In Midnight, all classes of World of Warcraft change. Over 100 abilities disappear, leading to drastic adjustments.
In a few days, the beta of World of Warcraft Midnight will start, but there has already been a long alpha phase in the last few weeks. The changes in the alpha have quite surprised some players – as nearly all specializations will lose some abilities.
What changes in World of Warcraft? With the upcoming expansion Midnight, the gameplay of most classes will drastically change. This is not only due to the new talents but also to a comprehensive overhaul of all classes.
Blizzard’s stated goal: Complexity should be reduced, and every key press should have a clear impact. It should no longer be necessary to use multiple “buffing” abilities in succession for the actual damage spell to have a greater effect.
The result: Numerous abilities will disappear or turn into passive talents that then impact the core abilities.
Fewer abilities, better gameplay?
The YouTuber and analyst Bellular has delved deeper into “pruning,” or the reduction of abilities. In one of his latest videos, he analyzes exactly which classes lose how many abilities or even gain new ones in some cases. He concludes that on average, 2.8 keys disappear per specialization, but “utility” abilities are less affected. If you’re interested in the entire analysis, you can watch it here:
Bellular concludes in his analysis that Blizzard has fundamentally achieved its goal, and the game would feel better in most cases – although some exceptions remain that need improvement.
What is Blizzard aiming for with this? The developers have recognized that the classes and specializations of World of Warcraft have simply become too complex over the many years. Particularly for newcomers wanting to dive in, the complexity of the classes can be overwhelming, so Blizzard has even implemented a kind of “emergency feature” – the 1-button rotation. This way, players don’t have to engage with the class much and can focus more on the whole “surrounding”.
It has become increasingly clear that this is not a healthy state for a game. The reduction of keys for the specializations is intended not only to simplify the rotations but also to shrink the action bars a little.
However, one must also be clear: A reduction of about 3 “pressable” abilities per specialization is not a gigantic difference. Whether a class has 29 or 26 keys available, it won’t drastically change the core gameplay – except in some extreme cases where the class fantasy is also revamped. One such case is the Shadow Priest, which is being completely turned upside down by Blizzard again.
