]

I wonder if they will remove the Shat port to the Isle of Queldanas?   

[K9]

It would seem pretty petty to do so.

[Chimpy]

It would seem pretty petty to do so.

Which means they will.

[Lantyssa]

Okay, I realize I've been pretty harsh on WoW of late, but does this honestly surprise any of you?  They've already made a huge number of changes for stupid reasons, even if you liked what the changes were.

[Threash]

Unnecessary change is unnecessary; what are they expecting, that everyone will stick around Dal once Cataclysm hits? Or maybe it will end up as a ghost-town, much like Shatt. Shatt would be even more of a ghost town without the portals too.

Shatt is only a ghost town because of the portals in Dalaran, if they hadn't been there i guarantee you everyone would be bound in shatt.  Of course everyone would stick around Dalaran once Cata hit if they left the portals in.

[Lakov_Sanite]

port to any number of places

This is what I don't get. Dalaran let you travel from your crafting/northrend hub to oldworld content for auction houses and whatever else you needed but most people would have never even left Dalaran were it not for lack of AH.  Is there some great need to go from thunderbluff to orgrimmar to silvermoon back to orgrimmar without any travel time?

What I'm trying to say is that the convenience of dalaran or shattrath portals was a perceived convenience due to restricting them from having an auction house. There was no real reason to ever leave outland or northrend instantly aside from the AH and by the same token is there any reason you need to get to the other continent in cataclysm faster than a flying mount can take you? Dalaran didn't have any portals to the nexus and that was a long ass flight.

[Soulflame]

The thing is, this is one more annoyance on top of everything else coming in Cataclysm.  Wrath brought about a lot of conveniences to WoW, that just made the game get less in the way of having fun. Cataclysm is taking big steps back from that, and I don't like it.

They're fucking up healing, because apparently healing needs to hold up everyone else by needing to drink far more frequently, plus healers didn't have enough to do anyway, so we should be forced to manage our mana bars as well as everything else we were managing.

They're making dungeons harder.  Mobs will require CC, because if you don't control the mobs, well, see "They're fucking up healing".

Now they're taking out portals that were a major convenience, and apparently in the name of a "vision" that capitals should be swarming with people, so new players walk into a town packed with annoyed 85s who now have to take blimps everywhere they might want to go that's in a different zone.

[apocrypha]

Being able to get to any of the major cities quickly isn't something I use every day. But when I do want to use it then it's damned useful.

There are many, many reasons for doing this. Running old dungeons with an 80 and a friend (i.e. not using the random dungeon finder because you don't want strangers in there with you). Doing achievments. Farming for mats from various places in the old world. Deciding to complete some ancient quest chain for fun. Getting around easily for various world/seasonal events.

One of the biggest is levelling alts. New alt? Get mage/warlock portal to Dalaran and bingo they can now get to pretty much any part of the world quickly and easily. Without those portals there's going to be a lot more time spent sitting on wind riders, getting boats, waiting for zeppelins. Great gameplay that is.

Of course we don't know yet how this will pan out but I don't see the need for it - it feels simply like adding annoyance for the sake of it.

[Paelos]

I don't think flying to a destination is the end of the world. The longest FP takes like 17m from the Shattered Staging to Booty Bay, and you'd only take that if you were a dumbass.

Remember when they didn't connect flights and you had to click on each one? Damn spoiled kids and their insta-travel.

[Soulflame]

Let me know when I can fly from Orgrimmar to Undercity.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Well I certainly agree that when levelling a new alt its almost necessary to get a hearth set to dalaran but why is that? because most of the levelling quests require you running back and forth between continents on a regular basis and its a pain in the ass. Hopefully this is something they will address and also, bored 85's aren't waiting on blimps or whatever, they will have flying mounts.

I just don't see how lack of portals is going to change gameplay dramatically, except that cities aren't going to be crammed like dalaran anymore.

Insert Quote
Let me know when I can fly from Orgrimmar to Undercity.

When cataclysm comes out

[Paelos]

Cataclysm does intend to fix the natural progression of leveling across zones. As it stands now, it's hideous once you're above 30.

[Chimpy]

This is a conspiracy to force people to play more bejeweled!

I swear, having that addon made my grind to 80 feel much worse because I never took my tradional "on a bird AFK" breaks.

[Azazel]

Definately another step backwards. I can see myself playing at most for the rest of my time left (40 days?), and probably a single 60-day timecard after that to check out the start of Cata, then taking a break for a year or more again.

Then when I play again, all this bullshit will be nerfed down to make the game more fun and less painful again. Healing, Arcane Mages, portals, etc etc. If they put in portals from city to city for each faction, even if they leave out Shatt and Dal, it'd be worthwhile. I wouldn't expect that early on, but it's the kind of thing that might happen after 6 months or a year or so...

[Lakov_Sanite]

Did wow make people this lazy or is it just general bitchiness?

[Rasix]

Being able to get to any of the major cities quickly isn't something I use every day.

I find it quite helpful when there's a holiday going on.  I wouldn't even bother with a lot of them if it weren't for the fact that getting from continent-to-continent isn't a chore at the moment.

So is this portal removal just a way for them to make sure people don't idle in the last expansion while LFD?  

On a whole, WoW didn't need to get harder or less convenient. As the general player base becomes less attached to the game (it's bound to happen sometime.. right?) they need to keep people from feeling like it's a hassle to play.  Of course, I'll judge it when I play it.  My tollerances are different from your typical player that actually raids or plays more than a 90 minutes a day.

Did wow make people this lazy or is it just general bitchiness?

No one who values their time wants to spend any significant amount of time traveling.  Poopsock McGee doesn't give a shit , but I'd rather not spend more than a minute at a time staring at windrider ass.

[Soulflame]

Did wow make people this lazy or is it just general bitchiness?

I play games to have fun.  Not to sit on a mount for X period of time.  If WoW decides to not be fun, I will not play WoW.

I don't understand why this is so hard.

The WoW team strove really hard to make Wrath accessible.  WoW was successful as a result.

Cataclysm appears to be stepping backwards.  It will make WoW less accessible.  I don't understand why Blizzard thinks this is a good idea, and I will not support it with my money.

[Shrike]

Did wow make people this lazy or is it just general bitchiness?

Saw the same thing in Anarchy Online (of all places) whenever they put in new teleport nodes. And you had flying mounts, there, too, so most didn't really care.

I really don't see a problem with this. I hate Dalaran with a white-hot passion and if I never see it again, it'll still be too soon. I think I've been back to Shatt since LK maybe two dozen times (once a month?)--and most of those were to kill unruly horde out in Honor Hold. I could just as easily come via the Blasted Lands.

My shaman has been farming HMgT lately for the shinies there and I've never used the Shatt portal. I always go via IF. Once you're back in the old world, I simply see now reason to worry about any of this. My alts might be a little inconvenianced in some cases, but hell, they're alts. Who cares?

[Hawkbit]

It's kinda funny how WoW used to be a world (albeit a small one) and now all people want is Guild Wars with a WoW setting. 

[Rasix]

World/not-World is a meaningless distinction, especially with WoW.

[WindupAtheist]

Oh no, without Dalaran portals how will I ever make those trips to super-important places like... uh... Exodar? Darnassus? I mean except for the boat from Stormwind that leads directly to them.

Come on, you guys didn't seriously think they were going to keep everyone packed into Dalaran for all of Cataclysm did you? I spend most of my time in Stormwind anyway. It's got the train to Ironforge, the boat to Exodar and Darnassus, and the PVP vendors, on top of stuff every capital has like the AH and the portal to Blasted Lands. I have my hearth set in Dalaran, but only so I can get back there to do daily quests or sign up for Wintergrasp.

Jesus, to hear you guys tell it, you'd think people still went places in WoW instead of standing around in dungeon/battleground queues. You're going to park in whatever capital is closest to the new daily quest hub and almost never leave and we all know it.

They're fucking up healing, because apparently healing needs to hold up everyone else by needing to drink far more frequently, plus healers didn't have enough to do anyway, so we should be forced to manage our mana bars as well as everything else we were managing.

They're making dungeons harder.  Mobs will require CC, because if you don't control the mobs, well, see "They're fucking up healing".

This is way more relevant. If heroics take more than 30 minutes each, I'm not going to bother. Between this, the primary outlet for PVP being "LF2M healers 4 rated BG, min 8k GS" trade chat pugs, and my particular class/spec being utterly ruined according to people in beta, I'm not the least bit excited about this expansion.

I'm not really picking up that much hype on the boards, either.

[Simond]

Let me know when I can fly from Orgrimmar to Undercity.

Right now. You get on a zeppelin.

[Ingmar]

The only characters I really see this hurting are the ones leveling 60-80, but all it will take is easy access to portals to Dalaran and Shat to fix that, which I am guessing are probably in the works. Changes that are meant to happen together often don't because, you know, beta.