Recently in Burning Crusade Category

Now that we are almost all traveling through Northrend, and we are well into our new year, I thought it night be a good time to look back on the war that was TBC. There were many fronts I that war, from the Naaru versus the Legion, to Scryers versus Aldor, even spreading to Alliance versus Horde. So who 'won' the war? Did the Naaru succeed in defeating the Burning Legion? Sure they had some victories, but as I flew through Hellfire the other day, I still saw plenty of demons, however Shattrath City also still stands, so the
Legion was not victorious in anything more notable than staying alive either.

The Scryers and Aldor began Burning Crusade as bitter hated enemies. Venturing into an opposition area was grounds to get booted from the city at best, get quickly killed at worst. While the forces came to work together over time, eventually joining forces under the banner of the Shattered Sun Offensive, venturing to Scyers Tier as an Aldor still gets the adventurer an unpleasant result. I am not sure what I would put this battle as, since it is neither won nor lost.

Now for the old standards, Alliance v. Horde. The two factions had more battle fronts in TBC than ever before. Hellfire, Zangarmarsh, Terrokar, Nagrand. More than half the zones of Outlands had a Horde v. Alliance fight, and while my realm most often had Alliance controlling the majority of those zones, Other realms cannot say the same. Again, we cannot declare a winner or loser in this particular battle.

So Aldor, Scryers, Naaru, Legion, SSO, Horde and Alliance. None of these groups 'won' the second expansion's content. I guess we need to look elsewhere for a winner. Firstly I think the players won the expansion. We got a lot of awesome content, some great new skills, and two years of amazing game play. We learned to fly, met the Draenei and Blood Elves, and found the end of the epic Sunwell storyline. Second, of course Blizzard won in TBC. From the first 24 hours of TBC, Blizz had a winner, setting records and learning from many design mistakes. What do you think? Who do you think won in the Burning Crusade era of WoW?

I was working last night when the Lich King began his attacks on Orgrimmar and then Stormwind, but his attacks were still underway when I got home to try to record All Things Azeroth. Once that fell through, I headed into game and took a look for myself. I was very happy with the event, though wish it had gone longer. What was especially nice, for someone who is concerned a lot with the impact of epic world events on lower level characters, was that lower levels who ventured to the docks were not attacked by all the aggresive mobs that were out.

As an end to the Burning Crusade era of World of Warcraft, I couldn't ask for a better, more epic experience, and it might not even be over yet. Right now the servers are still down, a mail bug that occured on maintenance and vanished all of our mail(the work of the LichKing no doubt), but when they come back up, who knows what might be happening. Will the event have progressed? Or will repeated attacks on major cities be the end of the Burning Crusade era of this game we all love. Farewell, Lord Illidan. We were not prepared when we flooded through the portal, but we leave to face new challenges, new enemies, new adventures. /salute

I have talked to a lot of folks, guild members, bloggers, fans of the podcast and blog, and I have gotten a variety of answers to this question, and to be honest it surprised me. Perhaps it was my inexperience shining through, but when Burning Crusade his, 22 months ago, it felt like the collective of WoW players were bristling with excitement over the expansion. People eagerly warmed the gate area, slaughtering demons en masse, and waiting anxiously for the portal to be accessible, waiting to pass through it's swirl into the world many of us has seen only in screen shots and YouTube leaks.

I was there, on that dais, 22 months ago, when the first Netherwhelp appeared alongside it's proud new owner. A guildmate had gotten his Collector's Edition, so many of us int he Shadow Walkers, occupying a reserved corner of the platform, sat and watched, admiring the sweet looking pet. Then, his excitement getting the better of him, the netherwhelp departed, following it's owner, as he ventured to the portal and through it. "HOLY SHIT!" were the next words he uttered in guild chat, as he eyed the world on the other side. All of us, each just as envious as the next, sat there for the next hour as first one by one, then ten by ten, and then in waves the players of Argent Dawn US passed through the Dark Portal.

If I were to compare the excitement, the eagerness, and the atmosphere of that launch, on that cold, snowy night in January, to the times now, as we approach the launch of Wrath of the Lich King, I can only call this muted. Yes, there are midnight launches. Yes, there are parties planned the world over. But somehow, this time, it all seems less of a fervor. The bloggers are excited, but even a few of them have said they aren't getting Wrath on the 13th. Some will go on the weekend, some in a week, and yet others say they are going to be buying it in weeks or months.

Will every one of those people hold off? No, of course not. They will see their friends, and their guildmates going on those boats and those zepplins to Northrend. They will see the loot from Utgarde, and Nexus, and drool. They will use the dressing room to see how uber that Death Knight gear would look on them. But some will resist. Some will continue their resolve to hold back. I know I won't, and don't plan to. I intend to leave work at 9 pm, and take the next bus to the EB Games, preorder receipt in hand. I intend to hustle my ass along the no doubt ice filled sidewalks those 4 blocks to my home. I will turn the camera on, and begin to record the unboxing of my Collector's Edition. How about you?

Today saw an announcement that the next patch to World of Warcraft will be incoming soon, which will be the pre expansion patch we have all been waiting for. I was luckily in the beta when the news hit, and I got a bit of the early reactions that those in the thick of testing have about the impending release. The first impression I got was that many think it is too early, and others thought that this was one of the many 'Soon™' promises that Blizzard is both legendary and frequently mocked for.

I did a bit of research based on the first expansion, Burning Crusade, and I got some insights into how things might go this time. I would like to point out first that this is not last time, and that was Blizzard's first expansion to an MMO, and they have most likely learned a bit since then. So, the first fact we need to keep in mind was the January 16th release date of Burning Crusade. The next one I dug up was that the 2.0.1 content patch was released on the 5th of December. This was 1 month and 11 days before the release of the expansion.

Now, these two dates do not really have much of a connection now, since we still do not know the date that 3.0.1 will be pushed to the live realms, but keep that in mind when we do get that anticipated patch. The other piece of data we have is that Blizzard, after weeks of speculation about the release date, confirmed the release date on the 9th of November. This was 1 month and 4 days before the patch was released and over 2 months before the expansion was actually released.

Now, again, as I said before, things may well be different this time. Mike Morhaime has stated emphatically that the expansion will be released in 2008, so even if the date is announced on December 1st, I would think it is unlikely it will be a 2 month wait. Second, Blizzard was being pummeled by it's fans and the press for a release date, or at least a confirm or deny on the matter. This could have forced Blizzard to give a release date before they were ready. Lastly, as I said in the beginning and repeatedly, things can be different. Things likely will be different. Tomorrow Blizz could give us a release date. They could do it at Blizzcon. They could release it at Blizzcon! In the end, we'll have to wait and see, but these are just a few of my ideas of what the announcement could mean.

I know a few people who are in the beta, so I think I have a decent cross section of the player base when I say that right now the beta server I play on, and the one the Europeans(Coldarra) play on are completely useless for actual testing. Beta testing is fun. I love finding bugs to pass along and helping to make the finished release candidate more polished and less bug filled than the current one. I cannot do this, however, if I can only play for 10-30 minute stretches filled with lag and looting problems.

Before, and even since I got into beta, I have listened with an uninterested eye as friends complained about lag filled and crash ridden servers in the beta. I figured, at worst, that these were likely the result of most of them being in Europe and the beta realms being located in the US, even the one for Europe. Not so. I have tried a few times in the last few days to get into the beta realm Northrend, and I get in for between 5 and 30 minutes before I get world server down.

Crashing servers aren't unfamiliar to me, I played in the original beta, in the days after the games release, and in the first few days of Burning Crusade, but this is a little ridiculous. Blizzard has said they are looking into it and working with their server team to find the problems, but in the meantime their beta testers are sitting there, hands on their chest, growing increasingly frustrated at lost opportunities. We all want to make a better release client, but every World Server Down and You have been Disconnected we get makes it all the more likely bugs will slip through.

I was sitting in IRC chat, discussing the beta, and a friend going by the name MrCynical pointed out that it seems Orcs get more play, again, in this expansion than his beloved undead, who you would think have more reason to want to take down the Lich King. I spent time last night exploring a bit and found the Westfall based human settlements in Grizzly Hills, which I noted made major human settlements in Howling Fjord, Borean Tundra, and Grizzly Hills, in addition to a human leading the Kirin' Tor, Rhonin.

I guess the two separate points struck me as odd. Then I realized something: The majority of the conflicts in the game from start to now seem to boil down to the hatred between Orcs and Humans. In fact, if you look back through the entire franchise, there seems to be a pivotal connection that boils all battles down to these two races. The biggest connection is that these two are the lead races of their faction, making them the big center pieces of many conflicts.

Sure, we have Undead and Humans, Orcs and Night Elves, Orcs and Dwarves, and Draenei and Blood Elves, but most of the major stuff, like the expansions and stuff, is pitting those two lead races against each other. From the start of Warcraft to the upcoming Wrath of the Lich King, these two races have taken the lead in the events of the people of Azeroth and Outlands. What do you think about this breakdown? Would you like to see more major roles for other races? Or are you happy with these two races sharing the lead of the game? Let me know in the comments. 

As we are beginning to see the news and blog posts of people making preparations for the upcoming expansion, I felt it time to begin working on this planned series of articles. When you look down the path and see change coming, it is natural for us to look back on what has been, and to look forward to what will come. That is the plan for this series of articles of indeterminate length.

Let me take you back, friends, to January 15th, 2007. About 10 pm server time on Argent Dawn people started congregating around the dark portal which was now clear of the demons that flooded from the portal in the weeks leading up to the opening of the big black wormhole to the heroes of Azeroth. If you recall the events, you will know that Kazzak, a troublesome relic of the Burning Legion on Azeroth, found an artifact that allowed him to open the portal again, flooding Azeroth with demons. You may also recall his reward was a promotion to Doom Lord Kazzak, and he was made larger and more powerful. his worldly possesions also gained a few levels.

As the heroes of Azeroth began to collect by the portal, we eagerly waited and talked about what we would do first. I had to wait until the following morning to pass through the Dark Portal, but the first thing I did was look around and admire the sheer awesomeness of the zone in front of me, and even more so when I looked at the world map and found I had only discovered a small fragment of the entirety of Outlands, and there was more to do and alts to do it on as well as my main, Medros.

Some of the things people talked about was that they were going to check out the new Battle ground, some were going to start Draenei or Blood Elves, just to admire these new playable races and admire the look of them. Others just spent the first few weeks of the expansion leveling lower level alts, knowing that the opening zones of Outlands would be swamped with players. There were also the few, the insane, who were looking to race to be their realms first 70, first Horde Paladin/Alliance Shaman to 70, and so on. Then there were the ironic ones, who just wanted to go back to Ironforge and enjoy the lack of lag in the city.

We have a lot of stuff we can do first thing after upgrading to the Wrath of the Lich King. We could hurry to the opening zones of Northrend, Borean Tundra and Howling Fjord. We can rush to the barbershop and get our first haircut in up to 4 years. We could create our very own Death Knight. We could go learn some new dances. Or we could just enjoy the pleasure of not having to compete for mobs, for gathering, or anything else that annoys. What will you do first when Wrath of the Lich King hits? 

As we are beginning to see the news and blog posts of people making preparations for the upcoming expansion, I felt it time to begin working on this planned series of articles. When you look down the path and see change coming, it is natural for us to look back on what has been, and to look forward to what will come. That is the plan for this series of articles of indeterminate length.

The first part I want to look at is looking back. First thing I would like to know is what your favorite part of Burning Crusade was. Was it flying mounts? Daily quests? The Isle of Quel'Danas? Becoming Ogre royalty? Or was it the end game? Did Karazhan give you the thrill of your raiding career or was it pushing into Black Temple and Sunwell? The improved leveling and Dustwallow Marsh revamp?

For me, it is a hard thing to answer. I have enjoyed making money at my professions. I always enjoy the feeling of flying from the most northern tip of Netherstorm to the Netherwing Ledge in under 5 minutes. I love the collection of flying mounts I have, and the soon to be 4 level 70s I have. I love the dailies, though to be honest after a month or so of doing each of the new ones, they can get boring unless combined with something I do already like the Nether Residue one.

The second part of this is what you liked least about the Burning Crusade expansion. Was it welfare epics? The constant first kills? Lackluster patching? Did Blizzard not take the game in the direction you wanted? Did you find a disparity between casual end game like the 10 person dungeons and the higher end 25 person raids like Magtheridon and Gruul's Lair? Do yuo not like how hard it is to get through the end game? Is your class not useful in raiding or PvP?

For me, I guess the one biggest annoyance is the duration of TBC. I have never denied that I thought we would have Wrath go gold by now with a July or August release date, not just at about the halfway point in development at this point. Another thing I didn't like about TBC was the utterly useless and wasted time spent on the in game Voice Chat feature.

With Blizzard's need to make their games available to as many people as possible this feature was doomed from the start, because accessible and high quality audio are not possible. Blizzard spent months on that patch when they could have put time and effort into other things like housing and more stable servers.


Overall, I give the first expansion to the game a 4/5 rating, or a B+ grade. The expansion brought a lot of content to the game and really changed a number of aspects of the game. From PvP to raiding, Low level to end level, the World of Warcraft changed drastically in the 2.x version, and I think overall it was a positive change to the game that has only increased it's popularity.

Next up, we will look ahead to a variety of aspects of Wrath of the Lich King that we know about before the big Worldwide Invitational.