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by Adam Holisky 
Feb 15th 2010 at 1:00PM
Fellow fatty Kevin Smith (we're part of a super exclusive club) was kicked off a Southwest Airlines plane this weekend. And while it has absolutely nothing to do with WoW, it certainly made me stop and cringe for a moment at the prospect of getting kicked off the plane as I'm on my way to BlizzCon. Of course I could take preventative measures to combat this inevitable passenger-eject-button-pushing, but I'm too busy eating my Pepperoni Pizza for breakfast, which is far better than Alex's Hawaiian Pizza.
Nomnomnom.
Ben asked...
"Do you think the tension in Cataclysm will possibly lead to World of Warcraft: The Fourth War? It could be a very PVP centric expansion, with raid content involving major battles in war, lots of new battle grounds, y'know, the works."
It certainly could. Cataclysm is going to caused renewed tensions between the Horde and Alliance, and anything concerning that buildup of tension could be a place to take the Warcraft storyline, potentially into a PvP centric mindset. But is that likely to happen? I honestly don't think so, not for a major expansion. I could see a content patch being all about PvP, but not an xpac itself.
Part of the reason I don't think PvP will get its own expansion is that it's not as popular as raiding and PvE. This doesn't make it any less valid, but we've seen a lot about how arenas are not like they were, and how BG queues are insanely long in some battlegroups. A new expansion that's PvP focused could certainly breath some new life into the PvP system, but it would be a risky financial move, and that's something Bobby K. isn't going to go for.
But on the flip side, I do think Blizzard could release a major PvP patch that changes the entire system. Cataclysm is going to go a long way to making Battlegrounds more attractive again, and somewhere along Cataclysm's release cycle they could dump a gigantic patch that redoes many of the foundational elements of PvP -- things like having separate spell actions and talent modifications for PvP environments (which is something they've said they won't do, but I think it's becoming increasingly clear PvE builds and PvP builds are incompatible in their very existence side-by-side).
At the end of the day though, we don't know what Blizzard's plans are post-Cataclysm. We've heard a few rumors, some of them are probably true, but nothing is out in public yet.
Lilschlute asked...
"Has Blizzard given any hints on if any new passenger mounts would be implemented in the future? If so what?"
Blizzard hasn't said anything about the timeframe of implementing new passenger mounts. They have mentioned they want to do multi-person flying mounts, but again, no timeframe. Possum brings up a good point however:
Elstor asked...As a mage and priest I'm all for multi passenger flying mounts.
Step 1. Get two of your friends on your mount
Step 2. Fly up really high
Step 3. /cancel mount
Step 4. Cast Slowfall/Levitate on self. Watch friends (or enemies??) plummet to their deaths.
"In your opinion, what's the chance of seeing Warcraft 4 ever made?"
Very likely in the long term, not likely at all in the short term. Blizzard has said previously they're open to Warcraft 4, but right now they've got all their development teams working on other projects (WoW, SCII, D3, Unannounced MMO). When one of those teams becomes free, there'll be a lot of discussion about what to do. That's not going to happen for a little bit though, even with SCII shipping later this year (it will still have two other campaigns to go after it ships).
The clearest indication we have on this matter is from Pardo's comments back in 2008, which you can read over at GameDaily.
Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW.com crew is here with The Queue, our daily Q&A column! Leave your questions in the comments and we'll do our best to answer 'em!Filed under: The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 7)
Sinnh Feb 15th 2010 1:23PM
Question: now that i'm done with Love is in the Air and almost done with Lunar Festival, I was perusing the wow calendar for the next event when I ran across this sentence for Noblegarden (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/events/noblegarden/): The egg hunt is on! The towns of Azeroth and their immediate environs have been liberally sprinkled with Noblegarden eggs for players to collect in a ravenous frenzy -- er, in the spirit of sharing.
Dare I hope that by writing "the towns of Azeroth" it means that any town will have eggs, not just starting areas? Or has it always been phrased this way?
ZMES_Matt Feb 15th 2010 1:45PM
Pretty sure that's the same way it's always been phrased.
I read it last year and got really excited and then really let down. :P
Vitos Feb 15th 2010 1:49PM
The others are villages, shires, colonies, forts, and camps. No other towns exist in the rest of the game. So while it does mean all towns, the only towns are the starting towns.
Beruza Feb 15th 2010 2:31PM
What happened to the old easter event where they placed eggs randomly all over the world? They usually contained chocolate and some coin. That was much more fun than fighting over eggs in starting zones (well....not fighting, but ganking and being ganked)
Saltypoison Feb 15th 2010 1:24PM
Is it just me, or does anyone else find it strange that Kevin Smith flys Southwest? They don't even offer a first class section...
Tethra Feb 15th 2010 1:36PM
He flies Air Canada when he comes up here, though AC doesn't treat him any better. He did an "Evening with..." tour up here in 2008 and his show here in Edmonton was postponed because he missed his flight. And by "missed his flight," I mean AC told him he was too late for his flight and wouldn't let him board, even though it wasn't supposed to leave for another hour. So, the show was postponed a week, but he did have some great rants about Air Canada.
Juzelle Feb 15th 2010 1:37PM
Despite being a well known director, Kevin Smith is pretty much just a regular joe. 'Because Southwest is cheap' is probably the answer ;p
Chilblain Feb 15th 2010 2:30PM
Not as strange as a fat guy trying to convince people he isn't fat.
Gemini Feb 15th 2010 2:33PM
He's not the only celebrity to fly Southwest. I used to work at SeaTac Airport as a contractor for Southwest and I remember a bunch of the ground crew getting all excited because they found out Courtney Love was on a plane.
Chilblain Feb 15th 2010 2:34PM
Also, not as strange as the fact that somewhere a studio still gives the talentless Kevin Smith money to make movies.
I hope there's a fart joke in this one!
Joseph Smith Feb 15th 2010 4:05PM
Kevin Smith has NEVER pretended he isn't fat. As a matter of fact he refers to himself as tubby, a fat bastard, and just plain fat.
As for talentless, I think we can let the sales of his movies speak for themselves. Maybe not YOUR cup of tea, but he does have an audience.
Nathanyel Feb 15th 2010 8:42PM
Another question would be, why was he kicked of the plane? Did he have "no ticket"?
Baine Feb 15th 2010 1:26PM
Bobby Kotick has been mentioned quite a bit regarding blizzard's financial movies along with other things such as Cataclysm. So my question: What does the blizzard-activision merge mean for blizzard and does Bobby Kotick have a say in blizzards decisions?
Baine Feb 15th 2010 1:27PM
Meant to say financial moves.
Candina@WH Feb 15th 2010 1:36PM
I believe you mean either motives or moves (not movies).
Bobby K has a great deal of influence at the business level. If a project is taking too long, or costing too much, he will probably say something. He will also be the guy who says, basically, how can we pump as much cash out of this franchise as possible (coming soon -- the WoW diet from Jenny Craig).
That being the case, I don't think he has much say in content development, story lines, etc. He would be wise to let those who have been successful (blizz) develop their games.
He can go and pimp Tony Hawk and DJ Hero and other Activision 'successes'
Andrew R. Feb 15th 2010 1:29PM
Why are the Paladin blessings only 10 minutes save for the greater blessings but mark of the wild and arcane intellect are 30 minutes?
ZMES_Matt Feb 15th 2010 1:54PM
Because not all classes are the same. Blizzard doesn't want to homogenize everything to the point of playing one class is like playing them all. While duration of buffs is just a very minor and (in)convienent way of keeping somethings different, if it really bothers you that much, then I'd have to ask you, how come your Auras have no duration and stay on forever so long as its toggled on? If they ever start changing these things for convenience, I would suggest then that Priests, Mages, and Druids just have their buff turned on at all times and always applied to anyone in their group/raid like an aura.
Although, that'd make your character feel like they're doing a lot less...
Banndit Feb 15th 2010 1:55PM
Hey, at least they aren't only a couple minutes long like our warrior shouts.
Shadowwind Feb 15th 2010 2:05PM
True, but shouts are instantly applied to all nearby party members, unlike blessings, which have to be applied one. at. a blinkin'. time! to four other people plus pets. That's a full mana pool right there for a baby ret or prot pally. Add that to the fact that baby paladins are lousy with mana conservation, and it gets REALLY annoying REALLY fast. Low-lvl tanking paladins have it the worst since gogogo dps tend to do dumb things like pulling the next group while the tank is sitting and drinking after the buffing.
Storm Eagle [Planeteer | Power of Phoenix Wrights Colloquial Catch Phrase - OBJECTION! and Captain Planets Second in Command] Feb 15th 2010 2:51PM
Wishes Horn of the Winter was longer than 3 mins......