Sounds good to me. I love raiding but also the beauty of the environment, especially while questing. I'm sure Blizzard will think of a quest or whatever once your reach 80.

I think this is a good idea, whats the point in having all these amazing landscapes if people are just gonna fly over and ignore it.

I say S.A.G (Surface to air Gnomes) should be fired at any under 80 who flies in northrend!

If they do Icecrown (or whatever the instance will be) like they did the instances in BC (multi-staged), flying mounts could be quested in as means to alternate entrances I.E first stage rewards you flying rights, so the S.A.Gs LOL dont shoot you down.

They could also implement a quest chain that - by logic - allows your flying mounts to survive (i.e., fly) in the harsh arctic climate of Northrend - something they would otherwise be incapable of doing.

Implement it at any point; I wouldn't mind having to wait until 80 to fly around Northrend, but I've been looking forward to this landscape being playable in WoW ever since they first hinted at it being a possibility.

-- Dear Blizzard: Please, *please* make Azjol-Nerub a worthwhile location to spend time in. Or at all.

i know people are gonna QQ about "i spent 6000g plus i spent 2 months grinding for my Netherdrake and i dont think its fair that i cant use them immediately"

personally i agree, i dont mind waiting until 80 to be able to use my mount, so I can enjoy the landscapes that Blizz has put before us.

I would hope nobody would whine about grinding for L300 flying skill and Netherwing rep. by the time this expansion is released.

I'm sure Wrath of the Lich King will add enough new features that people will forgo complaining about flying mount usage (depending on how Blizzard decides to handle it.) at least temporarily.

I don't feel the need to have a flying mount in Northrend. I'd be perfectly happy with ground-mounting it the whole way, especially if you give me a bunch of interesting things to do on the ground. Even now I really don't use my flying mount unless I'm in a hurry. I like my ground mounts and worked to collect them, so why not get some use out of them? Hey, you could even expand on ground mounts and give us something more ride across the tundras and glaciers of Northrend!

i,d be fine wating till lvl80 itll be fun to explore northrend on foot instead of carelessly fliying over it right away

i hope people wont overuse deathknights and then thered be no healers and stuff

"i hope people wont overuse deathknights and then thered be no healers and stuff"

people don't lose their character when they make a death knight so they would still have their main healer/dps or what ever. Also to get in raiding that death knight would still have to gear up before it's possible for X to raid with it.

i hope they dont let us fly until 80! i dont wanna miss any of the cool locations i know they will put in, just like they did with BC. you dont -need- to fly anyway.

"i hope people wont overuse deathknights and then thered be no healers and stuff"

Only healer you are at risk of losing completely is the priest population. They are about fed up with lack-luster talents, uber gear dependent survivability, and getting nerfed as collateral damage when blizzard takes aim at warlocks.

flying mounts will kill world pvp again

@xukimonde: a quest that gives you a blanket and woolen gloves/hat for it's paws ;-)

My biggest concern as well. They'll need to be very careful with how they interact in that region. The word that they want to let Engineers build flying machines for a war purpse a la Warcraft 2/3 may suggest they're going to play a vital role, though, so we'll see how it goes in beta.

I hope fly mounts are delayed until 80 also.

And I still think BC riding skill was poorly designed. I know some can amass 5k gold, but 99% of us never will. On the other hand, my "slow" flying mount does the job pretty well anyway.

One thing I've always liked is opening my map in any region and seeing all the pathways, villages, caves, etc. revealed. That way I don't feel like I've missed something! :)

(@ Prism)

The thought of my netherdrake soaring through this frigid, death-ridden wasteland with a cute little cap and woolen booties is quite entertaining to me at the moment.

Thank you.

First a quick mini-rant:

I still do not understand how people have such a hard time getting the 5k... I never sell greens (I get them DE'ed for enchants), I buy stuff (alot), and I've never bothered to try to sell my profession. I am not in a raiding guild and did not get money for anyone.

I made 2200g in 3 days, easily. All I did was quest. I did not have any assistance questing. I am one of the slowest classes to solo (holy pally with all healing gear). The majority of that came from SOLO quests in Netherstorm. Throw in the occasional group quest and poof, money out the ***.

Anyway, I think that those that spent the money to get the epic flier should have access to an improved speed ground mount for Northrend. I'm all for not letting people bypass stuff by flying and the like, but I'm getting really sick of the time it takes to get places in this game. It's awesome to walk somewhere the first time, but if you're in a hurry or doing it for the 20th time, you just want to admire the views for 2 minutes, instead of 20. I very much like the idea of a quest line to inure your mount to the harsh climate of Northrend.

And S.A.G. was freaking hilarious!

I hear many of you don't want to just fly over stuff and rather want to enjoy the content along the ground... I think along the same lines... the 1st time I have to do it that is - its all exciting the 1st time, but after you've done it and just need to get around faster from place to place, like when you're leveling up an alt the grind just gets mind-numbingly tedious.

So, Id say give people the choice - the large number of people who want to enjoy the lore and landscapes on the ground can and will do so anyway from what you're all saying. No one says that just because you can fly you are forced to.

Perhaps even just 'ground' the flying mounts - like someone previously suggested add a quest chain that 'attunes' the gryphons and drakes to be able to fly in the harsh Northrend tundra. But make it so that once your main character has got the attunements done, it applies too all the characters on your account so we dont have to repeat it over and over and over. I enjoy playing a few different character classes and Ill want to level up a few of my alts to 80. But the alt grind is getting longer and longer.

Oh no i've spent 37k gold and got my netherdrake in a week /sniffle. Seriously though, shoulda gotten yourself money tracker's (they let you know how much you spend vs. make.) and get yourself out of the ah and go farm some mats. From my experience in BC most of the ppl w/o epic Fliers didn't take the time to get their "easy to get mats" themselves, and instead spent most of their money buying mats for professions. I agree though There should be a faster land mount availiable to those that grinded it out. It's not like anyone's going to skip content anyway, even lvling Blizz has been pretty good about keeping the zones needing you to get a good bit of the last one out of the way for new lvls/talents/spells/equipment to survive the next zone. Not Very many ppl are going to take the time to enjoy the view until they are done grinding anyway.

What about druids though? They should give us a snow leopard travel form for northrend. Anyways getting the 5k was so easy but then again I didn't have to pay for the normal flying at all.