The NEW Face of Azeroth...

[Flex]

Ok, I have not read every page to see if this has been covered already, but seeing the direction of the discussion it doesn't appear to have been covered.

Key points about re-vamping Azeroth that make no sense

• Business model - Believe it or not, there are still people out there who only have Vanilla WoW or only have BC. This is why Blizzard has made very few changes to the overworld (SW harbor, the DK starting area) in the past. The revamping of Azeroth just doesn't fit the business model. If they were to revamp Azeroth, they would have to give the majority of the expansion content away for free or put up invisible walls everywhere. You would have to pretty much invalidate the content of older expansions because you would have to give Quel'thalas/dranei islands to the vanilla WoW populace and presumably give them northrend too if you mean to have a playable contiguous ocean. Even without a contiguous ocean, you're still giving away those two starting zones. The only content unique to the expansion would be stuff in the ocean itself and being able to play the new races.
  
• One giant sea (Server) connecting it all - Unless blizzard is much better at hosting than 5 years ago (which is somewhat true), you would have trouble organizing, storing, and hosting the world. Currently, EK/Kalimdor/outland(and BE/DR start zones)/northrend/instance are the five servers that make up every realm. You would have to bring everything except instances and outland onto a single server in order to have a sea connecting everything. If you planned to zone between ocean and continent, you would at minimum have to throw quel/dranei islands onto the EK and kalimdor servers respectively.
  
• Revamping...Azeroth? - If you were to revamp Azeroth you don't just revamp Azeroth, you revamp all the dungeons that take place in the over-world. Take a look at those maps which you so prominently are posting in this topic.
  
  
  • For EK, you would have to bring - Strathholme, Scholomance(or just block the balcony window), Shadowfang keep (or massively revamp it), Blackwing lair (as currently nef's balcony IS in the overworld, but your eruption would fix this), and most of all, Zul'gurub/Zul'aman! Zul'gurub exists in a non instanced form and it is possible to visit it with just slowfall. Zul'aman... the door to Zul'aman is built into a cliff with water on the backside, leaving no physical space for ZA to exist. You would have to alter the edge of Quel'thalas, making it look more like it did before BC IMHO, to make ZA a real zone. All of these places would have to become world-level content which as above would also completely kill the vanilla WoW/BC and seem to conflict with the business model. Finally, you'd have to put Stormwind into the map actually, currently it's a semi-instance that is suspended over a pit full of scenery. You only actually enter it through the doors (hence why you can end up 'under stormwind'. Add flying, and you have to make stormwind a real part of the map.
    
  • Now for Kalimdor, you would have to: First, actually put a top on Darnassus. I mean really, a giant tree with tons of other trees and towns and cities spread across the entire width and breadth of the tree midway up? How is the top of Darnassus supported? Is it a giant stump with tons of smaller trees combining to reform the canopy? Does it even have a canopy? In game world scale, isn't Darnassus like 100 times the size of the world tree too? I mean look how big that island is compared to the Hyjal zone. Darnassus would be visible from orbit and probably throw off the rotation of the planet. I am still wondering where they got the energy/matter to make a monstrosity like that. We make kalimdor flyable, and thus Hyjal accessible, you must account for these discrepancies. Next, you would need to bring at least razorfen downs and maybe the kraul into the overworld, you would definitely need to bring dire maul, zul'farrak, and orgrimmar(same as SW) into the overworld, and most glaringly... AQ20/the beginning of 40. We are talking the entire lower half of the silithus zone. If anyone here remembers pre 1.9, you could jump over the wall and explore. It is still possible to get back there with slowfall and a bit of dedication. What is left in the wake of the four or five ripups and revamps of southern Silithus is arguably the most flawed and incomplete area in the game. While vanilla content holders already have this content, you would still have to make the entire AQ20 instance an overworld part of the map along with Aq40 up to the prophet Skeram. I think some of the inhabitants, if any still live, might have something to say about you flying over.
    
  • For new content, you would have to give Glineas to the general populace to make azeroth flyable. If you did this for the alliance, you would have to do something similar for the horde, such as making undermine flyable and accessible to the general populace. Can you even imagine how much you would have to download to make this happen? While I think most WoW players have broadband/DSL, what about those who do not? Are they boned or in for a month of constant download?
  
  

I could come up with more, but I think this is enough of a Wall o' text to warrant some discussion. Please, I would love to hear everyone's opinions on this information. While I think your dreaming about how the world could be devastated is valuable and inventive, I don't think that it can be ignored in your theorizing.

tl;dr

It's gonna take a looong time to revamp the whole of azeroth, and a very complicated process, but it can be done.

[Drakivaz]

The phasing would probably not cover the entire continent. Most likely only the affected zones.

Also, it's Blizzard's engine. If they want to make phasing do that they can.

I suppose I am looking at it from more of a processes and resources angle. Yes, they can do whatever they want with their engine - I agree. However, seeing how servers perform now, running an entire world on top of another world just seems like they couldn't actually make it work. Nevertheless, that does not address the destruction of the social aspect of the game if 78-85 would have a different phase from everyone else. Also, phasing in general can wipe away some of the contradictions which I listed, but it does not answer them all - especially not the business model ones.

[ovideozn]

Any idea why i can't see any of the OP's images ? all i can see is "Bandwidth exceeded, Photobucket"

[Flex]

I suppose I am looking at it from more of a processes and resources angle. Yes, they can do whatever they want with their engine - I agree. However, seeing how servers perform now, running an entire world on top of another world just seems like they couldn't actually make it work. Nevertheless, that does not address the destruction of the social aspect of the game if 78-85 would have a different phase from everyone else. Also, phasing in general can wipe away some of the contradictions which I listed, but it does not answer them all - especially not the business model ones.

Nobody said anything about a continous world (The Sea etc). I'm thinking it will still be 5 servers + 1 phasing server with new areas.

You can still access the Vanilla zones, with no problem.

[Marla]

Any idea why i can't see any of the OP's images ? all i can see is "Bandwidth exceeded, Photobucket"

Bandwith exceeded.

[Wyshbonez]

Any idea why i can't see any of the OP's images ? all i can see is "Bandwidth exceeded, Photobucket"

Because so many ppl have looked at the pictures it exceeds the bandwidth they/he/she is allowed. Kinda obvious

[YumYum]

Ok, I have not read every page to see if this has been covered already, but seeing the direction of the discussion it doesn't appear to have been covered.

Key points about re-vamping Azeroth that make no sense

• Business model - Believe it or not, there are still people out there who only have Vanilla WoW or only have BC. This is why Blizzard has made very few changes to the overworld (SW harbor, the DK starting area) in the past. The revamping of Azeroth just doesn't fit the business model. If they were to revamp Azeroth, they would have to give the majority of the expansion content away for free or put up invisible walls everywhere. You would have to pretty much invalidate the content of older expansions because you would have to give Quel'thalas/dranei islands to the vanilla WoW populace and presumably give them northrend too if you mean to have a playable contiguous ocean. Even without a contiguous ocean, you're still giving away those two starting zones. The only content unique to the expansion would be stuff in the ocean itself and being able to play the new races.
  
• One giant sea (Server) connecting it all - Unless blizzard is much better at hosting than 5 years ago (which is somewhat true), you would have trouble organizing, storing, and hosting the world. Currently, EK/Kalimdor/outland(and BE/DR start zones)/northrend/instance are the five servers that make up every realm. You would have to bring everything except instances and outland onto a single server in order to have a sea connecting everything. If you planned to zone between ocean and continent, you would at minimum have to throw quel/dranei islands onto the EK and kalimdor servers respectively.
  
• Revamping...Azeroth? - If you were to revamp Azeroth you don't just revamp Azeroth, you revamp all the dungeons that take place in the over-world. Take a look at those maps which you so prominently are posting in this topic.
  
  
  • For EK, you would have to bring - Strathholme, Scholomance(or just block the balcony window), Shadowfang keep (or massively revamp it), Blackwing lair (as currently nef's balcony IS in the overworld, but your eruption would fix this), and most of all, Zul'gurub/Zul'aman! Zul'gurub exists in a non instanced form and it is possible to visit it with just slowfall. Zul'aman... the door to Zul'aman is built into a cliff with water on the backside, leaving no physical space for ZA to exist. You would have to alter the edge of Quel'thalas, making it look more like it did before BC IMHO, to make ZA a real zone. All of these places would have to become world-level content which as above would also completely kill the vanilla WoW/BC and seem to conflict with the business model. Finally, you'd have to put Stormwind into the map actually, currently it's a semi-instance that is suspended over a pit full of scenery. You only actually enter it through the doors (hence why you can end up 'under stormwind'. Add flying, and you have to make stormwind a real part of the map.
    
  • Now for Kalimdor, you would have to: First, actually put a top on Darnassus. I mean really, a giant tree with tons of other trees and towns and cities spread across the entire width and breadth of the tree midway up? How is the top of Darnassus supported? Is it a giant stump with tons of smaller trees combining to reform the canopy? Does it even have a canopy? In game world scale, isn't Darnassus like 100 times the size of the world tree too? I mean look how big that island is compared to the Hyjal zone. Darnassus would be visible from orbit and probably throw off the rotation of the planet. I am still wondering where they got the energy/matter to make a monstrosity like that. We make kalimdor flyable, and thus Hyjal accessible, you must account for these discrepancies. Next, you would need to bring at least razorfen downs and maybe the kraul into the overworld, you would definitely need to bring dire maul, zul'farrak, and orgrimmar(same as SW) into the overworld, and most glaringly... AQ20/the beginning of 40. We are talking the entire lower half of the silithus zone. If anyone here remembers pre 1.9, you could jump over the wall and explore. It is still possible to get back there with slowfall and a bit of dedication. What is left in the wake of the four or five ripups and revamps of southern Silithus is arguably the most flawed and incomplete area in the game. While vanilla content holders already have this content, you would still have to make the entire AQ20 instance an overworld part of the map along with Aq40 up to the prophet Skeram. I think some of the inhabitants, if any still live, might have something to say about you flying over.
    
  • For new content, you would have to give Glineas to the general populace to make azeroth flyable. If you did this for the alliance, you would have to do something similar for the horde, such as making undermine flyable and accessible to the general populace. Can you even imagine how much you would have to download to make this happen? While I think most WoW players have broadband/DSL, what about those who do not? Are they boned or in for a month of constant download?
  
  

I could come up with more, but I think this is enough of a Wall o' text to warrant some discussion. Please, I would love to hear everyone's opinions on this information. While I think your dreaming about how the world could be devastated is valuable and inventive, I don't think that it can be ignored in your theorizing.

blizzard has way more accurate numbers of WoW players with dsl and expansion packs than we have (or can guess)
and with a playerbase of 10mio+ a couple 1000 of classic raiders are mere colleteral damage.

concerning the 5 servers making one realm, why would this have to change? there can still be exhaustion, just like there is now. having one big ocean that you can travel on doesn't mean you can cross that ocean anyway you like. just put some deep blue parts where "servers end" that you cannot cross bcause of exhaustion.
or you just just get a loading screen when you cross the border, just like the plaguelands and BE starting zone connection

[ovideozn]

Any other place i can see them then ? >.>

[sweetman16]

it's not going to happen like some of you think. If i recall there was the break into SW harbor. and they did it through a patch. theres not going to be anything like the world turning dark randomly and everything flooding. it's going too happen through patch

[ovideozn]

it's not going to happen like some of you think. If i recall there was the break into SW harbor. and they did it through a patch. theres not going to be anything like the world turning dark randomly and everything flooding. it's going too happen through patch

no shit sherlock

[sweetman16]

no shit sherlock

Pretty much what im saying to them. So idk how that one back fired.

[Hothgor]

Ill try to find a new place to host the images, and update the posts to show some of the 'newer' maps that were model edited from that globe

[Drakivaz]

blizzard has way more accurate numbers of WoW players with dsl and expansion packs than we have (or can guess)
and with a playerbase of 10mio+ a couple 1000 of classic raiders are mere colleteral damage.

concerning the 5 servers making one realm, why would this have to change? there can still be exhaustion, just like there is now. having one big ocean that you can travel on doesn't mean you can cross that ocean anyway you like. just put some deep blue parts where "servers end" that you cannot cross bcause of exhaustion.
or you just just get a loading screen when you cross the border, just like the plaguelands and BE starting zone connection

That actually proves my point a bit. Loading zone or not, you'd have to have something players could see from the air - thus you would have to massively edit the terrain and in essence put the BE starting area into the vanilla world. You could always do some sort of magical shield or encircling mist so you can't see, but still it's something that shows flaws in the main theory of this topic.

Also, to other posts about the phasing server. The very nature of phasing as it is now means that something happens in the same space. A separate phasing server would be just making a clone of the world and giving it its own server.

edit:

Also, if they could do phasing rampantly, then why is the DK starting area an instance which you only exit after you finish the battle of LHC? It's not so simple

[Upptagen]

I can't see the pictures. Dunno why.

Anyone got a clue what I shall do?

[Hothgor]

I just upgraded my photobucket account to pro, pictures should now be visible again with a refresh!

[Shimata]

I can't see the pictures. Dunno why.

Photobucket exceeded bandwith.

OP please use imgshack or similar instead?

[Hothgor]

Photobucket exceeded bandwith.

OP please use imgshack or similar instead?

I upgraded to the unlimited bandwidth plan...could you check again to ensure you see them?

[Upptagen]

I see them now. And this is really cool Hothgor!
I like the whole idea much better now!

Thank You!

-Upptagen

[Kanaru]

First picture.. there is a Southrend!

You're looking at it wrong.

[Marla]

please dont quote the whole OP :P