I’m going to start by saying this isn’t because I think I have any new and fresh perspective on the newly announced expansion – especially not this early; rather, it is because I feel reasonably certain that people are going to ask me about what I think of it and I’d rather keep that in one place rather than have to repeat myself across a whole series of posts. If you’re looking for new information or insight, I’d recommend poking through MMO Champion or similars.
Right, with that out of the way, I think the simplest way to sum up my thoughts at this moment is either “I don’t know.” or “It’s too early to really know anything specific.”; I’m going to admit I’m pretty conflicted on the whole issue, but for reasons that may not be immediately obvious. The thing is – while the announcement of Mists of Pandaria as the next expansion hasn’t claimed anything that I’m immediately opposed to, it hasn’t exactly gone and addressed any of the issues that are the cause of me barely even playing World of WarCraft anymore either.
I know some people who are vehemently opposed to bringing in both the Pandaren and Pandaria, and I know some people who feel that the proposed changes to both talents and other mechanics are downright idiotic, and I know some people who feel the addition of the non-combat pet combat minigame is demeaning at best. For myself? I’m somewhere between ambivalent and indifferent about any and all of those issues – none of them are direct deal breakers or deal makers in any sense – some bits sound like they could potentially be rather interesting if done right, others reek of an attempted author’s saving throw, especially the bit about getting Diablo III plus beta entry plus some shiny horse if you sign up to stay for a whole additional year. For the whole though, none of the mentioned bits really push me in one direction or another – some of the additions sound like they could potentially be interesting or even fun if Blizzard manage to draw me back, but none really sound intriguing enough to do said drawing on its own, and it really comes down to what I mentioned earlier – none of it really touches on the true reason why I’ve ended up more and more distant from the game.
Don’t get me wrong, though – parts of me really wish to get that spark back. I watched the free stream of Metzen standing there on stage and being full of passion and glee over what was coming and to a point I’d love to just believe in all that passion and that it’ll be awesome because the geeked out dude with the beard and the Alliance shirt and Thrall’s hammer told me how awesome it would be so how can it be anything but. After all, I wouldn’t be putting together a Warcraft-based webcomic if I didn’t have some affection for the setting still lingering, and part of me would love to find the magic again with old Moonfall and her Draenei compatriot. On the other hand, we’ve been here before, and at this point I feel rather reassured in saying that I’m definitely not part of the intended target audience. It might still be interesting, of course. It might still go places I want to see, but I’m definitely not going to expect it to without reason to believe it might.
And at the end of the day, a whole lot of things can happen between then and now – for one, The Old Republic is looming with its release off in december, and that might be fantastic, or it might be awful. I know several of my fellow nubs and I are going to at least give it a try, me with the attitude of “it sounds kind of like World of Warcraft, but in Star Wars with some added interesting ideas and made by people who try to keep it at least slightly consistent.”, which might be all that I want out of it. Of course, it might also utterly fail spectacularely at being that, in which case I don’t know what’ll happen. After all, there’s also this theory going that the hinted at but not stated subtitle for the upcomming MechWarrior announcement may end up being “ONLINE” (it would match the few pixels at the top, as well as the hinted E at the end), and if that’s the case then I might find myself with a sudden urge to get myself a Davion Guards insignia and mount a few Autocannons, or any some such.
So, in short and to reiterate, I don’t know. Mists of Pandaria could either be a great set of changes and just what World of Warcraft needed to get back to the top of the game, or might make people try to add “Settled the Turtle” next to phrases like “Jumped the Shark” or “Nuked the Fridge”. (I didn’t explicitly have a problem with Crystal Skull, mind you, but still). We’ll have to see, but none of the announcements so far have really been enough to sway my opinion in either direction.
I would be one of those opposed to the introduction of Pandaren. It has potential, I guess, to be an interesting addition to the game… But to me, they were a little jesty thing added into Warcraft III for a bit of “that’s pretty cool”. For someone who used to invest nearly all of his time online in roleplaying, I kind of have to consider the story possibilities, or the impact of bouncy pandas rolling by. And most importantly, how badly a lot of them will be played.
I recently just decided to pack in WoW altogether, it’s true, but I was only even still there because of a few rare threads of in-character interaction that I was enjoying. The content itself was just, in my opinion, dry and lacking in “zest”, and I’m not inspired to think they’re improving their grasp of lore or perhaps improving their attitude to it. I can’t see happy meadows of daffodils ahead if the RP scene is flooded with pandas, and part of me doesn’t feel like they’ll redeem their storytelling particularly well either. Floods of poorly characterised worgen didn’t help, and I can’t help thinking this could be even worse.
Everything else is something I just can’t comment on, like yourself, because it’s too early to shout. And I will have to get all that knowledge second-hand anyway, lacking a subscription by time of release. I don’t get the impression that any of the additions or changes will ruin anything, but I don’t think they’ll improve it to the point it’ll rope my attention back into it. Increasingly Blizzard’s actions smell slightly of trying to milk the incredible revenue you can get from Warcraft-esque games a couple more times before it finally has to step aside. I guess I can’t blame them for it, but it’ll probably show.
In other words, roleplay is not going to benefit from this at all and I have no educated comment on whether the content will. It’s definately not the stunning huzzah and hurray that the other expansions have had (albeit, with ‘diminishing returns’ as they’ve enthralled me less with each subsequent expansion), and definately not going to make me take up warcrack again.
One has to wonder just how frickin’ bad the cartographers in Azeroth are, insofar as they keep NOT SEEING CONTINENTS.
Pandas do not fill me with optimism. I get why they’re doing it; now putting the final nail in WC3 story’s coffin (The Horde v. Alliance thing was orchestrated entirely by the Burning Legion to make Azeroth a softer target, so maybe we should stop fighting each other) by making the war in full swing again, they need a warfront to do it. And they just revamped normal Azeroth, they’re not going to revamp it AGAIN to make it a warzone. A few zones work for that, but the majority do not convey the feeling enough to carry an expansion.
So, new continent.
With Pandas.
Bleh.
Does someone at Blizz just have a weird fetish for animal-pun names? I don’t get it.
Anyway, my personal reactions to MoP have been roughly the same as my reactions to the Phantom Menace 3D announcement: I just don’t care anymore. Like Nhani and Noriam, I haven’t seen anything that really changes the game in a meaningful way. I have no confidence that Blizz is capable of writing good Alliance stories anymore, and I don’t care about pandas. I just hope everyone loves Kung Fu Panda, cause you’re going to be seeing a fuck ton of it.
I’d be interested to see how the monk class plays, and if the gear catches my Barbie Dress-Up fancy, I might stick around for a while. But this feels like just a change of scenery, with the added bonus of obnoxious alpha-male epeening.
As a side note, can we all agree to stop pulling “Online” in game titles? it’s 2011, EVERYTHING is online. Pointing it out is redundant at best,
Pandaria. I admit that it’s maybe a strange idea, and I watch all the doomsaying and crying all over the net with a certain pervert glee
An expansion from an idea started as a joke, I think this can be easely an awesome expansion. Or just as easely the worst ever.
I admit, I like the idea. Of course I was the guy who just loved Uldum with the whole Indiana Jones adventure, or the walrus-people on Northend. I’m not that wise and deep in the Warcraft lore, I started when my friend forced me into WoW, and it slowly made it’s way into me, to the point where I actually love it. Yet, I always seen it as an epic and great fantasy setting, yet sometimes just as silly and parodistic. In this light, I like the whole pandaren idea and asian theme, as it is. Seems fun, and if Metzen spoke the truth, maybe the story and the theme of this expansion will not be as silly as it now seem.
And I admit: the more I’m thinking about a night-elf monk, the more appealing it is to me (mostly as a martial artist with bare hands+feet and maybe a polearm – not the bald religion part). And with all their pagodas and overall feeling, maybe it’s not that weird as it sounds for the first time.
I’m with you, Meglivorn. I was dubious about the whole Panda thing (I staunchly refused to consider “Mists of Pandaria” anything more than a trading card expansion when the title was first leaked) but the idea is growing on me.
Part of the problem with Pandaria is not knowing what to expect from the expansion. Previous expansions could be summed up in one phrase. Wrath: “Arthas has to die.” Cataclysm: “Deathwing will pay!” With Pandaria, I’m left wondering what the expansion is about, which is oddly exciting, but not a terribly valid marketing strategy. I’ve been told this expansion will focus on conflict between the Alliance and the Horde. Without some overwhelming opponent to unite us, all semblance of truce is dissolved, and what better way to slate the blood lust of several thousand prime troops than to do battle over a newly discovered continent? There is plenty of material for the story-tellers at Blizzard HQ to work with here, so I guess I’ll stick around and see what they do with it.
Personally, I think Mists will probably bring about a lot of gameplay improvements guided by the problematic extremes both Cata and Wrath went to with their philosophies. However, I also think Blizzard knows that pursuing RPers as a market is a losing proposition. Tabletop RPGs are much more flexible in terms of story, character balance, character creation, loot, setting, enemy type, enemy setup, dungeon layout… even the fundamental rules can usually be altered with “house rules” or a well-placed magic item. MMOs just can’t offer that without alienating most or all of the non-RPers who want to play them like an offline video game, and that demographic is both bigger and easier to draw new players from. I hate to say it, but anything Blizzard does that brings back RPers like you will probably just be a side-effect of something else.
To be honest, when I make the statement nowadays that I don’t consider myself part of Blizzards target audience, I actually don’t tend to mean that as a roleplayer because Blizzards treatment (or perhaps more nontreatment) of that segment of the playerbase ultimately isn’t why I’m not playing much anymore. Sure, it’s probably some effect somewhere, but whenever I put together any set of critera what I consider Blizzard would have to do to reignite my interest… “care more about the roleplayers” isn’t actually part of it. Sure, it’d be nice to have, and I do admit that if they just went and removed all RP servers entirely then that would definitely be a deal breaker due to how unreceptive much of the rest of the community is, but the current situation with Blizzard and roleplayers isn’t the primary reason for my disinterest.
I don’t really mean it in terms of where I fit on the scale between casual or hardcore either, though that might actually be a slightly bigger factor because I’m less likely to be around a game I don’t enjoy playing.
I mean it solely in terms of the things that first managed to draw me in to the actual setting starting with WarCraft III (While I have played WC1 and 2 both, and found at least the second amusing for its gameplay, neither really got me all that invested in the story) – the characters, factions, themes and narratives that I went into World of Warcraft wanting to see, hear and learn more about. It’s about all the things, big and small, that lets me feel that World of Warcraft is indeed World of Warcraft, not just World of Oh Who Even Cares Anymore.
Essentially, Blizzard have been repeatedly sacrificing things I care about (within the setting) to further things I don’t care about, or to turn the things I do care about into things I don’t care about for whatever reason. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m perfectly aware that it’s entirely within their right to do that, and I don’t think their reasons for doing it has anything to do with them twirling their proverbial mustaches and cackling about how nefarious they are for spiting me and anyone of a similar mind. It’s just that they aren’t particularly interested in (or simply dislike) the things about the story and setting that I like.
Just a little addition, maybe it’s new for some:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-10-20-the-hero-factory-interview
Metzen interview.
That was actually an interesting link, so thank you for it.
Metzen is an interesting figure at Blizzard, and while there’s definitely a whole lot of times I disagree with him on what kind of story beats make for good story or how much you can re-jig or outright retcon things past established and get away with it… and how I’d definitely agree with him that Blizzard storytelling can often be heavy-handed and clumsy – doubly so in the case of World of Warcraft… I actually do respect him, in the very least for his passion.
This is not a guy who makes cold, calculated decisions or deliberately walks over half the fanbase because he somehow feels like it – Metzen is the kind of fellow who thinks that all of these new story hooks and events are totally AWESOME, and not only that, he really wishes we could all see just how AWESOME it all is like he does, because he’s just outright giddy about it all and wants us to geek out with him.
If there’s one person at Blizzard I’d genuinely want to discuss the Lore with (or am really curious what they’d make of the characters, story, concepts and ideas that go into BtT), it’d be Chris Metzen. Not because I’d expect him to agree with me (in fact, I suspect we’d disagree on a pretty wide array of things) but because he strikes me as very passionate about these things and I’d actually be really interested in knowing why they went in certain ways or what his ideas are in the case of certain gaps and such, or really just which iteration of canon is the more correct one when there are multiple accounts or depictions that come into conflict.
Don’t forget Nostalgia Critic’s “Frying the Coke”
I’ve pretty much got the same attitude you do… except for ONE little detail.
Hunters can no longer use Melee weapons.
I Roleplay. I have Quel’delar. I have the Hunter Staff. I’ve got a staff from ICC that summons a ghoul.(no one wanted it. I’m no HUNTARD) I’ve got many, MANY, trophies I’ve gathered since Vanilla….
….and now… I … I.. cant… use.. them? Not even to hang off my back/hips for show?!
Its bad enough they got rid of quivers… now Hunters are gonna run around looking weaponless…
I would bet money that hunters will holster their ranged weapons in some visual fashion.
It’s odd to me that they’re removing “pointless stat-boost ranged/relic” slot from the game, yet rings remain.
It would be interesting if they decide to visually sheathe ranged weapons (when they are the primary ones), definitely – now I admit I’m saying this from someone who hasn’t been able to stick with hunters and thus don’t have all that much vested interest in them, but if this means the ranged weapon would show up as sheathed when not in use, that might actually be a nice gain.
Of course, this also all assuming they actually would implement that feature, which is entirely up in air at this point (especially since it means they’d have to go through all their ranged weapons and make sure they sheathe at the right connector point)
On them removing the “pointless ranged” item, I find their argument for it more reasonable than you do – for one, rings and necklaces and such are typically widely established as just magical stat boost things in both games and fantasy in general, while the idea of a warrior carrying a bow into battle because it makes them hit harder (or conversely, an archer walking into battle with a huge two-hand sword because it makes them more proficient marksmen) is a bit more of an absurdity that only really works in the land of game mechanics and stop making much sense the moment you start thinking about just how that’s supposed to work out.
More importantly though, rings and amulets are much easier to make generic versions of than ranged weapon slot items are. Say you want to make a tanking item for the ranged slot – no matter how you approach this, you will only ever be able to make it work for one single class: Warriors will use bows/guns/crossbows, Death Knights require sigils, Paladins need a libram and Druids use whatever they call their things. By comparison, if you were to make a tanking ring, then suddenly you have an item that is at least likely to provide some benefit for all four, even if it might not always be optimal.
Which is not to say that I (playing a warrior) wouldn’t miss the ability to fire a bow for visual effect, nor that I can’t understand why hunters would feel disappointed that they can no longer carry a melee weapon they think looks incredibly cool, but I can see where Blizzard are coming from with it.
From a melee standpoint, a Hunter with the big two-hander doesn’t make sense. However, they should still be able to hang a one-handed mace or especially a pair of daggers off their belts. Taking that away makes no sense to me at all…
I agree with that. A ranged fighter with a bow or a gun isn’t going to carry a large double handed weapon. If for some reason they are forced into melee combat, they are going to pull out a dagger or a short sword. At the least, they are going to use their bow or gun to beat on someone.
Blizzard did say this weekend that they are working on bringing back quivers and ammo pouches as an aesthetic item for Hunters. A quiver will show when you equip a bow or an ammo pouch for equipping a gun.
I’m fine and dandy for the reasons, I’m just saying I’m going to MISS being able to use all those cool melee weapons (aforementioned Quel’delar and Epic Hunter Staff… or even simply my pair of Cruel Barbs for my “Ranger” outfit)
On another note, I just heard that the horde is gonna destroy Theramore. (As part of Jaina’s Character Development) THERAMORE. My favorite hangout… DAMMIT!
I officially don’t like this expansion anymore. Another iconic Alliance location wiped out…
While it’s silly having an alternative weapon for stats, I think it would be cool if Hunters could still carry whites bought from vendors simply for appearance. It’d be like wearing tabards and undershirts.
While that does seem cool and all, it just wouldn’t make much sense. They’re removing the “minimum” range on hunters, so they can essentially fire point blank into their opponents skulls. (not that thats bad mind you XD)
Having daggers or short swords on your hips would… I dunno… make you want to USE them?
I know that melee weapons for hunters (as well as ranged weapons for warriors/rogues) are essentially stat sticks… but it still feels nice to be able to use a good ol’ sword to poke at foes that get too close for comfort.
…by the way, has anyone else realized that no one is going to be able to use throwing weapons now? I wonder if they’re gonna become “vendor trash” like hunter ammunition was…
I was at Blizzcon and they have a few interesting ideas for this that I got to discuss with the CMs and Class Designers at the Blizz Booth.
They are planning on bringing quivers back as well as ammo pouches that will display and possibly be customizable. Ranged weapons will likely display on the back as well.
One of the designers at the booth said they HAVE debated allowing hunters to wear melee weapons as cosmetic items and perhaps ranged weapons as cosmetic items for rogues/warrior who will lose them.
At the same time, they want to get the librams and relics graphically appearing on paladins, druids, and shaman as well.
Well to add to your post Nhani, I won’t comment about Pandaria, but I was wondering, do you like Thedramore as a town? If you don’t then this might also be a thing to favor MoP, if you do… I’m sorry, Horde is going to destroy it.
Saw that coming the moment they announced a Jaina book with “ground-breaking changes”.
But it’s okay, guys! Cause the Alliance is so -unified- now! It takes a lot of cooperation to dig that many graves.
This really wouldn’t bother me so much if Blizz could just effing admit their fervent circle-jerk for the Horde, and not feel the need to insult us with “no, come on, we like both factions just fine, honest!” crap.
Being lied to gets me riled up. Being talked down to gets me riled up. Both just pisses me off.
Re: hunter weapons; I’m really not offended or put out by the change, or the reasoning behind it; rings are “established” gear, sure, but is there any slot less exciting to get an upgrade for? At all?
Yes, fully agreed with you. I’m just tired seeing the Alliance get put aside and for most part only used as a vehicle for the Horde.
About hunter weapons, it was ok I’d say, in the end hunters don’t use melee weapons much, however it is bad for roleplayers for they can’t even equip them anymore as far as I know, the same warriors and rogues can’t equip ranged weapons anymore. Makes me wonder what will happen with thrown weapons, nobody can use them anymore now. And yes, rings are stat-sticks as well, even more then melee weapons for hunters, at least hunters can show said weapons, rings not, they could at least make it so you only wear 1.
For me, personally, it’s the final nail in the coffin for not going back. Cata didn’t draw me back, and this does seem to do it’s best to push me away. Partly because the Pandaren were initially an April fool’s joke, but more so because it seems like something that should have been the very first expansion,in terms of theme.
You’ve faced the end of the world, Arthas, Deathwing, Illidan, huge lore-heavy bosses, constant threats to Azeroth, and then everybody go to Pandaland to kill each other.
Instead of building out the factions in a serious way, they resort to lean on an April Fools joke.
I’m headed to SWTOR, personally, already having found a nice RP guild, and from following the game rather closely since it’s announcement, I doubt it will disappoint. And as far as lore and story goes, (my main interest in MMOs) I don’t think a gameworld has been in better hands.
“and then everybody go to Pandaland to kill each other.”
I can’t think of a better ending.
Pandas are not an April Fools Joke or a joke hero. They were a playable race in the Warcraft tabletop RPG, and that book as been around before Warcraft III. They even had more pages to themselves than any other race.
A good reason they took so long to do anything about them was likely due to Blizzard basing Pandarens (based of Pandas, an Chinese cultural icon) them off Japanese culture. and for a very long time and for a long time in the future the word “Hate” can’t even begin to describe the animosity the Japanese and Chinese. If you look at the old illustrations and models and compare them to the current, new ones, you can see how they retcon Pandarens into a fully Chinese based-race. They have to change things around if they want to be able to sell their game in China, where a large portion of the player base lives.
Personally, I’m taking this new expansion with a grain of salt. I don’t play this game for serious RPG experiences anymore, but I do still enjoy it. Even with all its failings, Cataclysm is still far superior Wrath of the Lich King to me. I look forward to improvements in game mechanics and encounters that this upcoming expansion offers. BIoware might buy me over with KotoR because they do have a good reputation with RPGs and quality (granted, The Witcher 2 blew the entire Dragon Age franchise out of the water with hardly any effort), but playing arm-chair critic this early is just naive.
Uh, no. WarCraft III was released in july 2002 with its expansion pack Frozen Throne out in early July 2003 and the first WarCraft RPG sourcebook out late July 2003. Additionally, the Pandaren were actually not included in the core sourcebook and instead first appeared in the Manual of Monsters companion sourcebook which was first released October 2003.
In fact, the Pandaren weren’t included in the second edition World of Warcraft RPG core rules sourcebook from 2005 either, and for that edition of the RPG, Pandaren weren’t included or mentioned until the Dark Factions companion book which wasn’t released until 2008.
The first debut of the Pandaren was during Blizzards April Fools 2003 (available here) where they were simply visible as reskinned Furbolgs and art from Samwise Didier. Following on from that, Blizzard appeared to have liked the idea of it so much that they made a unique Pandaren Brewmaster model (which looked more like Didier’s art) and introduced that as a neutral hero in the Frozen Throne expansion pack.
http://www.darklegacycomics.com/311.html
Vaguely related.
I like the concept of the expansion and I wouldn’t mind Pandarians if they were unplayable. The only reason I didn’t quit when I saw how easy the raids in WOTLK were was because the lore was interesting and I mostly RPed after that (the last time I raided was ICC to get T10 for my warrior). Now, with Pandarians becoming playable Stormwind is going to be swarmed with antromorphic ninja-panda people (Worgen can at least change into their human form), that’s going to kill the immersion.
What did you think of Metzen’s answer, at Blizzcon, to a question about the RPG books not being canon? His reply was he thought it had been a mistake to make such a blanket statement and that he wanted to revisit the RPG books and decide what would be canon and what wouldn’t be canon.
I didn’t see/hear that response, actually. I’d agree with it being a mistake though – between Blizzard’s known tendency of approaching new canon as “Hey guys, I’ve got a great new idea!” and the notion that Primary canon is allowed to override Secondary canon, they already had a license to ignore them, so flat out announcing them as non-canon only serves to potentially further aggravate those segments of the fanbase who actually care about the setting enough to try and understand it.
As for what I think of him saying that, I honestly don’t know anymore. From some what I’ve heard of Blizzcon, it almost sounds like Metzen is the sole remaining person at Blizzard who cares at all about Warcraft as a narrative and many of the additions or changes that serve undermine either the narrative or its consistency were against his will. On the other hand, this is also the guy who has completely endorsed Knaak and mentioned during last year’s Blizzcon that if it were up to him he’d totally resurrect Illidan because he likes a “good redemption story”, so I simply don’t know.
I won’t be surprised if he brings Illidan back – if it’s not related to Warcraft 3, he seems to have no interest in it.
Which is why we’ve gone from the build-up for Kel’Thuzad, Illidan, Kael and Arthas as dynamic enemies… to Deathwing being some dragon who flies around to hand out achievements at random. Of course, Turaylon’s WC2 and Alliance, so we’ll probably never see him or Alleria. Can’t have them tip the balance, not when they’ve got more Alliance towns to burn down. “Don’t worry, this is going somewhere.” Y’know, just like they said Southshore and Ashenvale would?