New WoW expansion: Warlords of Draenor!

I'm sitting here at work watching the opening with no sound, but the trailer looked pretty neat from what I could tell.

Trailer

*sigh*

Should have killed Garrosh.

Edit: Sigh?

I'm liking the new character models thing.

Hmm, Garrosh again. I honestly thought that guy was done.

Okay ... I think I can say for sure that I do not get exactly what is happening with this time traveling stuff. It seems that Garrosh went back in time, did his stuff with the Iron Horde, and then connected their Dark Portal to ours. That's why they're connected but he didn't modify our past, if that makes any sense. Kind of a different timeline sort of thing.

I think.

I'm even less sure now actually.

Lol. Time travel plots. Am I right?

Having totally not obsessively read and listened to everything from Blizzcon I can say with fair certainty the people answering some of the Q&A's either were intentionally lying or weren't 100% on the story stuff themselves (I'm guessing the latter, it's happened before) because if you look at all the info some of it contradicts other info also given.

That being said my personal envisionment for how this will go I mentioned on the stream last night; basically we have Back to the Future time exemption, aka the time traveler is immune to the timeline changes (this is important).  This has been shown in WoW before as well the other 3 major times we've altered the timeline.  So, New World > Outland > Northrend > Cata > Pandaria will all stay as is basically, but then (from our perspective) we go back thanks to Garrosh working with a traitor in the Bronze flight (who better not be Kairos or I'm going to punch someone) goes back in time to stop all of Warcraft from happening by going to the time of the Iron Horde (WAY back, before the demons even got involved with the Horde) to stop them from drinking Mannoroth's blood.  We have an instance similar to other ones they've used (Pandaria starting island, Goblin starter, Worgen starter, DK starter etc.) to chase after him after he escapes, figure out the extent of the damage done, and go back to try and either stop him or mitigate the damage.  That leads to us heading back in time with him (possibly killing him there, unsure) at which point his and our interactions wildly change the timeline.  However, as I mentioned earlier we are immune to the changes aka we remember how it was so from a GAME perspective they don't have to change all the stuff I listed up above, but what they could do is have the next expansion be back on Azeroth but the NEW Azeroth, the one affected by the changes to the timeline we've done.

...to be honest, I don't agree with this overall direction, even though a story LIKE this would've literally been the perfect way to do a Warcraft IV without interfering with WoW's storyline.  Which they are not doing.  Also, to be even more honest, the entire storyline sounds face-palmingly retarded.  It's a shame because 100% of the other info about what they're doing gameplay wise sounds great.

Yeah Kolson. Time travel. Traveling into the future? Thumbs up from me. Traveling into the past, well...what have you done? I like it better when the current timeline is being traveled to from the past or the future, or when the player is traveling to the future in a manner that can't be reversed.

From what I can tell it's Kairoz. I would say the hourglass stuff could be a red herring, but seeing as how the Warchief reveal was pretty much not that, it may just be exactly what it looks like.

I dunno. I'm pretty indifferent about it. I'll have to see exactly what it comes out to be once the game is actually released. Who knows, they may actually change some of that. Wouldn't be the first time its been tweaked.

As good a place as any to put this....

Hopefully by the end of the month I'll have my new desktop built, and with that I'm planning on getting WoW for the first time. Ever.
Anyone interested in starting a new (level 0) character to play with me, teach a newb the ropes? (Or assist me with power leveling so I can play with your existing characters?)

Well I did let my sub die finally (mostly due to time constraints this time), but I'd be willing to hop back in to help.

So how long would it take to get past the level 20 (free trial) cap, and do I need to renew your Sub?

If you're speedrunning to level 20, well I haven't done that since pre-Cata but my old record was 40 minutes.  I couldn't guess at how long it takes normally, or if you haven't played the game before.

No need to renew my sub, Snarg already paid for it, I just didn't want to waste it by renewing when I knew I didn't have time to maximize its usage.

yeah, I'm up for leveling a character with you. Just got to make sure we're all on the same server. Kargath it should be, but let me double-check when I get back later today. What are you thinking of playing?

Archengeia wrote:If you're speedrunning to level 20, well I haven't done that since pre-Cata but my old record was 40 minutes.  I couldn't guess at how long it takes normally, or if you haven't played the game before.

No need to renew my sub, Snarg already paid for it, I just didn't want to waste it by renewing when I knew I didn't have time to maximize its usage.

Considering I'll be learning the game, I don't think I'll be speedrunning.
Hopefully playing with a newb won't be a waste of your time... Especially with your upcoming streaming schedule. If you want to hold off until after your marathon, I'd understand.

Snarg of Wildpaw wrote:What are you thinking of playing?

I'd like to play a fire mage, preferably Undead. Or if we're going to be Alliance, I could do a Draenei mage instead.
I suppose I don't have to figure that out right now, as the computer won't even be assembled until the end of the month.
Also, this looks pretty cool. Recruit-a-Friend

I think this is when Snarg and I duke it out for who gets to recruit a friend you.

I forfeit the match.

Decide what kind of class you think you'll be playing, Gwydo? Just asking so I can decide on a class and start gathering heirlooms for my guy. You said that you were more attracted towards warrior and paladin, right?

Still deciding. Doing a bunch of reading to determine what I want to stat with.
By the way, what faction do you guys play?

I'm more inclined to play the Paladin as a starter character.
If I choose paladin, probably leaning towards healer or retribution.
Race: If alliance, either Dwarf or Draenei. If horde, either blood elf or tauren.
Professions: Blacksmithing and Enchanting or Mining.
Secondary: 1st Aid

If I choose a warrior, probably be Arms.
Race: If alliance, either Dwarf or Draenei. If horde, probably Orc.
Professions: Blacksmithing and Enchanting
Secondary: 1st Aid

Thoughts?

We play on the Horde side. I'd encourage you to actually create one of each race and gender, then go through a few combats on each and decide what animations and models you like. If you don't care about those then there's really no huge advantage to any one of them as far as stats go - they all have cool things.

I really like the paladin choice, although I'm of course biased since my main is a paladin. Healing on a paladin is kind of whack-a-mole, so it can be a rather boring sometimes. Retribution is pretty fun, although it's probably one of the least complicated DPS classes and specs. That doesn't mean "not fun," but the rotation pretty much boils down to "hit highest priority item when it is off cooldown." All of the specs have a combo point system (called holy power) which you build up to 3-5 stacks and then use it on a finisher (usually a bigger heal or bigger damage skill.) They have some unique buffs and abilities that are almost always able to be used on yourself or an ally. Played properly, a paladin can save a raid by using their abilities to save others.

Don't have a lot of experience with warriors so I can't get detailed, but I can tell you this: if you're wanting to go towards a more interactive and mobile route, then warriors are definitely the way to go. They use a mechanic called "rage" which builds as you hit stuff. It's kind of like a reverse mana bar.

You can train all of the secondary profession; you don't have a limited number. i.e. fishing, first aid, archaeology, and cooking can all be maxed at once. The primary professions look good, I'd just pick whatever you think looks cool there. Obviously some stuff isn't going to synergize as well with plate warriors, like tailoring. Blacksmithing is all good though.

Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, the Burning Crusade cinematic pretty accurately represents the different playstyles. Paladin: buff self, lumber towards enemy, huge, slow swings
Warrior: leap in to combat, annihilate everything with huge swings, charge towards next target

Burning Crusade cinematic:

Don't read too much in to the warrior dying.

hehehe

Speaking of looking cool, they just released a preview of the new human female images.
http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/3717-Artcraft-A-First-Look-New-Human-Female-Character-Model

Oh yeah baby, shake that low poly ass.

"When developing the base model we keep the expression on the face as devoid of emotion or expression as possible"

Here Robinson, let me give you a reference point:http://static2.fjcdn.com/comments/My+_345a30c9c05fc6f4d04a7bef28f788ce.jpg