No content for a Year?

[artem123]

Wheres the i still have heroic content to clear along with a majority of people? so it doesnt effect me whatsoever?

[Mascotte]

Wheres the i still have heroic content to clear along with a majority of people? so it doesnt effect me whatsoever?

That actually kinda worries me tho, the whole 'go get looms from Garrosh while waiting!' could in theory be used to drag out current content.

[Duravian]

Why does everyone always act shocked and complain about a close to year-long lull after the final raid comes out when this has happened in every single expansion so far?

Hasn't killed the game yet.

No but it has severely damaged it. It probably won't be a full year this time though... I hope.

[SquishySquirrel]

I excpect Warlords to be released sometime in April or May 2014, five or six months from now.

The fact that they haven't done so before doesn't mean much, Blizzard is capable of changing their practices. With Hearthstone they announced and released (mostly, open beta is in December) a game within a same year and, since I've been sporadically following news (rumors) surrounding Titan, one of the Blizzard devs said that they have stopped announcing games too early in their development cycle (they showed everything they had for D3 when they announced it in 2008 so we waited four years for that) and are instead trying to announce games closer to their release.

WoD seems much more finished than other expansions have been when they were announced and, with dropping subs, they really can't afford to wait for typical 8+ months.

[Sinndra]

My guess doesn't really have anything to do with FnF-A, in fact I referenced only beta, not alphas in my response.

Let's make some assumptions and see how it affects the timing.

First off, new character models are a pretty huge part of this expansion. Let's assume they intend to push those out with Warlords. So they've been working on the models for -- what, years? -- and they're suddenly going to go from 2/24 sex/race model updates (currently they've shown us M-Orc and M-Dwarf with some M-Gnome) to 24/24 soon (tm)? Even if they have a system now for getting these models completed I think it's a stretch to say they're going to finish up 22 of them by April.

Let's say they roll out the models after Warlords hits so it won't delay everything else. The other big feature is Garrisons. I might feel motivated enough later to get you video time-stamps, but on every panel that discussed Garrison's, every third answer Cory Stockton gave way, "well, we still have a lot to figure out about Garrisons and how the _______ component will work exactly." In this case, we're not just talking about art assets to generate, we're talking about some lengthy code/tech to write.

What about the new land content? It would seem that since we only got one or two pieces of concept art from every zone but 2 so far, Draenor is a long way from being ready to test, let alone ship.

Again, as everyone says, WoW has a bigger team working on it now. So yeah, maybe that means Beta will only last 4 months this time instead of 6. But even so, I just don't think this x-pac is even close to be ready for testing.

as to the character models you are numbering.. you are slightly wrong. its not 2/24. they have no intentions of redoing worgen/goblins/pandaren. so thats 6 you can take away from your numbers right there. 2/18. they showed us 5. they only put together a sneak peek for 4. so lets give them the benefit of the doubt instead of constantly short~changing Blizzard.

6/18 should be in pretty good shape or even finished. while the other 6 are being worked on. Draenei and Blood Elves are lower on that list since they are newer. so we can widdle that number down even more and say 6/14 are ready, 14/14 will most likely come at launch with the slight possibility that Drae's and BE's coming in a content patch after launch. i still think its possible for them to be included at launch, as more focus is pushed to this expansion now.

now on to your concept of time... MoP was announced at Blizzcon, and people swore there was noway they could possibly be ready to start that beta process for another year. and we got beta access only a few months later. much sooner then people expected. what does this mean for WoD? its very close to the level of detail they showed with MoP when it was announced. so yes, we can easily see a beta starting very soon. im thinking Jan/Feb. but i can be surprised and happy if its sooner, its not out of the realm of possibility.

[Deleted]

There are 20 pre-cata races.

[Sinndra]

There are 20 pre-cata races.

ty i got confused reading to person i quoted. my numbers are slightly off, but my point still remains 3 races will not be updated as they are already being used as the bar to meet with the older races. the Drae's and BE's are not quite as old as Vanilla one's so they might not make the launch but there is still possibility. some races were not shown due to time constraints, but were mentioned as being complete (mainly the female version of the ones shown). he had 4 too many, i was 2 short. we were both wrong in our counts.

[Vightnic]

Their goal is to release it before Spring. So... double that is probably when we'll get it.

[Outofmana]

I'm not gonna stick around for another 10+ months without any content and won't be coming back either.

[ComputerNerd]

People will whine whatever blizzard do, because they enjoy it.
Here blizzard is trying to fix a problem that people were upset about, and still it isn't good enough.
As usual the community is acting like a bunch of spoilt kids.

That is why we will never have back the experience of vanilla wow, because the community would whine and pick fault with everything.
Half the experience is the game, the other half is the community which is going down the drain.
That is a good part of why the game is losing subs, way more than anything blizzard is doing.

[Zenotetsuken]

Ah yes, another misleading thread title followed by sensationalist propaganda, and non-information presented as "proof" to confuse the stupid. Now that you got your attention, Fox News needs you back on their teleprompter.

[PrairieChicken]

I thought siege would last for 8+ months.

But after seeing no new race, no class, semi rehashed zones with no new skins, "new and improved" character models that look almost the same, and lack of dungeons I think it might come out faster than that

[Count Zero]

"new and improved" character models that look almost the same

What are you smoking ? 'Cause I want some.

[Transmigration]

Pretty sure we are looking at an early summer/late spring release, even the devs are really hinting at it.

Edit:

That pretty much sums it up right there.

Like, duh...

[Boricha]

I don't know how large the WoW team is now, but since it is without a doubt much larger now that they got moved off Titan I would make these guesses:

Beta by Mid / late December
Release by Mid / late April - Early June

A mid April release would be a short beta for them, but maybe that's the point.

[Rizendragon]

I don't think it will be a year. ICC to Cataclysm was a year. DS to MoP was less. As to whether or not we're in alpha or beta, no new classes and no new races will shorten things up a bit. There was already a dungeon available at Blizzcon and some of the leveling content. Apparently they are well along, have a larger team and intent on not wasting any time.

This, and lets not forget that the only zone open when the Mists beta started was Jade Forest...

[Herecius]

The beta won't have to be very long, considering there's no new race or class to worry about. If they start the beta in February, the game could be out May easily. It's just a slew of leveling zones, dungeons and the two raids to test.

[Wafffles]

These biased polls are getting old. Nowhere did Blizzard say there would be no content for a year; where is the "this poll is illogical and none of the above options make sense" answer? Might as well make a poll: "do you agree with Tom Cruise's decision to eat babies alive? Yes, No, of Don't Care." But, Tom Cruise never made any such decision or announcement, so none of those answers make any sense. "Just answer the poll."

[0502wz]

Just AFK for a year, that is that simple

[Revolutions]

I think it depends on when Wildstar releases. They'll aim to release right before that MMO drops.