WotLK - Achievement System

[Boubouille]

Wrath of the Lich King - Achievement System
While Wrath of the Lich King will improve many of World of Warcraft’s existing features, it will also introduce plenty of brand-new ones to keep the game fresh and interesting. One of these new features is sure to suit a wide range of play styles: achievements. These self-contained goals will offer new challenges, satisfy goal-oriented players, allow others to see your accomplishments in World of Warcraft -- and are just plain fun.

World of Warcraft’s achievements system will launch with more than 500 individual achievements covering every aspect of gameplay, including world exploration, PvE, PvP, professions, and character development; from the purely whimsical to the truly epic, there will be something for everyone. Some achievements come with in-game rewards such as tabards, vanity pets, and titles. All of these rewards are purely cosmetic and just for fun, but you’ll certainly stand out when you proudly display them.

And don’t fret about running out of achievements anytime soon. The list is easily expandable, so you can expect additional achievements with each new World of Warcraft content update.

The Achievements Window
Upon starting your journey in Wrath of the Lich King, you’ll see a new button on your main action bar. Click that button to bring up the achievements window.

The top of the window displays the total number of points you’ve received for completing achievements. Below, each achievement appears with its name, description, point value, the completion date, and a progress bar (if applicable). Some achievements expand to display a list of individual components, highlighted to show which parts you’ve finished. You can also designate which achievements to track as you play, similar to the existing quest tracker. An important design goal is to provide players with everything they need to know to unlock an achievement.

It’s great to be able to see your own achievements -- but it’s even better to let the world know what you’ve accomplished. By right-clicking other players and selecting the appropriate option, you can compare your achievements to theirs. Every time you earn a new achievement, your accomplishment is announced to your guild and everyone in your immediate vicinity -- and the custom achievement animation and sound effect are unmistakable. Also, your achievements will be viewable on the Armory, allowing you to track and show off your accomplishments via the web.

Feats of Strength
Feats of Strength represent the past glories of Azeroth, and as such, players will find them very difficult -- if not impossible -- to earn. They’re worth no points, and unlike normal achievements, unearned Feats are not displayed in the achievements interface. Feats include old-world player-vs.-player ranks, obtaining rare mounts, special titles, and more. Feats of Strength will be awarded retroactively (that is, they’ll be immediately granted to your character if you qualify) since many of them will be impossible to earn in Wrath of the Lich King.


Types and Categories of Achievements
World of Warcraft’s achievements come in several varieties. Some simply require specific actions to unlock, such as getting a haircut or defeating a member of each race in your opposing faction in PvP. Others involve a progress bar and require you to do something several times -- such as give out 10 hugs. Some achievements are progressive; for example, once you complete an achievement to collect 10 vanity pets, you might next be asked to collect 25. Finally, meta achievements unlock when you complete other achievements -- unlocking all World Exploration achievements (see below) unlocks a World Explorer meta achievement. Some achievements, including those that involve quests, honorable kills, items currently in your possession, skills (including professions), exploration, and reputations, will be applied to your character retroactively.

To help keep track of all the different achievements you can unlock, you’ll find the following categories in the achievements window:

Player-vs.-Player
This includes arena, battlegrounds, and world player-vs.-player objectives. A few examples:

• Hot Streak: Win 10 ranked arena matches in a row.
• Alterac Valley All-Star: Capture graveyards, towers, and kill the enemy leader all in one game.
• City Defender: Kill 50 enemy players in your faction’s capital cities.
  

Dungeons and Raids
Every end boss of every raid and dungeon in the game grants its own achievement. Future achievements in this category may include ones for completing a run without any player deaths, with fewer than the maximum number of players, or within a certain time limit.

Professions
Advancing to each tier of mastery in a profession earns you an achievement, and there are specific achievements for secondary skills (with major professions to follow).

Quests
Quest-based achievements include completing a certain number of quests and completing specific quest lines. This category contains zone-specific subcategories.

Events
Seasonal events such as the Midsummer Festival, the Lunar Festival, and Hallows’ End have specific achievements of their own.

World Exploration
You’ll earn achievements by exploring each zone in the game -- and get meta-achievements when you fully explore a continent.

Reputations
This set of achievements includes attaining exalted reputation with each faction in the game.

General
These achievements tend toward the whimsical, including getting a shave and haircut (a new feature of Wrath of the Lich King), obtaining a certain number of tabards and vanity pets, falling from a great height, and more.

[zeroflow]

Nice...but what is the sense?

Do you get special things or is it just something to keep people occupied?

[Kristie]

World of Warcraft...Xbox 360 style!

[Darkminded]

lol :P reminds me of halo 3 achievemnt unlocked: 6,000,000 million kills

[FISKER_Q]

Nice...but what is the sense?

Do you get special things or is it just something to keep people occupied?

Well it's kinda like that addon Historian, now just with serverside records i guess :P

[SimTex]

April the 1st today?

This is getting more and more casual - there is noway im returing in Wotlk.

[Inept]

So, like XBox360 will achievement points mean nothing at all?

[LavaDuck]

more epeen!

[juelz]

Gateway to more titles?

[Croz730]

GL and HF.

It doesn't detract at all from normal gameplay and you can get special rewards for truly epic achievements (killing high end raid bosses).  It took them all of ten seconds to add and didn't do anything to the development of the rest of the game.  You're getting fucking bitchy over nothing.  

/agree
Why are so many people bitching about something that is totally optional? If you don't like it then don't open the window, it will be like it never happened. It is like saying you don't like the color of the underside of your floor mats in your car, so you will not drive it any more....lol. I think it is a cool edition, gives people something to do when they are bored. Though they never really did say what the "points" were for exactly.

Also, did anyone else notice some of the new armor in these pics?

[Tergeron]

April the 1st today?

This is getting more and more casual - there is noway im returing in Wotlk.

How is this remotely casual? Its just achievements for epeen players who have time to get them up (AKA BORED HARDCORE PLAYERS)

[pIRAteninjadragonzombie]

does anyone else think that the undead rogue's and the trolls armor look awesome ?

[Nova]

GL and HF.

It doesn't detract at all from normal gameplay and you can get special rewards for truly epic achievements (killing high end raid bosses). It took them all of ten seconds to add and didn't do anything to the development of the rest of the game. You're getting fucking bitchy over nothing.

QFT

I am not one to refrain from expressing my annoyance at the increasing casualness of the game, but I think this is a great example of adding something many differnt types of players can enjoy, while not doing anything to detract really from any other aspect of the game. Good addition IMO

[kazar123]

fuckin xbox...achievements are dumb

[kyrra]

If you look at this screenshot:
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/wrath...ievements2.jpg

They are getting a haircut in Stormwind. So we now know that the character customization will not be limited to Northrend.

[Eucep]

This is just outright mean against someone who is avid about collections like me. *weeps*

[De Maffe]

Do you get special things or is it just something to keep people occupied?

-Well , some Achievements can give you titles , i like titles , makes you look more Pr0



Beside the titles and Tabards , i think its a great idea , i get bored in wow pretty often .

[SimTex]

Imo this it is waste of development time to add something like this, and be rest assurred it did not only take only a few hours. In fact this is lack of focus in terms of what the game should be about if you ask me. But it seems that my opinion is a minority here so I will avoid to comment further on this.

[Varakai]

It's amazing what people will complain about. It's the little things we take for granted and later appreciate. If this was there from the beginning, there would be no complaining about it and by this point, you'd have ignored it, blown it off, turned it off or simply forgot about it by now. By adding some little stuff in later, it gives people a better appreciation for things they probably wouldn't have if implemented prior. A little this Xpac a little that... in the end who cares. And if you are all "GRRRRR... it's all end game or nothing" then you are missing out on a great deal of the game and what it has to offer. Look beyond the crap to be killed, the loot and what's in it for you and you might find the enjoyment in the little shit like this.

[danielsjt]

While some may maintain it's unnecessary and unfitting to an MMO, I believe it's a nice addition. Worst case, you ignore it and go about your regular playtime activities; Best case, someone likes it and it adds to their enjoyment in the game world.

It seems to be quite optional, and should add some flavor to the game -- I'm kind of interested at how much lore they may tie into some of them.