Posts with tag Northrend
Posted Oct 31st 2007 11:01AM by Amanda Miller
Filed under: Patches, News items, PvP, Expansions, Wrath of the Lich King
Although this is a bit disappointing, it is hardly unexpected, and there are so many upcoming positive changes that it's hard to be a sad panda for long. Currently, the devs are focused on improving
Alterac Valley for
patch 2.3 and creating new content for
WotLK, which will include an outdoor PvP zone,
Lake Wintergrasp. Following in the wake of
Halaa's undeniable success, this zone will boast siege warfare, and many other innovations in world PvP.
As for what the new battleground will be like? I'd still love to see an
Aldor vs. Scryers battleground; and as much as we all love to see new content drop, we can at least try to satiate ourselves knowing that what we will be getting will continue to advance PvP as we know it. Now; a little less sad panda face please!
Posted Oct 21st 2007 4:44PM by David Bowers
Filed under: Screenshots, Wrath of the Lich King
One of the latest screenshots of
Wrath of the Lich King shows a pink-colored sky over Northrend, with some possible cloud-moving effect I haven't seen in WoW before. When I look at this screenshot I imagine all those clouds roiling in the sky and I wonder if Northrend couldn't possibly beat Outland in most interesting skies after all.
It's a tough comparison -- Outland planets floating above the horizon are hard to beat, whereas Northrend will be limited to a more terrestrial skyscape. When
The Burning Crusade first came out, I remember being impressed that the skies had any animation at all, whereas now, of course, the bar has been raised much much higher. Still, there's a lot that the skies of Northrend could offer us, especially if Blizzard were to go crazy with clouds and colors inspired by the
Aurora Borealis.
What do you expect of future WoW skies? Do you hope for ever-increasing complexity, or do you think simple and realistic is always best?
Posted Oct 16th 2007 7:30PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Expansions, Leveling
Dreadly of Nerz'hul asks a question that I'd like to know the answer to, also-- will we ever see
new zones in Old Azeroth? I can't say I'm as concerned about this as I was a week or so ago-- the revelation that we'll finally see some
new content in Dustwallow Marsh has me content (so to speak) about midlevel content for a while. But it would be interesting to know if Blizzard has any other plans to add on to old Azeroth (either by creating new zones like the Draenei and Blood Elf starting zones, or by developing existing zones like
Mount Hyjal and Gilneas).
Bornakk, always the spoilsport, says what you would expect: while it would be cool, there are no plans right now. He also says, however, that Blizzard is "more excited" about working on new continents, like Outland or Northrend, at the moment. As usual, it comes down to the player base-- because Blizzard sees so many characters at 70, they're "more excited" about expanding the endgame than the midgame.
Bad? Good? We do know this: Blizzard has a history of paying attention to what their players do, not necessarily what they ask for. When Molten Core was packed with guilds every weekend, they made more 40 man raids. When Karazhan got super popular, they made Zul'Aman. And hopefully, when Dustwallow Marsh is overrun by players running alts through the middle of the game, Blizzard will finally see how badly players are scrambling for new content in the "old" game.
Posted Oct 10th 2007 2:00PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Lore, NPCs, Wrath of the Lich King
Malikoi
generously offers to buy Dalaran's old location over on the forums, and says he plans to create a new city, complete with flight path, graveyard, and even an arena. It's not like the Kirin Tor are going to need it any more, right? They're moving the magical city of Dalaran up to Northrend, so Malikoi should be able to pick up the old land.
Bornakk, however, says
the Kirin Tor are not selling the land, which of course begs the question: what are they going to do with it? They could only take part of Dalaran up north, and leave part of it there in the Alterac Mountains (to serve as a new quest hub for lowbies, perhaps?). Or maybe Dalaran will have to fly up north under duress and what's left behind in Alterac will be the remains of some battle the mages had to fight?
It will be kind of a shame to not have that purple dome there any more (and it would be cheating if Blizzard just left it there when they've already told us the mages have made the decision to move the whole city). There's a lot of wonder to be found in Azeroth, but I can't think of any other experience that has matched up in exactly the same way to turning a corner from Hillsbrad and seeing a gigantic pink dome in the middle of nowhere. Hopefully whatever replaces it will inspire that same sense of magical amazement.
Posted Oct 9th 2007 8:00PM by Amanda Rivera
Filed under: Polls, Analysis / Opinion, Factions, Forums
When
Wrath launches next year huge changes are in store for the people and places of Azeroth. The greatest reason I love this game is because of the compelling storyline underneath it all. We not only have great characters and plot lines to interact with, those plot lines progress, which is not always the case in an MMO.
Dalaran, for instance, which has been sealed away for generations, will be opened up as the new capital city for those traveling to Northrend.
But
some are not happy with the prospect of another neutral city akin to Shattrath. As
Sorun of The Venture Co sees it, shifting Dalaran from an Alliance city to a neutral city would only harm the lore. He says that the factions want to hate each other, want to be pitted head-to-head at every turn, and certain elements in TBC and elsewhere have shown a trend toward cooperation he doesn't like at all. Drysc mentions that no one has yet confirmed that the city will be neutral, and Neth makes a valid point on the subject later on in the thread:
I think it's a bit too early to be worried or upset about what is and isn't going to be in Dalaran. When we are further along and have information on it, we'll share it with you all. In the meantime, remember, Dalaran is filled with the world's most powerful magic users. While they work together, they are also filled with many different personalities and more importantly, have a bit of a crisis on their hands by the name of Malygos. I am going to hazard a guess that the Kirin Tor are going to be using all the available resources they can to survive the onslaught.
Irregardless of whether or not Dalaran ends up a neutral city, the forum thread raises an interesting topic: do players really want to hate members of the opposite faction? I know there is plenty of rivalry between the Horde and the Alliance, some created by the game itself and some created by the players. But I personally play characters of both factions and can't really say I prefer one over the other. Maybe I'm in the minority, I'm not sure. Perhaps you can help out here. Do you prefer hatred and animosity between the factions, or is cooperation more your thing?
Posted Oct 8th 2007 7:23PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Lore, NPCs, Wrath of the Lich King
We've talked quite a bit about
Sylvanas and her history with Arthas in the past, but let's not forget that there is another woman Arthas has a nice long history with on the opposite faction:
Jaina Proudmoore. Jaina's biggest moment in
WoW is probably
the Missing Diplomat quest-- after a long goose chase to find out where the lost King of Stormwind is, all you do is end up finding the man who betrayed him, and then Jaina thanks you and wishes you farewell. Wha? Players have always though the quest ended a little too quick, and Blizzard has admitted that they plan to continue the storyline at a later day.
As in, during the next expansion. When a player asks
what happened to Jaina and the Missing Diplomat, Drysc mysteriously says "Northrend holds many secrets, and many answers." So it's a good guess that we'll find out at least another piece of the puzzle to where
the Lost King of Stormwind has gone.
And it's also a pretty good guess that Jaina will be there, somehow. Despite the fact that she's pretty much the strongest leader the Alliance has, she's also pretty buddy-buddy with Thrall, and she's got that history with Arthas-- they were friends (and possibly romantically linked) before he went all power-crazy and possessed. There's no question that some of the answers we uncover in Northrend, whatever they may be, will involve Jaina Proudmoore.
Posted Oct 5th 2007 3:00PM by Dan O'Halloran
Filed under: Expansions, Galleries, Wrath of the Lich King
Blizzard posted two new
Wrath of the Lich King screenshots today. One looks like a lighthouse next to an Alliance port town. The other appears to be the port town in question with a ship building yard. It's hard to tell where these were taken. The only Alliance town we know of so far in Northrend is
Valgarde, settled by Humans and Dwarves left behind.
But the screenshots we've seen of Valgarde look different than this one. Maybe a new Alliance town is to be revealed soon.
We've added the 2 new screenshots to the gallery below and have added 11 more new screenshots as well. We'll continue to grow our Northrend gallery as the expansion draws closer.
Posted Oct 4th 2007 4:40PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Fan stuff, Odds and ends, Blizzard, Humor, Screenshots
Folks are saying this has been around since release, but I've never seen this before, either-- Serevarno
found a face in the landscape of Searing Gorge. You can really only see it on the minimap, and while it is pretty messy, it's too clean to have happened by chance. The image almost looks like that
"Andre the Giant has a posse" picture, doesn't it?
Bornakk jokes that
the Titans left their face there before heading off to another world, but while that's probably not the case (Titans aren't that grubby), it is interesting that he should say the Titans leave their images sitting around-- we've already
seen Titan statues appear in the videos for Northrend, and it's been confirmed there's a Titan instance up there. Leaving their images sitting around is definitely something they are wont to do.
But of course it's doubtful this has anything to do with the lore-- at most, it's just a developer hiding an Easter Egg, and at least, it's just a coincidence. Still neat, though.
Posted Sep 21st 2007 2:00PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Lore, Bosses, Factions, Wrath of the Lich King
We've already heard, as you may know by now, that
Malygos, the blue dragon aspect, will return in
Wrath of the Lich King, and, as the Guardian of Magic, is supposed to be a little unhappy at all the Mages running around. Malygos' big thing is that he wants to keep magic from the mortal races-- he doesn't trust them to use it without destroying the world. The only thing that's kept him from doing something crazy is the fact that he hasn't had a dragonflight for a while-- Deathwing wiped them out, more or less.
But in Wrath, Malygos is back, and so is his mind, and so is his dragonflight. The Blue Dragonflight is returning (thanks to Alexstrazsa's help), and as
Metzen told us at BlizzCon, Malygos is
waking up, looking around, and seeing all these little mortal players wielding magic like it was a game (a massively multiplayer game, more appropriately). And so he's not likely going to be happy with Mages when we arrive in Northrend.
To which Takeru says:
maybe Malygos is right. Maybe we shouldn't be using magic for our own purposes-- look what it did to the elves. Non-mage players are even saying we should give up the Mages to Malygos anyway-- what did they ever do for us, right? (err, besides make water and food and port us around and polymorph our enemies...)
At any rate, it probably won't matter-- Malygos will probably bring the war to us, and if he doesn't, then
the Kirin Tor (also in Northrend) will probably bring the fight to him by recruiting us to do it. Either way, we'll likely find the Aspect of the Blue Dragonflight on the wrong end of our pointy sticks.
Posted Sep 14th 2007 2:05PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Instances, Quests, Expansions, BlizzCon
Well this is exciting.
MMO Champion points us to WoW Wiki, where some enterprising person has assembled a map of
Utgarde Keep, the first instance in
Wrath of the Lich King. The map is apparently based on one published in
Games for Windows, but
as it appears on WoW Wiki, it's a little empty. Let's see if we can't clear some things up-- I've added letters to the map above, and below, I've described what is probably there, based on
my own impressions and what we've heard elsewhere.
A. This is the main entrance, and as I said before, it consists of
Vrykul metalworkers and forgemasters. The big firey graphic is
the Forge, which has three "walls" that only open up after the mobs are defeated there. After you clear all three walls, you head around to the left, and find...
B. Dragonhandlers and "Trained Proto-drakes," which appeared to be Blue Dragons. Draw your own conclusions there. This area is a stable type of place, which explains the stalls.
Continue reading Map of Utgarde Keep, and what we know about it
Posted Sep 3rd 2007 4:30PM by Chris Jahosky
Filed under: Mage, Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Talents, Wrath of the Lich King
Nayami over on Area 52 makes a
good point in a recent thread on the official Mage forums about how magi must usually respec depending on which raid they're running:
"
So I was talking with a few random raiders on my server, and I was informed that SSC and TK has a large amount of frost immunities?
I mean, I can accept the fact that fire does more damage than frost overall. That is the way it is and ever shall be. But I liked Frost because of the pvp viability and utility it brough [sic] outside of raid bosses and still managed to hold its own in terms of DPS. You weren't going to top any meters but you didnt suck. But Immunities? I dread to see how many things will be frost immune in Northrend."
Magi switching their spec depending on what they're raiding is nothing new -- back in the old days of Molten Core, you had to spec into Frost or Arcane. Other raid instances such as BWL, ZG and Naxx did allow Fire spec magi to raid, but it seems like raid mobs having immunity to certain schools of magic is a step in the wrong direction.
Nayami (and others in that thread) also point out something I hadn't thought about before -- what will Frost spec magi do when they get to Northrend? There are bound to be many mobs immune to Frost spells in the icy roof of the world. Is it fair to make a certain class respec this often in order to DPS efficiently? And when was the last time anyone saw a mob that was immune to Shadow spells? Warlocks and shadow priests certainly haven't found any, as far as I can tell.
Previously on Forum Post of the Day... Posted Aug 29th 2007 8:00AM by David Bowers
Filed under: Breakfast topics, Expansions, Wrath of the Lich King
A poster to the official forums
complained (they're just so
good at complaining!) that
Northrend is
"supposed to be completely covered in snow and ice," but so far there hasn't been enough of either in the screenshots for the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. Bornakk responded: "While we have no plans for Northrend to appear like an island of paradise, we do want the zones to bring a wide variety of scenery and environments for all players to enjoy. Making a continent one big block of ice didn't seem to fit with this ideology too well."
Several posters came right back at him though, and while no one wanted to go through a whole continent that was just like Winterspring, the general feedback going Blizzard's way was to say: less chill, more freeze. One poster put it well: "I was hoping that maybe the Devs would actually try and I bet if they wanted they could make a plethora of breathtaking Ice and Snow environments that would be much more interesting than Winterspring." When I read that, my mind leaped with images of giant ice structures protruding from the earth, refracting sunlight as you looked at them. It was a beautiful image, not at all like Winterspring, and possibly variable enough for one or two zones.... but 10? 10 whole zones of different ice and snow environments? How in the world could one avoid the overwhelming dominance of the color white? Where would all the variety be without some areas that have... less freeze and more chill?
Of course a lot of Blizzard's landscaping work for the expansion is probably already planned out, but as things stand I'd imagine it's not too late for a little bit of player input to influence just how icy Northrend actually is. What's your take? Can you describe some significantly different environments that don't look like Winterspring?Posted Aug 26th 2007 4:59PM by Eliah Hecht
Filed under: Expansions, Wrath of the Lich King
Games for Windows magazine has revealed a surprising amount of info on
WoW over the past year or so. Now, a subscriber has written in and claims that this month's GFW (not on newsstands yet) contains, among other things, a full zone list for Northrend. Obviously this should be taken as unconfirmed, since we don't have any scans or anything to go on, but I'm inclined to believe it:
- Howling Fjord (68-72)
- Borean Tundra (68-72)
- The Dragonblight (71-75)
- Zul'Drak (73-76)
- Grizzly Hills (74-76)
- Azjol-Nerub (74-78)
- Sholazar Basin (75-78)
- The Storm Peaks (77-80)
- Icecrown Glacier (77-80)
- Lake Wintergrasp (Outdoor PvP)
Also note that
WotLK is still in a fairly early stage of development, and so this is all subject to change. And finally, here's a couple other tidbits, ostensibly from GFW:
The Nexus is the instance hub in the west (Borean Tundra), and "a giant Horde citadel--the largest in Northrend" is also in Borean Tundra, but currently without a name. Also, the final raid wing of The Nexus will likely end with a fight with "half-mad Malygos himself".Sounds interesting enough, although they seem to be sticking uncomfortably close to the
Burning Crusade model. But we'll see. Does anyone else have a copy of this issue of GFW and can confirm this information?
[thanks, Neil]
Posted Aug 25th 2007 4:30PM by Dan O'Halloran
Filed under: News items, Mounts, Wrath of the Lich King
Many players were unhappy to hear that their hard earned flying mounts aren't usable in the early parts of the
Wrath of the Lich King expansion. Every player has to beg, borrow and steal to scrape together the 5,000g for their epic flying mount. Or in this case: grind, loot and mine. Why should they have to put aside their hard earned and beloved mount?
Recently,
CM Bornakk explained the reasoning behind that unpopular decision. Essentially, they don't want players flying over the early content. The entire expansion is designed with a certain progression in mind from zone to zone. Flying would make that irrelevant.
There will be a point in the expansion where flight will be enabled in Northrend. Blizzard is currently considering level 78, but hasn't made a concrete decision.
What do you guys think? Should flight be enabled immediately or should you enjoy the early zones flightless?
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