What made classic wow better than current?

[Drujitsu]

Vanilla wow was not a higher quality game. The sense of community far surpassed the current state the game is in, which made it a lot more fun. I believe it is due to the toxic nature of the LFG systems that ruined the game overall. Finding groups back in vanilla and early BC to stomp content was harder, but you knew most people on the realm by reputation and knew to not bring them along if they had a poor reputation.

[Kyanion]

Sorry to burst your bubble, I didn't do this. Projecting on others is a common mistake, I know.
I came, spend (already too much) time posting, then left when it was obvious there was no point trying to discuss things with you (there is a reason I rarely bother to answer your shit by now). Came back about 800 pages later to see how it was going, noticed you clowns were still bot-spamming, pointed it, laughed and left. Came back 500 pages later and you were STILL there. I decided that I'd come back at page 2000, blindly post a bet that you would still be there spamming, and would then check to see if it was true. Sadly, the thread was locked before

yeah you prolly only just typed out a few posts here and there, right?

[ping-pong]

Is this discussion still a thing? Stop with the illusions, you might like vanilla better, but it is not objectively better. If it was, it would have more then a tiny fraction of legion players. Yes, you have the right to play what you like and praise it on all accounts. You can't however make objective claims of vanilla being better, when it's obviously not the case. The game is played by players, better games (expansions) have more players. If legion was worse then vanilla, guess what, people would go to private servers for free and not pay for the legion.

Think about that fact and try to understand it: vast majority of players rather PAY for the new expansion then play FOR FREE on vanilla. There is a reason for that, and it's not in any way conspiracy or people not knowing or whatever. It's a simple fact - Legion has a lot more to offer then vanilla. Again, you can choose to play vanilla all day long, but there are really no arguments to support it being better in any way, shape or form.

[Akka]

Is this discussion still a thing? Stop with the illusions, you might like vanilla better, but it is not objectively better. If it was, it would have more then a tiny fraction of legion players.

You realize that Vanilla had more players than Legion ?

[Sansnom]

Vanilla wow was not a higher quality game. The sense of community far surpassed the current state the game is in, which made it a lot more fun. I believe it is due to the toxic nature of the LFG systems that ruined the game overall.

Ruined the game or ruined the "community"?

Finding groups back in vanilla and early BC to stomp content was harder,

Finding a group was harder, which is not a good thing when looking at the game overall. This like a group of kids who gets to pick other kids to play with them because they have the toys. Others will be left out. This is not a good design. If other think so, I like to hear it. Not from a player point of view but from the developer point.

And if people argues that they can form their own group. This is a cop out. It is not a valid answer. Not everyone is comfortable with forming and also will be required to lead a group. Just as people complaining about lack of tanks and healers, they can roll one but do not.

I can just as easily say, you do not have to use LFG or LFD or other automatic queue. They can still look for people the old fashion way. That has not been removed.

but you knew most people on the realm by reputation and knew to not bring them along if they had a poor reputation.

Lets clarify here. You knew "most" people or you knew "some" people? Sure some people who gained a poor reputation will be invited less. But poor reputation by whom?

- - - Updated - - -

You realize that Vanilla had more players than Legion ?

It its hard to quantify whether Vanilla is better based on that one metric alone. A more accurate figure is the retention rate. How many players stayed throughout Vanilla.

Vanilla was also much longer than Legions. 0- to 60 took longer than 100 to 110. Again whether that constitute to a better game is also subject to personal opinion. A longer book is not always better than a shorter one.

[Kyanion]

You realize that Vanilla had more players than Legion ?

You realize TBC and WotLK had more players than Vanilla? You realize that Legion is only what not even 6 months old while Vanilla lasted around 2 years? Also you don't know how many people are playing Legion, but nice try.

[ping-pong]

You realize that Vanilla had more players than Legion ?

You realize that there are both options available right now and Vanilla's numbers are non-existant compared to Legion's? Your argument is invalid.

[Akka]

It its hard to quantify whether Vanilla is better based on that one metric alone. A more accurate figure is the retention rate. How many players stayed throughout Vanilla.

Vanilla was also much longer than Legions. 0- to 60 took longer than 100 to 110. Again whether that constitute to a better game is also subject to personal opinion. A longer book is not always better than a shorter one.

I'm not the one arguing that "more sub = better" (or else McDonald would be the best restaurant in the world), I'm simply pointing the fact that Vanilla did have more subscribers to someone who does it.

You realize that there are both options available right now and Vanilla's numbers are non-existant compared to Legion's? Your argument is invalid.

If you try to compare numbers from official servers of a very well-known publisher to more or less pirate underground versions, this is just plain stupid.

[Ielenia]

I wasn't talking about all retail fans (plenty of retail fans simply are guys with their own preferences, good for them that WoW today scratch that itch), I was specifically talking about you and Kyanon.

So, you're admitting to shit-posting with the sole intention to throw personal attacks toward me and Kyanion, with nothing of substance at all to contribute to the thread?

And yes, you and him were spamming the entire length of the 1800 pages (and of all other threads which have this subject), repeating endlessly the same shit, even when it had been disproved ten times, simply ignoring everything and just cycling forever into the same crap. There is a reason why you look like bots.

I'll repeat myself: the legacy crowd is not blame-free. In fact, they're equally as guilty for, as per your own words, "repeating endlessly the same shit, even when it had been disproved ten times, simply ignoring everything and just cycling forever into the same crap."

Your double-standards are showing.

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You realize that Vanilla had more players than Legion ?

You realize that, during Vanilla time, there were much fewer games, both online and offline, than today?

[ping-pong]

I'm not the one arguing that "more sub = better" (or else McDonald would be the best restaurant in the world), I'm simply pointing the fact that Vanilla did have more subscribers to someone who does it.

If you try to compare numbers from official servers of a very well-known publisher to more or less pirate underground versions, this is just plain stupid.

You are not taking into account many other things, your ability to objectively look at things is clouded by your passion towards Vanilla. Your comparison to McDonald is way off. Again, it is perfectly fine for you to enjoy Vanilla million times more then Legion. Doesn't make it objectively better.

If a very well-known publisher makes a shittier expansion/game then before, people will look into options to play the better, earlier ones. Happened many times in history, happening with some games now, will happen with other games in the future. This is NOT the case for WoW, apart from a fraction of players which is so tiny that it's not even worth considering when looking at the big picture.

People play games to have fun. You are having more fun in Vanilla, that is ok for everyone. Vast majority of players is having more fun in Legion. That is ok for everyone too. Making arguments to prove that a few of you are right in your choice of game, and millions are wrong is a fight you cannot win. Legion has the advantage of being on official servers. Vanilla has the advantage of being totally free and literally 1 google search away. Millions choose Legion, thousands choose Vanilla. Quality-wise Legion wins hands down, it's not even a contest. Legion's still not the better choice for you or few of your like-minded friends, because you enjoy Vanilla more. And that is ok.

[Akka]

If a very well-known publisher makes a shittier expansion/game then before, people will look into options to play the better, earlier ones. Happened many times in history, happening with some games now, will happen with other games in the future. This is NOT the case for WoW, apart from a fraction of players which is so tiny that it's not even worth considering when looking at the big picture.

Considering we had so much noise about it that Blizzard even felt the need to do PR gestures like inviting guys from another continent in their own offices or explaining it was a subject they did discuss internally, I'm a bit at a loss when you say this is not the case for WoW.

People play games to have fun. You are having more fun in Vanilla, that is ok for everyone. Vast majority of players is having more fun in Legion.

If you're going to give lessons about objectivity and taking elements into account, you might apply them to yourself, because your reasoning is pretty lacking here.
What is this "player" pool you're speaking of (because if you restrict it to people playing Legion, that's just self-fulfilling prophecy, if you consider all people having played WoW at one time or another it's quite not the same picture) and how exactly do you measure how much fun they have ?

That is ok for everyone too. Making arguments to prove that a few of you are right in your choice of game, and millions are wrong is a fight you cannot win. Legion has the advantage of being on official servers. Vanilla has the advantage of being totally free and literally 1 google search away. Millions choose Legion, thousands choose Vanilla.

This comparison is absurd. Most people don't even know about private servers. Most people who know about their existence won't even consider them because they have this image of buggy mess (and that's not even a wrong image for most of the private servers existing). Even those who know about them and want to try them have a lot of work to find good ones. And that's just scratching the surface of everything that makes private servers an inherently much smaller pool than official ones.

Quality-wise Legion wins hands down, it's not even a contest. Legion's still not the better choice for you or few of your like-minded friends, because you enjoy Vanilla more. And that is ok.

Well at least you recognize that people can genuinely enjoy a different design without it being down to nostalgia.

[Effenz]

Considering we had so much noise about it that Blizzard even felt the need to do PR gestures like inviting guys from another continent in their own offices or explaining it was a subject they did discuss internally, I'm a bit at a loss when you say this is not the case for WoW.

If you're going to give lessons about objectivity and taking elements into account, you might apply them to yourself, because your reasoning is pretty lacking here.
What is this "player" pool you're speaking of (because if you restrict it to people playing Legion, that's just self-fulfilling prophecy, if you consider all people having played WoW at one time or another it's quite not the same picture) and how exactly do you measure how much fun they have ?

This comparison is absurd. Most people don't even know about private servers. Most people who know about their existence won't even consider them because they have this image of buggy mess (and that's not even a wrong image for most of the private servers existing). Even those who know about them and want to try them have a lot of work to find good ones. And that's just scratching the surface of everything that makes private servers an inherently much smaller pool than official ones.

Well at least you recognize that people can genuinely enjoy a different design without it being down to nostalgia.

What he said was "legion is still better, you are a nostalgia tard, but if it makes you happy, go do you"
Which is what everyone has been saying. Noone cares if you play on your shit servers buddy, if you want to play the game when it was at it's worst, go ahead.

[Deleted]

You realize that Vanilla had more players than Legion ?

In what universe? The one where squirrels make chocolate?

[Jngizu]

Vanilla wow was not a higher quality game. The sense of community far surpassed the current state the game is in, which made it a lot more fun. I believe it is due to the toxic nature of the LFG systems that ruined the game overall. Finding groups back in vanilla and early BC to stomp content was harder, but you knew most people on the realm by reputation and knew to not bring them along if they had a poor reputation.

Always found that to be a ludicrous argument. FFXIV uses LFG more than WoW's and it's often praised for its immersion and community. LFG didn't destroy shit, dead servers did. On smaller servers, all the good players end up transferring at some point because it's too hard to find a guild or recruit. You had more sens of community at the time because back then, people were looking to make friends in the game. New players don't give a shit about socializing anymore. LFG is an amazing tool, and WoW would never have survived without, or at least subs would have gone down a lot more.

Well at least you recognize that people can genuinely enjoy a different design without it being down to nostalgia.

Aside from trolls, everyone who has been arguing in this thread has no problem admitting it. It's just that the pro-Vanilla tend to force their opinions as facts. When it's just a matter of preference. I, for the life of me, cannot understand how someone would play Vanilla over Legion, aside from the nostalgia factor, but to each his own. You don't seem able to admit that though.

I also wonder where you found Legion's number, since they haven't been released. Again, you think Vanilla had more players because it fits your agenda, when in reality you have absolutely no idea if that's the case.

[Akka]

Aside from trolls, everyone who has been arguing in this thread has no problem admitting it. It's just that the pro-Vanilla tend to force their opinions as facts.

Have we read the same thread ? Where about half the count is made by drive-by posts saying "nothing, it's just nostalgia" and half of non-drive-by posts are people spending their time saying "Legion is objectively better, people who disagree are being nostalgic" ?

I also wonder where you found Legion's number, since they haven't been released. Again, you think Vanilla had more players because it fits your agenda, when in reality you have absolutely no idea if that's the case.

You're confusing me with otaXephon if you're accusing me of accepting things only because it fits my agenda.
I've no hard proof (because, well, Blizzard decided to not officially give numbers, which in itself is somewhat telling) but there is enough peripheric evidences to have a rough idea (obviously nothing precise, but a rather nebulous ballpark). Be it the famous "player activity" chart (which is statistically significant for everyone who is not completely ignorant of how stat work) which tend to indicate Legion being slightly above end-of-life WoD, or even making some approximations from Blizzard reports and "accidental" leaks, it all tend to circle around 6 millions or so (give or take a rather large margin).

[ping-pong]

Considering we had so much noise about it that Blizzard even felt the need to do PR gestures like inviting guys from another continent in their own offices or explaining it was a subject they did discuss internally, I'm a bit at a loss when you say this is not the case for WoW.

If you're going to give lessons about objectivity and taking elements into account, you might apply them to yourself, because your reasoning is pretty lacking here.
What is this "player" pool you're speaking of (because if you restrict it to people playing Legion, that's just self-fulfilling prophecy, if you consider all people having played WoW at one time or another it's quite not the same picture) and how exactly do you measure how much fun they have ?

This comparison is absurd. Most people don't even know about private servers. Most people who know about their existence won't even consider them because they have this image of buggy mess (and that's not even a wrong image for most of the private servers existing). Even those who know about them and want to try them have a lot of work to find good ones. And that's just scratching the surface of everything that makes private servers an inherently much smaller pool than official ones.

Well at least you recognize that people can genuinely enjoy a different design without it being down to nostalgia.

Noise is being created by a few people (few compared to the player pool). Very vocal few though, so they chose to address it. When the game fails to deliver, and players choose the previous version it is done by big percentages. Not by (don't know exact numbers, but let's say) 50k out of multimillion player pool. That is nothing, means nothing, is irrelevant.

You cannot take into account everyone that at some point played WoW. You don't know the reasons for quitting. Are you going to say that a fella that quit gaming altogether after Vanilla is not playing Legion because Legion is bad? Those things are impossible to predict and realistically calculate. You can only speculate, and that would be heavily clouded by your personal opinion and without any evidence. No, if both options are available right now, you look at everyone that is interested in playing WoW right now. You cannot talk about players that quit WoW (or gaming). And, right now, players, vast majority of them, CHOOSE LEGION.

You are giving excuses for why Vanilla servers aren't so popular. Stop doing that. Play your game, whichever it is, don't impose it to others. If there are more of you, you will surely get official servers and support. There is not so much interest for that, and that is why it's not happening. You can try to argument, but it's simple truth, Blizzard is investing time and resources into things that are liked and played by majority. They will not go back unless big % wants it. They don't. Get over it. Talking about it is not going to change anything. Numbers are there. Put your feelings aside.

Just imagine a talk in the Blizzard's office.
A: We should truly consider giving Vanilla official servers.
B: How many of players are there?
A: Around 50k at most who would play regularly. Some internet prophets without any objective ground or research have a feeling there would be a lot more, even millions if we gave it official support.
B: Are you freaking serious? Get out.

[Jngizu]

Have we read the same thread ? Where about half the count is made by drive-by posts saying "nothing, it's just nostalgia" and half of non-drive-by posts are people spending their time saying "Legion is objectively better, people who disagree are being nostalgic" ?

You're confusing me with otaXephon if you're accusing me of accepting things only because it fits my agenda.
I've no hard proof (because, well, Blizzard decided to not officially give numbers, which in itself is somewhat telling) but there is enough peripheric evidences to have a rough idea (obviously nothing precise, but a rather nebulous ballpark). Be it the famous "player activity" chart (which is statistically significant for everyone who is not completely ignorant of how stat work) which tend to indicate Legion being slightly above end-of-life WoD, or even making some approximations from Blizzard reports and "accidental" leaks, it all tend to circle around 6 millions or so (give or take a rather large margin).

As I said, those are trolls, and should be dismissed as such.

For the number of players, I don't know, but servers feel a lot fuller than at the end of WoD. Maybe it's because people just stayed in their garrisons, but servers felt empty. Now, all servers I play in are pretty active. In fact, they are the most active I've seen them since launch Cata.

[Kyanion]

As I said, those are trolls, and should be dismissed as such.

For the number of players, I don't know, but servers feel a lot fuller than at the end of WoD. Maybe it's because people just stayed in their garrisons, but servers felt empty. Now, all servers I play in are pretty active. In fact, they are the most active I've seen them since launch Cata.

And if we're going with his 6 million estimate for Legion let us consider this. Legion has been out since August 30th. Vanilla wow didn't break 5 mil subs I think until it was slightly over a year old. Legion is fairly unique in that it is actually getting many content patches unlike prior expansions so there is also a chance that number of Legion player could go up. Of course it could also go down.

He latches way too hard on the trolls posting and claiming it was only nostalgia or that nothing at all was better about Vanilla. Vanilla had some great points about it to also go with some crap points. But it is whatever, I gave him some replies in the past page or two and he refuses to acknowledge them now. He usually just resorts to the victim card when he's beaten soundly. It is quite endearing really.

[Akka]

Noise is being created by a few people (few compared to the player pool). Very vocal few though, so they chose to address it.

"vocal minority" is a pretty tired argument with no worth. If you take the player pool, there is NO majority anyway, because regardless of what venue you take, more than 90 % of players won't voice anything you can gather.

When the game fails to deliver, and players choose the previous version it is done by big percentages. Not by (don't know exact numbers, but let's say) 50k out of multimillion player pool. That is nothing, means nothing, is irrelevant.

The problem is that your ENTIRE argument is based on the completely flawed premise that there is two offers (Legion and Classic) on equal footing. Which is just not the case.
There were also private server during Classic. They were free. Yet the overwhelming majority of people chose to stay on retail, despite the offer being technically "WoW paid" or "WoW free". It's obvious the choice is not as simplistic and there is a ton of other factors.

---

As I said, those are trolls, and should be dismissed as such.

But then that doesn't leave a lot of people, does it ?

For the number of players, I don't know, but servers feel a lot fuller than at the end of WoD. Maybe it's because people just stayed in their garrisons, but servers felt empty. Now, all servers I play in are pretty active. In fact, they are the most active I've seen them since launch Cata.

WoD felt like a complete desert due to garrison, that's one thing.
The other is CRZ. If you're in the US it might not be as "in your face", but trust me, when I'm encountering everyday people with cyrillic name, it doesn't tell me that my server is bursting of people.

[ping-pong]

"vocal minority" is a pretty tired argument with no worth. If you take the player pool, there is NO majority anyway, because regardless of what venue you take, more than 90 % of players won't voice anything you can gather.

The problem is that your ENTIRE argument is based on the completely flawed premise that there is two offers (Legion and Classic) on equal footing. Which is just not the case.
There were also private server during Classic. They were free. Yet the overwhelming majority of people chose to stay on retail, despite the offer being technically "WoW paid" or "WoW free". It's obvious the choice is not as simplistic and there is a ton of other factors.

So, after all the fuss you guys made about Nostalrius and Vanilla, and Blizzard even helped you get your message across (there are vanilla servers, blabla) your numbers still didn't grow into anything significant. What does that tell you? On what grounds do you expect to have numbers even if Blizzard goes hardcore into vanilla servers? You understand that people who follow forums or anything wow related know about the servers, know even where to find them. Still they mostly stay on the current exp. Your passion for vanilla is shared by very few people. Nothing will bring back the "glorious" days of vanilla. They passed, Legion is now. Get along with it or play on vanilla, noone cares. Just don't talk about the quality of an expansion that was surpassed long time ago. Arguments do not exist. Only in your heavily subjective head.

Also, you are the one not taking all the factors in your calculations. Your illusion that vanilla only needs official support because back in the day it rocked comes from you not being aware of the simple fact that vanilla was revolution in those days. I repeat, IN THOSE DAYS. In the days that people who were hooked on warcraft universe got the opportunity to experience it in a completely new way. Now mmorpg is not a new shiny thing. Now the story is different. The market for gamers is spread across so many AAA titles, both on pc and consoles. Back in the day, WoW was a must try for everyone, even for those who knew nothing about warcraft. Now that's not enough, now the game needs to continually improve. Guess what, it does. Peeps love Legion.

About private servers during vanilla time, yes, they existed. Their quality was nowhere near what todays private servers are. You would have to be a masochist to go to a private server back then. Now you have a fairly stable experience. Yet most players don't want it. Think. Be passionate about it, but also be objective and admit that your opinion about the quality of expansion is not shared by most people. And it is ok, really. As long as you don't try to argue that millions would prefer it also, if only they knew what you know. It's not that complicated. People know about vanilla. People are not into the idea of playing it again. Deal with it.