Classic World of Warcraft Discussion [Megathread]

[Viikkis]

Hah you actually think you made a difference.. keep thinking that. *snip* has been around FAR longer and blizzard have yet to take it down because they cant.

You're talking about guys who managed to lose all their account data (-> people lost years of playtime) on their own WITHOUT Blizzard. Awesome!

[Echocho]

I call bullshit. Every player who was playing on Nost, but would have kept playing on official servers had Nost not been there (and don't pretend there weren't ANY of these) was a loss to Blizzard. Players who played on Nost, and would not play on official servers, were irrelevant, since Blizzard wouldn't get anything from them anyway.

The Nost fans are trying to spin this as a loss for Blizzard to do this, but it's anything but. The only way it could be a loss would be if the lawyers cost more than what they gained by unleashing them. And all this ignores the cost to Blizzard if private servers come to be seen as legitimate and grow in popularity.

I've cancelled my Legion and Overwatch plans as a result of this. If I have, so have others. I'll be taking my business to other companies from now on.

[Eroginous]

Oh fair enough I thought you meant the "in game issues" (because that's what you were, or rather I'd assumed you were, talking about regarding Nosts ability to manage their server) rather than the customer service side of things which I have no doubt they keep people on to deal with. So we weren't talking about the same "department" of Blizzard no.

My wall o' text covered a lot of different ground and I'm not sure how it was unclear, but I'll try to clarify anyway:

Blizzard has tools in place to catch people who violate the ToS and EULA. These tools come in the form of detection software, player reports, and specialists who actively investigate violations. There are some common misconceptions at work here:

1. Blizzard doesn't do anything about violations.

2. Violations are rampant because Blizzard doesn't do anything about them.

The truth is more complicated. As I said before, the size/scope of the game makes it difficult for them to know what's going on in game. If something happens their software can't detect then it's up to player reporting to catch them. If for instance, it's a mining/herbing bot that has hooks Warden hasn't been updated to find, that bot could spend days or weeks exploiting the economy before Warden is updated to catch it. Let's say for instance this particular bot is running unknown software - Blizzard can't even begin to update Warden to detect it because it's too new. Now they have to rely on a player seeing the bot, suspecting it's a bot, and then following through with a report to make sure that player is investigated.

The best way to think about an investigation on Blizzard's part is like a sting operation to catch a child molester or a prostitute. They have to see the player breaking the ToS to take action. It's not enough that Job Blow was online last night and saw a 'bot' mining some nodes in Tanaan Jungle. That's why it's possible to see the same character on for days or weeks after a report.

The other part of the coin is their customer service. In the past, it has taken inordinate amounts of time to get resolution for a problem. I've had tickets take up to a week to get a response. Which basically amounts to keeping a good ratio of reps:issues. Have too few customer service reps on hand and a lot of tickets being opened? Wait time goes way up.

[Deleted]

I've cancelled my Legion and Overwatch plans as a result of this. If I have, so have others. I'll be taking my business to other companies from now on.

Well playing on Nost wasn't business with Blizzard, so.. they're not shedding many tears over you.
Also - feel free to do that. That's cool. Why do we need to know that?

[Osmeric]

I've cancelled my Legion and Overwatch plans as a result of this. If I have, so have others. I'll be taking my business to other companies from now on.

The other benefit that Blizzard gets from this is Legion and Overwatch will have fewer sociopathic rulebreakers. This should make the experience less toxic for the honest customers.

[THEORACLE64]

I've cancelled my Legion and Overwatch plans as a result of this. If I have, so have others. I'll be taking my business to other companies from now on.

Well, buh-bye then! One less self-entitled salty player to deal with.

[Deleted]

The other benefit that Blizzard gets from this is Legion and Overwatch will have fewer sociopathic rulebreakers. This should make the experience less toxic for the honest customers.

How the F did you come to that conclusion, hahah!

[LordKain]

I've cancelled my Legion and Overwatch plans as a result of this. If I have, so have others. I'll be taking my business to other companies from now on.

I already have my legion ce on preorder, but you just convinced me to preorder overwatch.

Thanks Embriel!

[samus]

The other benefit that Blizzard gets from this is Legion and Overwatch will have fewer sociopathic rulebreakers. This should make the experience less toxic for the honest customers.

That's kind of weird conclusion to draw. If someone doesn't agree with a business decision then removing your money from their wallet is a good way to show it. People do the same thing for other companies all the time. People avoid Ubisoft games because of their awful DRM, people don't support companies due to their anti-lgbt stance, and this guy doesn't support Blizzards decision to sue a group that ran a private server.

It's called voting with your wallet, companies are more likely to listen to people who were going to give them money rather than people who are still giving them money.

[Osmeric]

That's kind of weird conclusion to draw. If someone doesn't agree with a business decision then removing your money from their wallet is a good way to show it.

The people who disagree with the closing of the private server are hypocrites. They benefit from an IP protection regime that allowed WoW to be created in the first place, but they don't want those rules to apply to them personally when this personally inconveniences them.

Someone who doesn't think the rules should apply to them is someone you don't want playing your multiplayer game.

[Deleted]

The statement I judge Blizz for

You judge Blizzard? For taking creative decision in the videogame created by them?
And that entitles you to support a project designed to exploit the intellectual property of Blizzard without permission?

That's your case?
It's all on Blizzard. None of it is on you?
Therefore it's ok to infringe copyrights?

Alright then.

(you're delusional)

[THEORACLE64]

The statement I judge Blizz for

eu.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/1751857331?page=1#15

and esp. this part in it :"...we still have no plans..." They'll have one when money takes 100% leadership in their decision making.


Just because a bicycle can be equipped with more accesoires like an electrical drive doesn't make the standard bicycle worse.

It!'s the real reason for the success of the product line because being the end result of a development from the demand of the people to getting around on their own power.

The original idea comes first, gimmicks are secondary.

Blizzard messed this up. And that's why I support Nostalrius and the project which continues it.

Most of this post is a mess so I won't even go there, but laws are laws. The people who were running Nostralius were infringing those laws, thus they were dealt with. The end.

[Huehuecoyotl]

People seem to think that programmers keep all their old source code neatly filed away, which simply doesn't happen.

I don't know where you work, but the organisation I work for we keep all versions of source code available. We can only go back to about 1998, as it happens, because that was the last point we moved version tracking software, but if you wanted any version of any piece of code recreated from any point after that, we can do it.

It doesn't mean that Blizzard do the same thing, of course, but version tracking is pretty much industry standard. And you would almost certainly need to go out of your way to delete older versions if you were using it. Can't imagine why Blizzard would want or need to do that.

[anon5123]

They've gone back on things they said they'd never allow so many times, I wouldn't hold it past us getting some version of a past game. Faction changes, realm changes from pvp-pve, etc. If the outcry on this is big enough, they may listen. Anyone who works in the finances department of a video game publisher will probably push them away from the idea.

The problem with this, is that if Blizzard were to release a "legacy" realm, they'd basically be admitting that they don't have faith in the current expansion(s) and so they're re-releasing old expansions for people to play.

I don't see legacy realms happening until WoW's development comes to a halt and new expansions are no longer being made. At that point, they can just focus on maintaining older expansion patches.

It does seem really weird that there's no legal way to play older expansions. It's as if Nintendo released Super Mario Bros 2 and in doing so, somehow made it illegal to play Super Mario Bros 1. It doesn't make much sense.

[THEORACLE64]

The problem with this, is that if Blizzard were to release a "legacy" realm, they'd basically be admitting that they don't have faith in the current expansion(s) and so they're re-releasing old expansions for people to play.

I don't see legacy realms happening until WoW's development comes to a halt and new expansions are no longer being made. At that point, they can just focus on maintaining older expansion patches.

It does seem really weird that there's no legal way to play older expansions. It's as if Nintendo released Super Mario Bros 2 and in doing so, somehow made it illegal to play Super Mario Bros 1. It doesn't make much sense.

A new expansion does not mean a new game. It's not like we're on World of Warcraft 7, we're on an expansion of the original game. Comparing an MMO to a singular console game isn't totally logical either, especially ones from a time when the Internet was still a chi (meaning it wasn't like Super Mario Bros could be patched and only played online).

I do agree that "classic" servers will probably happen one day, and that'll probably be when the game development comes to an end and when it's more about maintaining than progression.

[Varaben]

The problem with this, is that if Blizzard were to release a "legacy" realm, they'd basically be admitting that they don't have faith in the current expansion(s) and so they're re-releasing old expansions for people to play.

I don't see legacy realms happening until WoW's development comes to a halt and new expansions are no longer being made. At that point, they can just focus on maintaining older expansion patches.

It does seem really weird that there's no legal way to play older expansions. It's as if Nintendo released Super Mario Bros 2 and in doing so, somehow made it illegal to play Super Mario Bros 1. It doesn't make much sense.

That's imply one interpretation, and isn't a 100% clear explanation. It could just as easily be seen as blizzard trying to lure old players back to the game. Honestly, vanilla is a different game than wow today. Some people liked it more, some less, some don't care. Does blizzard still host Diablo 2?

Imo, the real reason blizz doesn't host old servers is not that people wouldn't pay or play it, not that its too costly. Its that as soon as they open the servers, they are basically locked in for all eternity or at least until the current game stops being patched. And that is probably a scary concept. Now blizz has to retain knowledge of the code and such for years and years. That's the real cost, having to have employees who know 20 yr old code and such. Running the server is cheap. But investigating bugs and providing support would be less so, and would only increase over time.

Don't get me wrong, I think blizz should still do it. If for no other reason than to say they told us so.

- - - Updated - - -

A new expansion does not mean a new game. It's not like we're on World of Warcraft 7, we're on an expansion of the original game. Comparing an MMO to a singular console game isn't totally logical either, especially ones from a time when the Internet was still a chi (meaning it wasn't like Super Mario Bros could be patched and only played online).

I do agree that "classic" servers will probably happen one day, and that'll probably be when the game development comes to an end and when it's more about maintaining than progression.

But you have to admit, in legion this game is almost nothing like original wow. From the world, classes, professions, etc being different to how the game is played. Each expansion may be similar to the last, but that evolutionary drift takes us far from the original after so many expansions. This is a different game than in 2004, I don't think anyone would argue that. Its as much or more different today than compared to other MMOs.

[Deleted]

So we label a company now as evil when they act in the interesst of their shareholders ? O.o

Calling people evil is obvious nonsense, but let the shareholders worry about the shares. Everyone posting here is a player and fan of Warcraft first and foremost.

The continued success and appeal of private servers has shown that there is an interest in playing older versions of WoW. Versions that people bought and paid for, but that Blizzard has effectively discontinued. It's the danger of always-online games in a way; the game can change without you having any say over it - and at some point the only option is to just leave. That not everyone is willing to accept that is completely understandable. The course of action they take in response is not necessarily laudable, but at this point Blizzard's continued refusal to even entertain the idea of hosting older versions of WoW seems curious at best.

[Holtzmann]

I don't know where you work, but the organisation I work for we keep all versions of source code available. We can only go back to about 1998, as it happens, because that was the last point we moved version tracking software, but if you wanted any version of any piece of code recreated from any point after that, we can do it.

It doesn't mean that Blizzard do the same thing, of course, but version tracking is pretty much industry standard. And you would almost certainly need to go out of your way to delete older versions if you were using it. Can't imagine why Blizzard would want or need to do that.

I'm sorry, I should have been more specific there. You do have to keep source code when you have to support multiple versions of your program at once. If you have part of your userbase running version 1.0 and another versions 1.1, you need both versions to be able to correct them. But when your entire install base has to update at once or they are unable to use your program, there's no point in retaining source code longer than strictly necessary. I'm sure they still have their old function and assets libraries around because those were and are reused across versions, but I wouldn't be surprised if good chunks of the actual game logic for version 1.0 were missing, for example.

It's a bit of a moot point, anyway. I remember a dev years ago (I think it was during Wrath) saying something about the old code not being up to proper programming standards (which is one of the reasons I think version control wasn't in their mind back then). The code was so full of kludges, hardcoded shortcuts and cheap optimization hacks that WoW was essentially spaghetti in the back end. That was the reason given for the backpack having only 16 slots, for example. The value was hardcoded, and changing that would require combing the entire project to fix what it would break. So even if they had full access to the source code, they'd still need to rewrite much of it to comply with their current standards. That is, after their current crop of programmers goes through it and figures out just WTF are they looking at.

[Stobbz]

After seeing all the negativity towards any kind of rationalization of whether blizz could support 2 different versions of the game , I think they should make WoW vanilla open source, it will solve all problems with anyone that has been annoyed by the current situation (trying to put that mildly), this is taking into account all the people on here saying its such an insignificant amount of people, and it will also reassure all the people happy playing in a garrison with a UI that legion and beyond is what blizzard is looking forward to working on. This would solve the PR nightmare getting any worse, having already stopped threads on their own forums to shuffle it.

[THEORACLE64]

That's imply one interpretation, and isn't a 100% clear explanation. It could just as easily be seen as blizzard trying to lure old players back to the game. Honestly, vanilla is a different game than wow today. Some people liked it more, some less, some don't care. Does blizzard still host Diablo 2?

Imo, the real reason blizz doesn't host old servers is not that people wouldn't pay or play it, not that its too costly. Its that as soon as they open the servers, they are basically locked in for all eternity or at least until the current game stops being patched. And that is probably a scary concept. Now blizz has to retain knowledge of the code and such for years and years. That's the real cost, having to have employees who know 20 yr old code and such. Running the server is cheap. But investigating bugs and providing support would be less so, and would only increase over time.

Don't get me wrong, I think blizz should still do it. If for no other reason than to say they told us so.

- - - Updated - - -



But you have to admit, in legion this game is almost nothing like original wow. From the world, classes, professions, etc being different to how the game is played. Each expansion may be similar to the last, but that evolutionary drift takes us far from the original after so many expansions. This is a different game than in 2004, I don't think anyone would argue that. Its as much or more different today than compared to other MMOs.

Of course things have changed, but you can still revisit old content if you wanted to (although "classic" is probably the most diluted since Cataclysm). Using your example, in Super Mario Bros 2 you could not go back to Super Mario Bros 1 and play the same content - you had to switch games because they were seperate games, WoW and it's expansions is still under the same umbrella.