World of Warcraft News and Raiding Strategies

Delve into the mysteries of Azshara with game designers Craig Amai and Dave Kosak, who talked with us about the Horde's northward expansion and the rise of the Bilgewater Cartel as part of our ongoing coverage of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm. Adventure, conflict, and, of course, profit await those who enter the newly re-imagined Azshara!

Q. What was the original concept for the zone?

A. Azshara has always been somewhat barren in terms of content, so our original plan was simply to fill in most of the unused space and then take some of the quests that spanned multiple zones and move them completely over to Azshara. The zone itself was a bit of a blank slate, so this approach seemed obvious from the very beginning.

While discussing our goals for the overall flow for Kalimdor, we started to heavily consider when, where, and how goblins would be introduced to questing on the continent. We realized that we were in sort of a dilemma because, at that point, four out of six Horde races were being routed through the same 10–20 leveling experience in the Northern Barrens. It was only then that we decided to retrofit Azshara as an alternative zone for level 10 through 20 Horde characters and make it a goblin hub.

Naturally, once goblins got involved, things sort of exploded.

Q. Who will be using this zone (what levels/factions)?

A. Azshara is designed for level 10 through 20 Horde characters. Goblins will be encouraged to level in this particular zone because it expands on their story and sheds some additional light on already established characters. Orcs, trolls, and tauren will be able to choose between Azshara and the Northern Barrens, based on their personal preference. (Hint: Pick Azshara!)

Q. Without giving up any spoilers, what's the general storyline for this zone? How has it changed from the original design?

A. Having recently gained the mantle of warchief, Garrosh Hellscream is preparing for war to claim all of Kalimdor for the Horde. The goblins of the Bilgewater Cartel, headquartered in Bilgewater Harbor, are playing their part by building war machines, constructing weapons, and establishing a massive naval harbor within sight of Orgrimmar. Meanwhile, the night elves aren't content to sit idly by; they fully intend to challenge this unwelcome occupation in Azshara and hopefully stymie a conflict that would otherwise be carried deep into their forests.

Amid all this tension, the Bilgewater Cartel is also out to make a name for itself in true goblin fashion. What is the best way to show solidarity? Reshape the Bay of Storms into a giant Horde symbol! From there, a secret lab, an extensive rocketway, and a "pleasure palace" with its own golf course are just natural leaps in goblin logic.

Overall, players will find that very little remains of the Azshara of old. The Hydraxian Warlords have departed. Azuregos is missing. Xylem's tower still stands, but Xylem himself seems to have stumbled upon something that has quickly driven him insane. And while clumsy explorers continue to be eaten by the local giant-life, the goblins have developed a method to make such an unfortunate circumstance practical and, yes, profitable.

Q. How has Orgrimmar's relentless expansion altered the lands of Azshara?

A. Orgrimmar now has a massive gate leading north into Azshara, and the canyon that winds into this gate will give players a brief look at the war machines being wrought from goblin ingenuity and technology. The rest of the zone expands further on this promise of destruction. The middle of Azshara includes the new Bilgewater Harbor, which acts as a naval port for the entire Orgrimmar fleet, launching boats and zeppelins to carry out Garrosh's vision for the future of Kalimdor and beyond.

Q. What have the goblins of the Bilgewater Cartel, now aligned with the Horde, done to reshape Azshara in their (or Trade Prince Gallywix's) image?

A. A quick glance at recent cartographical surveys of the region will show that the goblin commitment to the Horde cause is strong. Azshara is now the largest terraforming project on Azeroth! Whether it's sculpting the terrain to promote Horde propaganda, moving an entire mountain to pillage the minerals underneath, or slapping the face of the trade prince on a nearby crag, there's no question who wears the pants in Azshara these days.

Q. What do you think is the most exciting new addition to the zone?

A. Well, there are super-intelligent raptors, a haunted bulldozer, a crack squad of goblin commandos, a hunt for Azuregos, an insane mage with countless apprentices, rat riding, parachuting from an exploding tower...

What if we just say that the most exciting new addition to Azshara is the entire zone?

Q. You mentioned earlier that Azuregos is missing, but now he's being hunted. What's going on there?

A. Strangely, Azuregos has disappeared, and no one seems to know where he flew off to. After that last group of bloodthirsty adventurers came through on some sort of quest to make a now-useless quiver, he's just been... well, he's gone, and there have been whisperings of someone in Bilgewater Harbor who will pay handsomely for information on his whereabouts.

Q. What goes into redesigning a zone like this?

A. We wanted to maintain the original color palette and fall-foliage theme for Azshara, but beyond that, it was a complete rework from the ground up. Artists began the process by creating some incredible landmarks, including a giant cannon centerpiece for the new city and an entire "pleasure palace" complete with the goblin equivalent of Mount Rushmore, which just oozed goblin flavor. Level designers then reshaped the environment, literally moving mountains, parting waters, and erecting a colossal, zone-encompassing rocket freeway. We then worked to complement the new scenery by adding a bizarre array of quests befitting the unique and crazy capitalistic culture of the Bilgewater Cartel.

Q. What was the most challenging aspect about implementing all of these changes?

A. Not using our new terrain phasing technology to blow up everything. Self-restraint doesn't come easy.

Q. What should players do or go see first?

A. Players should ideally start at the beginning, near the rear gate of Orgrimmar, and then follow the quest series from there; it'll lead you on a nice, smooth ride of awesome. Or, if you're the impatient type, head straight to Bilgewater Harbor, take a stroll through town, and grab some lunch at the local crustacean shack.

Q. So, last question. Bilgewater Harbor: great port town or the greatest port town?

A. From its roots as a humble "city-in-a-box" to the bustling metropolis it is today, Bilgewater Harbor straddles the line between myth and legend. At least, that's what the brochure says.

The orc commanders might argue differently, though. It isn't exactly easy to maintain discipline in an otherwise lawless city where every vice you can imagine is available for just a handful of silver and debauchery is half off.

Thank you, Craig and Dave, for taking the time to sit down and speak with us about the work you've done to revitalize Azshara as an epic leveling zone in World of Warcraft: Cataclysm!

"Death will rise from the tide!" Level 80 Elite Tauren Chieftain once warned -- and at BlizzCon 2010, the band's dire musical prophecy will finally come to pass. Everyone who attends this year's BlizzCon or purchases the BlizzCon Virtual Ticket will receive an exclusive set of murlocalyptic in-game items for World of Warcraft and StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty. World of Warcraft players will be joined by Deathy, a murloc companion decked out as Deathwing and doing his best to strike fear into the hearts of Azeroth's crustacean population. You'll also be able to display your tidal pride in StarCraft II with a Murloc Marine character portrait and a pair of deep-sea decals to emblazon on your units, each with a different terran, protoss, and zerg design.

BlizzCon 2010 takes place on October 22 and 23 at the Anaheim Convention Center. For further details or to order the BlizzCon Virtual Ticket, visit www.BlizzCon.com.

Hunter (Forums / 3.3.5 Talent Calculator / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Volley removed
I know I'm going to regret posting in this thread again, but I think it's the right thing to do so I'll take one for the team.

We think Multi-Shot is a more interesting ability and can fill the hunter AE niche (along with Explosive Trap). We'll have to change Multi-Shot from the current version to get it there. I'm very sorry if for some unusual reason Volley was your favorite spell as a hunter. We've been trying to consolidate abilities and free up some bar space and having multiple AEs that competed with each other seems like a good area to hit up. The Volley and Multi-Shot niches were very similar, which resulted in the latter being dead. We wanted to pick one and we though Multi-Shot felt more huntery and less "clunky" (to use a favorite Wow forums term).

Do consider that you won't be AE'ing yourselves through Cataclysm content the way you do currently. When you do need to AE, hunters will have the tools to do so. In situations where you do have to AE, you are probably not also trying to CC. When you're back to the level of trivializing lower level content, nobody is going to say "Don't bring a hunter. Their AE spam isn't spammy enough." We don't consider easily breaking rogues out of stealth a good reason to keep Volley around.

I think that hits most of the reasonable concerns. I care much less about addressing the unreasonable ones.

As always, those of you whose sole contribution is to post very inane or derogatory things will be banned.

Man, have we come a long way from "AE is only for trash." (Source)

Paladin (Forums / 3.3.5 Talent Calculator / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
One Man Army
Yes. Many of the problems we've had with Ret are of the "one man army" category, where a paladin can do a lot of damage, then go defensive and heal themselves up. We love the kit of the paladin who can heal as well as do damage, but it needs to be tightly controlled. Word of Glory gives us that control. We have the room to make the spell really powerful because we know its on a tight cooldown and you sacrifice dps to use it. We can't do that today with say Flash of Light, because once you can cast one strong FoL, you can cast a bunch of them until you go OOM (at which point you Judge or Divine Plea, and you're going again). Similarly, we can make Selfless Healer nearly overpowered because you can't use it on yourself and because even with it you're not going to out compete a Holy paladin in healing. If you can occasionally contribute to group healing in tight spots, then that's great. That's some utility you can provide. (Note: Don't oversell this as "I'll get brought to raids because of my healing.") (Source)

Class balance and RNG
That's the wrong view to take though. The equivalent would be "I'm balanced around getting a crit every swing, so when that doesn't happen, RNG screws me." You get a Templar's Verdict every 3 Crusader Strikes. Sometimes you get lucky and need fewer. You of course need to pay attention for when that happens and be able to react to it and alter your immediate plans. That right there is the element we think is most missing from today's Ret paladin. (Source)

Words of Glory
The amount it heals is most definitely balanced around how good it will be for Holy.
Those numbers don't have to be the same though. The new talent tree design affords us a lot more flexibility in that regard. Part of the reason Word of Glory is so useful to Holy is because it costs no mana. Ret doesn't really care about mana, because it comes and goes easily, but a Ret generally won't be able to sit there and queue up several Holy Lights in a row. They will be able to sometimes use a Word of Glory though. (Source)