On the contrary, that ring gives you a way to jump to central Northrend without leaving your hearth set there. Even without the portals, I'm betting there will be the need to come back, occasionally. It will let you skip the boat ride.

I disagree entirely. You used it for nearly a whole expansion and now we're moving on. No "fale" there.

Just call it the "Ruined Ring of the Kirin Tor"

I feel the pain on this one, especially since I just bought the thing in the past 2 weeks for an easy-access-to-capitals-come-Cataclysm. Now they do this. Nnnnnnnn. ~>:(

I'll still be going to northrend on a daily basis to run H-UP for the Blue Proto Drake as well as hittin up the Oracles for my Egg once a week. It won't act as a second Hearth like I'd hoped, but between the cheap upgrade through different tiers of content and the time when it -did- act as a second Hearth (especially when I was grinding BC rep) . . . Well worth the cash I paid so long ago.

I agree that it's unfortunate to see the rings devalued like this.

I would like to see ring owners be given the ability to either use the old portals or port to the Dalaran crater in Hillsbrad (or something) as compensation. I don't think it's likely to happen, but I could see a game mechanic that made use of the rings being a plausible compromise.

I think your missing one other thing there. Class trainers have replaced the Portals. Hmmm now where will I have to go for those new spells and abilities that I have not already learned.

Might be nice to have half the population of Dal missing. Might clear up some lag issues for some.

Going to have to give buying a ring some thought.

The ring was never a good investment. You were better of getting the teleport-tabard from from Argent Crusade, takes you to the tournament grounds were are only a minute flight-time away from Dalaran.

I am loving my ring right now, as I'm working on Loremaster so I can hearth in whichever 'Azeroth' city is appropriate, and still zoom to Dal if needed (usually to port elsewhere..).
Granted, it will suck when it's pretty much useless. Oh well, it was an achievement, and it's gold I've long since replaced a few times over. I do hope they come up with something similar in Cata, though. I like advantages and flexibility.