Authors I have enjoyed enough to mention here: JRR Tolkein, Poul Anderson,Jack Vance, Gene Wolfe, Glen Cook, Brian Stableford, MAR Barker, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, WM Hodgson, Fredrick Brown, Robert SheckleyJohn Steakley, Joe Abercrombie, Robert Silverberg, the norse sagas, CJ Cherryh, PG Wodehouse, Clark Ashton Smith, Alastair Reynolds, Cordwainer Smith, LE Modesitt, L. Sprague de Camp & Fletcher Pratt, Stephen R Donaldon, and Jack L Chalker.
Jesus Christ...
As has been stated multiple times, they will see the player count splits internally as well as a THOUSAND other metrics measured by their analytics team -- average length of play session, login count breakdown by day/week/whatever, average engagement, etc.
Just play the game.
Just PLAY THE GAME.
JUST PLAY THE DAMN GAME.
Play it 200 hours a week, send an email to Blizzard every day saying how much you're enjoying it. Just leave us out of your bizarre vendetta towards Retail.
But just think how much better WoW would be if they had the OP decide where the money goes. They could have done so much with Classic, adding so much content and changing so many things... which is also what people are against... erm... Well, I'm sure it would be far better anyway.
I really don't get these types of threads. By the same logic, "retailers" should complain their money is being "wasted" on developing Classic and they want no part of it. Except it's Blizzard's money and they get to decide how to use it. You want to play Classic, do just that. If there's enough interest, Blizzard will know and act accordingly. What they don't care about is people like OP making dozens of pointless threads.
Well, many players didn't want this dug up coffin developed and didn't want Blizzard to divert any money to it that could have been spent on something useful.
So suck it up and just play with your damn classic.
Once upon a time... the end. Next time, try twice upon a time.
Imagine thinking retail is to "fast" does your brain have delay OP? Should prob get it checked out.
Where do you think the funds came from?
After the initial sub spike, it will settle down. I do believe that there will only be a small fraction of the player base who only sub for Classic and will not be playing BFA and beyond.
After the nostalgia wares off, and realisation that Classic is great for the memories and that's about it, bar a small sect of die hard players, its longevity is limited by restrictions, and you probably won't get many "new people" starting up, even BFA, you rarely come across a truly new person to the game.
Classic will not make ANY profits of its own. Classic is attached to World of Warcraft, essentially a free extra you get with your monthly sub, essentially similar to the PTR.
the 2 fallacies in your post are
1) thinking that revenue to blizzard is blizzard's money. it isn't, it is activision-blizzard's money and they can use it on whatever they want (mainly the vivendi buyback and king acquisition in the last several years).
2) if blizzard didn't have classic costing money, there is no evidence they would instead have that same money budgeted to another blizzard project. it isn't their money.
Authors I have enjoyed enough to mention here: JRR Tolkein, Poul Anderson,Jack Vance, Gene Wolfe, Glen Cook, Brian Stableford, MAR Barker, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, WM Hodgson, Fredrick Brown, Robert SheckleyJohn Steakley, Joe Abercrombie, Robert Silverberg, the norse sagas, CJ Cherryh, PG Wodehouse, Clark Ashton Smith, Alastair Reynolds, Cordwainer Smith, LE Modesitt, L. Sprague de Camp & Fletcher Pratt, Stephen R Donaldon, and Jack L Chalker.
Same way you support anything you care about. Spending time/ressources on it.
If you knew the candle was fire then the meal was cooked a long time ago.
Closing this as answered.
If you want to show your support for WoW Classic there will be no better way to do so than play it.
One other thing: If you want to answer another thread, the right thing to do is post in that thread instead of creating another. Mirror threads like this are nearly always closed.
"...money's most powerful ability is to allow bad people to continue doing bad things at the expense of those who don't have it."