As the title say! WOTLK classic is a huge success, most of my friends on b-net are online and play classic atm. And it is really fun to see the hype for a x-pac that is 12yo now!
But it also show us that most people still love WoW but really dislike retail and what it has become.
Dear blizzard please take a moment of reflection and ask yourself: why is wotlk still so popular 12 years later?
Mostly two things:
I’m pretty bored in Retail. Wrath prepatch is a nice distraction until DF comes out.
I think we’ll have to wait a bit to draw any conclusions as players are mostly brought back by nostalgia for what was universally deemed as the best expansion in WoW’s history and S4 being kind of non-existent.
I think what we want is retail and its QoL, but a solid expansion like Wrath in its story, cinematics and general feel.
Yepp I agree! I did my duty → KSM and slim cat.
Yea ofc! But at the same time why do so many have that feeling of nostalgia? It must be that wotlk design was vastly better then retail. No borrowed power (beside glyph)!
PvP was easy to understand and join. Jump in and farm your gear while doing random BG, there wasn’t Zerg people with elite gear that one hits you.
LK was cool as hell and the whole thematic was dope if you compare it to “the Jailer” aka space robot!
Collecting rep with tabard while doing dungeons was also really good system. And the list could go on 
It’s all in the running animations and the over the top breathing animations man, I swear.
and some of what Slapface said too
don’t think that it is SO popular. For me i would just go for only one purpose farm Zg for mount drop to feel satisfaction.
Must say, you have not seen Dragonflight. Playing BETA, and it’s like playing best expansion ever created. It has everything.
well its natual that people dislike content lul at end of expansion . and season 4 is a joke that shouldnt happen in first place- people got their ksm mount and toxic kitty and quit. and honestly cant blame them .
once DF launches wolk will insta die tough so doesnt matter 
Yes, I agree, that’s why DF seems to be finally moving in another direction than latest expansions, but also during Wrath WoW was still pretty new and I was younger 
Even the best expansion in the world won’t feel the same now for a big portion of the playerbase. That said, if you ever played WoW before it feels amazing to come back after a break, like coming home… if you stay for long is another case that depends on the state of the game indeed 
I think the lore is the thing that hurts most people in retail, as I have said before.
Even those who claim to be playing only for the game, they still see the cinematics and deep down it actually pains them to see how the story turned out.
For example, there is not one person who didn’t internally scream when Arthas turned into 35 anima… The overall quality of the lore has been in a downwards spiral since BFA, and it is frustrating.
In DF beta, I have only completed the first zone atm and the lore feels alright, but I remember that Shadowlands started mostly strong as well. We’ll see I guess.
Moving different direction than shadowlands maybe
It does hurt me a lot, but at the end of the day, I can still enjoy arenas, BGs and duels in a game with poor lore but good class design.
The current state of my class is most definitely what is hurting me the most, despite the lore being absolutely awful and beyond redemption.
Yeah I play BETA atm. And I absolutely love DF! They have outdone themselves this time
Yes I agree! But both Bfa and SL was criticized from lore and systems. And I’m super happy so see that they apply huge amount of design philosophy from WOtLK.
They just need to ensure that content isn’t relevant for one season like ZM, Korthia and so on! Whole Northrend did felt relevant in WOtLK
Boomkin makes sad noises 
As long as game will have so many difficulty levels this wont happen. DF seasons will still make older patch absolote. And not even commenting on how M+ made raids absolote which something what propably wont change for DF. Like core issues what Shadowlands had are still there you just dont have to grind extra powers thats like only difference.
Some of the community is a bit disappointing, people listing themselves for roles like healer or tank demanding money before they’ll join. We just tell them to jog on
They need to stop with that! It would be good to scrap LFR and just have Normal and Heroic and mythic raid should be like challenger mode where you get cosmetic and stuff!
This could be a terrible idea but it’s my opinion on the subject 
Yes been like that since vanilla! Some people are just to much! Lmao!
The majority of community is in fact really kind and helpful tho! I have meet so many chill and fun people in m+
It isnt terible idea. Terrible idea was idea to try make WoW end game acessible all type of players regardless of skill and time. Which lead to huge amounth of problems. Like since Blizzard started with this difficutly levels nonsense they were consntaly just fixing problem they created by themself just to be in point their game wont completly break.
I dont see this fixed in DF. There is still m+, there is still giant power inflation and invaltiond of content and effort. I dont know how can Blizzard think they will ever manage to retain players when each patch they just spit on their effort what they put into the game.
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LICH KING carried this expansions.
Char feels powerful as you level up and grow.
Open world has meaning. Zones has its own value.
Community
Professions has own value and choices
Dont require absurd amount of gold through out expansion.
Two Iconic raids - Ulduar and ICC
Memorable legendaries.
Invisible and frost worm mount.
Huge world and music
Witty boss lines (this expansion has most catchy lines in boss encounters)
What wolk missing
Flying in classic
Boring rotation and meaning less spec throught out patches. Retails has more fluid and refined spec over years. At end of wolk - blizz removed aoe cap abd overhauled many spec and classes.
Liner questing. For ungoro hand that quest in booty/undercity. Cata made questing so much better.
RDF (its the expansions where RDF actually valued)
True, like every new “hyped” mmo release sofar, for like 3-4 months, then become barren wastelands.