World of WarCraft (PC) The Patches

World of WarCraft (PC) The Patches
And what a start they had. Hundreds of thousands of people running to buy, what was going to be the biggest MMORPG in 2005. Blizzard even had to stop the sale of the game in Europe for about 2 weeks in order to create new servers and upgrade hardware and software to accommodate the very fast growing population of gamers that wanted to experience the life of Warcraft and heroism.
In this article I will go through the release patches and also tell you a little about the 1.11 patch scheduled to release in the first half of June.
At release there were not many end game dungeons to be played. Most people hadn’t even reached level 60 yet and due to the fact that the population was still growing, Blizzard felt the need to implement things for low level excitement first and foremost. The only really high end instances were the Burning cities of Stratholm where Arthas abandoned his paladin order to save his kingdom and his people and ultimately be its doom, the Black Rock Spire where the Blackrock orcs roam, Stratholme, the school of the burning blade cultists. As well there was the Molten Core, deep beneath the black rock spire where Ragnaros and his generals were building their power and enslaved dark iron dwarves to safeguard the entrance. But the biggest of all threats in the Azeroth at release was perhaps the broodmother of the black dragonflight, Onyxia, and her lair deep in the Wyrmbog in Dustwallow marsh.
As the gamers evolved, so has the game. In the first patch, Mauradon, the Centaur clan’s city was released, as well as the Gurubashi Arena where it is every man for itself. Minor changes like helm and cloak graphics were also implemented and the first of many yearly events, the feast of the Winter Veil was put into motion. With the 1.3 patch the forgotten High Elf city, and Home of Queen Azshara followers was released. Now inhabited by the scary, ogre clans and the wretched highbornes, it was called the Dire Maul. Meeting stones where put in front of every dungeon to help the gamers find a party to the various dungeons in the game, ui improvements and class improvements where also put in. UI improvements contained a quest tracker, 4 new action bars totaling up in 48 new slots and chat bubbles. Class improvements included a new spell for mages (mage armor), improvements for priests (Power Word: Shield could be cast on all raid members, not only party members), better regenerating for warriors (generate parry, dodge, block) and the cat form DPS of the druid got increased.
Two new outdoor raid bosses with mixed spawn time were also implemented. This was Azuregos, the blue dragon who guards the land of Azshara and Kazzak, a demon Lord of the Tainted Scar in the vile and treacherous Blasted Lands.
With the 1.4 patch, Blizzard went from PvE (Player versus Environment) to PvP (Player versus Player) and implemented the Honor system to award those who played for the PvP aspect of the game. Because of this, they also made the Gurubashi Arena event happen ever three hours. Due to the honor system, Blizzard also put in new armor and weapons to award the PvP’ers of the game. Another feature was the elemental Invasions of 4 different places in Azeroth. These were Winterspring, Silithius, Un’Goro Crater and Azshara.
1.5 brought the Battlegrounds to the table and a new spawn of guilds would soon emerge in its wake. Also new mid level (level 30-50) content was brought in and reputation quests for the different factions so that you could buy mounts from other races of your faction.
1.6 Implemented Lord Victor Nefarious, Also known as Nefarian, the Black Dragonflights Leader. He is in the highest towers of the Blackrock Spire and wages a war against Ragnaros the Firelord and the rest of the world, with the red dragons as his most hated foe. As this was the PvE content of the patch, more PvP content was put in with Battlemasters in the cities, who could teleport you to the various battlegrounds. Honor system improvements and more class improvements made this patch the biggest that had been implemented. On top of this, the Darkmoon Faire now started to regularly visit Elwynn forest and Mulgore and awarded tickets who again can be turned in for items later for the adventurers who helped them gather materials they need.
1.7 The Soulflayer and his enslaved followers were set to be rescued and killed. The League of Arathor and The Defilers were recruiting guards to help them get the resources out of Arathi Basin. Meanwhile, Baron Revilgaz of Booty Bay found anther way to make money. A fishing competition. A dressing room for the posh people of Azeroth was also put in. (Pink and green? I mean come on!) The start of the re-evaluation of the classes also began with the Hunter talent changes.
1.8 Something stirs in the Emerald Dream and four mighty green dragons emerged form the dream realm. And so four new outdoor raidbosses was implemented; Ysondre, Emeriss, Taerar and Lethon. Hallows End and the celebration of Halloween was also introduced to the yearly event calendar. Map changes were done to Silithius and Cenarion Hold grew forth to give adventurers new armor, recipes and the likes. The whole world also got more items and Zul’Gurub alone holds 120 of them. It was also the druid classes turn to get their talents change.
1.9 The bug patch. The war of the sand is yet again at hand and adventurers of both races must join together to open the gates of the ancient Qiraji city Ahn’Qiraj. The armor sets that drops from Onyxia, the whole of Blackwing Lair and Ragnaros the Firelord had their looks revised. Auction Houses was implemented in all the major cities and linked together. The Goblin Auction Hoses in Everlook, Booty Bay and Rathcet was also linked together Paladins got their talents redone.
1.10, and the arrival of weather effects in some of the areas of Azeroth. The upgrading quests of the armor sets from Stratholme, Scholomance and Blackrock Spire. It was also the Priests turn to get an upgrade.
1.11 is on the verge of being released. The content of it contains Naxxramas, a necropolis floating above the plaguelands in northern part of the Eastern Kingdoms and the seat of the Licc Kel’Thuzad. A whole new armor set is also put into the new dungeon. The shamans and mages will also get their talents changed.
As with all MMORPG’s and patches there will always be problems. Some bugs are resolved but others get through. Blizzard did something good about the patches. They opened test realms to catch most of the bugs before they were implemented, but some still managed to get through or aren’t resolved before release. The first patches contained little or no bugs, but the first patch with big problems was 1.7 and the latest patch 1.10 has been the worst.
The graphical changes to the ui and the implementation of the weather effects made a lot of people unable to play. A hot fix was implemented (1.10.1) and everything seemed to be right on track, but when an extra patch to remove a few bugs is put in, suddenly all the high end level dungeons weren’t playable at all. Random disconnects made guilds all over Europe (not sure about the US) cancel their raids for over a week.
The first five or six patches were evenly balanced with both PvE and PvP content, but as of late the patches have become a bit unbalanced. Nothing has been done with the PvP content in a long time. The talent changes have made the classes that haven’t got their talent changes yet seem in worse shape than the others.
The biggest problem with the latest patches is the imbalance between the new PvE content; Ahn’Qiraj, Naxxramas, upgrade of the Stratholme, Scholomance and Blackrock Spire and the Emerald Dragons, and the vast nothingness of PvP content for the last 6 months. Hopefully the PvP’ers will just keep to their PvP guild and their continuous farming of the three battlegrounds to reach the highest PvP rank, 14.
Blizzard will keep adding patches which contains new content for as long as money permits it, and with the expansion coming and the software and hardware being upgraded, the future of World of Warcraft seems promising. But what happens when it is released is another matter. We must also hope that they will implement new content for the people who love PvP. The community also wants to get the patches more balanced so the different sides don’t have to wait 6 months for new content. It seems though that the PvP content will always get the short end of the stick though, but we will see.
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