05-23-2004, 07:20 PM
As I've noted before, it's possible to climb just about ANY mountain in WoW. Blizzard cannot stop you from getting somewhere just by putting a mountain range in the way, at least in this push. Yesterday I found myself wondering what was north of Durotar, which is a place that has no marking on the continent map. So I grabbed my level 38 mage and went climbing. :)
What ensued was a grand adventure through all of northern Kalimdor. Here's the account, with tons of screenshots!
The view north of Durotar. I had climbed the ridges east of Orgrimmar using my illegal climbing method. I headed north.
I came down in a land named Aszhara, and was promptly killed by a level 52 dragon via an instant kill spell. "Unknown Being casts Death Touch on you for 990 hps. You die." FINE. We'll do it the easy way, then! With me dead, I could be free to explore as I like and never have to worry about taking falling damage. As it turns out, there's no way I would have survived my climbs anyway - but I'll get to that. Now dead, I returned to Aszhara, and noticed the mountain range to the north that is obviously designed to stop you from going that way.
Knowing I can climb anything, I just headed north. I climbed multiple stages of impossibly vertical cliffs to reach the top, only to note that further off to the north were even HIGHER mountains!
I was now in Winterspring, but there was absolutely NOTHING there except a road. Nothing textured, no objects, nothing. So I made my way north up the road to Hyjal. Hyjal was a big place, comprising the entire northern cul-de-sac of mountains of Kalimdor, and as I understand it, it's the place where Warcraft III ends (pre-expansion). I followed the road through Hyjal as it wound through the mountains, ever going upward.
On the way, I encountered quite a few things, like this tower. It didn't look right - the texturing was very simplistic and did not have the detailing that other places do in the game. I got closer to the tower to take a look inside only to see that it was closed off (and had floating props, too!).
Further up the road. More exploration. Until I came to a sight that was really amazing - a gigantic crater that looked like it was caused by an immense meteor.
North, always north and up...until I found what I was looking for, the Tree of Eternity, the end goal of Warcraft III (pre-expansion). This tree was enormous, stretching up into the sky for, well, miles? At its base was the remains of Warcraft III's Big Bad Guy, who I believe was named Archimonde.
The road ended there, but I headed north. I had not realized how far UP I had gone in the world, crossing over 2 or 3 impossibly high mountain ranges and STILL going up through Hyjal. On the northern side of the canyon where the Tree was, I climbed a ridge and looked down...into nothing....
....and fell, and fell, down such a distance as to kill anything alive. I just kept falling and falling. When I got to the bottom, I turned around on multiple occasions just to observe how darn far I had fallen. But I wasn't done.
Back in Winterspring, I headed south, where once again I found myself falling down to new areas. After another fall, I found what I thought was the edge of the world, but it was really just a sheer cliff so high that you couldn't see the bottom. Notice in that shot the little block of ocean water in the upper right? Very wild. :)
So I jumped, of course! Midway down I actually started to see the ground. When I hit bottom (which would have killed me, of course, but I'd be dead 50 times over from the earlier falls), I looked up.
I was in a plain of nothingness, one of those untextured areas where you're not supposed to be able to get to. Mind you, this is at the very northern tip of Kalimdor now.
I headed north, climbing a ridge and looking back down at the area I was just in. You can see a strange looking formation on the right side of that screenshot. I headed to investigate, but not without a quick look up at the range I had just fallen from. It's hard to explain just how far I had gone UP to get to these illegal areas, and then how far DOWN I subsequently fell as I headed back to the sea in northern Kalimdor. Wish I had video of it. :)
So, check out this odd formation of spikes coming from the ground. I headed north. Once again, I fell a distance, then looked up to let it sink in.
My adventure ended when I fell into a pit that there was no getting out of. My illegal mountian climbing trick requires a slight ramp before you hit a vertical wall, but there were nothing but 100% vertical walls where I was, so I couldn't get a foothold. I used /stuck and returned to Ashenvale.
What a time. Always fun to see areas that aren't yet developed and places where Blizzard doesn't want you to go. The only shame of it is, since I was dead, I couldn't see what monsters populated these regions.
Hope you enjoyed this writeup!
-Bolty
What ensued was a grand adventure through all of northern Kalimdor. Here's the account, with tons of screenshots!
The view north of Durotar. I had climbed the ridges east of Orgrimmar using my illegal climbing method. I headed north.
I came down in a land named Aszhara, and was promptly killed by a level 52 dragon via an instant kill spell. "Unknown Being casts Death Touch on you for 990 hps. You die." FINE. We'll do it the easy way, then! With me dead, I could be free to explore as I like and never have to worry about taking falling damage. As it turns out, there's no way I would have survived my climbs anyway - but I'll get to that. Now dead, I returned to Aszhara, and noticed the mountain range to the north that is obviously designed to stop you from going that way.
Knowing I can climb anything, I just headed north. I climbed multiple stages of impossibly vertical cliffs to reach the top, only to note that further off to the north were even HIGHER mountains!
I was now in Winterspring, but there was absolutely NOTHING there except a road. Nothing textured, no objects, nothing. So I made my way north up the road to Hyjal. Hyjal was a big place, comprising the entire northern cul-de-sac of mountains of Kalimdor, and as I understand it, it's the place where Warcraft III ends (pre-expansion). I followed the road through Hyjal as it wound through the mountains, ever going upward.
On the way, I encountered quite a few things, like this tower. It didn't look right - the texturing was very simplistic and did not have the detailing that other places do in the game. I got closer to the tower to take a look inside only to see that it was closed off (and had floating props, too!).
Further up the road. More exploration. Until I came to a sight that was really amazing - a gigantic crater that looked like it was caused by an immense meteor.
North, always north and up...until I found what I was looking for, the Tree of Eternity, the end goal of Warcraft III (pre-expansion). This tree was enormous, stretching up into the sky for, well, miles? At its base was the remains of Warcraft III's Big Bad Guy, who I believe was named Archimonde.
The road ended there, but I headed north. I had not realized how far UP I had gone in the world, crossing over 2 or 3 impossibly high mountain ranges and STILL going up through Hyjal. On the northern side of the canyon where the Tree was, I climbed a ridge and looked down...into nothing....
....and fell, and fell, down such a distance as to kill anything alive. I just kept falling and falling. When I got to the bottom, I turned around on multiple occasions just to observe how darn far I had fallen. But I wasn't done.
Back in Winterspring, I headed south, where once again I found myself falling down to new areas. After another fall, I found what I thought was the edge of the world, but it was really just a sheer cliff so high that you couldn't see the bottom. Notice in that shot the little block of ocean water in the upper right? Very wild. :)
So I jumped, of course! Midway down I actually started to see the ground. When I hit bottom (which would have killed me, of course, but I'd be dead 50 times over from the earlier falls), I looked up.
I was in a plain of nothingness, one of those untextured areas where you're not supposed to be able to get to. Mind you, this is at the very northern tip of Kalimdor now.
I headed north, climbing a ridge and looking back down at the area I was just in. You can see a strange looking formation on the right side of that screenshot. I headed to investigate, but not without a quick look up at the range I had just fallen from. It's hard to explain just how far I had gone UP to get to these illegal areas, and then how far DOWN I subsequently fell as I headed back to the sea in northern Kalimdor. Wish I had video of it. :)
So, check out this odd formation of spikes coming from the ground. I headed north. Once again, I fell a distance, then looked up to let it sink in.
My adventure ended when I fell into a pit that there was no getting out of. My illegal mountian climbing trick requires a slight ramp before you hit a vertical wall, but there were nothing but 100% vertical walls where I was, so I couldn't get a foothold. I used /stuck and returned to Ashenvale.
What a time. Always fun to see areas that aren't yet developed and places where Blizzard doesn't want you to go. The only shame of it is, since I was dead, I couldn't see what monsters populated these regions.
Hope you enjoyed this writeup!
-Bolty
Quote:Considering the mods here are generally liberals who seem to have a soft spot for fascism and white supremacy (despite them saying otherwise), me being perma-banned at some point is probably not out of the question.
