BlizzCon – What’s Next for WoW Classic

In this thread, please leave your feedback on the future of WoW Classic, as discussed in the World of Warcraft Classic: What’s Next panel at BlizzCon.

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Some initial thoughts!

General:

  • Heroic+ is carried forward, good!
  • Modern AH on Cata Classic, also good!
  • Not entirely sure what I think about increased leveling speed, but I guess that most won’t play Cata for the leveling experience.
  • Self-found for Hardcore!

Hype:

  • Season of Discovery!
    • Warlock tank
    • “Less good” classes are more valid
    • New content
    • Level raids
    • No PTR/Beta (this is gonna bite me, I know it)

Not as hype:

  • While I love that Season of Discovery is coming to us soon, I personally would have wanted a bit more of a heads up.
  • Also no roadmap for 2024
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I don’t have many thoughts about Classic Cataclysm, but I would like to talk about Season of Discovery a bit.

My main thought is that I hope this isn’t “Classic+” under a different guise and is more of a testing phase to see how Classic+ could be implemented. I made a post about Classic+ a few months back, which explains my thoughts on Classic+ as a whole (Classic Plus / Classic+ - The Best Risk Blizzard Could Ever Take). If possible, I would really love some clarity as to whether this new season will have evergreen characters or potential new seasons will be fresh starts visiting new areas and another seasonal theme.

I do quite enjoy that the team is making a 10-man raid out of a dungeon and expanding upon old ideas, but Classic+ (if it ever comes to fruition) should take a “less is more” approach. Being cautious about changes will keep the spirit of Classic alive and having overwhelming feedback from the community about things like Protection Paladin taunt or Warlock Demonology tanks is important. If these seasons are not evergreen, then I would instead encourage risk-taking on the short-term scale.

I’m also selfishly a little upset about the lead-in time for this. I’ve been waiting for a new Seasons of Mastery or a fresh wipe Classic server to jump back into Classic, but this is releasing just a couple weeks after the next major retail season begins. As a tank in a cutting edge guild, it’s going to be difficult to find time for Season of Discovery and I will definitely miss the wonderful experience of an MMORPG launch for this new Classic venture.

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Are the levelling speed changes for Cataclysm just Joyous Journeys remaining, with the option to turn it off from the innkeeper? I would like to be able to level 80-85 at least once the way intended in 4.0.3 in 2010.

As for Season of Discovery, part of the charm of Vanilla is the open-world difficulty. Whilst the oft-quoted “Vanilla was harder!” isn’t really true when it comes to raiding, it certainly is when questing in the outdoor world. I’m a little bit concerned that a lot of these spells from the runes may be overpowered, after all, one of the philosophies on the slides was to make everyone OP (even if that was a little bit tongue in cheek in regards to warriors being far and above everyone in raiding content).

I am looking forward to SoD though, the more approachable pace is great for the audience and I’m happy about the lack of PTR. Hopefully there’ll be a lot to discover!

I believe it was mentioned that the levelling speed was only from 1-80, not affecting “Cata” levelling at all.

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Big if true, hopefully still optional for the 1-80 (although 1-60 for me!)

As a player who doesn’t reach max level for a long time this new season will be perfect. I just hope the intervals of increasing level cap will be long enough for casual players to complete most of the content.
When will the season end - at 60 with Naxxramas? Level 70 with Sunwell?
What will happen to the characters after the end of the season?

Will there be Wrath of The Lich King Classic servers after the launch of Cataclysm similar to the Era servers after the launch of the Burning Crusade Classic?

Ana said that the team will take Classic to “Cataclysm and beyond”. Are there any plans what expansion will be the last for Classic? Or will it reach and merge with retail eventually?

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Season of Discovery:
This is amazing and I hope it keeps getting expanded. The concept of a classic plus seems really cool. The level band idea is great to make earlier content feel more relevant for awhile longer before moving onto the next phase. That Karazhan crypts is implied makes me really hopeful. I hope the game goes further in that direction of “what if?” as far as it can like an alternate universe route of WoW.

The idea of runes, new class twists and roles sounds super fun and I am personally going to play a mage healer. I am already looking forward to playing with my guild and doing some 10man BFD.

Cata Classic:
I don’t think I’ll play beyond the first tier of Cata since that one was always cool with the different raids but I do like the changes like transmog from the start and the faster pace of tiers. Personally more looking forward to MoP so just biding my time really.

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I think letting the seasonal servers continue through the Burning Crusade phases and keeping permanent (Era) Wrath of The Lich King servers would satisfy as many players as possible. During the last vanilla phase of the seasonal servers players can be given the option to transfer to Classic Era and after the end of the last Burning Crusade phase they can transfer to a Wrath permanent server or progression server (Cataclysm or beyond). I hope not many players would want permanent Cataclysm server once Cata Classic has finished.

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