The myths about Classic that have fallen apart

[Crillam]

Almost none of what you wrote is correct, especially 2, 3, and 7.

Vanilla talents are much more fun and rewarding. But to say that they are better than retail is pure BS.

[Mashanerz]

2. Old talent trees are better than the current ones

This is something that was advertised not only with Classic in mind, but in general in any discussion about the talent system in the current game. These initial weeks of people having access to Classic has shown that not only are those old talents not interesting (the vast majority of them just being +1% dmg on ability), but they also allow no options to pick at all, because resetting them costs a fortune. Depending on the class, about 2-4 talents in the whole tree actually make a difference in your gameplay. The rest is filler that doesn't give any tangible power up.

This is 100% incorrect.

First it should be pointed out that a high cost to respecing in no way makes the talents better or worse, it just makes the choice carry more weight.

Speaking of carrying more weight, there are a lot more choices that carry more weight in classic. I've been playing rogue for since vanilla so lets look over some choices:

In PvE, you have 3 competitive specs with sealed fate daggers, combat daggers, and combat swords. These 3 specs are all going to provide high output in raids, but even beyond that you have real choices between how they can be played, do you get imp evis? 0, 2 or 3 points of ruthlessness? 0-3 points into Aggression? You can decide if a talent is worth it and how much worth you think it should have....in retail, I can choose between 1 of 3 options and a lot of times there isn't a choice. In classic the choices are hard because the points are limited to spread around, so it's not saying "You get this OR that" it's saying "you can have this and that, but you won't have enough for something else too" This makes it feel far more impactful and opens up more options as a result.

[Wingspan]

Thankfully, wow classic is from a better time in gaming when a game could be a game and your effort and skill determined how far you’d make it.

Unlike retail, wow classic isn’t designed to please shareholders

Vanilla was a perfect storm of right place, right time, and being easier than nearly anything else on the market at that time.

Many people make the argument that Corporate ownership has destroyed Retail and left it in a horrible state, which is true to some degree.

But about 14 years ago, you could easily have made the argument that Vanilla pandered to bad players and destroyed everything good about an MMO (this actually happened back then... just not on WoW forums). Vanilla was intentionally designed to be easier, so that they could make money from a wider audience, so yeah, the money was a factor then too.


Everything is just a matter of personal feelings and perspective.

[Firedemon]

Vanilla talents are much more fun and rewarding. But to say that they are better than retail is pure BS.

Eh. They feel more rewarding during leveling because you get a minor boost almost every level and a major spell every 15 levels or so.

Comparing them at level 60 vs retail doesn't make them stand out like that, especially the 5/5 extra hit, crit, dmg. Esentially retail just cut the flat % increases from them.

[Mrbleedinggums]

Funny, I just did what you asked, here is the result I got, at 15:00 :



There is also three "low" realms on top (we can see pieces of the third one on the fringe). Just to be complete.
Seems you just purposely waited for the middle of the night to make your screenshot, just so you could pretend the realms are empty. What a surprise, another example of dishonesty by anti-Classic trolls. That's just happen so rarely

Too bad the mod don't do anything against this trolling, allowing people like you to just shitpost without end.

Just because a bus is full doesn't mean it's more populated than an international airplane at half capacity.

Classic servers have a much lower population limit because the end game for that is that there is to be NO SHARDING.

That means if you have 10,000 people limit on that server then eventually you'll have a maximum of 10,000 people sharing the same "instance" of the world.

Compare that to Retail where a server could have, say, a limit of 30,000 people. You can fit all those 30,000 people on there because there are multiple shards both amongst the server as a whole and between players depending on their quests. (ie: if you finish a certain quest they can change the zone to show that) It helps stabilize the servers and doesn't make killing mobs or farming materials a pain in the ass to impossible as it is in classic. (Not to mention quests are actually decent in retail instead of the shit-filled pinata they are in Classic)

[justandulas]

Vanilla was a perfect storm of right place, right time, and being easier than nearly anything else on the market at that time.

Many people make the argument that Corporate ownership has destroyed Retail and left it in a horrible state, which is true to some degree.

But about 14 years ago, you could easily have made the argument that Vanilla pandered to bad players and destroyed everything good about an MMO (this actually happened back then... just not on WoW forums).

Everything is just a matter of personal feelings and perspective.

I was there I remember. I remember my EQ guild kinda dismissing wow as a threat until it was too late. So many hard feelings could’ve been avoided.

That said, it still holds up 15 years later and will hold up 50 years later.

It’s from that last generation of gaming when it was truly for gamers by gamers and not a corporate overlord worried more about shareholder performance than gamer satisfaction

- - - Updated - - -

Just because a bus is full doesn't mean it's more populated than an international airplane at half capacity.

Classic servers have a much lower population limit because the end game for that is that there is to be NO SHARDING.

That means if you have 10,000 people limit on that server then eventually you'll have a maximum of 10,000 people sharing the same "instance" of the world.

Compare that to Retail where a server could have, say, a limit of 30,000 people. You can fit all those 30,000 people on there because there are multiple shards both amongst the server as a whole and between players depending on their quests. (ie: if you finish a certain quest they can change the zone to show that) It helps stabilize the servers and doesn't make killing mobs or farming materials a pain in the ass to impossible as it is in classic. (Not to mention quests are actually decent in retail instead of the shit-filled pinata they are in Classic)

Can you share with all of us, what you are smoking plz?

There are more people in queue for Herod than have been on my 3 retail servers COMBINED this expansion

[Akka]

It's true that retail has a seasonal character, but is that necessarily such a bad thing?

It makes the game seasonal e-sport instead of progression-based.
If you like e-sport action game, then no it's not a bad thing.
If you like RPG progression, then yeah it is.

WoW was released as MMORPG. So I'd say it should tend toward the RPG progression aspect instead of the e-sport action game aspect.

[aevitas]

I can't help but think of how much someone's life must suck to not be able to accept other people may like different things.

Is classic a success? Hell yes.
Is classic fun to play? HELL yes.
Do I like classic more than retail? HELL YES.
Do I think classic is the second coming of jesus christ and will I mock anyone that plays retail and doesn't like it? No, because different people like different things. These fucking pointless discussions should be banned already...


Edit: I guess this is what happens when you grow up. Both the classic and retail warriors need to drop it and just enjoy THEIR version of the game. But whatever, people gotta fight for some pixels it seems.

[Matt0193]

5. It's not an issue. Maybe for people who did nothing but dungeon spam to race to 60, but I've never seen any groups on my server, 40+ or not, that are requiring certain comps for dungeons. I've also never seen a group reserving items. Sounds like a bunch of made up bullshit to me

I disagree with most of the OPs points but this one I fully agree with. On Mograine it got so bad trying to find a group for Armory on my Warrior that I ended up just questing just to get to 38. Hadnt had a ravager drop f4om the three runs id somehow got into and then half the group's were reserving it and anyone that wasn't reserving it made it mandatory to have.

And every minute there's ZF zombie grind groups looking and brd aoe farms recruiting. And would you look at that, people are reserving HoJ/Ironfoe, since you can guarantee they're putting ML on to get their HoJ and when they see that other bad boy they're taking it as well.

Even have groups for rfk asking specifically for non axe users so Corpsemaker is reserved on Horde.

This was never as prevalent in Vanilla. Reserving items was, but very, very few people ran cleaves exclusively.

[Wingspan]

I was there I remember. I remember my EQ guild kinda dismissing wow as a threat until it was too late. So many hard feelings could’ve been avoided.

That said, it still holds up 15 years later and will hold up 50 years later.

It’s from that last generation of gaming when it was truly for gamers by gamers and not a corporate overlord worried more about shareholder performance than gamer satisfaction

I added a line after you quoted me but Ill throw it in (and expand on it) here.

Vanilla design was absolutely driven by the money... the relative ease of the game (and the enormous amount of solo material) was specifically to allow more people to play. Nothing has changed in this regard.

The corporate structure has changed and the level of psychology used is game design has evolved (mostly not in a good way)... but it was always about the money.

[Jeina]

You can see the evidence yourself. Just open the realm selection for wow classic. Here's a snapshot for you just in case that seems too hard to do.
https://i.imgur.com/AraYm0F.png

An out-of-context screen shot followed by an insult. No wonder no one takes you seriously. Next time post one during prime time.

Blizzard increased realm pop cap, added new realms, and handed out free transfers. In the evenings, the US server list still shows most realms to be High or Full. And that's even after they changed it so it wasn't relative to other realms. A handful of people have quit, but "most"? Hardly.

[Akka]

Just because a bus is full doesn't mean it's more populated than an international airplane at half capacity.

Classic servers have a much lower population limit because the end game for that is that there is to be NO SHARDING.

Problem is, that's the opposite. Retail realms have no layer, and actually are often in server groups, so actually they are SMALLER than Classic realms. Sharding is common to multiple servers, in fact it even reach through region (I had Russian people sharing the same shard than me during Legion), while a single Classic server has multiple layers.

In fact, after posting this image I made a test, and edited the post :

By comparison, I just logged my retail character. On her group of servers (that's 4 servers added together), there is a grand total of 12 characters in Nazjatar, and 14 in Boralus Harbor. Both added together can't even reach the amount of lvl 3 characters in the single server I'm playing on Classic.

[Self Inflicted Wounds]

Yay, a blog post full of opinions. Good format I guess?

[DeuZWw]

i can almost see what you are trying to write.

however, 6 and 7 are just wrong.

7. because no one ever said that, ever.

6. Class quests were awesome back then, class quests were so well accepted that it was one of the big Pros of Legion. Everyone loved it, and i see everyone missing the specific class history from legion in BfA.

[justandulas]

I added a line after you quoted me but Ill throw it in (and expand on it) here.

Vanilla design was absolutely driven by the money... the relative ease of the game (and the enormous amount of solo material) was specifically to allow more people to play. Nothing has changed in this regard.

The corporate structure has changed and the level of psychology used is game design has evolved (mostly not in a good way)... but it was always about the money.

Did they want a profit? Of course but the game was made for gamers by gamers at a time when the only other mmorpgs were full time jobs with overtime to be successful.

Classic wow holds up because every inch of the game was made for gamers and by gamers and without thought of milking the customer.

Compared to retail where shareholders clearly have the sway to force design and shop changes and it isn’t comparable

They honestly aren’t even the same game and barely the same genre. Ones a traditional old school mmorpg and the other (retail) has become an mmo arpg Lobby game. One patch from being a mobile title

[kamuimac]

My war is level 52 now and i made more friends leveling up then i did entire bfa expansion. I also feel a much deeper connection to my classic char then my bfa one i havent logged into bfa in weeks honestly. Classic is everything i expected it to be.

its not blizzard fualt that some people are socialy chalenged to the point when the game literaly has to force others to speak to them .

also you seem to mistake aquitances with friends -_- huuuuge mistake to make irl -_-

whenever i hear edgy statments like yours i think about those after dramas where girl talks to someone once and then he starts to stalk her because she was the only one ever to show him minor interest -_-

but i bet your situation is different and those people who grouped up with you to kill boars faster are your BFF now

[A Chozo]

Nice post, OP. Agree with all your points.

I hope you have flame-proof shields ready.

[justandulas]

Problem is, that's the opposite. Retail realms have no layer, and actually are often in server groups, so actually they are SMALLER than Classic realms. Sharding is common to multiple servers, in fact it even reach through region (I had Russian people sharing the same shard than me during Legion), while a single Classic server has multiple layers.

In fact, after posting this image I made a test, and edited the post :

By comparison, I just logged my retail character. On her group of servers (that's 4 servers added together), there is a grand total of 12 characters in Nazjatar, and 14 in Boralus Harbor. Both added together can't even reach the amount of lvl 3 characters in the single server I'm playing on Classic.

Agreed. How anyone can think otherwise is beyond me.

There will be more people in queue on Herod today for me than total player counts on my 3 retail realms combined. You could even combine them and multiply by a factor of 10 and herod still has more people in queue than exist total players on my retail realms

[Darkguyver2020]

Its about time the mods actually moderate these boards and starts deleting blogs and threads trying to stir up shit.

Its been a total shit show for a long time.

The Classic Zealots brought it upon themselves. They've been bleating non-stop about how much better Vanilla was while simultaneously taking shits on Retail ever since Nostalrius was shut down.
Well, it's payback time, bitches! Not our fault you Classic Sheeple don't like the taste of your own medicine!

I love seeing these comments. because the same people who make these alot of the time are people who do nothing but talk shit about live... then people say this, and they get made fun of...

I know right. These Classic fanboys are a wealth of contradictions and double standards.

Also, you should look up the definition of 'opinion', and not consider your subjective views on the subject as 'fact' or 'correct'.

Oh the irony.

[justandulas]

The Classic Zealots brought it upon themselves. They've been bleating non-stop about how much better Vanilla was while simultaneously taking shits on Retail ever since Nostalrius was shut down.
Well, it's payback time, bitches! Not our fault you Classic Sheeple don't like the taste of your own medicine!

What’s there to insult? Classic is more successful than even the biggest fans like me anticipated.

My server will have more in queue tonight than have played on my retail servers combined over the last decade.

While you are sitting here insecure about bfa and mindlessly trolling classic fans; we’ll be having the time of our gaming lives living this moment up in classic

But yea you keep on trolling and pretending classic isn’t the biggest wow product in well over 10+ years