Do you think Wrath Classic will be the last Classic expansion release?

[ercarp]

I think a lot of people see Vanilla, TBC, and Wrath as this "holy trinity" of great expansions. Sure, in hindsight you could say that Wrath introduced a lot of features that would end up making the game worse over the years, but at the time it was the best of the best and when Blizzard's subscriber numbers peaked the highest they ever would.

Cataclysm, on the other hand, ended up being kind of lackluster after the initial novelty of the new and ruined revamped world wore off so I think anyone looking for a Cata Classic has to be in the minority.

However, this is where it gets potentially complicated. MoP was way more popular than Cata and that's something more and more people come to realize as time goes by, even if they didn't like it that much at the time. The same goes for Legion actually, but Legion is preceded by WoD which I don't think most people want to re-experience.

The way I see it, the near future of Classic releases has the following possible outcomes:

1. They will stop at Wrath Classic, completing the "Classic Trilogy" of past expansions.

2. They will release Cata Classic and follow it up with MoP Classic (despite Cata not having as much hype behind it) in order to maintain the chronological order of releases.

3. They will skip Cata Classic and go straight to MoP Classic. (Potentially controversial for anyone who has a soft spot for Cata)

Now maybe I am wrong in this and people actually like Cata a lot, but I just don't hear a lot of people talking about it as much as they talk about MoP or Legion so forgive me if this comes off as super biased. That's not my intention here.

[Relapses]

I don't see any reason why they'd either stop at Wrath or skip Cataclysm.

[NineSpine]

Its really weird to me that how this whole thing was going to progress was obvious from Day One but people keep making up convoluted reasons why they would skip expansions or not move forward or whatever.

[kranur]

Either stop at Wrath or continue with all.
Makes no sense to skip ... if unsuccessful they can just release phases very fast.

[Kralljin]

Out of the presented options, it's going to be 2.)

1.) effectively means that a sizeable portion of their playerbase will be gone, people aren't going to replay Classic, TBC or Wotlk over and over again unless one makes at very least substantial changes.

3.) is silly because it simply doesn't make sense, Cata is the first dip, but it's not universally reviled.
Disregarding that, Cata only offers content at only lasts at best a full year - and that already assumes that one commits to farming DS for 4 months.

It's something that a lot of people forget, Cata simply doesn't offer enough content that you could stretch it to a similiar length as you could do it with Classic, TBC or Wotlk.
Nor does said content have the longevity, with "Play the Patch" coming into full effect, people aren't going to farm T11 once Firelands is out, nor Firelands with DS out.

If Cata Classic happens, it's going to be a ~9-10 months affair.
~3 Months for T11 + ZG/ZA Remakes
~3 Months for T12 (Firelands)
~3 Months for T13 (Dragon Soul)

And even there you can see that quite a lot of people will pace out after the first DS clear, because why bother farming this place for months when you throw that gear away within hours of MoP launch.
And by the way, a similiar thing will be true for MoP as well.

[InfernalDark]

How many poll threads we really need?

[Relapses]

How many poll threads we really need?

You should start a poll and find out. :^)

[RoKPaNda]

Given that every time someone in my guild talks about their favorite feature and asks when it came out and the answer is invariably Cata I'd say they would be pretty foolish to skip it.

[Romanthony]

I really hope it will be the last one, Id prefer them to stick to this "Triolgy" then doing a Cata classic, or a Shadowlands classic eventually...

[Stickiler]

I think a lot of people see Vanilla, TBC, and Wrath as this "holy trinity" of great expansions. Sure, in hindsight you could say that Wrath introduced a lot of features that would end up making the game worse over the years, but at the time it was the best of the best and when Blizzard's subscriber numbers peaked the highest they ever would.

Cataclysm, on the other hand, ended up being kind of lackluster after the initial novelty of the new and ruined revamped world wore off so I think anyone looking for a Cata Classic has to be in the minority.

However, this is where it gets potentially complicated. MoP was way more popular than Cata and that's something more and more people come to realize as time goes by, even if they didn't like it that much at the time. The same goes for Legion actually, but Legion is preceded by WoD which I don't think most people want to re-experience.

The way I see it, the near future of Classic releases has the following possible outcomes:

1. They will stop at Wrath Classic, completing the "Classic Trilogy" of past expansions.

2. They will release Cata Classic and follow it up with MoP Classic (despite Cata not having as much hype behind it) in order to maintain the chronological order of releases.

3. They will skip Cata Classic and go straight to MoP Classic. (Potentially controversial for anyone who has a soft spot for Cata)

Now maybe I am wrong in this and people actually like Cata a lot, but I just don't hear a lot of people talking about it as much as they talk about MoP or Legion so forgive me if this comes off as super biased. That's not my intention here.

The one possibility we can rule out immediately is 3, because the amount of work required to make the game functional while skipping an entire expansion would outweigh any possible upsides.

I'm partial to 2, because I like Cata.

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

I'm just interested what's going to happen, once again, to the Old World in Cata Classic. Because they will 100% chase the money and do a Classic for every single expansion.

Will they declare seasonal gameplay a failure and leave Classic/BC/Wrath to rot or will they do what they should do and start a new round of tri-expansion progression back in Classic Phase 1?

[Relapses]

I'm just interested what's going to happen, once again, to the Old World in Cata Classic. Because they will 100% chase the money and do a Classic for every single expansion.

Will they declare seasonal gameplay a failure and leave Classic/BC/Wrath to rot or will they do what they should do and start a new round of tri-expansion progression back in Classic Phase 1?

Difficult questions to answer though even SoM seems to have its own pretty dedicated fanbase. I'd say we're likely to get SoM versions of every expansion followed by a "base" progression server (ie, what TBC is now) which continues to mainline the old expansions chronologically.

[Meeks]

Hope so.....

[Lochton]

The box is opened with the first Classic release, there are fans for all expansions, so, I believe we'll see Classic continue forward as well.

[Fistfighter]

classic MoP is the only expansion I would want to play, so I hope they continue to that.

But when will they stop? Do they do WoD? Legion? BfA? surely not
but I would LOVE to replay WoD too, it had the best raid and some of my most favorite class design. But I can't imagine they will ever do WoD.

[ArenaDk]

Cata , Wod and Legion classic are hype as hell.

Mop and wrath are kinda meh, but will just not play them I guess

[shise]

Hope so.....

Why tho? If you want it to stop, you don´t play past Wrath classic. It then effectively becomes the last classic X pack
I´d love to get to MoP.

After MoP nothing is worth it tbh... Legion I liked but it´s too recent and modern.

[kranur]

I really hope it will be the last one, Id prefer them to stick to this "Triolgy" then doing a Cata classic, or a Shadowlands classic eventually...

What would be the issue if they do?
I personally won't play anything beyond wrath amd even that is dependable on how retail looks like, but if there are people who would re-play Cata, MoP etc., sure, why not .. let them have it.

[Nalam the Venom]

I was hoping they’d stop at clasdic.

Just have every one stuck in Naxx-limbo forever.

”New content” and ”Gear resets” have always been the worst part of WoW.

[ercarp]

Out of the presented options, it's going to be 2.)

1.) effectively means that a sizeable portion of their playerbase will be gone, people aren't going to replay Classic, TBC or Wotlk over and over again unless one makes at very least substantial changes.

3.) is silly because it simply doesn't make sense, Cata is the first dip, but it's not universally reviled.
Disregarding that, Cata only offers content at only lasts at best a full year - and that already assumes that one commits to farming DS for 4 months.

That sets an interesting precedent for the future though as that would mean they will have to release Classic WoD at some point. Although a part of me wonders where exactly the line between Classic and not-old-enough-to-deserve-a-Classic-release is. I would 100% want to see Classic Legion come out somewhere down the line as I had a blast playing that expansion, but I just don't see Blizzard wasting their time with a Classic WoD release that absolutely no one would play.

How many poll threads we really need?

I posted this before I noticed the other thread and it was stuck in mod review limbo so I couldn't delete it. But since the mods didn't delete it themselves, I assume they thought the thread was different enough to deserve a thread of its own.

- - - Updated - - -

But when will they stop? Do they do WoD? Legion? BfA? surely not
but I would LOVE to replay WoD too, it had the best raid and some of my most favorite class design. But I can't imagine they will ever do WoD.

That's what I'm most curious about. Where is the line between expansions that can be re-released in the Classic format, and ones that are much too recent? Are they going to stop at some arbitrary point or just keep releasing Classic expansions until the second latest expansion?

The latter of those two options isn't a terrible idea as it would ensure people would always be able to play whichever expansion they prefer. Although it does have the problem of splitting the community into even smaller pieces and thus making it harder for people to find players to play with across multiple Classic expansions.