I think that perhaps land was sucked into the Twisting Nether, but that does not fit with some other things that we know. The land, and what was on it, sunk, and was not obliterated. Magic?

I don't know how Darkshore was on the Well.

The Highborne are increasingly widespread, though they were supposed to be the most elite.

__________________
...what just happened?

If there's one thing I know about elitists, they like taking vacations to remote locations.

__________________

http://www.wowhead.com/npc=34938

Highborne Citizens, the commoners of the elite. These were hand-picked by Azshara. Safe behind the palace walls. They were to be spared when the world burned. And here they are, being oppressed.

__________________
...what just happened?

I almost want to chalk that up to a quest designer in 04 just screwing up.

Pretty much what I think. I don't think anyone at Blizz has the slightest grasp of geography, geology, oceanography, climatology. The environments are awesome, but the maps are pretty infuriating. It's just a patchwork quilt of vastly different climates and geography without rhyme or reason. Rivers don't work that way, man. Why is the jungle of Feralas surrounded by desert? How can the temperate, sort of arid Westfall be adjacent to the tropical jungle of Stranglethorn? Why is the perpetually snowbound Dragonblight surrounded by snow-less regions east, west and (most bizarre) north? How can Elwynn and Lordaeron (pre-Plaguewood in the Culling of Stratholme is identical) have similar climates with such a vast difference in latitude?

__________________
Now imagine a music, dear readers, heavy with cellos at a rapid staccato, cellos held between thighs in a dark room, the little room of Harry's chest as he walks with his teammates to the opening gate of his first Test of Cribbage. They are a rag-tag group of champions, this bunch, and, with Harry, the near-perfect new god, they know they will dominate the day. Harry is a world laced with rivers of wizardly blood. He is ready.

Oh this'll be fun.

• Feralas - Desolace is in the rain shadow of two major mountain ranges, the Stonetalon and Mulgore. This causes moist air to be caught up, allowing Mulgore and Ashenvale to collect the rainfall. As well, foliage, especially trees, are known to create their own climate. Thus the lack of large stands of flora previous to the Cenarion terraforming effort would also stop any real growth from occurring. Feralas on the other hand is a mountainous area itself, which means it creates its own rain shadow (stopping moisture from hitting 1k Needles) and absorbing that into its ecosystem.
• Westfall - Its arid climate is actually an artifact of human land use. It's a dustbowl by virtue of its lack of trees (cut down for lumber and to open up field space). Normally you would've seen a similar deciduous forest to Elwynn, but the degraded soil and the river prevents nature from easily reestablishing itself.
• Dragonblight - The Dragonblight is actually part of a receded glacier, thus why it's surrounded by higher portions (and also why Crystalsong is so indented into the land). Just as in Feralas, the massive glacier above it (Icecrown) creates a rain shadow. In this case though its effect is to increase precipitation (albeit snow) in the area. So why is Borean and Northern Kalimdor so warm? Well that's prevailing winds, specifically those that travel over Sholazar basin (with the artificial Titanic jungle heating it) and then sweep downwards, blocked by the mountains to its east. At the same time the Storm Peaks block cold winds coming off the glaciers to the Dragonblight's east, allowing the Grizzly Hills and Howling Fjord to also catch and enjoy a much warmer air stream. Finally, Crystalsong actually acts like a catch basin for that warmth, the air finally rising up, hitting the winds off Icecrown, and spilling over into Dragonblight (thus creating precipitation that would otherwise be absent).
• Lordaeron is actually a fairly cool environment if you look at its surroundings. Take Silverpine, which is clearly a temperate zone with lots of conifers and lack of large scale farms. The reason we see it as warmer is because it's fetid with the plague, but that's actually just a damp environment, much closer to Londons than Elwynns (which would be similar to southern France or the mid-atlantic portion of the US). Quel'thalas is an anomaly only if you forget that they've magically changed the climate of the area.

Overall, while the mountain ranges are a bit excessive, the actual design of Azeroth isn't completely batshit insane. You can find method in the madness, but you have to jump through a few hoops to get there.

__________________
Rationalizing the irrational since 2005.

I had the rain-shadow thought myself, but the problem is, the ranges that separate all the zones (vanilla at least) are roughly the same height. There was an image I saw a long time ago of color-coded elevation of the Old World continents. Hyjal, Stonetalon and Dun Morough were the only ones significantly taller than the rest. The rest of the zones all had this way-too-regular outline of mountains surrounding them. All of them.

I had pretty much the exact same explanation for Dragonblight (actually, it was the inverse - I was trying to figure out how Howling Fjord and Grizzly Hills could be so temperate). Borean, I explained to myself, is heated by all the geothermal activity roiling beneath the surface. But it's a lot of bending to get to that point. And the sea currents around Northrend must be such that the coastlines of both Howling Fjord and Borean Tundra are ringed with ice, but the interiors are below freezing. Note that Grizzly Hills has no sea ice along its eastern coast. Its western border with Dragonblight is most baffling, just separated by the Dragonspine Tributary and no significant changes in elevation. Also, the WotLK cinematic suggests that precipitation doesn't have much trouble reaching rather inland areas of Icecrown.

The reason I mentioned the Plaguewood specifially is because in the CoS instance, it had deciduous forest identical to Elwynn. Obviously, this can be meta-explained by resources vs. development time, but it was still glaring to me. Pretty much all of Lordaeron is coniferous forest (excepting Arathi), conifers thrive in higher latitudes where broad-leaf forests wouldn't get enough sunlight. Another thing to note - Lordaeron is the only area in the cosmology of Warcraft to have been depicted with seasons (recall the summer, autumn and winter tilesets from WC3). Oddly enough, the conifer trees turn orange/red in the fall and then green, albeit snowbound, in the winter.

__________________
Now imagine a music, dear readers, heavy with cellos at a rapid staccato, cellos held between thighs in a dark room, the little room of Harry's chest as he walks with his teammates to the opening gate of his first Test of Cribbage. They are a rag-tag group of champions, this bunch, and, with Harry, the near-perfect new god, they know they will dominate the day. Harry is a world laced with rivers of wizardly blood. He is ready.

Technically there is probably some seriously strange weather going on near to Quel'thalas, so you could see oddities in plaguewood that wouldn't manifest elsewhere.

As to Grizzly, there's always the possibility of currents converging and splitting oddly in random areas once you hit the plateau Zul'drak sits on. I can definitely see Crystalsong as getting a lot more weird weather considering it's got cold coming from the northwest and warm from the southeast. Grizzly actually mirrors the south-east near the Appalachians (which is also why it's one of my favorite areas), so I can see a cross of cold and warmth creating a barrier hill structure. If it does follow that geology, in winter (assuming weather patterns are seasonal in most of Azeroth) you would see much harsher weather including ice storms that would make Grizzly painful, but not impossible to habitate in.

__________________
Rationalizing the irrational since 2005.

Need to remember the good ol' thing called magic for some places as well. Crystalsong likely is effected by some blessing done by the dragons or elves in the past and Quel'thalas has the climate it has due to magic as well.

How about starting a climate and geography thread in the lore forums? I have a few thoughts and questions on relevant matters of wild and domesticated vegetation.

__________________

Stormwind's geography always struck me as odd. An oak forest next to a jungle? Plains on a coastline?

__________________
"Noble countrymen, evil is upon us. Darkness has befallen our shores. Rise and slay thy enemies… strike, strike so others shall live. The meek shall not fade into the night… live my brethren, live." - King Terenas Menethil II

I think they clear cut the area of Westfall. There were trees surrounding Moonbrook on the original Warcraft 1 map.

__________________

For some reason I keep thinking that Westfall used to be like Elwynn before the First War, in which the Old Horde fucked it up. Am I crazy?

__________________

Okay. I made a Geography and Climate of Azeroth thread. Maybe we can move the conversation there, while the mods can move the relevant stuff there?

__________________

The old horde supposedly burned down Elywnn, but it recovered.

Necromancing this thread for the Isle of Giants and Thunder Isle

EDIT:Is there a bigger version of this map? I kinda need it for something

__________________

Updated Map (click for big version).




I don't add the Blizz map background for several reasons. Because of the large resolution of the image all you'll see is blurry shit on the big map, I'd have to go over Ek/Kalimdor since I made those maps individually first and they both have a blue outline, and there's lots of custom coastline on this map for areas.

Is it safe to assume the Broken Isles are still around? Or has the Cataclysm destroyed them too?

Thanks i think i can use this.

__________________

They probably sunk beneath the waves, but a man can hope. (Kul Tiras, you better are alive!)

Here's fun speculation you can have as well given the location of areas. Thunder Isle was at the peak of a mountain and that's why the entire northern coastline of Pandaria is so above sea level. This also means Kezan was part of the same mountain chain.

Cool... So you just gave us hints?

No I'm just speculating based on given information.

I was just kidding Lev, don't worry.