⭐ Classic is Definitely not Vanilla

WoW Classic WoW Classic General Discussion
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Hi,

Just an open question… from a 2004 Vanilla player.

But first and foremost, thank you Blizzard, truly, for this opportunity!

Now - If the true purpose of creating WoW Classic is to recreate the authentic vanilla experience - then why not focus on just that, where it is possible?

Player experience in this context is not always the same as static data.

The experience back in the day was for example that dungeons were rather unforgiving. This was actually one of many important components that made the original masterpiece.

In my opinion - If we want longevity (as much as can be, WoW being an old game) in WoW Vanilla, if we want a standing chance of recreating the experience, then perhaps we should stop debating data and start discussing the experience instead!

Quotes from the original Blizzard WoW vanilla dungeon design philosophy:

“Experience feel meaningful”
“Sense of danger”
“sense of progression”
“pulling is a great way to show individual player skill”
“the path of least resistance”
“boom everything is dead”
The game design pillars of yesterday are the answer to recreating the player experience of the original Vanilla WoW back in 2004. They are timeless.

Watch the clips below - they are amazing! They touch on the subject rather well when it comes to recreating the WoW vanilla experience:

World of Warcraft vanilla Dungeon design

World of Warcraft vanilla Raid design

Down below are a few examples of the many nerfs made (to dungeons) on the way to patch 1.12. Raids have undergone the same treatment.

Some of the nerfs may not be relevant as they perhaps do not fit into the 1.12 patch. See this as input - not as a complete package of what to implement/reverse patch-wise.

Patch 1.12

Stratholme

  • Baroness Anastasi in Stratholme will now leave the possessed target when the target is below 50% health, instead of 30%. She will also cast Possession slightly less often.
  • Overall respawn in the entire dungeon made longer.
  • Crimson Conjurers will no longer roam in pairs.

Scholomance

  • Risen Aberration health and damage reduced.
  • Reduced the duration of Dark Plague from three minutes to 90 seconds.
  • The creature spell, Call of the Grave, has had its damage reduced by half.

Uldaman

  • Reduced the number of Shadowforge Ambushers that attack after looting the quest chest.
  • Shadowforge Ambushers are no longer elite.
  • The respawn of the Stone Stewards has been changed to 2 hours (from 30 minutes).

Zul’Farak

  • The respawn of the 2 Troll/1 Basilisk patrollers should now be 2 hours.
  • Reduced the damage dealt by the Sul’lithuz Abomination and Sul’lithuz Sandcrawler.
  • Zul’Farrak Dead Heroes are no longer elites.
  • Sandfury Cretins who engage the party during the pyramid event are no longer able to cast shadow bolt.

There are many more! Again, not even including the raid nerfs.

A solution

Build upon patch 1.12, but implement data/settings from earlier patches - where it fits. All in the purpose of creating the best prerequisites of reproducing the vanilla experience and staying true to Vanillas original design philosophy and actual patch history.

This includes the original AV or a version as close to it as possible.

The above suggestion has no conflict with the “no changes” statement. Since we should only be using settings that once were in the original game.

Patch 1.13 could be a combination of all earlier patches (that fit) all in the purpose of recreating the Vanilla experience.

The only counter argument to this in my opinion would be the following;

“We want Classic to cater to the masses, we want it easy, we want a new cash cow”

I didn’t wait half a decade just to se classic go down the same path (i.e a shallow game without depth without the sense of accomplishment or reward) as retail - did you guys?

// Daremx

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You cannot reproduce the initial difficulty without wiping all of our brains of all the knowledge about WoW we have gained in the last 15 years.

@Eloraell, sniped!

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Blizzard can not provide you with a memory wipe and a time machine. And they don’t want to be responsible for mis-balancing content in a museum recreation.

So they’re using the most consistent and bug-free patch version that they have, 1.12. Data is all they control.

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Exactly. As Taliesen said in one of his videos…“Blizzard can’t recreate how sh** I was at WOW back then”.

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that wasnt my point in the thread.

I merely want the game to be as unforgiving as possible. Why? Because it’ll aid in reproducing the vanilla experience it will also in a positive way affect the longevitiy of the game - who doesnt want that? :slight_smile:

Why not for example as stated in my post above, take away the nerfs to dungeons, which equals less elites etc…

What are the downsides of presenting the most challenging version even though its build upon patch 1.12?

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When people say that players are viewing Vanilla through rose tinted glasses or it’s just nostalgia this is exactly the type of post they’re talking about.

Enjoy Classic for what it is, a better MMO than the current market offers.

Attempting to recapture those feelings you experienced 15 years ago isn’t something that is possible but it doesn’t mean you can’t create new experiences in the same meaningful way.

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I want WoW to be as accurate to the original data as it can be.

Why?

Because I don’t trust modern Blizzard to rebalance everything in a way that accurately reflects the game as it was then.

Because its not authentic and modern ideas would intrude. I think you fail to realise the difference between “nerf” and “rebalance”.

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I dont think you actually read my post sir :=)

We won’t ever relive the exact experience, I doubt anyone believes that…

But why not present us with the most challenging Vanilla experience as possible - by only using old patches as reference?

I only se upsides to this.

Why would we want the nerfed face-roll dungeons instead of the original patch 1.x version of the dungeon? I fail to understand this =)

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I think your impression of how nerfed it was is vastly different to the reality of how it changed.

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I still don’t se the conflict.

Let’s take a simple example. If the ONLY change they would do would be to reinstate Zul Farak to it’s original form (where possible), for example reinstate the Shadowforge Ambushers as Elites (which they are not in patch 1.12).

That is still accurate, because its taken from a state of the game that existed - only pre patch 1.12.

I’m not saying switch patch, I’m saying take data/settings from earlier patches that fit into the 1.12 patch that makes sense that adds to the challenge.

Is there really a downside to that?

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I don’t want a challenge. I want classic because it’s easier than retail (talking heroic/mythic raiding). If you start messing with the system that works, it’s not classic anymore. It’s classic+

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Yes. Consistency.

You’re asking to cherry pick individual elements from a patch’s effect on one part of the game. That’s not going to work because its going to be unbalanced in a way that has negative impacts. These dungeons are not nerfed. By modern standards they’re still a giant time-sink of regular wipes.

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1.12 abilities and talents make all of this pretty moot. Do we take all the classes to their 1.0 states, before each class had its revisit or rebalance or whatever word they used? We’re getting 1.12 classes with 1.12 content rolled out in a progressive release format.

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At this point, I still faill to se your point.

I think I can appreciate where you are coming from though, but I feel that its way to macro and you are in my opinion generalizing.

Classes are still ~20% more efficient in patch 1.12 compared to the first initial patches. By only - using my above example - reinstating the old setup of the dungeons, it won’t in any concrete way ruin or affect the experience negatively.

You just have to be abit more carefull in the dungeon. Instead of facerolling - pulling 6 mobs with a 2 hander because they no longer are elites :slight_smile: you have to be abit more strategic.

Watch the videos from Blizzcon 2005, the design pillars are what mades us appreciate the game. Those same fundamental rules apply even today, they are timeless.

Mindlessly plowing through content does not aid to the feeling/experience of risk vs reward.

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You know why? For money. This isn’t the 2004 Blizzard anymore. Blizzard doesn’t follow those design philosophies anymore.

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No, I dont believe in messing with class balance, then we wont ever get the game released and I also believe that there are more risks to that than possibly rewards.

Only refering to content.

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Won’t it? Are you able to prove that your interpretation of why mobs were removed was simply “to make it easier”? Perhaps it was because they saw groups failing to complete the dungeon regularly and decided that it was a far too negative experience for those groups who break up.

I remember doing Uldamen in the closing days of Vanilla. Anyone at level who pulled 6 mobs with a 2 hander died rapidly. Especially since the “Fury Warrior Tank” is a misnomer that only exists on Private Servers.

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I think you answered your own question.

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Best reply so far, that might be the sad truth - hence my post in the first place.

I love this game, and I want it to last and give us the best possible experience - once again!

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i think the real question you have to ask yourself is , “what patch into vanilla are people remembering?”.

the simple fact is in earlier patches things did indeed hit harder due to lack of itemization or flat out bugs.

memory is weird like that though and we remember the difficulty of something in a patch and just blanket that into our memory of the full scope of the vanilla timeframe when it was just for 1.4 -1.5 or something like that.

alot of people had leveled to 60 before 1.7? i want to say , so they will remember things alot differently than someone who hit 60 in 1.8.

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