Im late to the party… Was a player in the Before times, have played retail again since SL. After HC and now SoD, I want to figure out how to not feel like I am abandoning all my toons, and find a home on Era -and in the Classic world in general.
Anybody have tips on how to switch over? It’s not a FOMO thing, it’s just the incredible amount of time I’ve put in to some of my Characters. Classic, SoD, and HC, all feel like a dream to me, and retail the actual.
If you enjoy pvp - make a toon on whitemane Era and you’re off to the races 
Just so you know everything in Classic WoW has been relegated to buying boosts and doing GDKP’s. The odds of finding regular groups for dungeons/raids is basically non-existent. Unless you make your own groups and lead your own raids/guild, then I’m afraid you pretty much missed the boat.
Perhaps non–existent if you sit in the city for 5 minutes waiting for it to fall on your lap then logout because it didn’t.
Every zone has players around, if you ask in local chat you can usually find a group for that local dungeon (eventually), there are all types of raids - though GDKPs are very common.
It may be a little slow on your first toon but when you have some momentum going Era become decently populated
Thanks, Sa. I will for sure roll there. Both factions active on white mane? Don’t need perfect parity (as if) just enough people around to play with.
According to ironforge.pro there are 55% alliance (3061) and 45% horde (2517). Since there are no layers on Era 5500 people doesn’t feel too empty. Their data comes from uploaded raid logs, so there are also all the toons leveling and players that don’t raid in addition.
I would just roll on the side you enjoy more, if you have no preference and plan to rank, perhaps go horde for the slightly faster queue times.
You didn’t even bother to re-read what you wrote, did you? “Every zone has players around, if you ask in local chat you can USUALLY find a group for that local dungeon(EVENTUALLY), there are all types of raids - though GDKPs are VERY COMMON)”. You know that means it’s the primary way, right?
Looks like Chogg’s just going to completely ignore what I said. That’s fine. There’s still fun to be had in vanilla. It’s just with all the boosts and GDKP’s, it’s super rare to find anything not a GDKP or Boost being spammed in LFG. And even trying to form your own groups are slow because a lot of people still playing would rather just buy boosts or GDKPs.
It’s probably not hard for Sa because they’ve accepted that’s how life is on Vanilla now, and doesn’t mind sitting around looking for a group for 50+ minutes for a 20 minute dungeon. And Chogg, I sincerely hope you do find a guild and a group of people that do things the natural way because despite being super basic, vanilla is really fun. But just know you’re NOT going to get the same experience as we vets did back in OG vanilla, nor what people got back when Classic Vanilla was the only Classic content. Even if you don’t partake in GDKP’s, your play experience WILL be influenced by them regardless.
If anyone doesn’t believe me though, feel free to grab the addon “LFG Group Bulletin Board”. It’s an addon that takes all of the messages people spam in any channel looking for a group for something and posts them on an interface for ease of use/reading/etc., etc… I hopped on my main the other day with that addon and tried to find a group. After 15 minutes it was all just boosts/gdkps.
And anyone who says “Just make your own fudgin’ groups!” completely misses the point of the entire argument and should remove themselves from the conversation. ESPECIALLY when it still takes forever to form groups.
That’s because GDKPs are the best loot system for pugs.
Because a lot of the community enjoys those sytems. But other options are not ‘basically non-existent’ you just have to work a bit harder to get things going. I have a good feeling that Chogg may just fun a few GDKPs, realize they are lots of fun, and simply enjoy the game.
What were you looking for? Expecting a group that needs you in 15 minutes can be quite demanding depending on what your role / gear is and what you are looking for.
Remember many Era players have been there for almost 5 years, they have plans ingame already and aren’t waiting for ‘some random main’ to login so they can complete whatever task they need.
You’re missing the point. You’re coping. Or you’re protecting your money source. Either way you’re trying to justify things that shouldn’t be a thing to begin with. If Blizzard had shut down GDKP’s before they had a chance to really pick up steam then vanilla would be a very different game today. That “social” aspect that everybody loved to praise vanilla for would still be a thing. And before you say it! Yes if you join a guild you’re being social. You know that’s not what I’m talking about, and that argument you were about to make in that regard is deliberately missing the point.
GDKP ruined vanilla plain and simple. GDKP’s and boosts. For as much as vanilla was supposed to be a return to the social aspects of the MMO, vanilla truly is where the last bastions of socialization went to die. GDKP’s and boosts set a precedent in classic wow that persisted through the various different era servers. And Blizzard’s poor handling of it took what should of been a beloved trip to a better time and ruined it for a lot of people. You can blame Wrath or Season of Discovery or Retail or any other era for the reason why vanilla is a paltry shadow of it’s former self, but really GDKP’s and boosting killed it way before anything else did. Maybe if Blizzard did something about it sooner, Whitemane would be full pop not medium right now.
Point is that excluding phase 2 of Season of Discovery, the way the VAST MAJORITY of the community plays this game is, depending on your era server, is you get gold, you spend that gold to have someone level you through a dungeon. Then once you’re max level you get more gold and spend that on getting people fully head-to-toe geared to carry you through raids and get you the gear. The most popular way to play Era wow, whether it be vanilla or Wrath, is to buy gold and let other people play it for you.
Yes yes I know you’re gonna say that’s not how you play it. Well good for you. Here’s your pat on the back. But it doesn’t change the fact that the vast majority of the community prefers to play the game this way. If you can even call paying people to play the game for you “playing the game”.
The game is still very social…
The only way Era is not social is if one makes an effort to not interact with people or decides that the community is wrong and chooses, again, to not interact with them.
Turns out there are thousands of people on Era playing the game the way they enjoy it. That’s why there are GDKPs, boosts, etc. because they add enjoyment to the people who have been playing on those servers for half a decade.
You have a very specific set of people you do things with in the game don’t you? You strike me as someone who has a set of people that you always run dungeons and raids with and you don’t deviate from it at all. There’s more to being social than just being in a guild.
I’m done though. I’m never going to convince you. It’s a waste of time even trying anymore. You think GDKP’s are a good thing. I don’t. We’ll never see eye to eye. So I’m done.
I run naxx with the same people (in a gdkp), but every other raid I will do with whatever GDKP run is there at the moment.
For pvp I usually solo queue but sometimes run with premade…
Yeah, I stated multiple other ways that people meet. GDKPs happen to probably be the biggest one (bigger than leveling, bigger than pvp, etc). Turns out killings dragons and getting gold is an activity people enjoy doing together
Well I didn’t mean to set people off, that’s for sure. I think just about everything BOTH of you is saying… And I think the only thing you can do is try to grab the fun you want, and let the other stuff roll off yer back.
For me, every iteration I’ve played in classic is a breath of fresh air, prolly because I’m a basic boomer at this point. Played back in the day. I have great interactions, literally all the time, and compared to retail-warts and all- this game is bliss.
Well creating your own group content is the name of the game in classic vanilla. I’m of the opinion that was clearly shown in this thread so far that gdkps and boosts have done nothing but negatively hurt the game. Then there’s people, the majority of classic wow enjoyers who feel that gdkp and boosting is the best way to play the game. WoW is nothing if not a community built around min-maxing the fun out of things. The people who support gdkp’s and boosts claim that there is still that social aspect to the game and whatnot, and they’re right by a very small technicality because you do have to socialize at least a little bit.
But I view boosting and gdkp’s as other people playing the game for me, and if I’m going to pay other people to play the game for me, then I’m not going to waste my money on a sub when there’s other, better games that my 15 bucks a month can go towards. I view it the same as like take someone in Diablo 2 who hacks a level 99 character with all the BiS pieces for their character. At that point why even play the game? The game is about the journey to level cap, in vanilla especially. The game is about the hunt for the items. It’s not about paying someone else to experience the journey for you. It’s not about paying someone else to hunt down items for you.
The people who enjoy/support gdkps and boosts typically, but not always, are the types of people who never really do much outside of the parameters of their guild. If they wanna do a dungeon, they keep it in house with nothing but guildies. If they want to do a raid, they only do it with guildies. That’s a valid way to play the game for sure, but it’s only like 1/3rd of the entire social aspect of the game, and for gdkp enjoyers to say that boosts and gdkps haven’t detracted from the social aspect of the game at all is just blatantly wrong. Especially when you take into consideration that since boosts and gdkps have become mainstream in the classic era servers, the community has “devolved” into the same toxic community that plagues retail.
At the start, before abusive boosts and gdkps you’d pass by someone out questing and trade buffs with one another, or trade a “/wave” or whisper a thanks if you were a class that couldn’t directly buff others(cough warrior main cough). You’d get into random conversations with people running to the same places as you. You’d group with others doing the same quests, and in a lot of cases just knock out the zone together. Now a days however, in the unlikely event you do come across somebody who is out in the zone doing the same things or the same quests that you’re doing, odds are they are not going to respond to anything you say. Furthermore what’s most likely to happen is they’ll either train mobs onto you for taking their farm, or use you getting ganked by a similar level member of the opposite faction as an opportunity to run away and see another day, despite the 2v1 being well within your two’s favors.
I played on my Alliance Warrior on Whitemane all day today for the most part just to see if I could see the things that Sa was talking about. I actually saw the opposite more often than not. Most zones felt like ghost towns and the only people I encountered were afk, or when I asked if they wanted to group for the quest we were both doing told me to either shut the eff up or just instantly put me on their block list. How very retail Andy of them. I tried forming a group for Deadmines for an hour and only got like 2 other people. I tried joining a group for deadmines a bit later and never saw anyone posting for anything other than a boost.
Sa will most likely have something to say to rebut everything that I’ve experienced, but like I said I’m done trying to talk about this with them. What I’ve said is just fact. And the wonderful thing about facts are you can choose to believe them or don’t it doesn’t really matter, a fact is still a fact. But don’t get it confused either. I’m not trying to dissuade you from playing vanilla. It’s something everybody who’s a fan of WoW I feel should experience at least once. I’m just trying to temper your expectations going into it, because it’s not going to be anything like any videos you’ve watched from 3+ years ago. Those days are gone.
Hey, I get it…right or wrong, You’re welcome to feel how you want about it, but that’s not at all what I was getting at with this thread.
I left OG WoW when Ulduar went live, and classic has hit that same point, and run into the exact same issues as back in '08/'09. At some point, classic will catch up to where retail is, and answering the same complaints will give us… Wait for it… Retail Wow.
Classic realms are Blizzards troll showing us why this community complains their way to exactly what we have.
My issue is this- my toons that played in the Vanilla world when current are STILL there…have accrued thing upon thing for about twenty years. Different game? Kinda. When I log into era, WotlkC, HC, it’s like an unreal side game. Nobody has anything, and I cant just take Chogg on his og Warg mount to Barrens and see one million levellers.
Just so we’re clear, this thread is not a gripe, nor is it sour… I just wanted to get insight into how people have found connection to these NEW game modes. Last night, after hours on Era realms, I logged into the realm I played most on in Vanilla wow, on three different old Alts made around Wotlk era, and just went fishing or flew around and f****d off. That was more real to me.
While I agree the boosting/GDKP situation is a problem for the game that makes things more of a challenge, I have never had an issue finding a group for a leveling dungeon. You simply use the various methods of communication and you’ll find a group. (LFG Channel, General, Trade, and Whisper /who level-level range.)
Like I said those in my last reply on this thread, I did spend an entire day trying to play the game like GKDP and Boosting wasn’t there. And the end-result was I really couldn’t. After spending over an hour to get a group for Deadmines, only to get 2 people to join, running into people who rarely talked and if they did it was to sling an insult, and bumping into people who just avoided you like you had digital covid, the vanilla classic experience has been made worse by boosts and gdkps. And people who say things like “You can still find a dungeon group EVENTUALLY.” or “Give it enough time and your groups will fill.” are the exact problem. If you’ve accepted the fact that it takes over an hour on average to find a group for a dungeon with people not in your guild or own little clique, to the point where you believe that’s justifiably okay, that’s a problem. And most people find getting randomly whispered “Hey, you wanna tank/heal this dungeon?” by people they don’t know to be rather annoying.
Others have made the argument here that the reason why it takes so long to find a pug group for anything is because the playerbase is so small compared to say Wrath era or SoD. Yeah normal vanilla classic servers are smaller than those right now, but Whitemane is a medium pop server, that’s still more players than OG vanilla servers had, so that’s a lame excuse at best.
Ever go to a party, and then you strike up a conversation with someone to make friends with cool people, and then the buzzed guy sits down and wants to turn the conversation to Palestine liberation again and again… Then you look over at the cool person who weighed in on your question, and they’re gone, and now you’re listening to the buzzed guy talk about Palestine?
This is that.
I bet gdkps in classic suck, I don’t know. I wouldn’t prolly run one. If I could run into two or five people having fun killing humans in Tol Barad this summer, great. Just want to find a good place to do that. I know there’s a short time you can enjoy it before “community” ruins it.
I already know I don’t want to play the game with ALOT of the people who came into the game around the time my friends and I left the game.
I mean, start the group, I bet there’s a ton of people who would join. It’s not like this gdamned content is brutally hard. Imagine gatekeeping in a Retro videogame for fifteen year old gear that has literally no monetary value in the Current (actual?) Game.
Come on over to Grobb and give Legacy a try! We have a few extensive description posts here on the forums. No GDKPs, we are the only alliance guild on the server and we raid frequently, we just downed 4 Horsemen in Naxx a couple days ago. Always looking for good players!
what is the average “buy in” GDKP (in gold) to run a Molten Core or LBR?
whitemane