The Beta Post part II
The Way of the Worgen
Having levelled a Goblin through the starting zones it was time to give the new Alliance race a go. Worgen seem less impressive at first glance, they seem to get less cool/useful racials the main attraction being the ability to transform into a Human/Worgen. Even that is hardly much of an ability (you transform into a Worgen whenever you are in combat and cannot change back until out of combat).
The start zone is in stark contrast to the Goblin zone, from the very start the city of Gilneas is under attack from Worgen who seem to be everywhere. In a sense this actually set the tone for Cataclysm in a much better way than the Goblin zones did, for the world of Cataclysm is one where war is never far away. For fans of the original Warcraft I & II this is finally the world that Cataclysm delivers. That is not to say there is forced PvP, but rather that many times your quest will involve fighting mobs from the opposing faction.
I decided to level a Priest as I had recently been levelling one on Aerie Peak and it didn’t seem impossible in the quests that were given. If the Goblin zone(s) were about humour and gimmicks, then the Worgen zone is about atmosphere and storytelling. It gives some early hints that the focus is now about you the levelling character and the whole levelling process (up to level 60 at least) allows you to develop a strong sense of having shaped events. How this will work on role playing realms will be interesting. As the story unfolds through questing you learn about the people of Gilneas, they have a strange version of Hollywood English accents which some may like but for others will likely grate. One of the oft repeated expressions is ‘Get gabbing or get going!’ There is a nice mix of quest types including some which give you unique mechanics so it doesn’t feel like too much of a grind. Indeed the plot has a number of twists and turns before you reach level 12 and get transported to the old world (in this case Darnassus).
The Worgen zone(s) also showed how much work needed to be done before the expansion can be released. Some days people would get disconnected every 5-10 minutes making questing almost impossible, especially in zone that made extensive use of phasing. Questing is now a bit like reading chapters in a book, in so much as once a certain quest (or group of quests) have been completed the zone changes. This caught some people out as if they hearthed back to the start area they found themselves trapped. There are also a number of scripted events one of which resulted in my Priest being trapped in a zone entirely devoid of life. I was out of phase and in the end deleted the character, I later discovered you could get back in phase by dying. I have played through the Worgen start zones twice now (not counting the Priest) and while it mostly works there are still some issues. Unfortunately when some things are fixed other have a tendency to break, even as I write this Goblins have been unavailable (including existing characters) for a couple of weeks.
Some of the bugs really affect the game experience in a big way;
- Not being able to train skills or professions if you had more than one profession
- Secondary skills being counted as profession slots
- A number of spells not being available from trainers
- Not being able to abandon quests
- Characters becoming stuck on the loading screen because they hearthed to the ‘wrong’ place (Moonglade for example)
- Herbalist getting stuck at 75 because the next level required level 10 and 150 skill!
And these were just some of the problems I encountered, this in addition to expected bugs because it is beta. The last patch was a good step forward and recent Blue posts suggest level 83-85 content will be in the next patch. Then the talent trees etc will get a more thorough examination.
In order to test as much of the levelling content as possible I planned to create 4 main characters, one of each faction on both continents. Because some zones are not completed it means some characters are in a holding pattern.
Kalimdor is complete up to level 40, Thousand Needles is not quite ready for testing but what I have seen so far is really good. There are some very inventive uses of game mechanics to make the quests less predictable and much more fun.
Eastern Kingdoms is better on the Alliance side (I have reached level 40 there and the next few zones are all tagged as ready to test). However on the Horde side the level 20-25 zone is under construction, however it does have a quest where you get to be a quest giver.
The breakdown of characters is;
Human Warlock (Eastern Kingdoms)
Undead Rogue (Eastern Kingdoms)
Goblin Hunter (Kalimdor)
Worgen Warrior (Kalimdor)
