WoW Cataclysm VS 4e Forgotten Realms

[Giltonio_Santos]

The reason is very simple, in my opinion. Cataclysm surely changed WoW, but not beyond recognition, like the spellplague did to the Realms. It also helps, as someone pointed above, that the way of experiencing the two settings is very different.

Another point, though: Blizzard was able to implement the changes in WoW in a more organic way, even the complicated ones, like Tauren Paladins and Night Elf Mages. In the Realms, a lot was done just to make it more friendly to new players or the 4E ruleset. You can call it a nice effort, but the results with the existing players were predictable.

Cheers,

 

[Rel]

In response to those mentioning how static WoW (and most other MMO games) is, interestingly one of the changes brought by Cataclysm is that it makes the game world less static than it has ever been.

By use of "phasing" the game gives the appearance of your character having an impact on the game world. As you complete certain quests, the game world changes and some monsters disappear and the landscape transforms. There is a lot of smoke and mirrors to accomplish this but it does a lot to make the experience more dynamic in my opinion.

They've also massively changed (for the better IMO) the low level questing so there is a lot more variety than "kill X number of Y monster" and "collect Z number of monster ears". The designers clearly learned a lot from the high level expansions they'd done and have applied that to make the rest of the game a lot better.

 

[Nahat Anoj]

My rationale? The Cataclysm was done better than the Spellplague.

What does "done better" mean? Well, for one, it was done in large part to fix things that were generally considered broken or at least suboptimal, such as quest flow, zone size, the ability to fly in Azeroth, and so on. FR had problems, but many of the changes wrought by the Spellplague go in a different direction than I think FR should have gone in (personally, I think a massive calamity that reset the timeline of the FR world - back to something resembling the original boxed set, but with a few differences - would have been better).

Also, I feel the Cataclysm was truer to the spirit of WoW than the Spellplague was to FR. I don't know what it is, exactly, but FR lost something with the Spellplague and the transition to 4e (I do think it gained some cool things, but not enough to counterbalance the losses).

 

[Baveboi]

Seriously, Spellplague would be an interesting idea if they at least gave it some thought. Differently than Cataclysm, which they actually made with understanding of procedure and actual forgotten Warcraft lore.

The Dragon Gods and elemental masters of Chaos were a lore so deep buried inside the antics of Warcraft that only a friend of mine could point out the stuff (he's some kind of Super Nerd).

But Spellplague? They just killed Mystra AGAIN! I mean, there must be a fan-club with t-shirt and everything by now. Mystryl, Mystra, Midnight... Really Wizards, what the hell. They destroy continents, flood others, kill the Archmages and characters everyone knows and loves and think the entire community will swallow it up? Sheesh...

 

[Obergnom]

Thats what I suspected. I knew the Spellplague was done in an amateurish way without much consideration about what the setting is and has been before.

I was not sure about what Blizzard did, but it seems like they would have even pleased P&P RPG players with their approach, because it is done in a way that makes sense in the context of their world.

 

[amerigoV]

I was not sure about what Blizzard did, but it seems like they would have even pleased P&P RPG players with their approach, because it is done in a way that makes sense in the context of their world.

Blowing up the long-ass peer in Darkshore is worth the money for the expansion, IMO.

 

[ark7]

If wizards wanted to make a new campaign setting, they should have given it a new name. It would have been a great success, and they could have let FR alone instead of making up a bunch of crap that barely makes any sense.

It seems that cataclysms have become sort of a fad nowadays, even Guild Wars is doing it. I guess the companies see it as a way to launch a new product without having to invest on a new brand name. In my opinion, wizards' greatest mistake was seeing FR as merely a brand, which led them to trampling on the players' feelings.

As a business administrator, I'd advise them to stop focusing so much on traditional marketing and instead start studying Blue Ocean Strategy. Although I think they need to go back and restudy the basics of marketing before.

 

[Dedekind]

My impression was that WotC wanted the Spellplague to be a relatively vague event so that DMs could attach whatever plot hooks they wanted to it.

As a working theory, I think the appeal of FR has always been that players and DMs felt like they were playing in a fantasy novel. Like a novel, there are important characters and locations and part of the fun was meeting people or visiting places from the "novel." The detail and richness were most of the appeal.

The new design paradigm, however, is more about providing a few interesting details, but leaving most of the things open for the DM. That leaves the root causes and motivations open to interpretation. And perhaps that's not what pre-4e gamers wanted out of FR?

Anyways, that is a working theory.

 

[Sunseeker]

In response to those mentioning how static WoW (and most other MMO games) is, interestingly one of the changes brought by Cataclysm is that it makes the game world less static than it has ever been.

By use of "phasing" the game gives the appearance of your character having an impact on the game world. As you complete certain quests, the game world changes and some monsters disappear and the landscape transforms. There is a lot of smoke and mirrors to accomplish this but it does a lot to make the experience more dynamic in my opinion.

They've also massively changed (for the better IMO) the low level questing so there is a lot more variety than "kill X number of Y monster" and "collect Z number of monster ears". The designers clearly learned a lot from the high level expansions they'd done and have applied that to make the rest of the game a lot better.

This is probably IMO the main reason Catacysm has gained so much popularity, as you do actually see the effects of your efforts upon the world. Something originally introduced way back in the Sunwell update/expansion that capped off The Burning Crusade expansion, and refined throughout WotLK.

I also agree that low-level zone redesign is a big part of it. Zones that used to be flat, open, and repetitive are now anything but. New classes for old races was also a great play to get people to play more than just the new races.

 

[DM Howard]

My impression was that WotC wanted the Spellplague to be a relatively vague event so that DMs could attach whatever plot hooks they wanted to it.

As a working theory, I think the appeal of FR has always been that players and DMs felt like they were playing in a fantasy novel. Like a novel, there are important characters and locations and part of the fun was meeting people or visiting places from the "novel." The detail and richness were most of the appeal.

The new design paradigm, however, is more about providing a few interesting details, but leaving most of the things open for the DM. That leaves the root causes and motivations open to interpretation. And perhaps that's not what pre-4e gamers wanted out of FR?

Anyways, that is a working theory.

This is what I'm thinking in the way of putting a finger on what is wrong with the new FR. My group used to almost exclusively play in a pseudo-FR setting where our locations if not major cities and the like were kept vague so the players could imagine in their minds where on the map of Faerun they were. We all liked to imagine meeting up with characters from the novels and the novels gave a more in-depth look at the world, if you wanted that.

I agree with what has been said about Cata. I play WoW and I think they did a great job of adding content and reviving some rather than destroying content like the Spellplague.