Except a lot of people won't read the text. I've watched my Dad run around looking for something for over an hour before he gives up and won't play again for a week or more. If he'd read the quest it would be simple, but he never does, and he gives up in frustration before he thinks of it.

I imagine there are many people very similar.

Further, there are some quests that aren't that clear. I was leveling a small Paladin in Darkshore, and the quest told me to swim north. I swam north and north until I was way passed Darkshore, and I still couldn't find the guy.

That's the idea.
Nobody likes reading stupid quest text (unless it's some lore heavy quest chain).
So they either do this or add full voice over to every quest in the game like in SWTOR.
If they did that, I'd actually turn on the game sound for a change..

Well, that's kind of the point, Luotian. This smacks of dumbing down the game, to cater to the players who can't be bothered to really play the game.

Now, I realize there are plenty of players who don't read quest text. That's their choice. But to design an RPG around these people has the effect of changing the game for the worse, making it even less of an RPG, for the sake of the wrong part of the playerbase.

At least, that's how I see it.

If they want me to read quest text, they should make interesting quests in the first place.

@Ronin: Not that, you know, you just simultaneously managed to insult myself and my father in the process of 'proving' your point.

Is it dumbing down the game? Absolutely, yes. Is that bad? I don't think so. I think its a good thing to make more content more accessible to people. To let me play for the hour a day I manage and not spend that whole time trying to get somewhere or find one thing that has eluded me for days. That's a good thing and worth my money.

Quest givers already have yellow "!" over their heads, and the same goes for the folk you hand them into except with a "?". Imagine what it would be like without those. Every gathering quest has the items sparkle for you, so I don't know how this is any different except they are implementing it in the 4th expansion. You still have to go do it yourself, just now you don't have to go to WoWhead to find out where exactly the NPC is, you can just see it in game like you should be able to anyway.

@Luotian, so you're insulted by someone sharing an opinion that differs than yours. And you have to play the "you insulted my father!" card too? How about just letting your opinion rest on its own merits, hmm?

Honestly, to me this is just hand-holding of the worst sort. As if you couldn't identify the body in question BY THE GIANT BLUE GLOW HE'S EMITTING you need cog wheels floating over the body as well?

I am actually color blind and that blue glow that "caz" eludes to, I can't even see the effing thing or the people that are supposed to be Ghosts, so Blizz makes them translucent, I can't see them either or they are very faint. Having to raid/dugneon in some of the older areas was a pain for me coz I couldn't see a lot of what normal sighted people can see. So, in my case, I am glad for these changes, it'll make my life a lot easier and I won't get as frustrated when trying to do questing with ghosts around. Ghost mobs were never a problem, coz of the red nameplates hanging above them. That red text I could see. Though it looked closer to a grey with red tint. hehe

I remember in the earlier days in EPL/WPL can't remember which, when you go to the southern town to talk to the little girl. I could never see her, period. I had to ask passing players where she was, so I could complete the quest. That was also during the time when you out-leveled a quest that the Question Marks/Exclamation points were not as bright as if you were of level for them.

Sorry for the wall 'o text, wanted to add my .02$ worth. :)
Shinanji

@Luotian re: "Except a lot of people won't read the text."

I think a lot of people have been conditioned to ignore quest text because of the vagueness of their "clues". If the quest text were improved to be descriptively useful, people might actually rely on them as a matter of course. Useful descriptors combined with visually distinct targets that don't blend into the environment could condition players to read and search.

Current quest text give the impression of being given a generic direction, with the expectation that the player should then do a tedious grid search. That's a time-waster and no one would accept such useless instructions in real life ("Find my wife, who may or may not be alive, somewhere down the road from here." Really?!). When you tell people to travel and talk to someone they've never met surely you give them something more than "Go to the city and talk to John Doe."

There was a time when I thought the sparklies over quest objectives and resource nodes made it too easy.

This, while I guess it makes it easier for some people, seems to be dumbing it down even more. Quest objectives now not only sparkle, but are marked on your minimap, pointed out to you by the game, have an exclaimation mark next to their name when you mouse over them, and have their names in red reguardless of your name plate options for NPC's.

Now they point out who you have to talk to by giving them a speech balloon, and interactible objects a gear icon?

The gear icon incidentally reminds me of the interactible icon in STO. It shows a scanning icon.