Well ladies and gentlemen, the release date for World of Warcraft has finally been announced.

The scheduled date is November 13th 2008.

I expect this date to be pushed back (as they usually are) but it is nice to finally know in concrete when we can expect to see this very anticipated expansion.


Some features include:

*Level cap raised to 80
*Destructable Buildings (In PvP bgs only)
*Hero Class: Death Knight
*New profession: Inscription


Are you as excited about it as I am?

Are your characters prepared? ;)




LINKAGE

Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrath_of_the_lich_king
Official: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/wrath/

EDIT YOUR POST BECAUSE DESTRUCTIBLE BUILDINGS ARE IN BATTLEGROUNDS.

Suckah.

Done.

Can't wait ~ I especially can't wait to become a slave to the new achievement system. I think I found what I have OCD for ::cry::

Man I wish they implemented the hero class system in a less retarded way :'(

That was one cool feature they had been working on since launch (supposedly) and it looks like they blew it big time, but I guess WoW hasn't ever really cared about the lore behind the game so I shouldn't be surprised.

What are you talking about?

What are you talking about?

Death Knights don't make sense as any other race but human (or forsaken). The concept of a Tauren Death Knight is so against the lore I don't even know where to begin. They're fallen paladins.

What's next, every race being able to be Blademasters? Archdruids? Crypt Lords?

Also the way they orginally talked about hero classes would be to be advancements of the original classes. Nobody really wanted to play, say, a Warrior when the game launched (how boring, who wants to be a generic Warrior, a class completley unheard of before in Warcraft?), so the theory was that as they got a high enough level and did a quest or whatever, they would advance to the hero class. So an Orc Warrior might become a Blademaster, while a Night Elf Warrior might become a Demon Hunter. Something like that. The system they're using firstly admits that they've fucked up the first 55 levels of the game by letting people know they don't intend players to have to grind through that again, and more importantly is much more of a balancing nightmare. How many hero classes can they add that are unique and balanced with the other classes?
Plus, implementing only one at a time has its obvious problems.

How is it against the lore? Gul'dan first created death knights by taking the souls of dead orc warlocks and putting them into the corpses of dead paladins.

Flash foward to Warcraft 3. Arthas becomes fully corrupted by Frostmourne and becomes a Death Knight (still 100% alive human). A process handled by the then Lich King'd Ner'zhul - a former orc.

The shift in the creation of modern Death Knights in WoW was established before WoW was even a twinkle in Blizzard's eye.

The important thing to note is that they've always been human at least in body. I wouldn't have a problem with Death Knights if that's how it was. Seeing a Gnome, Dwarf, or Tauren Death Knight is painful, similar to seeing Orc Warlocks (what happened to "lol we'll never let ourselves rely on demons again"? Did Gromm Hellscream sacrifice himself for nothing?). Yes the possiblity exists in the lore, but they had the good sense not to include, say, Tauren Rogues, so I'm not sure why they choose to specifically bend the lore for some race/class combos and not others.

The biggest problem I have, though, is the precedent it sets to have the first hero class be playable by every race.

What precedent? The lore permits it. In Warcraft 3 it is shown that a living being can be corrupted and thus gain the powers of a Death Knight via the Lich King. When you start a Death Knight in the expansion - you start under the employ of the Lich King but eventually break free through the main starting quest chain. You are saying this is an "afront" to the Lore when it already WAS the lore.

btw there are Tuaren rogues. Have you ever seen one? That's how good they are :)

They really fucked the lore before WoW. When WC3 came out.

Just sayin'

How so? Pick up your WC1 /2 manuals and you'll see mention of plot points and characters in WC3. WC3 does what any decent sequel does - expands upon the story line and mythos of the source material.

Blizzard have announced there will be one Hero Class per expansion, so Death Knights aren't the only one that will be available.

Apparantly Death Knights are very similar to Paladins and I hear they even have a tank talent tree, which I find hilarious considering that they are unable to use shields.

inb4 druids.

Does anyone know when the talent respec will be?

I'm looking forward to this badly

Probably when they release the 3.0 content patch. I cannot imagine it will be longer than 2 weeks.

Just had to download a 1.1GB Patch O_O

....and still no new talents....

Pre download it - so when it does come out - the servers aren't swarmed from millions of people downloading the files all at once.

Are we the only ones at FFS who play WoW? O_o

I used to play, but moved on. I get some entertainment watching these MMO arguments crop up from time to time. Lurking.

The expansion isn't enough for me to jump back in, though I doubt that was Blizzard's intention. The sudden flurry of emails I've received from them seem to suggest otherwise though...

Expansions are mostly to sustain the current millions of players they already have.

Everyone knows how boring things seem to be when your main characters gets to level 70, raids and does daily heroics and PvP everyday, levels their professions to maximum and then throws in a bit of time doing Arena with mates just to vary it up a little.

Naturally. Although I suppose it's a healthy business attitude to grab as many new player dollars as possible even as happenstance. Hope you guys enjoy the new thingy.

Honestly - Burning Crusade was a nice addition. WOTLK looks to be utterly game changing. We won't be playing the same WoW when it comes out.

Prepare for Awesomeness :)

So they're changing elements of the core gameplay? How do you mean?

One new addition that I like will be "Championing" which means that instead of grinding reputation with a faction by repeatedly foing boring dungeons, you can wear their tabard while you quest therefore increasing your reputation with every kill.

They are combining spell power / healing into one stat. Same goes for spell hit / hit - spell crit / crit - haste / spell haste and retooled other stats. This minimizes the amount of gear needed to get everyone geared up. Changes toclasses also laxes up the requirments needed for group make up. It is getting closer to getting 5/10/25 people together and just throwing them at content - a well played group > a "correct" group make up. Speaking from a warrior's /rogue's perpsective (and I'm pretty sure this applies to toher classes ) the amount of new talents / changes to old ones = TRUE choice when it comes to speccing your character.

Here's a link to other changes (a small list, the site contains other information as well):

http://wotlkwiki.info/index.php/Game_Mechanics

I'm slightly embarrassed I understood even a small portion of that.

But it actually doesn't sound too bad, especially the tweaks that will affect raids. I despise raids and might always. Although, it sounds as if they're further refining that jump from casual to hardcore play. And that can only be good, I hope. Certainly appreciate it.

The largest portion of the market of MMO players = casual.

$$$$!!!

I'm not sure I would consider myself hardcore or not.

I mean during the week it's all I do when I get home from work but on the weekend it varies...

I mean, if I have plans to go out with friends I will, but on some weekends I kinda do just play WoW the entire time.....does this make me hardcore?

I enjoy raiding but only if it's with friends I know and love. We have a blast and usually get drunk when we raid which makes for hilarious times indeed.

NEVER RAID WITHOUT BEER

WELL THE PATCH IS FINALLY HERE

I can't wait to get home and start checking out all the new features like shaving and haircuts, Stormwind Harbour, etc.

AND NEW TALENTS!!

I got the patch, logged into my server's character select screen - selected my char and let it load ... then nothing.

The loading screen to log into the game fills up then nothing. Lovely.

.........Oh dear.

I haven't tried logging in yet and don't get home until another 5 hours from now.

I hope they fix it soon.. T_T

Seems like this same problem is affecting alot of people.

Yep. I've been IMing a friend who only got through about 5mins ago after an hour of that.

Well - it is to be expected. Millions of people are bombarding their servers, haha.

True. He got a few instant level 10, 20, etc achievements, then a haircut, and logged because of the server lag. I ridiculed him. Fun for all.

Well I logged my pally, specced him Protection (yet again)..

Not very happy that his def rating and HP has gone down, but the new pallies are pretty awesome. Tanked last night and his dps was 2nd on the meter. They've made pallies so OP.

Logged my shaman and respecced him resto, because now Shamans are easily the greatest healers in the game. Also got an "emo" haircut whilst in Stormwind. Observe (me on the left):



LOVING the new achievements system and that pic was taken whilst in Blackfathom Depths where yesterday was spent with two mates just doing low level instances for achievement points.

We also snuck into Ogrimmar just so we could get Ragefire Chasm done :o

Go ret on pally while they are super charged for level 70 :)

I think they might nerf some of the new arms talents ... I cracked a guy who was at 75% health for a 7.1k execute. Poor bastard lol.

(There's a new talent that allows my crits to offer a 30% chance to get a buff that will allow me to use execute regardless of my opponents health %).

Yeah they have totally made most classes "easy-mode". It is now getting ludicrous...however it may prove to be a bit more difficult when the expansion hits.

I read a few Blizzcon announcements and I'm very glad to hear Warcraft IV will finally be in the works. My little ray of sunshine for the day.

Anyway, I hear a general craving for brains has overtaken the servers.

Only eight days to go!!! :o

I read a few Blizzcon announcements and I'm very glad to hear Warcraft IV will finally be in the works. My little ray of sunshine for the day.

Anyway, I hear a general craving for brains has overtaken the servers.

Shit, that means one of two things. WCIV is going to be set way in the future or WoW is going to be ending soon.

I mean, it'd be kinda gay to have both games intermingle.

Swami, WoW is like the most major cashcow for Blizzard and I don't see it ending especially just for one title.

Obviously, but it was still a valid pathway albiet a dumb one.

Shit, WCIV is gonna suck.

And apparantly WCIV will run on a smilar graphics engine to WoW.

I mean don't get me wrong WoW looks fine, but the in game graphics are outdated.

Well I just got a text message saying that my copy of Lich King has arrived!

However I can't pick it up until Friday :(


....Such a tease.

Ok expansion is here. And the queues are HUGE. Really tempted to move my 67 rogue over to the new Oceanic server, Saurfang.

Anyone else taking up the free transfers?

Naw - I'm stick to my server. My one friend who transfered to a different server literally has a wating time of 400+ mins. My wait at most has been 15 mins - but that has been only once.

I am REALLY happy with this expansion. Everything I loved about the game has been soaked in a rich juice of awesome and addiction. The quests are fun and engaging - and for once I feel like I am actually a part of something larger - not just a group of quests that only served as means for an end to get the max level.

And Noskill - why do you jump to that conclusion? They can change the in game content of WoW to match any story developments. So it is entirely possible for them to release WC4 - wait a month or two - then model the in game WoW world to reflect the story conclusion presented in WC4.

In any event - if you are a fan of WC lore - the expansion offers it in droves.

Yes I agree, Lich King is more lore-focused than the rest of WoW. I really enjoyed Borean Tundra and am doing Dragonblight at the moment.

Love the quest where you fly on the gryphon and save civilians "Come with me if you want to live..."

Also the Death Knights are awesome. Although they are overpowered at such a low level, their starting quests dwell on New Avalon and Light's Hope Chapel and the war with Morgraine.

Awesome so far.