Home Gaming Warlords of Draenor Preview: will it Draenor time?

Warlords of Draenor Preview: will it Draenor time?

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So after many PC issues and downloads I finally got into the beta for the new World of Warcraft expansion, Warlords of Draenor. I dove in to find out what the world of Draenor held for me after the surprisingly addictive experience Mists of Pandaria.

Draenor map

The biggest changes that you’ll notice if you’ve been playing WoW is the lowering of player and enemy health, the loss and gain of abilities, and of course, your own garrison, which is basically your own town that becomes quite large once it is levelled up. There are no additional classes or races, but there is the addition of Draenor, of course, which by all accounts and information is Outland of the past, before it was ripped apart. This means Shadowmoon Valley is a lush land with forests; Hellfire Peninsula is named Tanaan Jungle, and the amazingly unending drops between parts of land are now gone and replaced with water. Plus there are additional areas that we’ve never seen.

Horde Garrison

One of the main points Blizzard is trying to sell is the addition of the personal garrisons, a feature that many MMOs are now incorporating into their games. These pieces of land are all in the same place on the map depending on if you’re Alliance or Horde and are a separate “in world instance”: no one can see your garrison or your character while you’re in it. This addition reminds me of Warcraft 3 in a way; you start with your Town Hall and add a barracks, stable, etc. with your own peons doing all the building. There is also the addition of a new currency called “Garrison Supplies” which is required to build and upgrade your buildings. As you upgrade your Town Hall, your garrison changes and grows and you get more slots to add more buildings. You gain followers as you quest and you can send these followers off on quests to gain you supplies, experience, gear and gold.

Alliance garrison

The world of Draenor is really beautiful, quite large and full of quests, lore, amazingly difficult enemies and quirky characters, including one that’s apparently based on Twitter personage @angryorc1, named “Angry Zurge”. There are also the updated character models, which look so much better. This means the humans no longer look like they took a shovel to the face, and the orcs look like orcs instead of an uglier version of Shrek. Character customization is still quite limited, as it was in MoP, but the increased detail on the characters, armour and the ability to keep your helmet visible at all times means you can probably forget that your character looks like Geoff.

Draenor models

The classes have received a major overhaul with abilities being removed, locked to certain specialities or added, and some of the older players are not enjoying that. Why would they be complaining? For example, I have a level 90 Beast Mastery Hunter who has more abilities than I can get my fingers to, and I’d use most of them in any given boss fight. That same level 90 hunter in WoD has about 16 abilities, and I don’t think I’ve used 11 of them in 2 hours of play – not because I don’t want to, but because I didn’t have to. The amount of abilities my friends have been raving about in Mists of Pandaria that they’ll no longer have on their character is staggering, and I’m really going to enjoy listening to them rage about it. There is, however, one thing to be happy about though, for the first time in 3 expansions the Talent system hasn’t been totally destroyed and rebuilt.

Hunter talents 1

There are some nice little additions like getting a coloured outline on an NPC, player or enemy when you mouse over them, and a gold outline on someone that is required for a quest. They’ve added a “Bag Clean Up” which will auto sort your bag by item category, and junk in your bags now show a gold coin on them so you know it is safe to sell it. The Quest Journal has been updated to include a small map of the area with points marked for where you’ll find your quest related goodies or baddies.

Speaking of quests, Blizzard has mostly stuck to their “tried and tested” questing system: kill x amount of enemies, while collecting x amount of items from that area, or kill something to get x amount of items. This makes the whole experience feel like you’re still playing WoW, and if you’ve ever levelled multiple characters through Cataclysm or Mists of Pandaria, then you know that you’ll be limited to areas to quest through. The fact that you need to kill 30 wasps while collecting 10 flowers again, or having to kill 25 or more crocolisks to get 5 skins AGAIN, will probably put you off by the third character, or possibly the fourth one depending on your patience.

Quest tracking text 580

There is no real talk of whom the main end expansion boss will be this time, but there are many possibilities: from Grom Hellscream (Garrosh’s father) to Kil’jaeden, with the highest possibility being one of the other Warlords of the Iron Horde. We might see Kil’jaeden as a raid boss, but after Sunwell Plateau the chances of Kil’jaeden being the main boss dwindles. The Lore gives us so many possibilities, but we’ll just have to wait and see who Blizzard chooses.

While the setting and story behind Warlords of Draenor is impressive and immersive, will it bring players back to World of Warcraft? I have no idea – I know there will be many WoWaholics going back to the game and it might well bring many new players into the MMO. That said, following my time in the Beta, Warlords of Draenor didn’t grip me at level 90 or 100 and I don’t see myself going back to WoW for extended periods of time for a long time, if ever.

Last Updated: August 26, 2014

51 Comments

  1. Ottokie

    August 26, 2014 at 12:36

    Well I gave into my WOW addiction again… got the deluxe Warlords expack and waiting patiently to go kill some horde again in November 😛

    Reply

    • Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora

      August 26, 2014 at 12:36

      It’s ok man. Things will come right again. I know you can beat this. Just let it go man. Just let it go.

      Reply

      • Ottokie

        August 26, 2014 at 12:37

        Hahaha going all Frozen on me XD

        Reply

        • Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora

          August 26, 2014 at 12:39

          • Admiral Chief Assassin

            August 26, 2014 at 12:40

            Hahahaha

          • Ottokie

            August 26, 2014 at 12:40

            Thats actually pretty cool

          • Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora

            August 26, 2014 at 12:42

          • Rinceable

            August 26, 2014 at 13:00

          • ToshZA

            August 26, 2014 at 13:02

            What’s with your double posting today?

          • Rinceable

            August 26, 2014 at 13:14

            Not sure, something fucked with my computer.

          • ToshZA

            August 26, 2014 at 13:22

            Sure, blame the PC.

          • Admiral Chief Assassin

            August 26, 2014 at 13:33

            He always does

          • Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora

            August 26, 2014 at 14:09

            loooooooooool

          • Rinceable

            August 26, 2014 at 13:01

          • Alien Emperor Trevor

            August 26, 2014 at 13:03

            Same video twice in one post – automatic fail. Llew wins.

          • Admiral Chief Assassin

            August 26, 2014 at 13:07

            XD

            Rincey is doing quite a few 2x postings today…

            Getting old

          • Alien Emperor Trevor

            August 26, 2014 at 13:11

            Should go back to calling himself RinceandRepeat 😀

          • Rinceable

            August 26, 2014 at 13:13

            Getting? How dare you! I AM old! 😛 Not sure what’s happening to be honest. I was going to post it on the other comment but then stopped it, seems something a bit off happening. I still don’t get notifications too, but do for the movies site…

    • Kromas of City17

      August 26, 2014 at 14:00

      Sounds about right. Waiting myself for my boxes to arrive.

      Reply

  2. Admiral Chief Assassin

    August 26, 2014 at 12:39

    So it is not as ORCsome as they say?

    Reply

    • theseasonswither

      August 26, 2014 at 12:42

      I see what you did there…

      Reply

    • WarframedSquirrel

      August 26, 2014 at 12:48

      lol, nah, it’s not bad, really, but it just didn’t grab me like the previous expansions did. I tried every class, and didn’t enjoy a single one of them with the changes. Others love it though… *shrug*.

      Reply

  3. CGI_03

    August 26, 2014 at 12:50

    I can’t check my twitter for 2 hours. So please don’t send keys, k?

    Reply

    • Admiral Chief Assassin

      August 26, 2014 at 12:51

      OK

      Reply

      • CGI_03

        August 26, 2014 at 16:41

        I am ready. I have read every tweet on my feed today. GO GO

        Reply

  4. Travis

    August 26, 2014 at 13:24

    “The world of Draenor is really beautiful” Hmmm, it looks like crap to me, seriously I remember better graphics in games 15 years ago.

    Reply

    • WarframedSquirrel

      August 26, 2014 at 13:38

      lol, the graphics were updated with Cataclysm, then again with Mists of Pandaria, and now slightly again. This is WoW, not Farcry or Crysis, it has its own art style.

      When you get to see some of the other areas then you get to see how much effort Blizzard put into the areas.

      Reply

      • Travis

        August 26, 2014 at 13:51

        Im sorry i just dont get it, people are complaining about TESO, but it does have the graphics of a FarCry or Crysis, and I love the gameplay as well, in fact because of TESO, I have considered playing WoW as well, but I cant justify spending 3-4 times the amount of a PS4 on a PC, and then play a game that looks so old.

        Reply

        • Admiral Chief Assassin

          August 26, 2014 at 14:14

          “cant justify spending 3-4 times the amount of a PS4 on a PC”
          Doing it wrong dude, doing it totally wrong if you are spending THAT amount of cash on a PC.

          Reply

          • Travis

            August 26, 2014 at 14:18

            No Im not, why on earth would you say that, and thats direct from dealers Rectron and Pinnacle. I love my PC 🙂

          • Admiral Chief Assassin

            August 26, 2014 at 14:36

            Good. Just thought you were getting what is kind of on par with PS4 (which is low spec).

            PS FTW

          • Travis

            August 26, 2014 at 14:41

            Its the overclocking that ramps the price up, overclockable mobo is quite a lot, then the kiff chassis, water cooler, psu etc. But I see most of my games actually seem to run at 4.5ghz a lot of the time 🙂

          • Travis

            August 26, 2014 at 14:22

            Quad core overclocked to 4.5ghx, gtx 770, 16GB 2133 RAM, 500gb ssd drive, coolermaster cosmos se chassis, nepton 280 water cooler. 1080p 27 inch monitor, 3T extra drive for storage. Got windows 8.1 free from my work, they have extra licenses.
            Never happier 😉

        • WarframedSquirrel

          August 26, 2014 at 14:18

          They’re totally different games with totally different art styles… you can’t really compare TESO and WOW graphics.

          Reply

          • Travis

            August 26, 2014 at 14:19

            True.

        • Sk3tz0

          August 26, 2014 at 17:07

          thats the beauty of Wow.u dont need a powerful pc to play it.. it is why the game has survived for so long. u can play WoW on a 1mb line with low costing gfx card. and it’ll be fine for PvE game play.

          Reply

    • Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)

      August 26, 2014 at 13:53

      I don’t agree, I think Blizzard has always had a very aesthetically pleasing game, and it’s amazing to think that with its dated graphics it still showcases their excellent art design.

      Reply

      • Travis

        August 26, 2014 at 13:56

        Its cool you dont have to agree, I loved playing the original RTS warcrafts in the 90’s. I just think they could keep most of their style, but maybe use a better graphics engine.

        Reply

    • MakeItLegal

      August 26, 2014 at 13:57

      same same , tbo , a 10 year old game that looks , 10 years old , is not a 10year old game i wana play

      Reply

      • Travis

        August 26, 2014 at 13:58

        I would love Blizzard to develop a new IP MMO, with modern graphics.

        Reply

        • Travis

          August 26, 2014 at 13:59

          or new IP SP RPG.

          Reply

        • Kromas of City17

          August 26, 2014 at 13:59

          You mean Project Titan?

          Reply

          • Travis

            August 26, 2014 at 14:00

            Never heard of that, tell me more

          • Kromas of City17

            August 26, 2014 at 14:06

            Blizzards other MMO. Something about time travel etc etc. 7 years in the making and they scratched it and started from scrap.

          • Travis

            August 26, 2014 at 14:06

            I looked it up on Wikipedia, Looks like the project is not going well, rebooted or whatever they call it 🙁

        • MakeItLegal

          August 26, 2014 at 14:01

          Literally ! Or give the game a huge overhaul , up the min specs accross the board , make it wow 2.0 and let’s get on with it

          People to stuck in the past

          Reply

  5. MakeItLegal

    August 26, 2014 at 13:55

    is it just me or are the graphics 2003 / 2004 era ?

    my mate tried to show me WOW , and i was wow , those graphics look outdated , i mean even dota 2 has better graphics , and that is saying a whole lot there
    ps i love my heroin witch is Dota2

    Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      August 26, 2014 at 14:19

      It’s not all it’s cracked up to be 😉

      Reply

    • WarframedSquirrel

      August 26, 2014 at 14:21

      They’d have to create a whole new WoW to give it the “up to date” graphics.

      You have to remember it’s a 10 year old game, and they can only change so much on the engine.

      Reply

  6. Verrayne

    August 26, 2014 at 14:33

    It has been confirmed that Grom(mash) Hellscream will be the final boss of the expansion.

    Reply

  7. Sk3tz0

    August 26, 2014 at 17:10

    WHERE MY BETA KEY LG.NET!!!!!
    anybody still playing or wanna join.. I’m on Lightbringer. Allies (GUild is Overexposure Local SA guild)

    Reply

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