After playing the game, do you agree with Blizzard's expected "steep drop-off"?

[Vorkreist]

the simple fact that the game has no continuation makes the drop off inevitable, i mean even the most dedicated classic lover will get his chars to the max, level his professions, get his gold, get his mounts, clear nax, have fun with his PvP etc

and after that what? will he keep doing Nax and pvp over and over? for how long? classic has no future, it's a dead end (just pls don't tell me they'll move to BC afterwards... BC has all the stuff classic players hate: flying to trivialize world content,arenas to trivialize WPvP/bgs etc) intended for people to have fun for as long as it lasts

A lot will switch to TBC and a lot will continue playing classic. This retail mentality that once there is no new content every month people quit has no basis in reality.
The private servers proved this with the tier raid patches releasing once a year and still have the same or growing number of players in between.
Not every player will raid Naxx. Not everyone will have guilds that do all the progress. Not everyone will be bothered to tryhard 24/7 to reach 60 in 2 month never mind first month, or do all the work to progress in a timely manner through all the raids. A lot will make alts and a massive number will play pvp especially once bgs come out. And that last part. A lot will still join classic along the way. People somehow imagine everyone who could possibly be interested in classic started playing at release. You could go even now on retail and find a lot of people just starting out a char after x y z nr of years off or straight up new players that start playing wow for the first time.

[Big Thanks]

It's the average of the people playing right now, and the population is still as "high", exactly like two weeks ago. So the "population fell off a cliff at lvl 30" hasn't happened.

Edit : actually, the population is now "full" on my realm, not "high". Meh, it's even increasing compared to last week. And that's with the server size expanding.
Nearly all EU realms are "full".
There is :
1 german and 3 english at "low"
1 russian and 2 english at "medium"
5 english, 1 german, 1 french, 1 russian at "high".
Everything else (3 russian, 3 french, 7 german and 13 english) is "full".

Damn dat population that fell off a cliff

I stand by my previous post : the game is actually holding much better than expected. There WILL be a drop-off, but not yet.
These forums are just a cesspool of unmoderated negativity and tons of posters that just have some weird hate-boner about Classic.

I confirm this.
Europe is nearly all full with 3 medium and 2 low. The rest are full.

Zones are full of people.

Dont understand why some prople are spreading rumors othewise.
Or maybe is different in America

[david0925]

I think my hunch is right. "Drop off" from retail or classic, is by people who don't have guilds and/or don't really care about Warcraft lore.

My guild still got AOTC the week Classic was out. All the rumors are drummed up. Retail isn't dead, classic isn't dropping. Both are transient with people constantly leaving and returning.
A 15 year old game and an iteration of a 15 year old game, that's what people are splitting hairs over, it doesn't make sense anymore. I like elements of both games, I play both. Classic's PVP and progression, retail's raiding and aesthetics. What is there to argue about?

well yeah, people defending classic are always just bashing retail and people defending retail are always just bashing classic. It's almost as if they don't consider the people who just leaves WoW, either cyclically or permanently. If they are actually passionate about the game, maybe don't antagonist the other side when you are both on literally the same sub.

[tyrlaan]

I confirm this.
Europe is nearly all full with 3 medium and 2 low. The rest are full.

Zones are full of people.

Dont understand why some prople are spreading rumors othewise.
Or maybe is different in America

I find people that hate retail like to spread nonsense like this as well. People just can't handle folks having fun a different way than they do and will go to pretty dumb lengths to try to control/manipulate others.

[Schmilblick]

It's the average of the people playing right now, and the population is still as "high", exactly like two weeks ago. So the "population fell off a cliff at lvl 30" hasn't happened.

Edit : actually, the population is now "full" on my realm, not "high". Meh, it's even increasing compared to last week. And that's with the server size expanding.
Nearly all EU realms are "full".
There is :
1 german and 3 english at "low"
1 russian and 2 english at "medium"
5 english, 1 german, 1 french, 1 russian at "high".
Everything else (3 russian, 3 french, 7 german and 13 english) is "full".

Damn dat population that fell off a cliff

You know blizzard can change servers capacity right ?

[Big Thanks]

You know blizzard can change servers capacity right ?

They already did.
Thats why queues are smaller. Yet people here claim is because people are leaving "already".

I mean...i agree the "deep drop-off" will happen...but not yet.
Let people's monthly sub expire at least.

[Akka]

You know blizzard can change servers capacity right ?

Must be why I wrote :

Edit : actually, the population is now "full" on my realm, not "high". Meh, it's even increasing compared to last week. And that's with the server size expanding.
Nearly all EU realms are "full".

Blizzard massively increased realm size thursday of the previous week. And when I say "massive", I mean "two to three full Vanilla server worth, per Classic server", because we went from 6500 people in queue with a "high" server to no queue at all with a "full" server (knowing that a full Vanilla server was 2500 to 3000 concurrent players, it means that our server got AT LEAST 7000 more concurrent players, so more than two full Vanilla servers).

[Eveningforest]

Or maybe is different in America

We have 2 at Full and most at High, some at Medium. This is noon CST mind you, so likely to match yours as prime time approaches. I actually logged out since it's two crowded for me. Will hop back on Monday morning.

[Adviceanon]

I'm of the belief the opposite is going to happen.
I think the player base over the next several months is going to increase, just like it did all those years ago.
If you account for an entire new generation of people playing video games + the returning boomers I can't forsee anything other than growth.
I don't know by how much, but video games are a much larger industry than when WoW came out. When I was a teenager I was an outcast for playing video games. Now it's wildly accepted amongst the current teenager generation.
Even if you account for the massive amount of different games out there, I still believe classic will rise to the top because of its insanely addictive nature. Blizzard is grooming an entire new gen of 30yr old stay at home virgins.

[Big Thanks]

We have 2 at Full and most at High, some at Medium. This is noon CST mind you, so likely to match yours as prime time approaches. I actually logged out since it's two crowded for me. Will hop back on Monday morning.

I realllllllly loved the zones i did with other people and grouped up with BUT sometimes i like to chillax and level solo.
For that to happen i needed to use my trump card of Desolace.

Its probably the worst zone of the entire game for Horde players...you have no idea.

Is it crazy to believe im ahead of the curve for most people....at level 34?
I know its crazy but i swear the zones i go to now are not as filled as the lower level zones.

Im on Dustwallow Marsh now.
I see like 10 people there, which is "low" for the previous "chaos" i faced in other zones.

[MoanaLisa]

No they won't

The people who are gonna no life the shit out of ranks are already doing it and phase 2 is not gonna attract new players in the slightest

I think people will return in some numbers for the different phases. Blizzard will see to that with announcements and such. They won't stay though. It's like a patch. People will come, do the new stuff they want and then be out until the next phase. That's perfectly normal too.

[Akka]

For that to happen i needed to use my trump card of Desolace.

Its probably the worst zone of the entire game for Horde players...you have no idea.

It's the worst zone in the entire game, period

Is it crazy to believe im ahead of the curve for most people....at level 34?
I know its crazy but i swear the zones i go to now are not as filled as the lower level zones.

I've got the feeling that Kalimdor is much less populated than the other continent.
Not on Horde, but humans zones are absolutely saturated with players (joked that the Catacombs in Duskwood had more live people than dead, and it was literally true, with players outnumbering undead by three to one), while elve ones are pretty empty and I can usually quest in quiet.

Lvl 34 feels about the average right now. Maybe a tiny bit above.

[Big Thanks]

I've got the feeling that Kalimdor is much less populated than the other continent.
Not on Horde, but humans zones are absolutely saturated with players (joked that the Catacombs in Duskwood had more live people than dead, and it was literally true, with players outnumbering undead by three to one), while elve ones are pretty empty and I can usually quest in quiet.

Lvl 34 feels about the average right now. Maybe a tiny bit above.

Oh i see A LOT of people, just not is dustwallow marsh and for the quests i picked...which is strange
Probably just wishful thinking.
I enjoy the idea of being ahead of the curve...even though i shouldnt (>_<) on top of that, im the highest level on my Guild...which is boosting my ego a little bit lol

[Eveningforest]

I realllllllly loved the zones i did with other people and grouped up with BUT sometimes i like to chillax and level solo.
For that to happen i needed to use my trump card of Desolace.

Its probably the worst zone of the entire game for Horde players...you have no idea.

Is it crazy to believe im ahead of the curve for most people....at level 34?
I know its crazy but i swear the zones i go to now are not as filled as the lower level zones.

Im on Dustwallow Marsh now.
I see like 10 people there, which is "low" for the previous "chaos" i faced in other zones.

I have 2 toons I'm leveling simultaneously and the mid 20s zones are still packed. I would say 30+ is about average for people that have been playing one toon in the evenings, after work. Highest guildies are late 40s now but we have so many little toons and people keep pouring it. I'm sure it will settle down at some point but at least the lower zones are nowhere near quiet.

[Big Thanks]

I have 2 toons I'm leveling simultaneously and the mid 20s zones are still packed. I would say 30+ is about average for people that have been playing one toon in the evenings, after work. Highest guildies are late 40s now but we have so many little toons and people keep pouring it. I'm sure it will settle down at some point but at least the lower zones are nowhere near quiet.

Yeah, i already saw 2 level 60's on my server, so i know im not "actually" ahead of the curve.
But maybe in the world of "casuals" i am, lol i dont know.

[Coolascancer]

Gotta say I was super hyped when they announced classic and had it come out then i probably would've played to 60. Now, i started a new job and dont have time to play. I've just hit 25 and when i logged on last night i ran to turn in a quest and then ran back to the inn and logged. I think my time is done, honestly.
I have a few friends playing and I will be very surprised if they play much more after hitting 60. if they even do.

Classic will have a drop-off at some point. I figured it'd be around the 30-50 leveling range and then again shortly after hitting 60. Pvp could carry the population a little as vanilla's pvp was pretty good.

[Izenev]

I'm sure there will be a drop off, but there are people like me who aren't interested in anything else so this will be my primary game.

[aceperson]

it's hard for me to say. i gotta say i feel incredibly more rewarded in classic than i have in retail for years but to be honest, i don't know how long this will last. at least for the time being, i've pretty much ignored retail for the past week.

[Calibar]

I think there's a huge market for games like Classic WoW. After everyone has finished all the content, like any single player game, interest will fade. If they decide to release new content with the intention of retaining the current Classic design philosophy, while not bending the knee to complainers who want to make the game easier and less time consuming then they will retain a massive audience. Just my opinion.

[Akka]

I think there's a huge market for games like Classic WoW. After everyone has finished all the content, like any single player game, interest will fade. If they decide to release new content with the intention of retaining the current Classic design philosophy, while not bending the knee to complainers who want to make the game easier and less time consuming then they will retain a massive audience. Just my opinion.

I wildly dream about a TBC Reloaded, where they keep 2.1 design all along and don't follow the progressive devolvement that led to 2.4 and WotLK. TBC is the best iteration when it comes to gameplay and content tuning, it just need to cut the catchup mechanisms and nerfs and it will be glorious.