After the NDA on the Mists of Pandaria Press Event lifted, WoW Insider had a lot of new information about the expansion.
This was by far the most exciting news. In Mists’ final patch, we will lay siege to Orgrimmar to remove Garrosh Hellscream as Warchief. What an awesome move! I’m really curious to find out how he falls that far out of favor with the entire Horde. Some of this was planned for a while. Chris Metzen said “We always knew we would make him Warchief, but that would be a short reign. It’s not his Horde.” It would have been nice to see Hellscream hand over the leadership and take up a military position or something of that sort, but this solution works well too. The development of Varian also sounds fantastic. In the same interview, Metzen says that Varian will say something along the lines of “Protect the kids. We’re not here to conquer these people; we’re here to bring down a guy that needs bringin’ down.”
Two new battlegrounds – also great news! Temple of Power is set in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms. In it, the Horde and Alliance battle for a powerful artifact. The artifact sits in the middle of the battleground with the two factions’ graveyards on either end. When someone picks up the artifact, they start earning points for their team. However, holding the artifact also causes damage to the holder; the longer they hold it, the more damage they start taking. In addition, the farther from the center the holder runs, the less points they’ll earn for their team. This keeps them engaged. It sounds like a fun new battleground gets its inspiration from a FPS match type just like most of the other battlegrounds.
On a similar note, have you heard of payload maps in TF2? Well, tha’s what you’re getting in Silvershard Mine. The Silvershard Mine is an abandoned Venture Co. mine in Stranglethorn Vale, and the Horde and Alliance are fighting over it for resources. Standing near the mine cart moves it forward; get it to the end, and you win. In addition, enemies can flip switches to make it take a longer path. This also sounds like a lot of fun.
(Image from WoW Insider.)
The female Pandaren model was also revealed! Females can be black and white like their male counterparts or red pandas. The red pandas will have tails, too! They’re very cute!
This is particularly interesting I think. Instead of rolling against other players, you simply have a chance to win a random piece of loot usable by your spec. Quite the departure from normal loot mechanics, but a good one for the Raid Finder.
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Peter (Devee)
Kor'kron 501st 