Many of the players have noted that one of the biggest storyline disasters concerning leveling in the new expansion pack will be having to eventually travel in the past to the static outdated versions of both Outland and Northrend without any clear-cut explanation as to why or how this is happening. The explanation Blizzard seem to be using at the moment (as they did with WoTLK) is that these battles are still raging on, and from the perspective of the new characters' personal storylines characters such as Illidan, The Burning Legion or the Lich King have not been completely thwarted yet in these respective locations.
I could accept this back in the last expac, however I and many other lorehounds believe now that with Cataclysm, where places such as Eastern Plaguelands and Western Plaguelands are now growing with vegetation (in a level 45 zone!!) from the defeat of the Lich King, that it is a little too hard to swallow. In light of all this, I think there are some very simple ways Blizzard could add authenticity to what is going on without requiring much maintenance on their part. These are my suggestions:
Outland
Have it so that the actual Dark Portal is sealed after the Cataclysm. The only way to access the other side of the Portal will be through the Caverns of Time, which is simple and just as effective as going there from Blasted Lands (IMO), as we would be accessing the Outland of the past and it involves the Dragonflights who are the focus of this expansion anyway. You might say to yourself "But hold on, what about Goblins and Worgen? The Old Alliance and Horde would just accept them into the battle effort with open arms?" Well, yes, I frankly don't remember Tauren or Forsaken following Arthas into the Culling of Stratholme either whilst playing Warcraft 3, or why he and the rest of Lordaeron would co-operate with them, but the point is that this is close enough as we can get to maintaining any sort of legitimacy out of the gameworld.
In all, a very small change.
DK Starting Zone
This would only require a very slight modification to two of the final quests in the zone which I don't think would spoil the experience of this chain. Simply put, it would be exactly the same until the cutscene that plays in the Quest "The Light of Dawn!". Instead of your character joining the resistance with Darion and the rest of the Knights of the Ebon Blade, the Lich King will capture your character and strip him/her of their free will. Instead of using the Death Gate spell, your character will vanish alongside the Lich King as the other Death Knights sit there and watch.
The screen would then fade to black with something along the lines of "A Year Later...", with your (now free) character waking up in the restored Archerus where they would stand before Darion Morgraine. A quest would be toggled above his head similar to "Where the King Walks" or "The Warchief's Blessing" where Darion tells you that they managed to rescue you from the clutches of the Lich King, about the Cataclysm and how the Plaguelands are almost free of the Scourge. He would then direct you to your Alliance/Horde leader just like the other quest.
This might ruin the whole aspect of "I'm going to get revenge on the Lich King for betraying me" part of the questline, but they're going to have to explain the changes to Eastern Plaguelands anyway once you've phased out of the Battle for Light's Hope and you're meeting with Garrosh Hellscream as your faction leader instead of Thrall for that matter, so this would be a welcome change for me and again a very minor alteration in the long run.
Northrend
Now this wouldn't be a change at all, this would just be a lore explanation for what is going on: Simply put, the Cataclysm and the activity of the Black Dragonflight will instead of causing complete havoc (like Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms) have somehow temporarily dislodged Northrend from time. In other words, any ships or zeppelins that head to Northrend will end up in the past along with our player characters. Kind of lame and far fetched, I know, but it's the best i've got besides anticlimatically making it so that we go through ANOTHER PORTAL to access Northrend and ruin for example the scenary of sailing into Howling Fjord. This would also remove the cop-out of the Cataclysm conventiently not effecting Northrend and would require no changes to the terrain or the quests there whatsoever because of it.
(Yes, the above was partially inspired by Lost. Take it or leave it.)
I would post these on the Blizzard forums but my account is not currently active (and I'm from Europe anyway, do we ever get heard on those forums?), so if you like these ideas and want Blizzard to hear them feel free to repost them over there with or without credit (I couldn't care less, I just want Blizzard to implement something to fix this mess). This thread can also be used to discuss any alternative ideas you guys might have for sorting out these timeline inconsistencies, perhaps there are some better solutions for this.
Thanks for reading.