Achievements officially announced for Wrath
by Eliah Hecht 
Jul 17th 2008 at 1:40PM
As we suspected from some hints in the alpha, Wrath of the Lich King will indeed feature achievements. Blizzard just put up a page about them on the Wrath site, including lots of juicy information:
- The system will launch with over 500 achievements, from all corners of the game: exploration, PvE, PvP, professions, and "character development." They promise something for everyone.
- Some achievements will have rewards, but the rewards will be "purely cosmetic and just for fun" (examples are vanity pets, tabards, and titles).
- Additional achievements will come "with each new WoW content update" (which I take to mean "major patch or expansion").
Patch 3.0.2 "Echoes of Doom" has landed and WoW Insider has you covered. From patch notes to talent guides for every class to fixing your addons to 5 easy achievements you can snag right now. Make sure to check out the latest news.- Each achievement yields a certain number of achievement points.
- The achievements window includes a log of all achievements completed with the date on which you finished, as well as all the ones you're currently working on.
- Achievements will be able to be tracked like quests can be now.
- Right-clicking another player will let you compare your
e-peenachievements with theirs. - Unlocking a new achievement will play a distinctive animation and sound, and announce the achievement automatically to your guild and anyone in the area.
- Achievements will be visible on the Armory.
- There are three kinds of achievements:
- Simple achievements, where you just have to complete a goal (like "give 10 hugs")
- Progressive achievements: if you complete one to collect 10 vanity pets, you can now work on one to collect 25
- Meta achievements: completing a set of achievements may be, itself, an achievement
- There are also several categories of achievements (with an example for each):
- PvP ("Win 10 ranked arena matches in a row")
- Dungeon and Raid (each end boss in each raid and dungeon will be an achievement)
- Professions (each new tier of profession skill is an achievement)
- Quests (such as completing a certain number of quests)
- Events (seasonal events will have their own achievements)
- World exploration ("explore all of Kalimdor")
- Reputation ("get Exalted with every faction")
- General: these are said to "tend toward the whimsical" ("getting a shave and a haircut")
Finally, the page mentions "Feats of Strength," which "represent the past glories of Azeroth." These are worth no points and are not displayed in the normal Achievements interface; they mostly have to do with the old world (old PvP ranks, for instance, or rare mounts). As such, they will be applied retroactively.
Overall this promises to be a pretty cool system, and I am definitely looking forward to it (and hoping it doesn't trigger my obsessive impulses and make me try to collect them all). Still unknown is what the achievement points will be used for: just a fun score? Is this how we'll get access to the vanity rewards, or are they going to be tied to particular achievements? As always, if we find anything out, we'll keep you posted.
Filed under: Wrath of the Lich King, Achievements
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
Thrush Jul 17th 2008 1:46PM
I think this is a great idea. Looking forward to it. Gives the solo player something extra to do.
Sodon Jul 17th 2008 2:32PM
They can waste their time on this crap, and they still can't fix the terrain in Azeroth for flying mounts?
UberNoober Jul 17th 2008 2:40PM
When the game was first made the terrain was not designed for flying mounts. It would be a MASSIVE effort to change all of the terrain and unless they filled all of those areas up with new content (which would be another massive effort) it would also be giving little new content to players.
Massive effort for little content? Nah, I'd prefer them to roll out as much new content as possible thanks.
Tribble Jul 17th 2008 4:08PM
I don't know what's hard to fix about Azeroth terrain ... slap up some invisible walls (they exist in outland, did you know?) and you are all set.
Doffencrag Jul 17th 2008 4:52PM
@Tribble: Seeing as how, as one poster already pointed out, Azeroth was not designed with flying in mind, that would be a *lot* of invisible walls. I'm not sure flying through an invisible maze of walls is more fun than not flying at all.
FadingFan Jul 17th 2008 5:43PM
Wow, I can't believe all the time they are wasting on this achievement crap
kw Jul 17th 2008 6:43PM
Man, that dead horse is looking really beat up today.
I admit to having put up a private server once just to see how bad Stormwind looked from the air. It is _horrible_. I would be willing to do it again and take screenshots if anyone wants to see how bad. You know Stormwind Keep? The top of it is just.. floating in the air. It's a 2-D front just hanging there.. but you can't tell from the ground, just the air. Orgrimmar is also really bad, if you fly over The Drag you end up under the world. Granted, some of the issues might have been glitches with the server, but all in all? It would be a truly massive effort to re-work the old continents. They were never designed to be seen from the air; it's conceivable that when Azeroth was first designed Blizzard didn't even know they'd be adding flying mounts in the future.
In short: leave it be. I'd bet the vast majority of us would much rather have Blizzard focus on new content than old. Give me a new instance or faction or neat holiday event over flying through Azeroth any day!
Thrush Jul 18th 2008 7:15AM
I think the funniest part is that my original comment had nothing to do with flying in the old world. I'm sure Sodon just replied to me so he could have his wisdom at the top of the comments page.
Scepter Jul 18th 2008 7:24AM
Is Blizzard so desperate and sad that to entice players to actually keep playing the game, they have to rip of other games? Mainly DoaC and up-coming Warhammer: Age of Reckoning. They pretty much straight ganked WAR's Tome of Knowledge and made it Blizzified, which means they dumbed it down for the 11-teen year olds playing. Great job blizzard, first ya ripped half the names of "azeroth" from Warhammer lore, including the orcs, now your ganking modern era ideas. Way to stay classy.
Maya Jul 17th 2008 1:47PM
# Alterac Valley All-Star: Capture graveyards, towers, and kill the enemy leader all in one game.
Achievements like this might actually be an incentive for players to cooperate and make the game more fun.
native Jul 17th 2008 1:46PM
yay!
Willypiggy Jul 17th 2008 1:47PM
I hate achievements :( I think they are fine in single player but as soon as you put them into multilayer people will aim for solo achievements instead of a group goal. Sounds alot like the title system from Guild wars aswell... I am really not looking forward to seeing this implemented.
Super Guest Man 9000 Jul 17th 2008 2:02PM
You kinda missed the part that include achievements from such things as Arenas and Instances, those are kinda group efforts....
Willypiggy Jul 17th 2008 2:08PM
Nah, I get that but I mean, say there is an achievement for having dual warglaives, say they have no use in WoLK because weapons are alot stronger but there is still the achievement there, guilds will start setting groups going for the old achievements and someone will end up ninja'ing it resulting in drama.
toddcore Jul 17th 2008 2:18PM
So, by your logic no one should attempt to kill Illidan now? I mean, we wouldn't want a war glaive to drop and potentially have someone steal it.
Nick Jul 17th 2008 2:23PM
If you don't like it keep it to yourself. Positive comments are vastly different than negative ones. Its like... Ok.. you don't like something. Put up or move on...
Willypiggy Jul 17th 2008 2:33PM
Toddcore, I am saying that if you bring solo achievements into a multilayer game people will go after the solo achievement rather help their group, if you are doing a match in AV and you have been playing great your team is close to winning and all you need to do to finish your achievement you have wanted for awhile and been working on for a week is capture the graveyard. now, say there are a few people asking for help in /bg you are in between the graveyard and the place the people need help, what are you going to do? I bet that a high % of people would end up going to the graveyard and finishing their achievement rather than helping a team, and all they get is a few points which can be converted into something visual they can use to brag how they didn't play as a team. I have nothing wrong with achievements such as server firsts or just showing you have killed a boss, those achievements sound great to me as it means you get something even if you don't get loot but PvP achievements (especially those from randomly formed teams, BGs for example) people will go for the achievements rather than helping the team.
Hurode Jul 17th 2008 4:29PM
That's already an issue in things like AB where people want to get their BG daily done instead of helping the team win the damn thing. Achievements would only be done once, dailies are over and over again. It's not much of a problem now, and having achievements which can only be accomplished once will be even less of one. I'm not sure what you're trying to prove with that example.
Doffencrag Jul 17th 2008 4:55PM
"That's already an issue in things like AB where people want to get their BG daily done instead of helping the team win the damn thing."
I think that to get your BG daily done, you actually have to "win the damn thing."
Thander Jul 17th 2008 1:49PM
If it's like the Xbox system, the points will not be used for anything. Somehow people still like collecting achievement points for no reward though. Just another way to get people to keep playing the game. Even something as simple as getting a few more "points" will get people to stick with the game longer.