What if Blizzard Re-released Wrath of the Lich King?

[Worgenmaniac]

Wrath is often regarded as the pinnacle of WoW, particularly on this forum. Is Wrath really as good as some of us like to remember. The release of Classic has forced some players to admit that original WoW certainly has its shortcomings. The reality is you can't relive Vanilla WoW. So one should assume that the same applies for Wrath. But is that really the case?

I remember the first months of Wrath of the Lich King in quite some detail, perhaps better than most. The question is how would it all playout if the game was released again today. Well let's examine some of the content firstly. Northrend had some of the best leveling ever in the game, but it didn't take that long. It might take the average player only a week nowadays to ding 80. While the leveling content is fun compared to Classic, it is quite short.

The max level content in early Wrath was as follows. The dungeons included Utgarde Keep, Azjol Nerub, The Nexus, Gundrak, The Violet Hold, Drak'tharon Keep, Ahn'kahet, Utgard Pinnacle, Halls of Stone, Halls of Lightning, and The Oculus. Some of these dungeons were very disliked by the community. Dungeons like Oculus, Nexus, Gundrak, and Violet Hold were often complained about on the forums. The dungeons were also quite easy compared to TBC dungeons. Just imagine how easy they would be if played through today. I do think that the Utgard dungeons were pretty exceptional, but overall alot of the dungeons were forgettable.

Now for the Raid content. There were two raids. Naxxramas and The Vault of Archavon. Naxxramas was a pushover. It was considered faceroll back in 3.0. It is comparable in difficulty to some Classic WoW raids. It was that easy. Not only that, but it was a replica of a raid from Classic WoW, only now tuned for 25 players instead of 40. The reception was pretty mixed back in 3.0. Then there is the Vault of Archavon, the raid in Lake Wintergrasp. It was essentially a 1 boss encounter that players could complete once their faction controlled the Lake Wintergrasp PvP zone. The fights were all quite short and straightforward. It took about 30 minutes to finish.

The PvP in Wrath is considered one of the high points. What was it really like though? The fastest way to get Blue PvP gear was to honor farm in Strand of the Ancients. SotA is a battleground that largely involves siege warfare. The reason it was so popular in WOTLK is because the games would end fast. Players would often avoid fights and instead focus on destorying walls with siege vehicles. You didn't actually need to fight other players, since the ultimate goal was to siege the walls of the defending team. The Lake Wintergrasp PvP zone was pretty similar. It involved a lot of siege vehicles. Some players were into that kind of thing. Arena was bursty. Players would often be 100-0'd by Retribution/DK combos. The Deathknight class was truly heroic, and quite overpowered in Arena. While there was variety of decent comps, a lot of specs were pretty unviable when compared to the power of an unholy DK.

As fun as the leveling in Northrend was, there really wasn't that much world content. Players rarely revisited some zones. Dalaran was the main hub. It was majestic, yet at the same time cramped.There was a lot of standing around in Dalaran, no different than what you see in Orgrimmar or Stormwind in Classic. Now I know that Wrath eventually added some pretty spectacular content (Ulduar), there was definitely some disappointing additions (ToC). The Icecrown Citadel patch was pretty well received, but there was very little added to Wrath after ICC. I can't imagine being stuck in ICC for 8 months would be that fun nowadays.

I had a lot of fun in Wrath, but I question whether that could ever be relived. Knowing what we now know.

[Edlarel]

It would likely be released as Wrath Classic, with the effective balance patch being the last before Cataclysm, but the release structure similar to live back in the day (same as Classic Vanilla is doing). So we'd open with Naxx, Obsidian Sanctum, and Eye. Later we'd open Ulduar, followed by Trial of the Crusader, Argent tournament, and Onyxia. Finally, Ice Crown and its associated dungeons.

I look most forward to tanking as an unholy DK in ICC again

[HCLM]

You seems to not understand what people liked in wotlk. It not classic where you could faceroll through raids, as people in wotlk already had all the tools necessary to prepare themselves to every encounter, and the raids were well balanced difficulty wise.

Lore and climat was superb to what you have now or had in classic.

PvP was unbalanced af but it was fun. Very high skill ceiling, esp when 2 mages had duel in arena

[Globi]

Lore and climat was superb to what you have now or had in classic.

Wut??? WOTLK is probably the worst xpac from the lore-side.

[HCLM]

Wut??? WOTLK is probably the worst xpac from the lore-side.

Nice bait /10chars

[Globi]

Yeah WOTLK is nice, a xpac who destroy everything happen during W3 about Arthas and making his history useless

[Vankrys]

You seems to not understand what people liked in wotlk. It not classic where you could faceroll through raids, as people in wotlk already had all the tools necessary to prepare themselves to every encounter, and the raids were well balanced difficulty wise.

Lore and climat was superb to what you have now or had in classic.

PvP was unbalanced af but it was fun. Very high skill ceiling, esp when 2 mages had duel in arena

Naxxaramas was ... balanced?

I was part of a very average guild and we cleaned it the second week. One week to level up and get some gear and one week to kills 14 bosses, yup, 14.
Trial of the Crusader was certainly the laziest, the poorest, the worst raid in warcraft history with 1 circular room for the first 4 bosses, plus a cave for the last.
Dungeon were even more faceroll than in MOP, completely forgettable.

Ulduar and ICC were very good, highly thematic, lore rich, beautiful and with great fight (except maybe the 1st in ulduar, don't like vehicule fight)
sartharion and hallion were nice

I did like wintergrasp and the vault boss, great catch up mechanic, especially for alt.

for me, WOLTK was hit and miss, with great high and great low, i prefered TBC. Even if TBC didn't have normal/hard mode raid mechanics. Every raid dungeon were enjoyable. From karazhan to sunwell.

I also enjoyed Legion more than Wrath.

[BarosanuNr1]

I would be just as excited as when it came out. Wrath was the only expansion in which I enjoyed all aspects of the game, all of my main's specs, maintained the highest number of (active) alts and had the least inactive time overall. When I got burned out I just ran around Northrend on a ground mount, enjoying the largest expansion continent ever. I still listen to the soundtrack on occasion. WotLK was quite literally a game that I could play forever.

[deenman]

the idea that wrath is a ''pinnacle'' is pure lunacy,tbc or mop is the best wow has ever been,wrath is literaly worse than bfa,less content,extreme easy content,extreme catchup,granted i LOVED wrath when it was live,but my subjective experience doesnt blind me from the facts

[Zantera]

From a PVE perspective, Ulduar was really good and that's about it. ICC was OK (though definitely not better than other end-xpacs raids like Siege or Sunwell or even Antorus or Hellfire IMO) Naxx was a farce, Trial was one of the worst raids added and the small dragon raids felt like a time waste. On the dungeon side we got the easiest set of 5-man dungeons we've ever had in any xpac, the main 'daily hub' of the xpac was Argent Tournament which was really boring and that about sums it up.

Wotlk had good points to it (PVP was good, though as a PVEer that means nothing to me really) and classes/specs were in a fairly good place, but the actual content was mostly too easy or too boring. I'd rather go back and play WoD because the dungeons and raids were better overall than WotLK. So nah, I'd rather stick with BFA.

[docterfreeze]

I would play it but i'm still confident that retail can be better.

[Greyvax]

Unless you can literally rewind time to 2008/9, it won't recapture the same feeling.

There would be some fun nostalgic moments, but the 2020 mentality in gaming, will just inhabit a 2009 body.

[mvaliz]

Some of these dungeons were very disliked by the community. Dungeons like Oculus, Nexus, Gundrak, and Violet Hold were often complained about on the forums.

Of that list, only the Oculus was complained about simply due to being forced into unfamiliar vehicle mechanics.

I honestly do not recal any major complaints about the other dungeons. Especially VH, since it was relatively easy to get a PUG for that one due to its location. Keep in mind, you're speaking of "released" - as LFD wasn't added in until the end of the expansion. So the wait-times between bosses and the wait times in the Bran escort weren't a thing because they were actually functional for leveling purposes. You couldn't burn waves down fast enough the first 1/3rd of the expansion time, and you were busy fighting trash while Bran slowly walked by - not burning them down instantly as you did in LFD.

[Nak88]

Of course, it was the pinnacle of WoW because the game's main story ended with the defeat of its biggest villain. Everything was good in WotLK, yes, even the dungeon finder. Amazing raids, very good PvP (a bit unbalanced though), wonderful new zone (Northrend) with well-structured leveling, the classes were improved and they have never ever been better than in WotLK. Damn, I can't remember anything negative about WotLK to be honest.

[Greyvax]

Unless you can literally rewind time to 2008/9, it won't recapture the same feeling.

There would be some fun nostalgic moments, but the 2020 mentality in gaming, will just inhabit a 2009 body.

[Kyphael]

I played it when it was current, so no desire to replay it. The only one I've yet to experience is Burning Crusade.

[McNeil]

WotLK felt like the most ''chill'' expansion (not because of its cold theme), but because you could play the game however you liked without having to do to much to catch up. All the rep grinds were completely optional with maybe the exception of the Sons of Hodir for the shoulder enchants. People used to do them for the mounts, pets and maybe even an epic they could use. Naxxramas was undertuned as the first big raid but it also made it easier for alts to run, and for the people wanting a challenge they could try achievements that were fresh when WotLK launched, like not dying a single time or completing the place in a certain amount of time.

The continent itself looked absolutely beautiful, especially for its time. The story was much better presented and they did a much better job with the world building then before. WotLK for most part is still in the same vein as TBC where you have a much better sense of progression when you get a better item. It wasn't up till Cataclysm that WoW started to go in a completely different direction for the worst, making the game feel a lot more streamlined.

[Khaza-R]

I predict the community would ruin it just like they ruined Classic.

[Onikaroshi]

It'd be nice if they released patches in stages instead of the final patch on launch. It's one of the biggest reasons Classic is a joke.

Eh, it wouldn't be as severe as Classic because they weren't redesigning classes and trees every other patch and there wasn't a huge itemization halfway through the expansion.

[agentsi]

Nice bait /10chars

He's right though.

Arthas was built up from WC3 all through WoW until wotlk. And after it was over... the story was dead. They should've ended WoW1 there and started later down a different path.

My personal opinion, we never should've been able to beat Arthas. He kicks our ass, then sends us off into the shadowlands or something and we have to fight our way back to our reality and face him again. I think they did this shit in reverse.