WoW expansion sneak peak -- any details?

[Nevermore]

What would I like?  More of what I had fun with while leveling up.  Lots of non-elite quests, preferably with some non-traditional gameplay (where 'traditional' = kill x foozles).  Throw in a non-elite dungeon or two, maybe with traps and puzzles.  Faction quests that are more involved than old school DAoC kill-wait-for-respawn-kill mindless wack-a-mole.  The rewards for all this doesn't need to be hardcore raid ubercrap.  Make some of it decent, some of it unique but situational, some of it cosmetic, whatever.  I'm looking for stuff to do in between raiding, or while waiting for guildies to come online, or while waiting for a BG to start or when I just don't feel like playing with 40 of my closest friends.

But yeah, I saw the power creep you're talking about 6 months ago when I left the game.  I've been looking for an excuse to give the game another try because I really did enjoy it from 1-59.  Unfortunately, I'm not seeing much more being added to the game but more raid, raid, raid.  Not that I think raiding has no place in the game, I just think Blizzard puts too much focus on it.

[Venkman]

All this talk of what people are doing ignores where they are heading.

The expansion is not likely due out until next year. Forget how many Raids there are tonight. Think how many there were in February versus tonight versus next June versus next November.

Further, don't consider this out of the context of the other changes they're talking about. The fact they are adding more 5- and 10-man content, the sheer design of Medivh's Tower alone, the nature of Outlands, and the two newbie classes all bespeak the breadth of their intentions.

Finally, don't forget that people not Raiding fall into a vast number of groups. Two of them are anyone at 1-59 PvE or 1-59 PvP (PvE or PvP based on activity, not location). As such, these people see everything new. If they aren't some longtime veteran's alt, they haven't set foot in the endgame zones some of us have long since memorized. So even though the argument that these people are not getting anything new is wrong (per above), the fact is that the existing game is new to them through lack of experience.

WoW is not UO or Second Life. It will never be. Blizzard does not make virtual lifestyle experiences. And it's obvious the genre wants Games. So it's a Game. It has players. There are no rules of play, but to want to play this game means you share some similar desires to other players.

You're either having fun along the way and don't care about the endgame, you're gunning for the endgame, or you're swinging back and forth on a slow inertial pull towards the endgame. The first group sees existing content as new, the second would be happy with more of the same with maybe slightly lighter requirements, and the latter will quit long before the expansion if they aren't happy with the content.

[El Gallo]

I think WoW is well-equipped to handle mudflation while keeping the game accessable to newcomers.  They can keep the gear difference between hardcore raiders and freshly-minted max-level characters the same it is now by releasing new solo quests and 5-man dungeons that give loot equivalent to the 20/40-man raid zones 3 or so generations ago.  That way, newbs will be able to gear themselves enough to join a raid guild if they want.

EQ had that model for a while until Luclin and especially PoP came out and they fucked it up.  Flags were a big part of it, but I think the biggest culprit was AA points.  Now you need to have, what, probably 700 AA points to get into a top raiding guild.  That will take a year, and during that time those guys you are trying to catch up with are accumulating AA points as well.  It's essentially an unlimited levels system.

WoW's AA equivalent is the faction grind for the neat goodies from the latest quest faction.  The nice thing about that model is that mudflation makes all your old faction grinds irrelevant when the new faction grind comes in.  This way, a new player only has to do the latest and greatest faction grind -- NOT every previous faction grind and then the latest and greatest one --to be comparable to the l33t veterans. 

[Fabricated]

I think WoW is well-equipped to handle mudflation while keeping the game accessable to newcomers.  They can keep the gear difference between hardcore raiders and freshly-minted max-level characters the same it is now by releasing new solo quests and 5-man dungeons that give loot equivalent to the 20/40-man raid zones 3 or so generations ago.  That way, newbs will be able to gear themselves enough to join a raid guild if they want.

EQ had that model for a while until Luclin and especially PoP came out and they fucked it up.  Flags were a big part of it, but I think the biggest culprit was AA points.  Now you need to have, what, probably 700 AA points to get into a top raiding guild.  That will take a year, and during that time those guys you are trying to catch up with are accumulating AA points as well.  It's essentially an unlimited levels system.

WoW's AA equivalent is the faction grind for the neat goodies from the latest quest faction.  The nice thing about that model is that mudflation makes all your old faction grinds irrelevant when the new faction grind comes in.  This way, a new player only has to do the latest and greatest faction grind -- NOT every previous faction grind and then the latest and greatest one --to be comparable to the l33t veterans.

Heh, this sucks for me. I guess I'm a bit TOO casual. My warrior is the only level cap character I have, and he's decked out in...uh, mostly greens (Imperial Plate).

My question is, with the mudflation, will hitting Onyxia/MC/BWL be pretty much pointless due to newer 5-manners handing out nearly as good or better gear? Hell, I've only ran Scholomance twice. I haven't even touched Strat or UBRS yet.

[MrHat]

I'd do it twice or three times, just to have the experience.  Haven't done BWL/MC/Ony yet.

[Phred]

One of the better writeups Ive seen about the con.

http://forums.curse-gaming.com/showthread.php?t=4296

Of particular relevance to this thread is

Smaller raid sizes are planned in the future… they want to make more 10 and 20 man instances. They will still add 40… but the focus will be on 10 and 20 man instances for the raid team.

The dire Maul tribute idea they like a lot. It provides at least two ways to approach and experience the same raid. Expect them to do similar things in the future with multiple ways to play a dungeon besides just killing all that walks.

[Venkman]

My question is, with the mudflation, will hitting Onyxia/MC/BWL be pretty much pointless due to newer 5-manners handing out nearly as good or better gear

Also from Phred's link is the mention that level 65 Greens will outclass the purples from current endgame. Whether's that's true remains to be seen, but if the stuff drops from the 5- and 10-man raid zones, then it's all good.

Flags were a big part of it, but I think the biggest culprit was AA points.  Now you need to have, what, probably 700 AA points to get into a top raiding guild

So friggin glad that game is irrelevant. Nothing like giving a shit about some uber guild to really narrow the scope of the game.

[El Gallo]

Heh, this sucks for me. I guess I'm a bit TOO casual. My warrior is the only level cap character I have, and he's decked out in...uh, mostly greens (Imperial Plate).

Well, I was more addressing the problem of new players who want to raid, rather than the issues of new or existing players who just don't want to raid or who don't want to group.  The people that don't want to group (Sky) I think are going to be fucked.  People who don't mind grouping and want to raid can be supported as long as they don't play too often.  For your warrior, for example, there's a crapoad of single-group content to advance your character. 

My question is, with the mudflation, will hitting Onyxia/MC/BWL be pretty much pointless due to newer 5-manners handing out nearly as good or better gear? Hell, I've only ran Scholomance twice. I haven't even touched Strat or UBRS yet.

For the most part, yes.  Though there will always be new guilds cutting thir teeth on that stuff, and there may be an item or two from those places that is still worthwhile enough for people to do those targets with greatly reduced numbers.

Flags were a big part of it, but I think the biggest culprit was AA points.  Now you need to have, what, probably 700 AA points to get into a top raiding guild

So friggin glad that game is irrelevant. Nothing like giving a shit about some uber guild to really narrow the scope of the game.

The thing is that I believe AAs were put in to satisfy people who didn't want to raid.  During Velious, there were a lot of people at the level cap with max single-group gear who didn't enjoy raiding.  Luclin AAs were tailored to give those people a means of advancement without raiding.  And they were a pretty painless and powerful means of casual advancement (by EQs standards).  Hell, hour-per-hour you arguably got more of a character power increase from AAing than most raiders did.  Of course, the AAs were useful for raiders, and eventually raids were balanced around everyone having a crapload of them, making it impossible for new players to ever raid.  Oops.

[Malathor]

The thing is that I believe AAs were put in to satisfy people who didn't want to raid.  During Velious, there were a lot of people at the level cap with max single-group gear who didn't enjoy raiding.  Luclin AAs were tailored to give those people a means of advancement without raiding.  And they were a pretty painless and powerful means of casual advancement (by EQs standards).  Hell, hour-per-hour you arguably got more of a character power increase from AAing than most raiders did.  Of course, the AAs were useful for raiders, and eventually raids were balanced around everyone having a crapload of them, making it impossible for new players to ever raid.  Oops.

Exactly right. It turned out to be an exclusionary disaster, even worse than the keying/flagging crap.