A World of Warcraft without addons will be quite different – and should remain the same. What will change with Midnight is revealed by the Game Director.
One of the biggest and most controversial changes that World of Warcraft will experience in the next expansion “Midnight” is the abolition of numerous addons. Interface modifications that players have relied on for decades will no longer work. This will also change how WoW is played – and yet the difficulty is not supposed to change.
What addons will be prohibited? In principle, the functionality of all addons that access the current combat situation will be restricted. Anything that reads processes in combat in any way – such as the position of characters, current debuffs or mechanics – will be disabled. This mainly includes addons like “WeakAuras” or “Deadly Boss Mods.” The addons will not be “banned,” but simply rendered unusable by Blizzard, as they will no longer be able to access the corresponding information.
What was said? In a conversation with PC Gamer magazine, WoW’s Game Director, Ion Hazzikostas, spoke in more detail about how the game is supposed to change in Midnight. Because at the same time as the abolition of many addons, other aspects are also changing. Many classes will be significantly simplified and their core rotation reduced.
The goal here is to reduce the cognitive load of most classes in the game, so that players can also focus on things other than their own rotation. Something that could definitely become necessary if addons no longer provide significant assistance in combat.
Many of these changes have not been in the works for years, [but only for a few months]. When we began the conversation with the community about our design philosophy and considered where we wanted to go with addons, we immediately heard feedback like: “That’s all good and well, but how am I supposed to track this mechanic now?” And internally we thought: “They’re not wrong.”
There are several examples of this. Many classes, such as Beast Mastery Hunters or Arcane Mages, often rely on buffs that must be seen to the second to extend them in time or not to cast a spell too late when the enhancing buff is no longer active. In the standard interface, it is almost impossible to see these buffs clearly – as they are one of many small icons in the buff bar, and due to the combat situation with many effects, these icons often bounce around.
Therefore, Blizzard has introduced functions in recent months that allow players to better view active effects and highlight them clearly on the screen.
For even though many addons will soon disappear, some functions will become a fixed part of World of Warcraft. The goal is to create a fair playing field for everyone. Basic addon features should be offered in a simplified form by the game, allowing players to retain the advantage of seeing what addons provide – but they must solve the “problems” in battles themselves.
The fear of overly simplistic classes
However, some are concerned that Blizzard is overdoing it with the changes. Healer gameplay is supposed to be drastically simplified and many classes will become simpler. Many fear that WoW will become “too easy” and there will be no longer any way to hone one’s skill and stand out from others. After all, there is already a “1-key feature” that beats many average players.
The progression from a beginner to a good player lies in mastering your rotation so that you can perform it on a practice dummy. I know which keys I need to press, I equip myself correctly, I can somewhat achieve the maximum potential in a completely static situation.
And now we will add a few raid mechanics to that. The damage of each player decreases. When distracted, everyone performs slightly worse. When we talk about PvE skill, much of it is about what percentage of your theoretical damage you can achieve while multitasking.
It sounds fundamentally just like the World of Warcraft we already know – just without the added hurdle of the numerous interface addons that in most cases were needed to even keep up in high-level content.
Perhaps WoW will also cut off a few slices from other things – like Legion, as the expansion was quite dark and thus good.
