The Big Bad Beta Post
Screenshots:
-For your enjoyment: Full Screen Slideshow Click the pics for info about the pic.
If you do nothing else, check out the screenshots. 
The World
Stormwind Harbor = A new addition to the Stormwind city area. This area is huge and sweeping and really looks more elaborate than Stormwind itself does. If you drop by Stormwind now you can see the NPC workers getting ready to blow a hole in the wall.
Borean Tundra = Nice, based around Artic tundras. You have wide swaths of nothingness, oil spills, snow, ruins. BT is really a sort of hodge-podge place. The best thing about this zone however is looking up. An aurora borealis dances in the sky at all times. Here, unlike the Howling Fjord, the aurora is never blocked out by trees.
You first meet the Tuskarr here in small villages scattered around. You also meet some sort of fog people and there are of course nagas and undead. The dungeon instance on this map is called The Nexus, just that it’s centered around a mana/dragon/ice theme. Other than that I have no idea what the story is. I was asked to heal and haven’t done the quests for it yet.
Howling Fjord = Gorgeous, based on Norse culture, but honestly it reminds me of the California wilderness. I can smell the pine as I run through this place. The soft flute music, the shifting aurora in the sky, the sound of the wind in the background, this is easily my favorite zone. It reminds me of camping when I was a child.
You first meet the giant Vrykul people here and they’re none to pleased by the settlement on their land. I’m sort of offput by these initial quests but you’ll understand when the expansion launches. It’s too close to colonialism for me. The Fjord is also filled with all sorts of traveling contraptions. Ropes and pulleys that will either take you up and down cliff faces or down to the sea side like an ancient elevator. Though it makes me laugh, these things actually have ropes now unlike the Magical Thunder Bluff Elevator.
The Misc.
Gathering Spells/Buffs:
-Herbalism- Wild Growth – Instant 3 min cooldown – Embrace the natural energies surrounding you, healing you for X over 5 sec.
-Skinning- Master of Anatomy – Skinning all those dead animals has broadened your anatomical knowledge, increasing your critical strike rating by X.
-Mining- Toughness- All your hard work spent mining has made you exceptionally tough, increasing your maximum health by X.
Spellpower:
-The death of spell damage and spell healing
-Healers have litte to fear, healing spells themselves are being adjusted to give roughly the same output when you had +heal
-Cons: healers will have to fight mages/warlocks for +stam, mages/warlocks fight for +spirit/mp5
-Pros: in theory any loot that drops will be useable by somebody instead of being called “so and so loot” and being disenchanted
-Read a bit more about the pros and cons of the change
Exotic Pets:
-Large and in charge, but will they hinder views in tight instances/raids? Some like the rhino can easily cover 2-3 mobs, and become even bigger with the beast within talent, I haven’t yet seen a list of exotic pets separated into tank, dps, and utility ratings, so far personally I’ve seen the rhino, the ravasaur, and the worm. Tentative list for exotic pets. Who wants a core hound? 
Inscription/Glyphs:
-Come from the inscription profession.
-If you’re planning on taking this up max your herbalism now, and hold on to every level of herbs from peacebloom to netherbloom, you’re going to need them for leveling inscription or selling them on the auction house at launch
-About 15 per class
-Special page in the character sheet, you can have about six at a time
-Glyps for all classes: Subject to change prior to expansion launch.
Barbershop
-I’ve only tested two races/genders. Female Humans and female Taurens. Female Humans are able to change hair style, hair colors, and piercings. No new ethnic hairstyles so far. Which I’m partly glad of. For Tauren females hair style, horn style, and horn color. Though for Taurens there are many more horn styles than hair options. Lady Taurens can finally have the huge horn spread they’ve been waiting for. Changing these things will cost a small amount of gold, so that you couldn’t change things every day if you wished to. I’ve also seen pigtails on Forsaken women and it seems that human men will get the anime hairstyles from Blood Elves. Human women also get the anime hair styles from the Blood Elf women. Here are some pics of the styles.
More Misc
I’m tossing in informational links on things I haven’t had the chance to write about or play around with much.
-Changes to racials. Scroll down to Kalgan’s post #97.
-Tailors get a bunch of new stuff. And a mount pattern called Magnificent Flying Carpet it’s a very fast rug.
-For us roleplayers there are a ton of new emotes.
- The UI has been switched up a bit. Most notably there is now a guild/personal calendar so you don’t need to use an addon for this. There will also be some sort of visible threat meter.
- A list of the new Achievements. I haven’t paid too much attention to these. Sorry.
-Blacksmiths can now create sockets on items that don’t have them.
-More info on classes besides Death Knights and Holy Priests.
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