Cataclysm CONFIRMED!

World of Warcraft: Cataclysm
The Expansion will be Cataclysmic

* Level cap will be 85 because developers wanted to focus on the right things: redoing Azeroth and providing more end-game content.
* A new guild advancement system will let you earn guild perks and level a guild through 20 levels with points to spend in a talent tree. You will access abilities such as cheaper repairs, less durability loss on wipes, or mass resurection.
* Phasing can now add and remove terrain based on your progress. Coasts will be progressively more flooded depending on how far you are in a storyline for example.


Old World

* We all left a little part of ourselves in Northrend and the old world will be much darker than it was to make heroism and brotherhood more meaningful like Warcraft should be.
* Every zones will be revamped with new quests, items, and art. The old world will be a brand new experience and you won't have to deal with the annoying agility/spirit quest rewards anymore.
* Azeroth is now flyable. Pretty much all the zones will be changed to some extent, some of them like Elwynn Forest won't change too much but others like The Barrens will be sundered in two by Deathwing.
* The Wailing Caverns are now a lush and verdant Area.
* Desolace now has a lot more waters and a lot of plants can be seen in the screenshots.
* The Horde finally conquered Southshore.
* Auberdine was destroyed and the night elves have set up a new camp north of it. Garrosh wants to expand the horde and has built a fortified camp at the south of the zone.
* Stonetalon has been cleaned by the Goblins, Azshara will be the new Goblin zone, and are using quarries in the mountains of Azshara to build their town.
* Apparently Orgrimmar will be rebuilt and reinforced with steel, it now looks a lot like Garrosh strongholds...
* Undercity has been redesigned to be flyable, it now looks much more impressive from the outside.


Deathwing

* Deathwing, the leader of the Black Dragonflight will be the main vilain of the expansion.
* Deathwing heard the whispers of the Old Gods after the arrival of the Burning Legion, he eventually grew very powerful and also became very very crazy.
* His plan was to catch the Alliance and Horde unaware with something so massive that it would bring up the Elemental Planes.
* The Elemental Planes were created by titans to contain the elementals, they weren't happy with this decision and some of them like Ragnaros got really angry.


Starting Areas

* The Worgens and Goblins starting zone level goes from 1 to 15.


New Zones

* 7 new zones will be added


1- Vasj'ir

* Sunken City of Vashj'ir will be an underwater zone and was the home city of Lady Vashj before the original sundering, this is a gateway to the Abyssal Maw. Going through the Abyssal Maw will take you to the Elemental Plane of Water, even if the zone will be underwater you will be walking on the sea floor here, new underwater mounts will be available and should have the same speed as normal flying mounts.


2 - Deepholm

* Deepholm will be the new hub of the expansion, you will have portals here to let you teleport to Hyjal, Uldum, etc ... The Twilight's Hammer now serves Deathwing and have brought him back to full health in the Temple of Earth at the center of the map.
* Deepholm isn't really connected to Azeroth, the connection is where Deathwing emerged from the ground.


3 - Uldum

* Uldum will have at least two dungeons and is heavily inspired from Egypt. The sea at the west of Tanaris was just an illusion created by the Titan and Uldum is actually a brand new zone. It is rumored to hold a super weapon. Uldum is also the home of the Tolvir, a race of stone-like cats created by the titans.


4 - Plane of Fire

* Ragnaros used the cataclysm to come back from the Plane of Fire where we sent him and is now sieging the World Tree in Mount Hyjal to burn it down. Malfurion is back from the Emerald Dream. The whole zone (Hyjal) will make extensive use of phasing.


5 - Twilight Highlands

* The Twilight Highlands will feature Grim Batol, Deathwing literally broke open Grim Batol as he emerged from the ground. This is the new Twilight's Hammer base in Azeroth and both Horde and Alliance will have a new port town with boats here. The Red Dragonflight is still here but has been pushed back to the west of the zone near the Wetlands.


Dungeons & Raids

* The Firelands will be a new raid dungeon, it will let you go to the Elemental Plane of fire and visit Sulfuron's Keep, Ragnaros will be here and he's really pissed.
* Uldum will feature two new dungeons, the Lost City of Tol'vir and the Halls of Origination (a titan city)
* Grim Batol will have a level-up dungeon and a raid instance.
* Skywall (Air Elemental Plane) will have a level-up dungeon and a raid instance.
* The Deadmines and Shadowfang Keep will be back in a brand new level 85 heroic version.
* Blackrock Caverns will be a new level-up dungeon located in Blackrock Spire. This is an entirely new dungeon, new art, new creatures, new everything.


Player vs. Player

* Battle of Gilneas will be a new battleground where the objective is to control the city by controlling as many districts as possible.
* Tol'barad will be a new PvP zone and will also be the most important daily quest hub. Just like Wintergrasp a battle will happen every few hours and the winning side will get access to the Tol'barad Prison and extra daily quests, the really profitable ones.
* Rated battlegrounds will be added to the game and should get you the same rewards as Arenas.
* New arena maps will be added.


New Race & Racials
Goblins

* Goblins are a technological race from Kezan, their society is broken up into trade cartels run by trade princes. They are new factions and not the ones you can already see in game.
* The Cataclysm hit Kezan really hard and it's possibly destroyed. The goblins are now refugees on the Lost Isles.
* As a goblin you start as a neutral cartel and eventually join the horde as you progress through the questlines.
* Rocket Jump - Activate your rocket belt to jump up to 20 yards, every 2 min
* Rocket Barrage - Fire your belt rockets at an enemy within 30 yards, every 2 min. (Shared cooldown with Rocket Jump)
* Time is money - Cash in on a 1% increase to attack and casting speed.
* Best Deals Anywhere - Best possible gold discount, regardless of reputation.
* Pack Hobgoblin - Calls in your personal servent, allowing you bank access every 30 min.
* Better Living Through Chemistry - Alchemy skill +15, Your potions give more health / mana
* Goblins can be all classes except Paladin or Druids


Worgens

* Other races were discussed for the alliance, but the developers really felt that the alliance needed a monstrous race and horde needed something fun and tiny.
* Genn Greymane closed the Greymane Wall to block the Scourge's plague. Gilneas got nervous as the Scourge progressed to the south.
* Arugal was a patriot, he called the Worgens to battle for Gilneas but eventually was surprised by how dangerous what he called down was.
* Worgens are from somewhere else ... or even someWHEN else. They have a wolverine temperament and spent a lot of time trying to contain the beast within.
* Darkflight - Activate your true form, increasing movement speed by 70% for 6 sec, every 3 min.
* Viciousness - Increase damage by 1%.
* Abberation - Reduced duration on Curses and Diseases used against you by 15%.
* Flayer - Skinning skill +15, you skin creature fast, and you don't even need a knife.
* Worgens can be all classes except Paladins or Shamans


Worgen Form

* The Worgen Form is cosmetic only
* out of combat you can pick between Human or Worgen.
* In combat you will be a worgen.


New Secondary Profession
Archaeology
Archaeology is the new secondary profession that will be joining the ranks of cooking, fishing, and first aid in World of Warcraft: Cataclysm. Archaeology allows the player to unlock new abilities and rewards by discovering ancient treasures throughout the world. Each archaeologist uses the profession to uncover clues hidden in the world around them, such as troll relics or map fragments, and decipher their meaning, enabling the clever archaeologist to manipulate pieces of the past, learning the location of a treasure cache or valuable artifact. Such artifacts are highly sought after by the Archaeology Society, and they pay in gold and items for their return. Those who have mastered archaeology can find Titan artifacts, earning special currency used to unlock character paths and allowing the player to further customize their character.

Path of the Titans

* Talent trees won't be extended, you will just get 5 more talent points.
* The Path of the Titans will let players follow a path (not restricted to classes), this is a new talent system with new skills and passive abilities.
* A mastery system is being added as well, a lot of talents will be reworked to be more fun. The point is to get rid of a lot of the talent skills and not make you spend all your points in a talent tree just because it gives you more damage or higher crit chance.


Expanded Abilities of Existing Primary Professions
Reforging

* Reforging is another way to customize your gear.
* It will be relatively cheap, you will need a Blacksmith / Leatherworker / Tailor / Jewelcrafter / Engineer to do it. Each profession get to reforge a type of items.
* It lets you reduce one stat for another. Some restrictions will apply, you can't put the extra stat on something that is already on the item.


Changes to Leveling-up Professions
Professions

* Multi-gains will be added, while you level up your trade skills, rare items will give you more points as you skill up. (Rare items will give you 5 points for example, while green bracers will only give one)
* Gathering should be a little more fun.
* Engineering is a very fun tradeskill, but it's either amazing or it sucks and everybody drops it. More convenient items like Jeeves or Wormhole Generator will be added to the profession in the future to get back to the roots of Engineering.
* Fishing will also have some big changes, no details yet but it's going to be more fun.


MAJOR Changes to Gear Itemization
Itemization
In World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, there are plans to streamline the statistics found on items. We want to remove all unnecessary stats, make all existing stats understandable, and make all "core" stats more appealing. Here are some examples of such plans.

* MP5: This will be removed from items and replaced with Spirit. All healers will be given a meditation-like ability.
* Spell Power: Spell Power is being removed from items as well. Don't panic, we'll be improving Intellect so that it provides mana and Spell Power.
* Attack Power: We're removing Attack Power from items as well. Instead, we're allowing Agility to provide the necessary Attack Power for leather and mail wearers. Strength will provide the appropriate amount of Attack Power for plate wearers. This means leather and mail items will no longer be desirable for plate wearers.
* Defense: The Defense statistic is also being removed from items so that players no longer have to worry about juggling around "the cap." Tanks will receive the necessary anti-crit from talents, like Survival of the Fittest.
* Armor Penetration: This ability is too confusing and "mathy." It is being replaced with Mastery, a stat that makes you better at what you do. More on that later!
* Haste: Will also increase the rate at which you gain energy, runes, and focus. Retribution paladins and Enhancement shaman will have a talent that allows them to take advantage of this benefit.
* Block: Block Value is being removed. Blocking will now always mitigate a percentage of damage.
* Stamina: Players will notice more Stamina on gear as Defense, Spell Power, Attack Power and Armor Penetration are removed.


New!
Legendary Item

* Shadowmourne - You won't get Frostmourne in Icecrown but Death Knights and Hunters will get a Legendary Axe named Shadowmourne.


Class Changes
Hunter

* Hunter's mana is GONE!!!
* Hunters now use focus, no longer care about intellect or mana regen.
* Focus regenerates contunously, Steady shot improves the rate of getting focus bag.
* Rogue energy comes back at a 10 / sec rate, Hunter focus comes back at 6/sec (12/sec with steady shot)
* A shot costs 30 to 60 focus.
* Hunters will have fewer cooldowns on abilities
* Ammos will become an item, not a consumable.
* Hunter's new ammos might drop from bosses or bought with emblems, nothing is decided for the moment.


Warlock

* Soul Shards are no longer in your bags. The goal is to make them fun, not a hassle.
* Soul Shards will be integrated to the user interface. (Just like Death Knight runes)
* You get three shards per fight, they will regen very quickly out of combat.
* It will be possible to get more for long fights or mistakes through Drain Soul.
* Soul Burn (New Spell) : Cost 1 Shard, 30 sec cooldown, off the GCD. Empowers your next spell, many (not all spells) behave differently when empowered.
* Empowered Searing Pain : Next 3 Searing Pains crit
* Empowered Summon Demon : Instant Cast
* Empowered Soulfire : Instant Cast
* Empowered Fear : Instant Cast
* Empowered Death Coil : Longer Horror, more healing received.
* They are only used in combat, summons or demons won't use your shards.


Priest

* Shadow Priests will most likely get a nuke without cooldown in Cataclysm.


Shaman

* Shamans (Elemental) looks like "turrets" in PvP for the moment, the idea is to make totems funnier in the future ("put a totem down and something cool happens") but not a lot of details for the moment.


Warrior

* Warriors won't be as affected as other classes by the itemization changes, the goal is to make other classes gears look a lot like what warriors have.

More to come after Saturday's panel....

Rated Battlegrounds

* Rated Battlegrounds will be an alternative way to get arena points.
* Each week, one of the BG will be the Rated Battleground of the week. Winning in this battleground will improve your rating and give you points. Losing will not lower your rating.
* New PvP titles will be added, as your rating progress you will unlock higher titles. If you earned a PvP title you will keep it.
* When a Battleground is rated for the week, its normal non-rated version will still be available.
* The amount of Arena Points will be limited to prevent grinding.
* You will also earn guild level by playing these rated battlegrounds with your guildmates.


Tol'barad

* Tol'barad is a mix of Lake Wintergrasp and the Isle of Quel'danas.
* Every x hours the Daily Quests of the zone will shutdown and players will fight to capture the control points, the first team to get all of them wins.
* The winning team gets access to better daily quests rewarding more gold/better items.


Guild Leveling

* Guild experience is earned through multiple ways, players leveling, killing bosses, leveling professions, PvP victories, reputations.
* Each guild level rewards you with one talent point, these talents affect the whole guild. The top 20 earners of the guild will contribute to the guild experience for the day.
* Some of the guild talents will allow you to remove reagent costs from spell, get increased gold drops, summon your entire raid, rez your entire raid after a wipe, automatically transfer a % of gold dropped by bosses to the guild bank. Guild talents can be reset.
* Once your guild reached level 20, the guild experience becomes a currency and let you buy things like mounts, professions plans, banners, potions, rare reagents and guild talent respecs.
* Anyone can learn a guild profession recipe, if you leave the guild after learning it you will loose the recipe and it will be transferred back to the guild bank. Guild heirlooms also work the same way and are bound to the guild.


Guild Interface

* Guilds will have their own achievements, some of the old achievements might be converted to guild achievements. Some of the achievements are building a legendary item, maxing out every profession, etc ...
* A guild news feed will be added, it will shows boss kills, items looted, it will come with different filters to let you find specific information.
* You can now check the professions of every members of your guild and check their recipes list to see if they can create an item.
* You will also be able to invite other guilds to your guild events through the in-game calendar.


Mastery system

* There are too many talents right now and a lot of them are boring and just give passive bonuses. (1% hit bonus, etc ...)
* The goal is to make talents more fun and useful, Body and Soul or Juggernaut are a good example.
* The old passive bonuses will be automatically added to your character through the Mastery system as you spend more points in a talent tree. Spending a lot of points in Fury will give you extra crit, etc ... this will be implemented for all classes.
* Mastery bonuses will lower energy cost, increase your armor penetration, etc ...


Path of the Titans

* Character progression slows down drastically at level 80. Players will improve their character through the Path of the Titan by using the new Archeology profession.
* Archeology rewards you with "Ancient Glyphs" and give you bonuses reduced damage, reduced stun duration, etc ...
* They are NOT inscription glyphs and are totally different, as you progress after level 85 you will earn points to buy more glyphs. They are tied to your talent specialization and cannot be respecced.
* You will eventually get all your ancient glyphs, but hardcore players will get them faster. There will be a weekly limit to how fast you can get them.

Path of the Titans
Path of the Titans is another great new feature we covered that encompasses rewarding progression at max level. This new feature implements a third new type of glyph called “Ancient Glyph,” and as you can see, it is themed after the titans. These special glyphs are not associated with the Inscription tradeskill, and are also not specific to any class.

You’re able to unlock a path and progress within that path as you continuously engage in different aspects of the game. As you advance, you will be able to unlock special glyph sockets for your character. You can also respec your path at any time, in case you decide to change your path.

You earn these ancient glyphs by using the new Archaeology secondary profession to recover and trade in titan artifacts. Each path will have 2-3 choices per rank, and again, you can respec if you decide to go down another path.
- Path of Aman’Thul, the High Father
- Path of Eonar, the Lifebinder
- Path of Norgannon, the Dreamweaver
- Path of Khaz’Goroth, the Shaper
- Path of Aggramar, the Avenger
- Path of Golganneth, the Thunderer

You can earn progress down any of these paths by doing things such as questing, raiding, PvP, trade skills, etc., with a possible weekly cap for maximum progress. Over time, you’ll be able to unlock new ancient glyphs that will greatly benefit your character.

This new system will be accessible to all players at max level. Players will eventually be able to reach new ranks for ancient glyphs, encouraging them to further develop their characters. There is also a possibility that we will introduce whole new paths in future content patches.

Raids & Dungeons

* The concept of Ulduar teleports will be back in future instances including Icecrown Citadel. Developers do not want you to have to run for hours just to get back to a boss after a wipe.


Cross Server LFG

* This will let you PUG 5-man instances and search for groups through multiple servers.
* It will come with its own reward systems. If you're the leader of a PUG and complete the dungeon succesfully you will be rewarded.
* It should be out for patch 3.3.0.


Icecrown Citadel

* Icecrown Citadel will have 4 floors.
* It will be a 10 and 25 players raid with 12 bosses
* Waypoints / Teleporters are being reused here because the instance is really big.
* You will fight Sindragosa, the ultimate Frost Wyrm. You will also fight Arthas.
* The instance is built around the spire where the Ice Throne sits.
* At the 2nd floor, you will have to board an airship with your faction leader and race against the other faction to reach the 3rd floor. You will eventually board their ship with rocket packs and catapults to fight them.
* The 3rd floor seems to be the biggest one and will feature 3 wings
* The 4th floor is where you will fight Arthas


Icecrown Citadel - Dungeons

* The Icecrown Citadel will also feature a 5-man dungeon.
* It has 3 different wings and feature 8 bosses in total. You will have to unlock the 2nd and 3rd wings through an epic questline.
* You will fight alongside Horde and Alliance heroes.


Cataclysm

* 4 Raids : Grim Batol, Skywall, The Firelands, Blackwing Descent
* Dungeons : Grim Batol, Uldum, Deepholme, Skywall, Abyssal Maw, Blackrock Caverns
* Old World Heroics: Deadmines, Shadowfang Keep


Abyssal Maw (LVL 78-82)

* Abyssal Maw is one of the two 5-player dungeons located in the Sunken City of Vashjir. It will be non-linear.
* It's a giant vortex in the center of the zone, getting near the vortex will pull you down to the elemental plane of water.
* The dungeon will be on the ocean's floor. You will be able to see the ocean through windows in the dungeon and will make an extensive use of the new water effects in Cataclysm.


Halls of Origination

* Halls of Origination will be a non-linear dungeon with elevators to access higher floors. It will feature 7 bosses.
* This is one of the first 5 players dungeon located in the lost deserts of Uldum
* This is the ultimate titan dungeon, it will feature a lot of titan's lore and you will meet Brann Bronzebeard once again here.


Lost City of Tol'vir

* Exterior 5-man dungeon


Blackrock Caverns

* Blackrock Caverns is an entirely new instance located inside Blackrock Mountains. It was a good occasion to reinvent a fan favorite.
* It is now an off-site base for Deathwing and it's now occupied by the Twilight's Hammer. You will find out why the Twilight's Hammer is here and what they want here.
* It will feature new art, loot, and creatures. The Beast still lurks ...


Blackwing Descent (Raid)

* Nefarian will return in this instance. This is an entirely new raid inspired by the original Blackwing lair with new loot, new art, new creatures.


The Firelands (Raid)

* The Firelands is the Elemental Plane of fire. You will fight Ragnaros again here and you will finally fight him at his full strength.


Onyxia 5th anniversary

* Onyxia is back with updated encounter mechanics. You will find new and updated loot here based on the original items with improved stats.
* Onyxia's 310% flying mount "Brood of Onyxia" is going to be a very very rare drop.

All Great stuff.
Carnt wait to try it in bata hopefully by the fall of this year or start of next .