WoW: Warlords of Draenor

krev82 wrote:

Although I think I own BC I have not really played since uh.. classic.. and never got around to anything bigger than a 5 man instance.

How hopelessly lost would I be trying to dip my toes back into WoW after all these years? Bearing in mind I only have the time and interest to be a very casual player, maybe 1 day and 1 or 2 evenings a week if that.

I came back recently after not having played since Classic. Things are very different, but you definitely wouldn't be hopelessly lost. Leveling is still pretty straightforward and a lot of the questing is more interesting (though a lot is still also the same). Once you hit the cap, things get a bit more complicated as raiding, pvp, factions, etc are all very different - but you don't need to figure it out all at once, just get some answers from the guild about the stuff you're interested in and it will make sense pretty soon.

Honestly, I'm enjoying it a lot. I burnt out on WoW after finding I was spending way too much time raiding, and the systems they have in place now allow for a lot more flexible time commitment and still be able to do cool stuff. My girlfriend has commented on how much easier it is for me to just quit right away when something in life needs to be done than it used to be, which is pretty much the only way she'd still let me play WoW anyways

Enix tried to send me a SOR but I can not seem to get it working for whatever reason.

Anyone mind sending a recruit-a-friend
edit: got one, thanks folks, will try to hit up the guild.

Some of these potential level 100 talents seems pretty interesting. I'm especially liking that shaman will get a new elemental, this time for air. Of course, as a rogue main, I'm really loking forward to fiddling with the new finisher, if only to see what the animation is for it. I think I'd nd up using the passive one though (Master the Basics: Passive. When you critically strike with an autoattack, you gain an additional combo point on your target).

EDIT: And this shadow priest talent, not quite sure how it's supposed to work (wording seems off):

Shadow -- Void Entropy: All Shadow Orbs. 40-yard range. 1.5-second cast. Consumes up to 3 Shadow Orbs to deal up to 750 Shadow damage to every 3.00 seconds for 60 seconds.

I assume it's supposed to says "every enemy" or some such. Sort of a... super/aoe Devouring Plague, minus the heal part I guess?

I am sure a few people will crop up closer to launch. I would like to play more but I just don't have time with school.

Hopefully I can suck enough people in after the holidays to get a decent guild group for Flex SoO and finish that off.

I'll probably come back at some point soon. Honestly the thing I am happiest about is the graphics update for older races.

Btw if anyone wants a SOR let me know - I really want the mount and have been trying on Wowhead to send them to people but it just hasn't stuck for whatever reason.

Dysplastic wrote:

Btw if anyone wants a SOR let me know - I really want the mount and have been trying on Wowhead to send them to people but it just hasn't stuck for whatever reason.

I'll take one. How much time does it give you? If it lasts until the end of the month before I have to re-sub to get you the mount, we're good. If not, then give it to someone more deserving.

It gives you 7 days. Actually, I just realized that I did in fact get it before, I just had to claim it in my account status. So I'll send you one and you can claim it whenever - just pass me your email or battle.net info.

Reaper81 wrote:

Hopefully I can suck enough people in after the holidays to get a decent guild group for Flex SoO and finish that off.

I might be good for one run per week. My ret costume is passable. I might could heal with a little work.

P.S.: You can give out as many SoR as you want -- the only limit is you can send just one per day.

The RAF option (which now comes with pets!) cranks back up in a week or so.

Some other interesting pieces that I noticed:
1. The number squish is coming so the spells that currently crit for 600k will now crit for 6k. You'll still do the same number of casts so everything is just being re-scaled.
2. Crafting directly from your bank!
3. Changes to raid sizes and an additional level "Mythic"
4. Removal of meta gems, a number of items will no longer be enchantable or take gems

Most notably though, there won't be a 5.5. Metzen said that the entire team is working on WoD and that another major content patch would only add delays to WoD's development. They wouldn't say specifically but I got the impression from their comments they were hinting at Spring 2014.

If you want the full story WoW Insider has some great write ups.

I'd be stunned if WoD came out this spring. If June = spring, then, well, OK. (It still technically is, I guess.)

Another thing to add to your list: In addition to hit and expertise going away, dodge and parry are, too. And so's reforging and meta gems and set bonuses.

Apparently they're going with what I'd call dynamic armor. You wear armor appropriate for your class (plate for paladins and warriors, mail for shaman and hunters, etc.), but the primary stats on each piece change as you swap between specs.

I guess they're serious about clearing some bag space. I'd love not to have to carry around a bunch of spare armor pieces.

Enix wrote:

I'd be stunned if WoD came out this spring. If June = spring, then, well, OK. (It still technically is, I guess.)

Another thing to add to your list: In addition to hit and expertise going away, dodge and parry are, too. And so's reforging and meta gems and set bonuses.

Apparently they're going with what I'd call dynamic armor. You wear armor appropriate for your class (plate for paladins and warriors, mail for shaman and hunters, etc.), but the primary stats on each piece change as you swap between specs.

I guess they're serious about clearing some bag space. I'd love not to have to carry around a bunch of spare armor pieces.

The "toy box" idea is an interesting addition. Neathera said they might be able to recover some of the deleted items it was obtained through a quest . I can't even begin to think of how many trinkets and do-dads that I've deleted because I don't want them taking up bag space.

Not that I have any real need for them but it would be fun just for the memories.

Hmm, interesting. This is a much more compelling expansion for me than Pandas/China.

Someone on the internet figured out who Garrosh's friend really is:

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/721wYxv.jpg)

Their plans for the Garrison addition are incredible. That's some top shelf designery. Hope the system launches with as many hooks as they're planning for, they'll definitely have my axe.

Not sure if this was mentioned..but the developers said a few times that Nozdormu would be the responsible party for springing Garrosh as well as transporting him back in time to Draenor. (http://wowpedia.org/Nozdormu)

Kind of ties in with the Vision questline on the Timeless Isle which ended up with a very odd scene... now it remains to be seen the exact motive behind this. As well the devs went out of their way to explain that Garrosh was not the main villain of this expansion but rather a pawn to some unknown entity.

Rallick wrote:

Except for my inexplicable desire to play WoW again right now. Good thing I'll have to wait until the end of the month to resub, by then the desire might have passed. :-P

If it doesn't take endgame to scratch that itch, you could just fire up the starter edition and play through an opening zone or two.

TheGameguru wrote:

As well the devs went out of their way to explain that Garrosh was not the main villain of this expansion but rather a pawn to some unknown entity.

Garrosh may have been a pawn, but he's still an asshole.

I'm suddenly having WoW urges, too. Must resist...

Bear wrote:

Changes to raid sizes and an additional level "Mythic"

I saw a great slide illustrating the changes here, but they're not adding a raid level - they're just renaming them all. Mythic will be what we call Heroic now, for the best of the best, although they're making it a straight 20-man size now for easier balancing. The current Normal will be called Heroic, and the current Flex level will be the new Normal. Both will be size-flexible from 10 to 25 members, just like Flex is now. LFR will apparently also be flex from 10 to 25 people. I guess Blizzard just thought it was weird having "Normal" raiding mode actually be one of the higher difficulty levels.

Overall, from looking at everything they're doing in the expansion I'm fairly impressed yet again, and I'm sure before horribly long I'll get stuck in that quagmire again.

I have to echo my annoyance with Blizzard for getting my hopes up again. As an old-time Warcraft player, the promise of re-fighting the first war against the orcs plus controlling my own garrison sounds incredible. Also jumping straight to 90 sounds awesome.

Reaper81 wrote:

I am sure a few people will crop up closer to launch. I would like to play more but I just don't have time with school.

Hopefully I can suck enough people in after the holidays to get a decent guild group for Flex SoO and finish that off.

I may not be in the guild, but I'd be more than willing to join you guys for a flex group via cross-realm dealies. Of course, I don't have any of you as RealID friends atm, though (my email addy for it is [email protected] should anyone want to add me).

The level 100 hunter talent, lone wolf, seems interesting. I've started and abandoned hunters several times because after spending so much time with a warlock, I was tired of pet classes. A flat damage increase in exchange for the pet sounds fun.

Edit: probably lose out on some utility though right?

TheGameguru wrote:

Not sure if this was mentioned..but the developers said a few times that Nozdormu would be the responsible party for springing Garrosh as well as transporting him back in time to Draenor. (http://wowpedia.org/Nozdormu)

Kind of ties in with the Vision questline on the Timeless Isle which ended up with a very odd scene... now it remains to be seen the exact motive behind this. As well the devs went out of their way to explain that Garrosh was not the main villain of this expansion but rather a pawn to some unknown entity.

Kairodormu, not Nozdormu actually, is the Bronze Dragon involved with the Timeless Isle(Kairoz is the NPC). I don't remember who said it, but Kairoz was mentioned by name during the panel as being Garrosh's time travel buddy.

jdzappa wrote:

Also jumping straight to 90 sounds awesome.

I agree. I've leveled plenty of toons through the old worlds (I'm working on a warrior at the moment, and a horde priest is probably next), and I'd love to skip all that for once. (At the rate I'm going I'll have one toon from every class at 90 by the time the expansion comes out. But I digress.)

I think what Blizzard's doing is a very clever way to (a) bring back old players whose toons are stuck at 70 or 80 and (b) bring in new blood. But there's an amazing amount of hate toward the idea (read the comments if you dare!), mostly along the lines of I-leveled-all-my-toons-from-scratch-and-so-should-you!

Weird.

AnimeJ wrote:
TheGameguru wrote:

Not sure if this was mentioned..but the developers said a few times that Nozdormu would be the responsible party for springing Garrosh as well as transporting him back in time to Draenor. (http://wowpedia.org/Nozdormu)

Kind of ties in with the Vision questline on the Timeless Isle which ended up with a very odd scene... now it remains to be seen the exact motive behind this. As well the devs went out of their way to explain that Garrosh was not the main villain of this expansion but rather a pawn to some unknown entity.

Kairodormu, not Nozdormu actually, is the Bronze Dragon involved with the Timeless Isle(Kairoz is the NPC). I don't remember who said it, but Kairoz was mentioned by name during the panel as being Garrosh's time travel buddy.

Stand corrected.. though I swore they mentioned Nozdormu as well...

So I had a thought... with hit and expertise going away, I wonder what they'll change some of the racials to? I mean, half the raicals have something to do with expertise, what with the human one for swords/maces, guns/maces for dwarves, daggers/1h swords for gnomes, fists/axes for orcs, and ranged weapons for trolls, not to mention the draenei hit bonus... that's a lot of racials to revamp. I hope they get a little creative on the new ones and don't just palm off some crappy crap on us. They did pretty well with the Pandaren racials, so hopefully they folow suit (though, you know, I NEVER use Quaking Palm).

I realize now though that, among all the professions, all have a racial associated with them except leatherworking, blacksmithing, mining, and tailoring. I could see dwarves getting a mining or blacksmithing bonus. They do already have the bonus for archaeology, but it isn't a straight +something to it like the gnome one for engineering. I can't see any of the races being particularly "attuned" or whatever for leatherworking though... maybe trolls? And draenei already have the JC bonus, so I can't see them getting another profession bonus, particularly not blacksmithing.

Honestly though? I'd love to see dwarves get Find Treasure back.

AnimeJ wrote:

Someone on the internet figured out who Garrosh's friend really is:

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/721wYxv.jpg)

...and now there's this exclusive screenshot:

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/pHNbEZa.jpg)

Thanks to (I assume) Dysplastic. I've received the SoR, and am just waiting until the 22nd to accept!

Super excited about new talents.
DKs get DEFILE, I am sure all of you who remember the mortal struggle of the Lich King fight will share the sentiment with me (and that on hc mode was my favourite fight in WoW). Necrotic Plague was there too, but Defile seems like infinately more fun to use.
Guess it's time to switch my main back to DK.

Paladin talents look interesting for Holy, less so for Prot which I am.

Also intrigued by that mimic shadow talent Rogues got. League of Legends' Zed inspired? Possibly. Super cool.

I'm betting Garrosh redeems himself in the end once he realizes he's been duped by the Burning Legion. Like Father like son