Wrath Of The Lich King - Much Info in 1 place

[hutchkitch]

Hello All,

I have been diggin about various forums and found all this info about WotLK.

I know bits and peices have been posted and speculated on since the big announcement but I saw this and found it to be a real interesting read, alot of info in one place.

I have searched for similar but haven't found any, so apologies in advance, I just wanted to share

Apart from the above and this.... and this........... a-and this.... I did not write any of the below - it is just a copy n paste job from the wowhead forums Wrath of the Lich King - General - Wowhead Forums I am not taking the credit!................. and this




As we all know by now, the Wrath of the Lich King is, indeed, the title of the next expansion. Blizzard's official page is here: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/wrath/

1. New Zone: Northrend
* This area will have two points of entry - Borean Tundra and Howling Fjord. Much like Shat is the 'home
city' for Outland, Dalaran is the 'home city' for this area.

* Dalaran will be a floating city, able to be accessed via land and flying mounts.]It will be moved, leaving a gap behind. NPCs will be left to explain the move - the KirinTor is at war with the Blue Dragonflight. It will be a neutral city, but with no trainers or auction houses. There will be portals, like Shat.

* Flying mounts will be usable, but not "for the initial levels"; Current plans are to unlock the flying mount again (in Northrend, Outland it will stay the same as always) around max level (L78-80).

* Northrend, I believe, has ten areas within it:
- Azjol-Nerub (L74-7
- Borean Tundra (L68-72): It is the home of the Tuskarr. The Horde town is Warsong Hold and Alliance will be Justice Keep. The Naga are up to no good by melting the icecaps. Not to forget the Taunka are lurking in this zone. This zone has both a Horde and Alliance entry point (along with a village).
- Grizzly Hills (L74-76): The Furbolgs live in the forest. The Venture Company is also cutting down the forest of Grizzly Hills. There also seems to be an ancient Dwarven City called Thor Modan. Most of the zone will be covered with trees instead of snow.
- Howling Fjord (L68-72): It will hold the Daggercap Bay (a narrow canyon). Past the canyon you will find the town of Valgarde. The town is under constant invasions of evil Dragonflayers. The ancient Vrykul can be found in their instance Utgarde Keep.
- Icecrown Glacier (78-80)
- Lake Wintergrasp (see 2)
- Sholazar Basin (L75-7
- The Dragonblight (L71-75): The home of Wyrmrest Temple, the ancient meeting place where dragons go to die.
- The Storm Peaks (L77-80)
- Zul'Drak (L73-76)

* Screenshot links: http://www.wowinsider.com/photos/wrath-of-the-lich-king/
http://www.wowinsider.com/photos/wrath-of-the-lich-king-concept-art/

2. Lake Wintergrasp
* An outdoor region devoted entirely to PvP. Within this region siege engines will be available, as well
as in the new battleground (name unreleased). There is speculation that siege engines will be
available in all battlegrounds, but clarification is needed.
* Siege engines will be able to destroy destructible buildings.
* Siege engines are meant to be player controlled - emphasis on mobility and aiming!
* The new battleground will be a 15-man area.

3. New Class: Death Knight
A. This is a Hero Class, the first of more to come (though, not necessarily in this expansion - the plan, for now, is for a new hero class each expansion)
* In order to unlock this class, a character much reach somewhere between levels 55 - 70 and complete a quest similar in difficulty to the warlock mount quest - no raiding is required.
* Upon obtaining the Death Knight, it will not take the place of an existing character - it will be a new
character
* Death Knights will start at a higher level than normal - somewhere between 55 and 70.
* They have said that there will be no new character slots added at this point. So, if your realm is full to the brim of alts, you have to delete one of them in order to create the Death Knight.

B. DKs will be a plate wearing tank/dps hybrid, able to use caster and melee abilities
* They can use 2h swords or dual wield - no shields
* The intent is to have the class available for both factions (race determination has not been finalized)
* They will have their own mount
* They will have their own talent trees, and will be able to have some sort of summoning abilities (undead)
* The Death Knight will have its own itemization as well as share the appropriate items.
* They have their own, unique energy system.

C. The new energy system for Death Knights is focused around the use of runes, rather than mana or energy. The runes fall into three categories - blood (damage-oriented), frost (control-oriented), and unholy (utility and DOT mechanics).
* The runes can be combined in different ways, then etched onto the Death Knight's weapon. The energy of the runes is depleted when an ability is used, and not available until the cool down has expired.
* Possible new spells include: Army of the Dead (summons minions)
- Unholy Embrace: Instant Cast. 5 min cooldown.
Target is embraced by a silhouette of darkness for 6 seconds, corrupting any healing spells and effects cast upon or currently affecting the target to cause damage for 50% of their healing potential instead of restoring health. Any damage shields cast upon or currently affecting the target will also be instantly consumed, dealing 50% of their absorption potential in damage. Once afflicted with Unholy Embrace, the target cannot be afflicted with Unholy Embrace again for 1 minute.
- Death and Decay (AoE)

4. General Information:
* Level cap will be raised to 80, professions to 450
* New talents and extending of trees for all classes
* Character customization includes - haircuts and new dances
* New profession: Inscribing - able to modify existing spells and abilities
* At this time there is no plan for new playable races
* Arena: A new Arena season (season 3), Arena map as well as new Arena items are on the way. Blizzard is thinking about capping season 3 items for a minimum rating though. For example you would need a rating of 1900 to be able to buy specific items. Note: Season 3 is coming out either with or soon after 2.3. The release of the map and new items is uncertain, but presumed to be the same...
* There will be a closed beta for the expansion
* First impressions of Howling Fjord and Utgarde

5. Other news:
* There will be a new raid encounter added before the expansion with 6 new raid bosses (see 7B)
* There are some changes in the works for the UI along the lines of Outfitter and Item Rack
* Possible addition of a threat meter to the game
* Toying around with the possibility of enabling non-raiders and casual raiders to see end-game content (like Naxx)
* More honor will be gained at the end of BGs
* The Ashbringer storyline will be continued.
* There will be a world event as the Lich King moves against the Horde and Alliance. No other info is known yet.

6. New Items
* Fresh Glacier Water (9180 mana over 30 seconds)
* Crusty Flatbread (7800 health over 30 seconds)
* Frostweave

7. New Dungeons
* Grizzlemaw (Furbolg dungeon)

* New Caverns of Time instance (The new Caverns of Time instance will take you back to Warcraft 3 Stratholme. You will fight with Arthas (not against) to burn houses in Stratholme in an effort to “cleanse” the village from the Undead (or soon to be Undead). It has also been said we’ll see more what the Bronze Dragon flight is up to. The lore angle of this instance is that you will meet Arthas when he was still good yet here you are burning houses. Caverns of Time Stratholme will be a five-player level 80 instance. Mal'ganis will be the final boss of this instance.)

* Utgarde Keep (5 player level 70 dungeon, inhabited by the Vrykul)
* Dalaran instances (no other info)
* Naxxramas - see the end of this section below

* Nexus (Nexus will be a winged dungeon. One wing will be a 5-man level 70-71 dungeon called Ice Caverns. Also another level 80 dungeon will feature in Nexus. Another one of those wings will be a 25-man raid dungeon which will let you encounter Malygos. Nexus can be found in Borean Tundra. It will contain a lot of blue dragons.)

* Ulduar
* Uldum (mentioned by lore guys, nothing firm)

* Outdoor Dungeon Zones:
- Azjol-Nerub (big underground land full of nerubians)
- Gjalerbron (Vrykul are working side-by-side with Liches)
* There are plans to introduce some old dungeons back. For example there are plans to make Naxxramas a sort of MC-like dungeon. The dungeon itself is a floating fortress so it can easily be moved to Northrend. Of course Naxxramas will be retuned to a 25 man dungeon along with level 80 content.

8. Listings:
* Races that will be seen(not playable):
- Furbolgs
- Iron Dwarves (Offshoot of the Dwarves, will play a major part in the Dwarven history)
- Naga
- Nerubians
- Taunka (buffalo like humanoids, offshoot of Taurens)
- Tuskarr (Walrus like humanoids)
- Vykrul (15 feet tall humanoids)

* Famous Heroes:
- Alexstrasza
- Arthas (the Lich King)
- Brann Bronzebeard
- Garrosh Hellscream
- Highlord Bolvar Fordragon
- Korialstrasz
- Rhonin (and his family)
- Sylvanas
- Tirion Fordring

* Plot Points Addressed:
- The war of magic: Kirin’Tor vs. the Blue Dragon Flight
- The return of Malygos
- A return of the Order of the Silver Hand
- The Forsaken unleashing their own, anti-scourge version of the Undead Plague
- A continuation of Dwarves/Gnomes and their origin of life (ie: Uldum, the old gods etc)
- Unfolding Arthas’ plans
- Garrosh returns and is leading the Horde campaign in Northrend.
- More Old Gods and Titans lore


That's it!!

[ravrave]

u forgot ''NEw Expansion will ruin ALL'' :P

[Dunnomyname]

thanks for the info +rep =)

[Aciddrag0n]

I don't even think i'm gonna bother with the Exp...

[smeagol]

u forgot ''NEw Expansion will ruin ALL'' :P

/agree :banghead:

[Bludypeople]

BC ruined wow enough, do we really need this?

[Rodo]

* There will be a world event as the Lich King moves against the Horde and Alliance. No other info is known yet.

How cool would it be if Arthas' army attacked the major cities and for a month OGR, SW, IF, and UC were aflame and uninhabited, or inhabited by non-instance Elites. Like when the Scourge used to come to town, but longer and more environmentally devistating.

Elwynn forrest obliterated to smoldering stumps, and some zones comepletely destroyed.

The Alliance and Horde become one again.

Battle Grounds where you fight PVE, Ally and Horde side-by-side, against Arthas' armies for Honor instead of XP.



On a side note, let me just say that I would like to see some cinematics attached to he different raids and instances to show some backstory of why we're there. More than books laying about to read on the History of the Trolls.

Rodo aka Dr. Luke Verinopolis aka BooBoo the Dancing Naked Clown

[nerdywow]

This is cool! Death knights look so weird!! runes instead of mana/energy/rage i mean WTF? its gonna be wacky!

Nerdywow!

[meh]

This is awesome!! thanks for the info! I'm excited about the expanison.

[Equ1N0X]

2. Lake Wintergrasp
* An outdoor region devoted entirely to PvP. Within this region siege engines will be available, as well
as in the new battleground (name unreleased). There is speculation that siege engines will be
available in all battlegrounds, but clarification is needed.
* Siege engines will be able to destroy destructible buildings.
* Siege engines are meant to be player controlled - emphasis on mobility and aiming!
* The new battleground will be a 15-man area.



*Dalaran instances(not much info)

The Battleground will be uninstanced and in open air of northrend, and also theres no dalaran instances, its "the nexus" where the blue dragonflight is declaring war on magic, thats a 5 tier instance, meant toi start off with a low level instance ect.... kindof like hellfire citadel, and its rumored that at the end you get to slaty the mad malygos himself, lord of the blue dragonflight

Also for the siege engines, it has been confirmed by blizzard but you wont be in gnomish tanks andGoblin machinations whole time, you will "mostly" be on foot


I Done Reeserche!
And if you want more background lore, not just ongoing lore, just pick up a few warcraft books at your bokstore (IE WoTA Trilogy), takes about 4 hours to read through one

[
Malygos: *Yawn* that was some niiice sleep.
Blue Drake: BOSS! BOSS! THEY GOT A SOCIETY OF WIZERDS!
Malygos: WHAT?!??!?!?! DONT THEY KNOW DEMONS ATTACK PLACES LIKE THAT?
Blu Drake: Yeah we been waiting long time for you to wake up. boss
MAlygos: We gotsa fix this! Prepare the Nexus -NEXUUUUS

[$hOTty]

/quit wow when this is released...


wtf? destructable buildings
wtf? having a new like 55+ chara (dk) by doing a quest

can't believe they've made such a good game bad to please the 12 year olds...

[Rayz]

/quit wow when this is released...

You should send me a PM of ur account info when it comes out

[thrall-lal]

how long is it to the expansion releases? i just can't wait :weepy:

[Nugma]

Fast content = more whining
Slow content = more whining
Static content = more whining
Killing people from lore = more whining
Not killing people from lore = more whining
New expansions = more whining
No new expansions = more whining.

[Flying Piggy]

I actually think that TBC was a nice addition to WoW.
I also think that Blizzard will as always deliver a quality product.
Why winge about TBC and the upcoming expansion? I just don't understand some of you.