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[Bossun]

I think it's an aspect of WoW that is grossly underestimated: it was the beginning of real power gaming for a lot of people. There were no comprehensive, authoritative sources of information about quest locations or rewards. It wasn't built into the game to tell you exactly where to go and what to do. You couldn't just watch Youtube videos of every questline, start to finish, before they even hit live servers. There were things you didn't know, and more importantly that you couldn't easily find out. They didn't give you a shortcut to Desolace from Stormwind to start the Scarlet Monastery quests from the Alliance side. You had to figure that shit out.

Today, everything is known about everything before it even hits the PTR. Every element of a patch is datamined within hours of the patch becoming downloadable. Every new item, every skill change, every new quest is a totally known quantity. Your UI mods can tell you every action you need to take at every moment of a boss fight. Your gearing is decided for you by numerical models built and painstakingly tested by truly insane people. You have data reaping websites showing what is experimentally the best build/gear/playstyle for every class.

All of this lends itself to demystifying the game as a whole. It takes away that feeling of the unknown wonderment that was at the heart of what made vanilla WoW so special to experience in that time and place. It's why going back to it now can never be the same. It's also why no other game can come along and replicate it. WoW changed the face of heavily knowledge-based, complex games forever. It gave rise to the cold, hard process of analyzing and breaking down a game to its nuts and bolts then putting it on the internet for everyone to see or risk falling behind.

Exactly. That's when I started to lose interest in the game a bit. I remember that clearing a raid or a dungeon wasn't enough at one point. You had people starting to say "Hey 'name' you didn't do enough DPS, 'name' why are you third in the healing meter..." even winning resulted in analyzing data and find a way to do 0.05% more damage.

All of that happened at the same time as the uniformisation of stuff and rotation, you HAD to have that stuff because it was the best stuff for your class with the most damage/heal, then you HAD to do that rotation, it's the most mana saving rotation or highest DPS, even though I never had trouble managing my mana and was always in the top healers.

And then you had to install mods that told you what attack was coming and what to do and where to go and you just basically became a robot.
You had something telling you what to do and when, what your stuff should be and how well you performed. Sadly if you didn't have those mods or that particular stuff you would start to be rejected from raids or guilds.

It's something that happens in all game now. The higher you go in a game, the more uniformisation start to happen to maximise efficiency and that's when I lose interest. I wanna play my way, I'm playing, not working.

 

[nikos]

People took the Deeprun Tram between Stormwind and Ironforge.

 

[Nokterian]

I think it's an aspect of WoW that is grossly underestimated: it was the beginning of real power gaming for a lot of people. There were no comprehensive, authoritative sources of information about quest locations or rewards. It wasn't built into the game to tell you exactly where to go and what to do. You couldn't just watch Youtube videos of every questline, start to finish, before they even hit live servers. There were things you didn't know, and more importantly that you couldn't easily find out. They didn't give you a shortcut to Desolace from Stormwind to start the Scarlet Monastery quests from the Alliance side. You had to figure that shit out.

Today, everything is known about everything before it even hits the PTR. Every element of a patch is datamined within hours of the patch becoming downloadable. Every new item, every skill change, every new quest is a totally known quantity. Your UI mods can tell you every action you need to take at every moment of a boss fight. Your gearing is decided for you by numerical models built and painstakingly tested by truly insane people. You have data reaping websites showing what is experimentally the best build/gear/playstyle for every class.

All of this lends itself to demystifying the game as a whole. It takes away that feeling of the unknown wonderment that was at the heart of what made vanilla WoW so special to experience in that time and place. It's why going back to it now can never be the same. It's also why no other game can come along and replicate it. WoW changed the face of heavily knowledge-based, complex games forever. It gave rise to the cold, hard process of analyzing and breaking down a game to its nuts and bolts then putting it on the internet for everyone to see or risk falling behind.

Even when they datamine everything i avoid MMO Champion before release and so far it works out pretty great so there are a lot surprised for me in store, i don't play the beta because that will ruin the gameplay for me. And yes WoW changed a lot since it came at a good time when LOTR came out and was fresh in our memories.

Like i said earlier in this thread i've been playing this game for 13 years almost, this expansion is one of the most fun i had in a longtime it gives that TBC/Wotlk itch.

Also UI mods made the game better for me i cant play with the normal one, yes i use it for bosses my abilties, my skills and overall the look of it. Ever since i could mod my UI i was doing just that. I tinkered a lot with my UI the one i'm using now is the same one from a youtuber called Preach gaming his UI is not only good but useful also.

 

[Subpar Spatula]

That's nto true though, like, what caused world pvp to 'thrive' in vanilla that doesn't exist today? Literally nothing. You still see other faction players ALL THE TIME in modern wow, hell in Legion more than ever before because you're out in the world every day. You still have to go to raid instances, which means killing people outside of them if you desire, These are the two scenarios that led to like 99% of all pvp in vanilla. You know how often I get PVPed even when I see opposite faction players? Like, once or twice as week. It's not because we don't see each other, it's because it's a waste of everyone's time and they know it and I know it. Just like in vanilla, when Battlegrounds opened people stopped raiding Tarren Mill and Southshore, because there was no point in doing it. People did it prior to that because they could and because it was novel and new, and yes it was fun, but it was also unchanging.

The fact that people log onto a nostalgia based server to do nostalgia based things is unsurprising, I'm not sure why you think that means that is 'the game' from back then though - you could literally do those exact same things on live and get the exact same reward from it.

You could do those things on live if you wanted to but you have no reason to. You could go around killing mobs all day but there's no reason or compelling idea for you to let alone many people.

See, you say ganking is "waste of time" and that's almost 100% accurately because, well, fighting in itself takes a long time. The quickness of vanilla made it more approachable for anyone to do it because simplicity matters in getting folks to do something.

Vanilla servers to this day prove you wrong that BGs killed Tarren Mill vs South Shore. Like, you say people stopped doing these things but there's evidence to this day that shows that isn't true.

Vanilla WoW was crafted with community in mind. When you grow a community it socializes and starts to create friction. This friction helps PvP especially world PvP. There are many things vanilla WoW lucked into or did right to get folks to play together. You could in theory do all that in retail WoW but hardly anyone does because there's heavy incentives to spend your time doing something more rewarding like LFR or LFD or world quests. There will never be an equivalent of BRM again because the QOL improvements / increasingly more and more carrots make just interacting with other people inefficient and efficiency is now key.

Like, vanilla servers just show you how radically different the community / atmosphere is compared to retail.

 

[Thoraxes]

I agree with both of these. Aside from being at the right place at the right time, the mystification is what made vanilla WoW so mindblowingly special. However, I think some of the peeking behind the curtain was really good for the game. Especially since a lot of stuff just straight up didn't work properly or at all.

I wish I could have been there at the release of WotLK. It seems like that was a really strong period in the game.

Pretty much was super strong up till TotC. After one of the best raids they've ever made with Ulduar (the addition of mechanics-based hardmodes was absolutely incredible at the time), it was all downhill after that, till ICC came out. I liked ICC, but I don't think it'll ever hit the high for me that Ulduar did. Algalon was a super-fun extra boss too, and something that had to be earned. Also helps that my group was server-first 10-man for the Hard Mode Meta Achievement too.

Bringing back Naxx at the start was neat just because so many people never got to see it the first time. The achievement with title that got locked out after the first patch hit was a good motivator too.

 

[Nightfall]

People took the Deeprun Tram between Stormwind and Ironforge.

Oh yeah! The sense of scale and a really gigantic world was fantastic. Everything was full of wonder and awe.
A shame so much of that got lost over time.

 

[B-Dubs]

Pretty much was super strong up till TotC. After one of the best raids they've ever made with Ulduar (the addition of mechanics-based hardmodes was absolutely incredible at the time), it was all downhill after that, till ICC came out. I liked ICC, but I don't think it'll ever hit the high for me that Ulduar did. Algalon was a super-fun extra boss too, and something that had to be earned. Also helps that my group was server-first 10-man for the Hard Mode Meta Achievement too.

Bringing back Naxx at the start was neat just because so many people never got to see it the first time. The achievement that got locked out after the first patch hit was huge too.

WotLK had some really great boss mechanics in general. Ulduar was just great all around, I'd say that first boss was probably the weakest, and those final few bosses in ICC were a ton of fun.

 

[Maximus.]

I think it's an aspect of WoW that is grossly underestimated: it was the beginning of real power gaming for a lot of people. There were no comprehensive, authoritative sources of information about quest locations or rewards. It wasn't built into the game to tell you exactly where to go and what to do. You couldn't just watch Youtube videos of every questline, start to finish, before they even hit live servers. There were things you didn't know, and more importantly that you couldn't easily find out. They didn't give you a shortcut to Desolace from Stormwind to start the Scarlet Monastery quests from the Alliance side. You had to figure that shit out.

Today, everything is known about everything before it even hits the PTR. Every element of a patch is datamined within hours of the patch becoming downloadable. Every new item, every skill change, every new quest is a totally known quantity. Your UI mods can tell you every action you need to take at every moment of a boss fight. Your gearing is decided for you by numerical models built and painstakingly tested by truly insane people. You have data reaping websites showing what is experimentally the best build/gear/playstyle for every class.

All of this lends itself to demystifying the game as a whole. It takes away that feeling of the unknown wonderment that was at the heart of what made vanilla WoW so special to experience in that time and place. It's why going back to it now can never be the same. It's also why no other game can come along and replicate it. WoW changed the face of heavily knowledge-based, complex games forever. It gave rise to the cold, hard process of analyzing and breaking down a game to its nuts and bolts then putting it on the internet for everyone to see or risk falling behind.

So many great points. It was so fun exploring the world, the game was hard, there was so much unknown. The game was much more social and lively, you had to talk to people and get to know them. Money was hard to get and it took a while to save up. Dungeons took a while to complete, gear was rewarding and not RNG. There weren't stupid mods you could download that tell you how to play the game. WoW now is deff more convenient for the casual player, but it lost a lot by catering to that crowd and adding all these features. It felt like a true investment in a character, instead of a rush to the end to rush through raids and dungeons.

 

[Subpar Spatula]

WotLK is great from a stats point of view. Lots of people came in for the Lich King and then waited out that content drought to see what was next. Started to crash Q1 of 11. I've always wondered if they could have staved off a bit of the fatigue if they made WotLK the 3rd expansion and not the second.

 

[jotun?]

TheYanger please stop trying to ruin my memories

 

[B-Dubs]

I just remembered the boiling blood incident. That ZG boss's ability was a scourge on the game for like a week. Even rebooting the servers didn't do shit to stop it. I think they had to roll some stuff back to finally put an end to the madness.

WotLK is great from a stats point of view. Lots of people came in for the Lich King and then waited out that content drought to see what was next. Started to crash Q1 of 11. I've always wondered if they could have staved off a bit of the fatigue if they made WotLK the 3rd expansion and not the second.

I think the crash after WotLK was more due to the fact that Cata felt stagnant and clunky. The talent tree revamp wasn't that great originally and gameplay for a bunch of classes got messed with in a way that people weren't really fans of. They tried remaking the wheel in a lot of cases and wound up breaking it as a result.

 

[Thoraxes]

WotLK had some really great boss mechanics in general. Ulduar was just great all around, I'd say that first boss was probably the weakest, and those final few bosses in ICC were a ton of fun.

Totally agree about the first boss. Though you could tell they really were getting into the whole vehicles thing and experimenting with that.

But the rest of the hardmodes being built into the fights themselves instead of a toggle like it is now was so great. I love that they challenged you to manually change the mechanics of how you did a boss fight on your own, rather than it just automatically being different.

Like stuff like XT and Hodir were just strict gear-checks for the DPS, while Freyja was DPS and positioning, Vezax was a great show of the power of DK tanking and how OP it was at that time (haha), Thorim was coordination/speed/gearchecks, and Mimiron was just a button, but holy shit what a fight with so much going on.

Then there's the lights and whatnot. But yeah, I just like that if you failed to trigger the hard-mode conditions you'd just beat the fight regularly, and that the level of coordination felt like it needed to be higher. I like that people had to be good to get to even try them, and that the mechanics involved in triggering them had to be considered beforehand.

 

[B-Dubs]

Totally agree about the first boss. Though you could tell they really were getting into the whole vehicles thing and experimenting with that.

But the rest of the hardmodes being built into the fights themselves instead of a toggle like it is now was so great. I love that they challenged you to manually change the mechanics of how you did a boss fight on your own, rather than it just automatically being different.

Like stuff like XT and Hodir were just strict gear-checks for the DPS, while Freyja was DPS and positioning, Vezax was a great show of the power of DK tanking and how OP it was at that time (haha), Thorim was coordination/speed/gearchecks, and Mimiron was just a button, but holy shit what a fight with so much going on.

Then there's the lights and whatnot. But yeah, I just like that if you failed to trigger the hard-mode conditions you'd just beat the fight regularly, and that the level of coordination felt like it needed to be higher.

That stuff was amazing, I totally loved it. That expansion felt like they were going in one direction, then did an abrupt about face in the following one.

 

[JuxJuxJux]

A few good memoreis:

- 40 person MC raids while everyone freaks out on Vent

- Gearing for MC by farming fire resist gear, and killing Onyxia at least one billion times

- Getting Thunderfury as a rogue, pissing off all of the tanks (this happened to me personally)

- Alamo's Durid thread (https://tagn.wordpress.com/2009/07/20/alamo-teechs-u-2-play-durid/)

and of course

- PvP at The Crossroads

 

[Kalnoky]

A few people in my guild had Thunderfury (mostly warriors, but I think one rogue had one too), but I just remembered that our only Hand of Ragnaros went to a shaman, haha.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

A few good memoreis:

- 40 person MC raids while everyone freaks out on Vent

- Gearing for MC by farming fire resist gear, and killing Onyxia at least one billion times

- Getting Thunderfury as a rogue, pissing off all of the tanks (this happened to me personally)

- Alamo's Durid thread (https://tagn.wordpress.com/2009/07/20/alamo-teechs-u-2-play-durid/)

and of course

- PvP at The Crossroads

Our MT was on an alt or something when TF dropped, and I was at the top of the DKP list, so I got dibs on TF as a Rogue too. Except I was poor as fuck - I didn't get an epic mount until we reached AQ40 iirc - so my guild ended up giving me the hundreds/thousands of gold worth of materials to finish it, and I felt like such a piece of shit. Then I stuck Fiery Enchant on it, because that was all I could afford. I got so much shit for that from randoms in IF/SW.

Pretty much was super strong up till TotC. After one of the best raids they've ever made with Ulduar (the addition of mechanics-based hardmodes was absolutely incredible at the time), it was all downhill after that, till ICC came out. I liked ICC, but I don't think it'll ever hit the high for me that Ulduar did. Algalon was a super-fun extra boss too, and something that had to be earned. Also helps that my group was server-first 10-man for the Hard Mode Meta Achievement too.

Bringing back Naxx at the start was neat just because so many people never got to see it the first time. The achievement with title that got locked out after the first patch hit was a good motivator too.

Is ToTC Trial of the Crusader? What was so bad about it?

 

[TheYanger]

Our MT was on an alt or something when TF dropped, and I was at the top of the DKP list, so I got dibs on TF as a Rogue too. Except I was poor as fuck - I didn't get an epic mount until we reached AQ40 iirc - so my guild ended up giving me the hundreds/thousands of gold worth of materials to finish it, and I felt like such a piece of shit. Then I stuck Fiery Enchant on it, because that was all I could afford. I got so much shit for that from randoms in IF/SW.



Is ToTC Trial of the Crusader? What was so bad about it?

It was one room for 4 bosses, with one more room for the last boss. 0 trash. Like, it wasn't actually an AWFUL zone, but it wasn't very challenging and it was basically completely bankrupt of art assets so it felt very very filler. The lore behind it was suspect as well.

EDIT: BUT, it has my favorite music in all of wow.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wyi3mPJTV0
Wow has a lot of great music, but to me this song perfectly captures the feel of that place in the game.

 

[JuxJuxJux]

A few people in my guild had Thunderfury (mostly warriors, but I think one rogue had one too), but I just remembered that our only Hand of Ragnaros went to a shaman, haha.

My guild's first Hand went to a shaman as well. Wrecked shop in Warsong Gulch, and went on to become High Warlord (Horde for life).

 

[timetokill]

RECKONBAAAAAWWWWWWWMMMMMMMBBBBBB

That + bubble hearth out of a battle you were losing was hilarious

 

[JuxJuxJux]

Our MT was on an alt or something when TF dropped, and I was at the top of the DKP list, so I got dibs on TF as a Rogue too. Except I was poor as fuck - I didn't get an epic mount until we reached AQ40 iirc - so my guild ended up giving me the hundreds/thousands of gold worth of materials to finish it, and I felt like such a piece of shit. Then I stuck Fiery Enchant on it, because that was all I could afford. I got so much shit for that from randoms in IF/SW.

The arcanite alone to build TF was insane. Sounds like an awesome guild.

 

[TheMehyawa]

Going to a dungeon was something you free your entire night for and cancel any other plans you have. you must spam the chat in town to look for members, actually go through members not being patient while waiting for a tank or healer to join, and when you successfully gathered an entire group, you have to trek all the way to where the dungeon is along with your party. And once you manage to go through it eventually, it was one of the most rewarding experiences.

That was just a 5 man dungeon, I'm not talking about a raid.

 

[B-Dubs]

It was one room for 4 bosses, with one more room for the last boss. 0 trash. Like, it wasn't actually an AWFUL zone, but it wasn't very challenging and it was basically completely bankrupt of art assets so it felt very very filler. The lore behind it was suspect as well.

EDIT: BUT, it has my favorite music in all of wow.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wyi3mPJTV0
Wow has a lot of great music, but to me this song perfectly captures the feel of that place in the game.

The boss mechanics weren't that great either. That pvp fight was hot garbage.

Our MT was on an alt or something when TF dropped, and I was at the top of the DKP list, so I got dibs on TF as a Rogue too. Except I was poor as fuck - I didn't get an epic mount until we reached AQ40 iirc - so my guild ended up giving me the hundreds/thousands of gold worth of materials to finish it, and I felt like such a piece of shit. Then I stuck Fiery Enchant on it, because that was all I could afford. I got so much shit for that from randoms in IF/SW.

Man, getting TF was a journey. I wasn't able to finish mine until the end of Cata due to the shit drop rate on the damn second binding.

 

[Thoraxes]

Is ToTC Trial of the Crusader? What was so bad about it?

Yeah, Trial of the Crusader. The one cool thing it had going for it was the whole "Your final boss loot is dependent on how many wipes you've had while in the raid". I did like the Anub'arak fight (I was a dodge Druid tank at the time).

But some of the negatives for me:

- One room
- Toggle on/off hard modes, no longer mechanics/skill based to access them
- Very short
- Because of this toggle, there were actually 4 different lockouts each with their own loot tables and each giving loot the first time through, making it so that most guilds farmed it 4 times a week; 10-man normal, 10-man hard, 25-man normal, 25-man hard. Add in the attempts mechanic being a one-and-done deal, the stress to get the perfect run the first time through was not always enjoyable, especially on the hard mode. It was rewarding if you had a good guild, but that loot was largely locked out to most.
- Came with a rep grind patch
- The clusterfuck alliance/horde fight in there (seriously, what a mess of bad CC/interrupt mechanics with like no/poor aggro tables)
- It came off of Ulduar, which I would argue was one of the most interesting/unique raids they've done up to that point, and the first real game-changer in terms of raid difficulties and mechanics (also the first appearance of hard modes).

Now, I had a guild with two of the Ulduar legendary "Val'anyr, Hammer of Ancient Kings", so we didn't have too much trouble thanks to those. But the monotony of farming the same bosses 4 times a week got excessive, and the one dungeon they added took place in the same exact room that the raid did.

 

[JuxJuxJux]

Man, getting TF was a journey. I wasn't able to finish mine until the end of Cata due to the shit drop rate on the damn second binding.

Baron's? He gave me a tough time for a few months until he finally gave me the second binding. Almost missed that raid, too.

 

[TheYanger]

The boss mechanics weren't that great either. That pvp fight was hot garbage.

I liked Icehowl decently, Jaraxxus was really pointless, the pvp fight was great, it really showed you a lot about who understood the game and not just their rotation, though it was easily gamed once people figured out how their threat worked. I thought the twin valkyr were a very cool boss (and some of those mechanics have been used many times since, that boss was basically ikaruga). Anub'arak was legitimately a cool boss, I really thought the last phase mechanics of healers having to quickly apply heals to the right targets was fun rather than rewarding you for spamming heals.

 

[Thoraxes]

I liked Icehowl decently, Jaraxxus was really pointless, the pvp fight was great, it really showed you a lot about who understood the game and not just their rotation, though it was easily gamed once people figured out how their threat worked. I thought the twin valkyr were a very cool boss (and some of those mechanics have been used many times since, that boss was basically ikaruga). Anub'arak was legitimately a cool boss, I really thought the last phase mechanics of healers having to quickly apply heals to the right targets was fun rather than rewarding you for spamming heals.

The problem with the PvP fight was that while it was a cool shakeup for most, it sucked having to teach people who only PvE'd how to use their PvP skills/mechanics that they never touched.

 

[B-Dubs]

Baron's? He gave me a tough time for a few months until he finally gave me the second binding. Almost missed that raid, too.

Garr's. After my guild stopped running MC so we could put BWL on farm and head to AQ40 I started organizing PUG MC raids during the afternoon on weekends. At first it was painful, we never got anywhere, and finding people was hard, but after a month I started getting regulars and eventually raiding guilds would send applicants along to gear up and see if they were worth inviting to their guilds. After the second month or so we started clearing most of the raid (if not the whole thing) in a single afternoon. I must have geared damn near half the Alliance on US-Proudmoore chasing that damn binding.

 

[JuxJuxJux]

Garr's. After my guild stopped running MC so we could put BWL on farm and head to AQ40 I started organizing PUG MC raids during the afternoon on weekends. At first it was painful, we never got anywhere, and finding people was hard, but after a month I started getting regulars and eventually raiding guilds would send applicants along to gear up and see if they were worth inviting to their guilds. I must have geared damn near half the Alliance on US-Proudmoore chasing that damn binding.

Awesome story. I really love that you spent time building groups to go after it, and I'm glad you finally got your binding. Having a legendary in vanilla was some serious shit, and I really like hearing stories about people getting theirs. Thanks for sharing!

 

[HowZatOZ]

WAR actually felt like the perfect blend of what made vanilla WoW so successful while also updating it to be better with quality of life changes alongside the setting. Just sucks it got rushed to compete and thus caused its untimely death. I think if WAR had of succeeded we would have had a far different WoW then we do now.

 

[B-Dubs]

Awesome story. I really love that you spent time building groups to go after it, and I'm glad you finally got your binding. Having a legendary in vanilla was some serious shit, and I really like hearing stories about people getting theirs. Thanks for sharing!

I didn't actually get it until the end of Cataclysm :lol

 

[JuxJuxJux]

I didn't actually get it until the end of Cataclysm :lol

But that's the best part! Like, what did you do once you finally got it? I mean, at the point Cata was out, it was a very incompetent sword (no hate). I hope you went and murdered all 1-60 content with ease while watching that thing proc like crazy. You could put it in your main hand at that point, too!

 

[B-Dubs]

But that's the best part! Like, what did you do once you finally got it? I mean, at the point Cata was out, it was a very incompetent sword (no hate). I hope you went and murdered all 1-60 content with ease while watching that thing proc like crazy. You could put it in your main hand at that point, too!

I was a warrior tank. I might have had a mild heart attack in guild chat. I def equipped it every time my guild killed something for the first time and wanted a pic to show off.

Edit: I also used it to take Cata heroics for a week, just for a laugh. Luckily I was geared enough to pull it off.

 

[JuxJuxJux]

I was a warrior tank. I might have had a mild heart attack in guild chat. I def equipped it every time my guild killed something for the first time and wanted a pic to show off.

Hell yes, you make me want to go dig up my old killshots and start posting those things. Good stuff.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

The arcanite alone to build TF was insane. Sounds like an awesome guild.

I was too socially anxious to use my mic 99% of the time, so part of the deal for getting me TF was that I had to speak on Vent. It was unbelievably awkward, but they were gentle with me :lol

It wasn't the best, and it had its share of bad apples, but it was such an amazing group of people that I wouldn't have left for any other guild.

Our leader, Lazzador, was one of the coolest guys I ever met. I topped the damage meters and brought my A-game every raid, but there was no pressure to spec a certain way or meet damage quotas or any of that. We had a lot of family groups, spouses, and RL friends, so there was an atmosphere that I don't think you could find in too many guilds.

I'm eternally grateful that they put up with my obnoxious teenage self for so long, given that they were almost all adults in their 20s/30s.

Yeah, Trial of the Crusader. The one cool thing it had going for it was the whole "Your final boss loot is dependent on how many wipes you've had while in the raid". I did like the Anub'arak fight (I was a dodge Druid tank at the time).

But some of the negatives for me:

- One room
- Toggle on/off hard modes, no longer mechanics/skill based to access them
- Very short
- Because of this toggle, there were actually 4 different lockouts each with their own loot tables and each giving loot the first time through, making it so that most guilds farmed it 4 times a week; 10-man normal, 10-man hard, 25-man normal, 25-man hard. Add in the attempts mechanic being a one-and-done deal, the stress to get the perfect run the first time through was not always enjoyable, especially on the hard mode. It was rewarding if you had a good guild, but that loot was largely locked out to most.
- Came with a rep grind patch
- The clusterfuck alliance/horde fight in there (seriously, what a mess of bad CC/interrupt mechanics with like no/poor aggro tables)
- It came off of Ulduar, which I would argue was one of the most interesting/unique raids they've done up to that point, and the first real game-changer in terms of raid difficulties and mechanics (also the first appearance of hard modes).

Now, I had a guild with two of the Ulduar legendary "Val'anyr, Hammer of Ancient Kings", so we didn't have too much trouble thanks to those. But the monotony of farming the same bosses 4 times a week got excessive, and the one dungeon they added took place in the same exact room that the raid did.

That does sound pretty awful. The massive, sprawling dungeons were part of what made raids so cool. I guess it's kind of neat that they did something so different, though.

That quadruple raid format sounds like a management nightmare for the GL. I can't imagine trying to keep track of who goes where and when.

 

[Aquavelvaman]

If you ever had the feeling of looking around a big open world map and being overwhelmed with all of the stuff to do, like when you first played Skyrim or BotW, vanilla WoW was like that basically every time you entered a new zone. It was huge and we had no idea where we were supposed to go at any time. Sometimes I would spend my entire day's play time just getting to a new zone that I thought I should go to, only to realize that I was not a high enough level to quest there and just dying a lot until I finally found a flightmaster to get out of there. That would be a full day's session. Sometimes you wouldn't even know what level you were supposed to be to do a zone, even after visiting the zone. You started as an undead and wandered over to the western plaguelands border, and everything is ?? level and one shots you. When am I supposed to try again? Level 20? 30? Actually it was like level 52. That would be entire months of real world time later to get to that level.

I still remember going into Silverpine on my undead mage for the first time and getting my first sense of how large the world was. It took forever to walk from the Undercity to the first flight path in that zone, and when I saw worgens and stuff there I realized that there was an entirely different story and different creatures in this area than in the undead starting zone, which already seemed massive to me at the time.

And then I realized that there were like 40 zones and they all had distinct art styles and storylines...it was crazy. And we didn't know anything about the game. I didn't really expect to even see all of the zones in the game. It was so massive and traveling was so time consuming. Even as a mage who could teleport and was free to set my hearthstone anywhere, it took forever to get around.

Then we leveled and people started taking raiding seriously and people started to be competitive. Soon after it was min-max everything or don't bother playing. The wonder went away. No more wandering around and exploring zones, suddenly everything was a race. Get leveled as fast as possible. Do everything in the most efficient path possible. A lot of the charm and magic disappeared.

 

[JuxJuxJux]

I was too socially anxious to use my mic 99% of the time, so part of the deal for getting me TF was that I had to speak on Vent. It was unbelievably awkward, but they were gentle with me :lol

It wasn't the best, and it had its share of bad apples, but it was such an amazing group of people that I wouldn't have left for any other guild.

Our leader, Lazzador, was one of the coolest guys I ever met. I topped the damage meters and brought my A-game every raid, but there was no pressure to spec a certain way or meet damage quotas or any of that. We had a lot of family groups, spouses, and RL friends, so there was an atmosphere that I don't think you could find in too many guilds.

I'm eternally grateful that they put up with my obnoxious teenage self for so long, given that they were almost all adults in their 20s/30s.

I fucking love this story. Best part is that you expanded as a person at your guild's request. There's not a ton of emphasis put on this sort of thing when people talk about their times with WoW (or any MMO), but it's totally a thing, and I experienced something similar myself. Good on you for being open to all of it.

I also really enjoy that you remember your guildmaster / leader by name. I still talk to my GM from back then, and while we don't reminisce anymore, we both recognize that experience as the foundation or our relationship, and lock in quickly when we get the chance to play MP games together.

I'll always remember WoW for the relationships I got to help cultivate. Nothing has come close since, and I'm not sure anything ever will.

 

[StayDead]

If you ever had the feeling of looking around a big open world map and being overwhelmed with all of the stuff to do, like when you first played Skyrim or BotW, vanilla WoW was like that basically every time you entered a new zone. It was huge and we had no idea where we were supposed to go at any time. Sometimes I would spend my entire day's play time just getting to a new zone that I thought I should go to, only to realize that I was not a high enough level to quest there and just dying a lot until I finally found a flightmaster to get out of there. That would be a full day's session. Sometimes you wouldn't even know what level you were supposed to be to do a zone, even after visiting the zone. You started as an undead and wandered over to the western plaguelands border, and everything is ?? level and one shots you. When am I supposed to try again? Level 20? 30? Actually it was like level 52. That would be entire months of real world time later to get to that level.

I still remember going into Silverpine on my undead mage for the first time and getting my first sense of how large the world was. It took forever to walk from the Undercity to the first flight path in that zone, and when I saw worgens and stuff there I realized that there was an entirely different story and different creatures in this area than in the undead starting zone, which already seemed massive to me at the time.

And then I realized that there were like 40 zones and they all had distinct art styles and storylines...it was crazy. And we didn't know anything about the game. I didn't really expect to even see all of the zones in the game. It was so massive and traveling was so time consuming. Even as a mage who could teleport and was free to set my hearthstone anywhere, it took forever to get around.

Then we leveled and people started taking raiding seriously and people started to be competitive. Soon after it was min-max everything or don't bother playing. The wonder went away. No more wandering around and exploring zones, suddenly everything was a race. Get leveled as fast as possible. Do everything in the most efficient path possible. A lot of the charm and magic disappeared.

The one thing that Vanilla and to a lesser extent TBC suffered from is some of the zones were hot garbage. Places like Desolace and Stonetalon mountains were just awful, awful zones to quest in. It'd take like 10 minutes to get to each quest of just running as you never had mounts.

I almost quit the game when I hit thousand needles. Getting your mount earlier feels much better now. I do remember the feeling of having a bag full of teleport stones though and loads of free water. You'd have to drink after every fight so you saved so much money.

 

[KO Traveling Hobo]

I fucking love this story. Best part is that you expanded as a person at your guild's request. There's not a ton of emphasis put on this sort of thing when people talk about their times with WoW (or any MMO), but it's totally a thing, and I experienced something similar myself. Good on you for being open to all of it.

I also really enjoy that you remember your guildmaster / leader by name. I still talk to my GM from back then, and while we don't reminisce anymore, we both recognize that experience as the foundation or our relationship, and lock in quickly when we get the chance to play MP games together.

I'll always remember WoW for the relationships I got to help cultivate. Nothing has come close since, and I'm not sure anything ever will.

Thanks! It feels good to dig so far back into those times. It's cool that you're still in contact and gaming with your GM, and I agree that the positive social aspects of WoW/MMOs don't get their fair shake. It's always about the horror stories and lost time.

 

[Aquavelvaman]

The one thing that Vanilla and to a lesser extent TBC suffered from is some of the zones were hot garbage. Places like Desolace and Stonetalon mountains were just awful, awful zones to quest in. It'd take like 10 minutes to get to each quest of just running as you never had mounts.

I almost quit the game when I hit thousand needles. Getting your mount earlier feels much better now. I do remember the feeling of having a bag full of teleport stones though and loads of free water. You'd have to drink after every fight so you saved so much money.

That's another thing. We were all poor as hell. We couldn't afford to buy the upgraded spells in our spell book. Gold was extremely hard to come by. There weren't enough quests. There were no dailies. People would be level 60 for months before getting an epic mount.

 

[GankzyMcfly]

If you want to experience it first hand hop on the private server Elysium, hosted by the Elysium project. Its about as close to vanilla as your going to get. Obviously some things are not perfect...but ive been playing for months now and have been having a blast....joined a guild, met some pretty awesome people....just got my 2nd piece of t2 gear for my mage off rag tonight. Keep in mind that Elysium is a progression server, its currently vanilla, but has to potential to progress all the way up to tbc.

 

[Aquavelvaman]

If you want to experience it first hand hop on the private server Elysium, hosted by the Elysium project. Its about as close to vanilla as your going to get. Obviously some things are not perfect...but ive been playing for months now and have been having a blast....joined a guild, met some pretty awesome people....just got my 2nd piece of t2 gear for my mage off rag tonight. Keep in mind that Elysium is a progression server, its currently vanilla, but has to potential to progress all the way up to tbc.

Are they going patch by patch or what? Is AQ40 open?

 

[Cfer]

Vanilla had strat and scholo - End game was so good.

And I remember tier 3 warlock gear blowing my mind. Probably looks domestic compared to modern end game gear but I used to be so excited to see the tier kits as it was getting released.

I think I started losing interest when all the classes started to show similarities and borrowed skills. I actually liked that there was a difference and being a holy priest was a genuine commitment and you were seen as a lil celebrity. Suddenly druids and pallys doing equal heals - everyone becomes replaceable.

 

[Braag]

I played WoW from 2004-2007 and vanilla WoW is one the most amazing gaming experiences I've ever had. I'm still friends with some of the people I met back then.
When I start to think back on it, I get quite nostalgic..

 

[Tecnniqe]

Fascinating how Zul'Gurub still assist to epidemic modeling and research.

 

[bugulu]

I haven't played since Cataclysm, so I have no idea of the current state of the game is. But I did play from the European release up till Cataclysm non-stop.

Here are a few of the memorable things I enjoyed in Vanilla and to some extent, The Burning Crusade.

• You had to be social. Want to do a dungeon and no one in the guild is interested? Camp outside the dungeon entrance and ask for people to group up.The reputation you build up in the server also mattered.
• The raids required more coordination and more effort. Vanilla and TBC got it right, Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm, not so much. 40 man raids were very fun but also time-consuming.
• You had to work for your gear. With 40 man raids, you had to compete with several other people sharing your class. But boy, the moment when you got your weapon is pure ecstasy.
• The battlegrounds took a lot of effort. I remember reaching the ranks of Lieutenant General which took me some crazy grinding. I had a friend who became High Warlord, and he was the talk of the server. The time it took you to climb those pvp ranks were utterly insane and required a hell lot of dedication.
• Ganking in Stranglethorn Vale. I hated getting ganked when leveling up a low-level toon but it sure as hell as memorable. You have some douchebag going in killing level 30s, and you end up either asking your guild for help or log in with your high-level toon and destroy your opponent. Then you become the douchebag ganking low-level players as sort of payback. Then the cycle repeats itself all over again.
• The world was huge. With no flying mounts, you either had to explore by foot or be one of the lucky ones that could afford a mount. WIth this perspective, the world seemed bigger than it was and traveling through the zones took time. This also included waiting for your party members to get to a dungeon to complete it.

 

[RedSparrows]

The one thing that Vanilla and to a lesser extent TBC suffered from is some of the zones were hot garbage. Places like Desolace and Stonetalon mountains were just awful, awful zones to quest in. It'd take like 10 minutes to get to each quest of just running as you never had mounts.

I almost quit the game when I hit thousand needles. Getting your mount earlier feels much better now. I do remember the feeling of having a bag full of teleport stones though and loads of free water. You'd have to drink after every fight so you saved so much money.

No doubt that (many) zones suffered from some really poor gameplay flow. That said, I think it added to the charm, in a way. Places like Blasted Lands were just weird anomalies, whilst for an Ally Swamp of Sorrows, or Thousand Needles, was a weird, alien place that had no reason to exist other than existing. A romanticisation, sure, as I am sure I was pissed off at trudging through them at the time, but WoW's strength was a sense of place, and this added to that. Desolace was desolate. It was a miserable place to quest. Having to go there was a pain. But that had is flipsides (mainly because some other zones, e.g. STV, were such a joy that it alleviated that grief).

 

[RenegadeXV8]

That's another thing. We were all poor as hell. We couldn't afford to buy the upgraded spells in our spell book. Gold was extremely hard to come by. There weren't enough quests. There were no dailies. People would be level 60 for months before getting an epic mount.

I don't know why more people didn't just grind to Commander/Lieutenant General for the PVP mount, since it was only 90G. It wasn't really that grueling of a grind (not even half as bad as reaching Grand Marshall/High Warlord, for example) or as tedious as gold farming.

No doubt that (many) zones suffered from some really poor gameplay flow. That said, I think it added to the charm, in a way. Places like Blasted Lands were just weird anomalies, whilst for an Ally Swamp of Sorrows, or Thousand Needles, was a weird, alien place that had no reason to exist other than existing. A romanticisation, sure, as I am sure I was pissed off at trudging through them at the time, but WoW's strength was a sense of place, and this added to that. Desolace was desolate. It was a miserable place to quest. Having to go there was a pain. But that had is flipsides (mainly because some other zones, e.g. STV, were such a joy that it alleviated that grief).

Yeah this is a great point. I only played a Night Elf Hunter, never tried out Horde, so many of the zones in Kalimdor were literally an alien world to me. There were almost no quests in those areas, and some of them had this bleak, oppressive atmosphere... almost like I wasn't supposed to be there, but I'd still explore them anyway.

 

[Johnlenham]

Dire Maul Tribute runs was probably my favorite activity in Vanilla. I was sad there was nothing else like it in TBC or WotLK.




Rhok'Delar quest was pretty cool in that it was designed to test how good you were at Hunter mechanics.

But in reality, all the shitty Hunters (and there were lots of 'em) just paid someone else to do it for them.

I distinctly remember spending a fucking fortune on potions and way too long on that bastard in the ice place you had to kite around.

Nobody linked the video of the hunter kiting the fell guard demon thing from the portal like 8 zones away to stormwind?


Edit: also remember going back in Wotlk and joined a guild where i had to go fight a training dummy while the "top" hunter parsed me lol. Bloody absurd in hindsight 😂

 

[Coriolanus]

Vanilla had strat and scholo - End game was so good.

And I remember tier 3 warlock gear blowing my mind. Probably looks domestic compared to modern end game gear but I used to be so excited to see the tier kits as it was getting released.

I think I started losing interest when all the classes started to show similarities and borrowed skills. I actually liked that there was a difference and being a holy priest was a genuine commitment and you were seen as a lil celebrity. Suddenly druids and pallys doing equal heals - everyone becomes replaceable.

Wasn't so much a commitment as it was mandatory, tho. People fully expected priests to be holy/disc. If you weren't, you were told in no uncertain terms to fuck off. Shadow priests were absurdly rare as a result of this (and also because their threat generation was goddamn insane).

 

[Monkeyball]

A magical once in a lifetime moment in gaming history.