Is anyone else happy cataclysm is over and done with?

[Eadoin]

Cataclysm was a mixed bag for me, the content was fun; there just wasn't enough of it. I mean we have more bosses this tier then bosses not released with Cataclysm out of the box (T12 + T13). Firelands pre-nerf was fun/challenging, Dragon Soul Heroic before the buff started was also pretty fun (and then ruined by how high the buff got, 35% was not necessary). T11 is still a great content tier though. Overall, the problem was not enough quantity for the amount of quality. Then again, WLK had the opposite problem of quantity over quality. After Ulduar there were a grand total of 5 bosses I actually enjoyed doing (Anub, Saurfang, Putridice, Lich King, Halion), whereas at least in Cataclysm I enjoyed most of the (limited) content we had.

Really, when I look back, the biggest problem is everything after the first big raid of the expansion (not counting Naxx25 as a big raid, it was a copy/paste job), has been a complete letdown, almost like Blizzard starts working on the next expansion too early. Mayhaps this time around Blizzard will focus squarely on this expansion, I hope so!

Edit: I know most people didn't like Dragon Soul, I'm not stating my opinion on it as fact, I just found the place to be a lot of fun on Heroic before the nerfs started. Killing Ultraxion 25 man back when enrage was still a factor in the fight was downright exhilarating.

[Pachycrocuta]

I hated this expansion with a passion. There were only a few good things done during those nearly 2 years. Reforging and transmogrification. Worgen (and kinda goblins) are a slight positive. I say slight because I can't stand to go through that horrible Gilneas zone anymore.

As for everyone saying the revamp of 1-60 was a good thing: Like fuck it was. It was horrible and destroyed any fun that could be obtained from starting a new alt. I can't seem to stomach making another character anymore because I am forced to wade through the steaming pile of rancid shit that is Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor. The only reason why I have a monk up to 67 now is because she gets 105% experience increase (50 from enlightenment, 10 from guild, 45 from heirlooms), which let me fly through 1-60. Never thought I would ever say this, but Outland questing is superior to the new 1-58. I definitely do not look forward to taking her 80-85, and having to wade through the shit again. I only took 1 character (prior to the monk) from 1-85, and that was my worgen priest. Every other character I have started has died before reaching 60.

The heroics were terrible at the start as well. Oh, they weren't too bad if you were in a group with guildies. But in a group with 4 other random morons? They were horrible. And that's why people were paying tanks because no one wanted to do them, which brought about the 45-60 min queues for dps. And the crafting in Cataclysm was shitty as well. Especially when it came to crafting any epics. Being forced to endure 60+ minute long CC-fest dungeons to get to the last boss to maybe have a chance at the BoP chaos orb was horrible design. Not to mention being rewarded with a blue item (maybe) for all the suffering you went through.

Overall, Cata was shitty. I am glad that it is practically over. I just wish we didn't have to suffer through the rancid shit that is 1-60 and 80-85. Not only did it drive me away for 10 months all together (with 8 consecutive), it damn near destroyed my guild, which still hasn't exactly recovered. So close to attempting to find another guild, but there's an overabundance of douches on my server. I guess I should feel happy that there isn't anyone in my guild that I hate, although the guild leader and her loverboy are really starting to piss me off with their attitude towards me since coming back.

[aetti morkna]

I personally enjoyed the beginning of Cataclysm quite a bit. It was also responsible for the introduction of some long overdue quality of life improvements such as transmogrification. However, apart from that and especially towards the end it became a very numbing experience which is why I'm happy that it's over.

This.

I really liked 4.0. I like worgens, I like some of the things they did like the transmog and additions of raid finder later in the expansion. But, I really didnt like the overall experience. Cata was the worst expansion, the lore was soft, they could have taken Deathwing and ran with it, but the whole expansion felt disjointed. Pvp was a nightmare (by far the worst pvp experience since I started playing at the release of TBC) The 1-60 revamp was good, and realistically, it had to be done. Someone on staff said that they weren't happy wit the end game content because so much of the content was the revamp, and that as far as actual development was concerned, that was the most work they did on any expansion ever due to the size of the revamp.

[melodramocracy]

1-60 revamp, while quite good on a zone-per-zone basis, made the whole game feel very on-rails, which is never a good thing.

good things cata brought us:

Firelands
heroic dungeon difficulty
LFR.

Everything else was just awful.

[LilSaihah]

I didn't really mind it too much.

The new 1-60 is a good thing that I'm a fan of(though I would've liked it if they revamped belf/drae). They include some pretty good stories and help to flesh out the world. The one major problem that I can immediately think of is that the Worgen story is split between the Worgen starting quests and Silverpine's quests(which is obviously a Horde zone).
80-85 isn't too bad, IMO; if you don't like the directed/tunnel experience, fair enough. I usually spent my time questing finding the most efficient route possible and charging through in a straight line; the new style of questing takes that work out and I can just mindlessly blow my way through. Not too many major story hiccups that I can think of; the biggest one I can really think of is the lack of a consistent theme between the zones.
Dungeons were alright. They seemed, for the most part, to have good flavor and variety. Didn't mind the heroic difficulty because if worst came to worst I could chew through it with my guild, though I can definitely understand Blizzard's current position on Heroics. I thought that maybe the troll heroics were a bit much in that regard, but they were still doable regardless.
Raids were fine, for the most part. I thought BWD was kind of ehhh, but that's mostly because the instance itself was boring, and there was no prior story inclusion of Nef. It feels like the raid is just there so that there's another 6 bosses. Most of the raiding itself was quite fun, and starting with Firelands, we saw some very creative fight mechanics. Dragon Soul felt a bit samey and a bit flavorless.
PvP isn't my forte but the new maps are pretty so that's nice. I've noticed at least one person saying that they're the same gametype on a new map, and I don't understand what's wrong with that. If it's because it's lazy on Blizzard's part in regards to mechanics, fair enough. Same deal with Arena; I don't really pay attention there. I don't even know if they added new arena maps.

Seemed fine, except for pissing off casuals with Heroic difficulty/T11 opening difficulty. I'd say it's trading one devil for another with MoP's dailies.

[Scummer]

See that is super weird to me, I would have thought that would be the least controversial statement one could make for Cataclysm! Guess goes to show everyone really does have different tastes

To me, there were soooo many really great new quests and storylines. Even just to have the quest rewards updated was really needed. But most of all, after six or seven years and countless alts, the world just needed some novelty injected into it.

Here is an excellent blog post that covers much of the problems - http://childrenofwrath.blogspot.co.u...red-story.html

While I feel guilty every time I bring it up because the topic was beaten to death months ago there were problems on a faction related level and on a villain level.

The part not raised in the post that I feel was a problem concerns Deathwing. For starters Deathwing had gone from the evil Dragon that spent his time plotting evil deeds and trying to create the most powerful Dragonflight on Azeroth while twiddling his moustache and manipulating the Human Kingdoms while doing this.
Cataclysm Deathwing was more or less a different Deathwing. He was almost insane, completely consumed by his anger and hatred and was executing his plan more through brute force than cunning tricks.

[Tziva]

Here is an excellent blog post that covers much of the problems - http://childrenofwrath.blogspot.co.u...red-story.html

While I feel guilty every time I bring it up because the topic was beaten to death months ago there were problems on a faction related level and on a villain level.

The part not raised in the post that I feel was a problem concerns Deathwing. For starters Deathwing had gone from the evil Dragon that spent his time plotting evil deeds and trying to create the most powerful Dragonflight on Azeroth while twiddling his moustache and manipulating the Human Kingdoms while doing this.
Cataclysm Deathwing was more or less a different Deathwing. He was almost insane, completely consumed by his anger and hatred and was executing his plan more through brute force than cunning tricks.

It's a good blog post, thanks for sharing! I do agree with a lot of it, but it doesn't really change my opinion. I don't think the old world revamp was perfect, but I still think it was one of the strongest parts of the expansion and that it was really high quality.

As far as specific points from the blog, although it is referring to a lot of old world zones, some it is also referring to 80-85 zones like Twilight Highlands and the pre-Mists patch. A lot of the revamp has nothing to do with the faction wars, so those failures of story really shouldn't be held against it. But even those that did... yeah Westfall doesn't compare to say, Azshara, but new Westfall is still miles better than old Westfall.

On the same for your complaint, not everything had to do with Deathwing either. And a lot of the stuff that did, was after-the-fact kind of stuff (dealing with the destruction), so it wasn't really talking about his character or his role in lore. In fact, there's very little lore pertaining to Deathwing himself in the early game; I think it's almost entirely found in the end game content and probably elsewhere like the books. (not that that is great; one of my biggest complaints with WoW nowadays is how much of the story takes place outside of the game, which is very disappointing to miss out on as someone who doesn't read the books/comics/whatever)

So I see the points but for me, even the weaker points of the revamp are still waaaay better than what we had before.

[Scummer]

So I see the points but for me, even the weaker points of the revamp are still waaaay better than what we had before.

I suppose the point is that at the end of the day from Blizzards stand point it's most likely achieved it's goal with the 1-60 content which was to simply make new players enjoy it more and subscribe.
But yes, from an exclusively story based perspective I wasn't happy.

[Playintrafic]

Over & done with - you have a way of skipping levels 80-85?

Power level, or bot.

[Deleted]

Not sure what it was about it as I didn't raid but Cata was the xpac where I got bored and quit. Still not sure whether or not to come back. The high level zones just didn't feel engaging to me, I guess as a result of all the effort being spent on the revamp. I think that Cata had the most potential of all the expansions, but that blizzard bit off a bit more than they could chew.

[Osmeric]

I would rather see the backs of the designers of Cataclysm.

[Pull My Finger]

There were things about it that I liked and that I like to think back to, and then again things I didn't like. Just as any other expansion, including MoP. Looking back, I notice that I think about the good stuff first and foremost. People usually end up remembering the good stuff and fading out the bad, like with childhood, youth and nostalgia overall. I don't think about the crappy stuff in Cata, it's over, after all.

[Sharci]

Cata was by far the worst expansion for me and it kept me unsubbed for a very long time. However I thought pvp wasn't that bad and was okay I guess.

[Raenas]

I have mixed feelings about cataclysm...

I love the changes brought to the old world along with the increase in the quality of life aspect of the game, but I found the then-current content (cata zones+endgame) very dull and tedious. Until Dragon Soul came out (giving me the chance to get revenge on the giant fiery fucker that toasted me in Tanaris at the start of cata), I had zero interest in raiding and even then I got bored of it again after a month or so.

I'd say I'm rather enjoying MoP so far, though time will tell if it will topple Wrath as my favorite expansion.....but from the looks of it, it's well on its way to that.

[GennGreymane]

it made me finally quit

[Deleted]

I liked cata more than MoP, but thats the only expansion its better than, and that's only so far.

It seems like the whole MoP was just because they didn't have any more lore so they had to think something up. obviously all of the expansions are like that, but the 3 others at least had a lot of lore i'd heard about before, this doesn't

and the pvp is so imbalanced its retarded, more than in the beginning of the other expansions :/

[xindykawai]

I miss it only for pvp.. :x

[Deleted]

Cata was a very cool event made into such a bore that it feels like History class just ended.

[Deleted]

Glad to see unbiased poll options, loljk

[This name sucks]

Cata was so horrible after t11 because blizzard realized they fucked up by making the game hard again and their pathetic playerbase couldn't handle it. So they basically shit their pants 2 months into cata realized everything was going horribly wrong and ended up scrapping maw and the cot raid and doing t13 as quick as possible.

Heroics were nerfed immediately and they made as little content as they could possibly get away with so they could get out of the cataclysm that cata was destined to be from that moment on.