This is a question for all those who played in the Open Beta of WoW back in 2004. Do you have any good memories or funny stories from back then?
I want to share mine. So basically majority of the players in Open Beta were low levels, the highest level that I saw was level 20 and the dude was a Night Elf Warrior who travelled all the way from his homeland to Dun Moragh, Ironforge. So he came all the way from there to form a group, he recruited about 30 people, all low levels, ranging from 10-18. Basically we were going to walk all the way from Ironforge (we would all meet at the gates) to the Barrens to confront the Horde on Crossroads.
When we started our journey, we were about 30 people, the person who was the highest level would lead the group and everyone else would follow behind him, those who fell behind were basically good as dead because the mobs were very high level and 1 shotted most of us if we did not stay on the path, many died on the way, we lost quite a few brethren who died to Crocodiles in the Wetlands trying to get to Menethil Harbor, some dc’d as well. Once we got to Menethil we took the boat to Theramore, from there we made another dangerous journey into the swamp where again many people died and finally we arrived in the Barrens, we walked all the way to Crossroads and stood outside the gate, the Horde players noticed us standing there and then they were in disbelief, how did these guys get there from so far away especially being so low level, with no mounts etc, especially in open beta.
Anyway, they came out and we stood ready to fight the Horde players, I assume the Horde players were thinking, why the heck these fools walked all the way from the other continent to fight them in Barrens lol, I mean they stood there for a couple of minutes pondering over it, that said the fight eventually commenced because they knew we were there for a fight and a fight is what they gave us, we had a legendary fight there Horde vs Alliance, all low levels, but it was fun. That’s my golden memory of my open beta experience.
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Beta phase 3, 4 AND the Open Beta. I feel like I was young when all of this started, now I’m 55 
'member the “survival” skill, and making a bonfire/carrying a “torch” for the spirit? I think that was done away with by the open beta.
Ah, found it:
My priest was a tailor, so I knew where to go and what to solo to level as fast as I could and then make my own gear that was pretty good (for the time.) So I was pretty styling in the Open beta, by that point, and received compliments.
Yeah I remember that Menthel(sp) harbor run I did it first in the betas, so when retail started I was already pretty good at it on my NE priestess.
Yeah, if i recall the open beta was something of a PVP test too?
Not me! I started partway through Vanilla.
My favorite part of Open Beta was the end. We were all gathered in Stormwind just to watch it all shut down. No idea why. Then all of a sudden we were under attack by things like El Pollo Loco and other crazy large monsters. It was super fun and lots of laughs were had. Great way to end it.
Devs were having a good time closing it out. I had screenshots back in the day but those are long lost I suspect.
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I can’t remember which Alpha phase I was in 
Might have just been before Beta really kicked off. I do remember no Gnomes and Tauren yet though.
In Beta though I had the best Warrior charge bug. Basically the servers would loose your position and you’d just run AROUND the mob and never actually aggro them. Managed to charge a spider near the Duskwood grave yard area and just keep running around the mob for a good 5+ minutes.
I kept showing my roommates it as they’d walk by. Was pretty funny bug that would happen often enough. Ended up having to crash the game and go back in.
Was a little sad when launch came. Most of my real life friends were playing in the Beta with me and the whole time they were talking about going Alliance. Literally weeks of “last Normal realm on the list for EST and Alliance side.” Come launch they decided to go Horde because it made raiding easier >.< Meanwhile I went to an RP realm to play with friends from FFXI. Stuck on AD ever since 
That’s the kind of stuff I fondly remember from vanilla.
Wow is till fun all these years later, but the adventure from the game is more or less gone. Obviously 17 years later that’s to be expected, but the game itself isn’t about that kind of stuff anymore.
Unlike most of you I did not start playing this game in the closed Alpha secret special testing group for vanilla wow. I started in BFA. Mistakes were made.
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Was super secret or anything like that. I just played a lot of WarCraft 3 and got an email lol.
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Does anyone remember when they had a PTR where you could make a pre made character with FULL high warlord gear? It was crazy. There were people fighting all over the place. I think I fought the alliance in winter spring for 3 hours
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