World of Warcraft Forever stress test
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I played in the World of Warcraft Forever stress test, and I liked what I saw. I very much enjoy vanilla World of Warcraft, and Forever seems to offer the classic experience, but expanded and improved.
The absence of a plot, and the emergence of a story
One of the things I like about the old-school World of Warcraft is the lack of a big overarching storyline, and the emphasis being put instead on the kinda-sorta isolated stories of each zone. Of course, some of the zones influence each other in various ways (eg, Silithus' areas in Tanaris or Feralas), or are connected through questlines, but each of these connections is, again, mostly isolated from every other one as its own little story.
To me, this creates the atmorphere of being an adventurer questing for gold and glory, and not a hero seeking honour and the holy Grail. I prefer the adventurer's story, as it is closer to the ground and more relatable (if that can even be said about a story set in fantasy world where magic and monsters are common), than tales of struggle against cosmic horrors and world-ending evils.
From what I saw, Forever puts more quests of my prefered type in the game. For example, the new questline about Heglan Shadeeye, the missing orcish scout, in Durotar.
The world of vanilla WoW can be described, to steal from the fourth edition of Dungeons and Dragons, as a "points of light" setting. It is mostly untamed, dangerous, and hostile wilderness, and the settlements where you can rest and resupply are few and far between. The Barrens, Tanaris, Badlands, Strangethorn Vale are all like this.
Forever seems to add more details to the world at large, but not to make the world smaller by pushing the wilderness out.
Graphics and the interface
The artstyle
The environment graphics are clearly modernised. It is immediately visible that the shadows, the fog, the lighting have been updated. When I entered the Barrens at night, crossing over the river from Durotar, or walking from the direction of Ratchet the view and atmosphere were incredible.
At the same time, the artstyle remained firmly classic. I have only ever seen one game pull it off: Titan Quest II, which has managed the same feat — updating the graphics technology, so it looks better, but keeping the identity, so it is still recognisable as Titan Quest, or in this case World of Warcraft, instead of yet another generic realistic game.
I have enough realism when look out my window or when I go outside to touch grass. Give my stylised graphics that show the fantasy world; like classic World of Warcraft, Titan Quest, or the first Fable did.
Coordinates with no addon
The TomTom addon has been my loyal companion all these years, but now the coordinates right there in the base interface. There is a floating window with the current coordinates under the minimap, and the world map shows the corrdinates under the cursor and even lets you put a pin under the cursor.
The only thing left would be the "crazy arrow" TomTom gives you, or
an equivalent feature, that would let you set a pin as active.
And an alternative to TomTom's /wayb command.
Expanded quest log
40 quests instead of 20, so now I don't have to worry about having having 19 quests and finding a hard-to-reach guy in the middle of nowhere who gives two more.
Missing keyboard shortcut for basic skills
The k keyboard shortcut now shows the professions tab,
which is separate from the basic skills tab.
I would like to be able to have the old behaviour back ie, a window
that shows combined view of all the skill levels, or at least be
able to set a keyboard shortcut for invoking the basic skills view.
Junk items and item prices
So simple, and yet so useful. I had to use addons to gray-out junk items, and to show vendor prices of items in my bags.
The vendor prices are now displayed by default, without any addon. What is more, the actual vendors have a "sell junk items" button.
The gameplay
Gameplay of classic World of Warcraft may not be smooth in the modern sense (where everything is streamlined), but I like its slow, almost to the point of being turn-based, pace (a mix similar to how older Final Fantasy games are played). I like being able to rely on a plan, and not only on reflex and dexterity. I even enjoy the grind and farming a thousand bear asses, which can feel almost meditative at times.
From what I have seen, Forever adds more of the things I like.
Junior profession trainers
Gathering professions can be learned early, as soon as you create your character. I think this is a good idea.
I always played the game solo, and tried to keep the level of my character (a Troll Shaman, because a shaman is bestaman) and the level of the items I could craft equal. This allowed me to craft items that were actually useful at the time where I was able to start making them, instead of being level 40 and making level 20 items (which, from my point of view, is a ridiculous and broken design).
However, to be able to keep the crafting profession useful, I had to go out of my way to start gathering materials early. If the design team reconsidered how professions work (and what I have seen makes me think they did) and made them more useful, then it is another welcome change.
New leatherworking recipes
During the stress test I wanted to reach level 10 to see the talent trees and learn Leatherworking, my preferred profession. Veni, vidi, I liked it. New recipes were added, so Leatherworking will now produce more items useful over a wider level range, or so I hope.
It would be great if crafting professions created an viable alternative path to elite quests and dungeons.
Improved armor patches
Now they not only give increase armour value, but also grant a bonus to the Stamina attribute. Good news for someone who mains a leatherworker character.
Press-and-hold casting
This is a mostly mechanical change, but I like it nevertheless. Now I can hold a button down to release the same spell twice or thrice in succession if that is necessary (and it is necessary pretty often).
Reputation for Ratchet
The Barrens are one of my favourite zones, along with Feralas and Tanaris. If there are items (good items!) connected to Ratchet reputation, I can only hope Camp Mojache and Gadgetzan received similar treatment, because it would mean more stuff to do in the best zones.
Different types of food
It was already kind of the case in vanilla, especially at later levels eg, you can buy recipes for food that grants bonus Agility, health regeneration, or mana regeneration in Steamwheedle Port in Tanaris.
In Forever, such recipes are available as soon as you learn cooking.
Improved First Aid
One of the things I do not like about vanilla is how First Aid works; or rather, how it does not really work.
My main is always a shaman, so the character can heal itself. First aid is not necessary. When I played a druid or a priest as an alt, my characters could also heal themselves.
However, warriors were annoying to me. Playing a Fury warrior is fun (I like dual-wielding), but having no way of self-healing or removing debuffs like poison and disease was always a thorn in my side. First Aid was the obvious solution, but it was too underwhelming.
Forever makes First Aid much more useful, by not only adding Curatives (which remove poison and disease effects), but also allowing First Aid to create healing potions. This is a game changer, and an awesome change!