Some memories of WoW Classic cannot be replicated – but Blizzard doesn’t even try.
The long-awaited Classic version of World of Warcraft is slowly but surely coming closer. After all, an internal beta test is already underway and the launch is scheduled for summer 2019 – so within the next two to five months.
However, the developers already announce that some experiences will not be identical to what players experienced back in World of Warcraft. They provide some examples for this.
Items in the last valid version: All loot will only be implemented in the latest available version in the game. Items will therefore have the stats they had back in patch 1.12 and will not change over time.
As an example, the developers mentioned the warrior helm from the T2 set, the “Helm of Wrath”. This item has changed multiple times between patch 1.0 and 1.12.
- At the beginning, the helm had willpower and agility as attributes.
- With patch 1.5, the helm instead gained stamina, strength, and defense as well as elemental resistances.
- With patch 1.7, the amount of defense on the helm was reduced.
- Patch 1.8 brought a bug fix, allowing the set bonus of the helm to apply to the ability “Whirlwind”.
- With patch 1.9, the helm received a new visual design.
This “history” will not repeat for the helm. Once it is available in the game, it will be implemented in its final version – that is, at the state of patch 1.12.
The Unknown will be missing: Blizzard emphasizes that it will be impossible for the developers to recreate the “unknown”. For example, when players enter Blackwing Lair and fight Nefarian, they already know in advance which weapon will drop there. They know the strength of the Obsidian Edged Blade, so this weapon will no longer be a surprise.
The same goes for the progress in many raids. Back then, it took a long time for players to figure out how to trigger the second phase of the boss fight against Nefarian – if players even got to that boss. Today, most Classic fans will know that a certain number of drakonids had to be killed before the next phase begins.
This unknown and mysterious element cannot be recreated because players cannot simply forget that knowledge.
Many First Kills were only due to bugs: A similar “problem” exists with many bosses in World of Warcraft. Numerous first kills were achieved only because players exploited bugs.
- Most first kills for Ragnaros (Molten Core) occurred only because a bug caused Ragnaros to cease fire the lava eruption after the raid had wiped.
- Chromaggus (Blackwing Descent) was nearly unbeatable because a debuff stacked infinitely on the tanks. Only if you brought Chromaggus to a specific ramp could all players avoid the debuffs.
- C’Thun was considered unbeatable for a long time until a hotfix by the developers reduced the number of summoned tentacles.
These and other bugs, which were a constant part of the player experience back then, will not exist in WoW Classic.
Do you think it’s good that WoW: Classic doesn’t reintroduce the same “bugs” that were present at the release of the respective content in the game? Or would such bugs and oddities belong to a “real” Classic experience?
