I stumbled upon some links regarding the Burning Crusade expansion pack in the wow general forum.
Apparently they really altered alot of key aspects of the game. The one that might create the biggest discussion is the one where epic raids are being scaled down to 25 players.

All in all it looks pretty decent.

   

• Complete overhaul of the honor system
• Raidcap at 5 - 10 and 25 players
• etc..

well.. see for yourself.

http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/world-of-warcraft-expansion/725327p1.html

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/worldofwarcraftexp1/news.html?sid=6155696&tag=topslot;action;1&page=1&q=&q=&q=&q=

http://www.1up.com/do/previewPage?cId=3152830

was an interesting read

oh i also heard that the Nether drake mount will be around 17k gold and heavy quest chain
but dont know for sure, just speculation

They should make the instance change in difficulty depending on how many people are in the instance and still keep the 40 man cap.

25 People lower difficulty of mobs according to the amount in, 40 players keep it the same as now imo, but would require a minium cap so don't get like 10 people going in and doing the entire BWL instance for example.

Would probs require too much coding tho.

Q4 2006, so I'm guessing either early november or christmas

If they are that far behind you can be sure the marketing dept will push it back to December 07 xD

beta hasnt even started yet... dont get your hopes up for anything before the new year, i can see them release the game on the 2 year celebration for the japanese release of the game as that was the last version that went live...

also, first friday of july has been a releaseday for blizz for ages...

oh yeah, and 40 debuff cap in expansion too, read it somewhere just now was a bluepost on us forums

afaik those companies only guess the release date, dont think its something you can 100%  rely on

Perhaps you should aim for 70 instead? ;P