Breakfast Topic: Outland or Azeroth?

by Elizabeth Harper Jul 26th 2007 at 8:55AM

There are those who claim that since the release of The Burning Crusade, the game has been ruined. Outland quest rewards are too powerful, rendering most Azerothian goods obsolete and making much previous raiding experience pointless. And addition of Paladins to the Horde and Shamans to the Alliance ruined any unique sense of play that came from one side or the other. Such players claim that The Burning Crusade ruined the entire game. On the other hand, there are plenty of players who say that doing any pre-BC content now (i.e. leveling a new alt) is simply painful, because of fewer quests per zone, more travelling per quest, and generally slow and inefficient leveling. These people say some time needs to be spent on pre-BC content to bring it up to par with the different style of BC zones. And this morning I'm asking what you think. Has The Burning Crusade spoiled or perfected World of Warcraft? Is Outland superior to Azeroth or vice versa?

Tags: azeroth, burning crusade, BurningCrusade, outland, the burning crusade, TheBurningCrusade, world of warcraft, WorldOfWarcraft, wow

Filed under: Breakfast Topics

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)

Attapooch Jul 26th 2007 9:01AM

I play on Echo Isles and the Azeroth is pretty much a ghost town most of the time. There are plenty of times when I'm almost convinced I'm playing a single-player game.

loltrainz Jul 26th 2007 9:02AM

I had FUN leveling in outlands. I DIDN'T HAVE FUN leveling in azeroth. Nuff said.

g8rCody Jul 26th 2007 9:05AM

I played in Azeroth for almost 2 years and loved every minute of it. After 2 months in Outland, I cancelled my account.

Zecil Jul 26th 2007 9:05AM

Is it just me, or do both groups you represent seem to side with the fact that the Outlands are better than Azeroth?

mark Jul 26th 2007 9:06AM

Leveling to 60 was always sort of painful. I've had plenty of friends who loved the game up to the mid 30s. After getting their mount and trying out the subsequent levels, most quit the game and gave up.

The 40-60 grind was made to be hard because it was the last few levels. Now that the cap is 70 it no longer makes sense to have it that hard.

Bottom line: no one other than the hard core alt makers enjoy leveling in Azoroth. I myself have a 70 and 2 characters in the 30s and 40s and I cannot bring myself to play them much farther.

The next xpac better have some new content for the 20-60 bracket. Need to avoid the 'Stranglethorn Syndrome.'

Zequel Jul 26th 2007 9:07AM

I agree with #2, I'm toiling away with a 44 alt atm, dying to get to Outlands. Lots of fun quests (at least compared to Azeroth). Outlands has a much better design, probably because Blizz didn't have to worry about launching the entire game *and* designing content with BC.

Talitha Jul 26th 2007 9:07AM

Well, I think Azeroth does suck, and leveling there IS PAINFUL. Although, there is the nostalgic value of it, and I do feel more at home in Stormwind than Shattrath. "Where is everything grrrrr." I think it does need some work. Leveling in the new starting zones is fun, but after that it just sucks.

Nyctanessa Jul 26th 2007 9:11AM

I am an alt-oholic, and there are parts of Azeroth that make me cringe (30-50 in particular).. but I'm also a lore fan, and I enjoy the fact that Azeroth's quests seem to be more in-depth regarding lore than Outland.

Yes, Azeroth needs some serious revamping, but it's not completely terrible.

Anders Hagen Jul 26th 2007 9:13AM

Azeroth is desperately in need of some love. Its such a magnificent place, so beautiful, so varied so imaginative - and now it is a wasteland.

I recentliy leveled a lock from one to 60 in Azeroth, and it is lots to do there, but nothing that seems significant anymore. I didnt do a single instance above one run in DM and Scholo. With my main (a priest) i ran MC, BWL, AQ and Naxx until i was well geared and very fed up.

With the alt i didnt bother. During levels 60-63 i have replaced every single piece of my gear, except robe of the void.

So in terms of significance of the development of the character, Azeroth is now a moot excercise. Its just there to burn through for leveling. And if youre a starter leveling your main, some periods -levels 41 to 50 comes to mind, hopelessly underdeveloped, repetetive and boring (STV, anyone?)

So lavish love on Azeroth! Make quests that transverse the border between the continents, take us back and forth, that make us discover new areas, new dungeons, new lore - in the old world.

I will be very disappointed if the next expansion is just another high level continent, making Outland just as pointless as Azeroth is today.

So just do stuff to it - give the raid dungeons an heroic mode, make the zones dynamic, make stuff happen there, give rep for some factions thats needed in outland there. Just something, please.

Liel Jul 26th 2007 9:14AM

Expansions are supposed to make pre BC raiding gear pretty much obsolete. They went with the statistics of who raided and who did not and it seemed like MC was the normal cap that most people who raided got to in their raiding days pre BC. Hence why most of the first loot you got at 60-61 was tier 1 quality.

People who complained about their ubre loots being wasted need to realize that you replaced gear every tier set of raiding gear you attained. The time was only wasted if you went mainly and soly for the loot which I think most people do hence when the PVP patch came pre expansion everybody stopped raiding because they found out the loot that was quest rewards was even to what they had now. Hence they pretty much admitted they did not like raiding because if they did it for fun then the loot would not matter.

Also expansions are supposed to be a way to level the playing field again between the normal raider and the casual player. If they did not nerf the loot you had then you would use it to 70 and then complain "there is nothing in the game for me".

I do agree 100 percent that something needs to be done with the 40-60 levels though Outland made interesting quests that mattered with rewards that were sometimes useful.

crazygon Jul 26th 2007 9:16AM

i lover everything about pre BC but no wthat im in out lands i cant go back

Liel Jul 26th 2007 9:17AM

I have been tempted to try EQ2 but have been told by friends who play that with all the expansions new players will be pretty isolated so this is not something new to WoW.

Maybe Jul 26th 2007 9:18AM

I believe that the experience gained doing the instances in "Old " Azeroth is still valuable when it comes to learning to play in groups and learning general server etiquette. However, everyone pretty much steamrolls the old content as fast as possible to get to Outland. Try getting a ZF group lately? They need to go back and rethink the old content, maybe freshen it up a bit. I'd really like to see a Heroic setting for the old instances with the "Logical Loot" implemented. Give us a better reason to go back than to see if we can 5 man Ony. Heck, how many post BC Toons even bothered getting keyed for Ony? Kinda sad, lots of fun fights that a lot of people will never see.

Euphorion Jul 26th 2007 9:22AM

My rogue is 65 now, and he's never set foot in LBRS/UBRS/Scholo/Strat/DM. Outland is a lot of fun, but I'm looking forward to going back to the old instances at 70 with a friend to play around and do the quests for old times sake. Old end-game stuff is now optional, which I'm beginning to like.

Warlamb Jul 26th 2007 9:24AM

Just started leveling an alt after many months with my lvl 70. I agree that its a pain to run from zone to zone picking up quests but i actually see plenty of people still out there grinding and gankin. I was hating the grind until i started hitting the contested areas. The thrill of sneaking around and always watching your back to avoid getting ganked is back. Outland has become to carebear but good ole Azeroth is still as ruthless as before. So if you want the exitement back on Azeroth roll a pvp server and prepare for lots of gy walks.

Bey Jul 26th 2007 9:25AM

I think that Azeroth needs some serious improvement, especially the mid-level content. Also, my opinion is that some of the outland gear is just too easy to get considering the quality of it. I started playing when TBC was released, thus missed out on all pre-TBC stuff like MC (which I attuned for but none wants to run), scholo and strat etc. The only reason anyone runs these high level pre-TBC contents is for the epic mount. I guess it is too late to nerf the overpowered quest rewards/XP in outland, I just hope Bliz wont make the same mistake again when introducing the next expansion.

/ Bey

Nion Jul 26th 2007 9:32AM

Outlands FTW. Azeroth is misery compared to BC content. What I would love to see is a free 10 lvls on every alt per 70 on your account. You could skip a huge part of the 40-60 grind, and still not really miss much since you've gone through it once already.

Tophy Jul 26th 2007 9:27AM

I hear a lot of people say that Outland has way more quests per zone than Azeroth, and how that is a problem. However, how many zones are in Azeroth? I'm not going to count them, but the number far exceeds the 7 that Outland has. Also, you need a ridiculous amount of experience from 60-70, so there MUST be more quests per zone in Outland. If an Azeroth zone had as many quests as an Outland zone, you would shoot past the level of the zone and have a bunch of gray quests left with no purpose.

Patrick Jul 26th 2007 9:28AM

I do agree on the expansion ruining the game. But not only the expansion, also the beginning of the crossrealm battlegrounds and some other patches.

A long time ago, servers were like a community, people you met in instances, you also met in PvP - making the connection stronger between players. Now-a-days the only people I know are most of my guildies and some random guys i really liked partying up with. 95% of the people i see on the streets I do not know.

Beside that, pre-TBC the word 'epic' was truely epic. Now it's just a word that means 'grinding-allot'. Really, with the introduction of the arena getting really good gear seems like a piece of cake. Sure it takes time, but every 'noob' (forgive me, i don't like the word, but i'll use it so you know what i mean) can get his hands on arena gear. Pre-TBC epics were a mark of good teamplay, you killed big bosses in dungeons with the use of true teamplay and dedication - people respected you and sometime even /bowed you in the middle of the city. These days whenever i see someone goodgeared my thoughts are more like: "That guy has allot of free time".

Also, the classes are kind of screwed in my opinion. Paladins the best healers, rogues getting out-dpsed by priests, mages and warlocks. Warriors cutting through rogues like butter (yes i'm a rogue...). Craft professions that hardly have any use since it's more efficient to 'grind' arena gear.

I'll leave it with this, these are my biggest critics - just my two cents ;-)

Still i'll keep on playing, ain't this game addicting!

Jack Spicer Aug 2nd 2007 10:35AM

While there are some zones that I dislike, for example Ashenvale, for the most part I love leveling through the pre-BC zones.

I'd imagine that most of the people complaining about Stranglethorn Vale play Alliance, because I've never had a problem with that zone as Horde. Plus STV is filled with the most efficient kind of questing, the "kill X mobs" quests.

I do agree, however, that some of the pre-BC areas could use some tweaking, like Azshara and the Swamp of Sorrows.

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