How will the modern min/max mentality change BC?

[Tart]

Absolutely and that is absolutely why I won't play it. I was tremendously niave to believe classic would be like vanilla days. Far to many people have rehearsed it on private servers and just killed it with elitism for me. Each to their own but it's not for me.

I thought classic would have rekindled my love for wow but after a couple of cameos I really think warcraft is a chapter that's closed for good.

[Akka]

Back in Wrath there was a guild on Forgotten Coast that raided in blues for the challenge. I don't remember how far they got but to my knowledge they killed at least one boss in ICC. I wonder how far you could get in Classic or TBC.

They were "Undergeared".

As for me, how BC Classic will turn out will depend on two things :

1) Will we get the un-nerfed but fixed 2.1 content or the 2.4.3 destroyed one ?

2) Will Blizzard actually do something to prevent abuse (like perma-drums or rotating heroism) ? Or will it be like Classic with the world buffs allowed to destroy the whole game unchecked ?

BC was my favourite expansion, but that's because of the early design, not the late one. I'm not interested in getting a WotLK-like full of abuses.

[Dzonathan]

Same way they dealt with it back then.

Oh? You're a non-orc hunter without LW who wants to down Brutallus? Too bad...

[chrisnumbers]

They were "Undergeared".

As for me, how BC Classic will turn out will depend on two things :

1) Will we get the un-nerfed but fixed 2.1 content or the 2.4.3 destroyed one ?

2) Will Blizzard actually do something to prevent abuse (like perma-drums or rotating heroism) ? Or will it be like Classic with the world buffs allowed to destroy the whole game unchecked ?

BC was my favourite expansion, but that's because of the early design, not the late one. I'm not interested in getting a WotLK-like full of abuses.

Yep that was them. I never made it to actually raid with them, they stopped before I got to 80. It's weird seeing my posts from 11 years ago, and I don't even remember Kripparrian posting there which is also really strange to see. I don't think he was even streaming yet.

[Millyraynge]

Are we gonna have paladins standing outside Karazhan to buff people on the way in? Or a ton of warlocks and shamans? Everyone is a leatherworker for drums?

And Sunwell will be cleared 60 minutes after release / gating removed, right?

theorycrafting was on a whole other dimension during bc compared to vanilla. In Vanilla back in the days we never had propper theorycrafting. The riddle about the attack table got solved the very first time just a couple weeks before BC release due to updated combat log and enhanced addon functionality in 2.0 pre patch. With that being said bc was the prime of theorycrafting #elitistjerks. Sunwell forced guilds to class stack an min-max the manure out of the game.

[Echocho]

It'll ruin it, just like it ruined Classic, just like it ruins a lot of games.
You're no longer allowed to play for fun, you have to play to be the best.

[Creedo]

I started playing a TBC private server earlier this year (not the known one, but a small one). It is very chill and laid back without the massive "min/max" community, so it has been a blast (especially bringing back good memories). Just like like I remembered it too! Things that I noticed were that people still will try for the LW/Skin combo for Drums, Karazhan is super easy, Gruuls is super easy, Mags is decently easy (will challenge some PUGs), and difficulty starts at SSC. SSC isn't that hard at all, but expect all the end bosses like Vashj, Kael, Archimonde, and Illidan to be punishing to players that don't do mechanics. It is not mythic hard, but it will hurt PUGs and people who don't listen. That is how it was when I played in 2007/2008. Definitely easy to clear, but if you don't read/listen you'll pay for it. Sunwell is still challenging, but not a mythic quality challenge. All in all, it is definitely fun and still grinding aspects like Vanilla with Aldor/Scyer and professions. More casual friendl with Dailies to help with gold as well.

[Selvari7]

Realizing that most likely the game will launch with 2.4.3, and taking what happened in Vanilla as a reference, guilds will be thinking of speed runs. My gut feeling is the actual hurdle will be having a raiding guild as you transition from 40 man to 25 man. After that, will people move into the 'top dog' specs more? How many will re roll Horde Pala to DPS/Tank? Shaman to go ele or boomi? 2.4.3 Fire Mages can pump and Disco (PI) will be a thing.

As for drums, most likely will still be as huge as it was back in the day -didn't you need just 1 person per group?

Why would guilds be bringing mages over warlocks/hunters for ranged?

In KJ 1st kill where they were minmaxing with drums etc- 4 warlocks, 1 mage.
World 2nd was 5 warlocks.
World 3rd was 4 warlocks 1 mage.

[Cempa]

Why would guilds be bringing mages over warlocks/hunters for ranged?

In KJ 1st kill where they were minmaxing with drums etc- 4 warlocks, 1 mage.
World 2nd was 5 warlocks.
World 3rd was 4 warlocks 1 mage.

Because if you are able to sustain the most ideal raid setup for said encounter than you are in a really good place .. Practically, many guilds will always struggle with attendance and don't always have the raid pool ..

[T-34]

It'll ruin it, just like it ruined Classic, just like it ruins a lot of games.
You're no longer allowed to play for fun, you have to play to be the best.

What stops you from finding other people that "play for fun" and just play with them?
Or aren't you allowed to do that?

[Selvari7]

Because if you are able to sustain the most ideal raid setup for said encounter than you are in a really good place .. Practically, many guilds will always struggle with attendance and don't always have the raid pool ..

It makes me wonder though for Sunwell progression the guilds are going to need high level play and dps. Can't be sure if the majority of these guild leaders are going to want to stack certain classes as per the Meta. If anything the less skilled guilds might have more incentive for class stacking.

[Outofmana]

Actually kinda scared what kind of a lame thing people will find out in TBC, like a quest at ~65 or w/e that gives a 1h 30% DPS boost or something and then people having to level lvl 65s. Something like that.

[Synical123]

If that is the case the game will be very different, itemization wise/pre raid BiS .. Guess will find out soon enough.

This is 100% the case, not saying they won’t start with 2.4.3, but if they are being honest with the data they have, 1.12 for classic was basically a requirement, they had no other option.

For tbc, again if they truly just had data from 1.12+, then they theoretically could go patch to patch 2.0-2.4.3.

Not saying they will or won’t, I personally believe they should, but at the very least it’s a possibility.

[tikcol]

it's going to change tbc as much as it did classic

[Synical123]

Actually kinda scared what kind of a lame thing people will find out in TBC, like a quest at ~65 or w/e that gives a 1h 30% DPS boost or something and then people having to level lvl 65s. Something like that.

There really isn’t any of this in tbc, they basically removed all world buffs and consolidated most pots and stuff to either battle/guardian elixers or both. The only REALLY sweaty thing that people will do is trade off professions nonstop.

What I mean by this is that while they raid, if you want to be super hardcore, everyone in the raid DURING the raid should be a leatherworker for drums. So people may get their BiS for the time, level JC or whatever they want, get the benefits of making/enchanting that great piece of gear, drop that profession, and then go back to LW for drums.

I don’t see very many people doing this because obviously dropping professions like this all the time is obviously insane, but then again classic surprised the hell out of me for what people are willing to do to get that extra 5%

[Speedlance]

Problem is the fame associated with doing something first. This removes any nostalgic reason for playing it and turns it into a meaningless race.
This ruins the whole point.

[T-34]

Problem is the fame associated with doing something first. This removes any nostalgic reason for playing it and turns it into a meaningless race.
This ruins the whole point.

Are you implying that you are the only one with a "nostalgic reason for playing it" and all others will turn it in to "a meaningless race"?
Don't you think that there might be enough people like yourself to make your own group where you can play it exactly how you want to play it?

[Selvari7]

There really isn’t any of this in tbc, they basically removed all world buffs and consolidated most pots and stuff to either battle/guardian elixers or both. The only REALLY sweaty thing that people will do is trade off professions nonstop.

What I mean by this is that while they raid, if you want to be super hardcore, everyone in the raid DURING the raid should be a leatherworker for drums. So people may get their BiS for the time, level JC or whatever they want, get the benefits of making/enchanting that great piece of gear, drop that profession, and then go back to LW for drums.

I don’t see very many people doing this because obviously dropping professions like this all the time is obviously insane, but then again classic surprised the hell out of me for what people are willing to do to get that extra 5%

There was already a fair bit of min maxing for sunwell and Muuru. Likely way more than had ever been seen in Vanilla. It makes me wonder how much more will be done in classic because a lot of it was already done and the content was still very difficult. It's not like these guilds weren't rocking warglaives etc either from BC. Unless in classic they start doing alt runs etc for BC/Hyjal to ensure everyone really has BIS in each slot..

[Dhrizzle]

there wasn't much min/max when I first got my priest to 60, I farmed dungeons until I had full devout (getting groups to stop at the egg boss in ubrs was annoying because most ppl just skipped it still took me 30+ runs to get devout shoulders), most ppl went for their dungeon set and replaced that with t1 or zg gear.

You think persuading people to do Father Flame was hard? Try persuading a PuG to do Jandice for the shoulders when you're a warlock. Most groups I was part of back in the day would go for the boss if a Priest needed shoulders because they respected healers but no-one cares about a half-arsed DPS who either runs out of mana and stresses the healer or pulls aggro and dies. Especially not when you have to fight through a horde of skeletons that are immune to magic so the warlock can't even help out with them.

- - - Updated - - -

Min-maxing took off in a big way in TBC anyway. It's when 0-21-40 Warlocks (themselves a spec that min-maxed all the fun out of the class) and Shadow Priests were the order of the day to keep everyone passively healed and filled with mana, backed up with just the right number of Shaman for some nice Heroism action.

[BetrayedOf52]

if you're a mage get ready to buy 10000 mana pots.