Posts with tag warlords-of-draenor-garrisons

It's no secret that I love Dog, the farm puppy I rescued from the fields of Halfhill in Mists of Pandaria. I've written about Dog on a couple of different occasions, because he was just a really cool and unique perk to leveling reputation with the Tillers. Does Dog do anything? No, not really -- he just hangs around on the farm, responds to a few different emotes, but he doesn't actively do anything to further the game. He's just Dog, defender of the farm house, digger of holes, and overall good boy.

It was with some concern that I wondered what Dog's fate would be when Warlords of Draenor hit -- I didn't like the idea of leaving the poor little guy behind. According to a recent tweet by Cory Stockton, that may not be a worry after all.

A certain "Dog" might have just found his way to your Garrison in a future build.

- Mumper (@mumper) August 7, 2014

One of the most prized, beloved items from the Burning Crusade expansion had nothing to do with your armor or your prowess in slaying endless dungeon and raid bosses. In fact, it wasn't even a quest reward -- it was simply a quest item, Archmage Vargoth's Staff, which was used to summon an image of Archmage Vargoth himself. Many players didn't bother handing in the quest in which the staff was obtained, because there was something appealing about having Vargoth on call. Players were so pleased with Vargoth that the image was eventually changed to respond to player emotes -- when you danced, Vargoth would chuckle at your absurdity.

In Warlords of Draenor, where you go, Vargoth will follow -- or at least he will if you can find him. A rare level 100 follower with a whopping 550 ilvl, Vargoth, or rather, his image, is a solid addition to any garrison. But Vargoth isn't the easiest mage in the world to track down, and requires a little legwork and exploration if you want to add him to your army. Vargoth may be a powerful mage ... but he's not so good at getting to Draenor.

Warlords of Draenor is bringing some big changes to the table -- and Wowhead recently interviewed Lead Game Designer Ion "Watcher" Hazzikostas about many of the changes we'll be seeing in regards to raiding, valor, and more. Item upgrades will be going away entirely, and with them, the valor point system seems to be attracting a shift in purpose, although that shift hasn't quite been decided just yet. However, the incentive mentioned during last year's BlizzCon that rewarded players with extra valor for grouping is undergoing a revamp, as valor currently isn't as useful as it has been in the past.

Also interesting to note are the design changes for gear rewards. For the past several expansions, gear obtained from varying levels of difficulty in raids has always been the same model, simply different colors. In Warlords, this will be changed to be similar to what we saw in Burning Crusade -- PvP and PvE gear will share similar models, and the color shift will denote whether the armor was obtained in PvE, or PvP. Raid gear will go back to having different artwork, depending on the difficulty of the content completed -- so players that have defeated the most difficult content will have the snazzy gear to show for it.

While Garrisons are going to be a huge piece of playable content, Hazzikostas pointed out that the feature is in no way mandatory -- the feature is not meant to feel like dailies in any way, and there won't be any sense of obligation to work on them on a daily basis. For those that have waded their way through the daily system introduced in Mists, that should be a relief to hear. Check out the full interview above for more from Hazzikostas -- and keep an eye on Wowhead for a full transcript of the interview soon.

Hunter site Eyes of the Beast attended PAX East this weekend, and uploaded some images from the press kit. Included in the screenshots are an impressive shot of what appears to be the Spires of Arak, a shot of Frostfire Ridge, another shot of the gorgeous scenery in Shadowmoon Valley, and of course, garrisons. The garrison screenshots in particular are interesting because it looks like this is a garrison at or very near completion -- giving a much clearer look at just what these things will look like when we get to set them up ourselves.

Of course, the buildings displayed are all Alliance structures -- we haven't really seen any fully realized previews of Horde settlements just yet. The Alliance architecture seems to blend in with Draenor's lush landscape remarkably well. I'm hoping that the Horde buildings won't stick out like a sore thumb in comparison -- but we'll have to wait to see what the Horde structures look like, for now. Check out the full post on Eyes of the Beast for all the images.

Garrisons seem to be shaping up to be the centerpiece of Warlords content -- not in the sometimes soul-crushing manner of the daily quest grind in Mists, but as an entertaining and engaging diversion for players to do at max level in between dungeons, raids, scenarios, and whatever else happens to pop up. We have yet to get a proper introduction to the feature, but we've been told and shown in glimpses here and there that it's going to be big. Much, much bigger than our farms.

Wowhead has been busily datamining everything under the sun from the Warlords alpha client, and some of that information directly involves the new feature. While there's not a clear picture of how exactly garrisons are going to work, the datamining does point out some fascinating details and perks. It's become incredibly clear that while garrisons have been referred to as WoW's version of player housing, in fact they're likely going to be much, much more than that.

While we haven't exactly had an influx of news regarding WoW's next expansion, one good piece of information was recently mentioned on Twitter. Garrisons, a major feature in Warlords, will not require gold to build. Instead, they'll have their own resource system -- although what that resource happens to be, or how it works, has yet to be revealed.

Garrisons are WoW's answer to a plea for player housing that has been asked for as far back as vanilla WoW. However, rather than a traditional view of player housing, garrisons have already been shown to be a far more interactive experience, one that your character can use to their advantage by gathering followers, sending them on missions, and even use as a method of boosting professions. While we've seen screenshots of garrisons, and seen a post on the art and design elements behind the feature, we haven't really heard a lot about the actual mechanics other than little tidbits released via Twitter or mentioned in interviews.

Here's hoping that waiting for the "soon" mentioned in Senior Game Designer Jeremy Feasel's tweet will be a pretty brief experience. And even though we haven't got much in the way of details, it's nice to know that garrisons won't be breaking anyone's bank.

It seems that Creative Director Alex Afrasiabi isn't the only one tweeting images from Draenor. On the heels of some perfectly lovely screenshots of Talador and Gorgrond, another screenshot has surfaced. Game Designer Jeremy Feasel has stepped in the fray, having joined the Twitter crew yesterday under the moniker @Muffinus. Feasel designs Pet Battles, was the mastermind behind the Timeless Isle, and is now currently working on Garrison content. After a short introduction, he didn't waste any time, posting a new screenshot of a garrison in progress.

Senior Art Director Chris Robinson has been keeping us on tenterhooks awaiting the next Artcraft installment, dealing with Garrisons, and it's here!

It's a fascinating post, giving way more than just art, an insight into the design process and the "gameplay first" approach the designers have taken. We also hear from Wendy Vetter, the Dungeon Team's lead artist, who walks players through the process of making the new old, and the old new, as they borrow and adapt older textures and assets while still bringing them up to date with the new systems and graphical quality.

There's also input from the props team, giving information on the elements they've added into the mix, the storytelling side of design, creating a whole with items and their use. They're the team working on decoration and filling the space in the buildings.

It's another great installment in the series and a fascinating read!

Over the weekend, Lead Content Designer Cory "Mumper" Stockton tweeted several exciting tidbits about Warlords' much-anticipated Garrisons feature. Wowhead rounds up the key tweets, which cover things like the focus of Garrisons, and some exciting hints at buildings.

When we were talking last week about things that make your Garrison feel like home, one thing that cropped up was ways to show off achievements past. Mumper mentions that there will be Monuments that players can place, earned from achievements. However he does go on to clarify that Garrisons are not about placing furniture and decorating. This isn't The Sims in WoW, after all.

Most exciting, though, he talks about one building, a Mage Tower spec called City Portals that opens ports to every major city. It seems from his later tweets that the tower will not be mage-specific, but will need to be specced and upgraded like any other building to get the portal setup. His response to another tweet confirms that the plans will be from drops, quest rewards and vendors, again implying the buildings will be available to all.