This discussion was primarily about the upcoming expansion and what we can expect to see from it. They discussed the basic look and feel of Northrend as well as what types of inhabitants we will probably see there. Having learned from the previous expansion they have decided to add two points of entry into Northrend so as to lessen the number of players coming into a single area. Some of the points of interest are as follows:
- Howling Fjord: – point of entry and home to giant Viking-like beings.
- Borean Tundra: – point of entry and home to Walrusmen.
- Grizzly Hills: Home to Firbolg and Ancient Dwarves.
- Dragonblight: Location of the entrance to Azhol-Nerub and home of the Dragonflights.
- Dalaran: will be transported magically to Northrend and be a capital for players
Death knights were discussed in some detail. They will be a plate wearing dps class with the ability to fill some tanking roles as well. They can use two handed and dual wielding weapons but cannot equip shields. Rather than having mana or rage to deal with they will use a new system of carved runes that go on their weapon and determine what powers and level of skills they can use. They will focus on the powers of Blood, Frost, and Unholy abilities and will resemble the old Warcraft versions fairly closely. Expect to see undead summoning and Unholy area affect attacks being their bread and butter. Using a skill will activate a rune of that type and an associated cooldown. The more runes you have of a given power the more of that power you can use before waiting for cooldowns. Some more powerful skills will use multiple runes while others may use a combination of rune types.
Hero classes will be a way for Blizzard to introduce new classes slowly and as part of a larger story. It also allows them to bring many of the classes they originally wanted to see in the game such as Blademasters and Demon Hunters. Heroes will also be able to be created at a higher level so as to allow veteran players the ability to start new characters without going through the low level grind currently associated with new characters. These hero classes will be unlocked with high level quest chains only accessible to players who have leveled their current characters up to the maximum level.
Some of the other features discussed were the inclusion of destructible buildings and siege weapons into the PVP game. This will allow for much more dynamic game play in PVP scenarios, and may even open up PVE encounters that make use of siege weaponry. World zones will also be added that make use of siege weapons and PVP objectives similar to Halaa in Nagrand, but on a larger scale.
After the presentation the audience was given the opportunity to ask questions. Some of these are outlined below:
- They will be adding ways to speed up leveling for alts and existing players. They felt as though the level grind could be faster for those players.
- With a level cap raise there will obviously be new skills and talents bringing the talent trees up to date much like the level 70 cap did for Burning Crusade.
- There will be changes coming to get us more interested in the old world again. Expect to see another Caverns of Time instance, as well as possible revamps for various old-world dungeons. Another area briefly mentioned was Grim Batol which should be familiar to most of us who know much about Warcraft Lore.
- Existing players will not become Death Knights. The class will be unlocked by your existing character, but will require you to make a new character of that class once it is unlocked. This new character will start at a higher level than other classes so as to allow you to skip the associated level grind. Exact level you start as is yet to be determined, but you can expect it to be somewhere between 50 and 70.
- Item progression and itemization will be similar to the way it is in BC. Players were fairly happy with the speed at which we acquired new items and upgrades for old gear in the expansion, and they expect to follow the same model with Wrath of the Lich King.
- When asked if more raids would be added before the expansion, they alluded to another 25 man that will be beyond Black Temple in progression but before the expansion. They also mentioned Zul’Aman coming in a content patch very soon as a 10 man just beyond Karazhan.
- When asked if there would be another mount we would have to buy or upgrade to like the current epic flying mount they said there would not be another “riding skill” to attain but that there WOULD be more mounts added both flying and non-flying. They also briefly mentioned that Flying Mounts WILL be usable in Northrend.
- When asked if Death Knights will supplant rogues in the dps category it was suggested that the role of the Death Knight will be different enough that guilds would see a reason to have both present.
- When asked about the level progression from 70 to 80, they said that it should feel about the same as it did when going from 60 to 70.
- They said they would be focusing more on making outdoor questing more soloable while dungeons and raids encounters will be where groups and raids are required. This should promote more content for the casual gamers while still allowing plenty of content for the large guildsand groups.
- When asked about what factions or races the Death Knight will be, they said the current plan was to allow it on both Horde and Alliance side for any race. The race thing may change as they near completion, but for now it was being pushed as any race.
- When asked if Death Knights will be able to summon minions like in previous Warcraft games they said that they were not planning to make it a pet class, and were focusing more on summoned minions as part of spells and effects, much like the tree summons on a druid.
- When asked if we would be seeing more character slots they said there were no immediate plans to add any more slots.
- When asked if there would be a limit on the number of hero classes you could make they said there is currently no plan to place such a limitation on us, and we should be able to make as many Hero characters as there are slots.
- When asked if they planned to make the old raid areas accessible and usable again for end-game raiding they said that there were no real plans to do so. Where it makes sense like in the case of AQ they may add content or versions of it that fit into the Northrend story arc, since AQ would be a huge part of the Nerubian story. But for the most part they design raid areas with the understanding that they will probably go away and not get used at some point.
- When asked how Death Knight’t tanking ability will compare to Feral Druids, Protection Warriors, and Protection Paladins they said that the same rules apply as it does for DPS classes. They do not wish to take anything away from the other classes ability to tank, and merely intend this class to be one more choice for tanking. It will do that role differently than the other 3 just as they do it differently from each other.
Link to the YouTube video can be found here.