Yes, it’s time to do some amusing (but oh so pointless) speculation of what the Cataclysm Patch Cycle will bring. I’m aiming for ‘serious’ here, but I’m guessing it will quickly mutate into unexpected hilarity, except probably more expected now.
And, it looks like it did almost immediately. I’ll whack on a bit of more serious forward-looking at the end of the post.
This is a Blog Azeroth Shared Topic, which is always a good way to write a thousand word post. Getting ideas is probably the hardest part of blogging, true story.
Here’s the prompt, for the terminally curious:
Although players are still busy digging through all of the Cataclysm raid and heroic content, some are already starting to wonder what we’ll see added to the game in the 4.1 patch and beyond. While we have some hints, what do you expect to see added over the life of the expansion? How many patches? How many new dungeons? What will happen to your favorite professions? And how will the expansion’s storyline continue to unfold — and which loose ends will be wrapped up by the time the 5.0 patch is released?
- Ringo Flinthammer
Okay, now on with the show.
4.1 – Keep on the Firelands *coughDnDReferencecough*
Now we know a fair bit about what is coming in 4.1 anyway, but here are my ‘wanted’ and projected major features.
Firelands Raid: Molten Core was just a Setback.
Someone will finally open that gate in the huge keep (probably too soon) that is in southern Hyjal, and will find 3 instances inside it. One, the Raid, and two 5 man dungeons, each with 3 (or perhaps 4) bosses.
In addition, there will be new Reputation Dailies for the Earthen Ring and Guardians of Hyjal, in Hyjal itself, probably 2 or 3 each, just to smooth off those Rep grinds for any characters who have a tiny amount left to gain with them.
4.2 – Tasty Vashj’ir Surprise
I’m thinking that 4.2 will probably have the Vashj’ir raid, perhaps split into two smaller raids, one that is just a single boss (did we end up killing sir-giant-freaking-squid-alot?) and one more standard one with a mixture of Naga and Twilight Hammer NPCs (like all the ones around the rift in Vashj).
There should probably also be a new battleground layout (CTF (WSG) reskin, as I doubt that Blizzard would be up for a reskin of AV :/ ), and the creation of Heroic Mauradon (in preparation for 4.3) and Heroic Stockades (85 Hogger — read ‘fun’).
4.3 – This is why we don’t like Tauren goddesses
Two words: Killing Therazane. (Okay, the chances of this happening are astronomical, but to be fair, she’s the only one left, and she’s the most horrible of all the elemental lords, too (at least, the only one who has actually antagonized any players – Rag we went in there and tried to steal his mace, Air dudes are just kinda shifty and aligned with a dargon, Water dude doesn’t actually die, I guess?), and killing her would be an excellent capstone to the increasingly lame dallies that she made (makes) us do. (Seriously though, Hodir dailies at least were amusing to a degree, and the giant blue dudes at least had nice beards)
We would also (hopefully) get another 5 man, this time being similar to CoT-BM, or VH, in the case that it would involve killing waves of enemies for some reason. I don’t really care about lore reasons, just want the best type of 5man to be represented (what, they’re fun).
Lore wise, Deathwing would probably take this opportunity to make a Tactical Strike against Stormwind and Orgrimmar, vomiting deadly death fire over Varian’s Statue and Garrosh’s Palace, enraging both racial leaders, who then go off to have a duel to the death on Deathwing’s back to see who gets to deliver the killing blow after the 4.4 Deathwing raid.
4.4 – Return of the (War)Chef(Chief)
This would be the boring, gratuitous Deathwing killing raid, the other bosses would probably comprise of the few members of the Black Dragonflight who are still crazy enough to hang with Deathwing, and anyone else who is about, I guess?
This patch should introduce a new faction, which would be probably a combination of the Earthen Ring and some Dragons, which would be primary a raid reputation, but also have a few daily or even weekly quests to gather war supplies or something that would give other players something to work towards, although they should probably gain reputation at a slowed rate (for instance ~6 rep for a proper trash mob, ~2 for low trash, ~125 for bosses, (~75 if championing in 5mans), and the few dailies would give like ~50 each), as it’s supposed to be a bit of a grind.
Presumably these guys would have some nice rewards, including new Epic Recipes for crafting professions (although I assume that we would see them in other raid tiers as well, these would be strictly reputation locked).
It would also be nice to see a couple more 5 mans, but it largely depends on how many others they release throughout the expansion.
5.0.1 – Loose Ends (and somewhat more serious ideas about the patch progression, but don’t tell anybody)
Plot wise, something major presumably happens after Deathwing is defeated (I’m going to assume he dies, but leaving my options open here) – I’d like to see another Burning Legion expansion, as I don’t really think that a Maelstrom/South Seas expansion would be opportune after the fluster-cluck that was Vashj, and seriously, the Burning Legion will have been just chillin for like 6 or 8 years (game time) at this stage, without doing anything interesting at all.
I also think that it would be strange to beat the Old God that corrupted Deathwing before Deathwing himself, so that’s why I didn’t put him in there and instead opted for the ‘Killing Therazane’ choice, even though it is highly unlikely. However he doesn’t really seem like a logical choice to focus an expansion around, I wouldn’t be surprised if a new villain is crafted throughout the latter stages of this expansion and throughout the next (assuming that the next will be another Burning Legion centric one), to set us up with somebody we know exists as a big bad.
Why? Because both Illidan and Arthas were fresh in people’s minds from Warcraft 3 (& TFT), and Deathwing was in Warcraft 2 (from memory, it’s been a long time since I last played it myself), and who else do we have left with that much infamy? Azshara? Feels too soon, but she would certainly be an option, I guess. Sargeras? Too strong, I think we’d have to focus on killing Kil’jaeden first, and K’j has a bone to pick with Azeroth as well (Sunwell was just a setback!).
Anyway, if you want my serious expectations as to what the patches will be, here they are in convenient list-form.
- 4.1 – Firelands
- 4.2 – Elemental Plane of Water
- 4.3 – Probably a Titan/Old-god or Troll raid
- 4.4 – Deathwing
Alternately, there is no 4.4, and 4.3 is Deathwing, which could also happen quite nicely.
Plot wise, I’m thinking that things will happen, and I will kill a huge internet dragon perhaps. Not really too fussed about it, to be honest.