Wrath of the Lich King
 

For those of us familiar with the magical lands of Azeroth, we have seen dark portents of things to come. The zombie invasions left cities decimated, unplayable, and overrun, and the scourge bring their vile kind to attack our lands.

In two weeks, we will begin our counterattack, and march into the frozen lands of Northrend. We will take the fight to the Lich King himself. No longer Arthas, no longer Ner'zhul, he is simply a monster now.

We will suffer innumerable losses and anguishes at the hands of our adversaries, and we will struggle every step of the way to reclaim our world from the dead. We will fall many times in battle.

And I for one could not be happier.

In the words of Hellgate: London:
Remember the dead. Fight for the living!

I don't believe in the "war" part of Warcraft. Nothing in the state of the world ever changes, it's always a war threatening to break out at any moment, it's always a few weeks since the Dranei landed, I'm always the destined goddamned hero prophesied to save the NPCs all. But I do welcome new lands to explore and sights to see.

Yes and no.

As you level "time" goes on. Thats why you can find Baron Rivendare and Tirion Fordring in the EPL and at the same time they will be in Northrend.

As for the war breaking out part, the conflict is supposed to get much more open. I'm not sure how that will work, but whatever.

You may not be paying enough attention then. That or, more likely, Blizzard hasn't taken the route of beating the player over the head with the changes that take place over the course of a character's leveling experience, of which there are actually quite many. Also, they hadn't figured out how to implement it technologically yet.

Now, however, they do.

Aside from the Death Knight starting quests, the most publicized use of the new phasing technology is in regards to two faction-specific quest lines you get around level 72 surrounding the same major event, which will greatly change a lot of the state of the "war" in Warcraft that you mentioned.

The cut scene that starts the whole mess, unless you aren't interested in spoilers.

Things only change for your character, though. The world is static, as I've noticed with my habit of starting new characters every other day. One might question why there is a supposedly persistent world and why it's shared by thousands of players when everyone is more or less living in their own world.

Compare to City of Heroes or Eve Online or Planetside where things like the zombie invasion happen on a regular basis and have persisting effects on the state of the world. Now we're feeling the "Massively" part of MMO. WoW might as well reintroduce Diablo 2's game making lobby and single player mode. . . actually that's a good idea, it might improve the immersion by several magnitudes I think.

Well, it's a narrative told from the perspective of the player's character. Starting a character is page one. If you read all the way to chapter twelve, page one doesn't suddenly catch up to where the story is at chapter twelve. Granted, it has to be a bit more loose than that to accommodate the entire player base, but that's the basic idea.

Exactly. Just because you make it to page twelve, get bored and start reading the book again while sitting upside down doesn't mean the story doesn't go beyond that point.

And you say that the world remains static even with this phasing thing.

The point is that now a newbies world remains in that peaceful perfect, static place where war is only for those who sign up for it, while the higher levels can enjoy a changing world of carnage and destruction.

Incidently, I find one of the more funny parts of this starting up story is that I find the king of Stormwind to be a bit of a douchebag, while my Alliance friend thinks he's completely justified.

Hey, on that, there's a perfect example of the world Changing. The King of Stormwind is back.

What would you prefer?

Would you prefer that you log in only to be squashed by a catapulted rock in a capital city? If they did implement constant and large scale warfare, it would make the rest of the game virtually unplayable. Plus, the new outdoor pvp area, Lake Wintergrasp, is a war zone. It has a wonderful feel to it and includes multiple siege weapons. I've tried it out myself and I LOVE it.

The world of warcraft is what we make it. Blizzard is not responsible for running our auction houses, why should be they be responsible for our wars. Would you really prefer an ongoing and never-ending npc war in which few, if any players ever competed? If you want a war, go start one. Raid a city, jump into the battlegrounds. Make the game what you want it to be.

And if you really just don't enjoy your experience, I suggest not getting Wrath of the Lich King and quitting.

My biggest concern is that World Phasing won't be implemented aggressively, as it is in the DK starting zone. That it wouldn't be used for the little touches - once you kill a named NPC for a quest, you don't see that NPC anymore - and instead be reserved for big events like the one linked above.

Second biggest concern: The most painfully generic dialogue I have ever seen.

Sounds like you want Warhammer online, then. Cities being captured by the enemy and your starting area being beseiged in wartimes by the enemy. actual PC's killing your training NPC's. Level 40's stomping through your main city, keeping you from developing any core skills in your cities dungeons, because they are closed off.


I prefer Warcraft. Lich King will be awesome. Mounted Combat ftw.