Its official -- Sunwell Plateau is the real deal.

[Clawsout]

I've had very bad luck then... even solo farmed it for ages. I'm suspicious of wowhead's 15% droprate figure.

On current content its 15% it generally drops to 1% after the content is deemed old

[cparle87]

attunements were gone by swp if im remembering right,also in the swp patch some really insane bt/hyjal level gear was added for badges

You are correct. Checking wowpedia just now the Hyjal/BT attunement requirements were removed in 2.4.

[hulkgor]

They did, you really, really underestimate how the brain works. My dad, as an example, listened to like 10-20 bands in the 70s and 80s, when he studied etc and had the best time of his life. Now, nearly 40 years later, he STILL listen to the same music over and over and over, and nostalgia is the main reason. And my dad is not alone in this.

That is not nostalgia, at all. That's just liking that music.

I listen to the same playlist for the past fifteen years, usually adding a song here and there, but most of it being the original ones.

[Sicknex]

SWP is harder than most of wrath. Muru is harder than most bosses and it's not close. There are some hard ones like mimiron pre nerf, yogg0, LK hc that might be on par or harder. But overall, SWP is the hardest raid until t11.

[h4rr0d]

I've had very bad luck then... even solo farmed it for ages. I'm suspicious of wowhead's 15% droprate figure.

I think it was about the same the first time round. But even with 15% you might see it either in long time or even not at all. Point in case: I have 21 Kel’Thuzad kills on my DK I played in WOTLK and have only ever seen Betrayer of Humanity drop once (and that was long after it was even remotely relevant). It also might have even been on a different character. According to Wowhead, it’s drop rate is either 13.8% (value in tooltip) or 22% (value in KT drop rates) - the highest out of all non-tier items.

[deenman]

You clearly don´t have a clue about what you are saying.

Classic is simply superior due to one simple fact: it is the original, real WoW.

Retail has a lot of extra crap, indeed, but most of it is completely irrelevant and unnecesary.

unnecesary to what?those are the most popular activities,people in the world are always farming them 24/7,also saying something is superior because its original is nonsensical,one could argue that those things are the most relevant as they never lose their worth like ilvl does

[Battlebeard]

That is not nostalgia, at all. That's just liking that music.

I listen to the same playlist for the past fifteen years, usually adding a song here and there, but most of it being the original ones.

But, objectively, Classic is garbage. No matter how fun people think it is, it lacks so much that later expansion have that this hasn't, objectively it's worse.

[hulkgor]

But, objectively, Classic is garbage. No matter how fun people think it is, it lacks so much that later expansion have that this hasn't, objectively it's worse.

You should check what "objectively" means so you don't make a fool out of yourself :P

[Battlebeard]

You should check what "objectively" means so you don't make a fool out of yourself :P

It means that some things are undisputed one way. Objectively, Nadal is one of the best tennis players, no matter if you like him.

Objectively, Classic lacks a lot of good things, like class balance, it has few BGs and no RBG, it lacks difficulty options for the raids, it lacks a collection tab, making mounts/pets take space etc. These are things that ARE better in retail, objectively, no matter what you say. A game with 10 different BGs IS better than a game with 4 BGs. More bag space IS better etc. Many, many examples like this.

[Sicknex]

It means that some things are undisputed one way. Objectively, Nadal is one of the best tennis players, no matter if you like him.

Objectively, Classic lacks a lot of good things, like class balance, it has few BGs and no RBG, it lacks difficulty options for the raids, it lacks a collection tab, making mounts/pets take space etc. These are things that ARE better in retail, objectively, no matter what you say. A game with 10 different BGs IS better than a game with 4 BGs. More bag space IS better etc. Many, many examples like this.

Class balance in tbc and wrath is better than retail. Especially tbc. Some specs do high dps, some specs have great utility. There are only a few specs that are trash. Meanwhile in retail, m+ is almost unplayable if you are playing the wrong spec with bad cleave/aoe. Playing feral in early BFA was a horrible experience.
Multiple difficulties for raids is a bad thing and results in us having 4x versions of the same item. Loot in retail is incredibly boring compared to classic. I checked warcraftlogs right before SWP was released, tbc had 20 mil parses across 2 weeks, retail had 5 mil. And that is not even counting the fact that people do all raids in tbc still, even in the last patch. People prefer classic raiding, even with simple mechanics and simple classes. It's just a fact.

I can agree that retail has some good QOL changes, but that does not matter if the game is bad. Same with bg's, who cares if you even have 100 different BG's, if the game is boring to play, it does not matter.

[Mr. Smith]

A game with 10 different BGs IS better than a game with 4 BGs.

This is not an objective statement. "A game with 10 different BGs has more BGs than a game with 4 BGs" is an objective, factual statement, what you're saying here is subjective. Saying that the game with more BGs is better just because it has more BGs is ignoring things like:

- Does the game with more BGs have identical gameplay and mechanics as the one with fewer? In my case, I'd rather play a game that's more fun with fewer maps than one that's less fun but has more.
- Are the extra BGs fun? If there's 6 extra BGs, and they're all of the same quality as Isle of Conquest, then I'm just gonna stick to the same 4 that the other game has.
- How balanced is the game with 10 BGs? I wouldn't be having fun if that game has some class/character that can just fly around and one-shot people.

None of this represents my actual opinions on Classic/Retail, I'm just clearing up the usage of the word "objective".

[Northern Goblin]

Strong disagree about TBC class balance being good. It's great if you're one of a handful of specs that sit at the top, it's pretty crappy for many others.

And some of us are still playing with half a toolkit. Wrath is significantly better at achieving balance (yes I know day 1 DKs existed, but look at their final state)

[Kralljin]

And some of us are still playing with half a toolkit. Wrath is significantly better at achieving balance (yes I know day 1 DKs existed, but look at their final state)

I think that's a purely numerical view of things.
Thing is, hardly any spec in TBC is useless because almost any spec bring some sort of solid raid support buff / debuff.

Whereas with Wotlk, all that matters is the number that your spec pulls, at least in 25man, because the huge amount of slots enables you to pretty much cover any buff / debuff without having to worry too much about the setup.

While i'd say that the class balance is overall better in Wotlk, there are some specs that certainly fell through the cracks and it took Blizzard multiple expansions to solve it because they just didn't give enough of a shit about it.
As Ele, Wotlk has been this infamous moment where it went from a pretty useful specs to "Why don't you just play Mage / Warlock?"-spec, because it frankly got shafted hard in Wotlk.

[Celarent]

Strong disagree about TBC class balance being good. It's great if you're one of a handful of specs that sit at the top, it's pretty crappy for many others.

And some of us are still playing with half a toolkit. Wrath is significantly better at achieving balance (yes I know day 1 DKs existed, but look at their final state)

Classic has been extremely helpful for reliving the legendary expansion because, wow, it' seems it succeeded in 2007 only because the vast majority of players were new to MMOs and had no set expectations.

Increased difficulty with poor balance and as you note, disparate toolkits creates a state of play where basic advancement can sometimes be impossible -- especially buried under attunements with minimum class requirements. Today's meta awareness heightens this, obviously, but I've never seen an expansion so vulnerable to behavior that discourages participation. Actually a testament to Blizzard's efforts from Wrath onward.

[Kralljin]

Classic has been extremely helpful for reliving the legendary expansion because, wow, it' seems it succeeded in 2007 only because the vast majority of players were new to MMOs and had no set expectations.

Bit of a historical revitionism, MMO's predating WoW were arguably even worse.

WoW has became such a success because it was far more accessible than previous titles, WoW could just be picked off from the getgo and played, no need to look up any guides (in an age where Internet research wasn't exactly common), nevermind that in WoW you merely lost time when you died, rather than XP or even gear.

You're looking at Vanilla with 2022 goggles, not 2004 / 2005 goggles and then in particular just the endgame of WoW, which wasn't the focus of the game until later.

[Celarent]

Bit of a historical revitionism, MMO's predating WoW were arguably even worse.

And which of those hit 10 million subs?

TBC is showing its age for activity that's more than basic casual play or extremely slow progression, is all. I still had fun and I'm still enjoying leveling another character through it. You don't have to go to the mat on this one.

[Kralljin]

And which of those hit 10 million subs?

None but i don't see the point you're making here.
I don't think that WoW's success is down to people's lack of experience with MMO's, because if they had it, then WoW would have still been the most accessible one.

[Celarent]

None but i don't see the point you're making here.

Point is this: accessibility was a huge factor in WoW's success. That accessibility was very imperfect, especially TBC, but originally, benefited greatly from the limit in scope and expectations of most players. With today's stricter and conventionalized player expectations, TBC is very "Play X or die," and to that degree has not really stood the test of time.

I dunno, I'm probably too poetic. Northern Goblin put it succinctly.

[Kralljin]

Point is this: accessibility was a huge factor in WoW's success. That accessibility was very imperfect, especially TBC, but originally, benefited greatly from the limit in scope and expectations of most players. With today's stricter and conventionalized player expectations

I don't disagree entirely but will also point out that part of WoW's appeal that it retained the social fabric of early MMO's, which is also often citied for its success.
That's a big counterpoint as back then the concept of being able to play online with tons of players had a much bigger novelty and was one of the key aspects of MMO's.
Encouraging social interaction does not mesh well favoring accessability over everything, yet i would say that WoW back then found a balance that worked for its time.

For example, Blizzard early on tried to an early version of the Dungeonfinder in TBC with semi automated grouping, that thing was almost universally rejected because people didn't want that.
Blizzard even went as far as to remove the /lfg chat in early to TBC so people start using their tool, which players rejected and basically used every other chat available for LFG.
Blizzard then had to begrundgingly add the /lfg back and then said tool (the same one we have in TBC) vanished into obscurity until it was replaced by the Dungeonfinder tool in 3.3.

I think if you had an MMO in 2005 (build with the tech of that time no less) that basically disguised itself as a single player game (*ahem* FF14), then whole thing wouldn't have seen nearly as much success, because single player games weren't a new thing, whereas an accessible multiplayer online game that still has social elements was.

Nevermind that players back then valued also certain things a lot differentely, the way i see it is that players back then cared a lot more about the concept of the "living world" a lot more than they do now.
Whereas previously something such as the leveling boost would have been met with massive backlash by the community, it was now welcomed by many, the concept of being "proud" of having a capped character is something that was very much there back then but not so much today.
Same goes with RMT, back then barely anyone would have admitted to buy gold, now you can find those players in any GDKP, where other players also gladly join in.

TBC is very "Play X or die," and to that degree has not really stood the test of time.

I think you have to separate design intent from the actual state.

First off, you can play almost any class / spec in TBC and still be useful, you're not going to be #1 dps with all of them, but it's not like anyone will turn down an SP because of their low dps.
It's not like Classic where your class basically determines your role and some classes are just straight useless.

Second, the issue is simply that class balance wasn't refined as then, that's just how it was, i would've loved to see Blizzard make actual balance changes in TBC, but seemingly putting a single designer onto the Classic team that brings some minor class changes with each phase is something their budget can't handle.

[Vaerys]

Second, the issue is simply that class balance wasn't refined as then, that's just how it was, i would've loved to see Blizzard make actual balance changes in TBC, but seemingly putting a single designer onto the Classic team that brings some minor class changes with each phase is something their budget can't handle.

This is not about budget. That is not what Classic WoW is supposed to be, in principle. I oppose this type of rebalancing in Classic WoW altogether.

I would rather have some specs be useless than have my expectations subverted and have to rediscover the game every patch.