Hello, I would like to present the concept of the “Parallel Running Season” here.
Sometimes, I stroll through the old world and think about the many beautiful times we’ve had. Whether it was the ICC patch, the raid on Battle of Dazar’alor, or even the Siege of Orgrimmar. No matter how wonderful it once was, it is forever forgotten once the next patch arrives at our doorstep.
With the Parallel Running Season, I aim to introduce a system to revive the old world and relive the good old times.
Welcome to
The Parallel Running Season
In each upcoming season, a parallel season will run simultaneously, ensuring that each upcoming patch activates two sets of patch content at the same time.
The Parallel Season ensures that the content of the reactivated patch is elevated to the current level. The dungeons and raid of this season are brought up to the current content level, allowing players to choose whether to engage with the current patch, the revived past patch, or both patches together.
Let me provide some examples:
Season 1 - Dragonflight (Patch 10.0)
Parallel Season - WOTLK ICC Patch (Patch 3.4)
Imagine if this system were already in place at the beginning of Dragonflight. Now, you could choose whether to continue the story in Dragonflight or relive the past. Of course, you could switch at any time and even experience both paths to completion.
Dragonflight’s Season 1 produced a total of 8 dungeons, whereas Patch 3.4 added only the 3 dungeons of Icecrown Citadel.
With the PRS (Parallel Running Season) system, players could have visited a total of 11 dungeons, each brought to the same equipment level on normal, heroic, and mythic difficulties. (Also the PRS-Dungeons are part of M+)
At the beginning of Dragonflight, players would have had access to two raids offering good equipment: the Vault of Incarnations and Icecrown Citadel. The loot from both raids would have been as follows: Normal 398, Heroic 402, Mythic 415.
All dungeons and raids will, of course, be adjusted accordingly for the PRS.
The legendary questline for Shadowmourne would be particularly interesting, as the PRS system can make old, now uninteresting legendaries fully engaging once again!
Some other example:
Season 3 - Dragonflight (Patch 10.2)
PRS - Battle for Azeroth - Battle for Dazar’alor (Patch 8.1)
Imagine if the current season of Dragonflight had a PRS alongside Patch 8.1, which introduced Dazar’alor.
In this scenario, players wouldn’t receive any new dungeons, but they would have access to the two past raids, ‘Battle of Dazar’alor’ and ‘Crucible of Storms’. Therefore, with the PRS principle, players would have three current content raids, which should keep them busy. Additionally, there would be so much variety in the loot drops that no two players would likely be alike.
With the PRS in this variant, players could engage not only with the new content in the Emerald Dream, which might seem somewhat boring, but also with the renewed version of two Island Expeditions, the Battle for Darkshore, and Faction Assaults on Zandalar and Kul Tiras, all to acquire loot at the current content level.
As a small mixed feature, the Heart of Azeroth could be introduced here, given to every player for this specific patch, and it could be filled with three abilities again.
The content from Patch 3.4, which no longer is a PRS, would revert to its original state from 3.4 and NOT be elevated to 10.0.
The last example:
Season 4 - Dragonflight (Patch 10.3)
PRS - Classic Naxxramas Patch (Patch 1.11)
Now, imagine the next patch from Dragonflight will NOT have a PRS.
Patch 10.3 looks like this: Players are allowed to revisit the raids of Dragonflight one by one, experiencing the new old content repeatedly. There are no new dungeons, no new raids; Patch 10.3, roughly speaking, will not introduce any innovations that make it special or otherwise.
And now, imagine the next patch from Dragonflight will have a PRS.
In this presented variant: With Patch 1.11, the release of Classic Naxxramas.
With Patch 1.11, the Classic Raid Naxxramas was introduced, which players can visit alongside the rotating Dragonflight raid. Naxxramas offers an extremely large raid with a lot of loot, including the legendary item: ‘Atiesh, Greatstaff of the Guardian’. Items like the corrupted Ashbringer and many others can attract many players, as they are not only extremely powerful but also represent true treasures in World of Warcraft.
The raid will be introduced according to the current system in Normal, Heroic, and Mythic+, but there could also be a special event:
Special 1: Instead of redesigning the raid in normal, heroic, and mythic, the raid will only be playable in HEROIC mode and contain loot between item levels 506 and 515. Only the legendary staff Atiesh will have an item level of 528. At the same time, Naxxramas will be counted as the only 40-man raid, to preserve the classic feeling here.
Special 2: As an additional special feature, the patch could be enhanced with the ‘Battle for Andorhal’. This was once a PvP event in the open world where three factions fought against each other. Although this event was introduced with Cataclysm and quickly disappeared from the game, it fits thematically with Patch 1.11.
How the PRS is chosen
Either Blizzard selects them by themselves or lets the players decide through a survey which PRS will appear next. Also possible would be a draft process where Blizzard gives us three options to choose from, and then we select one that appears for ALL players.
The Adventages
The good thing is: The system has exclusively advantages and rather few disadvantages.
The advantages are primarily:
- The old world is filled with more content.
- Nostalgia
- More opportunities to equip your character.
- Players are no longer forced to play THE endgame content; they can now opt for alternatives without being weaker than other players.
- Less boredom between patches.
- There will be unique experiences that will never occur again.
- And much more!
The disadvantages - What if I don’t like PRS?
The good thing is: PRS is completely optional and does NOT force ANY player to play the revived content.
You receive NO disadvantages if you simply ignore the PRS.
You can fully equip yourself through the current content patch, play it through entirely, and end up being the best player in the world without having played the revived patch even once.
Playing the revived patch does offer bonuses, such as more armor choices, different gear, more chances to obtain gear, and especially a lot more fun, but if you choose to forego this, you will not be penalized in any way.
No, the developers should focus on more important things!
And they do, when the majority of players are having fun and are even more engaged than before, then the developers can focus even better on future patches and bring even better content than before.
The development effort for Plunderstorm and for further ‘experiments’ is higher than it will be for a PRS, which captures significantly more players and fills significantly more time between patches.
The PRS system creates a win-win situation because
the players who like and actively play the system will receive countless benefits from it and will have double the fun in every patch.
And the players who don’t like the system also benefit from it,
because these players can expect even better updates from the developers in the future!
This is truly a completely optional path that no one has to take.
And now you!
Which time in WoW did you enjoy the most, that you now wish to have back? Which raid was simply THE raid for you, and which feature captivated you especially, but has now become completely irrelevant?