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May 14, 2025 27 mins

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Contradictory player opinions about Classic and Retail WoW reveal fundamental disconnects between what players claim they want and what they actually enjoy.

• Classic players simultaneously demand "no changes" while requesting quality-of-life improvements
• Season of Discovery controversy highlights player confusion—it maintains Classic gameplay while adding QoL features
• Class balance in Classic is objectively poor with fury warriors dominating, yet purists resist improvements
• Perfect balance is impossible in MMOs while maintaining meaningful class identity
• Returning Retail players complain about complexity without specific examples
• Modern WoW's questing is actually more streamlined than ever with clear guidance
• Gear and crafting systems in Retail are straightforward when explained properly
• The WoW community often makes sweeping generalizations without nuanced understanding of game design

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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Music.
Thank you, hello and welcome tothe Pig and Whistle Tales from
Azeroth.
As always here at the Pig andWhistle Inn in Stormwind, I go
through a variety of subjectswith regards to World of

(01:02):
Warcraft.
Grab a bottle or a pint, sitback and enjoy this midweek
episode.
We're going to be looking at acouple of things on the forums.
We're going to be looking atclassic, for one, as well as
retail.
We're going to be giving myopinions on the matters that
they are discussing.
We're going to be saying, ifit's a stupid grey idea, bad
idea, everything in between.

(01:22):
We're going to be going over acouple of other bits and bobs
during this and trying tobasically gauge whether or not
it's actually a constructiveargument that they're giving or
not at all.
So let's jump into classicfirst.
I'm going to jump into theclassic one first, and this
one's going to be a few pointsthat have been made.

(01:44):
So can we have some sensiblechanges please?
This is for classic, okay.
Classic general discussion.
This isn't Season of Discovery.
This isn't anything like that.
This is from what I'm readingclassic anniversary and classic
era okay, give Paladin CrusaderStrike.
Make Summoning Stones work.

(02:06):
Make soul gems stack.
You know stuff like that.
Okay.
So this classic community needto understand, or figure out if
they really don't want anychanges or if they want changes,
okay.
They need to figure that out,because this person's saying
that they want some changes,okay, others will say, no, we

(02:29):
don't want any of this.
And so who's right here?
Who's right, who's wrong?
If blizzard do one thing,they're going to get uh annoyed
by other people or they're goingto annoy other people by doing
this.
But the biggest thing I wantedto discuss here is this comment
on it um, this person puts uh,sod is too many changes for you.

(02:54):
Question mark, which is a fairpoint, because if you look at
the points that he's made, givepaladins crusader strike they do
in season of discovery.
Make summoning stones work well, they don't really, uh, in
season of discovery, butwarlocks can make a summoning
stone that other people canutilize.
So you've got that change there.
And soul gems stack.
They don't have that in sod,okay, but soul stones are a lot

(03:17):
more useful in season ofdiscovery, okay.
Um, so this person asks isseason of discovery, sod too
much changes for you?
And this is the reply fromsomeone I leveled to level 12
and abandoned it.
Absolutely disgusting what theydid to classic.
It really wasn't classic though.
It's its own sort of spin-offof classic.

(03:40):
It's retail all over again.
Just isn't retail, though I'mhappy for those who liked it, of
course, but that's not for me.
And just play retail at thatpoint, oh my god.
Okay, the difference betweenretail and season of discovery
is like night and day.
Okay, season of discovery ismore classic than it is retail.

(04:03):
People need to understand thisBecause in Season of Discovery
you are still only pressing oneto two abilities in a raiding
environment.
Season of Discovery is morequality of life stuff to classic
With the abilities.
They help your rotations andstuff like that.
But you are ultimately at theend of the day, when you're

(04:25):
raiding, when you're doingdungeons, pressing one to two
abilities.
Okay, it's that simple.
With boomy you're pressing likestar surge into your uh, wrath
and star fires.
You know something like that.
With warriors, you're pressingpretty much the exact same thing
, except you get some executeprocs or something.
With mage, you're pressingbasically fireball or frost

(04:48):
fireball, bale fireball, youknow these sort of things.
So it's still a one buttonrotation.
So it's more classic than it isretail.
But sure, there are twocategories of changes to the
classic that I could envisionokay gameplay gameplay changes
add new abilities that changedamage, modifiers and so on.

(05:09):
In the end that I couldenvision Okay, gameplay changes
Add new abilities, change damagemodifiers and so on.
In the end, change balance.
While I'm not against this perse, I don't trust Blizzard to
execute it well.
Classic is good enough, as itis Not perfect, but it is what
it is Okay.
If they were to balance Classic, they would do a better job
than how classic is released.
Yeah, rep paladins, fuckinggarbage in radio.

(05:31):
Anything that isn't a furywarrior in raiding, you're
useless, okay.
This is why the best guildstake 35 warriors and probably
one of each healer or something,or it's probably like 30
warriors and then like a mage ora couple mages, and then you

(05:52):
know healers of different specs.
You get a druid for the druidbuff, priest for priest, buff,
etc.
Etc.
You know there is a reason thatpeople take warriors when speed
running classic raids becausethey're a lot better.
So balancing is nowhere neargood enough in classic.
If you're looking to do content,okay, um, secondly, they would

(06:13):
do it better.
Again, it's an mmo.
You would never be able tobalance a mmo.
It's impossible.
It's impossible in every singlemmo try, try and balance.
That it's ridiculous,especially if you want class
identity.
Okay, class identity is what'sneeded in an mmo for the classes
to actually feel good and forother people to pick it up and

(06:35):
be like I enjoy playing warriorbecause I want to get in there,
hit stuff with big axes.
I prefer playing a mage becauseI like to, you know, fire some
frost bolts or fireballs andstuff like that at my target.
And all of these classes needto feel unique.
But they, if you were to balancethe game and be like OK, mages
have a blink, they havesomething that can TP them 15

(06:58):
yards, yeah.
So what can warriors do?
Let's give warriors a blink,you know, or a leap.
It just takes them 15 yards,yeah, heroic leap.
Instead of you targeting whereyou go, it's an immediate 15
yards, you just leap 15 yardsahead, kind of deal.
Yeah, it's a blink, pseudoblink.
Now, all of this is going to bevery generic and it's going to

(07:23):
be like oh well, since warriorsand mages have a blink, now we
should give druids a blink.
We should give rogues a blink,you know all of this sort of
stuff, and it's like, well,where's the class diversity in
that?
That's just not fun.
This is why MMOs are a balllake to balance, because you
obviously have such a widevariety of skills or abilities

(07:45):
that you can use that you cannotbalance everything around the
same abilities because noteveryone has them.
Um, yeah, and classic is thefurthest part from being
balanced.
It's the worst version of worldof warcraft to be balanced ever
.
Okay, that's just a fact.
It really is just a factualstatement that, uh, all gameplay

(08:07):
changes Blizzard did were utterfailures.
Layers, double spec, chronobooms are a few that come to
mind.
Okay, so layers literally areneeded at the start of releases
of games, at the start or therelease of the 2019 classic

(08:27):
version.
I genuinely think the game andthe servers would have been
unplayable without layers.
Okay, they just would have beenunplayable.
No one would have enjoyed itand it would have lost a lot of
people very quickly because it'slike oh well, I can't do
anything, there's no mobs, I'mlagging my absolute like shit
out, like my tits off here and Ijust can't play, so I'm not

(08:50):
going to bother playing, kind ofdeal.
Layers are there to help peopleget a better performance when
the game first released againnow I would admit I think layers
need to be decreased when thegame is being played.
But again, this can causeserver lag.
This can cause just personallag, stuff like that zone lag.

(09:10):
As for double spec, yeah, Ithink you could have left that
out of Classic.
I would have loved this when Iwas actively playing Classic, to
be honest with you, because itwould have been nice to have
that second specialization forPvP and raiding.
But you know it is what it is.
Uh, chrono booms doesn't reallybother me.
I like that people.
The chrono boom shouldn'tbother people because they are

(09:34):
used for people who want to holdon to world buffs and really
try and pass or whatever.
Fair enough, but honestly, itisn't a bother.
It isn't something that has toworry you, because what you have
to do is you have to go tochromie at chillwind camp or
anderhall, sorry and you have tobuy them off of her, and then

(09:54):
you have to make sure thatobviously you're getting your
world buffs, storing them andthen reusing them, etc.
It's a lot of hassle and youdon't have to do it.
If you don't want to straightup, you don't have to.
So it's really not a bother atall for most people.
Um, so no hope for them toimprove gameplay.
Therefore, I just wish theydon't touch gameplay at all.

(10:16):
Ui changes replace auction housewith new generation.
Add target npc health displaymodern raid frames.
Show incoming heals.
Improve map and npc tracking.
Add map markers, add groundmarkers.
Add spell overlays for someclass buffs.
Those changes are present inretail wow for years, and I

(10:36):
think they would be good forso-called classic plus.
So is this guy not wantinganything for classic plus or
classic, because that's a lot ofchanges?
Um, hell, even achievementscarefully reworked to keep
classic style.
No kissing squirrels, please.
What the fuck is this guythinking of?

(10:57):
What kind of achievement is hedoing?
Um, look, class achievements inclassic is fine, but again,
what is it going to be?
Kill ragnaros, yay.
What is it going to be?
Kill emperor therazane cool.
Like it's just going to be killdungeon bosses, and then that's
it, and obviously the earnreputation like stuff.

(11:17):
It's.
It's going to be ridiculous.
This one is crazy, though, andtransmorphic.
Transmogrification wouldactually improve the game for me
by adding new objectives toachieve.
Are you kidding?
That is such a big gameplaychange.
Your character in classic ismeant to look stupid.

(11:37):
Okay, that's the whole feel ofthe character.
That's what gives it it's.
Oh, that's actually quite acool look kind of deal.
You know you can make it work.
You're a bit rugged and all ofthat.
Having the transmog graphic,like the transmog stuff, is just
ridiculous.
Um, also, some boss fightswould benefit from enhanced ui.
For example, gideon debuffshould be more visible to a

(12:00):
player than some tiny debuff inthe corner.
Okay, you can change the scaleof your UI.
You need to know that.
All right, it is in the options.
You can change the scale ofyour UI.
They added looking for grouptool and I think it fits Classic
very well.
That's an example of welcome UIimprovement.

(12:20):
The core gameplay stays thesame, but interface to the
gameplay is improved.
That's very nice.
I have seen so many peoplecomplain that they should not
have added this back in 2019because it ruined classic.
Okay, I've seen so many peoplesay, oh, but it ruins classic,
it ruins the immersion, it ruins, you know, the um, what is it

(12:43):
not?
The audience, the interact,interactions with everyone, the
like classic spirit and all ofthat, and it's like, well, what
do you want then?
Do you want it or not?
Because this person's sayingthat it's a great gameplay
aspect and I personally thinkit's a very good one as well.
Um, I think that it allows youto still message people and be

(13:03):
like, oh, do you need a hunter,do you need this?
And they'll be like, yeah, sure, sure, sure and all of that
stuff, and it shows that you'reinterested in doing a dungeon
and people can look through it.
They're not having to just spamlooking for group with, oh my
god, looking for more mariden,uh, one dps, one hill, need like
, need to like, prefer druid orsomething.
You know all of that shit.
Um, look, people need to figurethis out, okay, because

(13:32):
literally the next comment onthis is yuck, no, thanks, it's
enough.
We've got flight path markers.
You're kidding, right, you, youare absolutely kidding.
We have got flight path markersand those good-for-nothing
carrots in the minimap C-A-R-E,t-s.

(13:54):
I have no idea.
I have no idea.
Um, yeah, it's absolutelyridiculous, because you've got
people who are literally justsaying, oh my God, this
shouldn't be in Classic.
And he does say Classic Plus.
I will give him that he doessay Classic Plus, but it seems

(14:15):
like he is trying to advocatethis to be in Classic Era as
well.
Before that, he needs to statethat this is for Classic Era or
Plus.
Okay, because it is quiteunclear at points, but people
need to.
The whole classic community islike, oh no, we shouldn't have

(14:36):
any changes.
And you get people who are like, oh no, I think a few ui
changes would be good.
And then, as soon as these uichanges come in, it's very much
oh my god, it's basically retail.
What the fuck are they doing tomy World of Warcraft?
And it's like, oh yeah, okay,whatever, I'm over it.
Yeah, whatever, mate, um, it'sabsolutely ludicrous.
It just is.
It really really is.

(14:56):
And this leads me to the nextone is the other side, on retail
, because people in retail dothis as well.
What, what's going on?
Who is this game for?
Why is it so over-designed?
I don't know how to start this.
I'm going to type into the abyssand just give my thoughts on
where retail has ended up.
I haven't played it properlysince the start of Shadowlands.

(15:18):
Okay, you haven't played sincethe start of Shadowlands, so you
have missed two expansions,pretty much because Shadowlands
came out in 2019 as well, Ibelieve.
I think it was late 2019, so,or 2020, it might have been 2020
, I think is more likely.
So you have not played for fouryears.

(15:41):
We'll say, we'll say four years.
So let's see, I've done my fairshare of mythic raiding and
mythic plus, but admittedly, mypeak was around tumor sargeras
in legion.
I had a good time.
Tumor sargeras is a long timenow.
That is seven years, nearly.
That's crazy.
Um, however, I just logged intoretail to pick up some built-up

(16:03):
trade attendees and just wantedto share my thoughts as to on
as an on again, off again,returning player.
My insight into how a lot ofthings work nowadays, nowadays,
is limited.
I'll keep it brief.
Why is there so much stuffTokens, crafting materials, loot
for all kinds of systems withinsystems within systems,

(16:27):
crafting materials, loot for allkinds systems within systems
within systems?
Honestly, I've completed allthe zone quests when the war
within, when war within, when itfirst released, and it's enough
to put any new or returningplayer off to the get off the
game.
Why, though, bombarded with somuch random rubbish at every
avenue that you just quit thereand then, because it's too much,
it's just overwhelming.

(16:48):
What is overwhelming?
What is overwhelming whenyou're completing zone quests?
You're doing the quests, you'regoing oh okay, this tells me to
go here, this quest.
It's literally giving youbreadcrumbs to get to the next
quest and you're saying it'soverwhelming.
It's, it's absolutelyridiculous.
Um, where was I?

(17:09):
I had a glance today andcouldn't tell you what a single
one of the consumable tokens,that's, currencies in my bag or
character panel tabs, do, orwhere the vendors are.
You can defeat a random mob inthe world and loot an electric
whispered giblet of a highstreet fashion dance troupe and
it all.
It means nothing to anyone.
There's so much stuff in thisgame, my god.

(17:32):
Okay, he's, he's not provingany point.
Okay, there's so much stuff inthis game.
Okay, it's so overwhelming.
Like this will get people tojust stop playing the game.
What will you need to make apoint?
You have made no point.
Okay, you're just saying oh,it's so overwhelming.

(17:54):
What is describe?
What is overwhelming?
It's ridiculous.
I also did a bit of mythic plusat the start of war with vin and
, to be honest, I can't reallywork out what's going on on my
screen anymore.
There's so many animations,graphics, mob spamming, one-shot
abilities, un, unintuitivemechanics from bosses, green

(18:14):
attacks with a green skybox witha green floor, etc.
Etc.
This game is just off-puttingto anybody who doesn't want to
sweat.
Oh, my god, you were literallyso.
You have stated that you didmythic raiding back in legion
and yet, like you're worriedthat it's too much of a sweat

(18:36):
doing mythic plus, whereasmythic plus is more friendly
than mythic raiding and thething is like, wow, mechanics
have always gradually gottenmore and more predictable, like,
oh my god, this guy's doing aslam, don't stand in the swirly
thing, move out of this, moveinto that.

(18:56):
You know it's these kind ofthings.
The mechanics are staying thesame, it's just the swirly on
the floor looks different.
And the thing is, in thisexpansion they've actually
changed the look of most ofthese raid encounters and the
raid abilities to make it a bitmore user-friendly to see these
abilities happening and what youshould or shouldn't be standing

(19:18):
in that.
They've made it a bit easier inthat regard and they are
continuing to do so in the nextpatch as well.
So they are addressing this,which is very good, but at the
same time, he's not reallystated anything.
He just simply hasn't statedanything.
In my honest opinion, with allof this, all he said is
something about a dance troupelike, and that's clearly just

(19:42):
gibberish.
It is just gibberish.
Um, I know the problems are alot deeper if you're actually
playing the game, and this isall very shallow.
I could go on, but I won't.
I haven't provided much detailhere.
I know specific situations, sothis just seems like nonsense.
I've just felt this way aboutretail for a really long time.
I'd love to play it, but thegame is a mess.

(20:05):
They're designing a game withso much content there's
something for everyone, but thenit feels like it's for nobody.
What, how?
How does that make sense?
Also, you can't have a say inthis.
Really, I've just felt this wayabout retail for a very, really
long time.
You're a returning player fromshadowlands.

(20:26):
You haven't played the game forfive years, nearly okay.
When you stopped doing yourmythic raiding and mythic plus
in legion, you still had a wholeexpansion after that before,
like shadowlands, which wasbattle for azeroth, because

(20:48):
battle for azeroth came afterlegion.
So, like what, what was it inbattle for azeroth then?
Was it too much for you?
Is that why you stopped?
Did you stop because there wastoo much of mythic plus
happening or mythic raidinghappening in battle for azeroth?
No, shadowlands.
Shadowlands was a shitexpansion.
It was shit gear wise it reallywas, and it's when all of these

(21:08):
new implementations for gearingcame out, and it always will
happen.
When a new system comes out inthe game, it usually doesn't hit
the ground running.
It really, really doesn't.
The only ones that do are kindof the artifact weapons from
Legion, but this is because theyare insanely good.
Artifacts from lore purposesOkay, death Knights had remnants

(21:32):
of Frostmourne, mages hadEbonchill like a literal
guardian's weapon.
You had a Lunath, you've had afellow Malorn, you've had many
different weapons over the yearsof wow storytelling to look at
and be like, oh my god, that'sso cool that my character has
this.
Um, but stuff like the gearwhere you upgrade it using

(21:55):
certain currencies, that startedin shadowlands and it wasn't
very good.
Okay, there was a lot ofimprovement needed and they've
been doing that throughout theexpansions, which is good.
A lot of people are just goingto say play classic or some
other response, and that's fair,I guess, but I do miss some of
the retail elements.
It's just like everyone'sgotten a bit out of hand.

(22:17):
Anyway, maybe I break throughthe barriers come next expansion
.
Also, dell should have justbeen easy solo content, nothing
more Difficulty should be keptto group content, unless they
want to do a new Mage Tower orsomething that was great.
Okay, delves are solo content.

(22:38):
Okay, you are able to do aDelve on any difficulty.
Solo the higher Delve you do do, though, will push you to your
maximum, okay, so you can walkinto a delve at a plus eight and
just absolutely breeze throughit.
You can walk into it at a tier12, and you will struggle a lot

(23:02):
more with it because it's meantto be a mythic plus, but for
solo content, so you can go ashigh as you really want.
If you want to really stressyourself out and push yourself,
you go for that tier 12.
If you want to chill, you gofor a tier 8 or a tier 5 or a
tier 2, however comfortable youfeel.
Delves are solo content.
Okay, it's ridiculous.

(23:23):
This entire post has statednothing.
Okay, firstly, yes, when peoplelook at it, the gearing system
might be a bit complex, but Ican sum it up relatively quickly
.
Now for pve, you get your gear.

(23:43):
Doing mythics gives youcurrency, gives you valor stones
, and it gives you a crest.
The crests depend on thehighest level, uh, or the level
of the dungeon you did.
You use these to upgrade yourgear.
It's that simple.
That's the very bare bones ofit.
Okay, now, if you want to crafta piece of gear, you simply buy

(24:08):
the mats that you need and youput it up for a commission, this
commission people will be like,oh OK, I'll take that on, they
will craft it and you will getit back in the mail.
It's that simple.
Ok, you just make sure that youhave all the crafting materials
that you want so that they cancraft it for you.
That simple, that easy.

(24:30):
I promise it's not thatdifficult once you just take it
step by step.
But because this guy sees 20animations on the floor and the
thing is, it's not like there'sa shit ton happening.
There's a shit ton happening.
If there is something you arenot meant to stand in, you can

(24:51):
easily see that it is a giantblue circle not to stand in.
Okay, it's that simple.
It's not difficult.
It's not rocket science.
Stop standing in the shit onthe floor.
It's that easy.
But this guy provided no info.
Pretty much his entire point isinvalid because there needs to
be specifications on what he'sactually trying to talk about.
He can't just say it's socomplicated when he's talking

(25:13):
about questing through the zonesand the quest, literally just
babies, like they just walk youthrough the entire campaign.
You can just do one quest andit will take you through the
entirety of the campaign withoutever having to like find your
way to the next quest.
It's that simple.
Okay, it really really is.

(25:34):
Look, that is where I'm gonnaend it for today.
I'm actually getting quiteannoyed at this guy's like post.
I don't know why, but that iswhere I'm gonna end it for today
.
Thank you all very much forlistening.
Do check out all of the socialsdown below.
Constant stuff happening overthere, as well as the Etsy shop.
Multiple things up thereconstantly.
But thank you all very muchonce again and go eval a friend.

(25:56):
Goodbye all, thank you.
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