Joe's World... of Warcraft - Keeping the Wow in WoW: Trapped in Outland

Is it me or once you hit level 70 do you feel trapped in Outland? Sure there are the Seasonal Events “back home” to get players involved in Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms, and those events are great. *cough* see last week’s column *cough, cough* Additionally there are the High Level Outland instances including Serpentshrine Cavern, The Black Temple, and Mount Hyjal as well as all the heroic level instances. And let’s not forget PvP (not that any hardcore WoW player could). All Outland based options for the level 70 player.

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The problem is, once new zones are launched, game developers have to expect that those original zones will empty out, especially when those new zones are geared toward end-game level characters. A prime example of this was found in Dark Age of Camelot, when everybody jumped to the Shrouded Isle zones. The upcoming Zul’Aman will take you to the Ghostlands, but that is still a Burning Crusade zone.

One way Blizzard has forced level 70s back to original cities is by not having an Auction House in Shattrath. That’s blackmail, pure and simple. I understand and appreciate the fact that a lot of hard work went into creating and designing all the major cities. When you take the time to look at them all, they really are great and the level of detail is amazing. I agree with Blizzard that it would be a waste for all players not to visit them on a regular basis. But give players a real reason to visit them, not just make it an inconvenience.

Hey Blizzard, “You want us back in the old zones? Don’t blackmail players, bribe players”:

• How about the Auction House doesn’t take a cut in your city of origin?
• Maybe huge discounts for being exalted. Hell I’m exalted, prove it to me. As my co-worker Thunderballz said “even when you work at a department store you get 30% off” These NPCs should be begging to fix my armor.
• Get some daily quests moving in places other than Outland.
• Make Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdom questing worth more gold. Would it really hurt the in game “economy” so much to throw players an extra couple of gold a day?
• Daily quests for more factions. It would a good alternative to just instance grinding.

Those are just a few ideas to bring the high-end character back home. We should want to go to the original zones, not feel obligated to go to them.

Another fun way to re-explore the original zones is what I like to call “pay back instancing”. I think every WoW player knows how it feels to wipe running an instance. Unless you belong to some sort of prodigy guild that ran Onyxia, Molten Core, Black Wing Lair or Zul’Gurub without a wipe. Now it’s time to pay those dungeons back. All those pain -n-the-ass dungeons that took their toll on level 60 WoW players have easily become five or ten man raids. There is a certain amount of satisfaction of running these places without all the tedious planning; The loot isn’t too bad when it’s split amongst smaller parties. It’s a fun way to kill some time.

Let’s hear your comments or ideas of keeping some fun around at 70.