With everyone looking forward to Cataclysm, speculation and excitement in the Warcraft forums is certainly pretty rife. Looking at what's planned it seems that Blizzard will produce the goods once again.
Leaving that aside, what concerns me is the time scale.
Ok, Cataclysm seems a long way off. Patch 3.3 has been out a while, yet the vibes we are getting from Blizzard is that there will be no major content additions between now and Cataclysm.
So, no major content added between now and the release of Cataclysm (and patch 4.0)
Looking back over the history of Warcraft updates, it follows a pretty tight pattern. Major additions in the form of "on tenth" increment patches or expansions are released every four to five months. The longest wait so far was between 2.4 and 3.0 (i.e. not including the "one hundredth" increments, they aren't generally content additions) March 2008 to October 2008. Just over five and a half months.
Now take a look at the projected release dates for Cataclysm. Forums, retailers, e-commerce sites, they all put the release at late 2010. Dates range from "Quarter 4 2010" to "Christmas 2010". Optimistically we are talking 10 months between 3.3 and Cataclysm. On average, if the speculation is anywhere near correct, we are really thinking in terms of almost a year
A whole year? I'm enjoying Icecrown as much as anyone. But a year?
The expectation in my guild is that we will have done and dusted everything the Icecrown has to offer far sooner than this. Running it again and again to get BiS for Alts and dual spec layouts? Well, there's only so often you want to do that.
What do Blizzard expect us to do in the mean time? Keep paying the subscription then sit back and twiddle our thumbs?
Definitely not, this makes no sense and will not happen. One of two things will happen between now and then.
There are two possibilities.
Patch 3.4 will come out. Probably introducing more Troll lore and getting the Worg back-story moving or...
The Cataclysm expansion will be released in early fall (autumn) no later than September.
Keep this to yourself though. Simply mentioning either of these possibilities in the Warcraft forums will get you beat down before you can touch the "reply" tab. The people who won't accept this do not understand either Blizzards financial model, or the game mechanic that is inter-reliant on it. Warcraft is a game of progression. It always has been and it always will be. Blizzard will not let it stagnate for months; it would be financial suicide for them. 9 or 10 months without new content will not happen. Period. So it's early Cataclysm, or patch 3.4.
Those are the options as I see them. Unless of course you know different - 30431
Leaving that aside, what concerns me is the time scale.
Ok, Cataclysm seems a long way off. Patch 3.3 has been out a while, yet the vibes we are getting from Blizzard is that there will be no major content additions between now and Cataclysm.
So, no major content added between now and the release of Cataclysm (and patch 4.0)
Looking back over the history of Warcraft updates, it follows a pretty tight pattern. Major additions in the form of "on tenth" increment patches or expansions are released every four to five months. The longest wait so far was between 2.4 and 3.0 (i.e. not including the "one hundredth" increments, they aren't generally content additions) March 2008 to October 2008. Just over five and a half months.
Now take a look at the projected release dates for Cataclysm. Forums, retailers, e-commerce sites, they all put the release at late 2010. Dates range from "Quarter 4 2010" to "Christmas 2010". Optimistically we are talking 10 months between 3.3 and Cataclysm. On average, if the speculation is anywhere near correct, we are really thinking in terms of almost a year
A whole year? I'm enjoying Icecrown as much as anyone. But a year?
The expectation in my guild is that we will have done and dusted everything the Icecrown has to offer far sooner than this. Running it again and again to get BiS for Alts and dual spec layouts? Well, there's only so often you want to do that.
What do Blizzard expect us to do in the mean time? Keep paying the subscription then sit back and twiddle our thumbs?
Definitely not, this makes no sense and will not happen. One of two things will happen between now and then.
There are two possibilities.
Patch 3.4 will come out. Probably introducing more Troll lore and getting the Worg back-story moving or...
The Cataclysm expansion will be released in early fall (autumn) no later than September.
Keep this to yourself though. Simply mentioning either of these possibilities in the Warcraft forums will get you beat down before you can touch the "reply" tab. The people who won't accept this do not understand either Blizzards financial model, or the game mechanic that is inter-reliant on it. Warcraft is a game of progression. It always has been and it always will be. Blizzard will not let it stagnate for months; it would be financial suicide for them. 9 or 10 months without new content will not happen. Period. So it's early Cataclysm, or patch 3.4.
Those are the options as I see them. Unless of course you know different - 30431
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