Warlords of Draenor: Remaking a World



Warlords of Draenor: Faction Zones



Warlords of Draenor FAQ
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment (Blue Tracker)
Q: What are the key features of Warlords of Draenor?
Some of the new content and features of Warlords of Draenor include:
  • Explore a Savage World: Explore the hostile world of Draenor, home of the orc and draenei races, as it once existed, and adventure in all-new zones alongside characters central to Warcraft history.
  • Build Your Garrison: Construct, command, and expand your own customizable stronghold on Draenor, and gather NPC followers to collect resources and embark on missions on your orders.
  • Instantly Upgrade to Level 90: Boost one character of your choosing to be ready to adventure on Draenor, making it easier than ever to enjoy the latest content alongside your friends.
  • New Player Character Art: Character models and animations for many of World of Warcraft’s existing playable races are being fully revamped in keeping with the game’s iconically epic style.
  • Adventure to Level 100: Reach new heights of power and unlock bonuses to further enhance your abilities on your way to the new level cap of 100.
  • …And More: Take on a wide array of Dungeons, Raids, Scenarios, Battlegrounds, Challenge Modes, and more—no matter what kind of content you enjoy, new adventures await.

Q: How does the Garrison work? What kinds of followers and upgrades are available?
To establish a foothold on Draenor and bolster your faction’s defenses against the formidable Iron Horde, each player will need to build and manage their own Garrison, a customizable fortress that serves as your personal base of operations throughout the course of the expansion. As you complete quests and win allies to your cause, your Garrison will expand and you’ll be able to choose which upgrades you’d like to construct from a variety of options. You’ll also meet and recruit NPC allies and followers who will join you at the Garrison, each providing different benefits.

For example, a miner rescued from a dungeon might take up residence and help gather Mining resources. A heroic warrior you quarter might embark upon quests at your command, with a chance to return with valuable treasures. Other characters might provide you with quests that expand upon their own stories or lead you to valuable assets in your campaign.

When it comes time to upgrade your Garrison, you might choose to build a Barracks to send more followers on missions simultaneously, an Inn to provide new recruits, or an Infirmary to speed up injured followers’ recovery time between assignments. You may instead decide to build a Smithy and recruit a Blacksmith to research new plans and craft valuable resources (such as those with daily cooldowns). You’ll also be able to invite friends to visit your Garrison to trade resources and see how your home base stacks up against their own.

Q: What new zones will I explore on Draenor?
The expansion sends players to Draenor as it existed before it shattered into the realm World of Warcraft players know as Outland—and while some of the names of these places might be familiar, we’re building them all from scratch for the expansion.
Here’s a breakdown of Draenor’s zones:
  • Frostfire Ridge: Across snow-covered wastes and beneath towering volcanoes, heroes of the Frostwolf clan and the Horde unite to repel invaders from their homeland.
  • Shadowmoon Valley: Amid rolling moonlit hills, the draenei at the holy temple of Karabor unite with the Alliance in a desperate fight for survival against the Iron Horde and Shadowmoon clan.
  • Gorgrond: Deep within the desert canyons of Gorgrond, an arsenal of massive siege weapons built by the Blackrock clan is about to be unleashed upon the whole of Draenor.
  • Talador: In the shadow of a besieged Shattrath City, the Auchenai Soulpriests actively seek to safeguard the countless draenei souls inside Auchindoun from a terrible demonic threat.
  • Spires of Arak: At the height of their power, the regal arrakoa plot atop their high peaks, well out of the reach of the brutal Shattered Hand orcs and the wingless outcasts below.
  • Nagrand: Among the fertile hills and outcroppings of Nagrand, the bloodied wolf-riders of the Warsong clan remain a threat not to be trifled with.
  • Tanaan Jungle: Within the overgrown jungle home of the Bleeding Hollow clan, a Dark Portal is under construction . . . and an Iron Horde army makes grim preparations to conquer Azeroth.

Q: Why are you giving everyone a level-90 character boost?
World of Warcraft is constantly evolving, and these days players engage with the game in a wider variety of ways than ever. Some enjoy the process of exploring the world and leveling up. Others enjoy the challenge of raiding. Many simply enjoy playing with their friends, wherever they may be. One of our primary goals with Warlords of Draenor is to empower WoW players to quickly and easily be able to participate in the content they’re most interested in, and giving everyone a level-90 character upgrade right out of the gate helps make that possible.

One common piece of feedback we’ve received from new players and those who’ve taken an extended break from the game is that World of Warcraft requires a significant time investment before they’re able to “catch up” and play with high-level friends. Design changes such as speeding up the leveling curve and features like the popular Scroll of Resurrection and Recruit-a-Friend system have proven very popular, but the issues’s only getting more challenging with each patch and expansion we release. By giving players the option to boost a character to be ready for the latest expansion content, we hope to remove some of these entry barriers and make it so anyone can pick up and enjoy Warlords of Draenor right away, no matter how much World of Warcraft they’ve played in the past.

Q: It’s been a while since I’ve played WoW—will I know what to do with a level-90 character?
At the start of the new expansion, players will be thrust into an exciting introductory experience involving a desperate strike against the orc forces on Draenor. During this opening sequence, new and returning players will have an opportunity to get up to speed on the game before diving into their faction’s starting zone content—similar to the Death Knight starting experience in Wrath of the Lich King. We’ve also recently added features such as Proving Grounds, which help players learn how to tank, heal, and deal damage in dungeons in a solo “teaching” environment, to help ease the learning curve and prepare players for battle as quickly, efficiently, and enjoyably as possible.

Q: How will the included level-90 character upgrade work?
In regions where players purchase World of Warcraft expansions, each World of Warcraft account that you upgrade to the Warlords of Draenor expansion will receive one level-90 character boost (to be used once the expansion releases). You don’t need to decide which character to boost immediately. You can also create a level-1 character from scratch and then use the upgrade on that if you wish. The boosted character will also receive a level-appropriate set of gear (along with some other assistance) to make sure you’re set for adventuring. We’ll have more details to share as development continues.
For regions where players do not purchase expansions (including China, Korea, and Taiwan), we’ll have more information to share on our plans in the future. In the meantime, our goal for all regions remains the same—to give players a way to get straight to the action in Draenor.

Q: Why revisit the player races’ art now? Will I recognize myself in the mirror?
As we’ve released new World of Warcraft content and expansions, we’ve received feedback that some of the earlier player character models and animations are no longer measuring up to the quality of the newer races. Because Warlords of Draenor takes players back to the homeland of the Orcs—one of WoW’s original playable races—it felt like a great time to update not just the Orcs, but other playable races that could use a refresh.
We know that many of you already strongly identify with the look of your current character, so we’re dedicating a lot of time and resources to make sure these updates capture each race’s iconic identity and personality. We’re still in the process of determining which races will be available upon the expansion’s release, but our goal is to update all eight of the original World of Warcraft playable races, along with the Draenei and Blood Elves, over the course of the expansion launch and subsequent content updates.

Q: What kinds of bonuses will my character earn on the journey from level 90 to 100?
Warlords of Draenor introduces a new bonus system that rewards players with powerful perks as they level up to the new cap. At every level from 91 to 100, characters will earn a major permanent boost to one of their their key spells and abilities (e.g. a Fire Mage might earn a +50% damage boost to Pyroblast or +30% boost to Scorch). Players will also unlock a new talent tier once they’ve achieved level 100, rewarding each class with three potent new abilities to choose from.

Q: What are the plans for new Dungeons, Scenarios, and Raids?
We’re planning 6 new 5-player dungeons for the launch of Warlords of Draenor, along with a revamped version of the classic Blackrock Spire. One of our goals is to make sure we’re giving players a good mix of “level-up” Dungeons along with some new, unexplored Dungeons to delve into at max level. The expansion will also give players a chance to earn awesome transmogrifiable weapons and other unique rewards in Challenge Mode Dungeons. We’re also planning a wide variety of Scenarios for launch, along with Heroic Scenarios for those who enjoy the extra challenge.

On the Raiding front, we’re planning 2 new raid instances around launch, as well as new world bosses. We’ll also continue to provide players with a wide variety of raiding options. In addition to offering four tiers of difficulty as in Patch 5.4, we're also extending our Flexible Raid scaling technology to Normal difficulty raiding. We’ll have more details to share as development continues.

Q: What challenges await in the world of PvP?
Warlords of Draenor will feature a new world PvP zone that hurls Horde and Alliance players into an epic conflict fighting for control of strategic fortresses on Draenor. This new area will be seamlessly instanced, with the goal of providing better performance and a more balanced PvP experience than was possible in WoW’s earlier world PvP zones. We’re also planning several major PvP-related UI improvements, including updates to help you track and communicate with your team about objectives in Battlegrounds, along with enhancements to Arena and Rated Battleground enemy unit frames designed to relay key information more clearly.

Q: What’s in store for professions?
One of our goals in Warlords of Draenor is to make each of the game’s existing Professions more engaging and integrated into the gameplay. To that end, the Garrison will play a major role in your character’s Professions in this expansion—similar to how your farm was key to the Cooking profession in Mists of Pandaria, only on a much more epic scale.

Q: What can players expect while questing in Draenor?
We received a lot of feedback over the course of Mists of Pandaria about what kinds of quests and world PvE content players enjoy most, and we’re continuing to evolve the questing experience in Warlords of Draenor with that in mind. Our goal is to give players a wide variety of fun and unexpected activities, ranging from the kinds of quests they’re familiar with to new experiences along the lines of the exploration- and event-driven Timeless Isle introduced in Patch 5.4: The Siege of Orgrimmar.

Q: Will you be making any changes to what Stats are available?
One of our goals for Warlords of Draenor is to make the act of finding and collecting loot even more exciting for players. With that in mind, we’re adding some fun new stats to gear, such as Movement Speed and Cleave, which gives you a chance to do extra damage or healing to additional nearby targets. In addition, we’ll be retiring a few stats that players don’t find very enjoyable to manage, such as Hit and Expertise. We’re also making improvements to armor itemization that will make it easier to share armor pieces across classes. We’ll have more details to share as development continues.

Q: Will there be any updates to the graphics and changes to the minimum system requirements?
Yes—we’re planning a number of tweaks and improvements to the graphics engine in this expansion, including some updates related to the upgraded player characters and the introduction of the Garrison. We’re also looking into updating other existing systems with an eye toward improving graphical quality and performance. We’ll announce the exact system requirements closer to the expansion’s release.

Heroes of the Storm Cinematic Trailer



Heroes of the Storm Gameplay Sneak Peek



Heroes of the Storm Developer Interview

This article was originally published in forum thread: Warlords of Draenor FAQ and Videos, Heroes of the Storm Videos started by chaud View original post
Comments 31 Comments
  1. Beret's Avatar
    I'm not sure how I feel about this..
  1. Terminal Lance's Avatar
    That HotS trailer doe...
  1. medievalman1's Avatar
    So how will this garrison work with multiple characters? I'm assuming its a BoA thing, (I'm an altaholic but would rather not have to build it up on every character to reap the rewards accordingly)...
  1. mmoc768010fc85's Avatar
    Heroes of the Storm is so gonna pawn Dota2.
  1. Matchles's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by medievalman1 View Post
    So how will this garrison work with multiple characters? I'm assuming its a BoA thing, (I'm an altaholic but would rather not have to build it up on every character to reap the rewards accordingly)...
    Since it sounds like you can build it in a number of different places, I'd probably prefer not to have it account bound. I'd like to try building it up in a number of different ways.
  1. Neurodrill's Avatar
    No new playable races? They already half-assed it sharing pandas.
  1. Zaries's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Neurodrill View Post
    No new playable races? They already half-assed it sharing pandas.
    We don't need another race or class. We need an expansion with real story depth. I hope this delivers.
  1. Duster505's Avatar
    Absolutly Crap expasion what I have heard so far.

    The worst part tho.. is that it seems like they are putting ZERO effort into 5.5 so ppl are talking about AT LEAST 8 months of nothingness on live servers. Thats total and utter disgrace and shows HOW LITTLE Blizzard has learned from Cataclysm where they let their severs die and put ZERO effort on paying loyal consumers.
  1. BarelyLegalBear's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Neurodrill View Post
    No new playable races? They already half-assed it sharing pandas.
    Quit whining, this helps this focus on making better content for the players. Same reason i'm kind of glad there are no new classes, that would require more balancing and such. That makes people complain, instead blizz is being smart and they are going to focus on the current classes and also make them better.

    Other than that, i AM EXTREMELY STOKED FOR THE EXPANSION!!!! Looks very cool and the ZONES are not REHASHED! They are being built from scratch guys so stop with the "its going to be the same thing again". Its not going to and i am really looking forward to this.
  1. Duster505's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by stevo5566 View Post
    Quit whining, this helps this focus on making better content for the players. Same reason i'm kind of glad there are no new classes, that would require more balancing and such. That makes people complain, instead blizz is being smart and they are going to focus on the current classes and also make them better.

    Other than that, i AM EXTREMELY STOKED FOR THE EXPANSION!!!! Looks very cool and the ZONES are not REHASHED! They are being built from scratch guys so stop with the "its going to be the same thing again". Its not going to and i am really looking forward to this.
    Better content? You know this is Cataclysm version of The Burning Crusade right ? Now only longer since its 10 levels.... not 5. But the land mass is tiny.
  1. Notos's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Duster505 View Post
    Absolutly Crap expasion what I have heard so far.

    The worst part tho.. is that it seems like they are putting ZERO effort into 5.5 so ppl are talking about AT LEAST 8 months of nothingness on live servers. Thats total and utter disgrace and shows HOW LITTLE Blizzard has learned from Cataclysm where they let their severs die and put ZERO effort on paying loyal consumers.
    Relax man, nobody takes your posts seriously anymore anyways...if they ever did.

    OT: I just had a double nerdgasm from the HotS trailers.
  1. iceberg265's Avatar
    Heroes of the Storm trailer was cheesy as fuck
  1. phred754's Avatar
    Another click to move MOBA, just what the world needed. I was really hoping it would be third person like Smite. Absolutely no interest in in now.
  1. Zannypants's Avatar
    New character models, prepare to mourn for your once loved character animations.
  1. thedogmode's Avatar
    this expansion is not a time travel expansion? ummm really blizzard? you make the players go back to a world that doesn't exist in the present timeline anymore and you say its NOT about time travel?
  1. RumlyD's Avatar
    I liked everything I saw on the WoW panels, except for the insta 90 thing, not sure how I feel about that. I thought that what was shown of the new player characters was amazing; they managed to give them some amazing fidelity but keep the same over all look, gotta give them credit for that. I honestly don't mind if there's no new classes or races because it means they've finally been able to get to some other stuff that people have been asking for for years and years. Also, Trial of the Gladiator and the world PvP zone sound promising.
  1. Dundebuns's Avatar
    Is it me or is Kaeo Milker fit as f*ck?
  1. Pandorox's Avatar
    That HoTS trailer made me fill like a little kid discovering videogames for the first time again.
  1. Sekar's Avatar
    I'm looking forward to some parts, like the Build Your Garrison.

    It is curious, though, that instant level 1->90 boosts will be given out, when even as extreme an alternative change as a 50% or 75% experience-required-per-level reduction would reduce the mess of just dropping all level 90 abilities and expectations on inexperienced newbies at once. Death Knights at least required a player to have leveled *some* character to level 55 first.

    The limit of one 1->90 boost per account isn't solid if anyone can permissibly (no ban risk) buy multiple account keys; get a level 90 for each class they would ever plan to play; and then do paid character transfer all to the same account, so as to afterwards only pay for one monthly subscription. Fewer players would spend long leveling up alt after alt.

    Like many other MMORPG designers who have made leveling super short in an attempt to make players happy, they're in for a heck of a surprise. Do simple /who searches on random samples on any typical WoW realm: Contrary to the composition of hardcore raiders disproportionately seen in customer feedback, only at most half or fewer of characters online at a time are max level ... *because not all but most players (in about any MMORPG, even WoW) don't actually keep playing a character for very long after reaching max level.*

    Most who would have spent X hundred hours leveling, looking forward to new abilities and new non-instanced huge zones all that time, then played for Y hundred hours at max level won't actually play for as long as (X+Y) hundred hours if given a level 1->90 jump with a mouseclick. They will also feel less invested in and attached to their characters.

    A level 1->90 jump is a bit like handing out cheat codes at the start of a game: fun initially but not optimal for total playtime. I hope Blizzard doesn't end up with a lot more revenue decline in the long term because of this.

    Games like Guild Wars 2 (even despite its high ratings in initial play) and Diablo 3 have had 90+% of players feel done with the game and quit within a few weeks after release. The average lifetime playtime per WoW user and the number of active subscriptions at a time are likely to drop drastically and mostly permanently after the expansion's 1->90 boost system is several months old, probably not that quite much but still likely by tens of percent on average (if not halving).

    Unfortunately a bunch of players will get a level 90 set of abilities without a single hour of prior play, then complain about such seeming challenging. Such appears likely to reach a receptive ear in the developers (already worried about more than a small fraction of keys on 101-key keyboards being used in combat keybindings), but such is sad, from the perspective of someone like me who would rather not see the game dumbed down in the future from that feedback.

    After TBC (which was the high point of WoW's success since the record number of expansion box sales at WoTLK release was really based on TBC-built perceptions), WoW developers have focused more and more upon trying to make the game not too hard, from "ability bloat" concern to making early leveling easier and easier, but I suspect they are overemphasizing some skewed source of perceptions (like Friends & Family Alpha test relatives who don't ordinarily play computer games), for more people actually quit because of play being so easy as to be boring (outside of PvP and the hardest group PvE content).
  1. Tenjen's Avatar
    the DOTA and LOL communities are toxic as hell. You think the WoW community is bad? we are lamb chops play along compared to how toxic they are.

    I for one look forward to a brawler game that has our community in it.

Site Navigation