World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade

I got it yesterday, and despite the tedious install process (I didn't have the original installed, so I had to re-install and re-patch before I could get the expansion running, a process which took three hours) it's fantastic. They seem to have done an overall graphical upgrade -- everything looks very sharp and vivid. They seem to have incorporated a lot of the standard UI modifications into the basic design (as options if not as a part of the basic set-up), and for being on the first day of a new expansion in the starting area for a new race, there wasn't a single hint of lag or other server issues to be found. I haven't tried the Dranei yet, but the Blood Elves are great fun (even if some of their design elements seem cribbed from the LOTR films).

All in all, a quality effort all around.

I picked this up yesterday. After installing everything went pretty smooth until about 8 pm or so when my server decided to take a shit every 15ish minutes (I'm on Malygos, Alliance, Lvl 60 rogue). The scenery is beautiful and it's great to have so much more to do than the mindless PvP and 40 man raid grind.

I highly recommend it.

The story going around is that they had server problems at 10pm Eastern time -- as everyone who had logged off to watch American Idol logged back on. Probably an urban legend, but funny nonetheless.

I dropped my WOW account about two months ago as I find my 360 taking most of my limited gaming time. I'm was a WOW player from day one. I'm a little snake bit on how piss poor the WOW Launch was and how bad my servers were that I want to wait until things settle down before looking at BC. WoW got boring for me there at the end so I hope BC offers a lot of new and different stuff. If not, I may just skip it completely.

JS

I can't wait to pick this up. It's not like I was doing anything with all that free time I had. You know, like working, boozing, watching movies. Nah, who needs that when I can finally level my warrior again!!?

For those of you who haven't gone there yet, Outland rocks like a motherfucker. Really great graphics, rewarding quests, flying mounts, and the best thing of all--aerial bombing missions!

Picked mine up yesterday morning at work (Best Buy, I got the CE). The install/patch process took me less than 20 minutes. I had been reading about how stable the servers had been and how smoothly things were going all day at work, and wouldn't ya know it, when I finally get home to play, the majority of the servers crap out. It was in and out for a few hours, but I finally got on at about 10pm or so and was able to play until almost 2am without interruption. Overall I think the launch went very well though. Much better than I was expecting.

I'm on Earthen Ring, I have a 60 Dwarf rogue, a 44 Night Elf shadow priest, and now a 9 Draenei shaman. The rogue and priest will be put on the back burner for awhile as I'm changing my main to the shaman. I raided on my rogue for over a year and I'm bored with him. I'll get him to 70 eventually, but I want to get my shaman up first.

I got to play the beta, so I've seen a lot of the new zones already, but yeah, they are totally gorgeous. Really good stuff.

Now, if you'll excuse me, my new character needs leveling.

If my account was still active I would have picked it up, but I basically gave up on WoW after hitting 60, as I am not a fan of spending countless hours doing pointless 40 man raids.

I absolutely love outland, although the population on Hellfire peninsula on my server is irritating at the moment. that and I've done 3 runs in Hellfire Ramparts and all 3 times I get to the first boss and someone either leaves or they restart the server.

the design elements and scenery are spectacular. I really love Silvermoon city and exodar. both of which are HUGE. i think blizzards counting on a lot of people meeting up in these cities. Nagrand is the best looking part of Outland for me so far, it looks like the african serengetti, complete with roaming elephants and other creatures.

I'm digging the blood elves as well, although i'm still confused as to what being "energized by arcane power" actually does. i have my paladin upto level 10 and leveling is actually getting more fun as I go. Bloodelf starting point is huge and easy to get quests done, draeni, not so much.


starting tomorrow I start leveling my main(i'm halfway to 61 now)

I have a funny story for you. As most of my friends know I'm an idiot. So there I was a level 60 hunter spending time farming gold for my epic mount, rather grudgingly I might add. So i get bored and in a moment of epic stupidity not only do I cancel my account, but also delete my character thinking that I'm through with WOW.

Until I play a little on a friend's beta Burning Crusade. Suddenly I'm hooked again, I order the expansion and start playing. So for anyone that likes WOW or even used to play but stopped The Burning Crusade is a must. Blizzard is just so good at this stuff now it's scary. Quality, polish and gameplay are just miles ahead of anyone else. Hence the 8 million accounts and the close to a billion dollars a year income just from WOW alone.

[RANT]
All in all, the quality of this expansion, from my position, is entirely contingent upon the new Arena system.

I've basically been one of those retards that throws countless hours at new raid instances, trying to be the first to take down boss x, y or z. Why? Well, I mostly play online games in order to compete with other players, and without a true PvP ranking system, raid instance progression was the only option. And for people like me, the game drastically changed with the introduction of Naxxramas.

Suddenly, it was less about learning the mechanics of encounters and getting forty people to execute. Now, not only do people have to do that, but they have to farm enormous sums of gold, or materials, to fund the ridiculous consumable requirements that many of these newer encounters require.

The key problem is this, Blizzard tunes these encounters to be hard, but hard for whom?

A) Forty people?
B) Forty people in gear obtained from previous raid instances?
C) Forty people in gear obtained from previous raid instances chugging every possible consumable?

If Blizzard tunes the difficulty towards A or B, group C will smoke whatever it is that's in their path. If you tune towards group C, you're now requiring players to farm enormous amounts of gold and/or materials to fund such a process. Suddenly the game is less about completing dungeons than it is being able to maintain the resources necessary to complete them.

It's a problem that hardly effects the majority of players, but it is more than enough for me to want to look elsewhere. Arenas represent a potential option, the kind of option that could turn this game into something that more resembles Starcraft (or DotA) than present day WoW, but until I can really see them in action, I can't really say whether or not this Expansion has succeeded.
[/RANT]

Yeah the expansion is pretty cool. I have not experienced any server issues or even lag really (Ysera server, recently moved to play with friends from Llane). All that is pretty incredible considering how these games usually go, and especially considering the amount of players (plus all the return players). When you are talking 7 million players, they are doing a bang up job.

Just to point out new raids are 25 man. Also the way to design is include all the elements listed. Assuming gear progression and consumable use (not necessarily popping a pot every available moment). I have no clue what game you would leave for. WoW sorta dominates the market right now, and for probably quite a bit.

It's more than just potions.

There are Darkmoon Faire Fortunes, Dire Maul buffs, Elixirs, Flasks, Foods, Juju Power, Night Dragon's Breath, Oils, Whipper Root Tubers, Winterfall Firewater, Sharpening Stones, Zanzas, Quest reward buffs like Heads of Nefarian and Onyxia, Hearts of Hakkar, and look, they've released even more consumables in The Burning Crusade.

What do you ballance around? Leave too many out and the encounters are too easy, include too many and the game is more of a job than fun.

Honestly, I think Arenas have it right. Just purge em all and let the chips fall where they may.

While I see your point, and I generally do not raid (do to work schedule/play schedule) it does not need to be perfectly balanced. It is not a black or white issue, where it is a cake walk or freaking impossible. I have done some raiding, in a guild that just started MC. We used the crap out of whatever we could get our hands on, and it still was challenging at the beginning. As our gear got better and our tactics refined, it got easier. The progression felt as good as it could get. Now if you did that with hardcore lifers who play 24/7, it probably would not have been that difficult. Since they would all have the strats memorized before the encounter, all the best pre-raid gear, and every consumable possible. Luckily those individuals are in the extreme minority, so the game is not (and should not be) balanced for them. For the majority is in the middle of all the points you make.

they need to get my server issues sorted quick. 4 times myself or someone in my party has been D/Ced inside of Hellfire Citadel. aggravating.


although I did get my first outland blue drop earlier. almost to 61 now too.

Words cannot descirbe how much fun Outland is. I was very close to giving up on WoW in previous months as I didn't have time to do six hour raids, I'm not terribly good at PvP and I didn't have any quests that took me anywhere new--all were leftovers. With the new zones, new enemies, new quests, managable gear (I've replaced 2 pieces of Nightslayer with better equipment), and most of all, new tactics, the game's gotten fun again. Part of what got me hooked in the first place was the discovery of everything, the stepping into the unknown and not knowing what kind of monsters you were gonna find. Outland's brought that back to the game--rather than have the same ol' mobs, but at a higher level, they've brought in new variations (who here didn't freak out when a sandworm busted up out of the ground at random right underneath you?). The instances was also a great change--running Hellfire Citadel in under an hour was a welcome reprieve from having to slog through five hours of Blackrock Spire.

Fear not, Warcraft. You've still got your horrible addicting hooks in me.

I've quitted WOW since last May, after getting bored farming for that pathetic Lightforge set (which is ridiculously hard to acquire back then for such a lousy set), and my MC-raiding guild collapsed without getting anywhere, and the whole guild disbanded. However, I have been thinking about BC, and whether I should get back to it. I've always wanted to play a horde pally (I play paladin in just about every rpg I got my hands on), and LE paladin seems like it will be fun to play.

However, I don't think my wife will approve of it, and I'm unsure just how tedious it will be to get decent armors without spending hours upon hours doing the same instances (I have work and wife, so I don't have much time). For now, I think I'll try to resist the temptation of BC for as long as I can.

Vastly better gear than anything you could've previously attained, given this description, is available as BoE green drops from mobs any class can grind at level 60. Ample quests that you can do, by your lonesome, provide you with quite solid gear for the minimal amount of effort.

Honestly, if your only concern is farming instances a countless number of times for viable upgrades, you probably have nothing to worry about. There are so very many paths for gear at the moment, it's almost comical how difficult it was beforehand.

Er, the game is ballanced towards them, which is the problem I was referring to. In other words, the guilds that kill Kel'thuzad and Sapphiron first did so fully buffed, or not at all. These encounters were tuned in such a way that to be competitive with every other raid, you absolutely needed to be fully buffed, or be left behind.

And the raid game appears to be going further down this accursed path.

Obviously this isn't a problem for the overwhelming majority, but it is for anyone that enjoyed being on the bleeding edge of content.

Are you saying that the progression of raid instances requires you to gear from the previous one, plus all the buffs or no dice ? After you start taking down the bosses and get the better gear, the need for max buffs lessens. There is definitely progression from one raid to the next. For example: you start MC, it is real tough unless buffed, then every boss downed it gets easier, until you are onto BWL, etc and trend repeats itself. The only time it gets insane is if you are pushing for world first type stuff, where no strats are on the street.

But take that all with a grain of salt since I never raided really far, lost interest before then. I also think the reason things like Naxx where designed the way they were, was to keep the raiding guilds busy until expansion launch. I would guess this will repeat itself with CoT (or whatever the last raid instance is). Though they say one expansion is planned a year now.

AQ40 and Naxx were implmented to giv 60s something to do other than slaughter each other in battlegrounds. Hell, when they first put AQ40 in the game, the final boss was unbeatable no matter how geared you were (there's a video somewhere of a raid full of teir 2 geared players getting creamed by th giant eyeball in five seconds). And it's pretty obvious how there's raid progression--fire resist stuff you need to get through MC drops in UBRS, the tougher fire resist drops in BWL, and BWL drops teir 2,which has nature and frost resist buff on it!

It's a sliding scale--the more geared you are the easier something gets. I don't think it's fair to criticize the mechanics of the game just because you're falling over yourself to do someting first. You need all those expensive potions if you want to be first to down Kel'Thuzzad because you haven't gotten the gear needed to do it without them--how is that not a fair trade off? And with the addition of Jewelcrafting and socketed items, it's gona be even more diverse on how far you can get with your gear, without consumables.

Anyone ever type '/played' ? I did, and returned something like 26 days of playtime. And that was enough WoW for me. Back to Diablo II!

Here's the thing, though, this is a new requirement. You didn't need the buffs required for Loatheb, Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad to be one of the first to kill C'thun, Nefarian, or Ragnaros. And months after the first kill, you still need those same buffs to continue to kill Loatheb, Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad, even after the point you'd have assumed gear would have caught up.

It has gotten to the point that raiding guilds have to synchronize quest turn-ins in order to actually kill things they've long since had on "farm mode."

The cycle you assume is in place works for a fair chunk of mobs in the zone, and it is the one everyone expects, but it halts when confronted with the final three bosses in Naxxramas. The worst thing about this, though, is that they got it right with the Four Horsemen encounter. The Four Horsemen is the most complex encounter in the game, and while easier with buffs, was entirely feasible without, even from the start. Due to it's complexity, it was the biggest cockblock in the zone (it took the longest to kill, once a fair chunk of guilds reached that point of Naxxramas), progression wise.

If you can make encounters that difficult, without requiring world buffs and all sorts of other toys, why make more Loathebs, Sapphirons and Kel'thuzads?

Mind you, I'm making certain distinctions here. When I say buff, with regards to Loatheb, Sapphiron and Kel'thuzad, I'm referring to going through this process in order to kill them weekly, months after the encounter has been put on farm:

- Drag the raid to Stormwind so someone can turn in Onyxia's head
+140 Attack Power, 5% Melee Crit, 10% Spell Crit

- Drag the raid to Yojamba Isle so someone can turn in Hakkar's heart
+15% Stamina

- Pass out forty Bijous from Zul'gurub while on Yojamba Isle so that everyone can pick up a Zanza
+50 Stamina, +50 Spirit

And that's rather light, to be honest, there are plenty of guilds that throw in 4-8 Dire Maul runs so that everyone can also get the Ogre buffs.

See, all of that sounds like absolute zero fun to me. I'd much rather have content like quests that lets me advance past level 60 (like we got in the expansion) than constantly getting more and more complicated raids/time-sinks. Farming the same instance over and over again is the height of boredom as far as I'm concerned.

It isn't any fun, in fact, it's the exact opposite of fun. S'why I'm hoping Arenas work out.

I don't like the whole raiding mentality period. Getting any game content to the point where you're "farming" it seems like the most utterly pointless exercise imaginable -- "Let's get so good at something that there's absolutely no challenge to it. Then let's keep doing it!"

I haven't played WoW. The answer to this is probably buried somewhere in this forum, but I figured I'll ask it here for a fresh answer:

I did play Everquest for about a year, and enjoyed the interactions with other folk and the general world exploring. I did not enjoy level grinding or item hoarding (I eventually just bought a bunch of stuff).

Does WoW contain story-line or Quest related content, or is it mostly raiding and level grinding? Would it be worthwhile to buy the game, become familiar with it, then just buy a high level character? I'd like to go adventuring with other players, but my time is just too limited to spend a month trying to level up a character.

The leveling-up process is almost entirely story and quest based. I got a character up to level 30 in about a month, and with very little grouping with other players (although some quests practically require more than one person to complete them at the level you receive them). The problem comes once you reach the higher levels and the focus shifts to raiding. There's no advancement past the level cap, so there's no questing past that point, and nothing really to do except raid or do battlegrounds.

I don't think anybody likes that part, it's all about progression. A bunch of people busting their asses trying to get to that next level, it's just like playing a singleplayer game at home. That feeling you get when the boss you, and those 39 other people, have been banging their heads against finally goes down, that's why people do it.

Each subsequent kill is more work than fun, and the issues I referred to above only makes matters worse.

I have no question that killing a difficult boss is thrilling -- the first time. But running through Onyxia or Upper Black Rock Spire over and over and over again because everyone in your guild has to have the drops to move on to the next raid, that's what I can't stand. And there are guilds who will make you drop whatever else you happen to be doing and join the raid or else kick you out. All to do something you may have done a dozen times already.

I know it's probably impractical to keep introducing high level content that allows you to keep leveling -- the speed with which people level in these games makes it almost impossible to stay ahead of the curve. WoW has a much better handle on it than EverCamp -- errr, Quest -- but there's still that point where you've levelled all you can and it's either raid, go PvP, or start a new character.

That's it? Hehe....I've got about 65 days played on my main (if I count alts it's probably closer to 80), and I know plenty of people I've raided with have 100+.

The first dude to 70 did it 28 hours after the expansion went live. It was a french guy playing a gnome mage on one of the European servers. What a nut. There was a US player who did it about a day after the french guy, and now there are 70s popping up everywhere. I have to admit, I'm a bit let down at how fast people have been able to reach 70. I rolled a new character for the first few days of the BC, but now I'm turning to my 60 to begin the trek to 70. I'm not the most hardcore player I know, but I imagine that even for me it'll only take 2 weeks or so to get to 70. I was really hoping for at least a month's worth of work to hit the new cap. I sure hope the arenas and the new raid content have a lot to offer; otherwise this expansion will fall far short of what I was expecting.

A lot of those speed levelers are probably four or five people sharing a character, playing 24-7 and switching off every couple of hours or so.

Yeah, just under 500k. But, with the amount of XP you get per kill/quest turn-in, it really doesn't take long. Especially if you're rested. My 60 sat untouched for the first week of the expansion, so I probably have a full level of double XP. I imagine I can get to 61 in a matter of a few hours.

That being said, I'll level how I always have. I'll complete every quest I can find in one zone before I move on to the next. I did that when I was playing the BC beta, and I got to 63 in the first 2 zones. I've been reading the WoW forms some, and there's apparently still a ton of quests to do and areas to explore after you hit 70, plus you have a couple raids out now, arenas, and they haven't patched in The Black Temple yet. There's going to be enough to do. They're also saying that they want to be on a "once-per-year" expansion schedule, so we probably won't be raiding the same instances for over a year anymore.

i'll hit 63 tonight. best part about the expansion so far is that I can do things on my own for the most part. and it's not hard to get a pug going for the new instances.


I feel wierd wearing green items in place of most of my old purples though.


just a heads up artisan riding skill is 5000g....oof. thankfully the mounts are only 200-250g

I heard the first guy got a bunch of people to help him tap level and what not, but the first guy on my server was a Mage in my guild, and like any nutcase, he did so by going a few days without sleep.

If you and four friends can throw a whole day at it, you can hit 64 running Blood Furnace alone... not that that's as fun as the alternative.

a lot of people are using their guilds as multi users on the same account.


I'm jealous of Druids. they have a bird form and don't actually need a flying mount. luckily if they don't fly high enough they can be hit by arrows.

The flying mount training might be 5000g (4500g with faction discount, I believe) but money drops like candy compared to what it was in old WoW. Making that much shouldn't be too hard at all. It'll take a little while, sure, but it's not nearly as daunting a task as it sounds.

Yeah, in the week the expansion's been out I've made over 300 gold just from quest turn ins, grinding and loot drops. I was worried about the hefty price tag on the epic flying mount but if this keeps up I'll get it within a week or so of finally hitting 70--which won't be for a while because I only average a few hours a day (or a week, depending on my schedule).

Fuck, I had forgotten how addictive this game was. Here I am again leveling like a madman and thinking about dps, reputation and quest stacking all day long. Like my life needed any more of this shit. Goddamn Blizzard.

i love how fast rep goes up now.

I have a question and I hope it's not to stupid. The box says 10 gig HD space required, does the expansion take the full 10 gigs? Again sorry if it's a stupid question but I have seen other games say they take a certain amount of free drive space but then not take up that amount.

I haven't checked my HD but 10 gig seem pretty likely if you have TBC installed too.

I ponied up and got the expansion and it's not 10 gigs. I think altogether it takes up about 7gigs with the original and the expansion. Thanks for answering my question. I started a Dranei Palidin and am having fun with it. Jewelcrafting is cool and I seem to be getting more $$ than I did in the original. And that's not a bad thing.

Damn you Blizzard, damn you straight to hell. Yes, I have picked up the expansion and jumped back into WoW after being WoW-sober for 6 months.

JS

I got my shaman up to 22 before I decided I was feeling left behind when all my friends were hitting 70, so I put the shammy on hold and started on my rogue again. He's 64 now. Just started in Terokkar. Man, all the new zones are just gorgeous. I think Nagrand is my favorite. Simply beautiful.

I'll second the Nagrand love, mostly because Halaa is all sorts of fun. The other town that stood out to me was Area 52 (Netherstorm), but for vastly different reasons.

I'm so loving my new Dranei/palidin. I don't know if it's the new area or what but I'm enjoying the game much more now than I was before, good thing I'm already married. No need for pesky socializing.