It’s hard to believe that it’s almost been a year since Cataclysm was first released. There’s been a lot that has happened – good things, bad things, and things in between that people really aren’t sure about. The expansion on a whole seems to be controversial in the fact that some believe it’s been a big success, while others believe it’s been a failure. I personally think that it’s an experiment that was partially successful, but that’s for another time.
As of November 29th, the beginning of the end of Cataclysm is upon is.
Blizzard has said that this will be the last full content patch for the expansion, and that this will basically be the end for updates before Mists of Pandaria comes out. This could be taken two ways: the optimistic way, thinking that we’ll be seeing MoP sooner rather than later and won’t have to do this content forever; or the pessimistic way, thinking that we’ll be doing the exact same content for a year, as we did with Icecrown Citadel at the end of Wrath of the Lich King (Ruby Sanctum doesn’t count).
Unfortunately I don’t work for Blizzard, and I don’t know when they hope to release MoP. Like everyone else, I’d rather see it sooner rather than later, but we know that it will be done when it’s done. However, all that being said, I’d like to take the optimistic view.
The 4.3 content patch has a lot in it. Not only do we get the new raid on Deathwing, but there are three new 5-man dungeons, a revamped Darkmoon Faire, Transmogrification, Void Storage, the Raid Finder, a bunch of new items from the raids and other content, and a whole bunch of balance changes. It would take too long to go through each one, so I’ll suggest you check out WoW Insider’s guide to Patch 4.3 to get the details about many of the new features.
Briefly, I’m very happy with Transmogrification. The interface is incredibly easy to use, and I finally am rewarded for being such a packrat for all these years. I was able to have one of my favourite looks of the Tier 5 shoulders and Wildfury Greatstaff for my Druid, which really makes me happy and nostalgic.
Void Storage is nice, but unfortunately a bit too restrictive. I have a lot of stuff in my bank from the many holidays that have come around, and I was hoping to empty a bunch out to free up some room. The biggest thing is that items labelled “unique” or items not soulbound cannot be deposited to VS. Many tabards, as well as other holiday things are all unique, and some of the holiday items like the Brewfest and Winter Veil gear are not soulbound, but I wanted to keep them nonetheless. So I deposited what I could, and at least freed up some room.
The Raid Finder has been one of the things I’ve been looking forward to most. As I’ve mentioned before, my schedule is very weird for when I can raid, so now I can raid whenever I want – as long as there’s enough other people queuing as well. I was able to get into a group, and successfully get the four bosses currently available with little drama. We only wiped twice, and there were people taking charge of the raid to get things done.
We also got Tyrael’s Charger. It’s pretty.
All in all, there’s some great new content that everyone can enjoy no matter what you do. Raider, casual player, leveling player, there’s something for everyone. As I experience more of the new content, I’ll post my thoughts about some of them. In the meantime, happy exploring!