Extreme Exploring
Posted November 10, 2008 at 02:08 PM by Warpy
Tags exploration
You've probably flown over a number of places that no roads lead to, or realized that something ought to be on the other side of those mountains.
Much like the real world, Blizzard's World of Warcraft has some places that don't serve anyone's purposes; they're just there! There are a lot of players who have put serious time and effort into getting to them.
A number of these places seem to exist to liven up flight paths, particularly the Shatterspear Village that you see between Auberdine and Moonglade, or the Dun Morogh airfield between Ironforge and points north.
There are also places that no one would ordinarily ever see, usually on the inaccessible coasts of zones bounded by mountains, like the empty Tauren village below Silithus or Newman's Landing on the west coast of Dun Morogh.
So how does one get there, and why would one want to go? Most importantly: Is it illegal and could it get one's beloved warlock banned?
Before I even set off, I had a look at the WoW Terms of Service. They even forbid the use of profiling software! However, I've never heard of anyone getting banned over Magelo or Guildlaunch Characterprofiler. That rule is in there to protect Blizzard; if there's a threat, they'll respond.
The only possible problem for a visit to the secret places is 5.C.1:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blizzard
Using or exploiting errors in design, features which have not been documented, and/or "program bugs" to gain access that is otherwise not available, or to obtain a competitive advantage over other players.
GMs used to instakill player characters caught wandering around the Dun Morogh airstrip, but they no longer bother. Blizzard can and sometimes does change small features of the landscape or boat paths to make some hidden areas inaccessible; they've done it to Hyjal and those two islands between the continents on Azeroth. You simply can't go to Hyjal or the troll islands anymore.
I can see some problems with players getting trapped in some places, or having troubles getting to one of them and hassling GM's. That's probably something Blizzard wants to avoid. Never go anywhere without your hearthstone. If you leave it behind and you can't climb out of your current location, you can always die and rez in an accessible graveyard, everywhere I've ever been or heard of. Remember to take your armor off first.
What I've noticed about hidden areas. Since few players will closely interact with them:
- The NPCs and buildings will often be stock models. At least the Shatterspear trolls have their own name (and 4 named NPCs), but they are pretty bland beyond that. The Dun Morogh airstrip is populated by generic Ironforge Mountaineers (complete with directions to all kinds of trainers) and even Holdout Warriors from Gnomerangen.
- The NPCs for the flight path decorations are animated. They are endlessly dancing or spawning/fighting/dying or crying, or otherwise engaging in repetitive activity that would create lag if lots of players were around. This makes them fun to watch from the air.
- Sometimes they have Doors or Tunnels to Nowhere that can be used to connect them to the rest of the world if Blizzard ever decides to use them. Trying to use these doors/tunnels usually results in death and a trip to a graveyard back in the normal WoW world.
Some of them may have been intended as quest hubs. Faldir's Cove is an example of a quest hub that's hard to see, hard to find, and hard to reach. For all I know, it may have started as a secret place with a pirate ship. The author of the WoWwiki article on the Dun Morogh airfield proposes that it may have been intended as a gnome starting area, as part of a road from Ironforge to Menethil, or as a quest hub for the AQ War Effort.
So how does one get to these places? For the Dun Morogh airstrip and the Shatterspear Village, there are places you can climb up and work your way through the mountains. The easiest path to the airstrip involves using slowfall to help your mount jump further. For both of these, bring slowfall stuffs like parachute cloaks, Noggenfogger, seasonal goodies, etc. You can corpse run if you must, but slowfall and soulstones are a better deal. I recommend not wearing your expensive T6 armor! Tuxedos don't break and look so much spiffier in screenshots!
Bring lots of shards and friends if you want to summon your undeserving guildies to these places. Keep in mind that certain n00b hunters will then turn around and kill all of the NPCs.
Getting back from Shatterspear Village involves hearthing; you can't climb out. If you didn't bring your hearthstone, you can offer your guildies in another zone a small fortune to summon you or you can drown in the lake.
On the way down from the Dun Morogh airfield, one usually wants to go north to have a look at the little Wetlands farm and its Tunnel to Nowhere. Do not fall down the waterfall the way I did.
From there you can head east through the mountains to view unnamed secret places. For example, this blank spot where I'm standing (little silver arrow) on the map below:
holds a very pretty lake, with ordinary bristle-whisker catfish.
Getting to the coastal sites is simply a matter of swimming or waterwalking to them. Be careful, as the shallow water zones along mountainous zones tend to be very narrow. Two yards out, and your character's fatigue bar lights up. I hoped I could put my toon on auto-run and go do other stuff in the fifteen-plus minutes it takes to get there, but I had to check at least every 30 seconds to make sure he didn't end up in deep water, die, and have to ghost-run all the way back!
Multiple swim-speed potions or water-walking elixirs are needed here, or a heck of a lot of patience.
Neither the Tauren Village nor Newman's Landing are visible from any flight path, so no player knows why they are there. The Tauren village and the nearby cave are empty. So was Newman's Landing until recently. With patch 3.0.2, it became the retirement home of High Admiral Shelly Jorrik, who sells blacksmithing supplies and speaks with a female gnome voice.
I was surprised that these inaccessible spots were actually pretty polished, with complete models, and mostly complete textures on the landscapes. The only unfinished bits I saw was a small area in the Wetlands between the farm and the lake, and I've seen worse on highly visible ridgetops between mountainous zones.
In fact, a number of the zones seemed to be designed with visitors in mind! There are little goofy touches like the signpost near the Wetlands Farm, which points out "This Way", "That Way", and "The Other Way".
So where to next? It won't be hard to check out the lighthouse near Auberdine, and I hear good things about Quel'Thalas, but there are some interesting elven ruins and Tauren settlements visible from flightpaths along the coast of the Stonetalon Mountains. Time to get Warpy some climbin' boots and to send him up there.
Total Comments 12
Comments
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Very nice. I love doing exploration like this :DPosted November 11, 2008 at 12:19 PM by Debuff
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So what's that area behind the big iron gate just south of Shadowfang keep? I know there's a human population outside of it, but that's all i know. and great post btwPosted November 11, 2008 at 04:00 PM by Mollytov
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TY for comments! The zone south of Silverpine Forest (on the world map) is Gilneas. It is completely cut off from Silverpine by the Graymane Wall. There's a Horde quest that involves one of the human refugees that camps by the wall, begging to be let in. Baron Longshore and his crew who harass Rachet are from Gilneas.
Gilneas can be entered, but by using a bug (and that is a bannable offense) and said bug may not work anymore. The area behind the wall is mostly undeveloped, with no features to see. Metzen, a Blizzard developer, admitted to having forgotten about Gilneas!Posted November 11, 2008 at 04:52 PM by Warpy
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This is me a couple of months ago before they fixed walljumping. This picture displays the gate from the other side:
And this is where it ends:
I always loved jumping on the hills of Zul'Farak and walk all way to the shimmering flats. Managed to get inside a plateau in Zul'aman as well:
Posted November 11, 2008 at 07:41 PM by Sabulus
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I'll have to see if I still have screen shots of the Pre Burning Crusade highest point in Azaroth (which is near the airstrip).
Nice post! Thanks Warpy!!Posted November 11, 2008 at 08:16 PM by Vmaster
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You used to be able to use the sheep bug to get into the under area of Karazhan which is vast, bigger prolly than above ground Karazhan.
Does anyone know what the trolls are high up on Ironforge mountain? If you come into IF from Southshore or Arathi and miss the menethil run in, there is high up on the mountain a cave with hostile trolls there...
Blizzard can't really say anything about IF airport as there is a way of literally walking up there near the northernmost tower near the Dun Morogh exit tunnel on its way to the Dun Algaz/Thelsamar junction, mount up and ride up if you know where it is... takes a bit o' exploration but is extremely easy to get there with patience...
Strangely when we went to IF airport there was a Hunter trainer up there complete with pet trainer at his side and have noticed also what appears to be green titled npc's now in the huts on the farmland below the airport.
On Teldrassil, if you swim round the eastern shore of the tree roots I found an abandoned village tucked right up in the cove, further round was another with some minor furbolgs that despite being red didn't aggro.Posted November 12, 2008 at 05:43 AM by Ancientone
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Old IF - takes the ole sheepy trick to get in there. Also let me be the first to tell you going into IF might not be the best of ideas I had to beg and plead with a gm one night. (Im sure he got a jolly laugh out of how freaked I was.)
FUn STuff Good PostPosted November 12, 2008 at 03:52 PM by AballahSon
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yea there is another village east of Scarletmonastry along the coast that i found a nice night eleven place go check that out too
ive been to the tuen village and the airstirp too also the secret pirate islands in tanaris to the the far south
ill go check out the village soon too trolls ftw they will have nw bodys now coz the forest trols now have ZA models so im gunna go check it out tooPosted November 13, 2008 at 09:36 AM by Netheriol
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and old IF is cool too lol i love the little secret area that you can duel then runPosted November 13, 2008 at 09:37 AM by Netheriol
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Now I have to check out the roots of Teldrassil and the village near the Scarlet Monastary. Thanks, guys! design for flying mounts have made these obscure spots rare in Outland, but there are a few weird spots, like the orphanage in Nagrand. I can see some eye candy in Howling Fjord already that I'll have to fly over to when I hit level 77.Posted November 14, 2008 at 11:30 AM by Warpy
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Have you tried going to the area east of Loch Modan? Not much to see, but its huge, and its really cool. Its the unclickable portion of the map that follows the loch up to wetlands on the map. A little tricky to get there, but with a mount it should be ok. You can move around much more than you'd expect from mountains. More like plateaus up there. (slowfall+forward motion=really cool) The terrain is all one template, though. Well, was when I was there, which was quite some time ago. Its one of the reasons I don't have a level 70 yet. That and Hyjal, the roots of teldrassil, IF airport, the secret island off of dustwallow with all the dragons on it, (not to mention like every single other island on the whole map) climbing out on branches of Teldrassil, and the fact that i had every single flightpoint at level 30. (also my countless forays into Outland via ritual of summoning and hearth to shatt.) I am the definition of Attention Deficit Disorder. lol Also, a question--has anyone been in Grim Batol? If so , what's it like? And how do you get into old IF?? I've tried, what, like 300 times?Posted November 15, 2008 at 10:09 PM by Drew
Updated November 15, 2008 at 10:15 PM by Drew -
And watch for anything involving the IF airstrip once Icecrown comes online. For I believe I am correct in saying that you cannot, at this time, actually kill Arthas? Because of such an enormous air presence in Icecrown, having an airfield full of bombers might be something usable in the future of Wrath of the Lich King.Posted November 15, 2008 at 10:19 PM by Drew
