Blizzard announced "Classic" World of Warcraft

[Lacrymas]

There's no problem finding groups IF you start reasonably early in vanilla's lifetime. Once BWL hits, it becomes more and more difficult until people start only raid logging at AQ's release. That goes for both max level and lower level dungeons, although it goes double for lower levels. The problem is not having enough new blood coming into the servers, so it depends on how enduringly popular Classic is going to be. Vanilla has the issue of having to clear and gear up from previous raids first before tackling newer ones, which drives away potential new players due to the fact if they start leveling at the beginning of AQ, they probably won't see AQ before TBC comes. You'll have to mostly rely on old guilds still farming old content (and they'll be doing that, since a raid never becomes obsolete in vanilla and that's a bad thing) boosting you. Good luck finding that and even if you do, you are just along for the ride, you don't participate in the raid as such.

 

[RapineDel]

A real key factor to Classic WOW, even on private servers today is the way in which you form groups. When a group is randomly assigned as with the dungeon finder then there's zero investment. When you have to spend half an hour spamming group chat, traveling to nearby zones etc. to fill the group for a quest or dungeon you're completely invested in the group and are more inclined to help and communicate to ensure everything goes like clockwork.

The decline of WoW started with the best of intentions, most of the decline which started with WotLK were features that sounded good on paper but upon implementing them you kill the very soul of the game. It's very much a game that you need to experience first hand to enjoy as on paper it certainly does sound boring when you're killing 10 boars, fetching an item etc. but the whole experience of classic is the journey and not the destination (another reason why playing on a non PVP server is stupid in classic). A lot can happen during and on the way to doing these quests such as random PVP, you have to on the ball with your character even when leveling if you pull more then one mob and little things like this change the experience enough every time to feel fresh. I can imagine raiding on the other hand losing steam pretty quickly though, I really only see the leveling/leveling dungeons as being the spark that keeps this official classic ticking along so they'll need to reset it every 18 months or so.

 

[Fedora Master]

PUGs are shit regardless of how they come to be because pubbies are all mouthbreathing retards who barely know how to play babbies first MMO. Heck, I suspect many of the people who claim they "want" a Classic server are incapable of organized grouping because the later dungeons have become pure popamole shit and that's all they know.

 

[Angthoron]

A real key factor to Classic WOW, even on private servers today is the way in which you form groups. When a group is randomly assigned as with the dungeon finder then there's zero investment. When you have to spend half an hour spamming group chat, traveling to nearby zones etc. to fill the group for a quest or dungeon you're completely invested in the group and are more inclined to help and communicate to ensure everything goes like clockwork.

The decline of WoW started with the best of intentions, most of the decline which started with WotLK were features that sounded good on paper but upon implementing them you kill the very soul of the game. It's very much a game that you need to experience first hand to enjoy as on paper it certainly does sound boring when you're killing 10 boars, fetching an item etc. but the whole experience of classic is the journey and not the destination (another reason why playing on a non PVP server is stupid in classic). A lot can happen during and on the way to doing these quests such as random PVP, you have to on the ball with your character even when leveling if you pull more then one mob and little things like this change the experience enough every time to feel fresh. I can imagine raiding on the other hand losing steam pretty quickly though, I really only see the leveling/leveling dungeons as being the spark that keeps this official classic ticking along so they'll need to reset it every 18 months or so.

To be fair, it wasn't the LFG tool that killed the community, it was the cross-server LFG tool that did it. I actually met my back-then raid group via LFG that way, we ran through a bunch of dungeons, joked, crashed through shit, they gave me and my ex an invite to check out the raids, we went.

Now? To be entirely fair, I've ran into a few good LFG groups each expansion, some of them completely random, but it's so rare you might as well grab a unicorn trap along too.

 

[RapineDel]

A real key factor to Classic WOW, even on private servers today is the way in which you form groups. When a group is randomly assigned as with the dungeon finder then there's zero investment. When you have to spend half an hour spamming group chat, traveling to nearby zones etc. to fill the group for a quest or dungeon you're completely invested in the group and are more inclined to help and communicate to ensure everything goes like clockwork.

The decline of WoW started with the best of intentions, most of the decline which started with WotLK were features that sounded good on paper but upon implementing them you kill the very soul of the game. It's very much a game that you need to experience first hand to enjoy as on paper it certainly does sound boring when you're killing 10 boars, fetching an item etc. but the whole experience of classic is the journey and not the destination (another reason why playing on a non PVP server is stupid in classic). A lot can happen during and on the way to doing these quests such as random PVP, you have to on the ball with your character even when leveling if you pull more then one mob and little things like this change the experience enough every time to feel fresh. I can imagine raiding on the other hand losing steam pretty quickly though, I really only see the leveling/leveling dungeons as being the spark that keeps this official classic ticking along so they'll need to reset it every 18 months or so.

To be fair, it wasn't the LFG tool that killed the community, it was the cross-server LFG tool that did it. I actually met my back-then raid group via LFG that way, we ran through a bunch of dungeons, joked, crashed through shit, they gave me and my ex an invite to check out the raids, we went.

Now? To be entirely fair, I've ran into a few good LFG groups each expansion, some of them completely random, but it's so rare you might as well grab a unicorn trap along too.

I think cross server systems in general were the final nail but the dungeon finder massively killed the feeling of a world. Obviously guilds are fine but it's not quite the same as everyone just sticks to that specific group and all these tools ensure you don't mix with anyone else.

What you'll find as well is once a LFG tool is introduced at end game the attitude filters through to the rest of the game even though the mechanics aren't there yet. For example a lot of the leveling group quests started being skipped by people leveling alts as they were simply used to not having to put together a group. Skipping quests made it difficult to have enough XP to get to the next zones so instead of finding a way to make them work, Blizzard simply lowered the amount of XP needed to get to level cap undermining both the leveling and any incentive to group up. Changing leveling from possibly the most interesting experience in the game to being a tedious, single player grind to get to level cap was another huge mistake.

 

[Norfleet]

Levelling is never an interesting experience in any game, it's simply an annoying distraction from your objective. Your goal in levelling is always to minimize the amount of wasted time and effort on garbage that will ultimately not have mattered when you get there.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Levelling is never an interesting experience in any game, it's simply an annoying distraction from your objective. Your goal in levelling is always to minimize the amount of wasted time and effort on garbage that will ultimately not have mattered when you get there.

you're supposed to enjoy the journey

 

[ADL]

Levelling is never an interesting experience in any game, it's simply an annoying distraction from your objective. Your goal in levelling is always to minimize the amount of wasted time and effort on garbage that will ultimately not have mattered when you get there.

you're supposed to enjoy the journey

And in these types of content-driven themepark MMOs with vertical progression, there's certainly an end to that journey and once you hit it... hundreds of hours worth of good content and plenty of repeatable content in the game is invalidated. Having the end game hurdled up in the only remaining relevant zones doing relevant quests, dungeons and raids for relevant gear fucking sucks.

This is why "/g see you next expansion guys" is so common and I can't wait to see how people react to WoW Classic which has a definitive end.

 

[Lacrymas]

I'd argue leveling is the only thing that isn't invalidated ever. The goal of leveling is to gain experience and level, and when you do that you'll always be at least that level. Everything else - gold, items, artifact power, whatever - is temporary. I guess toys, pets and mounts are also like that.

 

[shihonage]

Too lazy to check if this was already posted. It's videos like these which make you realize that Blizzard used to be a smart, talented company.

 

[ADL]

vertical progression
smart, talented company
pick one

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

I liked Vanilla WoW for what it was, but seeing all these pansy content creators come out of the woodwork to romanticize the shit out of it makes part of me hope it completely dies out within six months and Blizzard becomes a pachinko company.

 

[Norfleet]

you're supposed to enjoy the journey

That's the kind of thing slackers say to justify the fact that they're not getting anywhere. Always focus on the goal.

 

[Norfleet]

I'd argue leveling is the only thing that isn't invalidated ever. The goal of leveling is to gain experience and level, and when you do that you'll always be at least that level.

Exactly, and everything else you did to get there is irrelevant, since you throw it out out as worthless garbage when you get there. So anything that minimizes the amount of unnecessary cruft you do streamlines the process. There is no point in acquiring worthless low-level junk you will just throw out at the end of the process if you can just skip it entirely with a more efficient process.

In my current shitty MMO, for instance, I have streamlined the level-up process into "Press F Repeatedly". No equipment of any kind is needed, and it takes about 20 minutes to do, which keeps the wasted effort down to an absolute minimum and absolutely no fun whatsoever is had in the process. JUST HOW I LIKE IT.

 

[Dawkinsfan69]

I liked Vanilla WoW for what it was, but seeing all these pansy content creators come out of the woodwork to romanticize the shit out of it makes part of me hope it completely dies out within six months and Blizzard becomes a pachinko company.

WoW players in particular are insane addicts. They'll consume literally any content as long as it has something to do with WoW, which is why even though the game's community isn't huge, they support tens of youtube channels that shit out daily videos covering stupid crap like a top WoW reddit post or a reaction to another content creator's third reaction to a particle effect change.

Most people who are into games move around and play a variety of things but the majority of wow players ONLY play wow and when they're not playing wow they're watching videos or streams about it or they're dreaming/daydreaming about whatever stupid fucking skinnerbox grind they're currently working on.

Anyway if any of u wanna start a youtube channel, covering inane wow crap is the way to go

 

[HanoverF]

I liked Vanilla WoW for what it was, but seeing all these pansy content creators come out of the woodwork to romanticize the shit out of it makes part of me hope it completely dies out within six months and Blizzard becomes a pachinko company.

Eh, it'll go longer than that, they'll probably have to add servers at launch, then by four months it will be down to a PVE, mostly dead RP, and 2 PVP servers

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Anyway if any of u wanna start a youtube channel, covering inane wow crap is the way to go

Yeah, now that I clicked on two video links here I have these faggoty WoW videos clogging up my recommendations and getting in the way of watching animals devour other animals in the wild.

Like look at this shit. "TOP TEN ENCHANTING MATERIALS FOR TBC." "FIVE THEORIES ON SYLVANAS' VAGINAL STATE POST DEATH." "WRATH OF THE LICH KING CINEMATIC REACTION (WITH CHAT)."

WoW ruined Warcraft and MMORPGs.

 

[Norfleet]

Most people who are into games move around and play a variety of things but the majority of wow players ONLY play wow and when they're not playing wow they're watching videos or streams about it or they're dreaming/daydreaming about whatever stupid fucking skinnerbox grind they're currently working on.

Well, of course. WoW was a thing you paid for by subscription for an entire month. You pay for a month of something, you're USING that month of it, otherwise you just wasted your money. Same reason why when you buy a month of Internets, you're using that entire month.

 

[Dawkinsfan69]

Most people who are into games move around and play a variety of things but the majority of wow players ONLY play wow and when they're not playing wow they're watching videos or streams about it or they're dreaming/daydreaming about whatever stupid fucking skinnerbox grind they're currently working on.

Well, of course. WoW was a thing you paid for by subscription for an entire month. You pay for a month of something, you're USING that month of it, otherwise you just wasted your money. Same reason why when you buy a month of Internets, you're using that entire month.

It's $15... If $15 triggers sunk cost so hard that you spend every free moment obsessing over it then you need to see a shrink

 

[Parabalus]

I'd argue leveling is the only thing that isn't invalidated ever. The goal of leveling is to gain experience and level, and when you do that you'll always be at least that level.

Exactly, and everything else you did to get there is irrelevant, since you throw it out out as worthless garbage when you get there. So anything that minimizes the amount of unnecessary cruft you do streamlines the process. There is no point in acquiring worthless low-level junk you will just throw out at the end of the process if you can just skip it entirely with a more efficient process.

The entire game is just a timesink though, everything you do is irrelevant, point is to have fun.

Hitting the gong being almost server-unique might count, not much else in vanilla.

I liked Vanilla WoW for what it was, but seeing all these pansy content creators come out of the woodwork to romanticize the shit out of it makes part of me hope it completely dies out within six months and Blizzard becomes a pachinko company.

WoW players in particular are insane addicts.

All the HWL/r14 players I played with were on unemployment benefits .

 

[Aildrik]

All the HWL/r14 players I played with were on unemployment benefits .

Hah! I was the second HWL on Moonrunner but in my defense it was a few months prior to cross realm bullshit. I would get home from work, there was a group of about 8 of us that just rolled PUGs for a few hours. Usually the BG queues would stop popping around 9-10pm EST. In a nutshell, by organizing and also lucking out on being on a server that didn't have a lot of crazy competition on our faction side, I was able to do it while holding down a job and getting a decent amount of sleep. I cannot imagine what people had to resort to once the cross realm crap went in and you had queues going, possibly, 24/7. I would guess account sharing or potentially fatal amounts of caffeine would be the only way to R14.

While it was a horrible grind nonetheless and I will never do anything like it again, the game had a great PvP community. You would eventually end up talking to pretty much every player that did regular PvP at some point. People that tried to pull shit like AFK shenanigans honor farming were shamed out of the BGs. Reputation of your toon actually meant something. I ended up meeting some really great people and after we all helped each other hit rank 14 we ended up forming into a PvE guild that had a decent amount of success in Vanilla and part of BC. There is no doubt in my mind that the game suffered as a result of the introduction of cross realm tech, but in the overall grand scheme of growing the game and making it more casual friendly, I will just say I am not shocked that Blizzard went in that direction.

 

[shihonage]

WoW was casual-friendly in 2004. It was a super-accessible game. Modern WoW is lobotomy-friendly, Idiocracy-level shit right there.

 

[Aildrik]

WoW was casual-friendly in 2004. It was a super-accessible game. Modern WoW is lobotomy-friendly, Idiocracy-level shit right there.

WoW 2004 was indeed casual friendly, especially if you came over from EQ like many did. That said, you *gasp* had to TALK to people to do things like group (for elite quests and dungeons) or even raid. Blizzard needed to fix that!! No socializing necessary now! Just log in, hit your dungeon finder and raid finder and throw your damn keyboard in the trash! Joysticks baby!

 

[Dawkinsfan69]

Whenever I play modern WoW I'm always talking w/ people.. Mythic + keys require communication and people are always either in the in game voice chat or discord.. Same with raids and rated pvp. I even get a lot of banter when just running islands tbh.

I never touch normal/heroic dungeons or LFR though those are hot garbage. Timewalking is fucking miserable too if you're pugging. Last time I pugged a timewalking dungeon we were stuck on the first fucking trash pack for over 10 minutes because the dps wouldn't read chat and interrupt the healer I ended up dropping group mid fight and never timewalking again.

 

[Lyric Suite]

I liked Vanilla WoW for what it was, but seeing all these pansy content creators come out of the woodwork to romanticize the shit out of it makes part of me hope it completely dies out within six months and Blizzard becomes a pachinko company.

All classic games share the same problem. Great for the time but flawed and in need of an evolution that never came. In fact, they all devolved from what was a work in progress to begin with.

This is what creates the contradiction here. On one hand, you have something that was good but was in need of a lot of improvements, and then you have everything released after which was actually worse. So you are forced to romanticize and glorify something that was supposed to be a stepping stone to something better and was not perfect or beyond reproach in itself, but you just have no choice on the matter because that's as good as it ever got.