It’s a game. If the story is affecting the game, then it needs to be in the game. Expand on things in the official fanfiction if you want, but don’t just suddenly ‘lol different’. I had no idea for quite a while that Cataclysm has like an 8 year timeskip since the end of WOLTK.

That being said, the scenario was ok. A little more detail might have been nice, and Jaina has a huge character derailment ‘suddenly she’s the KKK’ moment… But it was fun-ish, and filled a little of the story.

Thing is — it wouldn’t have been hard to make it better. They wouldn’t even have had to add much.

Horde side: A breadcrumb quest to lead you to Garrosh, who orders you, as an experienced adventurer, to head to Dustwallow Marsh and assist with the new all-out on the Alliance. Arrive in Dustwallow, where your contact tells you that their spy has been captured and asks you to retrieve him. Enter scenario.

Alliance side: Breadcrumb quest summons you to Varian, who either tells you that a spy in the Horde ranks has turned up something worrying, or tells you that they recieved an urgent, cut-off message from a mage in Theramore, and asks you to investigate. Sail to Dustwallow, and as soon as you arrive, the cutscene happens. The ship’s captain cries out that you must assist any survivors. Enter scenario.

If you wanted to make it even more all-out? Put an NPC into each of the Horde cities making speeches about the need for war, and add a few ranks of soldiers outside Orgrimmar. Maybe have Garrosh talking to the other Horde leaders. Put Jaina into Stormwind’s throne room talking about her change of heart. Add a few Theramore refugees.

Dungeon Finder has accustomed us to just stepping into dungeons without going there first, but having context leading up to it always makes it better. The scenario was fine, but felt disconnected.

Hopefully entering Mists will be better than this.

I will probably not run the same scenerio too many time.. might run it a few more times on my really low gear toons though. Hey it’s rough keeping 10 toons geared up.

You’re right, this scenario as scenario #4 of 11 would be perfectly fine.

But as the first bit of new content in a year, launched when the pre-launch event would have been underway and as a new medium for telling the biggest “current” story in the game, it was overwhelmingly underwhelming.

It just sucked all the excitement out for Mists out of me in one prolonged ten minute “When does the action start? The hell! It’s over?” moment.

I don’t even know how the Alliance side plays out, or what you’re supposed to do, other than watch Theramore get nuked.

But yeah, no sense. After we blew up the boats, and go walking into Theramore proper, we were just killing patrols and stuff on the way from the tanks to the barracks, and I ran up the hill to the tower. And there’s Jaina with her 26 million hps, just kicking it like three horde members are nothing and her soldiers will take care of us, eventually.

I backed away from her slowly, until I realized she’s not attackable. wtf.

So, you have arguably one of the most powerful leaders of the Alliance just sitting back watching her little seaside community get wtfpwned by three moderately equipped Horde secret soldiers, and she doesn’t do anything.

Most retarded shit ever. No wonder Alliance always loses and Thrall had to take the lead on saving Azeroth.

I hope, somewhere deep in the Lore that I won’t read, is an explanation. But to us very casual players, it really, honestly, makes not a whit of sense.

Thanks for the free fireworks though – that was epic. Reminded me of dinging 80 all over again.

So yes, when it’s supposed to be a world event that gets everyone fired up for the next expansion… more people need to be able to get in. That is, if they care about everyone knowing the story. Maybe that’s really not much of a priority.

I guess I should look at that crafted gear. I don’t even know how much coin I have at the moment, though. :) Thanks!

It is just totally gone wrong ( for an event), it is less than the opening of the Dark Portal and maybe Blizzard just is tired to never get as good again as the zombie event. MoP needs to be so much better than anything I expect to make up for it again. (and I doubt it will be)

After my initial reaction was over, I thought a lot about how I felt about this scenario. These are supposed to fill the gap left by the removal of group quests in the world. You’re not expected to fill a certain role, just to play smart, like avoiding avoidable damage and use snares and utility abilities that aren’t always used in raids. I liked running through it the second time, and I think they did a good job when viewing it from this expectation.

I think a simple intro quest or even intro story page as it loads up would help, just to set the scene, like you would have gotten with old group quests. Ideally the rewards would be more consistent, instead of randomly nothing one time and epic with JP and gold the next. I don’t expect to be geared out in the highest gear level from scenarios, but even a consistent small amount of Jp would make me feel better then the chance to get nothing. Even the old group quests had nice rewards to look forward to when you completed them.

I am reserving final judgement though, as I know the level 90 scenarios could be different. They could have these small tweaks that would make the experience more enjoyable. It is unfair to the scenario that it is the stand alone new thing to do before Mists hits.

Sorry about that! I was at work and someone came to my desk and I ended up hitting submit and forgot to come back to finish my comment!

But … now I can’t remember what I wanted to say!

Won’t happen again, I promise!
:)