Just my thoughts on the wave of complaints in the forums from retail andys. Things cost too much, things don’t give enough exp, I don’t do enough damage, I can’t reach 60 fast enough, people aren’t skipping enough, finding a party takes too long, etc.
Sense of achievement in games can only be achieved by overcoming friction. Wow forever is not meant to be non-stop cheap dopamine hits to fry your brain. It’s meant to be something that requires time and effort. This is not the game made for the single mother working two jobs to afford rent that has 12 minutes of free time per day. (not to say that person couldn’t still play if they really wanted to)
You’re going to have a much better experience with the game if you stop thinking of getting exp and gear as the main objective, and start thinking of exp and gear as merely tools for which to allow you to see more of the world and the stories within. You don’t have to day 1 do all the raids as soon as they drop. This place isn’t going anywhere. Go do a starter zone that you didn’t start in. You will gain next to no exp or usable gear or needed crafting materials. Very little material benefit at all. Just experience the stories in the zone and feel rewarded for the effort you put into getting strong enough to make this area a breeze. Get off the constant feeling of powerlessness on the treadmill where you don’t ‘really’ get that much stronger since the enemies keep pace with you, and experience the rewards of your efforts.
… Exp and gear is LITERALLY THE WHOLE POINT… You need XP to play, you need gear to not get bent over a dumpster behind an inn by a random bear.
Not only do you start your post by calling everyone critiquing the bad design choices “retail andys” like that means a thing, but then you go and say the dumbest thing I’ve seen on a forum post today? Yeah, okay.
Boy do I have bad news for you. The devs have already started “balancing” the game based on the top 1% and streamers (like they do Retail), so the game is not starting out strong in that regard.
i mean itll be dead in a couple months anyway cause the classic crowd will move on. this games hope is to keep the retail crowd cause the classic crowd have already abandoned their classic servers once already. whats stopping forever from being the next?
tbc / wotlk are retail game mode but yes forever will prob kill them
era will stay basically the same and prob have much higher population next year as this gets bloated and people realize the good parts were vanilla all along
I dont get Forever. It outright is a direct grab at the Classic communities. I guess Blizz is ok with wherever players gravitate to since the revenue all goes to the same people.
Telris You describe it as if you’re agreeing with me and you don’t even realize. Exp and gear is a means to an end. You get it so you can overcome the friction of that bear trying to bend you over the dumpster. That is the part that makes it a game and not a movie. You only get that gear and exp so you can do the quests, or the dungeons, or whatever tickles your pickle in particular. Getting that stuff is part of the friction that leads to the reward of the content.
That friction should exist, if everyone is just granted tons of free exp and gear from anything and everything, the reward is diminished. That’s how retail has kinda ended up. Anyone can literally press one button and have the game play itself.
I’m just saying, Forever isn’t that kind of thing. I think it leans a lot more towards the Classic way of doing things, although it’s not going to be as stagnant as that is. Gear should be hard to earn. Leveling should take awhile. Make players earn it.
I can understand it, but sometimes it feels suffocating. Like you need to spend all your money training, but somehow you need more to start professions, and craft better gear, and sell the gear you have, but the money doesn’t add up well and it makes professions feel more railroady than a choice you made to increase money gained. I just feel like I get to level 6, but I’ve spent too much money on training to then spend money on professions and it makes me think “this game kinda sucks.” But I get it. That’s how it used to be, but in 2026, it feels like hot dog crap. Is all I’m saying. I get it, but it feels more like a poverty simulator than a game.
stop buying all your abilities
don’t level professions for no reason
and you will find yourself with plenty of gold
and also poverty simulator makes it extra fun when you are full of gold
if everyone has infinite gold, everyone is poor. if 90% of people are poor but 10% are rich, those 10% feel good and everyone else has a reason to grind harder
The idea is that you have to choose and prioritize. It is unreasonable to be perfectly up to date on everything you can possibly be up to date on. You can invest in better equipment to give you better base stats, or new skills to let you kill faster, or maybe a profession to get you some buff items to help you in your time of need. You could choose to grind low level areas for money to catch everything up, or you can push through to harder areas to get more valuable things to help you catch them up
As someone like me who doesn’t care, FFXIV, GW2, etc. I don’t really like retail anymore, because of how competitive it is and how terrible the community feeling is.
But again, I understand what this is trying to be. I’m just saying it isn’t that fun. When you remove the nostalgia that is. Maybe because I’m almost 40, but it’s too slow and railroady.