Information on Northrend

[Boubouille]

This post is a summary of recently given information about Northrend in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion:

Disclaimer: This thread and everything posted in it is still in development and is subject to change based on further development and testing.

Northrend is the icy northern most continent of Azeroth. Formed during the War of the Ancients, and initially introduced in Warcraft III, players will be returning to it in The World of Warcraft Expansion: The Wrath of the Lich King.

Geography:

Northrend will have zones of a comparable size to those in outland, it will also have more zones, but the exact number has not been finalised yet.
Players can start from two different zones: Howling Fjord & Borean Tundra.

Howling Fjord:
Your first chance to go up against the ancient Vrykul in their instance Utgarde Keep.

Borean Tundra:
The home to the Tuskarr.
Parts of Borean Tundra are being melted down for water by the Naga
Garrosh Hellscream has established a base of operations at Warsong Hold.

Grizzly Hills:
The home of Furbolgs and their city of Grizzlemaw.
Also home to the ancient Dwarven City of Thor Modan.
The land is largely covered in forests - an example of our desire to make sure that not all zones are just snow and ice.

Dragonblight:
The home of Wyrmrest Temple, the ancient meeting place where dragons go to die.

Lake Wintergrasp:
A new non-instanced PvP zone with Siege Weapons, destructible buildings and multiple objectives with lasting effects. Players on Normal realms will automatically be flagged for PvP when entering this zone.

The Storm Peaks:
Containing Ulduar, the ancient Titan city in the Far North.

Capital City:

The Kirin Tor, led by Rhonin, have moved Dalaran to Northrend as a final front in their war against the Blue Dragon Flight. The Blue Dragon Flight, following a strengthened Malygos, are now attempting to purge all magic users from Azeroth.
It will act as the central neutral city floating above Northrend - a Shattrath of the North.

Races of Northrend:

Taunka – An ancient offshoot of the Tauren, who have a considerably different outlook on the world.
Tuskarr – The Nomadic Fisher Walrus men make a return from Warcraft III.
Iron Dwarves – There is a great deal to be discovered about the history of Azeroth through their story.
Naga – Pursuing their material interests further in Northrend.
Vrykul – The ancient giant vikings of the Howling Fjord
Furbolgs – The Furbolgs live in the city of Grizzlemaw in Grizzly Hills.
Nerubians – The Nerubian spiderlords are related to the silithid of Silithus and are followers of the Old Gods in Northrend.

Famous Faces:

Players will interact with Arthas right from the beginning in Northrend.
Arthas is the avatar of the Lich King and is scheming to corrupt the players of the Horde and Alliance against their own people as he himself was corrupted against his own father by the Lich King.
Every player, whether a raider or solo player, will have a hand in whether Arthas is defeated or whether he ultimately dominates the entire world.

Garrosh Hellscream has moved to Northrend to lead the fight following in the steps of his father.
Lady Sylvanas is leading the Forsaken with their experimental plague against the scourge and Arthas
Highlord Bolvar Fordragon will be at the forefront of the campaign for the Alliance in a tumultuous storyline.
Brann Bronzebeard is the consummate explorer and finally makes an appearance in World of Warcraft helping the dwarves explore their origins in Northrend.
Tirion Fordring and The Order of the Silver Hand make a return, bringing with them the legend of the Ashbringer
Rhonin is now leading the Kirin Tor in their war against the Blue Dragon Flight.

PvP:

There will be a new mid-sized (e.g. 15 vs 15) battleground in which the goal is to blow up the enemy base using Siege Weapons. (Not yet determined if this is actually located in Northrend.)

There will be a new Arena Map and Season.

A new non-instanced PvP zone, Lake Wintergrasp, will contain Siege Weapons, destructible buildings and multiple objectives with lasting effects. Players on Normal realms will automatically be flagged for PvP when entering this zone.

Other threads related to the Wrath of the Lich King:

Videos from Blizzcon (thanks to Foolz):
http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=394089700&sid=1

Regarding the Deathknight:
http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=394469665&sid=1

Arthas:
http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=305722605&pageNo=1&sid=1#16

Flying mounts:
http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread....eNo=1&sid=1#13

Developments to the Lore (thanks to Marlamin):
http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=305682716&sid=1

We will update this thread with more content when we can. If there is something important we have missed please let us know and we will try to include it.

[Nero Duskwind]

The info on Lake Wintergrasp is sweet. It's what I was hoping for from WoW since it was first launched. We're finally seeing Blizzards taking serious steps towards putting the "WAR" back into Warcraft. ;D

The overall interaction with Arthas from the beginning sounds like Blizzard is borrowing from the Live Event concept in Matrix Online, where the overall outcome is ultimately in the player community's hands and allows them to directly influence the lore of the game.

[Maas]

Every player, whether a raider or solo player, will have a hand in whether Arthas is defeated or whether he ultimately dominates the entire world.

I'm totally for Arthas. May his icy grasp squeeze the light from our lands.

[The3nd]

I'm totally for Arthas.  May his icy grasp squeeze the light from our lands.

Agree Arthas is do damn f*cking awsome, he'll conquer the world no matter what any1 says, he'll just ignore Blizzard and WIN!

[SuperflyForever]

Oh man, the sight of Arthas at the start sounds awesome. I'm all for joining him.

[Hellstream]

This post is a summary of recently given information about Northrend in the Wrath of
Capital City:

The Kirin Tor, led by Rhonin, have moved Dalaran to Northrend as a final front in their war against the Blue Dragon Flight. The Blue Dragon Flight, following a strengthened Malygos, are now attempting to purge all magic users from Azeroth.
It will act as the central neutral city floating above Northrend - a Shattrath of the North.

Rhonin is awesome, glad to see that he is in there where we will be able to interact with him.

http://www.wowwiki.com/Rhonin

[Mantisen]

Oh my god, I can barely wait :O Blizzard is teasing us by releasing all this info I tell you! :P

[SOaD!]

Every player, whether a raider or solo player, will have a hand in whether Arthas is defeated or whether he ultimately dominates the entire world.

Information linked with the DK quest maybe?

[Falgorn]

Every player, whether a raider or solo player, will have a hand in whether Arthas is defeated or whether he ultimately dominates the entire world.

Information linked with the DK quest maybe?

You know.. this could be some cool interactive quest series culminating in numerous large scale battles.

Or..

It could be another AQ gates grind fest that either never gets done or is a burdon on all the Raiding Guilds.

[Drachar]

I would love to hear from Blizzard's lore section why the Blue Flight, guardians of magic, are now trying to wipe it out. (Or why the Kirin Tor even believe they have a chance against Malygos.) Outside force tampering with them?

Anyway, good that Blizzard is releasing this information.

[Nero Duskwind]

I would love to hear from Blizzard's lore section why the Blue Flight, guardians of magic, are now trying to wipe it out. (Or why the Kirin Tor even believe they have a chance against Malygos.) Outside force tampering with them?

Anyway, good that Blizzard is releasing this information.

Sounds to me like Malygos has gone off the deep end. He probably recalls the reckless use of magic from the Highborne that led to the Legion's first visit and the subsequent War of the Ancients that pushed his flight to the brink of extinction and has now launched a crusade of his own to purge Azeroth of all magic users.

[HallytehPally]

Every player, whether a raider or solo player, will have a hand in whether Arthas is defeated or whether he ultimately dominates the entire world.

Information linked with the DK quest maybe?

I definatly agree that players interaction with Arthas will have something to do with the quest(s) to unlock DK.

This is puzzling though becasue exactly how will we be interacting with him I wonder? Obviously we won't be walking up to him and having a chat, but maybe there will be servants or leutenants of his who have infiltrated both Horde and Alliance settlements?

Who knows, but this information just makes me wanna play it even more!

[Nero Duskwind]

Every player, whether a raider or solo player, will have a hand in whether Arthas is defeated or whether he ultimately dominates the entire world.

Information linked with the DK quest maybe?

I definatly agree that players interaction with Arthas will have something to do with the quest(s) to unlock DK.

This is puzzling though becasue exactly how will we be interacting with him I wonder? Obviously we won't be walking up to him and having a chat, but maybe there will be servants or leutenants of his who have infiltrated both Horde and Alliance settlements?

Who knows, but this information just makes me wanna play it even more!

I wouldn't doubt it if we interact with the Lich King through Scourge sleeper agents embedded in the Horde and Alliance. After all, these agents are probably the ones fueling the emnity between the two factions and pushing them into open war on each other in Northrend. Divide and conquer baby!

[Ninav]

I would love to hear from Blizzard's lore section why the Blue Flight, guardians of magic, are now trying to wipe it out. (Or why the Kirin Tor even believe they have a chance against Malygos.) Outside force tampering with them?

Anyway, good that Blizzard is releasing this information.

Sounds to me like Malygos has gone off the deep end. He probably recalls the reckless use of magic from the Highborne that led to the Legion's first visit and the subsequent War of the Ancients that pushed his flight to the brink of extinction and has now launched a crusade of his own to purge Azeroth of all magic users.

Yar, looks like he went nutzo after Deathwing pwnt him?

http://www.wowwiki.com/Blue_Dragonflight
http://www.wowwiki.com/Malygos

[Juju]

He (Malygos) had gone into depression after Deathwing killed most of his flight, but he recovered from it after the event of the day of the dragon (powers restored and the red flight helped him re-built his flight with their queen's powers on life), he might have gone nuts from the old golds, or like that previous post said by fear of seeing the events of the sundering repeat themselves (but the burning legion is already there, so I'm not sure it's that), he could also be under some sort of influence from something (Lich King? or old gods like I said, heck even sargeras as far as we know)

As for Arthas, I would fight for him BUT, as a mage, I'm going to have to go with Rhonin (and Krasus?) and I don't think the two are compatible :-p

[Mahir]

i didnt think the Aspects cared much for the mortal races of the world so its no wonder the blue dragonflight dont like magic users much, its going to be fun to see whats going to happen anyway and i cant wait to see the Dragonblight.

[Juju]

i didnt think the Aspects cared much for the mortal races of the world so its no wonder the blue dragonflight dont like magic users much, its going to be fun to see whats going to happen anyway and i cant wait to see the Dragonblight.

They don't care much, unless it affects the world (or the part of the world they're responsible for), but seeing how the Red Flight opposes them there's probably something wrong going on with them (the notes alost say something about how the blues took a wrong turn, hinting that their leader went nuts or is being controled by something/one else, somehow)

[Shadowclaimer]

i didnt think the Aspects cared much for the mortal races of the world so its no wonder the blue dragonflight dont like magic users much, its going to be fun to see whats going to happen anyway and i cant wait to see the Dragonblight.

They don't care much, unless it affects the world (or the part of the world they're responsible for), but seeing how the Red Flight opposes them there's probably something wrong going on with them (the notes alost say something about how the blues took a wrong turn, hinting that their leader went nuts or is being controled by something/one else, somehow)

*cough* old god *cough*

[Juju]

i didnt think the Aspects cared much for the mortal races of the world so its no wonder the blue dragonflight dont like magic users much, its going to be fun to see whats going to happen anyway and i cant wait to see the Dragonblight.

They don't care much, unless it affects the world (or the part of the world they're responsible for), but seeing how the Red Flight opposes them there's probably something wrong going on with them (the notes alost say something about how the blues took a wrong turn, hinting that their leader went nuts or is being controled by something/one else, somehow)

*cough* old god *cough*

*cough* afraid so *cough*

[Shadowclaimer]

You forgot to italicize it

Metzen already showed a long time ago that the 5 old gods make a pentagram on the world map of Azeroth, and the northrend one was right at the nexus if I remember right..