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WoW Cataclysm: Details from IgroMir

I got pretty hyped up during Blizzcon to the point where the Cataclsym confirmations sold me on WoW for 2010, the latest news from Russian IgroMir gaming convention (where Blizzard was attending) has me all fired up again.

Rated Battlegrounds
Battleground and Arena gameplay are different and currently completely separate. Some players enjoy battlegrounds more but they cannot gain Arena points in battlegrounds and thus they cannot receive Arena rewards. Rated battlegrounds will be an alternative way to get Arena points. Each week, there will be a featured battleground, helping concentrate queues and keeping the rated battleground experience exciting and different from week to week.

If you win a game in a rated battleground you will gain rating, however your mileage may vary depending on the BG. Each victory in a rated BG will also give you Arena points. However, a loss will not affect your rating, nor your total number of Arena points.

If you have Arena points, you should spend them on something epic! Among the possible rewards, the most exciting will be the return of the classic honor titles like Grand Marshal or Knight Lieutenant. Players will also be able to earn epic ground mounts and vanity items such as tabards and pets in addition to helping their guild acquire levels and achievements.

You can enjoy end game PvP outside of the arena now in a big battle and you can get the old classic PvP titles. This is made of win.

Tol Barad
Tol Barad is a brand new battleground which will have features similar to those found in both Wintergrasp and the Isle of Quel’Danas. When battle mode is active, the contest will be similar to WIntergrasp with PvP fights, vehicles and destructible buildings. When battles are not in progress, Tol Barad becomes a daily quest hub like the Isle of Quel’Danas. The faction that wins the battle in Tol Barad will not only get Tol Barad marks of honor, but also will get access to bonus daily quests and special bosses.

The Sunwell Isle was actually the best part of Burning Crusade and the prospect of something worth fighting over means that perhaps we’ll see a little concentrated PvP in this particular area. But this is nothing new that I didn’t already report from Blizzcon.

Guild Advancement
Guild advancement will be one of the biggest changes made to the World of Warcraft game system when Cataclysm arrives. Guilds will be able to level up and gain talent points, develop guild professions and gain achievements.

Players earn guild experience in a variety of ways, for instance by gaining levels, reputation ranks, boss kills, rated battleground or Arena wins, or profession ranks. Each guild level grants a talent point that can be spent in a guild talent tree which works similarly to character or pet talent trees. Some of the options in this tree include repair cost reduction and increase in looted gold. Guild talents will affect all guild members. To give fair opportunities to both big and small guilds, only the top 20 earners per day in each guild will contribute to guild experience points.

Guild experience will be converted into a special guild currency, which can be used to buy a variety of rewards such as profession plans, recipes and reagents; vanity items (mounts, tabards, etc.), and guild talent respecs. Guild heirlooms can be created with the help of professions and are bound to the guild, which means that if a player leaves a guild, the item will be returned to the guild. Guild items require less reagents, which can be bought with guild currency.

Players will be able to earn achievements as a guild as well. To do so, at least 75% of guild members (for the moment) will need to complete an achievement to make it appear in the guild achievement tab. As players’ guilds complete achievements, players who are offline will be able to read the latest guild news through an RSS feed to the World of Warcraft Armory and get access to profession info and much more. Guild banks will receive a percentage of gold looted from a boss when guild members make boss kills. Also, it will be possible to invite other guilds to various events such as weekly battlegrounds.

This is by far the most exciting change to gameplay mechanics as you can literally start a guild and tailor it to leveling, then switch it to focus on PvE content, then again to PvP if you so desire. The emphasis on your guild is being ramped up and that’s fucking amazing. When cross realm Battlegrounds came out, and name changes, and transfers, it really did a number on the reputation game. You could be a jerkoff theif and get away scott free, reputation in your server meant nothing as you could easily guild hop. Not anymore in Cataclysm, and that’s a very strong step in the right direction.

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WoW: Cataclysm details in PC Gamer UK

Just in case you’ve been under a rock for the past week or two, more details from Cataclysm that were already speculated have been confirmed. You can check out coverage from WoW.com as they got their hands on the magazine before anybody else could it seems.

• Garrosh is the new Warchief of the Horde. He has redesigned Orgrimmar and the Taurens and Orcs are the only races allowed in the center of the city because they’re the only ones strong enough to defend it in his eyes. I wonder how the Trolls feel about this since they’ve been there since day one.
• The Ruins of Lordaeron / Undercity will be expanded with a pit opening into the Undercity. So hopefully no more ass elevators.
• Zoram’gar Outpost in Ashenvale will be changed to a Warsong Hold style naval base; and Astrannar looks to be destroyed by the horde offensive. Perhaps the Draenei outpost to the North of Ashenvale will be completed and a new stronghold for the Alliance can be found there?
• Stranglethorn will be the most altered zone. Presumably because of Grom’gol’s expansion which would be nice. Both the Alliance and Horde have minimal resources in the zone with tons of ancient troll lands to conquer and push into. I can see how splitting the zone in such a way would be great for PvP.
• Apparently Southshore wasn’t retaken by the horde (it was mentioned during Blizzcon) but has succumbed to tidal waves and thus has been wiped off the map.
• The new raids will be more like Naxxramas than Sartharion. Which most likely means that there won’t be any more of the Onyxia type encounters where you get a giant hall with a few bosses in it and nothing more.

There’s more that was mentioned regarding the Goblin and Worgen starting experiences but I’ll put those up in a bit.

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WoW Cataclysm: Blizzcon Preview

I’m going to try and keep this as organized as possible. There is a lot of information to digest and process through with what feels like an overwhelmingly endless series of implications tied to them. This is just the general preview post I’ll publish out the more specialized topics in a few minutes. Picture spam at the bottom.

General

• Level cap will be 85 because developers wanted to focus on the right things: redoing Azeroth and providing more end-game content.
• A new guild advancement system  will let you earn guild perks and level a guild through 20 levels with points to spend in a talent tree. You will access abilities such as cheaper repairs, less durability loss on wipes, or mass resurrection.
• Phasing can now add and remove terrain based on your progress. Coasts will be progressively more flooded depending on how far you are in a storyline for example.

Path of the Titans

• Talent trees won’t be extended, you will just get 5 more talent points.
• The Path of the Titans will let players follow a path (not restricted to classes), this is a new talent system with new skills and passive abilities.
• A mastery system is being added as well, a lot of talents will be reworked to be more fun. The point is to get rid of a lot of the talent skills and not make you spend all your points in a talent tree just because it gives you more damage or higher crit chance.

Archeology

• Archeology is a new secondary profession, not many details about this one but we’ll probably hear more about it in future panels.

Deathwing

• Deathwing, the leader of the Black Dragonflight will be the main villain of the expansion.
• Deathwing heard the whispers of the Old Gods after the arrival of the Burning Legion, he eventually grew very powerful and also became very very crazy.
• His plan was to catch the Alliance and Horde unaware with something so massive that it would bring up the Elemental Planes.
• The Elemental Planes were created by titans to contain the elementals, they weren’t happy with this decision and some of them like Ragnaros got really angry.

New races – Worgens

• Other races were discussed for the alliance, but the developers really felt that the alliance needed a monstrous race and horde needed something fun and tiny.
• Genn Greymane closed the Greymane Wall to block the Scourge’s plague. Gilneas got nervous as the Scourge progressed to the south.
• Arugal was a patriot, he called the Worgens to battle for Gilneas but eventually was surprised by how dangerous what he called down was.
• Worgens are from somewhere else … or even someWHEN else. They have a wolverine temperament and spent a lot of time trying to contain the beast within.
• Racial – Visciousness – +1% damage.
• Racial – Dark Flight – +70% run speed for 10 seconds.
• Racial – Abberation – Duration of Curses and Diseases reduced by 15%
• Racial – Flayer – Skinning skill increased by 15. Also they can skin with their own claws no need for a knife.

New Races – Goblins

• Goblins are a technological race from Kezan, their society is broken up into trade cartels run by trade princes. They are new factions and not the ones you can already see in game.
• The Cataclysm hit Kezan really hard and it’s possibly destroyed. The goblins are now refugees on the Lost Isles.
• As a goblin you start as a neutral cartel and eventually join the horde as you progress through the questlines.
• Racial – Best Deals Anywhere – Always receive the best discount regardless of faction.
• Racial – Pack Hobgoblin – Calls your personal servant allowing you bank access for 1 minute. 30 mins cooldown.
• Racial – Better Living Through Chemistry – Alchemy skill increased by 15.
• Racial – Rocket Barrage – Launches your belt rockets an an enemy, dealing fire damage. 2 min cooldown.
• Racial – Rocket Jump – Activates your rocket belt to jump forward. 2 min cooldown.
• Racial – Time is Money – 1% increased attack and casting speed.

Old World

• We all left a little part of ourselves in Northrend and the old world will be much darker than it was to make heroism and brotherhood more meaningful like Warcraft should be.
• Every zone will be revamped with new quests, items, and art. The old world will be a brand new experience and you won’t have to deal with the annoying agility/spirit quest rewards anymore.
• Azeroth is now flyable. Pretty much all the zones will be changed to some extent, some of them like Elwynn Forest won’t change too much but others like The Barrens will be sundered in two by Deathwing.
• The Wailing Caverns are now a lush and verdant Area.
• Desolace now has a lot more waters and a lot of plants can be seen in the screenshots.
• The Horde finally conquered Southshore.
• Auberdine was destroyed and the night elves have set up a new camp north of it. Garrosh wants to expand the horde and has built a fortified camp at the south of the zone.
• Stonetalon has been cleaned by the Goblins, Azshara will be the new Goblin zone, and are using quarries in the mountains of Azshara to build their town.
• Apparently Orgrimmar will be rebuilt and reinforced with steel, it now looks a lot like Garrosh strongholds…
• Undercity has been redesigned to be flyable, it now looks much more impressive from the outside.

New Zones

• 7 new zones will be added : Twilight Highlands, Mount Hyjal, Deepholm, Uldum, Gilneas, The Lost Isles, Sunken City of Vash’jir.

Starting Areas

• The Worgens and Goblins starting zone level goes from 1 to 15.

Vasj’ir

• Sunken City of Vashj’ir will be an underwater zone and was the home city of Lady Vashj before the original sundering, this is a gateway to the Abyssal Maw. Going through the Abyssal Maw will take you to the Elemental Plane of Water, even if the zone will be underwater you will be walking on the sea floor here, new underwater mounts will be available and should have the same speed as normal flying mounts.

Deepholm

• Deepholm will be the new hub of the expansion, you will have portals here to let you teleport to Hyjal, Uldum, etc … The Twilight’s Hammer now serves Deathwing and have brought him back to full health in the Temple of Earth at the center of the map.
• Deepholm isn’t really connected to Azeroth, the connection is where Deathwing emerged from the ground.

Uldum

• Uldum will have at least two dungeons and is heavily inspired from Egypt. The sea at the west of Tanaris was just an illusion created by the Titan and Uldum is actually a brand new zone. It is rumored to hold a super weapon. Uldum is also the home of the Tolvir, a race of stone-like cats created by the titans.

Plane of Fire

• Ragnaros used the cataclysm to come back from the Plane of Fire where we sent him and is now sieging the World Tree in Mount Hyjal to burn it down. Malfurion is back from the Emerald Dream. The whole zone (Hyjal) will make extensive use of phasing.

Twilight Highlands

• The Twilight Highlands will feature Grim Batol, Deathwing literally broke open Grim Batol as he emerged from the ground. This is the new Twilight’s Hammer base in Azeroth and both Horde and Alliance will have a new port town with boats here. The Red Dragonflight is still here but has been pushed back to the west of the zone near the Wetlands.

Dungeons & Raids

• The Firelands will be a new raid dungeon, it will let you go to the Elemental Plane of fire and visit Sulfuron’s Keep, Ragnaros will be here and he’s really pissed.
• Uldum will feature two new dungeons, the Lost City of Tol’vir and the Halls of Origination (a titan city)
• Grim Batol will have a level-up dungeon and a raid instance.
• Skywall (Air Elemental Plane) will have a level-up dungeon and a raid instance.
• The Deadmines and Shadowfang Keep will be back in a brand new level 85 heroic version.
• Blackrock Caverns will be a new level-up dungeon located in Blackrock Spire. This is an entirely new dungeon, new art, new creatures, new everything.

Player vs. Player

• Battle of Gilneas will be a new battleground where the objective is to control the city by controlling as many districts as possible.
• Tol’barad will be a new PvP zone and will also be the most important daily quest hub. Just like Wintergrasp a battle will happen every few hours and the winning side will get access to the Tol’barad Prison and extra daily quests, the really profitable ones.
• Rated battlegrounds will be added to the game and should get you the same rewards as Arenas.
• New arena maps will be added.

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