Patch 2.5.4 - Wrath of the Lich King Classic Interface Files

Originally Posted by Kralljin

I'm not going sit here and debate whether any of those additions have been good or not, however the fact remains that a substantial amount of them were frankly a massive breakaway from WoW's RPG roots.

If you think they improved the game, good for you, but that doesn't mean that Wotlk due to that belongs into that category of "Classical, RPG heavy" WoW akin to Classic, just because you prefer it, that's not how this works in my opinion.

I'm not really sure how any of those things breaks wow away from RPG roots, but then my definition of RPG covers a pretty broad spectrum. Like there's a huge difference between Baldur's Gate, Final Fantasy VII and WoW and yet all of them are RPGs that share some elements while having vastly different elements.

I mean having dungeon finder and easy catch up gear doesn't make FF14 any less of an RPG either (and I'd argue it's more so than WoW was due to the heavy focus on story)

Originally Posted by THEORACLE64

You clearly didn’t play it at the time if this is what you think.

WOTLK was the peak of WoW, and that’s just established fact at this point. Cata was the beginning of “modern” WoW, which is when things started getting shaky for sure. MoP and Legion were the only two other peaks after Wrath.

Incorrect...because the issues people have with things like LFG were introduced in a late game patch of WotLK.

Cataclysm was infamous for forcing alliance players to follow Thrall around, and lots of bad phasing tech that was eventually ironed out. But as far as sweeping changes, CRZ didn't enter Cata until 4.2 --- which was roughly same time LFG and welfare catch-up epics were added to WotLK...a late game patch.

I hope 3.0 doesn't get released until 2023. Personally, people confuse nostalgia with the actual quality of the game. Wrath had good things like ulduar, but it was the start of wow decline. There's still ZA and the 2.4 Sunwell patch for tbc classic, excitement there.

ofc its coming this year.

i mean how can you pretend that 9.2 will keep people playing till summer 2023 when release of 10.0will be .

zereth mortis couldnt keep me ingame for 2 hours. and i kinda cba to farm whole season of m+ doing exackly the same set of dungeons again.

once i get KSM mount next week im out till wolk classic release . where im gonna spend time i cannot say sadly because i keep getting infracted for just stating it . but all im gonna say is i will spend this time in vastly supperior mmorpg game.

It's unfortunate they have to rush out these classics because retain has barely any content. One zone and a 11 boss raid is just not enough, especially considering how long we had to wait for this patch and how long we will have to endure it. This is desperation and detrimental to letting classic expansions breathe.

Originally Posted by SniperCT

I'm not really sure how any of those things breaks wow away from RPG roots, but then my definition of RPG covers a pretty broad spectrum.

They surely do.

Dungeon finder is the best example, rather than travel to a dungeon and pick up quests, you just hit a button, get teleported to it, don't care about a single quest (because even traveling around to turn them in isn't worth it anymore), get a bag of loot dropped out nowhere into your inventory.
It's simply not an immersive experience, whereas doing dungeons in Classic very much is.

Similiar story with "Play the Patch", it makes the world feel a lot bigger when multiple raids and dungeons provide relevant loot to the player, rather than a place becoming abandoned the second a new one comes out.
When you look at Wrath, you don't give the slightest fuck about Naxx, Malygos or OS once ToC is out.
It makes the character progression feel very systemic, because Blizzard effectively makes the decision whether a place is worth running for the player, in Classic or TBC, it's the player who can decide whether they want to run a raid for a specific item, because the itemization gives you enough wiggle room.
Whereas the Ilvl based itemization introduced in Wotlk, pretty much kills this wiggle room, nevermind that the catchup provided makes it hardly worth running a previous raid tier.

And "Bring the player, not the class" is something that goes without saying.
Unique elements to a class simply add a lot of flavor to the game, because it naturally makes the classes feel different.

Again, if you don't care about of those elements, it's fine, but don't be disengenous and pretend that any of those elements do not provide an alternative experience to the player.

Originally Posted by Celarent

Likely just misstated. Structurally, Cataclysm's similar to Wrath. As far as the historical event, it was a wrestling clothesline to WoWdads and WoWmoms who'd grown accustomed to low-stress mechanics and gameplay. Might've been good for those drawn to challenge, but not the best for business. Theme-wise, comparing the two is like Led Zeppelin IV to In Through the Out Door, and, yeah, same band but not the same sound. Combined, it was the bloom coming off the rose, and a turning point for the title.

Difficulty is certainly an aspect where Cata deviates from Wotlk, but then i'd say Cata is basically a hardmode version of Wotlk.
It's about the general structure and design of those respective expansions, tuning is something that can be (easily) altered.

Originally Posted by kamuimac

ofc its coming this year

WotLK Classic will come out in early 2023. While they're aligning their whole product ranges, look at the progression of TBC Classic.

They won't shorten Phase 4 at all. It'll stay around for ~4 months which considering we're still early days of Phase 3, and then we've still got Phase 5 (Sunwell) to go, it won't be this year.

My prediction is WotLK pre-patch early January, including Death Knights and other changes. 2 weeks later, full launch.

The only way we're getting WotLK Classic this year is they shorten Phase 4 or roll it out sooner than planned and cut the length of the expansion down as a whole.

Phase 5 is going to have a lot of hype and plenty of people will return to level, find guilds and get gear for the leveling to come.

Originally Posted by ResentfulUK

They won't shorten Phase 4 at all. It'll stay around for ~4 months which considering we're still early days of Phase 3, and then we've still got Phase 5 (Sunwell) to go, it won't be this year.

They just announced the PTR for ZA, so that already puts a massive dent into your theory.
Phase 4 is going to be 100% shorter than any previous phase, else Season 3 will be twice as long as any other Arena season.

Phase 4 simply isn't a full fledged phase, ZA provides only a handful of upgrades for characters that are already farming T6 content, nevermind that the 3 day lockout means you'll acquire those items at a much faster pace anyway.

Phase 5 will happen in early Q3, then Classic Wotlk will launch in mid / late Q4, an entire expansion worth of content just before the holidays with tried and tested content sounds like an opportunity that no one would let slip.

Originally Posted by ResentfulUK

WotLK Classic will come out in early 2023

I am very certain that 10.0 is planned for early 2023.

There's basically two scenarios
(1) 10.0 comes out in late 2022 and Classic Wotlk in early 2023
(2) Classic Wotlk comes out in late 2022 and 10.0 in early 2023

Chances of 10.0 happening this year is next to 0, they haven't even announced the damn thing and would have to blast through the entire Alpha+Beta cycle this year, nevermind that they're not going to launch a full expansion in december because of the holidays.
Classic Wotlk and 10.0 both happening in early 2023 would send the beancounters screaming, there's not going to be a double expansion packet within the same quarter with jackshit to follow it up.

I'm excited for WotLK, but I'd rather it come late 2022 or early 2023 because I also want to play more TBC for a while. Speaking of which, I wonder how they will handle the transition. Will they fuck it up like they did at the launch of TBC with paid character copies?

What Wrath introduced to WoW was to take away the repercussion for being a toxic player. Before if you were an ass people would know you and have you on your ignore list, denying you access to content. With LFG (introduced at the very end of the expansion) that changed. You no longer had to maintain friendship with people (or that one good tank you knew), you could ninja every item because why not, and you no longer had the need to be nice to people.

And that was the downfall of WoW. Not content, not a specific feature or the lack of it, it was people being allowed to act as toxic as they'd like to. And that is the knife in the heart of WoW until today.

Originally Posted by twothe

What Wrath introduced to WoW was to take away the repercussion for being a toxic player. Before if you were an ass people would know you and have you on your ignore list, denying you access to content. With LFG (introduced at the very end of the expansion) that changed. You no longer had to maintain friendship with people (or that one good tank you knew), you could ninja every item because why not, and you no longer had the need to be nice to people.

And that was the downfall of WoW. Not content, not a specific feature or the lack of it, it was people being allowed to act as toxic as they'd like to. And that is the knife in the heart of WoW until today.

Dunno man, i dont need fear of repercussion to be nice and polite. If somebody is nice because of fear of punishment then they are awfull human being.

Originally Posted by BarosanuNr1

I'm excited for WotLK, but I'd rather it come late 2022 or early 2023 because I also want to play more TBC for a while. Speaking of which, I wonder how they will handle the transition. Will they fuck it up like they did at the launch of TBC with paid character copies?

what do you mean about fucing it up ? it was complete success

without that paid boost TBC would be mostly ignored. nobody has time to level through classic

their only cuk up was not offering more boosts both in classic and tbc - then those game would be 10 times more alive

Originally Posted by alexs

LFG should be there on day 1, if people complain about LFG being there, they can just leave.

Or you can just not play if you don’t want to experience the game how it was originally. We love wrath because it was wrath. LFG will come at the end as it should.

- - - Updated - - -

Originally Posted by kamuimac

what do you mean about fucing it up ? it was complete success

without that paid boost TBC would be mostly ignored. nobody has time to level through classic

their only cuk up was not offering more boosts both in classic and tbc - then those game would be 10 times more alive

No one has time to level? The game was humongous when people leveled in it originally. And classics original launch kinda proved tons of people had time to level. With boosting happening too it was quicker than ever if you wanted to go that route.

Originally Posted by kamuimac

what do you mean about fucing it up ? it was complete success

without that paid boost TBC would be mostly ignored. nobody has time to level through classic

their only cuk up was not offering more boosts both in classic and tbc - then those game would be 10 times more alive

I don't mean the boost. I mean the character copy gated by payment that forced many people to choose between TBC and Classic Era, effectively killing Classic Era. I hope they don't do the same at WotLK's launch because I might want to continue playing TBC in paralel.

Originally Posted by Kralljin

Difficulty is certainly an aspect where Cata deviates from Wotlk, but then i'd say Cata is basically a hardmode version of Wotlk.
It's about the general structure and design of those respective expansions, tuning is something that can be (easily) altered.

Oh, 100% agreed. Cata, like Wrath, continued the "bring anyone" philosophy in spite of greater challenge. I actually enjoyed mechanics of T11 in particular. Ironically, I completed normal tier content pre-4.2* with a 10-man consisting of the 12-15 left in our guild after dozens quit.

Certainly, early class mechanics played as big a role in performance collapses as changes to 5-man difficulty and raiding structure. I still think a Classic Cata would benefit from a nerf to bring normal 10-man closer in-line with Wrath for F&F — but at the same time I'd be very curious to see what 4.3 mechanics, especially for healing, did for gameplay.

* 4.2, not 4.1. Looked it up! Got Nefarion last on 5/22.

Originally Posted by RobertMugabe

Can't wait to play Wotlk. TBC got too boring and too tedious pretty quickly.

No way, most peopel are still playing it like it just came out.
Best expansion ever

But I too look forward for WotLK. leveling there was awesome.

Very boring, I'm not trying to relive "glory days" maybe they'll add microtransactions so it's actually profitable. Zzz banking on nostalgia again, at least it's not Warcraft 2 they're butchering.