Is Questing any Different?

There has been a lot of talk from Blizzard since they first announced Wrath of the Lich King last year at Blizzcon about making the quest experience better and more inclusive. Many times it has been mentioned that they wanted to try to include players more, especially leading up to instances and raiding. Many players went into and completed instances with little or no understanding of why they were there, other than for the loot. Blizzard was also looking to have players feel more included in the whole environment, to get a feel of what was going on around you and why.

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A starting quest provider

With access to the beta now open, and having had a chance to play around in it for a while, I wanted to give a quick editorial on how Blizzards efforts have gone so far.

After questing through much of the first Alliance zone, the Borean Tundra, and venturing into the mainly Horde Howling Fjord zone, I found a few ups and a few downs to the new quests.

What's Better?

Starting on the up side, I found that many of the quests linked together to form much more cohesive stories than previous. Even though the text wasn't much longer, Blizzard seems to have focused on many of the key story elements much closer in this expansion. As you move from quest to quest you get a better feel of what is going on in the area and why you are expected to help or do things.

I also really enjoyed the fact that there are many more quest hubs in the zone. When WoW was originally released quests were all centered in the one or two towns in a zone. Then in the Burning Crusade Blizzard started to include at least a second quest hub area in each zone, some zones having three or more, for example Blade's Edge Mountains. In Wrath of the Lich King, at least in the first zones, there are many more small quest centers. This allows you to move around with quests and not have to return to one central area all the time.

Similar to the point above, Blizzard seems to have continued to increase the number of quests in the zones. This will help keep players interested as they level, and should decrease or eliminate the amount of grinding required to level quickly. The more quests that are available also helps to spread players out and provide more options. If a group is already killing the MOBs you need, there always seems to be another quest you could do in the same area.

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Small Quest Hubs

Quest tie ins to instances are so far much better as well. One of the key issues Blizzard has stated that they wanted to address was players not understanding why they were in instances, and lack of quests to push them into them. In the first two instances there have been far more quests and linkages to them then there were in the Burning Crusade. I remember leveling in the Burning Crusade and wondering why so much time was spent on creating the starting instances (Hellfire Ramparts, Blood Furnace, and Slave Pens), yet so few quests were involved in them. There are more quests tied to the Nexus alone than I remember for HF and BF combined. This is a welcome change since I really enjoy instances, as it should generate more interest in players entering them as they level.

What's the Same?

Not surprisingly many of the quests are the same thing as before. I say not surprisingly, as there really isn't much else to do for quests. They have the typical escort, kill/gather X items, bombing, and travel to quests. All are fairly standard and understood. They all provide decent experience and gold so far, although none provide any item that would be considered an upgrade to most level 70 players.

What's Worse?

While I really like many of the changes, some of them actually create just as many issues as they solve. The biggest one that I found is that because the quests are more story driven, they follow a slightly more linear model. This is very apparent in the Alliance town in the Howling Fjord. When you get there, there is only one quest to do. You must finish it, then a string of single follow ups, before additional quest givers open up in the area. While I really like the mechanic of it, and it works to ensure that a story is delivered, it will be hell on launch day. The single string of quests to start these areas will bottleneck and stall players longer than required and cause a lot of frustration.

I hope that Blizzard looks at this mechanic that is used in several of the quest areas to open up more quest providers and pulls it back to use in later zones only. This way players can get into the starting zones, level a bit and spread out a bit. That way when they get to single thread quest strings they is less competition for them.

Overall

As a whole, I really like the subtle changes that Blizzard has made to quests so far in the Beta. While many of them are just minor tweaks from what was there in the past, I really like the effect. It feels like a similar upgrade from WoW to BC all over again, which is a good thing. As I mentioned earlier however I worry that the more focused quest lines in starting areas will have a negative impact. Once past those areas though, the many more small quest hubs will likely really spread out the competition quest items and MOBs.

So, is questing any different in WotLK, probably not. It is more refined and feels more involved though. Which is something we should all be able to appreciate.


The Messiah has had his say, what’s yours?  Do you have big expectations for changes to questing? Do you like what you have heard? Do you have suggestions you wish Blizzard would take?

Email me at: Byron Mudry - ([email protected]) or post in our forums (linked below).

Disclaimer: The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Ten Ton Hammer network or staff.


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Last Updated: Mar 29, 2016

About The Author

Byron has been playing and writing about World of Warcraft for the past ten years. He also plays pretty much ever other Blizzard game, currently focusing on Heroes of the Storm and Hearthstone, while still finding time to jump into Diablo III with his son.

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