Possibly no flying throughout entire xpac.

[Aberzombie]

It's no different than buying a sports car that will do 260 mph, and living in a city where the max speed limit is 65

Seems more like if the German government suddenly banned any vehicle that could do over 55kph from the Autobahn.

[-Superman-]

Still being sold by blizzard says otherwise. Use of it in relavent content maybe but even blizzard knows how badly gamers want flying. Otherwise you wouldnt have flying mounts in the collectors edition or still being sold in their cash shop.

Flying is going nowhere. To much of a cash grab for blizzard on multiple fronts to let it go. If it was really detrimental to the design process. It would be out as a new wave of better content came around.

We're not really getting that.

I think everyone enjoys flying to be honest, not just casuals and at this point I'd rather any gamer and give them the low down before they drop $50 on an expansion (that will not tell them flying is out till some random date in the future).

Tell them how content really hasn't changed as blizzard said it would just because they removed flying. It's just no flying, some added waste of time traveling and thats about it.

Whatever floats your boat. I've tried honesty, logic, faith, common sense, and deductive reasoning. At this point you are really just being stubborn and argumentative even when I agree with you about the return of flight. So, I will no longer be responding to you... or your drama. Good luck til 6.1.

- - - Updated - - -

Blizzard spending millions and millions to buy their company back from Vivendi? They lost out on funding for their project "titan" when they had to spend all that money on a dying company. They had to reallocate all those "titan" employees or fire them(they couldn't fire all of them). They had a massive slow down with developing WoW when they put all those new workers into the team. They also had several big names leave the team.

But, sure, blame it all on one person leaving.

I am no saying it was ALL because GC left. But he was a key influence who is still in constant contact with his former peers, active on Twittier, and still willing to be the focus of a discussion.

http://wow.joystiq.com/2014/07/02/mo...ome/#continued

This article made some great points, but it will just be shrugged off by the Pro-flight camp, so I will post it here:

Greg Street doesn't work at Blizzard anymore, but that hasn't stopped him (at all) from talking about game design and general product building concepts. As a industry nerd I find what he has to say incredibly interesting. A particular exchange recently happened:

Greg Street
My humble suggestion is that if you're not on board with a change, explain why, not that it was "promised."

-----

And even if it was a promise, you should still be thankful if bad ideas get killed.

-----

To underline even more: most of our ideas will be TERRIBLE. You don't want them in the game! Some will survive.

I absolutely love this. Designers fail, they're not perfect -- far from it. They're much like the artist who tries different combinations of things dozens of times until the music is perfected. And even then the song could be just a little bit better with just a little bit of a tweak. What Greg says here is entirely true and relevant, especially with today's issues the community is having with Blizzard.

Things get "promised" (I use that word lightly), and then things get redacted. This isn't because of poor planning, it's because of the exact opposite. Good planning and development allows for agile moves and changes (infact, there's an entire discipline called Agile Development that revolves around not being stuck to what you say, but instead course correcting as the project moves forward). Greg is spot on when he says we should be thankful that these changes were rejected.

Let's talk about the elephant in the room -- flying. Why was it disabled? Well, we know in broad strokes that it's a gameplay issue for Blizzard. They want players to have a better experience when they travel around the world leveling. Was this a decision that was made by Cory Stockton waking up one night and going "Eureka! I'm going to disable flying tomorrow!" No, it wasn't. not by a long shot. It was a decision that while someone probably said in a meeting, many designers were likely thinking about it, and after the group talked it out and decided it was a good course correction, it took place and was announced.

Blizzard has some absolutely rock star designers and developers -- I have no doubt that they tested leveling with flying. They had to in order to draw the right conclusions (and remember too, we know what leveling with flying is like, given the previous expansions). People might not like the change, but it's not because the designers are idiots and break promises. It's because they're iterating over game design. It's what we desperately want and need them to do. After all, we don't want to end up with another end-game like we had when Cataclysm was released, do we?

I'm not saying you need to agree with everything Blizzard does -- you don't, and I certainly don't. But it is important to recognize that these changes in course are normal and good.

[thilicen]

I just love how some people seem to think that this feature alone is responsible for over half the subscriptions per today. Get a grip, really.

[-Superman-]

Seems more like if the German government suddenly banned any vehicle that could do over 55kph from the Autobahn.

There ya go. So the Germans ban those vehicles and the autobahn is now slower, and safer.

[quras]

Whatever floats your boat. I've tried honesty, logic, faith, common sense, and deductive reasoning. At this point you are really just being stubborn and argumentative even when I agree with you about the return of flight. So, I will no longer be responding to you... or your drama. Good luck til 6.1.

Hey, if that floats your boat and yes, I've very argumentative. Blizzards lack of honesty, commen sense, and as of recent general lack of ability as well as a touch of "we say one thing and do another" has a tendency to make me lose faith.

Blaming flying on their inability to produce content we all know they have done in the past is rather mental of them..

I just love how some people seem to think that this feature alone is responsible for over half the subscriptions per today. Get a grip, really.

Got that right.



While posted by by Adam Holisky, I'm not entirely sure he has much sense.

Let's talk about the elephant in the room -- flying. Why was it disabled? Well, we know in broad strokes that it's a gameplay issue for Blizzard. They want players to have a better experience when they travel around the world leveling.

We could only do that in cataclysm and from what I hear about cataclysm, flying while leveling wasn't what hurt that expansions.

I have no doubt that they tested leveling with flying. They had to in order to draw the right conclusions (and remember too, we know what leveling with flying is like, given the previous expansions). People might not like the change, but it's not because the designers are idiots and break promises. It's because they're iterating over game design. It's what we desperately want and need them to do. After all, we don't want to end up with another end-game like we had when Cataclysm was released, do we?

We all did and at the end of it, flying wasn't the problem with cataclysm. Even blizzard said that much IIRC. Blamed it on heroic dungeons and gamers not stepping up and not enough content. It was never flying mentioned. Of course we don't want another cataclysm but we do want content. And it doesn't seem content with flying has been the problem. Just getting any content was the problem.

I'm not saying you need to agree with everything Blizzard does -- you don't, and I certainly don't. But it is important to recognize that these changes in course are normal and good.

To which who said that I would disagree. Pretending flying is blizzards problem with content is a fib or at a minimum, the stretching of the truth. IF it was a problem with designing content, it would have taken it toll on TBC and WoTLK. Hard to see that. Of the problems for Cata and MoP - Flying was not mentioned so it petty sound to say, flying wasn't the problem but more of a scapegoat to blizzards inability to produce content. Something has to take the blame it seems, so instead of blaming themselves for lack of content, it was flying that made them not produce it. Yea, I'm not buying that.

[Aberzombie]

Something has to take the blame it seems, so instead of blaming themselves for lack of content, it was flying that made them not produce it. Yea, I'm not buying that.

I've said time and again that flight is not "the culprit". Whatever problem Blizz is having internally, free form flight certainly didn't cause it and removing it won't fix it. In the months at least since Afrasiabi's GamePlanet "can we have a world w/o flight and players love it?" video that kicked this whole dumpster fire off (the 6.1 patch dustup was miniscule in comparison) people who claim to be for free form flight's removal have laid any # of ills at flight's feet only to have every single one of them countered and buried (sometimes hugely) by the proflight crowd.

I admit to favoring flight's retention along the usual lines to date, meaning: reach level cap, find the flight trainer, pay some $ and you're off. I would have little issue with the Blizzcon referenced "mini-legenday-like quest" in addition to or even in lieu of the flight trainer and/or gold provided it didn't require something truly unnecessary (like PvP to get the PvE Legendary Cloak in Mists -- that pissed me off and I've refused to do it). I've thought of and seen suggested a large # of variants of gating, limiting or otherwise altering free form flight that would have address most if not all of Blizz's supposed concerns about it's "interference" with content interaction. The fact that Blizz has outright refused to even acknowledge any of those suggested anywhere (WoW General in particular) suggest strongly to me that they do not and never have wanted to "fix" flight (and the associated problem is supposedly responsible for). They just want the feature gone and are acting on that desire in a preemptory and ham-handed manner that is making them zero real friends and risks (without doubt) the loss of a substantial portion of their remaining playerbase.

Though I don't like the thought of the loss of free form flight this whole hubbub has been less about that than it has been about Blizz's methodology... which I've found increasingly deplorable on almost a daily basis. Whatever one believes on this issue I would argue that "incompetence" probably isn't the #1 factor. They've done too much for too long for me to swallow that excuse easily. No, this is a planned campaign that's being carried out with some respectable precision, if not respectable method.

[Maneo]

Seems more like if the German government suddenly banned any vehicle that could do over 55kph from the Autobahn.

That would be a more accurate analogy

I just love how some people seem to think that this feature alone is responsible for over half the subscriptions per today. Get a grip, really.

The removal of flight is going to cost them subs, hell even Blizz knows that. How many though is the question. Will it be enough of a loss to cancel out any of the savings they would gain in being able to develop all future content w/out flight??? Only time will tell.

My opinion is that is 6.1 is released w/out flight a couple months after the sub base will be less then 5 million. At the end or WoD the sub base will be right around 3 million.

[khalltusk]

I think they had huge problems with this new tech they are using. I think it forced Blizzard to put product on the street in an unreasonable time frame.

- - - Updated - - -



I think Bobby is in control and he has Bobby-fied the company.

Who is Bobby?

Walter :P Knew you would like that one! I think GC did a pretty good job overall. As far as the games direction atm. If we take flying out of the argument the changes to raid formats - Great lots of flex tech more loot dropping in LFR for people Normal raids and Heroic raids having different looking gear from LFR. Mythic being the new Heroic and only 20man makes it so hardcore guilds know what they are in for.

5man dungeons are looking awesome (if few in number sadly) the gearing path from them to raids is looking good as well.

Garrisons are looking more and more awesome to me as well. If flying comes back at 6.1 and new areas open up which have no flying I am not bothered. As the new content will be locked to no flying and the older content will have flying unlocked to speed up catch up from newer players or players who are still behind.

[-Superman-]

Who is Bobby?
Walter :P Knew you would like that one! I think GC did a pretty good job overall.

That was pretty clever

[Baconeggcheese]

The removal of flight is going to cost them subs, hell even Blizz knows that..

I don't think they do, or they wouldn't even be hinting at the idea (because it is still not 100% that flying won't come back).

They're a company out to make money like any other, I guarantee they're not sitting there going *hmm, what's an acceptable sub loss to create our vision of a perfect world?* They're sitting there trying to figure out how to increase the sub count or at least halt it from hemorrhaging more players.

I imagine they're thinking they will at least stop the bleeding if not hopefully gain subs with the moves they're making in wod, not simply just the no flying at the start but a bunch of things combined.

Some people will quit because of this, but some people will also come back who were put off by it. I imagine in anything blizzard does they assume that balance will be in their favor. That doesn't mean they're always right, but they aren't intentionally doing things with the intent of making their player base smaller.

[quras]

I've said time and again that flight is not "the culprit". Whatever problem Blizz is having internally, free form flight certainly didn't cause it and removing it won't fix it. In the months at least since Afrasiabi's GamePlanet "can we have a world w/o flight and players love it?" video that kicked this whole dumpster fire off (the 6.1 patch dustup was miniscule in comparison) people who claim to be for free form flight's removal have laid any # of ills at flight's feet only to have every single one of them countered and buried (sometimes hugely) by the proflight crowd.

Agreed - Played a lot of wow and put in a lot of wow time. For all it's downfalls, flying just wasn't one of them.

I admit to favoring flight's retention along the usual lines to date, meaning: reach level cap, find the flight trainer, pay some $ and you're off. I would have little issue with the Blizzcon referenced "mini-legenday-like quest" in addition to or even in lieu of the flight trainer and/or gold provided it didn't require something truly unnecessary (like PvP to get the PvE Legendary Cloak in Mists -- that pissed me off and I've refused to do it). I've thought of and seen suggested a large # of variants of gating, limiting or otherwise altering free form flight that would have address most if not all of Blizz's supposed concerns about it's "interference" with content interaction. The fact that Blizz has outright refused to even acknowledge any of those suggested anywhere (WoW General in particular) suggest strongly to me that they do not and never have wanted to "fix" flight (and the associated problem is supposedly responsible for). They just want the feature gone and are acting on that desire in a preemptory and ham-handed manner that is making them zero real friends and risks (without doubt) the loss of a substantial portion of their remaining playerbase.

So many things that could have been designed better than complete removal of flying in relevant content at max level. If gamers can come up with suck good ideas off the top of their heads, you would think blizzard could too. You would think they could create a feasible way to grasp both sides of the fence. Anything from tweeking flight, creating better content that we have seen in the past that also had flying or just simply, making that epic quest to get flight. So far, removal in WoD content is the best their brilliant minds could come up with yet still sell flying to you in their cash shop and collectors edition.

I don't think they really wanted to "fix" flight either.

Though I don't like the thought of the loss of free form flight this whole hubbub has been less about that than it has been about Blizz's methodology... which I've found increasingly deplorable on almost a daily basis. Whatever one believes on this issue I would argue that "incompetence" probably isn't the #1 factor. They've done too much for too long for me to swallow that excuse easily. No, this is a planned campaign that's being carried out with some respectable precision, if not respectable method.

Agreed. I think it would have been a lot more acceptable even for me if blizzard has been more forthcoming in their intentions with flight. As in, make a decision instead of stringing along the gamers, pitting one side against the other one whos side playes best. I have no doubt blizzard position on flight is still up in the air because they do not want to hurt bax sales.

If they actually made a decision, one way or the other gamers could at least decide to support it or not based on what they like. Blizzard clearly doesn't want that to happen till after they sale them a $50 box.

Another big problem I have had with the way blizzard has handled it. Like you said, their methodology is terrible. Removing flight in an area you just paid more to be in but blizzard continuing to sale it. In the cash shop and collectors edition, mounts based on being raised and breed in WoD but suddenly they flop on the ground.

I can't respect blizzard for that kind of business.

[Mormolyce]

and now you find out he was way better than the guy that replaced him

Only thing that changed when he left is that all the tedious people on the forums went from blaming all the things they hate about WoW on GC to blaming all the things they hate about WoW on GC leaving.

Personally, I always enjoyed his blogs and tweets and whatnot.

[-Superman-]

Personally, I always enjoyed his blogs and tweets and whatnot.

As did I. He was himself, and did not care who it bothered.

[Lumineus]

The removal of flight is going to cost them subs, hell even Blizz knows that. How many though is the question. Will it be enough of a loss to cancel out any of the savings they would gain in being able to develop all future content w/out flight??? Only time will tell.

Here's the thing, you don't save anything by developing the flightless game. It is actually more expensive and time-consuming, especially in terms of QA analysis, to develop the world as a series of Hollywood backdrops than it is to just plunk down a single 3D model.

[Deleted]

I actually like this, since flying mounts was introduced, World pvp died and you never really 'meet' other players that much.

[Aberzombie]

As did I. He was himself, and did not care who it bothered.

As a relative newcomer to the game (started with Cata) I never understood all the GC-hate. He was one man in a fairly large organization and his rold as systems admin (not a actual developer -- he didn't draw art or design quests, etc.) his job was more for determining whether something the devs wanted to do could or could not be done given the tech abilities/lilmitaions available at the company. The only "faults" (if one wants to call them that) he may have had was perhaps being a bit too public, too 'accssible' to the players in general -- and he was (refreshing, to me) blunt in his comments. So many public faces at Blizz (from forum 'blues' to execs) play the PR game. GC at least told us what he thought.

But, in followup to my comments earlier about perhaps "something changed" at Blizz, I'm very unsure it was his leaving that was what kicked off the flight debacle. I think it more a symptom of a problem that may have brewing behind the scenes for some time and his departure was timed to a avoid the fallout. Let's be honest, he was making some serious cash with Blizz. Leaving that kind of job isn't a spur of the moment thing. There had to have been negotiations going on for some time (weeks, maybe months) before he annouced. Whether anyone at Blizz proper know of it before hand may be unknowable but I'd bet $ Street was prepared to jump before that Blizzcon every opened. In other words, the decision for flight (and other radical game changes) was made some time well before Blizzcon and GC "saw the writing on the wall" and built himself a lifeboat to avoid "goind down with the ship". He waited out Blizzcon to avoid any appearances of "impropriety" or possible accusations of "sabotage" or some such, but the moment he could safely do so, he bailed.

What may actually have changed to push him out (he started about the time Wrath did, didn't he? so ~6 years?) after that long, we're only getting partial glimpses of, but I think that Afrasiabi's position as the "front man" or "the face" of the flying change alone is indicative of something important the rest of us would be well counseled to get a handle on. There are "bios" and articles easily available on him and from what I've read to date labeling him "an arrogant bastard" wouldn't be too far off... along with "eletist" and "snob". He came to Blizz out of (vitriolic) criticizm of WoW during early Vanilla and is apparently one with the mindset that late Vanilla and early BC were WoW's "golden era". If so, it's little wonder that there's been pressure inside (because of steadily falling subs over time -- ~3-M per expansion since Wrath) to "retro" to those methods.

/shrug
/endrant

- - - Updated - - -

I actually like this, since flying mounts was introduced, World pvp died and you never really 'meet' other players that much.

Oh, god... another one.

Look, free form flight did nothing to "wpvp". Two other thigns did.

1) Instanced pvp . Instanced pvp has far more rewards/incentives to it than open world pvp does and as a result those who are serious about pitting themselves against others to determine who actually has the better skills to it that way than roaming the overworld randomly slashing at others hoping for a "fair" fight.

2) Attitude. "World" pvp as it stands now is dominated by the pvp outliers, the gankers/campers/griefers who don't really want a fair fight, they're more interested in victims. It's more a 'bully' mindset than a formally competative one. And they frequently exhibit disgusting behavior towards other: /spitting on people, "t-bagging" people, use of rampant profanity, insults of a wide variety, even playing insulting or otherwise objectionable soud-bites when they "pwn" someone 30+levels below them. They have become pariah's in the community and are probably more responsible for the erosion of "wpvp" popularity than any other single factor. As of right now ~60% of the playerbase plays on PvE servers ostensibly to get away from "wpvp" (namely the dirtbag types just mentioned). They were harassed and insulted to no end and told, "If you don't want to pvp then roll on a pve!" And they did, in droves. Those that didn't shifted servers to put themselves in the majority faction causing must of the gross imbalances we now see making anything like 'fair' open world pvp (that isn't gank/camp/grief-fest b.s.) difficult if not impossible to achieve.

Flight's advantages and disadvantages cancel each other. Its net overall offect on "wpvp" is nil. It is not the problem and removing it is not the solution.

[-Superman-]

I actually like this, since flying mounts was introduced, World pvp died and you never really 'meet' other players that much.

There will be flight in PvP in WoD in Ashran

- - - Updated - - -

As a relative newcomer to the game (started with Cata) I never understood all the GC-hate. He was one man in a fairly large organization and his rold as systems admin (not a actual developer -- he didn't draw art or design quests, etc.) his job was more for determining whether something the devs wanted to do could or could not be done given the tech abilities/lilmitaions available at the company. The only "faults" (if one wants to call them that) he may have had was perhaps being a bit too public, too 'accssible' to the players in general -- and he was (refreshing, to me) blunt in his comments. So many public faces at Blizz (from forum 'blues' to execs) play the PR game. GC at least told us what he thought.

But, in followup to my comments earlier about perhaps "something changed" at Blizz, I'm very unsure it was his leaving that was what kicked off the flight debacle. I think it more a symptom of a problem that may have brewing behind the scenes for some time and his departure was timed to a avoid the fallout. Let's be honest, he was making some serious cash with Blizz. Leaving that kind of job isn't a spur of the moment thing. There had to have been negotiations going on for some time (weeks, maybe months) before he annouced. Whether anyone at Blizz proper know of it before hand may be unknowable but I'd bet $ Street was prepared to jump before that Blizzcon every opened. In other words, the decision for flight (and other radical game changes) was made some time well before Blizzcon and GC "saw the writing on the wall" and built himself a lifeboat to avoid "goind down with the ship". He waited out Blizzcon to avoid any appearances of "impropriety" or possible accusations of "sabotage" or some such, but the moment he could safely do so, he bailed.

What may actually have changed to push him out (he started about the time Wrath did, didn't he? so ~6 years?) after that long, we're only getting partial glimpses of, but I think that Afrasiabi's position as the "front man" or "the face" of the flying change alone is indicative of something important the rest of us would be well counseled to get a handle on. There are "bios" and articles easily available on him and from what I've read to date labeling him "an arrogant bastard" wouldn't be too far off... along with "eletist" and "snob". He came to Blizz out of (vitriolic) criticizm of WoW during early Vanilla and is apparently one with the mindset that late Vanilla and early BC were WoW's "golden era". If so, it's little wonder that there's been pressure inside (because of steadily falling subs over time -- ~3-M per expansion since Wrath) to "retro" to those methods.

/shrug
/endrant

Greg once replied to me on Twitter about Flight when I was ranting and raving at Bashiok for being a liar. He said in response to both of us on the subject (sarcastically), "I wanted the best of both worlds. Flight while leveling and then no flight at max level." I found it humorous even in the wake of the no flight catastrophe I was facing. But, the timing was poignant. His departure came on the heels of Blizzcon where the first announcement was made. Alex A. took it upon himself 4 months later to blurt out about flight in an offsite interview. Was it a plant? A hoax? A duplicitous measure? Or just an accidental comment that blew up? Who knows. But Greg could not pack up his desk and change his twitter account fast enough. Personally, I don't blame him.

[Ferocity]

This article made some great points, but it will just be shrugged off by the Pro-flight camp, so I will post it here:
<snip>
From quoted:I absolutely love this. Designers fail, they're not perfect -- far from it. They're much like the artist who tries different combinations of things dozens of times until the music is perfected. And even then the song could be just a little bit better with just a little bit of a tweak.

Game designers must be gamers in heart, it is mandatory. Now point me at any gamer who enjoy spending a lot of their in-game time by not playing the game but washing dishes, smoking, whatever (while their character is on something like flight path in WoW)?

I am not saying that game designers fail if they don't see the stupidity of this. Activision Blizzard keeps looking where it can make more money from, and artificial extending of game-time by emphasizing on huge AFK activity will surely protract players' experience.

What concerns actual content, they make another foul thing with it. Instead of explicit Annual Pass, people have to deal with content, which can only be experienced if you played at relevant time (with some medium time investment over a period of time), namely Legendary questlines. Iconic MoP questline is going to be removed forever as being their 1st implicit Annual Pass. Same goes for Legendary ring in WoD. At least Annual Pass wasn't driven by iconic lore or something, it was simply agreement + with only one exclusive (unobtainable otherwise) bonus - mount, not whole storylines and gear.

If you still don't see what is wrong here, can't see that Activision Blizzard doesn't care about if there is any new content, that they make "temporary" content and remove it while game stagnates in 14 months of being like on life-support (haha automated Brewfest, they could at least update trinkets from 476 to 496 just for some minimum to be done), then you are out of help. Keep thinking that flying won't be available because of "immersion".

[Dormie]

Game designers must be gamers in heart, it is mandatory. Now point me at any gamer who enjoy spending a lot of their in-game time by not playing the game but washing dishes, smoking, whatever (while their character is on something like flight path in WoW)?

I am not saying that game designers fail if they don't see the stupidity of this. Activision Blizzard keeps looking where it can make more money from, and artificial extending of game-time by emphasizing on huge AFK activity will surely protract players' experience.

What concerns actual content, they make another foul thing with it. Instead of explicit Annual Pass, people have to deal with content, which can only be experienced if you played at relevant time (with some medium time investment over a period of time), namely Legendary questlines. Iconic MoP questline is going to be removed forever as being their 1st implicit Annual Pass. Same goes for Legendary ring in WoD. At least Annual Pass wasn't driven by iconic lore or something, it was simply agreement + with only one exclusive (unobtainable otherwise) bonus - mount, not whole storylines and gear.

If you still don't see what is wrong here, can't see that Activision Blizzard doesn't care about if there is any new content, that they make "temporary" content and remove it while game stagnates in 14 months of being like on life-support (haha automated Brewfest, they could at least update trinkets from 476 to 496 just for some minimum to be done), then you are out of help. Keep thinking that flying won't be available because of "immersion".

And keep believing in your conspiracy theories. Funny how it keeps coming back to that..

[-Superman-]

If you still don't see what is wrong here, can't see that Activision Blizzard doesn't care about if there is any new content, that they make "temporary" content and remove it while game stagnates in 14 months of being like on life-support (haha automated Brewfest, they could at least update trinkets from 476 to 496 just for some minimum to be done), then you are out of help. Keep thinking that flying won't be available because of "immersion".

As someone who is pro-flight, but ok with no flight til 6.1, I've said the following at least a dozen times. But, since it has been awhile, I will repeat it:

Flight never killed immersion. Instance queues killed immersion. Immersion is the ability to completely envelope oneself in their environment. Your fantasy world is shattered with a sound, and a pop up that allows you to magically teleport to an instance, any instance. Instead of physically travelling to the instance, and walking through a portal, you just pop in from the AH, or bank, or wherever you were hovering, and go for it. Once done, you are popped back to your last location.

Honestly, had they not OVER advertised things at Blizzcon, and then fallen behind in production, WoD might have launched 6 weeks ago, and people could stop bitching about SoO. Maybe they will improve their delivery system in WoD. If they would just drop new stuff every six months (6.1 - 6.4), nothing would ever be more than six months old, and no one would be tapping their toes waiting. Then again, if they put things into TBC perspective, it would take 6 months just to level up.