My goal with this post is not to offend anyone or talk down players who choose to play other game modes than I do. This is simply a reflection, a shrug and a shred of hope for the future.
I played the 2019 classic, but as I quit before TBC my character was moved on. In 2023 I picked up interest for the game again, and the era servers were perfect for me as there were no microtransactions, the game still felt quite vanilla-esque, and the community was thriving.
As SoD released we saw a small drop in the population, but the anniversary realms were what dealt a crushing blow on era. Sure, there are still raids available each day and doing a quick /who for level brackets reveal that people are leveling chars. But the feeling that seeing Stormwind so much more empty makes me really sad.
I have invested many hours in my characters this last year and made a lot of new friends, and starting over in anniversary doesn’t feel like it is for me. The quick content progression, the mega multilayer servers and QoL changes also put me off. Furthermore I hear there’s a lot of botting and RMT trouble on anniversary, and I’m glad that is no longer a big problem on era. What I really want to play is a game as close to vanilla as possible, and at the moment that is still era. And no, I am not saying it is without changes, so you don’t have to point that out.
What gives me a shred of hope for the future is the expectation that transfers from anniversary to era might become possible at a later time, most likely when TBC hits. Either way, many of the players who prefer vanilla over the expansions surely will return at that time. Until then I will be lurking around on era, albeit playing less than I used to.
I will end this off with a question for all the anniversary players, and particularly those who left era for anniversary: have you ever thought of returning to era? Why, or alternatively why not? What is it that keeps you on anniversary?
if you look at it with a bit of perspective, Era still has the population of a high populated server in terms of raid numbers / AH items during Classic re-release.
During the first 12 months of Era, there were only 2 Alliance guilds and 4 Horde guilds. We had max 3-4k items on each AH, and I regard this period as the golden Era of Era. Why? Because we had zero of all the issues that now plague all of the versions of the game, and a little hardcore community that loved the game.
The opposite can be said of when Era popped off - GDKP & botting issues, toxic community, extreme meta culture…
If I look at the state of Era today, given the fact SoD and Anniversary are running in parallel, I believe we are at a pretty good and healthy spot. Will we go through fluctuations? Definitely. It is always been like this…
As for the future, people will always want to continue playing Vanilla. I have zero concerns about the viability of our servers having made it this far.
I was on era about a year ago, had a break and came back recently. The population on horde side pve at least seems more active than a year ago. I understand there has been a drop off with anniversary launching, but so far as I can tell it’s a relatively small drop in context of a steady rise.
Many people will come back. They just implemented a lot of new stuff like Retail S2, SoD new patch, Fresh Anniversary, etc. So people just messing around and trying them. But one thing is sure, people will come back when they get bored, it’s the curse and the beauty of ERA server.
Like a version with new abilities for classes that are unlocked via new quests and Discoveries? And new raids as the max level was increased? And other new levelling cards content?
To be fair, SoD was great fun, until they made the raids too complex and demanding to be pugged easily from trade. I enjoyed mage healing immensely, and every class actually having 3+ viable specs was a breath of fresh air.
There were mistakes, sure, but SoD is a great basis to build classic+ upon.
I feel you pain. I did the same with WotLK and cata. Cata killed my ream long before anniversary and there is never more than two players in any main hub.
So I began anniversary realms and haven’t looked back. I am not paying them for a transfer. As far I’m concerned them chars won’t be looked at until mists. Cata is awful awful awful.
Thanks! Luckily for me, there are still daily raids and quite a few people online at all times, even people leveling new characters. What makes me sad, though, is that the population seems to have more than halved since early fall last year. I guess it’s a cycle and I hope for people to return when TBC releases on anniversary. After all, there are quite a few players who prefer 1-60 over TBC
Yes, this is also my concern. If you look at SoD then you see, that almost all additional stuff is only a backport from retail. It seems, that the current WoW team is not able to take a very different road and to try real new things.
I spent too much time in 2019 leveling my character, so after 6 months with 52 level I understood that I missed all the endgame fun. I couldn’t find any guild who’s starting over in MC, everyone farmed out Scholomance months ago, everyone knew everything. So while I enjoyed that “journey”, it ended in nowhere.
This time I played like everyone else. I mindlessly rushed to 60 level and I actually was able to participate in pre-raid farm, I was able to experience molten core first time with other people who were new to the game, I actually wiped here and there and that was fun.
I plan to continue playing this character in TBC and, possibly, WotLK.
Era is always in soft place of my heart, so it is possible that after Anniversary vanilla will end and I actually would experience all raids, I’ll roll new character on Era some day. But not soon.
I had such a different experience. For me, 2019 was all about exploring. Started during Phase 2, leveled very slow since it was my first time playing WoW. Had very long dungeon runs, had issues farming my gold (I was killing trolls in STV for Wildvine and was selling it at the AH and I had no clue for whatnis used, lol).
My guild creared MC just few days before Christmas, so thats like 3+ months after release. My first Mara run was like 4+ hours long, etc. Game didn’t feel that much “solved” like I have a feeling now. Right now, it all comes to efficiency, HRs and preparation. Many people advising gold selling, boosts, gold trading and many people buying it. Maybe it was the same back then or maybe I didn’t notice it, but for me it was completely different experience then now.
Not saying that I am not enjoying Fresh, this is my favorite version of WoW, had better time last time but still love it anyway.
