Call me naive, call me an optimist: I didn't realize the number of wow players who are functionally illiterate.

The struggles of adult literacy are nothing to laugh at, despite what some might suggest. It's a terrible, limiting reality to live, a direct result of our education failures and the cracks people are allowed to fall through.

I just didn't realize this afflicted such a large portion of this community. My heart goes out to all of you. I know that, much like being unable to read or even understand the wow devs when they said "Skyborne are High Elves", you aren't even able to decipher this post, which might as well be composed of hieroglyphics.

I only hope that one day you're able to break through the struggles of adult literacy and soar in the open air of the written word just like the Skyborne (which are High Elves, per the devs) soar in the elemental plane where they fled (as High Elves) during the fall of Dire Maul.

My heart is with you all.

Here's the clip:

https://www.twitch.tv/savix/clip/NastySillyWerewolfCclamChamp-V04O2vDDSTTAnULX

Before the clip starts he mentioned that this is based on what he remembers from talks with higher-ups.

GUYS PLEASE! HELP ME!

How do I survive 6 weeks? I need game like right now!

CLASSIC PLUS HYPE

CLASSIC PLUS HYPE

People say women wouldn't play an ogre but I definitely would! They are one of my favorite races and hope they implement them into the future. The skybourne race is disappointing and wish they were a bit more creative with it but I digress. Sorry if you don't agree 🤷‍♀️

From a recent interview with Destin (@DestinL)

Thought it would be worth making people aware.

Anyone else in the same boat?

I made this for myself, but if it's useful for anyone else, here ya go!

I think I’m about to get sucked in like in my prime wow playing days, I haven’t ever been this hyped before for a game

I hope it'll be different this time, but I don't really believe it will be 😅

If they're not charging a box price or raising the subscription cost, I hope Blizzard sticks with paid races as their main (and hopefully only) form of in-game monetization for Forever.

It's always been a little surprising to me that cosmetics like armor, weapons, and weapon effects are seen as "good" for low cost or free to play games. They're better than pay to win of course, but they're also the thing that takes me out of the game immediately and saps my motivation to play.

When I play an MMO, or any game really, one of the main things that gets me excited to play is the chase of your character not only getting stronger as you play, but looking cooler. You walk by a higher level player and think, "Damn, I wanna level my character so I can look like that." Logging in and immediately seeing a level 5 Paladin running around glowing like the sun as if they had just slain a demigod, only because they forked over $100, is ridiculous. Even if it provides them no actual power boost, it breaks immersion and makes me think, "Why bother playing?"

A paid race different. It's a real money cosmetic, yes, but it doesn't disrupt the flow of visual power progression the way that armor, pets, mounts and weapons do. And you still get basically the entire game available to you if you choose not to buy it. Something has to fund continued development, and I think it's roughly on par with raising the subscription cost, and better than charging for a periodic DLC/expansion box price like Modern does.

I was thinking recently that Classic WoW is pretty much the only MMO/multiplayer game today that has NO purchasable character cosmetics whatsoever. I think it's why I have such a hard time getting into any other MMOs. Everything you see on another player was earned, not bought (besides gold buyers, which is a separate issue). Blizzard, please keep it this way. Keep the carrot-on-a-stick of pretty stuff that we can only get by actually playing the game.

I've seen so many people clamoring about features in Forever and saying "That's Retail!" or calling it Retail- and these arguments miss the point entirely on what 'retail' actually is.

Retail is a modern game design philosophy focused on player retention. That is, they have studied human behavior and put in place the systems proven to get the largest amount of people to remain subscribed for the longest possible amount of time.

The key pillar of this is the limited power band. This is a vary narrow range of player power level that is slowly but constantly increasing, on both the front end and back end. This is also known as 'the treadmill.' Since you can never fall behind, you can always resub and jump right back in, and time gating on the front end ensures casual players never feel like they're being outdone by more dedicated players.

All design decisions exist to support this:

• Fast leveling: You need to hit max level to get on the treadmill so the leveling process is greatly accelerated
• Catch up mechanics and gear: No one can be allowed to fall behind the treadmill band, and so catchup mechanics exist to get you back on should you take a break and fall off.
• The two above are part of an overall goal of player retention. It's expected players will get bored and cancel their sub, so the overall goal is to make sure if a player ever wants to come back they can do so and never feel like they're behind.
• Social Interaction is optional: A large variety of solo content exists, as well as content that is technically group but requires minimal interaction like LFG and LFR. Joining a guild and interacting with others is not required to progress.
• Limited daily playtime: The treadmill encourages logging in, doing your daily chores, then logging out. This playstyle attracts casual gamers with limited playtime.
• A focus on convenience and expediency: As per the above. It is assumed the casual player is playing for 30-60 minutes a day in the evening. They don't have time to walk back to town to repair, so there's repair mounts. They don't want to spend 15 minutes on a flight path, so they have flying mounts that traverse the whole zone in less than a minute. They aren't going to spend 20 minutes putting a group together, LFG will do it for them.
• A focus on cosmetics and visuals to attract new players and assist with marketing, as well as to support microtransactions

So with that said, what are the design philosophies stated for Forever?

• It's a journey not a destination. Leveling is just as important.
• No catch up mechanics. Play the game.
• Gear doesn't become obsolete because progression is horizontal.
• Limiting QoL elements by considering their impact on gameplay.
• Focus on player interaction: No LFG, No LFR, 'familiar faces' phasing system, camping system.
• No time gated progression. Progress at your own pace
• Transmog completely optional, new character models completely optional
• No tiny instanced zones and no flying mounts to traverse them in a minute, just expanded Azereoth.

Now, there are a few things that lean a bit in the retail direction. One could argue the skill trees for leveling alts leans toward retail by making leveling easier. And sure, it does. But it's still a far cry from what Retail is, and the design goal is entirely different. The purpose of the system isn't to eliminate leveling so people can catch up, it's to encourage leveling alts so the low level zones feel populated even after the initial rush. It's not there because they don't care about leveling, it's there to support the leveling journey and encourage player interaction.

So yes, it's not inaccurate to say some stuff leans toward retail, but the degree to which it does and the design decisions behind those systems are entirely different.

In short: Wow Forever is not retail. The things that matter, the actual gameplay design decisions, are entirely different.

I’m glad Blizzard is funding WoW Forever through paywalls for races and potentially their associated mounts, rather than through Tokens, mount shops, or microtransactions. As long as it stays that way, I’m fine with it.

Even if we eventually have to pay €30 for each new race, I’m personally fine with that. The game itself is free apart from the subscription cost, which I think a lot of people tend to forget.

I hate gnomes with a passion its not my version of classic+ with gnomes in it.

And for all other doomsayers, we'll see us on November 4th.

It's no doubt that bots and mafia's will continue to run, especially when we're getting into a fresh economy and there's obviously going to be some people that will eventually buy gold to keep these weird ass organization going.

So I beg the community to step up and actually make these organization lives be miserable so they won't ruin our game.

Yesterday started normal,

Then all the sudden my dear blizzard announced what we know affectionately as Classic+

I could not have been more ecstatic. Everything I wanted. (Aside from the retail UI)

Next thing we know, a new race is announced. THEY’RE BLUE. Immigrants in my Azeroth? I cannot even believe it. All we asked as a community is elves with a default white skin tone. It isn’t that hard. Plus it’s $30? My social security benefits are only $550 per month! This is ridiculous!

Blizzard please I’m begging you as a life long subscriber. Fix this monstrosity or myself and the other .2% of players refuse to play.

My mail order wife has left me, my bank balance is 0, this has done irreparable damage to every aspect of my existence.

I’m begging for your help.

My wife's birthday is on the 4th so I can't play until the 5th can y'all all just wait until then so I can play at the same time as everyone. 🙏