TL;DR
My worry with WoW Forever is that it keeps sliding toward the same homogenization that hollowed out retail. The new raids are shrinking to 10 or 20-player instead of Classic’s 40-man, and new cross-faction combos like Dwarf Shaman and Undead Paladin blur the lines that used to define Horde and Alliance identity. Classic’s magic wasn’t balance — it was asymmetry. Every class and faction was good at different things, which is what made each one feel unique. Forever risks smoothing that away again.
The Full Thing
I’ve got mixed feelings, because the two biggest changes so far look like more of the same thing that turned retail into a mashed potato sandwich: technically food, but every bite tastes the same.
The core problem with retail is homogenization. In Classic, a Mage had Blink — an instant 20-yard teleport nobody else had. Casting it felt like being a wizard. In retail, a Mage Blinks, a Warrior Heroic Leaps, a Hunter Disengages, a Monk Rolls, a Druid Wild Charges, etc. Everyone has the same toolkit with a different coat of paint on it. It’s a buffet that used to have food from around the world that says it still has variety because you can pick a hamburger, a cheeseburger, or a bacon hamburger — but everyone’s still eating a burger.
Classic wasn’t fun because it was balanced. It was fun because it wasn’t. A Druid was a joy to level — tank as a bear, pop out of form and heal, do ranged dmg, melee dmg, all in one character. A Warrior or Priest was miserable to level: no self-healing, or low damage and squishy. But that suffering bought something. At 60, a Warrior was the best tank in the game and a Priest the best healer, full stop. The Druid’s reward was flexibility and a good leveling experience; the Warrior’s and Priest’s reward was being unmatched in their roles. Different upside, different downside. Yin and yang.
That asymmetry is exactly what 40-man raids protected, and it’s exactly what’s disappearing in Forever. The new raids are 10 and 20-player — only Ony is staying 40-man. Smaller rosters mean less room for niche specs. In a 40-man, you could bring a Moonkin Druid whose damage was mediocre next to a Mage’s, but their improved thorns was nice - or a rogue who spec’d into improved expose armor. It can be a real difference when there’s 40 people. But shrunken raids make those slots disappear, which is probably exactly why so many of those niche buffs got pruned from retail in the first place; you can’t justify a weak-damage spec’s seat if there isn’t a spare seat to give it.
And 40-mans weren’t just a numbers game — they built community. Running one meant a guild deep enough to field 40 people, which meant class officers coordinating who spec’d what, players grinding dungeons and gear together long before raid night, and a web of familiarity that held the guild together and made raid night feel like all of your friend groups hanging out in one place. Ask anyone why Classic became a phenomenon and “the community” comes up almost every time. A 40-person raid forces that community into existing. A 20-person raid doesn’t need it nearly as badly.
The other homogenizing move in Forever is cross-faction classes — Dwarf Shaman and Undead Paladin, and more to come. I get that it gives a burst of appeal to a small group of people. But Horde having Shamans and Alliance having Paladins wasn’t just a lore quirk — it shaped how each side played. Horde’s Bloodlust gave them the ability to brute force through some fights and Alliance’s Blessings gave steady, always-on buffs that rewarded consistency over bursty plays. In my experience, that bred two different player cultures — Alliance players who were careful and mechanically precise because they had to be, and Horde players (myself very much included) who could get away with a sloppier “dance” because Bloodlust let us push through some mistakes. Blur that line and you lose one more thing that made choosing faction: red or blue.
I’m not saying Forever is doomed and I don’t want this to be all negative - mid-level dungeons, overhauled formerly “useless” or “niche” gear, new crafting/professions all seem amazing and are keeping me hooked. And the new zones, campfires, and race I’m kind of on the fence about. But some choices revealed so far are pulling in the same direction retail already went: smaller raids, more overlap between factions and classes, and less reason for any given class or spec to feel like a little (but necessary) piece of a big puzzle. Classic worked because everything didn’t have the same options/abilities, but different ones that complimented each other’s. I’m hoping Blizzard remembers that before Forever slowly turns into retail with a nostalgia coat of paint.