- I dont like the UI, and can’t find any UI addons that do the trick either.
- I dont like dragon riding but they seem to be making it more and more of a thing.
- I absolute cannot stand the new talent trees.
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It’s been years, since I last played retail. Looking from outside, the only thing that I consider an asset nowadays are the different levels of difficulty in dungeons.
Apart from that, there are so many things I actually dislike in retail, that I didn’t even buy the Dragonflight expansion anymore. While I still bought the Shadowland expansion, I didn’t even play it a single day. 10 Minutes into Shadowlands I was so utterly disgusted, that I just logged. That character is still stuck in the intro to this day.
That’s it. Retail is a distant past. Something remote.
From all those things about retail, let’s just mention one aspect.
I love the open world. It may be dangerous. I may die. But in Classic you still can go everywhere, no matter your level or race.
It started somewhat with BC. The new starting areas were separated from the rest of the game. But there were ways to join and decide about your own path. It became worse with the death knight quest chain in LK. But well, I didn’t fancy DKs much anyway.
But then, with the Cata Beta, the isolated starting areas hit. Terrible game experience. I absolutely hated this. And left for good for EVE Online before Cata really hit. EVE Online: One single cluster, one big open world to explore. Yay!
Got back for WoD, absolutely hated the intro, felt like prison but got through it. Didn’t like the rest much either and left again. And back to EVE Online. Basically the same for Legion and BfA.
CCP managed badly and by 2018 I was on my way out of EVE Online when Blizzard announced Classic. So I came back in 2019 for this. It was not the same for obvious reasons, but until today it’s decent enough to log in whenever I find some time do do so.
And then I tried Shadowlands and decided 10 minutes into the intro, that I’ve had enough of this. For good.
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I like the leveling period. Also classic is more kino, it gets the ‘feel’ right.
Retail has nothing to offer to someone like me.
Also retail does everything in its power to stop interaction with other players. Instead of going around and socializing with people in order to create a group, then everyone travels to the dungeon location - you just have a button ‘dungeon finder’ that you just click, wait 5 minutes, then boom you are teleported into the dungeon with a bunch of people who dont know each other and seem to be uninterested to make any connection anyway. Just breeze through the dungeon get the loot and get out.
And this is just one example of stuff the game does that takes out the MMO from the MMORPG of the game.
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Sorry to burst your bubble but era is no different “hey” and “bye” is what you are most likely reading and that’s it. also there are also many players who just wanted to get boosted and “socializing” becomes harder. it’s the general shift in the gaming community.
I will never “get used to” Retail. I stay Era / HC thanks. Already gameplay in Cata is too not me playing, but game playing me. I think so first time around, even more now, being older and more careful with my time.
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It’s funny because when I watch a classic player stream, they have lots of addons
Can you elaborate? I mean I understand from QoL standpoint, but that’s just mostly stuff that is designed better. I’m talking about stuff that is less confusing, markers on the map is a grey area because 90% of the people already used questie in 2005.
Aside that your actual character is more involved. You have a more intricate rotation, CD management, bosses are tougher and have more mechanics.
In Vanilla? Half the classes have a one button rotation. Fire/frost/shadowbolt spam 90% of the time. Melee is just autoattack and waiting for that one button to come off CD, especially paladin. If that isn’t the game playing for you then I don’t know what is really.
Look Thalissa I like you, but I feel you cling to vanilla more on principle rather than based on facs. It makes you come across like someone who mindlessly goes “VANILLA GOOD RETAIL BAD” without giving actual reasons aside from the general ones we keep seeing. Vanilla was amazing when it launched, but it had a lot of flaws. Flaws that had to be fixed for the game to grow to what it is today.
Is retail perfect? Hell no, but it’s fun and it’s the most popular version of wow to date.
Sure it lacks the RPG feel Vanilla/TBC had, but the skill ceiling is higher and as a casual you’re not limited with just leveling chars over and over.
People that compare vanilla to retail often say that retail has become a themepark mmo, but they fail to realize vanilla already was a themepark mmo with it’s linear design where you go from zone to zone with actuals guided quests. If you look at mmo’s before wow you see what I mean. They were mostly just open sandboxes without quests or even instances.
I watch no streams, I play. And I have no addons. I can speak for me only.
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you are a rare person, the majority of players are assisted by addons
This. I want discover for myself. not told where go. I not want bushes and quest items glittering. Not want any markers on map except for gathering and Quest hand in dots! I LIKE world to be big and confusing, any and all “QoL” things always just make game easier. I use only Addons to hide minimap in Wrath.
Levelling is what I do. I use almost all abilities. I not follow streamers or meta-bulids. And in Vanilla can do. In Cata not, as talent points forced.
Don’t know any more of Retail, so I not compare to Retail, as not played since BfA. But compare Vanilla / HC to Wrath and even more to Cata (which I clearly remember from launch), I much prefer Vanilla playstyle for freedom of choice, for flavour thing like bullets, feed pet, mats for fire, given food and drink from start … No bling, no breadcumb quests (almost) No nothing forced on you. If close minimap to not see yellow dots, you on your own.
But I like levelling chars over and over … is what I do!
I talk levelling, not dungeons. In open world from Cata on, game tell you what to do and where. Thaa wat I mean with Game play you. You not decide! Game do. If in Cata I want go quest in swamped 1K Needles, cannot! Need to go stupid Feralas, do pre Quest which is inane Pseudo PvP versus NPCs to go have fun in 1K Needles. In Vanilla I just go somewhere, find questgiver, do quests, no … or almost no linearity.
Is OK fix the flaws, but too much fixed, game streamlined. I prefer faults with freedom over other faults and hand holding.
I know poeple use addons, I see when people ask for help, strange numbers on quest descriptions, If I group, people just pull me along telling where to go, and where is items we look for. I not like this, like play slow and discover where is items for myself. It is addictive. I advice everybody do this from time to time. Is anti-dote to stress and hurry-hurry mentality from everyday life.
PS to do, you need addons to hide minimap in Wrath 
I tried Retail and it’s just a completely different game. I don’t even like the graphic style and spell animations.
The game feels very linear, a problem that pretty much all expansions I played had, even BC.
I did some LFR and it’s just a zerg. After a wipe I tried to read mechanics quickly while we were starting, which is eh, ok, but not great. Also people say how cool retail is because bosses have mechanics, well for the most part it’s still don’t stand in front or behind dragons, get out of coloured stuff on ground, maybe LoS stuff so it’s not rocket science except the odd 1 thing you need to know. I hear later difficulties is same you just use weakauras to tell you what to do.
I am missing a lot of stuff from classic, but I still find it the best version there is, including the most consistent open world experience by far.
3 Likes
Forgot this - fully agree!
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Why do you play Classic, and not retail?
Cos i enjoyed cata back in 2010.
But i am quickly finding out that this cata classic has no resemblence to what i once played. They are nowhere near what it was. Two different games.
I liken this to a retail funnel. They made this so easy you get bord and get “funneled” into retail with its ingame shop and micro transactions and tokens…oh wait…there are tokens in cata classic as well even though in 2010 there were NO TOEKENS at all in cata. Its a cash grab. A shameless cash grab
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Blizzard will never wrap this game up as you say unless subs are so few that it costs them money to run this gam,e. If they are not makign money then it will shut down. The emulator scene will take over just like any other game.
I understand that blizzard needs to make money. This is not a charity. But the way they are doing it is ticking off a lot of players. Timegating crap for the sake of a sub. Intentionally slowing down the pace and progress of a player for the sake of a subscription. This, while ok for some - they are still a minority i think, is not ok with the majority of players.
I timed a flight from darnassus to tenaris.
In that time i went to the bathroom and did a big one. Went to the kitchen and cooked two burgers and plated it all up and the flight was still going. And this is ok with people? This is ok with blizzard? For the sake of a sub and prolonging th egame they are ok with people spending nearly 15 min of time to get from one place to another?
Retail is about completionism and instanced high endgame content, me personally got bored of this after BfA. I dont wanna spend most of my played mmorpg time doing instanced content and i dont care about post endgame progression.
And thats why i prefer Classic, especially Vanilla. Wich is way less focused on the endgame / post and more on the process of getting there.
We all agree Cataclysm is more retail than Classic but i would say even Tbc was more retail than Classic. Where main appealing was also endgame instanced content: heroics, raids and arena. Of course its not so extreme like post-Cataclysm but at the end, most expansions did was extending the endgame.
And its not like i dont want endgame, but the wow one isnt the most appealing to me. If some of you knows DAoC, thats the one i like. And thats another reason i prefer Vanilla: World pvp. I just wish they focused more on that, open world endgame instead of instanced.
You are travelling through an inmense continent, what do you expect? Damn, you had to wait a huge 15 min. Lol. Even flight paths are a bit OP for me. Is not being able to just /teleport everywhere also timegating? How dare i cannot do everything and go anywhere instantly.
The point of slow progress is to give you more time to enjoy it and make the world feel alive. If you just find it tedious, there are another versions with portals to everywhere, flying mounts, fast traveling, fast gearing. So you can get to the endgame in 2 days without seeing another player and start doing the same content over and over.
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What do i expect? Not to fly for 15 min.
How about instant portals?
WHy make your player base fly for 15 min? I know there are shorter paths taking boats but even those come close, as the boats are on a 2 min timer and you have to take mulitple boats. Meaning the time is almost the same.
Ive played the game off and on since 2010. Also on other servers. So ive leveled so many toons i care not for the journey as in each expansion it is only the end content that matters. Hence they dumb down all content before that. But not the flight times. That stays the same. Time gating stays the same. Crafting CD stay the same. That stuff does not get any easier. No.
I played the classic cata and ran across mayve 5 players that i saw. So it is funny to hear you mentioning playing alone as that what goes on in the servfer i am on. The server is locked so wont take any more people. Meanign it is full so plenty of peeps. But i still did nto see anybody.
Oh you are talking about Cata. Yeah i agree with you, at this point, only endgame matters. So might aswell get to it asap. But although Cata is focus on endgame, its not like retail with 10 different difficulty, mythic plus etc. In Cata you do heroics and raidlog. So its a cheap solution for the lack of content
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Vanilla is the best game Blizzard has ever made!
It’s art!
There are things that not everybody can do and things that are not for everybody.
These elements are like the salt in the soup which makes it delicious.
It’s like a beautiful mosaic, which consists out of bright and colourful stones as well as dark ones - all of these make the whole.
The way (and each moment) through the world was equally appealing as the endgame.
And it all led to an immersive experience of a “real world”, like no other game has ever managed to accomplish, that encouraged people to dive in the world and work together as in the “real world”, where no being can survive without being in some form of dependency or attachment to another being.
It didn’t isolate the player and didn’t reward him for being on a solo-trip so much. It managed to discourage ego-centered behaviour.
No expansion or later “version of Classic” managed to accomplish all of that.
3 Likes