Upcoming World of Warcraft Cataclysm Updates and Changes

With Cataclysm on its way, there are many changes taking place in the World of Warcraft. The pre-xpac patches are bringing some of these new changes as a preview of more to come. If you've been playing WoW then you probably already know about the many big changes that are in place already but do you know about everything that is on the way?

At BlizzCon 2010, the World of Warcraft panels released even more information about Cataclysm, upcoming updates and patches and what players can look for in their favorite game. Here are some highlights:

• All instance quest givers will now be found inside the instance itself. There's no more running all over the world looking for this or that quest-chain to get the instance quest you want.

• Classic dungeons in WoW will experience a major revamp with one common goal in mind- shorter, easier and more fun. Many instances will be cut down or shortened altogether. Some specific dungeons getting split into multi-wings include Blackrock Spire, Uldaman, Maradon, Wailing Caverns and Sunken Temple.

• Shadowfang Keep and The Deadmines will have new heroic versions as well as normal versions that are tuned for the same level range as they were before. However, they will have new content and encounters to explore.

• Cataclysm will greatly change the raiding philosophy, once again. Blizzard wants to bring more dungeons available on launch and in bite-sized chunks. The goal is to create dungeons and raids that competent raiders can get through in a single night of play and not something that takes many hours or days to achieve.

• Blizzard is also aiming for cooler raid encounters with Cataclysm but we're all going to have to wait and see if this one pans out. It's all been done before so it will be tough for Blizzard to pull out something new and original that is also interesting.

• There will also be new flexible raid lockouts that give you more opportunities to join raids. It will be handles instead on a per-boss basis meaning you will not be able to kill the same boss twice but otherwise can join any raid you choose.

• 4.1 also promises a new upgraded dungeon map system that will give detailed info about the bosses, the loot and more.

• 4.1 will also bring new dungeons/raids such as Firelands, an indoor/outdoor raid with 7bosses that leads up to a re-vamped version of the infamous Ragnoros as well as The Abyssal Maw, which is an underwater 5-man dungeon.

With all of this in store, plus so much more, it's easy to see why WoW fans are lining up to preorder Cataclysm. In addition to the many things mentioned here, there will be new pets, new quests, new zones and a whole new game experience, even for those who have been playing since the Vanilla WoW beta.

Sources:

Personal experience paying since Beta

WoW Cataclysm Official Site