Stray Thoughts on WoW Classic

I thought I'd play WoW Classic for a few hours, then give up. But I still haven't stopped.

My three most anticipated games of this year have now been released: Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, Total War: Rome - Remastered, and World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade - Classic. These also happen to be the only three new games I've yet played this year.

These also happen to not be new games.

Whether this is an indictment of me as a gamer or an indictment of the games industry as a whole is, I suppose, unimportant. A full review of the Legendary Edition and Mass Effect as a series is forthcoming; I have a lot to say. But before I get to that, with this week's release of the pre-patch for The Burning Crusade in Classic WoW, I thought this would be a good time to post some stray thoughts on my overall Classic experience.

Like It's 2004

I was very young in 2004 but I had fond memories of leveling my Night Elf warrior, Weaselofdoom, alongside my elder brothers. Everyone in my family played. Weekly raids and dungeon-delves defined my childhood for well over a decade.

Or, watching weekly raids and dungeon-delves. I could never get into it. I preferred singleplayer games. I never made it past level 20, even after Cataclysm.

So I found myself in an interesting situation come the release of Classic. There was a lot of nostalgia for me in the older editions of World of Warcraft, and I was eager to try my hand at the game now that I was older. I didn't expect to last very long. I rolled up a human mage, named her Saline after my favorite Torchbearer PC, and prepared myself to give up after a few levels.

I never gave up.

Not only did I make it to 60, I ended up raiding a fair amount, too. My goal was to get any purple weapon, preferably the Azuresong Mageblade, at which point I'd call it quits until the expansion was released.

I never found a purple weapon. In fact, with the exception of my cool Katrana Prestor dress, I never received any decent loot at all. So it goes. All said and done, as of the release of the pre-patch, I had 19 days played. It bears noting that I hadn't touched old Saline since Thanksgiving, which was when my subscription last expired. Meanwhile, my attempt at leveling a mage in Shadowlands saw me lose interest somewhere around level 45.

There's a lot to dislike about Classic, but it's clearly doing something right. It's a huge timesink, filled with shitty quests and tedious grinds, and after a day of playing I often feel like my brain has turned to mulch. It also has deep progression systems, lots of content, an engaging world, and enough room for players to make their own paths.

That was what kept me going, I think. I decided to play a Fire mage, because Saline was a fire mage in Torchbearer.

"Noooo! You can't do that!" they all cried. "You can't play Fire in Classic until Zul'Gurub comes out!"

At first I gave in and went Frost, but I soon realized that Fire was infinitely more interesting as a spec, and also far superior in terms of DPS. So I rebelled. I leveled Fire anyway, from 20 to 60, never respecing. I was the only one in the universe. This got me kicked out of no fewer than two separate guilds.

"BUT THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE!" they cried again, "YOU CAN'T RAID BLACKWING LAIR OR MOLTEN CORE AS FIRE! THEY'RE ALL FIRE IMMUNE!"

As it turns out this is a complete falsehood. Fire isn't optimal in either raid, but it's perfectly viable. I regularly out DPSed Frost mages in both, provided food and water and buffs and decurses for everyone regardless, and even at my worst did no less damage than a hunter or poorly geared rogue. I was later vindicated completely; as of my last full clear of BWL before I stopped playing, I and another Fire mage were both at the top of the ranged DPS charts. That's right, we out-DPS'd every other caster in a raid where every boss is fire immune or resistant. And I didn't even have good gear!

An extremely rigid meta had crystalized around Classic, but the received wisdom it imparted was almost always wrong. If you asked someone why you couldn't raid as Fire, the answer you'd receive was, "because no one raids as Fire." No one had ever thought to try!

Similarly I leveled an alt paladin as Prot and was told endlessly that it wasn't viable, that paladins couldn't tank, that paladins were the worst class in vanilla. Guess what? Wasn't true. Paladins are phenomenal tanks for leveling and ideal for late-game dungeons. The people who decried those of us who tried hadn't tried themselves; they were just saying what was conventionally accepted. Why can't you tank as a paladin? Because, "no one tanks as a paladin!"

This stifling and completely tone-deaf meta, parroted by countless players, was very frustrating for those of us determined to make our own paths. At the same time, though, the capacity of Classic to allow players TO make their own paths was tremendous. I specialized my characters in ways that made the most sense to me, given an accurate understanding of the game's mechanics, and it worked: I held threat as a tank, I did upwards of 100% more DPS than anyone else I played with as a Fire mage (in dungeons, anyway). The meta could blow me.

There was a thrill to being unique, too. It felt good to play the only Fire mage on my server. It felt good to level a Prot paladin. It gave me a niche. Something unique. That was, I think, the main reason why I kept going. So while I was mostly done with the game by late 2020, my 400 or so hours in Classic were a positive experience overall. Old-school WoW clicked for me. I finally understood what it was that kept my family playing, which I never did as a child.

What Else Works?

This isn't an essay or analysis, but the question I keep asking myself is how I made it through Classic when I can't get to max level in retail. It bears noting how much better retail's gameplay is. A Fire mage c. 2020 is amazingly fun to play. The design is tight, responsive, and borderline aRPG. I'd take Shadowlands over Diablo 3 any day. Far more of the game is spent playing and not walking. The grind, which I loathe, has been eliminated. Why isn't this the more engaging game?

Foremost, the design principles have shattered. I want you to guess how many other players I ran into while leveling--I used Wrath--in Shadowlands. Go on. Guess right now. Got it? The actual answer is...

ZERO.

I never once encountered, let alone joined parties with, another player. This was a singleplayer experience through-and-through.

I'd contest that what's remarkable about multiplayer games is not the mere fact of having multiple players on the same server at once. Rather, it's the social experience of making friends, building relationships, and working alongside other, real people. This is why Space Station 13 is so compelling, despite being a useless piece of shit game with servers run by idiots.

What I remember most from leveling my mage is not the grind, which has all blurred into nothingness. It's that time a level 45 Tauren warrior saved my ass while doing a class quest, despite the fact we couldn't even communicate. It's the friendship I developed with an older woman who was getting into WoW after her children moved out, and the way we kept bumping into each other while leveling. It's the shit I talked with my brother and our guildmate while farming Blackrock Depths for dozens of hours trying to get Hand of Justice, and then the stupendous excitement when it finally dropped. And, of course, it's topping DPS by a mile in BRD and later MC after being endlessly shittalked for refusing to spec Frost--and the conspicuous lack of shittalk afterward.

These are the experiences that define Classic. The gameplay itself is tertiary. If Blizzard could combine modern WoW systems design with the social principles of the past, and I mean removing shit like the group finder and cross-server play, it would be the best multiplayer game ever made, hands down.

I Am Not Prepared

Now we find ourselves faced down with Burning Crusade: Classic. BC is the expansion I have the most nostalgia for; every Sunday I would watch my brother raid with his guild (over Ventrillo!), killing Kael and Vashj and all the rest, although I don't remember ever making it to Illidan. Of course I hardly played myself, but that sense of nostalgia is strong none the less.

We'll see how far I make it. I'm currently leveling another paladin as a Blood Elf, since I've never experienced the pre-Cataclsym Horde questing experience before (and I hear they have it easier than us Allies). There's a decent chance I end up back on my mage once the actual expansion comes out. But even if I quit before making 70, my time with Classic will remain a highlight of my career as a gamer. If you're someone who historically dislikes MMOs, which I am myself, I still recommend giving it a shot.

As for retail--you can skip it.