So you are saying the same people who want cloning back are those who buy gold?
I wouldn’t mind if it came back but I don’t think it will as I think the data is gone and can’t be “remade”, “found” or “Copied from Wrath”
“Do you not have phones” is what I was referencing.
However,
Save your words though, as someone who acted on the email when I received it several times, your words ring flat.
Which is within their rights and stated in the ToS as something that you have zero recourse on and is at their discretion.
agree tbh.
Plenty of warning went out, directly to the Email associated with WoW accounts affected. Both my WoW accounts received emails about this happening. If they were someone who stepped away for an indeterminate amount of time and just chose not to check their email that’s on them. Sucks, but is on them and their lack of due diligence.
If this is someone who stepped away and just didn’t play WoW the whole time, ignorant of the cloning, they’re probably still ignorant of the cloning and not thinking of the game.
+1 for $500
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No, I’m saying the same people who will pay $500 for a service that was $5 and was unreasonably removed are the same people who are buying gold.
For clarity, I want cloning back. It should never have been removed. If Blizzard can persist inconsequential character data from 2004, there shouldn’t have been any issues persisting Classic Era character data. I cloned all the characters I wanted and was aware of the service shut down when it was happening, but I have empathy for players who were not active subscribers during that period and missed the announcement on the wow forums/news sites.
This scenario simply should not have been allowed to happen. There was just no reason for it.
Yea I know what you were referencing, I’m just saying that no such email was sent. Or at least, not to everybody.
There was no email for the service shutdown. I’ve checked several times. Only for the service launch. The last email in my inbox from Blizzard that has the word “clone” in it was from May 21, 2021 announcing the pre-exansion launch for TBC Classic.
From where I sit, and from what’s in my inbox, you’ve either received an email I haven’t received or you’re mistaken. Is there a safe way for you to demonstrate this? I’m not out to get you here, maybe the email doesn’t have the word clone in it and I just need to try a different search. Let’s get to the bottom of this.
However, if I did not in fact get the email it does demonstrate that Blizzard made an error here.
It’s a matter of what’s reasonable to expect. If you made a character in 2004, played for 3 days then unsubbed and never touched it again, that character is still available today on live servers. Based on how Blizzard has treated their character data for the last 20 years, nobody would expect them to treat Classic character data any differently unless informed otherwise.
That last bit in italics is the problem. People weren’t properly informed.
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There was however links to the news and Blogs that talk about the service closing down.
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Yea, I’d appreciate that. I’m not asking you to compromise your personal information here, so let’s see what we can do within the realm of safety to identify the situation better.
My wow email address is a gmail one, so what I did was just search for “clone” in the dialog and fine the most recent one from Blizzard. I also did “blizzard clone” but I went with something more generic to cast a wider net. Both search results found the same May 21, 2021 email I referenced above for TBC Classic pre-patch launch. There was nothing after.
The email is the sticking point, really. If you’ve stepped away from WoW, it’s probably unreasonable to expect someone to keep up to date on WoW news. I know I’ve walked away from the game for periods over the years and sometimes I do keep up to date, but sometimes I just need a break. I’m always reachable by email though.
Again, this boils down to what’s reasonable. The game has kept character data from 2004 intact, so why would anybody expect WoW Classic to be any different unless otherwise told?
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In an email? Can you provide details about the subject line and/or other details that one could use to verify that this email was sent?
Okay so I didn’t deleted that last post of mine, I used inappropriate language and got moderated for it, rightfully so.
Looking for the email now
Edit: found the email, working on getting the images into this post. Hilariously enough had I checked my email more regularly I could have been in the Shadowlands Beta and saved myself 60 bucks.
Oh, no worries. I wouldn’t have noticed had you not pointed it out. I didn’t even notice any language violations lol, but it happens to the best of us. At least you didn’t get a ban! I slipped up once, innocently at that, and got a 3 day ban for my troubles. Completely my bad, but still 
Can you post some search terms as well that might help me find it? For example, I’ve been searching for “clone”. Does that appear in your email?
Pictures will help too, but I can search in the mean time.
So what I have is essentially an advert for progressing realms to TBC from Era. In the add they state that everyone will be moved from Era to TBC and if you want to keep your dudes in Era you need to clone.
Figuring out hosting of the image as even though I am young, I am slightly tech inept. I will verbatim type the paragraph I am referencing in hopes you can search it.
“As a reminder, all existing WoW Classic Era realms will be converted into Burning Crusade Classic Realms starting now, and the new Classic Era Realms will be opened for players who wish to continue experiencing WoW Classic through the Shadow of the Necropolis update only”
Received this around the release of TBC pre-patch(05-21-2021). Hopefully this is helpful, I 100% do not expect this to be taken as gospel as I understand I am not able to back it with the SS at this time. I will say that they could have done more, but it wouldn’t have done much for those who dropped the game wholesale and those who just don’t check out the WoW news or adjacent sites.
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Your one time $500 transaction (nor the entirety of clones who would transfer 2 years later after skipping it for $5) isn’t worth the development and maintenance time to a company who makes $400+ million a quarter on Candy Crush. The dev team for Classic WoW, a small niche of the overall WoW team at Activison Bli$$ard King, is currently focused on HC. They can hardly support it as is. Opportunity cost to reboot a dead cloning service (I don’t have the data, but they do, and they know people stopped using it) isn’t worth your $500, sorry pal.
I mean this so seriously. It’s time to move on from your two year dead clones. They deleted the data. One of the classic era devs has gone on record saying it’s not technically possible anymore.
Move on, and have fun with what we do have today.
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It’s all good, maybe I can help!
If you hold your windows button and shift, then press S, Windows will allow you to draw a rectangle around the thing you want to see. Once you’re finished drawing the rectangle, it will automatically be on your clipboard. Now you can open a drawing application (ie, Windows Paint) and press ctrl+v to paste it in. Save that as a file on your desktop. Finally, you can go to your favourite image hosting website (ie, imgur.com) and upload the image. It will give you a link that you can then paste here 
I absolutely could write out those steps better haha, let me know if that works for you.
With that said…
This is the email I have. It’s clear in letting you know that Era realms (not characters) will automatically migrate to TBC, and further down in that email, it’s clear that you can clone your characters.
What is not clear is the service is a limited time only. As far as I can tell, there’s no subsequent email that announces the end of the service.
This is where the ball was dropped. If you weren’t actively subbed and/or paying attention to WoW news, it’s actually quite easy to understand how someone could have missed that the service is shutting down. Returning later to the game to find your characters gone (with the clone service no longer available) feels bad, especially in a game that has consistent, 20 year track record of never deleting character data 
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This is probably the response that from me that is gonna sound a tad rougher. If the people who are disconnected from news/communication missed this, then what steps should be taken to make sure even inactive past players aware of this?
If someone has stopped playing and interacting with the game, then missing this is pretty much on the inactive player.
In my reading this includes those characters on the progressed realms as the realms are being entirely migrated to TBC. Coupled with the “new realms open” phrasing support this in my mind.
Appreciate you help! Instructions were easy to follow, thank you.
You can only do so much to make people aware, and if those people just aren’t connected or watching for WoW news I understand how it can be missed. The email, to me, was pretty clear though I will agree there should be dates included for the end of the promotion.
However, even if dates had been posted in the email or in subsequent hypothetical emails, those who aren’t actively paying attention to WoW news still may have missed that as well. It may be worth, if possible, to check the page for the service and see if there are any cut off dates there, which I get isn’t the best place to put them but might be something to look into.
I agree its a huge feel bad situation, though I do believe deleted data is the wrong phrase. The data was progressed to TBC not deleted. The realms just stopped being Era realms at that point and those toons that people want to clone are still there, just sadly in an expansion they’d prefer not to be in.
Happy to help! Glad you got it sorted out.
From the images you posted, and the search terms you’ve posted, I can confirm that your email is the same one that I have. It’s the announcement of the TBC pre-patch and the cloning service.
What is missing from this email is any correspondence suggesting that the cloning service is temporary or would have an expiry date. Furthermore, there is no subsequent communication (via e-mail) that the service was shutting down. This is the crux of the problem here and why people are, understandably, upset.
I’ve rewritten this response because I was quoting and responding too much to what you said so I’d like to refocus to what’s important, which is identifying what is reasonable to expect here.
There are two key sections I want to address…
This was not actually the case. Your characters weren’t migrated to TBC, they existed in both places upon TBC launch until you chose what character they would be permanently migrated to. Until that choice was made, those characters existed in both places. I actually had to go through and deliberately delete characters on both versions that I didn’t intend to play on that realm or clone because I got tired of the UI option being there every time I went to sign in on a character
It’s important to recognize here that, as of service launch, cloning was a choice that could be made, but until it was made, the choice remained available. No expiry date was advertised.
The step that should have been taken is that an email should have been sent out announcing the retirement of the cloning service. If an email was sent out to advertise its launch, it’s not unreasonable to suggest that one should have been sent out for when it was closed down.
As I stated above, it baffles me that they even bothered to shut this service down to begin with, but it also baffles me as to why they didn’t send an email out.
Sounds good, my replies may be a tad shorter as my work day is being inconsistent.
I remember this, but I also think that the data was at that time in limbo. The realms themselves were being updated and any back up from which to clone was not data that persisted to the mentioned new Era realms apparently. Which is why I think while the character data wasn’t “saved” at 60 it was “saved” at TBC launch 60. Granted a cessation of service would have been helpful to those still actively watching WoW related news. For those who dropped WoW wholesale it would have had minimal effect.
I don’t disagree, however since the majority of those posting or mentioning it seemed to have taken a long hiatus I don’t know what effect more emails would have done. For example, I had a shadowlands beta invite in my email that I missed. There were no subsequent emails notifying me of that invite or follow up. I skipped the last half of BFA and most of the beginnings of SL, stopped really keeping an eye out for WoW emails during this time and disconnected a bit from the infosphere of WoW.
Probably hosting reasons? If I am saving something for someone who has either forgotten about it or repeatedly not checked in, ill usually do whatever with it at that point. (matter of months, not days in this case ymmv).
As for a second email, for those paying attention to their emails it would have been nice and helpful I agree, however those who moved away from WoW a second email has a high chance of being ignored or equally disregarded as any prior emails about the service.
We can debate if they should have kept it open, I am largely indifferent to it as I wasn’t playing Era for Era but as a launch pad into TBC. I do sympathize with those who did disconnect under the reasonable assumption that things would be there when they got back, and essentially though not ideally for most, they still had their character just on different realms(post closure of the service).
This response works for your first paragraph as well, but I don’t think this is the case. I mentioned earlier, but if you created a character in 2004 and only played for a month, that character still exists today. All you have to do is resub on your old account and your character will be there waiting for you. Granted, things will look a little differently and you will almost certainly have to rename it, but all your stuff will still be there.
Given this, why was it so imperative that the cloning service be shut down?
For me, it’s about what is a reasonable expectation for communication. It makes sense that people will walk away from WoW (I’ve certainly done it in my day), but the email address tied to your account is the one form of communication that remains intact, at least until you make a conscious effort to disconnect from that.
If Blizzard sent out that email and people didn’t notice it, or if they deliberately unsubscribed then I don’t think Blizzard would have any fault here. However, no email was sent out to inform people that things are changing, giving them an opportunity to decide for themselves whether or not they wanted to take action.
Honestly, this is the bottom line. Blizzard made a mistake in communication and people got bit by it. I think the service should be restored but maybe it can’t be, and that’s just the way it is. However, my intent here is to address what is effectively the shaming of people who lost their characters to this, being scolded and told “You were warned and didn’t clone your characters, tough luck!”
I just don’t think that’s right.
I think Blizzard needs to take responsibility for this. If the character data truly is gone (which again, baffles me) then I’m not sure what they can do, but even just an acknowledgement that a mistake was made and that they’re sorry would probably go a long way.
People were tired of Classic after 2 years of it - but looking at games like OSRS, it was always going to come back in popularity. Can’t believe they deleted the data and didn’t just leave the clone service available forever.
I want my Naxx geared mage back
Scraping the bottom of the barrel, but potentially server space or potential incompatibility? I never really was of the mind that it was the right choice to end the service.
Agree, and while I may be viewing this slightly different as I do exist within the WoW news world and am able to see the updates sooner than waiting for emails.
I did skim the blue tracker for clone related Blue posting and only found two things, one I won’t link as it’s just about the price reduction. The other is this:
Which has essentially the same information as the Email but in a tad more detail. Seems like they’re taking their trademark vagueness to all communication now. I did NOT find an announcement of the ending of the service. Granted I did not check the Blue posts for Retail General but that’s a dig through time I can’t currently commit to.
Comes down to keeping the snapshots at this point. Don’t see any solid answers from a Blue or article about it.
I have appreciated this conversation, very rare interaction on here where we didn’t just attack each other. Sadly work she does call.
Using your logic that it was always going to come back… why did you not pay $25 to preserve your Naxx geared toon… foolish. Let alone at $5 sale price.
I also agree, they should have kept it up, but still. I have lots of criticism for their massive. botch around clones. But you defeat yourself with your own logic.