Is Warcraft boring you?

Now for most of us the answer to this question is pretty simple and that is a firm no. You ask how could Warcraft be boring? Well I would agree with you that the game as a whole is nowhere near boring and is amazingly addictive but lets play devils advocate here for a minute and look at it in 3 areas.

First I’m going to look at the 1-80 game. Now for a lot of players this is a whole new area and for the newer players this is what they see as they make their way to max level. It is an area that has completely changed with the Cataclysm and was for the benefit of everyone and I cannot think of one person who could not say that these changes have been for anything other than the good of the game.  No more does it take a few days to level to 40 or 60 but you can complete this transition in a few hours if you are dedicated enough and even playing casually I was able to get to 40 within 5 hours of game played time. The questing is fun and imaginative and attractive and gives you that chance you may not have had previously to learn your classes abilities and in what area of the game you must want to participate whether it be tank healer or dps caster or melee. You also see a better understand of combining a rotation to help you get the most out of your dps or help protect yourself more. This is where the game flourishes at the moment. The new quests and areas fir so perfectly together that it is fun and great to run alts through these new and exciting areas. Will this shine last? Well I hope so. This part of the game is nowhere near boring. Yet. Well until you hit 60-80 and have to do Outland and Northrend which are unchanged as yet.

The second area is the  80-85 leveling aspect. Now whether you choose to go to Vashj’ir or  Mount Hijal is completely up to you. After playing through both areas I really think that Vashj’ir is for more experienced players who want to see the newness and coolness of this area and Mount Hijal is just another leveling zone with a couple of twists. Both areas experience the use of phasing and it works particularly well as you travel and reclaim areas of Hijal and also the Naga quest line in Vashj’ir is amazing. Yet again the 80-85 areas share that same feeling of amazing questing as the 1-60 areas and with a few exceptions of “where the hell now?” moments in Hijal  the quests flow seamlessly from one to the next with naturalness and you actually do start feeling like the hero that Blizzard wants you to be. No more so is this shown in the Ulduam Harrison Jones quest line which yes is a direct copy of the acclaimed movies but come on it was an epic and funny quest line and something I think was handled really well and didn’t go in over kill.  We forgive you Blizzard for being lazy this once. It was here in these new zones that I started to care about my character and what might happen to Azeroth as we know it. It is a testament to Blizzard that they can come up with such creative and funny and emotional storylines that keep gamers around the world captivated.

Finally I want to look at the “end game ” aspect and this is where I have a couple of problems. Ok so I am a casual player simply because I work a full-time job with terrible hours during raiding hours and also have a 3-year-old daughter so all this takes up a lot of my time. Now at the moment there ate only certain factions that you can get rep with through daily quests and the rest for the moment anyways you have to use the faction tabard in dungeons to make your way to exalted. Here in lays my problem at the moment as it is extremely hard for me to dedicate at least 2 – 3 hours on a dungeon. Yes I do like that the dungeons are now hard and I think this is a very good thing as over time they will get easier as we all gear up but people seem to be thinking along my lines as well and I have found a lot of groups that the group you start the dungeon with is not the same one (unless its a guild run) that you finish it with because people drop out constantly. It’s like a pandemic at the moment. Plus apart from dungeons and raids there is not much else to do after you rep grind your factions. This has been an issue in the game since launch and obviously Blizzard wants people to be running alts but they take no time now to level . So what would my suggestions be to players? Well I have found the battlegrounds a good time killer to be honest and have got myself a nice set of PVP gear in the process. The battlegrounds now are fun and seem fairly balanced from what I have experienced. It is a great way to kill half an hour or more and have fun also plus it is a completely different aspect to the game than the rest. If battlegrounds aren’t your thing then this is where you will run up against a brick wall of stuff to keep you interested. Guilds are currently in holding patterns waiting for people to gear up for in some cases heroics and raids which is also having it’s effect. I would say to people in random dungeons to be patient with people as you are never going to get a perfect group and Blizzard do not nerf the dungeons as this will not be to the benefit of people. Give us something more to do at 85. I think we all wish path of the titans had been introduced including Blizzard and hopefully we will see something come of it down the road but for now the game is split. Great leveling and not much to do after so far. Lets hope for a change.