Why Cataclysm and MOP Classic would be better than you think

WoW Classic Mists of Pandaria Classic Discussion
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These days I decided to roll a new toon on retail and go straight to Mists of Pandaria content via Chromie. The more I played, the more I realized that re-releasing Cataclysm, then MOP makes more sense than you imagine.

Cataclysm and Mists of Pandaria came out when people still deeply cared about the game, yet a lot of them disagreed on the direction Blizzard was going. Back in Classic and WOTLK the low level zones were heavily imbalanced - there were more Alliance settlements. In order to fix that, Blizzard invented Garrosh and made the Alliance-Horde war possible. The Horde was mostly victorious, and the story of Alliance was one of loss.

Understandably, this made many people upset - including me. A lot of us wanted a satisfactory storyline for the Alliance - yet they forced us to help Thrall in Cataclysm and play with the pandaren in MOP. This prevented us from fully enjoying Cataclysm and MOP for what they were, and this was not what we wanted.

But now, when we know how the story will play out, I believe it’s a good moment to revisit Cataclysm and Mists of Pandaria. Just as some books are better when they’re being reread, Cata and MOP will be felt much better on replay than they were played first time.

When I rolled my newest toon and sent him to Pandaria, I realized that I enjoy the continent more than I remembered back then. I enjoy it for what it is - something I missed back in 2012, because everything in my head was “What’s going on with the Alliance-Horde war?” and “When is the Alliance getting its fist pump moment?”. Now I see the complicated story of the jinyu and the hozen, the pandaren. I got to know the Hidden master in the Valley of the Four Winds, then went to Kun’Lai to help the grummles.

And suddenly I realized I want to re-experience everything again. The damaged Stormwind. The toppled statue. The park gone. The marage of Thrall. The destruction of Theramore. The trip to Pandaria. The beauty of the Vale of Eternal blossoms, which is now GONE. The campaign in Krasarang. The purge of Dalaran. The liberation of Razor Hill/scouting Orgrimmar with a robotic cat. The long-lost Monkey king. And what I miss most - 3-person scenarios

This is why some of us may need Cataclysm and MOP. We think we don’t, but we may actually do… Even if we hate them once again, it would be worth it - we’ll remember why we hate them.

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It will never be good. Unless they make an entire new expansion that has nothing to do with either cata or pandaria but name it cataclysm classic and pandaria classic.

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Only bots will play that like in WOTBOTKING

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You can speak from now on till end of world. Cata onwards will never be good.
For me game breaking is:

  • World ruined
  • Account-wide everything
  • Talents specific spells ect. aka new talents trees
  • evelything locked to endlevel.
  • and later: scaling.
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Good luck with having any discussion on those topics when most people don’t know anything about those expansions and/or run on pure emotions.

Further expansions will be released anyway and people will play them

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Will they? So far there have been surveys, but I’m not sure Blizzard will commit to Cata. The reaction here is negative, with some people saying: I’d replay MOP. But we can’t skip to MOP without doing Cata.

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Really? I wont. I play WoW as long as Era last. No Cata and on for me. Even Wrath was over quick.
I of course miss things from Pandaland (Ferdinand, nice vistas, Nat Pagle and his Fisherfriends), and other places. But gameplay is king. If play is no fun then nice pictures and green pastures can go forget it!

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This. I’d skip Cata in a heartbeat if there was an option for it. But I adore Pandaria to bits. The PvP, the PvE, the quests, the atmosphere, everything was so well designed. Hell, I loved playing Monk during WoD. Nat Pagle was the sole reason I levelled fishing in MoP, it was so good.

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I would love another cata/mop expansion, but without F’ing pve items in arena this time…

DS items and legendaries completely killed arena for me.

Backpedding rogues with FoF, no words.

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But gameplay was shot after Cata. Why you think IronMan (Which is OG HC challenge) Was invented in Cata?
I tell you because you could pul-pull-pull, go in max level zone pull three or four randoms upon just arrive in Pandaria and still survive while chatting.
Game is no fun when everything given to you, and when everything fun start at max level.

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If you are going off negative feedback here then I am afraid that the game is dead since release. Actually, it was dead before release.

I think most people will agree, that’s why you will even find people eager to play Shadowlands classic over another year of raiding molten core with 1 button rotation. Every expansion is a favourite to someone, everyone hates some expansions. Personally, I am never touching vanilla again and TBC can kindly gargle on my nuts if they will release it with initial rep grind again.

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Taste differs :slight_smile:
I stop played Retail. Not even bougth SL or Dragonsflight. I love rep grind - I did AQ rep with carapaces now twice :wink: I love fishing, and I LOVE slow levelling in Era. 2 or 4 or even 6 buttons not much differnce, difference for me if you have to use brains too to survive, not only pull all what move.

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They would have to remake the old world again to fix those zones after the screw-up that was cataclysm. I mean sure, I do enjoy the occasional pop culture reference or cool story moment, but Cataclysm heavily overloaded the world with both to the level that it is not interesting at all.

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If it was just me then I wouldn’t, but if the guild continues then so will I. They are worth it even if the game is not.

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I mean, if people want Cata, more power to them. I know that if I can’t transfer my WotLK characters to a WotLK Era server, I’ll be deleting every one of them. I do not want to subject myself to the post Cata game world. At least I’ll still have Classic Era (and maybe the HC server) to enjoy.

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I would cry - I moved ONE to WotLK for Achievements. I would hate to “kill” him. But will never again play Cata.
Just hope for WotLK Era!!!

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As long as I have classic Era I’m OK, though deleting this character - the one I originally started Classic with - will be particularly sad, even though he’s all but retired. I still have many fond memories of Classic, almost all of which are connected to this Druid. Here’s hoping I can just retire him in peace on a WotLK Era server and use him for forum posting (as I’m practically doing now) rather than delete him!

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Is also my oldest / firs character, that is only one in Wrath.
This here is my PvP-failure / Forum dweller, it will never get “older” :wink:
I also play most Era.

We hope, cross fingers, and so on for Wrath Era!

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After what they did whit wotlk, i dont want to see what they gona do whit cata/panda…

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My all time favourite expansion was MOP, I started in BC but the game was at it’s best for me personally in MOP. So yeah I would love a MOP expansion. The classes where all fun, PVP was amazing and raiding for me was top tier fun. I also loved the whole theme of it

I haven’t touched the current woke disneyland spiro the dragon expansion and never will, so for the time being I’m on WOLTK and classic

1 Like