So dungeon spellcleave/any-cleave quick leveling, mass gold farming from some spots, world buff raid speed meta… and let me guess - also big pop realms with overblown economy and bots to make everything in AH plentiful and cheap?
We have “no changes” Classic and players altered it beyond recognition.
They already stated they won’t do patch progression.
People like fresh because vanilla is best when fresh. When it’s AQ/Naxx time it’s getting stale so people will leave to next fresh classic or TBC, whatever is fresh.
If people will even bother with most of phase 6. FRESH.
Because FRESH was proven replay-ability for vanilla tested by private servers. Some even run at 2x speed with fresh + static main realm to which each fresh is merged at the end and new fresh starts.
No. We never had no changes, we had some changes. By no changes I mean NO CHANGES. Population, nodes, respawn rates, abilities etc. etc. as it was when Vanilla went live; and nothing added - or subtracted - from the game as it was in Vanilla.
I do not give two hoots about ungeon spellcleave/any-cleave quick leveling, mass gold farming from some spots, world buff raid speed meta…
I just want the game as it was when I first began playing, not the Classic hodgepodge.
This does not exist and your obsession on playing patch 1.1 is highly artificial. Even if they would find and run a 1.1 version people around you would never play like it was back then and you would quickly find “changes” like different screen resolution or your inaccurate memory…
Can you even describe what you want to play without using a patch number? What exact experience and world state are you expecting? If you have precise requirements then there may be a solution that isn’t a specific patch.
I want: Old talent trees (we have this - but people clamor for changes), No dismount in flight button, No Quest helper arrows that pops up now and then, No mounting aboard ships, No open all mail button, Hunters that can’t shoot and move at the same time, Spawn rates like in Vanilla, Server population like in Vanilla, Mail functions like in Vanilla … and all the zillion other small and not so small things that were changed for “QoL” reasons … I don’t really care about patch number as long as it’s lower than 1.12
Edited to add: Plus I’d like a chance on the old mounts (why I said the beginning).
More add: I play for nostalgia, for the journey, not to be first, best, biggest … and all those tiny, medium and big changes all take away a little bit of my joy each time I meet them.
So you would likely have to play on the old client on a customized old version that isn’t official. There are “slow” and “oldified” servers of vanilla but mostly a niche (and they don’t revert class design but like keep available gear limited on the top).
I’m not some #nochanges fanatic. I don’t need “no changes” I need a cool game and old WoW usually is fun when fresh. All they have to do is limit player cheese. SoM has good ideas, but all will make or break on the implementation (instance exp, mass pulls, boosting, no mega realms). It will be similar to your requirements just with modern client (mail, hunters etc.)
SoM will be more private server experience than Classic which had actual data from vanilla but the playerbase just abused everything possible to give the least vanilla experience ever.
You’re rigth in so far as the player base ruined it … more on the PvP servers than in “my reservation” Rp-PvE. But Blizz HAD the choice of being 100% faithful to Vanilla and they lost it - somewhere between test at Blizzcon and launch.
NN
Madseason made a video about the difference between “how it was technically back then” and “how it was played back then”. Classic was trying to have as much original data as possible. This resulted in least realistic vanilla feel of the game. Now they are trying to change the game (block cheese) to get “how it was played” and not how technically it was back then. Players changed and now they have to alter the game so the players don’t alter it any further.
Private servers that wanted to recreate blizz-like experience had to do the same thing. Like gold farming from DM - it was possible back then but now everyone knows it and amount of gold would be way higher - so depending on server there were changes like another patrol or one patrol moving at the speed of light - it’s still possible to farm DM but much harder - getting more realistic amount of gold generated.
And there was no pathing abuse pulls. You could do ZG mass pulls but only by running in circles as a frost mage and alike - pretty much 1:1 form old Faxmonkey videos from actual vanilla The only pathing abuse from vanilla I saw was like first boss in DM:N.
The last two chapters are not something I can understand at all, I never tried a Pserver, and I haven’t seen how to’ s or even been gold farming … as a level 51 I had a hard time finding the 10 G for the Brewfest ram in TBCC. As I said, I play for fun, for the journey!
Don’t start involving me in a load of tecnicalities and dizzying talk.
Blizz COULD have made the UI totally like Vanilla - they did choose not to!
Blizz COULD have made a Vanilla experience … the test during Blizzcon actually was! But they chose not to.
Whether it was because of people clamouring for changes - which I seriously doubt, as all I spoke to duing the test run were happy - or because they wanted to show us that ‘you think you do, but you don’t’; which I also doubt as I do not like conspiracy theories - I do not know. All I klnow is that someone somewhere seriously worked hard on ruining what could have been even more fantastic.
The problem is people won’t do the journey if given the opportunity. You had problems with 10g while others had 10 000 gold prior to TBC.
Blizzard does not give you vanilla experience but players around you. And players around won’t give you vanilla experience because that’s not “optimal gameplay”.
Nowadays our displays have much higher resolutions.
Yes I know all of this. But ffs. let ME do the journey in peace. I don,t mind people using addons to get what they like, I can’t see the results; I don’t mind people having even millions of G, BiS from day 2, all the things money can buy. It does not hurt me. It’s still there, when I and my slow collegues - or my guildies’ alts - make it to that instance. The supply of items and G won’t EVER be depleted.
What hurts me is the zillion of small, medium and big changes Blizz unnecessarily made to the UI
It’s not the resolution, I’m talking of It’s the, arrows, helpers FP icons, carets …
All the things not there in Vanilla. Or removed from …
Edited to add:
Plus the one thing we can’t have from Vanilla no matter how what and why. Everybody NOT starting at the same time.
You answered your own question. Also the population there is raiding naxx and have characters in full bis gear? All content is unlocked and finished. It is not the same thing as a fresh server at all.
Yes. I want to progress my character and guild from the beginning. Do all the content in the cadence it is being released. All the raid releases, Azuregos and Kazzak, Nightmare Dragons, Scarab Lord and so on. While at the same time having an alive server where stuff is happening, where people are leaving city hubs to take world buffs and other resources. And travelling to the raids causing huge battles in BRM and elsewhere. These things are for me what vanilla is all about.
Maybe you want this, but this is really not the Vanilla experience.
We did not all start on the same day. When I began, some people were already at level 60, some were in between, some just started same as me, and still after me new people arrived as well.
The only pathing abuse from vanilla I saw was like first boss in DM:N.
- make it to that instance. The supply of items and G won’t EVER be depleted.