The Wrath you never saw
by Matthew Rossi 
Dec 28th 2009 at 5:00PM
We're all familiar with the strange case of Azjol-Nerub. Originally it was intended to be a complete underground zone that players were to level in, do quests, and so on. Then that was scrapped and we instead got two instances and an NPC who was clearly the remnant of a once far more expansive plot. It's a shame, too, because those two instances are tantalizing hints at how vast and expansive an Azjol-Nerub zone could have been. Frankly, I found (and still find) the Nerubian architecture in those instances far superior to Naxx both in design and its surprising color palette. And when you look around Ahn-Katet and realize how vast the cavern is and how little of it is actually seen in the instance, or run Trial of the Crusader and fall into yet another astonishingly vast and underused space, I don't see how you can not wonder why the Azjol-Nerub zone never manifested itself. Perhaps we'll see World of Warcraft: Underground at some point.
But while in Azjol-Nerub we have a zone that failed to materialize, in Crystalsong Forest we have a fully developed zone with floating, magically altered forests of shattered crystal trees filled with ruins and NPC's and... no real point. There's two flight points, one for each faction, but you could easily miss them because why would you go to them with Dalaran floating right there overhead anyway and no quests to drive you down to them? Why does each faction need its own flight point in the region? Are they fighting over some objective? What is it?
Likewise, Dalaran's presence is intended to somehow oppose the Blue Dragonflight but aside from erecting yet another giant purple bubble (man, they love giant purple bubbles) they don't really seem to be doing anything to all those Blue Dragonflight mobs floating around on flying platforms in the zone. You get sent to Crystalsong by the Argent Crusade a couple of times, first off when they're pushing into Icecrown and then after they've erected their tournament and want you to kill satyrs for scrying crystals or knock out the Black Knight's squire.
This just begs the question: why is the Black Knight's squire in Crystalsong? Why are the satyrs there? There are ancient night elf ghosts haunting the ruins, the Blue Dragonflight, this zone should be positively bustling with player activity and instead it's a ghost town because there's no actual content here, just hints at it. There's a really interesting bit of backstory hinting at a war between the Black and Blue Dragonflights here that made the trees turn to crystal, and the Lich King's attempt to harvest the forest's power, but it doesn't actually appear anywhere in the game that I've seen. Crystalsong is basically just a very elaborate backdrop to fly over to get to Dalaran at this point.
Another thing that's interesting when looking through the data files is how many items that ended up in Naxx and (more recently) the new five man instances were, at least during the design process, intended to drop somewhere else. For instance, here you can see various familiar shield designs but also at the top and bottom you'll notice two designs you've yet to see. One of them, the bottom design, has an art style that clearly matches the Hate-Forged Cleaver which drops in regular Halls of Reflection, and which you can find in the item files as 'axe_1h_draktharon_d_01'.
The axe and shield are hardly unique as being designed and created for an instance that they don't appear in. It's not even unique to this expansion: there are 2h sword models in the files which are named for Auchindoun, for example. What's interesting in all these models that either don't drop at all or which drop in ICC instead of the places which they are named for is what they suggest, namely that once there was the intention to have more varied raiding across Northrend instead of one large Naxxramas raid and two smaller one-encounter raids in Obsidian Sanctum and the Eye of Eternity.
Several sword models, as an example, either appear only on NPC's or in instances completely disconnected from their file names. Here, for example, we see several swords named for the Nexus, but only one of them drops in the Eye of Eternity raid, the rest all drop in Naxxramas (or Forge of Souls in the case of one of the reskins). Again, this isn't terribly unusual: several of the original sword models in the first release of World of Warcraft have names that hint at a faction bias that never came to pass, for example. We can, however, speculate that perhaps there was to originally have been more expansive content at Utgarde Keep, Drak'Tharon/Gundrak and the Nexus than actually came to pass, and that several of the art assets and models originally designed for these zones ended up moving to other instances like Naxxramas 25. (Naxx 10 more or less just re-used original Naxx 40 models.)
Now, at this point I hasten to add I am just speculating. I have no way of knowing and have found no conclusive comments from Blizzard saying "Yeah, we were going to do a bunch more raids but then we didn't and we just focused on Naxx instead" but it is clear that there was a great deal of work put into designing item models for zones that they never appeared in or appeared only on NPC's such as Ulduar. (And yes, I still wish that big Blinkstrike looking 2h had dropped somewhere, but I'm glad to see that axe and 2h sword get into player hands.) It's hard not to get caught up in wondering what Wrath would have looked like with more raids at start... one can imagine an Utgarde Keep with a UP raid on top. The place certainly seems big enough for a raid with King Ymiron having gotten a lot of build up in Howling Fjord only to then sort of fizzle out by being farmed constantly by pre-Naxx guilds looking for a Red Sword of Courage.
Likewise, both Drak'Tharon Keep and Gun'Drak just look overdesigned for the amount of content accessible: there's multiple structures and portals at Gun'Drak. Not only does Drak'Tharon look like you could easily have another instance there, the one we have is kind of confused and unfinished to me. Who exactly is the Prophet Tharon'ja? He looks vaguely like the Avatar of Hakkar from Sunken Temple... is he intended to be the harbinger for the various priests of the animal gods we encounter cannibalizing their own gods in Zul'Drak? Because we already have one of those, and he actually looks identical to Tharon'ja until you drain him for Quetz'lun's spirit. I'm fascinated by the lore hints in all the Zul'Drak instances (heck, the animal gods from Zul'Aman show up! Thankfully they didn't hold a grudge) and so, the idea that there was a possible raid exploring this in more depth and maybe explaining what exactly gave them the idea of eating their gods in the first place would have been fine by me. Maybe we could even find out what that enormous serpent tail in Gundrak is connected to.
I have no idea why, if there was work on UP and Drak'Tharon raids, that work was stopped. Then again, I don't know why Azjol-Nerub didn't pan out as an underground zone or why Crystalsong just sits there like an endless footnote in the Nexus war. I don't even know why we kill Malygos, Aspect of Magic and lord of the Blue Dragonflight, two raid tiers before we fight his undead consort. An argument could be made for Malygos as an immediate and arbitrary threat that needed to be dealt with, of course. It's just always seemed odd to me that we killed Malygos, empowered by Norgannon himself as Aspect, and then we go to the Titan-constructed prison of Ulduar and there's no real connection between the two events. It sometimes feels that in their drive to put Arthas on center stage they took the spotlight away from others too soon, and left a lot of interesting ideas undeveloped.
I've always wished they'd forgotten about Wintergrasp and its weird Titan structures and done AN as the PvP zone. Man, imagine mass battles crawling through the depths, fighting both the other faction and hordes of faceless ones? I'd be so down for that. Alas, as we approach the Fall of the Lich King and the oncoming Cataclysm, the possibility of seeing any of these underdeveloped or undeveloped ideas becomes ever more remote.Several sword models, as an example, either appear only on NPC's or in instances completely disconnected from their file names. Here, for example, we see several swords named for the Nexus, but only one of them drops in the Eye of Eternity raid, the rest all drop in Naxxramas (or Forge of Souls in the case of one of the reskins). Again, this isn't terribly unusual: several of the original sword models in the first release of World of Warcraft have names that hint at a faction bias that never came to pass, for example. We can, however, speculate that perhaps there was to originally have been more expansive content at Utgarde Keep, Drak'Tharon/Gundrak and the Nexus than actually came to pass, and that several of the art assets and models originally designed for these zones ended up moving to other instances like Naxxramas 25. (Naxx 10 more or less just re-used original Naxx 40 models.)
Now, at this point I hasten to add I am just speculating. I have no way of knowing and have found no conclusive comments from Blizzard saying "Yeah, we were going to do a bunch more raids but then we didn't and we just focused on Naxx instead" but it is clear that there was a great deal of work put into designing item models for zones that they never appeared in or appeared only on NPC's such as Ulduar. (And yes, I still wish that big Blinkstrike looking 2h had dropped somewhere, but I'm glad to see that axe and 2h sword get into player hands.) It's hard not to get caught up in wondering what Wrath would have looked like with more raids at start... one can imagine an Utgarde Keep with a UP raid on top. The place certainly seems big enough for a raid with King Ymiron having gotten a lot of build up in Howling Fjord only to then sort of fizzle out by being farmed constantly by pre-Naxx guilds looking for a Red Sword of Courage.
Likewise, both Drak'Tharon Keep and Gun'Drak just look overdesigned for the amount of content accessible: there's multiple structures and portals at Gun'Drak. Not only does Drak'Tharon look like you could easily have another instance there, the one we have is kind of confused and unfinished to me. Who exactly is the Prophet Tharon'ja? He looks vaguely like the Avatar of Hakkar from Sunken Temple... is he intended to be the harbinger for the various priests of the animal gods we encounter cannibalizing their own gods in Zul'Drak? Because we already have one of those, and he actually looks identical to Tharon'ja until you drain him for Quetz'lun's spirit. I'm fascinated by the lore hints in all the Zul'Drak instances (heck, the animal gods from Zul'Aman show up! Thankfully they didn't hold a grudge) and so, the idea that there was a possible raid exploring this in more depth and maybe explaining what exactly gave them the idea of eating their gods in the first place would have been fine by me. Maybe we could even find out what that enormous serpent tail in Gundrak is connected to.
I have no idea why, if there was work on UP and Drak'Tharon raids, that work was stopped. Then again, I don't know why Azjol-Nerub didn't pan out as an underground zone or why Crystalsong just sits there like an endless footnote in the Nexus war. I don't even know why we kill Malygos, Aspect of Magic and lord of the Blue Dragonflight, two raid tiers before we fight his undead consort. An argument could be made for Malygos as an immediate and arbitrary threat that needed to be dealt with, of course. It's just always seemed odd to me that we killed Malygos, empowered by Norgannon himself as Aspect, and then we go to the Titan-constructed prison of Ulduar and there's no real connection between the two events. It sometimes feels that in their drive to put Arthas on center stage they took the spotlight away from others too soon, and left a lot of interesting ideas undeveloped.
Filed under: Patches, Wrath of the Lich King, Leveling, Lore, The Burning Crusade, Expansions, Instances, Odds and ends, Analysis / Opinion, Cataclysm
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 9)
Mike Dec 28th 2009 5:11PM
My guess is they ran out of time.
Knob Dec 28th 2009 6:46PM
Yes, and it is such a shame. And the article doesn't mention Sara and what her connection was with Yogg-Saron. Combine that with the mentioned stuff and this entire article depressed me. :(
N-train Dec 28th 2009 8:18PM
And that becomes the real balancing act the whole dev team has to deal with, and at some point they have to sacrifice content for timing. Imagine what three or four more months of development would have done for Wrath. While something as massive as an AN questing zone probably couldn't have been implemented in 3-4 months, a lot of these loose ends could have been tied up, like giving Crystalsong a reason to exist.
Yet BC was rapidly winding down, despite the best efforts of 2.4, and there was only so long they could wait to release the next expansion before everyone got sick of Outland and left WoW.
We're kind of at the same junction now, with Cata on the horizon. This is another reason why I'm pretty okay with the gating of content in ICC, because pushing deadlines back and killing time by Blizz (while it sucks) means less things have to get cut, and I'd rather wait an extra couple months then have to read a similar article about Cata in 2011.
kabshiel Dec 28th 2009 8:58PM
Sara was Yogg-Saron. It was just another mind game.
Opala Dec 28th 2009 9:43PM
but the problem is she's just sort of there, no real reason behind it, just randomly standing in the room, you know somethings up from the start. I've always gotten the impression that she was supposed to be a bigger player in what would have been the azjol raid, leading you on throughout, at the moment, she's just a random fight mechanic.
I also wish they'd do something with the connection between yogg and arthas, there may be something later, but with sara transforming into a val'kyr, and the arthas vision in the fight, i'd like to see how it all linked together.
I think a the problems came from hard-modes, plus combined 10-25 raiding. Stories like the gun'drak one, would have been finished in a 10 man alternate raid if this were the BC days, and i think making 2 lots of items for every instance, plus hard mode items, plus hard mode fights, sucked up the time, as well as made it so if they did do those additional places, they would have had to have all those things done for them to.
Dominika Dec 28th 2009 10:59PM
Ran out of time is pretty accurate. You see this sort of thing in EVERY game, if you dig through the files. Sounds, models, scripts, sometimes entire areas that got cut. Why? Because quite frankly, if you continually try to add every cool idea you come up with, you'll keep pushing the game further and further back. There's a certain point where you have to lockdown what you have at the time and say "This is what we're shipping with, this is what we're going to finish, this is the game we're going to polish and perfect from here on out," and more often than not you're going to have to cut a few things to get there.
If you don't, then you wind up with something like Duke Nukem Forever, where the game continually is redesigned and has new stuff added to it (Of course, the reasons for DNF's delays and endless revamps are more complex than that, but it's the same basic thing).
thebitterfig Dec 28th 2009 11:51PM
running out of time doesn't explain all the awesome weapon models that got designed, but never drop anywhere, particularly when some models get reused. zones getting cut, lessened scope to instance clusters, these things happen and i can forgive. but damn, i want some of those awesome looking unused ulduar weapons. they did a mostly good job with the ICC 5's at bringing in a lot of new and different models, now just keep up the good work.
uncaringbear Dec 29th 2009 4:20AM
Re: Running out of time.
When Blizzard runs out of time on a project, they have enough commitment and skill to release something as good as WOTLK. When other developers run out of time, they end up with Conan and Warhammer.
Eisengel Dec 30th 2009 5:20AM
12 million subscribers, all of whom are willing to pay subscription fees while waiting for 'Soon (tm)' to happen, while Blizzard continues developing 'for the good of the game'.
Honestly, there was no reason for them to ever be out of time. To me the release felt rushed, and the timing was incredibly convenient to torpedo Conan.
... things that make you say, 'wtf?!'
Nathral Dec 28th 2009 5:15PM
Agreed. It's kind of a damned if they do, damned if they don't thing. People complain about the artifical gating of content like in ICC, but if they have to push content out faster, then there isn't time to do everything they want to do and then people complain about missing potential.
Ringo Flinthammer Dec 28th 2009 5:25PM
Sometimes.
But simply not using the same few models over and over again, when there are more sitting in the files, ready and available, that's not a "damned if you don't" scenario at all. (That said, I loved the Ulduar gun model we ended up getting, and don't miss the other ones at all.)
Tiis Dec 28th 2009 6:45PM
Wrath was rushed an unfinished. With the exception of the first starting zones, it feels like it. There is so much more that is not there and you get the sense it should be, but the entire thing was rushed.
Kinjamani Dec 29th 2009 10:11AM
I'm with Tiis; as a whole, Wrath has been disappointing. I enjoyed this article, as my own quest for Lore and the tying of loose ends has lead me down some of the same paths of thought that the writer mentions.
This post reiterates some of the same ideas and a few others; I've been following it and hoping for some sort of Blue response, but to no avail:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=20677632277&sid=1&pageNo=1
There have been good moments in Wrath, like the quest line in the Storm Peaks leading up to Thorim, the Son's of Hodir, and Loken. Even parts of Zul'Drak were enjoyable; but they're scope fails to be as broad and interconnected as what was accomplished in the Burning Crusade.
In fact the "star" villain of Wrath was dangerously close to falling into the realm of Saturday-Morning Cartoon villains, complete with "Haha! I could totally end you now, but I won't because you screwing up my plans is so amusing!" and "I'll get you next time Gadget... next time!" /strokeevilfelinecompanion. The new ICC instances do a lot to redeem the Lich King as an actual villain in my eyes. Halls of Reflection gives him the respect he deserves; portrayed as an unstoppably approaching force of cold and undeath, growing ever nearer, making you look over your shoulder as you run for your life.
If all of the instances and storytelling in Wrath had been the quality found in the new ICC instances, then the expansion would have been something special. As it is, it feels like something that could have been so much more than it turned out to be.
Ramco Dec 28th 2009 5:15PM
I'd really liked a Zul'Drak raid, but they probably didn't make it because of the Zul'Again whiners. But hey, maybe we get some raids there in Cataclysm, like we got Karazhan in BC.
Nate Dec 28th 2009 5:59PM
I was at my WoW playing peak all through BC and I have to say, looking back, Kara is probably my favorite raid that Blizz has made that I've ran to date. I might have an emotional attachment to Kara, mostly because of the late night memories of near wipes on Prince (random dropping AoE's ftl), or the feeling of accomplishment of taking Curator (gear check) down for the first time. Of course Kara got boring when we could all face roll through it, but when it was fresh Kara was the shizznit. And Im seriously not trying to troll.
Marcosius Dec 28th 2009 6:31PM
If there's a troll raid or even an instance in Cataclysm I'm going to strangle someone with my Kalu'ak fishing pole. And I really love that pole, I'd hate to break it for that, but I will. Trolls have had enough screentime already, we get it, they like to sacrifice their gods and eat other people and trolls, we get it that they're ancient and very desperate, let them be for one expansion pack, puhleeeeze Blizzard?
splodesondeath Dec 28th 2009 7:24PM
@ Marcosius
You're just jealous of our sexy tusks and 10% health regeneration in combat!
Rollo Dec 29th 2009 1:32AM
Yeah, trolls are awesome. But let's hope we get to kill some gnomes and dwarves soon instead! :-D
qoa Dec 29th 2009 2:08AM
The actual zone of Zul'Drak looks like it leads to a raid. The building even sort of does. I hope that the mystery final raid of this expansion (if it follows tradition) will be troll based.
PS they have said there will be another content patch after Icecrown is done.
SINisterWyvern Dec 29th 2009 6:01PM
The reason trolls come up everywhere across the world is because they used to own the entire world. Think about the grand empires they had when so much is covered by them. Think of when Azeroth was connected. Zul'Drak comes down to what is now Ghostlands/EPL w/ Zul'aman. There are trolls all over the Hinterlands and some villages in Arathi. That's just one grouping.
Then there's Swamp of Sorrows with STV. There probably used to be more between there before the Dark Portal was opened and Kara being in Deadwind Pass.
Although on the Kalimdor side there's just Zul'Farrak. But a lot of change could have happened to those areas since the great troll empires.
http://codeflavor.com/bbs/screenshots/azeroth.jpg
And that's just what's left of the trolls. The rest of the races are all young and have changed much of the world.