WoW Classic AMA - Tuesday, Aug. 20 at 10:00 a.m. PDT

Just one question, is layering for sure getting removed after phase 1? Because nobody wants it even then

Originally Posted by Slashnox

Just one question, is layering for sure getting removed after phase 1? Because nobody wants it even then

You might want to actually post that question on the AMA, y’know... but no, there’s a chance it’ll be removed during phase 1. I believe they said it’ll probably be during the first few weeks/depending on server stability.

Originally Posted by THEORACLE64

You might want to actually post that question on the AMA, y’know... but no, there’s a chance it’ll be removed during phase 1. I believe they said it’ll probably be during the first few weeks/depending on server stability.

meanwhile theyve had to open new servers and predict long queus on high populated servers lol, its not going anywhere until world bosses imo

Originally Posted by Gravity2015

meanwhile theyve had to open new servers and predict long queus on high populated servers lol, its not going anywhere until world bosses imo

Spoken like someone who has never played a pserver

Population is always super high at launch but drops off a good deal after a month or so. Last pserver launch I took part in had 14k players online at launch, and just 3 weeks later, we were down to 9/10k at peak.

I don't see layering lasting more than a month, especially with the dynamic respawn system that Blizz fixed and enabled for Classic.

Can't wait. I've had a question about Murky that they've intentionally been ignoring for over a year

"What percentage of my subscription fee is going towards wow classic staff and expenses?"

Interested to know server population info such as when a server is full or what the maximum capacity is, how many players per layer etc.

Originally Posted by joxur

"What percentage of my subscription fee is going towards wow classic staff and expenses?"

what % of my subscription fee goes to things I have no interest in like pet battles / store mounts etc

For a 15 years old game, theese Classic team developers are quite.. amazing. Lots of beta testings, communicate with its playerbase etc. As a retail person, im really jealous.

I wonder if they will answer the possibilities of adding a cash shop. Good way to completely destroy a game for a few extra bucks.

Originally Posted by Restors

For a 15 years old game, theese Classic team developers are quite.. amazing. Lots of beta testings, communicate with its playerbase etc. As a retail person, im really jealous.

All you've said is actually not really the case.

- Communication was mostly just PR. They've had a handful of detailed responses to high-profile concerns (which really weren't that concerning, just some part of the community made them big), and that was that. Many actually relevant technical questions have been gone unanswered. For example, as an addon author, we've not been given any information, feedback or insight into their plans for the classic UI. In fact they've been making breaking changes to the UI since up to two weeks ago even, and the technical aspects of the Classic UI are appalling, almost feels like an intern did that. Communication with the Retail UI team has been great over the last years, Classic did not have a single word for us.

- Beta testing was a PR farce. They invited very few people to the actual closed beta (many streamers though!), not even addon authors have been able to get in - which was something that was 100% reliably possible with every retail beta previously. Nevermind that they shut the beta down very early, then re-open it for 3 days, whats that about? PR. If it was about re-testing fixed issues, they would've at least given some rough outline what areas might need testing, but instead they bumped max level and hoped for more PR hype.

Originally Posted by Nevcairiel

All you've said is actually not really the case.

- Communication was mostly just PR. They've had a handful of detailed responses to high-profile concerns (which really weren't that concerning, just some part of the community made them big), and that was that. Many actually relevant technical questions have been gone unanswered. For example, as an addon author, we've not been given any information, feedback or insight into their plans for the classic UI. In fact they've been making breaking changes to the UI since up to two weeks ago even, and the technical aspects of the Classic UI are appalling, almost feels like an intern did that. Communication with the Retail UI team has been great over the last years, Classic did not have a single word for us.

- Beta testing was a PR farce. They invited very few people to the actual closed beta (many streamers though!), not even addon authors have been able to get in - which was something that was 100% reliably possible with every retail beta previously. Nevermind that they shut the beta down very early, then re-open it for 3 days, whats that about? PR. If it was about re-testing fixed issues, they would've at least given some rough outline what areas might need testing, but instead they bumped max level and hoped for more PR hype.

Some PR might be involved, but not entirely. Communication has been alot, such as What is bug and What's not. The communication about the different phases, which build they will start with, reasoning etc. Ofc its all PR, but that does not mean its full time commercial. Its actual info and insight in what they're doing and what they hope to achieve. Giving beta access to top streamers is ofc pure PR, and smart one aswell since it will reach to alot of people. But then there is this "entitlement" camps, thoose who played during vanilla, thoose who stayed subbed since vanilla and people like you who feel entitlted cause of author of an addon. There are shit tons of addon authors, Blizzard wants their game fixed firsthand, not having people poking their codes to create and extansion for their game. They want their system fleshed out tested.

They opened up the beta few days after Name reservation.. My first thought was they want to check their servers once more, since so many people logged in just to reserve names, we almost crashed the login servers. They might have second guessed themselves in terms of "how stable will our servers be during launch?".

Not saying you dont have any truth in your words, but I dont blindly think this is just a huge Pr coup either.

My question: What are Blizzard's plans when/if populations for Classic drop to the point of raiding/PVP not being sustainable anymore?

Originally Posted by joxur

"What percentage of my subscription fee is going towards wow classic staff and expenses?"

I can't believe people would seriously ask this question. It's a subscription for privately created content, not taxes. If you don't like the content, then don't pay it.

Originally Posted by Gravity2015

meanwhile theyve had to open new servers and predict long queus on high populated servers lol, its not going anywhere until world bosses imo

These launch numbers aren’t going to be sustain though - far from it. A week or two and they’ll start dropping like crazy.

"We understand Layering is supposed to make sure servers don't die and have a healthy population after the 'tourists' leave. However, how will you solve so called 'dead realms' IF that happens? Cross realm is not something the Classic community will accept. Forced server migrations?"

"Could we get an alliance to horde ratio indicator on the realm list? Or maybe a forum post dedicated to the current state of reams ratio? It's important on all realms to have a good Alliance to Horde ratio."

Originally Posted by Sensa1

what % of my subscription fee goes to things I have no interest in like pet battles / store mounts etc

Go ahead and ask this edgy childish question, but you're an idiot if you expect an answer - it's a Q&A, not an earnings call.

Originally Posted by joxur

"What percentage of my subscription fee is going towards wow classic staff and expenses?"

Originally Posted by Sensa1

what % of my subscription fee goes to things I have no interest in like pet battles / store mounts etc

Originally Posted by Kanegasi

I can't believe people would seriously ask this question. It's a subscription for privately created content, not taxes. If you don't like the content, then don't pay it.

To you they may seem silly questions but I understand the desire to know how the split will be.
I want to play Classic but do not want to provide any support or reward to the current Retail team if possible.

I would be much happier with separate subs; I know it is not going to happen as the one sub for both games will help prop up the MUA numbers, a very shrewd move by Bliz, and with good numbers they can continue to pat themselves on the head and exclaim just how good they are while the game slips further down the toilet.

Originally Posted by Walkerbo

I want to play Classic but do not want to provide any support or reward to the current Retail team if possible.

This is exactly what I meant, it's a stupid question and a stupid thought process. A WoW sub is not a tax, you have no say over how it's used and no one cares enough, Blizzard or reasonable customers, to actually figure out the percentages.

Originally Posted by Nevcairiel

All you've said is actually not really the case.

- Communication was mostly just PR. They've had a handful of detailed responses to high-profile concerns (which really weren't that concerning, just some part of the community made them big), and that was that. Many actually relevant technical questions have been gone unanswered. For example, as an addon author, we've not been given any information, feedback or insight into their plans for the classic UI. In fact they've been making breaking changes to the UI since up to two weeks ago even, and the technical aspects of the Classic UI are appalling, almost feels like an intern did that. Communication with the Retail UI team has been great over the last years, Classic did not have a single word for us.

- Beta testing was a PR farce. They invited very few people to the actual closed beta (many streamers though!), not even addon authors have been able to get in - which was something that was 100% reliably possible with every retail beta previously. Nevermind that they shut the beta down very early, then re-open it for 3 days, whats that about? PR. If it was about re-testing fixed issues, they would've at least given some rough outline what areas might need testing, but instead they bumped max level and hoped for more PR hype.

All subbed players had the chance to get a beta invite and quite a few addon authors were in the bunch, I can understand that you feel you didn't get the specialised focus you felt due but I would rather they continue to retest and fix issues to ensure a stable launch.; If only the Retail team had the same sort of focus.
There feedback and action has far exceeded simple PR with thoughtful posts and responses to player raised issues; once again a lesson the Retail team should try to emulate.