If you’re a World of Warcraft veteran, then Wrath of the Lich King is going to hold no small amount of fond memories. Launching in 2008, this was the game’s second expansion and at the time become the fastest-selling PC game ever. It brought the continent of Northrend, the first hero class, and some of the best WoW raids of all time. In many ways, it laid the foundation for the modern WoW, as it added systems like achievements or group searching that are seen as standard today.
If you’re someone who longs for those halcyon days of the late 00s then you’re probably already playing WoW Classic, and if you’re not then the fact that Wrath of the Lich King is now available on those servers should be able to tempt you. We spoke to the Lead Software Engineers for Wrath, Ana Resendez and Brian Birmingham to reminisce a little and talk about what the team wanted to achieve with this new iteration of the expansion.
Note: The Q&A has been edited slightly for clarity.
GLHF: So let’s kick things off with a broad question — what are some of the most significant differences between what Wrath Classic is doing now and what Wrath was on its original launch?
Resendez: One of the biggest differences is that we did, from the get-go, was enable people to create Death Knights before the expansion even launched, starting with the pre-patch. You aren’t required to have a level 55 character on your realm to create one either, which was a requirement in the original version — with the exception of ‘fresh realms,’ which do have that requirement imposed, as well as preventing transfers into the realm. Aside from that, additional layers still play a factor in Classic server management, allowing larger servers with a larger capacity.
Birmingham: That’s a really good segue because layers created a unique problem with Wintergrasp. [Ed: Wintergrasp is an outdoor-only player-versus-player map that players would fly into to participate. On the original launch, Wintergrasp did not have a queue system.] The question was “What do we do with an outdoor PvP zone when there are multiple copies of it?” Our answer was to create a battleground that spins up so you can play region-wide matches against various servers. If anybody comes back to your server having won their match, they unlock the Wintergrasp features, like Archavon and elemental spawns, for your faction.
This does create another problem, however — what happens when both factions in different instances won Wintergrasp? So to solve that, we’re making sure that both factions, if they’ve won, can go to the keep and access Archavon. Players won’t be able to see each other, and outside of the keep PvP is still enabled, so players will have to compete for the elemental spawns.
GLHF: I fully admit, I didn’t follow a lot of the hubbub around the Looking For Group tool announcement for Classic Wrath earlier this year. Could you go into more detail about it?
Birmingham: For those unaware, the Looking for Group tool as most modern WoW players know it didn’t come into existence until the final patch of Wrath of the Lich King — bringing with it the ability to queue directly into a dungeon and automatically form a group for you. We decided that when we brought back Classic Wrath, we wanted to take that feature out and recapture the sense of local community and organic group formation. That’s how it was in the first few patch cycles of Wrath originally, and we don’t think that the LFG tool features really “fit in” with Classic.
We did, however, create a bulletin board-style tool where you can list your group or yourself and recruit from it for a variety of activities, so you won’t need to resort to spamming Trade Chat to find a group.
GLHF: Have you seen that organic group forming, that sense of community building on servers? Or has it not really worked the way you thought?
Birmingham: It’s realm-by-realm — some realms really do have a close-knit community and some realms don’t. The thing we have to pay attention to is being careful not to overemphasize any one person’s opinion, be it our own or any particular person complaining about an initiative. Is something widespread? Or is it a problem right now for a specific individual? We definitely see communities forming and new friendships being made, so we’re wary of overadjusting.
Resendez: I have definitely seen in the chat channels that we’re seeing more organic formation of groups and people trying new things out — scenarios like, a group is looking for a tank and they start whispering Warriors questing in the region to come tank a dungeon, even if they’re new.
GLHF: Blizzard has recently rolled out a poll asking players their opinion on Cataclysm Classic servers. Cataclysm is really what I think of when I think “modern WoW”, so how has that gone for you?
Resendez: One of the biggest draws for Classic servers is that we really do care about the community and their thoughts on things. We send out these polls because we want to bring them into our decision-making, because at the end of the day this is a game for the players and the community to enjoy.
Birmingham: Yeah, as we approach each expansion, we think about what makes sense for each one to have. With Burning Crusade, for example, you can’t really do Burning Crusade without flying. With Wrath, taking the LFG tool out was easy — again, players didn’t have the LFG tool for most of the expansion originally anyways. But newer tech, such as phasing, or the cool storytelling tricks we designed specifically for Wrath? We have to have that.
GLHF: I have seen players, after years of being told by us veterans that the “old days were better,” join a Classic server and bounce off of it quickly due to the lack of modern quality of life features retail players take for granted. Have you noticed this drop-off occurring, and was it worse in Classic or Burning Crusade Classic?
Birmingham: I can’t talk about specific numbers. I will say that, of course, we always see a big spike of interest whenever anything new comes out before tapering off. That’s just the nature of video games in general. What we’ve been doing is trying to make sure that if any realms get smaller, we offer an opportunity for you to move to other realms — we’ve been offering free transfers to realms that are more populous.
People are coming back for Wrath, however, so we’re offering free transfers back off if you find yourself stuck on a realm that is queueing right now. We’re trying to have a really active hand, especially right now during this really busy time, to try to guide people to a place where they will have a healthy community — one that is letting them play right now, and also is likely to last a long time.
Resendez: Also, Classic Wrath isn’t the only thing you can play if you find yourself struggling with queues. Players can experience both Classic Wrath and Retail [Shadowlands], so we are trying to keep options available for all.
GLHF: I gotta ask — where does the “Classic” train stop? Wrath and Cataclysm were, in my opinion, the last remnants of a period of World of Warcraft that largely doesn’t exist anymore in Retail — Mists of Pandaria really moved the needle forward from that period in terms of quality of life. Are we gonna see Legion Classic at some point?
Birmingham: Why do we have to stop? Let’s keep going forever! No, but seriously, Retail WoW is still innovating new things all the time, so by the time Classic catches up to those expansions, if we decide to go that far that is — who’s to say what Retail WoW will look like at that time? That’s why we have these surveys and why we keep brainstorming new ideas. Things like the Season of Mastery, which is still active right now — and we’ll give those players an opportunity to transfer forward into Wrath once the season ends, or stay in Classic.
Resendez: Listening to the community is extremely important to us. If players are asking for it, then that’s what we’re looking for — players have different fond memories from different eras of the game, so we want to enable that for the players.
GLHF: Wrath has a lot of raid content in it — Naxxramas, Ulduar, Trial fo the Crusader and Icecrown Citadel to name a few. Are you planning on staggering release of that content out?
Resendez: We’re planning on doing a staggered release, and we’re looking at a similar patch and content release cycle as we have for previous expansions. Players will be starting with Naxxramas, and we want to give players enough time to observe and enjoy the content without feeling rushed.
Birmingham: In fact, remember when Naxxramas came out in Wrath originally, it was undertuned? We’re tuning it up a bit to feel more satisfying for veterans. It won’t be extremely challenging, so first-time raiders can still enjoy it, but it won’t be as easy as it was previously. Look forward to Four Horsemen!
GLHF: While you have Classic servers still around, Burning Crusade servers are all being upgraded to Wrath servers. Are there plans to keep some servers on the Wrath cycle permanently, or will those upgrade to Cataclysm if that project moves forward?
Birmingham: It’s something we’re definitely talking about, as we know that there are a lot of people who were very fond of Wrath of Lich King. It is a difficult thing to manage too many versions of the game at once, so we want to make sure that we’re directing players toward exciting activities where they’re going to find other people to play with them — while also making sure we haven’t diluted the player base across too many different offerings. We’ll always be looking for things that we can do to try to keep the spirit and excitement of it alive in the future.
GLHF: Favourite Northrend zone? Mine was Storm Peaks, mostly because I spent all my free time trying to find the ultra-rare mount there. Never got it.
Resendez: The Underbelly in Dalaran. I love watching duels and PvP down there, it was my first introduction to PvP when I started playing.
Birmingham: Grizzly Hills. That music just cannot be beat, but also the redwood forest just feels fun to navigate.
Wrath of the Lich King Classic is available to play right now.
Written by GLHF.
