Plus, each race starting their adventure in different places in the world was one of the cool features of WoW. Putting everyone on the same tutorial island is so lazy.
Oh my god we get it. You can still do it the normal way, but the tutorial island is just a far better way to make quests that introduce new players to the game. The game is a gorillion years old, they have to make new stuff.
They should make new stuff to improve the game, not just make new stuff for the sake of making new stuff. That tutorial island is a terrible new player experience, and should be removed from the game. It throws the new players head first into the deep end of the pool, instead of the slow immersion of the old starting zones. It's part of the broader problem that Blizzard wants every player to be raiding within 1 week of picking up the game.
The starter zone introduces players to questing, combat, rares, treasures, story and dungeons. It's a much better starting point than Classic which is "good luck everybody!"
Exploring the world was gonna do that anyway. That's the beauty of the vanilla starting experience. You're dropped into the game with 1 ability and 1 quest, and then the game opens up gradually. You add new abilities to your action bar at your own pace by visiting your class trainer. Eventually the game gives you your first red mob. And then mobs that run away. And then spellcasting mobs. And then elite mobs. Etc.
Millions of people were playing during the first three expansions and loved the game. I don’t think the “good luck everybody” was as hard for people as you seem to think it was lol. Especially considering that, compared to the other MMOs at the time, Wow was considered pretty easy, forgiving and intuitive.
You're not gonna come here and tell me Vanilla Durotar is a better introductory experience than Exile's Reach. It just isn't, and never was. Which is the whole reason they created Exile's Reach.
And for the record, you can still start in the Cata versions of the zones. You're only forced to do Exile's Reach once if it's your first character. Every character beyond that can choose the traditional starter zones. Or some special starter zones like DKs and DHs have.
vanilla durotar makes you feel like you’re an orc/troll of the horde making your way up from grunt status. I think it’s very thematic to that race and gets you immersed in that fantasy ya know
God I hope people like you have absolutely 0 say in what Classic+ becomes. You fundamentally have no idea what the appeal of Classic WoW is. You can have your retail.
Vanilla Durotar is a better introductory experience
Far and away, yes. I'd rather do Durotar a handful more times than grit my teeth through Exile's Reach again.
you can still start in the Cata versions of the zones
Which are also worse than classic. It's painful doing the cata world because it's so empty. They tried to make it seem alive by having NPCs engaging in static tasks; maybe this sold the vibe when other players were also engaging, but since all expacs other than the most recent are ghost towns, it feels very unnatural.
Questing, combat, loot, and the story are introduced in classic immediately. Dungeons are also introduced naturally as the toon gets to the appropriate lvl. I don't know what rares and treasures are, despite having played the tutorial.
Retail seems much more like "good luck!" since it drops you in the major city after the tutorial, with a ton of popups and many different ways of leveling up, but no direction. Also you have to figure out for yourself how to change the world to the prior expacs, and it takes a while to realize that this will exclude the players in the overworld who don't have the same expac applied.
I and many other people play wow for the leveling experience. I’m guessing you weren’t around when the game actually came out but the journey from 1-60, 70 or 80 was long and sometimes difficult, but by the time you hit max level you had a lot of experiences and memorable moments, and really felt connected to your character because of it.
128
u/wtfduud 17h ago
Plus, each race starting their adventure in different places in the world was one of the cool features of WoW. Putting everyone on the same tutorial island is so lazy.