At Blizzconline 2021, Blizzard announced something many fans had been anticipating since the release of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic. As an expansion to the vanilla game, players can choose to continue to the new content or remain on Vanilla servers when The Burning Crusade Classic is released later in 2021.
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With the pre-patch on the horizon that will allow players to create Blood Elf and Draenei characters, players are already getting back into a 2007 mindset and breaking out game guides from the original release of The Burning Crusade. Fel reavers, a new PvP meta, and the unique Outland armor sets are all coming back in style – or rather, without any sense of fashion at all.
10 The Warrior Metamorphosis
Warriors in World of Warcraft Classic are notoriously difficult to level up, but can put out top damage numbers in end-game raids and dungeons. Many players flocked to the Warrior class when Classic was released to be the best in the raid down the line.
When The Burning Crusade Classic comes out, though, Warriors fall all the way to the bottom of the charts, with Warlocks taking the top overall damage output instead. It should be no surprise min-maxing players start anew as this casting class to stay on top.
9 Boar Livers
One particularly rough part of questing in Outland is the drop rates of certain quest items. While there wasn't a specific quest related to boar livers in Hellfire Peninsula, there was the quest Demonic Contamination, which asks the player to gather 6 Helboar blood samples. The drop rate on these samples is... abysmal, to say the least.
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In the Barrens, there is a similarly frustrating quest titled The Zhevra, which tasks the player with finding 4 Zhevra hooves. Players often spend hours decimating the Zhevra population for these hooves, and some quests will feel eerily familiar in Outland.
8 Outland Armor Is... Unique
In World of Warcraft Classic much of the armor the player acquires throughout the game looks at least half-decent when worn with pieces from differing sets. In Outland, though, it's a different story. Every zone has its own unique, vibrant armor – and the stats might just force the player to equip something downright ugly.
If a player wants to be successful in The Burning Crusade Classic, they will have to get used to their character looking like a walking disco ball for most of the experience.
7 Drake and Josh and the Fel Reaver
Ah yes, the Fel Reaver, destroyer of the unobservant and the big bad guy to avoid when starting The Burning Crusade Classic. Players can hear the Fel Reaver approaching from its signature metallic screech that rings out across the landscape of Hellfire Peninsula as it gets closer, and should keep an eye out at all times for its location.
Even modern vehicular technology wouldn't help Drake and Josh escape this absolute unit of a foe – if you can hear the Fel Reaver, it's already too late.
6 Crashing the Exodar
While there hasn't been an official announcement as to when the pre-patch for The Burning Crusade Classic will hit servers, players are already foaming at the mouth for the chance to experience Azuremist Isle and Eversong Woods all over again.
A short-term truce between the gnomes and goblins could have lead to impressive feats of engineering – instead, their eyes are on the skies with rockets and explosives at the ready. The quicker the Exodar falls, the quicker players can start playing as a Draenei, right?
5 Saving Gold
Along with The Burning Crusade Classic comes extremely steep prices for new services and items available in the expansion. Flying mounts will cost 800 gold and epic riding training costs 5000 gold, while the average World of Warcraft Classic player barely has enough to afford epic ground mount training at 1000 gold.
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That's not to say things are cheap in Classic, though. Naxxramas is infamous for forcing players to buy a huge amount of consumables and items just to have a chance at beating Kel'Thuzad.
4 #NoChanges?
When World of Warcraft Classic was announced, there was a huge movement in the online community to prevent the game from becoming the engorged beast it is today. Blizzard for the most part listened to these demands, instead implementing small bug fixes and class imbalance issues along the way instead of releasing a "fixed" game.
As part of The Burning Crusade Classic announcement, it was revealed that players will get a level 58 boost for one character to bring them up to par for new content. It's a controversial decision, but ultimately will be a player-by-player choice.
3 Always Prepared...
While World of Warcraft Classic is a revered grandaddy of modern MMO design, a significant amount of players were looking forward to future content rather than the original vanilla experience. It's a grind, the stories are all well-known by World of Warcraft players, and the game didn't reach a peak player base until The Burning Crusade and later expansions released anyway.
For many, the entire Classic experience was one big preparation for The Burning Crusade. The expansion simply improves upon a list of issues with the original MMO, and for many, it was their introduction to World of Warcraft back in 2007.
2 Rainbow Anduin Lothar
The Warcraft movie, released in 2016, only received lukewarm reviews for its storyline only players would understand, among other things. One detail the designers clearly missed out on was the colorful palette of armor in The Burning Crusade.
If Anduin Lothar engaged in a Mak'Gora with Blackhand while wearing this ridiculous oversized set of armor, perhaps it would have been more accurate to the source material.
1 Chasing the DPS Charts
The DPS warriors can put out in Classic is definitely top-tier when properly geared at the end-game. In The Burning Crusade, though, warriors are one of the lowest-ranked DPS classes in the game, a stark contrast to former glory.
Warlocks on the other hand got some major boosts with The Burning Crusade, and for players who care a lot about dealing tons of damage in a raid or dungeon setting, it was the best class to pick. Unfortunately, this meant the world was saturated with dark magic users and had a significant lack of sword-wielding fighters.