[spoiler] Ghostcrawler confirms ridiculous Alliance outcome in 5.4

[Verdugo]

That's like all the Gnomes shouting "Damnit! We want to see more Gnome love!" and you saying "My God... they fixed the Black Morass so you guys don't swim anymore. Are you NEVER satisfied!?"

The shittiest race of warcraft should be happy that they were not retconed out of existence yet.

[Talen]

Immersion is useless and a waste of resources if players don't have a reason to go there.

The same can be said for any zone and any area in game.

Theramore was also directly involved in the events of the scenario for which it was changed.

Other areas have changed as a result of dungeons and scenarios and raids and quests without that change being reflected in game. different?

But a patch just for doing tedious crap after the final raid of the expansion isn't likely going to be worth it for Blizzard. They aren't going to throw resources at something like that when they could spend it on the next expansion.

"Tedious" meaning doing the same stuff you 'll be doing in the new continent anyway, with the main difference being where you do it.

As it is...it could be done. It could be done in an engaging fashion. Simply writing off the stories and quests and lore that can be written as not worth it because you think the end result will be "tedious" is simply you not putting in any effort into developing new stories such as Ashenvale....the Demon remnant has succeeded in opening a portal and the area is now the centre of the demon invasion or Azshara....main focus of the Naga assault on the Night Elf territories and the front line in the efforts to hold them back.

Story is what you make it and if you require gameplay to be present to update a zone, gameplay can be provided.

As it is, a lore based victory, a few lines of quest text, a reward if a copy of the Actual treaty specifying terms and conditions and so on woudl be acceptable to many Allaicne players, Just something to sto[p them looking like a bunch of suckers.

EJL

[Dreknar20]

"Tedious" meaning doing the same stuff you 'll be doing in the new continent anyway, with the main difference being where you do it.

Which is a big difference
Part of the drive and vibe of a new expansions or even major patches is new environments and creatures

[Talen]

Which is a big difference
Part of the drive and vibe of a new expansions or even major patches is new environments and creatures

Which can be provided by changing the old areas as well.

EJL

[Aquamonkey]

The same can be said for any zone and any area in game.

Except those zones are building up for the overarching story and feed into the climactic ending, not some vanity wind-down tacked on after the climax of the expansion is over.

They didn't make a patch after DS devoted to Aggra pushing out a baby orc. Or the Aspects walking around adjusting to their mortal lives. They didn't even bother making a patch about the Earthen Ring sticking around the Maelstrom to repair it.

Other areas have changed as a result of dungeons and scenarios and raids and quests without that change being reflected in game. different?

Just keep ignoring the relevant points about the scale of the things they changed:
it was a tiny location compared to sweeping zone changes. Removing something and replacing it with an empty crater is a far cry from changing all the NPCs and architecture of a zone.

"Tedious" meaning doing the same stuff you 'll be doing in the new continent anyway, with the main difference being where you do it.

I've already posted this:
If it's phased and actually incorporated into the narrative, I don't have a problem with it. It worked alright for 5.3.

And:
That's why I've been saying that if they were to make 90+ go back to those zones to show the post-SoO outcomes, there'd have to be compelling gameplay to give us a reason to go there. Doing so takes up deveopment resouces. Something Blizzard isn't going to spend after the last raid of an expansion just for lore flavor because they would want to put those resources on the next expansion.

Unless those things overlap. Like we are sent to those areas for things happening in the next expansion and they just happen to reflect post-SoO because that is the timeframe in which they occur.

[Dreknar20]

Which can be provided by changing the old areas as well.

And old zone is still and old zone.
Which do you think Blizz and players prefer, new content in an old zone or new content in a new zone?

And there is literally zero reason to redo leveling zones again, gameplay always trumps lore for WoW.
And new content has to be dynamic, what exactly would then be making an old zone into a max content zone provide? What is its purpose? What is it supposed to lead to?

[Talen]

Except those zones are building up for the overarching story and feed into the climactic ending, not some vanity wind-down tacked on after the climax of the expansion is over.

And there's no reason why old zones can't be used for the same purpose. And what's wrong with a wind down? Closure in a story is important.

They didn't make a patch after DS devoted to Aggra pushing out a baby orc. Or the Aspects walking around adjusting to their mortal lives. They didn't even bother making a patch about the Earthen Ring sticking around the Maelstrom to repair it.

But that was mentioned in lore.

it was a tiny location compared to sweeping zone changes. Removing something and replacing it with an empty crater is a far cry from changing all the NPCs and architecture of a zone.

Depends on how you do it. A straight swap Horde NPC for Alliance NPC won't be that difficult.

That's why I've been saying that if they were to make 90+ go back to those zones to show the post-SoO outcomes, there'd have to be compelling gameplay to give us a reason to go there. Doing so takes up deveopment resouces. Something Blizzard isn't going to spend after the last raid of an expansion just for lore flavor because they would want to put those resources on the next expansion.

Which is why I've pointed out that a lore based victory would be acceptable. And pointed out that developing the zone CAN add gameplay, it CAN be tied into the next Xpac if desired and it CAN add value by providing impact and satisfaction to players.

What it can't do is fill your personal criteria if those criteria are "find any spurious reason not to do it" . It can be done in a manner relevant to the next XPac.And yes...it would take resources from other aspects. The question is whether that diversion is worth it. Whether throwing Alliance players even a small bone is worth a small investment in effort.

And old zone is still and old zone.
Which do you think Blizz and players prefer, new content in an old zone or new content in a new zone?

And there is literally zero reason to redo leveling zones again, gameplay always trumps lore for WoW.
And new content has to be dynamic, what exactly would then be making an old zone into a max content zone provide? What is its purpose? What is it supposed to lead to?

So Blizzard made a mistake with 5.3 and the Barrens then?

EJL

[Aquamonkey]

And there's no reason why old zones can't be used for the same purpose. And what's wrong with a wind down? Closure in a story is important.

Whatever patch is coming after 5.4 is the first time they're going to give a wind-down patch to show the aftermath of the climax.

But that was mentioned in lore.

And we still have no idea what actually happens at the end of SoO.

Will the other leaders give Varian flak for going over their heads in the letting the horde go with no reparations made from them
Just because we don't take ten minutes to show negotiations doesn't mean there's no reparations. (Source)

Plus there's a whole other patch after SoO for them to reveal the aftermath.

Curious, will we see Org back to normal after 5.4 such as the troll district? Be odd to see current 5.4 PTR next expac.
Most of Orgrimmar permanent changes will happen in a future patch, but before next expansion. (Source)

Depends on how you do it. A straight swap Horde NPC for Alliance NPC won't be that difficult.

And what of the actual gameplay to get players to go there to see the change?

Which is why I've pointed out that a lore based victory would be acceptable. And pointed out that developing the zone CAN add gameplay, it CAN be tied into the next Xpac if desired and it CAN add value by providing impact and satisfaction to players.

What it can't do is fill your personal criteria if those criteria are "find any spurious reason not to do it" . It can be done in a manner relevant to the next XPac.And yes...it would take resources from other aspects. The question is whether that diversion is worth it. Whether throwing Alliance players even a small bone is worth a small investment in effort.

We don't even know what the next expansion is, Blizzard does. If they though putting stuff in those zones would add to the next expansion, they would do it. We don't even know the full extent of SoO ending. People are getting their panties in a bunch over stuff that is over 6 months away from every being implemented.

[Sayomara]

"Just because we don't take ten minutes to show negotiations doesn't mean there's no reparations." Isn't this the major problem with mmo story telling when you get down to it. We spend a lot of time telling but not showing. How much better would have Cata storyline have been if we has seen more of what he was up too rather than. "Look he's evil, now go kill him." It wasn't quite that simple but wasn't far from it.

[Deleted]

Isn't this the major problem with mmo story telling when you get down to it. We spend a lot of time telling but not showing.

Sadly, I fear that the developers got way too comfortable with canalizing narratives through implied in-game messages and - above all else - World of Warcraft-related novels. I have seen a couple of instances on off-MMO-Champion sites where many players have ceased to expect any substantial movement of the world in the WoW gameplay and delegating newcomers to lore books and novels was performed as if there was no other way around it.