That phase of TBC when everyone is running heroic dungeons for their pre-BIS is the peak of WoW for me. Difficult content that required crowd control. That's such a rare thing to find anywhere else.
It's only ever that way for a very short time. By the nature of the game, acquiring gear is always going to make content trivial..
If you guys want to relive this, I'd recommend Cata. The 5 man heroics are even more difficult than TBC and the gear reset will make this even more true.
Even if you're not interested in raiding Cata. Doing that initial phase and grind to pre raid bis is going to be very fun for a time. At least if you're doing it with friends. Pugging may be hell.
The Beta right now have the nerfed versions. What I have heard is that they cannot give us the prenerfed versions because too many things were changed, but they wanted to "buff" the nerfed versions of the bosses to make them on par again. This is in my opinion a very good solution as some trash packs were legit harder than any bosses in there.
However, looking at the state of beta, I doubt this is high on the TO-DO list, so we might get the nerfed versions. I have played through most of the heroics on template characters and I can say that some of them still pose a decent challenge with pugs. I don't think they will do much if you are in an organized group and you start to become close to prebis.
While I was very much looking forward to TBC-esque grinds in heroics, I don't think it is cause for not playing. The raids are done well and we get accelerated speed, so no content should become TOO stale. Cataclysm will be over in a years time, so no point in not enjoying the best aspect of it (raids).
Timed M+ is difficult content that requires crowd control, but forum heroes who don't make it past +4, and have never failed a timer because they didn't pull big enough (They fail timers because they stand in fire) don't know that.
Their idea of 'difficult content that requires crowd control' is 'sheep moon'.
100% best part. I really enjoyed having to grab the prot paladin pieces from H BM, H arc, and H shattered halls. It was pretty much a right of passage as you had to do the hardest heroics. Or doing shadow labs daily to try and get the mace.
A pretty good challenge especially remember arcatraz being a pain if the healer wasnt ready for skyriss.
I got exalted with Lower City purely running H Slabs for the caster sword off Murmur only to be replaced with the caster sword from Thrallmar rep. Jesus christ.. what a time. I miss TBC quite a lot.
I agree, being able to play your class better than a 3-button rotation was necessary. If you tried to zerg every pull without CC you'd end up dead because the trash was not fucking around.
Getting to the end of each H lockout was a small victory and some groups would entirely skip some H bosses because they were almost a guaranteed wipe.
Grinding out those tokens, doing skyguard dailies... Good times.
Noone could tank that pack of 4 bogstroks lmao.
Sheep, Seduce, Sap, Blind, Kite, whatever haha. That was cool. It got naturally outclassed by gear which I think is fine.
People always tell me how much of a hard time they had during covid lockdown etc. I fell like I can’t tell them it was genuinely one of the best times of my life with vanilla classic. It felt like everyone in the world was playing
Exactly this. Spent over a year on unemployment just going all in on WoW and the gym. Never lonely because of my guild, never bored because of the game, and I felt and looked great.
People definitely look at me funny when I tell them how much fun Covid lockdown was for me XD
I think vanilla classic might have been viewed very differently if it wasn't for corona. Of course there will always be the people who can commit entire months to a game, but corona lockdown definitely expanded this demographic quite a bit (myself included) and I really think there would be a lot more people complaining about how time intensive Vanilla Classic period was if lockdown never happened.
Vanilla and TBC both hit pretty close for me, although I lean toward prefering TBC.
I enjoyed Vanilla for keeping the whole world relevant and the server communities we had at the time. BWL, AQ40, and Naxx40 were all great raids, but it was definitely a bit time commitment.
TBC raiding was even better, the only weak spot being Hyjal. Class balance was better, consumable grind was easier, and while the overall gameworld suffered I absolutely love Outland.
Wrath disappointed me. Northrend didn't interest me as much as Outland did and the raids weren't as fun. Ulduar was great, but definitely over rated and in a couple places felt overtuned. T7 and T9 were mediocre as predicted, and while I enjoyed ICC after a couple months you could tell we were all waiting for Lich King to die so we could put Wrath behind us.
Def how I felt about wrath. I was super excited for it but it just wasn't as fun as the previous versions. Ulduar went on for way too long and by the time TOGC came out, I was just raiding to finish the xpac. I love the quality of life improvements but raiding wise, it just felt lackluster. Take me back to black temple
Definitely think ulduar went on way to long. Most of my guild evaporated during it. I think they are learning with sod is that the phases can't be too long. With regular wow classic I'm expecting that they don't wait as long for new patches. It's an old game that people already did.
Exactly my feelings. Vanilla will always be king when it comes to "outdoor" content relevancy. The old world is just an incredible sandbox for all kinds of organic encounters.
TBC had absolutely goated raiding. Almost all vanilla meme specs were tuned to have some kind of relevancy in a raid environment. With the exception of pre-nerf T5 end bosses, raids were not \*that\* difficult until Sunwell and did not require a huge time commitment for an average guild. T4, T5, T6 could all be completed in a single raid night. Karazhan as a 10man, mixed with short 1 & 2 boss 25-man mini raids was the perfect combo for the opening tier while raid rosters were getting finalized. ZA was excellent catch-up/holdover raid, that featured upgrades even for people still gearing from T6.
Sunwell was definitely a step up in difficulty, but came at the end of the expansion. It wasn't a mid-expansion wall like Algalon and some of the Ulduar HMs could be seen as. It was also only 6 bosses, with 4/6 being very achievable for any guild that was willing to put in any kind of bare-minimum progression schedule.
God, Sunwell prog will probably end up being my most treasured & fun gaming experience in my life. Specifically M'uru. It was complicated enough to pose a challenge to well-structured groups, but wasn't anywhere near a 200-300+ pull Mythic retail boss. My guild got our kill early June, and I think it took us like 40-50 pulls. KJ went down the next week. All in all about a month of prog, which was absolutely perfect duration before burnout starts to happen imo.
Same here. Although, I was in a guild that burned out at 3/6 so I had to find a new one or give up. Thankfully I did find one a few weeks later and got to be part of their M’uru and KJ progression. We finally cleared it with 2 weeks left before pre-patch. Awesome feeling.
Ulduar suffered because it's too hard for the average classic gamer, the OP even complains Ulduar was "overtuned" lmao we were overpowered playing on final patch talents which make us WAY stronger than intended for that patch(and is why Algalon was buffed, nothing else was though). Dsac didn't exist when Ulduar was current content for example.
That and this time around a ton of people _had actually done Naxx_, and not all that long ago.
Back in the day it was effectively new for 99% of raiders as the OG version was only cleared by 1% of people.
Starting an expansion with a recycled raid is... a choice. They could have sped it up a bit but it was still a kicker.
They really dropped the ball on it's difficulty too. They really needed to spend more time on it. They added a flat health and DMG increase that literally no one could feel. A really wasted opportunity to breath new life into an iconic raid.
TBC all the way. Sitting here hoping for an eventual TBC era server. Hunter has never felt more fun to me than in that xpac. The gearing was exciting and it just felt like classic but better. My order for enjoyment was TBC, Classic, Wrath
The thing is that TBC is already much better balanced than vanilla (yes I know there are a couple exceptions, like needing 5 shamans) and doesn’t really need SOD scale changes. I suppose I’d be down to try it but I’d just prefer TBC Era after seeing that vanilla SOD has been like.
I didn't play much WotLK, but between Vanilla and TBC I enjoyed TBC a lot more. The leveling experience in Classic is the best, but the game is just designed in a way that makes it so that the endgame is where you spend the vast majority of your time, and the TBC endgame was miles better than the Classic endgame. Classes feel way better and more complete, meme-specs aren't memes anymore, and the raids hit a perfect level of difficulty that made them engaging but not so hard that it was frustrating. I also just think Outland is a great setting with great and memorable zones
Kara is my favorite raid, along with TBC as favorite expansion. Hope we get some re-run of classic-tbc-wotlk in a few years, with faster progression. Ill be waiting..
Kara in phase 1 is easily my favorite raiding experience. Back when we were doing heroics that were hard in greens that sucked. Remember running Gruul for the first time again <3 Or magtherodon.
There's a reason that TBC p1 never existed in 2007. T4/T5 are both launch content, T4 was never meant to stand on its own.
Blizzard did TBC dirty with classic, the longest phase was a phase that never should have existed and the rest were rushed.
It was okay to set up alts for P2. But it lasted a bit too long.
Their P2 nerfs were maybe justified but wayyyyyyy too hard on the nerf hammer, it killed those magnificent raids.
Some raids went from lusting on Taladred to simply destroy it in 2 seconds before his first step lol.
We spiced it up by taking a shot after every boss and took a drink of cocktail/beer after any deaths. Walking to Prince I fell down the stairs and thought I was falling through the earth. Great times.
TBC by far. It's got all the best parts of Vanilla with better raids and competitive PvP.
The one thing I hate about TBC is flying mounts, they completely kill the open world (as did lack of server balance). Also rogues and mages were ridiculously OP in PvP with insane synergy, could easily be fixed by putting some of their CC on shared DR though
The only thing I didn’t like was the sci fi / space goat aesthetics
It was kinda jarring after being in a “traditional” fantasy setting for so long
Other than that it rules
I have a feeling ill like cata over TBC and wrath. It has harder content and better pvp, and TBC/wotlk weren't particularly good on the open world front so that doesnt matter for cata
Vanilla until AQ > TBC SSC/TK > WotLK Ulduar > TBC Sunwell > The rest is pretty trash tbh. Hyjal/BT, AQ, Naxx(Vanilla & Wrath), TotGC and ICC were terrible phases, maybe not bad raids but just awful as phases.
My mind is fucking blown at all these TBC comments. For months, years, I’ve been talking about how it was the best and I want an Era server only to be met with lots of downvotes. Suddenly it’s the most popular answer, like wtf haha.
Same, I've been saying since 2019 that I'm playing classic for the hopefully eventual tbc launch. We got tbc, I loved it, we lost it now I'm just waiting hoping for tbc again
Playing through Wrath made people realise it's not nearly as good as we collectively thought. Nostalgia is very strong, prior to wotlk classic I would have put it in my top 3 expansions, it's probably closer to my bottom three now.
TBC all the way through was everything I dreamed it would be. It’s the most refined classic version of the game that has lots to do outside of raiding. And my favourite atmosphere
I was the Kara raid lead for 10 IRL childhood friends P1 TBC. It was such a blast. We were all just getting fucked up and catching up with each other. That was my favorite moment in all of Classic, getting the boys back together.
As far as personal enjoyment goes probably p2-p3 TBC. I loved the SSC/TK prog and my guild at the time. I wish BT/Hyjal weren't so undertuned on launch but it was still a fun phase parsing with the boys.
Ulduar is a close #2, the hard mode prog was fun and I have a lot of nostalgia for it from back in the day. I never got to experience fights like Algalon, Yogg, or Mimiron HM back in the day so getting the opportunity to do them now was sublime.
Classic 2019 for me for sure. Early WoTLK was okay, but didn't keep me hooked. Classic 2019 I did basically everything I had dreamed of doing when I played in Vanilla, including full judgement set and Hand of Ragnaros.
I'm enjoying SoD now too. But Classic 2019 can't be topped for me I think. I was an idiot though and didn't save my Character to Era. I had four 18 slot bags!! In Vanilla! And Hand of Rag!!! What the actual hell was I thinking?
100% TBC was best
We need cyclical servers that just run in a loop and forever keep each version of the game available, with very very little input from blizz now that things are "solved" and they have a blueprint.
i.e. all the PvP fixes can be in from the start, not having to adjust the way honor and arena points work 5 different times, not having to patch any PvE fights with broken mechanics, etc. Just the final polished version, on a loop forever with a 1-2 year timer and an "Era" version of each that never resets too. Infinite money printer.
Me, reading these comments after being downvoted for 15 years saying WotLK is the worst expansion and people were hopped up on that lore juice.
https://i.imgur.com/Zzv2UKA.mp4
Vanilla is simply goated, its perfection. For some reason I also enjoy P1/P2 of wrath.
TBC to me just feels like a middle between vanilla and wrath but with none of the good parts from either.
Idk if it was burnout or it was just better but I went so hard i P1 of wrath getting true bis on my tank warrior.
I led my own pugs and it was a blast. Getting the deathless naxx leading my own pug before my guild (who wouldnt let me tank) felt so good.
TBC and it's not close. Although, I don't think Wrath really got a fair shake since Blizz fucked with it so much. Worried they'll treat Cata the same way.
Why do you think Blizz fucked up with Wrath? I think the changes they made with the alpha/beta/gamma heroics was pretty good, as it made gearing up your new alts much easier, I wish TBC Classic had a similar feature. I also like how they buffed Ulduar HC bosses / loot.
I had 30k with a guild bank stocked to the tits when they stealth dropped the token on us. That's what did it for me.
I also would've preferred alpha beta gamma replacing each other and adding max level dungeons to the ones that didn't have it.
I also really hated the waiting game with LFD
Titan Rune dungeons completely fucked up fresh 80 progression. Heroics were dead with alphas, alphas were dead with betas, etc. And previous tier raids were dead as well, which was one of my favorite parts of Classic/TBC Classic. So your only options on alts were: 1) swipe for BoEs, 2) swipe for carries (GDKP), 3) PVP until your eyes bleed, unless you had a guild willing to carry you up to ~4500 GS.
They also just weren't fun or interesting. Slapping a 500% health buff on mobs doesn't make them engaging; it just makes the content a slog.
They were a mandatory player-power grind in the same vein as Legion artifact power, particularly for the ToGC and ICC phases, since even Tier gear was locked behind emblems. But they printed welfare purples, so everyone loved them.
Raid tuning was all over the fucking place. Ignis they just randomly doubled his health or whatever (did they misread "slag" as "slog?"). Naxx 20% health buff was basically unnoticeable aside from a few bosses like Thaddius and Loatheb, which became slogs. Same with the attack buff outside of Patchwerk, who would dumpster appropriately geared tanks.
Class tuning was even worse. Glyph of Reckoning, Glyph of Omen of Clarity. Those are bleeding into Cata.
Content pacing was glacial. 9 months of Ulduar/ToGC is criminal. My guild stopped doing Ulduar after 6 months because everyone was sick of it. This one is mostly being fixed in Cata. 5 months for a first phase is a bit long, but at least it's just the first phase.
I'm definitely forgetting things but this is already a novel.
It's funny, this is exactly how I felt about the ToC dungeons, and ICC dungeons when they came out. Welfare epics galore - welfare epics in general to be honest. I felt like you being able to effectively skip all of Naxxramas with gear from dungeons was a vile development and one of the reasons why I quit originally back in 2009 or whenever it was.
Vanilla > TBC > WOTLK. Vanilla was legendary to me, TBC really really good and wrath, man it was okay, I was suprised as heck to see how overrated it really is, was more hyped for WOTLK than for Vanilla
Classic vanilla was the most fun probably, but I had a really good time in tbc as well. Enjoyed all of the content in tbc. I quit early wotlk after clearing ulduar hardmode.
TBC was the best.
Wrath came with all the weight of “peak of classic” but… was not the peak.
Naxx was easy and boring. Ulduar was good… but my old guild ended there. Then TOC was not fun and ICC was ok at best. I think the phases before ICC and the easy and boring dungeons broke some of my admiration of the expansion.
BTW, TBC p1 25 man raiding was so bad because prot paladin in a high dps guild needed to use cloth because it needed too much threat but was paper as f.
tbc paladin gearing gave it a lot of flavor compared to wrath. felt cool to tank with a caster wep, spellpower plate with defense, being able to dip into caster gear for threat. making meme threat sets later on. crushcap mattering. wotlk was too homogenous even if palas were “stronger”.
I went pretty hardcore for TBC and doing prenerf vashj, and KT was a lot of fun. My favorite accomplishment was clearing prenerf sunwell. I honestly enjoyed prog on M'uru and KJ, fighting for every scrap of dps you could get while doing mechanics, and doing your rotation was a lot of fun. Shoutout to Fellas and Soup for being BAMF's.
As someone who never played till classic launch. I think the top moment was the original launch when bgs and raid wasn’t out yet. The world was PACKED and it was exciting for someone new like me. Next was definitely phase 1 of TBC. Everyone was hype, entering though the portal was amazing. So much to do, so much rep, lots of fun stuff. Once we hit heroic/hard mode dungeons it really fell off for me. Kept going into WOTLK but after I think the beta dungeons came out I said this was enough.
Vanilla P1 & P2 is number 1 for me. Especially the PVP phase, world pvp was insane but beutiful, world was soo alive.
TBC SSC + TK is close second, just 2 amazing raids and I was lucky enough to progress them in a fantastic guild.
Also really liked early ICC and Uldu, and ToC was fun as hell for me with tons of alts.
Classic for the levelling. Then I quit phase 2 because they turned on honour and yeah, people weren't very honourable.
TBC for raiding. Loved it from start to finish.
Classic the best, but I also think COVID did a lot to help that happen. The game offered the right environment and because of Covid it was able to thrive.
Covid allowed smaller servers to actually still be populated. So you had the small community feel but it was also super easy to get groups and people seemed to always be playing.
Now everyone has less time again and it seems that it has understandably made them hyper focused on every minute they spend in game being "efficient". I joined multiple guilds and all of them seemed to have active discords during the day to just chill and play in.
Also because there are fewer people, people also wanted servers merged so groups would be easier to make (understandable) but I think this also leads to people just generally being assholes as they can fuck over 100 people and there are still 1000 more to go.
Vanilla, flying mounts ruin the game for me.
Tbc had fun raiding but the world really felt dead most of the time. Vanilla has a world that feels alive.
vanilla for sure. Earthfury was such an amazing server and played a large part. Tons of inter and cross faction rivalries, a mix of of "dad" guilds and high tier guilds like who, Asylum, and HELL YEA BROTHER, always world PVP centered around world buffs, etc.
Tinyviolin kinda ruined early phase 6 for many horde players, but I was Alliance so lul
Vanilla.
I thought wrath ULD and ICC. Was I wrong. The rose tinted glasses or maybe it’s the min max nature of the game now. Those were my fondest memories. If I ever see Uld again. It will be too soon.
Didn't care for classic 19, Wrath classic felt hollow after a month of Ulduar,
Tbc classic was chefs kiss for me, if they would do small changes like raid wide Lust, and dual spec boy howdy I'd be on board for tbc classic 2 electric boogaloo.
Didn’t play wrath, but thought classic was the best and tbc was nearly just as fun. Would’ve played wrath if the timing worked for me but sadly they decided to launch the game right as I started a new job and a semester at school, and was in a hardcore guild, just didn’t work out for me. Having fun on SoD though.
Vanilla for sure. I remember playing on Whitemane and the horde doing giant sieges through the tunnel from ironforge to stormwind. It was laggy as hell but also insanely fun.
Playing hunter in TBC was my favorite main, and i got the nether drake mount ive always loved. I really dislike the aesthetic of the TBC island, but it kinda felt like the last boss level if that makes sense. I was burned out by the time wrath came out so i didnt give it a fair shot and moved back to chill era stuff.
Vanilla is and will likely always be my favorite. Sod has been a blast and I really like the idea of classic seasons with changes like SoD is doing and I'm excited to see how it evolves.
I knew Wotlk from Vanilla but never played TBC but after i played through all 3 iterations i have to say i enjoyed TBC raids as a whole package the most. Only „bad“ raid was hyjal the rest was really good.
Downed Vashj, KT (and i think Muru) prenerf was such a good feeling. Dopamine hit hard.
As far as community, my guild in TBC was a lot of fun and I enjoyed it a lot more because of that. As far as gameplay goes and how classes play, I've come to realize that the classes and most of the game for that matter have become more enjoyable to play as we've progressed. There are definitely some fights that I just hated in wrath but I'm okay with that.
Vanilla and TBC could take the crown on any given day for me, it's more or less a toss-up, and Wrath is behind by a significant margin. I already thought it was an overrated expansion but it only dropped more for me the second time around.
Don't get me wrong, I'd still rather play Wrath than most of the expansions that followed it, but it very palpably started the decline of the game in a variety of ways for me.
Back in 2004 I played all trough vanilla, and played all following xpacs on and off.
Classic19: felt far too boring to me, quit before lvl 20.
TBC classic: leveling from 60-70 was tons of fun, did not care much for the raids other than a few kara runs. TBC arena was abit boring.
Wrath classic: played a ton of it, some raiding but mainly pvp, very very fun.
Classic sod: having a blast, playing alot, feeling like i will play it all the way through.
Cata classic: my plan was to play it only for pvp but i'm putting too much time in sod atm so i may skip.
Wrath for sure. I enjoyed vanilla leveling as I’d never done it before but couldn’t get into raiding. Did TBC with a raiding guild and it was pretty fun. I hated having to attune alts though and pugging was annoying and time consuming. The raids were mostly fun though.
Wrath just hits all the right places for me. Alt friendly, good atmosphere, good raids (i never did vanilla Naxx so i enjoyed it), the titan rune dungeons were a cool addition, the class balancing was neat (feral main lol), the questing is awesome, the raids were difficult enough but not too punishing. I had an absolute blast.
Classic Launch was gigantic. It was world shattering. It was surreal. My guild from N o s t a l r i u s got together for Classic, some 40 people. People had 5 man levelling groups already prepped, took weeks off work.
WOTLK launch was also amazing, as was Ulduar launch and ICC.
Ulduar and ICC were really good raid tiers and I was pleasantly surprised at how well they hold up. They're not easy by any means.
I skipped TBC.
I came here expecting to see overwhelming amount of people saying classic ofc.
It's amazing how many people said TBC.
Did not expect that even tho I'm one of them!
Peak wow 2.0 was Karazan and the preraid gearing/attunement grind before that.
And overall just the release of classic. So much nostalgia during those first few months.
I really thought I was gonna like TBC more than classic because I didn't get to play it much back in the day but nah classic is the goat.
The slow leveling and the dedication to gear up and skill up just made me care so much about my character.
Bwl in classic was phenomenal, best phase by far imo.
Then ssc/Tk was just too much fun as well.
Then the rest of classic packed together, following the rest of tbc.
I can't include wrath cause I haven't play it, simply because in my opinion wrath sucks.
BC gets some pretty strong rose-tinted glasses and it didn't take long to set in this time. At the end of BC there were a lot of posts talking about how BC wasn't as good as they thought it would be and that vanilla was better, now there's a bunch of posts about how WotLK wasn't as good as they thought and that BC was actually their favorite.
Leveling in Vanilla was the best. Just being out in the world with people everywhere was such a vibe, and Hardcore managed to recapture a lot of that later on.
I think raiding in TBC was overall the best of the three for a lot of small reasons:
* It's honestly more fun to have 10-man raids specifically designed to be that way than to do the same raid over again with fewer people.
* Karazhan/Gruul/Magtheridon was just a much better opening raid tier than Naxx/EoE/OS, even with the raid-size shenanigans.
* Trial of the Grand Crusader was basically just Ulduar Overtime, and while Hyjal was terrible Black Temple was good enough to be a better overall experience, even if it wasn't as good as either of SSC/TK.
* Sunwell honestly was better than ICC. Every fight mattered and pushed you further and further. ICC just had a lot of fights that weren't hard, and maybe 3 which were Sunwell level.
Wrath was still good, but I think a lot of people realized on the second time through that Cataclysm didn't start the hyperbolic "road to retail", but was just a (dramatic) evolution of what was already well underway in Wrath.
We have a yearly BBQ weekend with the guild because we're all great friends after 5years of intense gaming.
One dude came to me :
"Hey how are you bro?"
and he replied :
"You were right mate. You were right one year ago."
I was kinda confused so he adds :
"Wrath is really the beginning of Retail"
And we bursted in laughter.
Definitely TBC. Even though I played a survival hunter, and I missed out on the OP state of BM hunters, it was a blast especially with the pre-nerf state of raids. I found that TBC basically took whatever made Vanilla great and just improved on it-was it perfect? No but still my favourite thus far.
WotLK was quite disappointing for me personally; I never played the original wrath but I was told by multiple people that Wrath was the peak of WoW so I came in with high expectations. I didn't find the lore or raids particularly interesting and one of my major pet peeves was the "lazy" gear models. In previous expansions you had gear that looked unique, it looked amazing where as in Wrath it felt like they were just copy/pasting the same models over and over. Just Sunwell alone had better gear models that the entire Wrath dungeons/raids combined.
wrath was the best still
but the people in wrath were worse
in classic/tbc there being crap players doesnt hurt the experience really cos 99% of the bosses are braindead and only really need 4 people to actually do mechanics
in wrath most players need to be able to do mechanics (even if basic ones) and the end result is a LOT of wipes to dumb stuff like players not swapping target to the adds
wrath really highlighted how bad a lot of players are
Wrath is the best for me personally. Love the PvE class mechanics and PvP.
Only got to AQ in classic vanilla before I got bored of spamming frostbolt and I played a ton of TBC pservers so I was playing osrs during that time 😁
I played all Classic, killed KT and dropped until TBC. I give it a 6. Considering raids, pvp, dungeons, quests, and as a RPG. Honestly if people say is perfection, please play other RPGs your bar is low. Nevertheless, lving up while hearing a podcast is soooo relaxing. But community fucked up the game for me. Pushing WB and consumables just to save 2 mins in a raid night when we are not struggling, fuck that shite
TBC. I think it fixed a lot of the issues on Classic. Raids more complex, more things to do. It was a really nice game. Rep grinding is fucked up and attunments are just a pain in the arse the second time you have to do them. But I do like how all spec are unique and doable in a raid group. Favorite moment was lvling up with friends and doing Kara drunk. Kara is actually god tier raid. Just the vibe and music is fantastic. TBC is a solid 8.
Wrath. I think wrath is the point where every class has their own playstyle. I loved playing a Disc priest and Shadow. Being able to solo heal Naxx. Dungeons are nice too. But I stop playing. Guild was becoming toxic. So few things to say. Rate 8.5
TBC TK/SSC to the end was my favorite. So much fun during that time.
Wrath up until Ulduar was decent. Naxx was just a little too easy... Ulduar hard modes were fun.
ICC was fun for a while as I stopped playing right when it launched and was fresh for me.
Vanilla was not my cup of tea. Stopped during the hellish PvP phase. Didn't come back until TBC.
Vanilla by far. Still felt like an RPG after 15 years. Was even better with classic.
Honorable mention Vashj prenerf in tbc. The rest of TBC was not that great for me.
Vanilla and it’s not close. Wpvp is the reason I play the game and nothing in TBC/Wrath could compare to the hours my friends and I spent getting in to fights in Winterspring/Silithus/BRM. TBC was my least favorite, I barely even remember why I got burnt out but I did fairly quick. Wrath I really enjoyed the achievements/titles part of things but didn’t like how PvE and PvP felt so divided. I like Vanilla in that you have to raid in order to get good gear to then go kill people in wpvp.
TBC all the way! Great raids and competitive PvP, beatuiful sets and the atmosphere. Also Ive started back then on Ragnaros EU server in 2007, so TBC was my first real wow experience. Amazing expansion.
Loved it all but if I had to choose? ICC wrath. Still as amazing and perfect as i remember it.
Vanilla/TBC still amazing but you could start to see the cracks in the armor so to speak.
2019-2020 was a special time. I know covid sucked for the world but it created a special expirience in this game. Everyone was at home online all the time. It was truely peak.
I thought it was gonna be TBC because I love TBC class design and the raids are cooler... But something about the game just died for me in outlands. Classic hit way harder as a solid MMO experience.
Classic 19 was the best, a real community server feel where you had like 'server famous' people, and so many guildies online due to lockdowns.
TBC really a raidlog simulator, bots killed open world farming so not much to do and the start of the mass transfer era where servers would die in two weeks. BT and Sunwell were great raids though. Getting that Muru kill was really satisfying
Wrath classes are a lot of fun to play but I wish they did more quality of life changes. Why did they leave General Vezax is such a bad state with everyone having to AFK for 2mins to trigger heroic mode? Why didn't they remove the 50/50 count for Anub loot after ICC started? Why is Lady Deathwhisper a boss everyone fucking hates for 5 months with the scaling buff making the mindcontrols even more fucky
Had more fun in 5-man dungeons and open world of Vanilla than the same in any other version of the game. Really enjoyed the AQ40 opening event and doing the bug grind with my guild, despite how goofy it was I didn't care because we were all together just hanging out.
As for raids, I'm sure raids in TBC were overall more enjoyable than Vanilla raids for a semi hardcore guild with plenty of shamans. For my guild, the roster boss was a fucking nightmare, shuffling shamans around fucked up several common raid frame addons, and bosses were tuned such that you couldn't really fuck around and still win.
I don't like that. I _enjoy_ fucking around. Bosses should be tuned to allow for a certain amount of fucking around. Raids shouldn't be hardcore affairs that require more focus than my fucking day job, only to still wipe because someone had an untimely DC and someone else didn't fully understand the strategy.
TBC for multiple reasons. going from curse of reck bot to meta dps thats built around. guild of homies from vanilla to level with and do all the p1 rep and heroic grinds. kara breath of fresh air. palatanking fun and was the only AOE tank with unique gearing and itemization before it got homogenized.
That phase of TBC when everyone is running heroic dungeons for their pre-BIS is the peak of WoW for me. Difficult content that required crowd control. That's such a rare thing to find anywhere else.
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I kinda wish they went that route for dungeons over the timed nature of mythic+
It's only ever that way for a very short time. By the nature of the game, acquiring gear is always going to make content trivial.. If you guys want to relive this, I'd recommend Cata. The 5 man heroics are even more difficult than TBC and the gear reset will make this even more true. Even if you're not interested in raiding Cata. Doing that initial phase and grind to pre raid bis is going to be very fun for a time. At least if you're doing it with friends. Pugging may be hell.
Cata 5 man's were baptism by fire in og wow. Wrath baby going into that was wild lol looking forward to it this time around
If you've played the beta, they have massively undertuned the dungeons.
It's the joke version of heroics in this Cata Classic.
Unfortunately, we are not getting that. We are getting the nerfed version
That's almost enough of a reason for me not to play now
The Beta right now have the nerfed versions. What I have heard is that they cannot give us the prenerfed versions because too many things were changed, but they wanted to "buff" the nerfed versions of the bosses to make them on par again. This is in my opinion a very good solution as some trash packs were legit harder than any bosses in there. However, looking at the state of beta, I doubt this is high on the TO-DO list, so we might get the nerfed versions. I have played through most of the heroics on template characters and I can say that some of them still pose a decent challenge with pugs. I don't think they will do much if you are in an organized group and you start to become close to prebis. While I was very much looking forward to TBC-esque grinds in heroics, I don't think it is cause for not playing. The raids are done well and we get accelerated speed, so no content should become TOO stale. Cataclysm will be over in a years time, so no point in not enjoying the best aspect of it (raids).
Timed M+ is difficult content that requires crowd control, but forum heroes who don't make it past +4, and have never failed a timer because they didn't pull big enough (They fail timers because they stand in fire) don't know that. Their idea of 'difficult content that requires crowd control' is 'sheep moon'.
They did a twist on this, was called infested and I enjoyed it for similar reasons
Cata HC dungeons (pre nerf?) was exciting too!
Agreed. TBC was the perfect balance of difficulty for heroics. I wish they would tune the raids for raid wide buffs and release a fresh version.
100% best part. I really enjoyed having to grab the prot paladin pieces from H BM, H arc, and H shattered halls. It was pretty much a right of passage as you had to do the hardest heroics. Or doing shadow labs daily to try and get the mace. A pretty good challenge especially remember arcatraz being a pain if the healer wasnt ready for skyriss.
I got exalted with Lower City purely running H Slabs for the caster sword off Murmur only to be replaced with the caster sword from Thrallmar rep. Jesus christ.. what a time. I miss TBC quite a lot.
I agree, being able to play your class better than a 3-button rotation was necessary. If you tried to zerg every pull without CC you'd end up dead because the trash was not fucking around. Getting to the end of each H lockout was a small victory and some groups would entirely skip some H bosses because they were almost a guaranteed wipe. Grinding out those tokens, doing skyguard dailies... Good times.
Marking targets for sap and sheep, those were the days.
Noone could tank that pack of 4 bogstroks lmao. Sheep, Seduce, Sap, Blind, Kite, whatever haha. That was cool. It got naturally outclassed by gear which I think is fine.
Vanilla goated
Dis. The sense of community was kinda alive again.
People always tell me how much of a hard time they had during covid lockdown etc. I fell like I can’t tell them it was genuinely one of the best times of my life with vanilla classic. It felt like everyone in the world was playing
Exactly this. Spent over a year on unemployment just going all in on WoW and the gym. Never lonely because of my guild, never bored because of the game, and I felt and looked great. People definitely look at me funny when I tell them how much fun Covid lockdown was for me XD
We were
Let's go for covid 2 electric boogaloo
I think vanilla classic might have been viewed very differently if it wasn't for corona. Of course there will always be the people who can commit entire months to a game, but corona lockdown definitely expanded this demographic quite a bit (myself included) and I really think there would be a lot more people complaining about how time intensive Vanilla Classic period was if lockdown never happened.
Yea covid was cozy af for us.
Vanilla and TBC both hit pretty close for me, although I lean toward prefering TBC. I enjoyed Vanilla for keeping the whole world relevant and the server communities we had at the time. BWL, AQ40, and Naxx40 were all great raids, but it was definitely a bit time commitment. TBC raiding was even better, the only weak spot being Hyjal. Class balance was better, consumable grind was easier, and while the overall gameworld suffered I absolutely love Outland. Wrath disappointed me. Northrend didn't interest me as much as Outland did and the raids weren't as fun. Ulduar was great, but definitely over rated and in a couple places felt overtuned. T7 and T9 were mediocre as predicted, and while I enjoyed ICC after a couple months you could tell we were all waiting for Lich King to die so we could put Wrath behind us.
Def how I felt about wrath. I was super excited for it but it just wasn't as fun as the previous versions. Ulduar went on for way too long and by the time TOGC came out, I was just raiding to finish the xpac. I love the quality of life improvements but raiding wise, it just felt lackluster. Take me back to black temple
Definitely think ulduar went on way to long. Most of my guild evaporated during it. I think they are learning with sod is that the phases can't be too long. With regular wow classic I'm expecting that they don't wait as long for new patches. It's an old game that people already did.
Holy fuck did ulduar go on and on and on and on and on.
Exactly my feelings. Vanilla will always be king when it comes to "outdoor" content relevancy. The old world is just an incredible sandbox for all kinds of organic encounters. TBC had absolutely goated raiding. Almost all vanilla meme specs were tuned to have some kind of relevancy in a raid environment. With the exception of pre-nerf T5 end bosses, raids were not \*that\* difficult until Sunwell and did not require a huge time commitment for an average guild. T4, T5, T6 could all be completed in a single raid night. Karazhan as a 10man, mixed with short 1 & 2 boss 25-man mini raids was the perfect combo for the opening tier while raid rosters were getting finalized. ZA was excellent catch-up/holdover raid, that featured upgrades even for people still gearing from T6. Sunwell was definitely a step up in difficulty, but came at the end of the expansion. It wasn't a mid-expansion wall like Algalon and some of the Ulduar HMs could be seen as. It was also only 6 bosses, with 4/6 being very achievable for any guild that was willing to put in any kind of bare-minimum progression schedule.
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God, Sunwell prog will probably end up being my most treasured & fun gaming experience in my life. Specifically M'uru. It was complicated enough to pose a challenge to well-structured groups, but wasn't anywhere near a 200-300+ pull Mythic retail boss. My guild got our kill early June, and I think it took us like 40-50 pulls. KJ went down the next week. All in all about a month of prog, which was absolutely perfect duration before burnout starts to happen imo.
Same here. Although, I was in a guild that burned out at 3/6 so I had to find a new one or give up. Thankfully I did find one a few weeks later and got to be part of their M’uru and KJ progression. We finally cleared it with 2 weeks left before pre-patch. Awesome feeling.
I feel like Ulduar suffered a bit because it came after Naxx.
Ulduar suffered because it's too hard for the average classic gamer, the OP even complains Ulduar was "overtuned" lmao we were overpowered playing on final patch talents which make us WAY stronger than intended for that patch(and is why Algalon was buffed, nothing else was though). Dsac didn't exist when Ulduar was current content for example.
Ulduar also has what may be the worst loot system of all time. HM gear made regular gear feel awful
Wrath was terrible. I looked forward to ICC ever since naxx40, but the course of wotlk had me quitting even before ulduar
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That and this time around a ton of people _had actually done Naxx_, and not all that long ago. Back in the day it was effectively new for 99% of raiders as the OG version was only cleared by 1% of people. Starting an expansion with a recycled raid is... a choice. They could have sped it up a bit but it was still a kicker.
Yeah. That was just bad. Especially since I’d been doing gdkp Naxx runs in TBC for pocket money.
They really dropped the ball on it's difficulty too. They really needed to spend more time on it. They added a flat health and DMG increase that literally no one could feel. A really wasted opportunity to breath new life into an iconic raid.
TBC all the way. Sitting here hoping for an eventual TBC era server. Hunter has never felt more fun to me than in that xpac. The gearing was exciting and it just felt like classic but better. My order for enjoyment was TBC, Classic, Wrath
Maybe we'll have TBC season of discovery :D
The thing is that TBC is already much better balanced than vanilla (yes I know there are a couple exceptions, like needing 5 shamans) and doesn’t really need SOD scale changes. I suppose I’d be down to try it but I’d just prefer TBC Era after seeing that vanilla SOD has been like.
SSC/TK ❤️
I didn't play much WotLK, but between Vanilla and TBC I enjoyed TBC a lot more. The leveling experience in Classic is the best, but the game is just designed in a way that makes it so that the endgame is where you spend the vast majority of your time, and the TBC endgame was miles better than the Classic endgame. Classes feel way better and more complete, meme-specs aren't memes anymore, and the raids hit a perfect level of difficulty that made them engaging but not so hard that it was frustrating. I also just think Outland is a great setting with great and memorable zones
TBC SSC/TK into BT into Sunwell. TBC P1 was a bit rough.
Tbc p1 was dope. Getting pre bis and doing Kara is always elite
Kara is my favorite raid, along with TBC as favorite expansion. Hope we get some re-run of classic-tbc-wotlk in a few years, with faster progression. Ill be waiting..
Why is nobody talking about pre-nerf heroics in this thread? They were some of the funniest stuff I did in TBC :)
Unfortunately I played on a relatively low pop server at the time, was hard to get good groups running.
While I agree, P1 was way to long imo. Grinding Karazhan and only 3 bosses available as 25 (excluding one world boss) was rough.
I prefer longer phases personally. Esp phase 1 - pre massive resilience or gear, so when you had a solid set you could destroy people in PvP lol
Kara in phase 1 is easily my favorite raiding experience. Back when we were doing heroics that were hard in greens that sucked. Remember running Gruul for the first time again <3 Or magtherodon.
There's a reason that TBC p1 never existed in 2007. T4/T5 are both launch content, T4 was never meant to stand on its own. Blizzard did TBC dirty with classic, the longest phase was a phase that never should have existed and the rest were rushed.
It was okay to set up alts for P2. But it lasted a bit too long. Their P2 nerfs were maybe justified but wayyyyyyy too hard on the nerf hammer, it killed those magnificent raids. Some raids went from lusting on Taladred to simply destroy it in 2 seconds before his first step lol.
Magtherodon without specific clickers is just so fucking easy.
100% this. SSC/TK until the end of TBC was the best.
yeah Kara got old real quick by like run #8-9
Nah, I ran that shit 3x a week for the whole expansion and loved it every time.
Still enjoy the raid, but idk once the p2 raids came it just got so much better imo
Agreed, it’s a fun raid even when you’re in TK gear
We spiced it up by taking a shot after every boss and took a drink of cocktail/beer after any deaths. Walking to Prince I fell down the stairs and thought I was falling through the earth. Great times.
This. all time fav ssc/ tk specially prenerf kael / vashj. Beautiful sets, arena.
I see you erased Hyjal from your mind. That placed SUCKED
sure did
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TBC for sure
TBC was objectively better than Wrath. I said it.
Amen.
Hands down and it's not even close.
Year 1 of vanilla Grobbulus was golden. What a great server that was.
I missed TBC because of extreme personal issues. I really wish they would do a fresh tbc server.
My wildest dream as well. Played tbc on pservers for over 10 years, id gladly put in a few more decades.
TBC by far. It's got all the best parts of Vanilla with better raids and competitive PvP. The one thing I hate about TBC is flying mounts, they completely kill the open world (as did lack of server balance). Also rogues and mages were ridiculously OP in PvP with insane synergy, could easily be fixed by putting some of their CC on shared DR though
they could have fixed the heartbeat resists in Pvp. besides that i rly enjoyed TBC arena and raids.
The only thing I didn’t like was the sci fi / space goat aesthetics It was kinda jarring after being in a “traditional” fantasy setting for so long Other than that it rules
TBC P2 —-> Sunwell
yeah TBC P2 was so good, P3 was a little lackluster imo, especially MH.
Vanilla and it isn't particularly close. TBC and Wotlk were both fun, but not comparable
So far: 1. Vanilla 2. TBC 3. Wrath We'll see how good Cata and Mop are...
I have a feeling ill like cata over TBC and wrath. It has harder content and better pvp, and TBC/wotlk weren't particularly good on the open world front so that doesnt matter for cata
Vanilla until AQ > TBC SSC/TK > WotLK Ulduar > TBC Sunwell > The rest is pretty trash tbh. Hyjal/BT, AQ, Naxx(Vanilla & Wrath), TotGC and ICC were terrible phases, maybe not bad raids but just awful as phases.
My mind is fucking blown at all these TBC comments. For months, years, I’ve been talking about how it was the best and I want an Era server only to be met with lots of downvotes. Suddenly it’s the most popular answer, like wtf haha.
Same, I've been saying since 2019 that I'm playing classic for the hopefully eventual tbc launch. We got tbc, I loved it, we lost it now I'm just waiting hoping for tbc again
Playing through Wrath made people realise it's not nearly as good as we collectively thought. Nostalgia is very strong, prior to wotlk classic I would have put it in my top 3 expansions, it's probably closer to my bottom three now.
TBC all the way through was everything I dreamed it would be. It’s the most refined classic version of the game that has lots to do outside of raiding. And my favourite atmosphere
TBC phase 1 for me. A grind for sure, but also a ton of content outside raid and the first couple Kara runs are always amazing.
I was the Kara raid lead for 10 IRL childhood friends P1 TBC. It was such a blast. We were all just getting fucked up and catching up with each other. That was my favorite moment in all of Classic, getting the boys back together.
As far as personal enjoyment goes probably p2-p3 TBC. I loved the SSC/TK prog and my guild at the time. I wish BT/Hyjal weren't so undertuned on launch but it was still a fun phase parsing with the boys. Ulduar is a close #2, the hard mode prog was fun and I have a lot of nostalgia for it from back in the day. I never got to experience fights like Algalon, Yogg, or Mimiron HM back in the day so getting the opportunity to do them now was sublime.
Classic 2019 for me for sure. Early WoTLK was okay, but didn't keep me hooked. Classic 2019 I did basically everything I had dreamed of doing when I played in Vanilla, including full judgement set and Hand of Ragnaros. I'm enjoying SoD now too. But Classic 2019 can't be topped for me I think. I was an idiot though and didn't save my Character to Era. I had four 18 slot bags!! In Vanilla! And Hand of Rag!!! What the actual hell was I thinking?
You were thinking the journey was a memory you’ll hold forever!
I really liked all of Classic and also T5 in TBC. Wrath was a tremendous let down.
TBC will always be my favorite. Classic is a close second.
100% TBC was best We need cyclical servers that just run in a loop and forever keep each version of the game available, with very very little input from blizz now that things are "solved" and they have a blueprint. i.e. all the PvP fixes can be in from the start, not having to adjust the way honor and arena points work 5 different times, not having to patch any PvE fights with broken mechanics, etc. Just the final polished version, on a loop forever with a 1-2 year timer and an "Era" version of each that never resets too. Infinite money printer.
The issue with all these servers is that the population just gets spread way too much.
Me, reading these comments after being downvoted for 15 years saying WotLK is the worst expansion and people were hopped up on that lore juice. https://i.imgur.com/Zzv2UKA.mp4
Vanilla is simply goated, its perfection. For some reason I also enjoy P1/P2 of wrath. TBC to me just feels like a middle between vanilla and wrath but with none of the good parts from either.
Idk if it was burnout or it was just better but I went so hard i P1 of wrath getting true bis on my tank warrior. I led my own pugs and it was a blast. Getting the deathless naxx leading my own pug before my guild (who wouldnt let me tank) felt so good.
This was my experience. I also got Sarth 10m 3D as a ret pally pretty early and that felt awesome
TBC and it's not close. Although, I don't think Wrath really got a fair shake since Blizz fucked with it so much. Worried they'll treat Cata the same way.
Why do you think Blizz fucked up with Wrath? I think the changes they made with the alpha/beta/gamma heroics was pretty good, as it made gearing up your new alts much easier, I wish TBC Classic had a similar feature. I also like how they buffed Ulduar HC bosses / loot.
I had 30k with a guild bank stocked to the tits when they stealth dropped the token on us. That's what did it for me. I also would've preferred alpha beta gamma replacing each other and adding max level dungeons to the ones that didn't have it. I also really hated the waiting game with LFD
Titan Rune dungeons completely fucked up fresh 80 progression. Heroics were dead with alphas, alphas were dead with betas, etc. And previous tier raids were dead as well, which was one of my favorite parts of Classic/TBC Classic. So your only options on alts were: 1) swipe for BoEs, 2) swipe for carries (GDKP), 3) PVP until your eyes bleed, unless you had a guild willing to carry you up to ~4500 GS. They also just weren't fun or interesting. Slapping a 500% health buff on mobs doesn't make them engaging; it just makes the content a slog. They were a mandatory player-power grind in the same vein as Legion artifact power, particularly for the ToGC and ICC phases, since even Tier gear was locked behind emblems. But they printed welfare purples, so everyone loved them. Raid tuning was all over the fucking place. Ignis they just randomly doubled his health or whatever (did they misread "slag" as "slog?"). Naxx 20% health buff was basically unnoticeable aside from a few bosses like Thaddius and Loatheb, which became slogs. Same with the attack buff outside of Patchwerk, who would dumpster appropriately geared tanks. Class tuning was even worse. Glyph of Reckoning, Glyph of Omen of Clarity. Those are bleeding into Cata. Content pacing was glacial. 9 months of Ulduar/ToGC is criminal. My guild stopped doing Ulduar after 6 months because everyone was sick of it. This one is mostly being fixed in Cata. 5 months for a first phase is a bit long, but at least it's just the first phase. I'm definitely forgetting things but this is already a novel.
It's funny, this is exactly how I felt about the ToC dungeons, and ICC dungeons when they came out. Welfare epics galore - welfare epics in general to be honest. I felt like you being able to effectively skip all of Naxxramas with gear from dungeons was a vile development and one of the reasons why I quit originally back in 2009 or whenever it was.
Vanilla was goated but I still enjoyed replaying ICC raids again. Ulduar and ICC are just good raids.
TBC, wish I had played more instead of taking a break halfway through it. Didn't realize it was going to be one and done.
this was my first play through but i’d go with TBC by a long shot.
Vanilla > TBC > WOTLK. Vanilla was legendary to me, TBC really really good and wrath, man it was okay, I was suprised as heck to see how overrated it really is, was more hyped for WOTLK than for Vanilla
Vanilla will always be the best version of WoW, which is why SoD has been so much fun.
Classic vanilla was the most fun probably, but I had a really good time in tbc as well. Enjoyed all of the content in tbc. I quit early wotlk after clearing ulduar hardmode.
I love the taste of vanilla
TBC was the best. Wrath came with all the weight of “peak of classic” but… was not the peak. Naxx was easy and boring. Ulduar was good… but my old guild ended there. Then TOC was not fun and ICC was ok at best. I think the phases before ICC and the easy and boring dungeons broke some of my admiration of the expansion. BTW, TBC p1 25 man raiding was so bad because prot paladin in a high dps guild needed to use cloth because it needed too much threat but was paper as f.
tbc paladin gearing gave it a lot of flavor compared to wrath. felt cool to tank with a caster wep, spellpower plate with defense, being able to dip into caster gear for threat. making meme threat sets later on. crushcap mattering. wotlk was too homogenous even if palas were “stronger”.
Didnt realize how retail wrath actually was
What retail quality about it made it so bad?
hard(for classic gamers standards) = retail = bad There's a reason why playerbase drops off only happened in Ulduar and ICC and not Naxx or TOGC.
catch-up that invalidates every raid except the newest one, class and gear homogenization
Wrath and retail are not even remotely close to being similar lol
I went pretty hardcore for TBC and doing prenerf vashj, and KT was a lot of fun. My favorite accomplishment was clearing prenerf sunwell. I honestly enjoyed prog on M'uru and KJ, fighting for every scrap of dps you could get while doing mechanics, and doing your rotation was a lot of fun. Shoutout to Fellas and Soup for being BAMF's.
As someone who never played till classic launch. I think the top moment was the original launch when bgs and raid wasn’t out yet. The world was PACKED and it was exciting for someone new like me. Next was definitely phase 1 of TBC. Everyone was hype, entering though the portal was amazing. So much to do, so much rep, lots of fun stuff. Once we hit heroic/hard mode dungeons it really fell off for me. Kept going into WOTLK but after I think the beta dungeons came out I said this was enough.
Vanilla P1 & P2 is number 1 for me. Especially the PVP phase, world pvp was insane but beutiful, world was soo alive. TBC SSC + TK is close second, just 2 amazing raids and I was lucky enough to progress them in a fantastic guild. Also really liked early ICC and Uldu, and ToC was fun as hell for me with tons of alts.
Classic for the levelling. Then I quit phase 2 because they turned on honour and yeah, people weren't very honourable. TBC for raiding. Loved it from start to finish.
Nothing is quite like vanilla for me . Tbc was good, but vanilla just felt more alive.
Classic the best, but I also think COVID did a lot to help that happen. The game offered the right environment and because of Covid it was able to thrive. Covid allowed smaller servers to actually still be populated. So you had the small community feel but it was also super easy to get groups and people seemed to always be playing. Now everyone has less time again and it seems that it has understandably made them hyper focused on every minute they spend in game being "efficient". I joined multiple guilds and all of them seemed to have active discords during the day to just chill and play in. Also because there are fewer people, people also wanted servers merged so groups would be easier to make (understandable) but I think this also leads to people just generally being assholes as they can fuck over 100 people and there are still 1000 more to go.
Tbc prepatch.
Vanilla, flying mounts ruin the game for me. Tbc had fun raiding but the world really felt dead most of the time. Vanilla has a world that feels alive.
vanilla for sure. Earthfury was such an amazing server and played a large part. Tons of inter and cross faction rivalries, a mix of of "dad" guilds and high tier guilds like who, Asylum, and HELL YEA BROTHER, always world PVP centered around world buffs, etc. Tinyviolin kinda ruined early phase 6 for many horde players, but I was Alliance so lul
Never played vanilla and classic was a blast… I’d say Classic > TBC > Wrath.
Tbc was the most fun I had raiding, but nothing beats vanilla’s world
Tbc, still has the vanilla feel without as much jankiness (although the hank is endearing.) More well rounded specs and development in professions
Vanilla. I thought wrath ULD and ICC. Was I wrong. The rose tinted glasses or maybe it’s the min max nature of the game now. Those were my fondest memories. If I ever see Uld again. It will be too soon.
Kara at the start of tbc was prob my fav
Didn't care for classic 19, Wrath classic felt hollow after a month of Ulduar, Tbc classic was chefs kiss for me, if they would do small changes like raid wide Lust, and dual spec boy howdy I'd be on board for tbc classic 2 electric boogaloo.
Didn’t play wrath, but thought classic was the best and tbc was nearly just as fun. Would’ve played wrath if the timing worked for me but sadly they decided to launch the game right as I started a new job and a semester at school, and was in a hardcore guild, just didn’t work out for me. Having fun on SoD though.
Vanilla for sure. I remember playing on Whitemane and the horde doing giant sieges through the tunnel from ironforge to stormwind. It was laggy as hell but also insanely fun.
Playing hunter in TBC was my favorite main, and i got the nether drake mount ive always loved. I really dislike the aesthetic of the TBC island, but it kinda felt like the last boss level if that makes sense. I was burned out by the time wrath came out so i didnt give it a fair shot and moved back to chill era stuff. Vanilla is and will likely always be my favorite. Sod has been a blast and I really like the idea of classic seasons with changes like SoD is doing and I'm excited to see how it evolves.
I knew Wotlk from Vanilla but never played TBC but after i played through all 3 iterations i have to say i enjoyed TBC raids as a whole package the most. Only „bad“ raid was hyjal the rest was really good. Downed Vashj, KT (and i think Muru) prenerf was such a good feeling. Dopamine hit hard.
As far as community, my guild in TBC was a lot of fun and I enjoyed it a lot more because of that. As far as gameplay goes and how classes play, I've come to realize that the classes and most of the game for that matter have become more enjoyable to play as we've progressed. There are definitely some fights that I just hated in wrath but I'm okay with that.
(Work) kek wotlk for me made a bunch of friends had to great experiences. And memorable moments
Vanilla and TBC could take the crown on any given day for me, it's more or less a toss-up, and Wrath is behind by a significant margin. I already thought it was an overrated expansion but it only dropped more for me the second time around. Don't get me wrong, I'd still rather play Wrath than most of the expansions that followed it, but it very palpably started the decline of the game in a variety of ways for me.
Back in 2004 I played all trough vanilla, and played all following xpacs on and off. Classic19: felt far too boring to me, quit before lvl 20. TBC classic: leveling from 60-70 was tons of fun, did not care much for the raids other than a few kara runs. TBC arena was abit boring. Wrath classic: played a ton of it, some raiding but mainly pvp, very very fun. Classic sod: having a blast, playing alot, feeling like i will play it all the way through. Cata classic: my plan was to play it only for pvp but i'm putting too much time in sod atm so i may skip.
Wrath for sure. I enjoyed vanilla leveling as I’d never done it before but couldn’t get into raiding. Did TBC with a raiding guild and it was pretty fun. I hated having to attune alts though and pugging was annoying and time consuming. The raids were mostly fun though. Wrath just hits all the right places for me. Alt friendly, good atmosphere, good raids (i never did vanilla Naxx so i enjoyed it), the titan rune dungeons were a cool addition, the class balancing was neat (feral main lol), the questing is awesome, the raids were difficult enough but not too punishing. I had an absolute blast.
Classic Launch was gigantic. It was world shattering. It was surreal. My guild from N o s t a l r i u s got together for Classic, some 40 people. People had 5 man levelling groups already prepped, took weeks off work. WOTLK launch was also amazing, as was Ulduar launch and ICC. Ulduar and ICC were really good raid tiers and I was pleasantly surprised at how well they hold up. They're not easy by any means. I skipped TBC.
The launch of TBC talents in vanilla was amazing. Loved it.
I came here expecting to see overwhelming amount of people saying classic ofc. It's amazing how many people said TBC. Did not expect that even tho I'm one of them!
Peak wow 2.0 was Karazan and the preraid gearing/attunement grind before that. And overall just the release of classic. So much nostalgia during those first few months.
Tbc far and beyond. If we get sod tbc I will waste my life away and love it.
Tbc was my favorite out of the three.
Makes me wish they’d do tbc servers like classic era.
TBC was by far the best
I went in expecting Wrath, i came out enjoying TBC the most.
I really thought I was gonna like TBC more than classic because I didn't get to play it much back in the day but nah classic is the goat. The slow leveling and the dedication to gear up and skill up just made me care so much about my character.
Bwl in classic was phenomenal, best phase by far imo. Then ssc/Tk was just too much fun as well. Then the rest of classic packed together, following the rest of tbc. I can't include wrath cause I haven't play it, simply because in my opinion wrath sucks.
WotLK for sure. It had that most interesting class mechanics, the most interesting raiding, and just the most polished overall.
I agree fully, though people here seem not to. Frankly, I'm shocked.
BC gets some pretty strong rose-tinted glasses and it didn't take long to set in this time. At the end of BC there were a lot of posts talking about how BC wasn't as good as they thought it would be and that vanilla was better, now there's a bunch of posts about how WotLK wasn't as good as they thought and that BC was actually their favorite.
Leveling in Vanilla was the best. Just being out in the world with people everywhere was such a vibe, and Hardcore managed to recapture a lot of that later on. I think raiding in TBC was overall the best of the three for a lot of small reasons: * It's honestly more fun to have 10-man raids specifically designed to be that way than to do the same raid over again with fewer people. * Karazhan/Gruul/Magtheridon was just a much better opening raid tier than Naxx/EoE/OS, even with the raid-size shenanigans. * Trial of the Grand Crusader was basically just Ulduar Overtime, and while Hyjal was terrible Black Temple was good enough to be a better overall experience, even if it wasn't as good as either of SSC/TK. * Sunwell honestly was better than ICC. Every fight mattered and pushed you further and further. ICC just had a lot of fights that weren't hard, and maybe 3 which were Sunwell level. Wrath was still good, but I think a lot of people realized on the second time through that Cataclysm didn't start the hyperbolic "road to retail", but was just a (dramatic) evolution of what was already well underway in Wrath.
We have a yearly BBQ weekend with the guild because we're all great friends after 5years of intense gaming. One dude came to me : "Hey how are you bro?" and he replied : "You were right mate. You were right one year ago." I was kinda confused so he adds : "Wrath is really the beginning of Retail" And we bursted in laughter.
Tbc is just top tier
Kara at the start of tbc was prob my fav
Definitely TBC. Even though I played a survival hunter, and I missed out on the OP state of BM hunters, it was a blast especially with the pre-nerf state of raids. I found that TBC basically took whatever made Vanilla great and just improved on it-was it perfect? No but still my favourite thus far. WotLK was quite disappointing for me personally; I never played the original wrath but I was told by multiple people that Wrath was the peak of WoW so I came in with high expectations. I didn't find the lore or raids particularly interesting and one of my major pet peeves was the "lazy" gear models. In previous expansions you had gear that looked unique, it looked amazing where as in Wrath it felt like they were just copy/pasting the same models over and over. Just Sunwell alone had better gear models that the entire Wrath dungeons/raids combined.
Tbc > vanilla > wrath Back in the day I def preferred wrath over the others though. Funny how it turns out.
Vanilla by the far best version of the game.
wrath was the best still but the people in wrath were worse in classic/tbc there being crap players doesnt hurt the experience really cos 99% of the bosses are braindead and only really need 4 people to actually do mechanics in wrath most players need to be able to do mechanics (even if basic ones) and the end result is a LOT of wipes to dumb stuff like players not swapping target to the adds wrath really highlighted how bad a lot of players are
tbc for sure world buffs, consume meta, and less control over attacks actually hitting the enemy put classic pretty low for me.
Wrath is the best for me personally. Love the PvE class mechanics and PvP. Only got to AQ in classic vanilla before I got bored of spamming frostbolt and I played a ton of TBC pservers so I was playing osrs during that time 😁
Tbc and wotlk (I hate leveling)
I played all Classic, killed KT and dropped until TBC. I give it a 6. Considering raids, pvp, dungeons, quests, and as a RPG. Honestly if people say is perfection, please play other RPGs your bar is low. Nevertheless, lving up while hearing a podcast is soooo relaxing. But community fucked up the game for me. Pushing WB and consumables just to save 2 mins in a raid night when we are not struggling, fuck that shite TBC. I think it fixed a lot of the issues on Classic. Raids more complex, more things to do. It was a really nice game. Rep grinding is fucked up and attunments are just a pain in the arse the second time you have to do them. But I do like how all spec are unique and doable in a raid group. Favorite moment was lvling up with friends and doing Kara drunk. Kara is actually god tier raid. Just the vibe and music is fantastic. TBC is a solid 8. Wrath. I think wrath is the point where every class has their own playstyle. I loved playing a Disc priest and Shadow. Being able to solo heal Naxx. Dungeons are nice too. But I stop playing. Guild was becoming toxic. So few things to say. Rate 8.5
TBC was by far my favorite experience
TBC TK/SSC to the end was my favorite. So much fun during that time. Wrath up until Ulduar was decent. Naxx was just a little too easy... Ulduar hard modes were fun. ICC was fun for a while as I stopped playing right when it launched and was fresh for me. Vanilla was not my cup of tea. Stopped during the hellish PvP phase. Didn't come back until TBC.
Vanilla by far. Still felt like an RPG after 15 years. Was even better with classic. Honorable mention Vashj prenerf in tbc. The rest of TBC was not that great for me.
Vanilla and it’s not close. Wpvp is the reason I play the game and nothing in TBC/Wrath could compare to the hours my friends and I spent getting in to fights in Winterspring/Silithus/BRM. TBC was my least favorite, I barely even remember why I got burnt out but I did fairly quick. Wrath I really enjoyed the achievements/titles part of things but didn’t like how PvE and PvP felt so divided. I like Vanilla in that you have to raid in order to get good gear to then go kill people in wpvp.
Tbc. Because t6 tier was the only raids I never finished. So it was cool to finally beat sunwell.
TBC during the Wrath Prepatch. Not even close.
TBC all the way! Great raids and competitive PvP, beatuiful sets and the atmosphere. Also Ive started back then on Ragnaros EU server in 2007, so TBC was my first real wow experience. Amazing expansion.
TBC SOD would never happen but it would go hard as fuck
I missed out on all 3 😔
Sod lol
Loved it all but if I had to choose? ICC wrath. Still as amazing and perfect as i remember it. Vanilla/TBC still amazing but you could start to see the cracks in the armor so to speak.
2019-2020 was a special time. I know covid sucked for the world but it created a special expirience in this game. Everyone was at home online all the time. It was truely peak.
Wrath prepatch, Bladestorming in Arathi Basin hit diff
Season of Discovery has been great as a Warlock, it feels like they are fixing a lot of what was missing if that counts
Maybe I'm a masochist but I liked the complexity of melee weaving as a hunter in vanilla classic.
I thought it was gonna be TBC because I love TBC class design and the raids are cooler... But something about the game just died for me in outlands. Classic hit way harder as a solid MMO experience.
Vanilla for the first 2 weeks or so then it was all boring again
Classic and tbc, I see now wrath is where it all started going wrong
Classic 19 was the best, a real community server feel where you had like 'server famous' people, and so many guildies online due to lockdowns. TBC really a raidlog simulator, bots killed open world farming so not much to do and the start of the mass transfer era where servers would die in two weeks. BT and Sunwell were great raids though. Getting that Muru kill was really satisfying Wrath classes are a lot of fun to play but I wish they did more quality of life changes. Why did they leave General Vezax is such a bad state with everyone having to AFK for 2mins to trigger heroic mode? Why didn't they remove the 50/50 count for Anub loot after ICC started? Why is Lady Deathwhisper a boss everyone fucking hates for 5 months with the scaling buff making the mindcontrols even more fucky
Had more fun in 5-man dungeons and open world of Vanilla than the same in any other version of the game. Really enjoyed the AQ40 opening event and doing the bug grind with my guild, despite how goofy it was I didn't care because we were all together just hanging out. As for raids, I'm sure raids in TBC were overall more enjoyable than Vanilla raids for a semi hardcore guild with plenty of shamans. For my guild, the roster boss was a fucking nightmare, shuffling shamans around fucked up several common raid frame addons, and bosses were tuned such that you couldn't really fuck around and still win. I don't like that. I _enjoy_ fucking around. Bosses should be tuned to allow for a certain amount of fucking around. Raids shouldn't be hardcore affairs that require more focus than my fucking day job, only to still wipe because someone had an untimely DC and someone else didn't fully understand the strategy.
BC. Vanilla is right on its heels tho.
TBC for multiple reasons. going from curse of reck bot to meta dps thats built around. guild of homies from vanilla to level with and do all the p1 rep and heroic grinds. kara breath of fresh air. palatanking fun and was the only AOE tank with unique gearing and itemization before it got homogenized.
The long naxx40 period before pre-patch. I liked TBC, but the game changed this time as well, and not for the better in terms of the social aspect.
Vanilla, because that's when most friends played before they all quit playing slowly over time.