The team are showing real commitment to a true vanilla experience with each of these updates. It's reassuring.
I'm aware that the Alterac Valley update split people; however, there wasn't going to be a solution that favoured everyone honestly.
I really hope they keep this level of communication as we roll towards release. Awesome news though, gives me some real hope that they actually have a grasp on things and won't screw it all up.
As long as they keep it a passon project, and don't let the Activision leeches in, we should be good.
Man, why is the classic team so much better than every other Blizzard team at the moment?
I don't want to see this as a big "conspiracy theory", but it looks like when players are giving feedback about Retail WoW, there is so many players to account for, and so much money involved, that Blizzard can feel the omnipotent eyes of Activision (and its investors) luring above them, which makes them unable to fully takes the right decision, or they may take it but a little step at a time, just to be sure not to disturb too much things at the same time (which honestly, on the long run, do more harm than good to the game)... At least I see it like this, and I hope it's something like this, because else, it would mean that it's just Retail devs that are completly out of touch with the community, and that's even worse.
On the other hand, Classic isn't even in the radar of Activision (and its investors), it's like this big boss that would authorize you to do your side project during your free time at work as long as it doesn't impact your efficiency. So Blizzard don't have their hands tied here, they know their decision will only impact a very specific target (which also might be the most unforgiving one) so they're trying even harder to appeal to those players, because they don't feel restricted by any means, it's their "passion side project" and that's why they seem dedicated enough this time.
I might be absolutly wrong here, but that's how I tend to see this, considering the contrast between Retail ongoing messy dev and Classic promising one.
I love this! Both as a player, and as someone who fervently writes about Classic World of Warcraft (in Dutch, mind you), it's great to see Blizzard is opening the communication channels. The stream of news we're getting is great. And it can only mean one thing:
They're finishing up the project and are getting ready to make an announcement any day now.
I don't want to see this as a big "conspiracy theory", but it looks like when players are giving feedback about Retail WoW, there is so many players to account for, and so much money involved, that Blizzard can feel the omnipotent eyes of Activision (and its investors) luring above them, which makes them unable to fully takes the right decision, or they may take it but a little step at a time, just to be sure not to disturb too much things at the same time (which honestly, on the long run, do more harm than good to the game)... At least I see it like this, and I hope it's something like this, because else, it would mean that it's just Retail devs that are completly out of touch with the community, and that's even worse.
On the other hand, Classic isn't even in the radar of Activision (and its investors), it's like this big boss that would authorize you to do your side project during your free time at work as long as it doesn't impact your efficiency. So Blizzard don't have their hands tied here, they know their decision will only impact a very specific target (which also might be the most unforgiving one) so they're trying even harder to appeal to those players, because they don't feel restricted by any means, it's their "passion side project" and that's why they seem dedicated enough this time.
I might be absolutly wrong here, but that's how I tend to see this, considering the contrast between Retail ongoing messy dev and Classic promising one.
The thing with retail is that it is a 15 year old product, and with common (non video game related) business practices, it is no more than a cash cow. The video gaming market is changing insanely fast and that a 15 year old game still is supported and updated is nothing short of a miracle.
Regarding Spell Batching: I like that Blizzard is paying attention to details here and is going for authenticity, although I don't really like Spell Batching and personally would prefer it if they would go with the modern system.
This is great. I'm glad to see they're kinda paying attention to the playerbase.
Wow, I did not expect them to retain vanilla spell batching. This is confirmation that it’s time to lose our collective shits. Classic is going to be authentic boys & girls. The hype is real.
I just keep getting more and more excited. So glad that the Classic team actually communicates with us and lets us know what they are doing and why. Love it.
We think it’ll be fun to see those sorts of things happening again.
Great attention to detail too. More than I expected.
This great but i thought that's the way retail wow works at the moment, doesn't it?
Modern wow has significantly faster batches, by a wide margin. It's one of the reasons people were so concerned wPvP might not work, because of the increased server load. Or worse, mitigating the increased server load with sharding, which is also how retail deals with it.
So we only need the old AV back ;)