World of Warcraft - Cataclysm

[Huntn]

I'm wondering how "phasing" will affect the original areas of WoW when you buy the Cataclysm expansion? My understanding of phasing is that it is an instanced space such as the Death Knight starter area and I know from personal experience that other players are there too so it's not a locked area like a dungeon, where only your party can enter but it is available only to those doing what you are doing.

Ok, so they are gonna rip up Azeroth. Let's say you have a range of toons from 10-80. I assume your level 10 will see nothing different in the original part of the game, but what will your 80 see? Will they never be able to go back to the original part of the game? And what if they want to help out a low level friend, can or can't they? In WotLK, I have seen phasing issues on quest lines, where you have friends at your level when they come to help you, when they get to your location, they can't see you because you are in a quest related phased space.

 

[TSE]

WoW is going down a very slow end of the road. It's probably going to remain the biggest MMORPG for atleast 5 more years, but it's never going to get bigger, only smaller.

They are doing what almost every death of an MMORPG is caused by, they are dumbing the game down, trying to fix what isn't broken, and ignoring their older fanbase.

 

[topgunn]

Ok, so they are gonna rip up Azeroth. Let's say you have a range of toons from 10-80. I assume your level 10 will see nothing different in the original part of the game, but what will your 80 see?

When Cataclysm comes out, the world will be changed for everyone. It doesn't matter if you have vanilla WoW, BC, WotLK or Cataclysm; everyone will see the new world layout.

Phasing will occur but not but not to the scale that the Barrens will be whole for a level 10 and destroyed for a level 80. One instance they mentioned was the shoreline at Darkshore. As you progress through the questline, the shoreline continues to move higher up the terrain. The 3D model of the world will be the same for everyone; only graphic elements, buildings, NPC's and such will change via phasing (think Icecrown).

 

[huck500]

They are doing what almost every death of an MMORPG is caused by, they are dumbing the game down, trying to fix what isn't broken, and ignoring their older fanbase.

They are certainly making it easier to access end-game content, and I know people who enjoyed being part of the relatively small group who did 40-man raids in vanilla WoW might be upset by that, but I quit the game the first time because I was shut out of that content and had nothing to do. Even now I hate doing 25-man raids because it seems like when you get 25 people together in a videogame, a certain percentage are going to be pretty horrible people.

The only reason I still play is because I can do end-game content with my wife and three friends or with 9 people from an adult guild. I have tier gear now, which I never had even in BC. My guild just downed Freya for the first time, and that was really gratifying... and I really don't see how that fight is 'dumbed down', it's pretty frigging difficult. And if it's not, there's a hard mode, too.

Personally, I think Blizzard is focusing on the majority of their players and making content more accessible, and with a greater range of difficulty. There are still very few guilds that have killed all the hard-mode bosses.

And to those saying WoW subscribership is down... it's actually holding steady at 11.5 million right now.

 

[AndyCodez]

With Wrath we have lost just about all the old time raiders in the guild. We kinda still want everything to be a challenge and worth earning. Even PVP now any **** that can run a heroic and run around in full deadly(un enchanted and un gemed of course).

I used to raid Ony, BWL, MC back in the day... It was a lot of fun, but there were many negative aspects to the challenge and the length of the raids. I'll say that seeing and killing Ragnaros for the first time was amazing.

Back then I also had much more time to play. In college I had so much free time to play and gear out my toons! These days i get maybe an hour or 2 a night to play and that really doesn't accomplish too much. Do a couple of heroics or do some pvp no real time to get in to a raid that has more then 5 bosses.

They made wrath so easy to get into. I can pop on the weekend and pug a raid and complete most or all of the raid, lots of non raids to complete and get gear. I don't have to play 24/7 to get my pvp gears, do WG and a couple of bg's and get tokens to get some gear.

Overall I enjoy wow much more with Blizz dumbing down the game. Except I really don't like the 1092380129830192831092831 Deathknights everywhere lol.

Anyway here is links to a couple current and past toons:
80 Paladin Tank/Ret

80 Shaman Elemental/ Resto

70 Rogue (Old School raider i hit 70 and havn't really touched

 

[Huntn]

When Cataclysm comes out, the world will be changed for everyone. It doesn't matter if you have vanilla WoW, BC, WotLK or Cataclysm; everyone will see the new world layout.

Phasing will occur but not but not to the scale that the Barrens will be whole for a level 10 and destroyed for a level 80. One instance they mentioned was the shoreline at Darkshore. As you progress through the questline, the shoreline continues to move higher up the terrain. The 3D model of the world will be the same for everyone; only graphic elements, buildings, NPC's and such will change via phasing (think Icecrown).

Thanks for the explanation!

 

[Randman]

I've done just about it all in the game. From raids back when UBRS was a 15-man through current heroic content in ToC-25. More and more, I've gotten bored with it. I pretty much ignore PvP these days. I haven't leveled more than 2 toons up to 80 though both are in nice epics.

I like a few things like Goblins. And I may try the race/faction change on a toon but I think I'll hang on and just play casually once Arthas is deaded.

 

[Bimmi]

And to those saying WoW subscribership is down... it's actually holding steady at 11.5 million right now.

When I started playing in 2007, Blizzard claimed 8 million WoW subscribers; less than six months later that figure grew to 10 million, with 11 following shortly thereafter. The numbers since then appear to be largely unchanged, despite the launch of a major expansion and its accompanying patches. The subscriber base has almost unquestionably peaked.

WoW is nearly five years old. Just about everyone who's ever thought about playing it has done so at this point. People who've been playing for years are getting bored and putting it away. If Wrath failed to bring in a significant number of new subscriptions I see little chance that Cataclysm will either.

Again, for all the changes they're bringing to the table, there's nothing there that makes me want to play this game for another year.

 

[Cabbit]

I would be happy if they just gave us a new Zul Aman, that gave me my giggles twice a week.

 

[Nermal]

Phasing will occur but not but not to the scale that the Barrens will be whole for a level 10 and destroyed for a level 80. One instance they mentioned was the shoreline at Darkshore. As you progress through the questline, the shoreline continues to move higher up the terrain. The 3D model of the world will be the same for everyone; only graphic elements, buildings, NPC's and such will change via phasing (think Icecrown).

They mentioned that terrain elevation will also be phased now, so it's a bit more involved than Icecrown. But still, it's not going to be phasing entire zones.

 

[Huntn]

They mentioned that terrain elevation will also be phased now, so it's a bit more involved than Icecrown. But still, it's not going to be phasing entire zones.

I don't have a good handle on phasing other that it is an instanced space. I assume who you can see in someplace like Darkshore (a phased location) is based on what part of a quest line you are?

 

[Nermal]

You will only be able to see other players in the same "time period" as yourself. Usually (always?) you will progress through phases via quests.