Hey people, I just wanted to share what I’ve been up to in the past days.
I was in need of some good old escapism and thought to revive my sub to the game.
Since I already had a character on a server that was pretty high in population at Classic’s launch I thought to remain on that server and make a new one more geared towards soloing.
Flabbergasted by the absence of players from every corner of the world, even the major cities and chat channels, I grew curious about the server’s current population and found out, according to a rough estimation, that there is nobody else.
So… what do I think of it? Well…
I remember my days as a desperate kid in the original WoW, when questing even simple stuff was 100% times more tedious due to other players hogging all the lootables and mobs, with confusion arising when instructed to look in a certain area and finding it empty, frustration induced by unpredictable respawns that inevitably brought to unnecessary deaths and - the worst - seeing another player casually waltz in to loot that one vein/plant that was surrounded by mobs you spent the last 15 minutes clearing while you’re still targeted by the very last of them ( I know some players have ethics and etiquette, but most don’t).
Not having to do with any of that is truly a boon.
Now it feels like I’m in a theme park opened up just for me… it’s flattering.
Sometimes it can be a little alienating, I’ll admit, but most of the alienation comes from the memories I have of how things were like decades ago: I don’t think someone stepping into it right now would feel the same.
In the end, the game devoid of other players isn’t any weirder than other single player games… what’s amazing is that it does a decent job at that even if it was never intended to.
And with the ascetic calm of solitude come insights that I never truly grasped… like Macros: I love them!
I played many games of many different genres, but being able to code lines into a game that can turn its tangled array of icons into smooth rotations, user-made scripts that enhance their own experience by swapping the mental taxation of the grind with a much more invigorating power-fantasy… this is unlike any of my other experiences: I feel part player and part modder, a generous stretch for snippets of 250 characters or less but still, it’s awesome!
The character is no longer the only one leveling up, my limited LUA skills are growing too, taking the player’s relationship with the game one step further… I think of it as different, in the same way buying a gift for someone and using handicraft to actually make it yourself yield two distinct feelings and degrees of satisfaction.
And all of this before I even begin to ramble about how much I like ( and always preferred) the old system for talents, skills and trainers.
I would recommend a try to anyone who is just as reflexive, or maybe introvert, or perhaps even dysfunctional, as me.
If you kept reading this far, thank you! 
