Why arent the unarmored mounts going to be available in vanilla. I am outraged....:(

[Philmahuders-arthas]

@Vakul-lethon

The same response will address both of these points. The reason there was a vendor is because Blizzard knew it would be a bad idea to invalidate rewards they had already given out. Rewards are what underpin an MMORPG. If you show players there accomplishments might get taken away after the fact, that’s a huge blow to player motivation. So the people who did get them got to choose. They mounts were still removed for everyone else.

In this case, the rewards are never going to be introduced, so there is nothing to take away, hence everything works out.

Yes, that is why they kept them in for those who have them. But, it doesn’t support why they are not including them in classic wow. Which makes

@Vakul-lethon

They were originally removed because they were placeholders

Not a very compelling point.

@Vakul-lethon

The frostsaber is a special case. Very, very few players ever get the frostsaber as it requires a lot of grinding. Epic mounts are sort of the “standard package” of what a player should expect to get at end game and you never had a choice between armor or no armor when you bought one for the same speed mount. Also, the frostsaber will obviously be unlockable forever. So it’s really apples to oranges.

It is a special case because it visually shows that having armor doesn’t always equal epic speed. Hence,

@Vakul-lethon

The reskin mounts require meta knowledge to know if someone is on an epic mount or not

Isn’t very compelling either (especially if there are exceptions to the rule of mount visuals).

@Vakul-lethon

There are two axis we can measure this on: definiteness and impact. Naxx is supposed to be in the game, and is part of the definitive rendition of Vanilla. The mounts were removed during Vanilla, as they were not what the Vanilla devs wanted. The impact of Naxx on the meta is also low. Very few people will choose their class based on Naxx, as it’s a very long term goal that isn’t going away. The mounts, however, are an achievable goal if you set yourself to it and power level. They are also on a timer, and therefore the limited nature skews the axis of impact to the point where they start to influence the meta too much for what they are.

The point of the example was to show that players, are already spoiled with knowledge of future outcomes and already basing their goals (regardless of how farfetch it is) around them (what would I do differently?). which makes

@Vakul-lethon

It would not be authentically Vanilla, as this time around we would know long in advance they were being removed, so every player would have a choice on their hands they didn’t have to make in Vanilla. Do I level slowly or power level to get the mounts?

not very compelling since everyone is spoiled to some degree on different things.

@Vakul-lethon

Because we need consistency. If you take a little bit from this patch and a little bit from that patch, you end up with a permutation of Vanilla that is very off from what ever existed. The line is drawn at 1.12 as the definitive edition of Vanilla, and we’re only adding very major pieces of content. No balancing, no individual items, etc.

Blizzard never stated they are 100% going with 1.12.

@Kaivax

Like many aspects of the game, Alterac Valley was tuned and adjusted in different ways from patch to patch in 2005-2006.

First and foremost, we’re planning to use the 1.12 version of Alterac Valley. For many parts of the game like this, we’re picking an original WoW patch that gives us the most clarity for WoW: Classic, and 1.12 is that patch.

They are using 1.12 as a template/guide for clarity, not as a rule of law or an opposition to other changes. Which is why Blizzard is more than willing to add layering and 2 hour trade windows(not that I’m in support of these) to help them achieve (what they believe) a more classical experience/health of the game. For that reason,

@Vakul-lethon

Before 1.12 many things were added and removed from the game. Adding back in this one thing to 1.12 and not adding back in the other items or removing things that didn’t exist for a time would be unfair to the other players whose experiences were defined by those additions/subtractions.

doesn’t sound very compelling.

@Vakul-lethon

I’m only bringing that point up as a counter to people saying that Blizzard is doing something they wouldn’t have done in Vanilla. I’m not saying they’ve committed to following the Vanilla devs in all their decisions. Certainly if the Vanilla devs took something out, it means they really didn’t want it to be there, it was either a test that failed or something they did out of a lack of time.

There were at least some things in vanilla that were a mistake or they wanted to implement. But, this isn’t just an opportunity for current Blizzard to go back and do things right by fixing them (bugs/launch experience). It’s to recapture that classical experience in whatever way they can. With that in mind, some players believe that unarmored mounts should be included in some way for that experience.

Thanks again for responding and being civil.