 This is a hundred percent classic plus beta. They said there's no beta or anything for this. Well, that's because this is the beta Okay, you saw scarlet monastery. Okay. I told you what I said, that's gonna be level 40 cap They're gonna do a raid. That's what my prediction is Karazhan Crips hell. Yeah, dude, dude, I'm telling you it's like they're not there But there's so much like you can see the light at the end of the tunnel and that's so hype dude I'm like I'm like freaking out internally So here's what you guys are gonna see we're gonna go sit on the classic paneling in the other while classic What's next coming up? Hey guys, we're all the great again brother. Hello Blizzcon. My name is Josh Greenfield And I'm the senior game producer on while classic I'm here to talk to you today about our new season for a classic World of Warcraft season of discovery Today I'm going to give you an introduction and an overview of what our season is at a very high level as well as Giving you an idea of what our major features are after this overview I'm gonna hand things off to a few other classic team members to dig into some specifics about what I'm gonna cover So let's go ahead and jump in So now it seems fitting to start off talking about discoveries. It's it's in the name after all so it seems pretty important to the season It's good now when you first start a character in season to discovery It'll look and feel identical to original World of Warcraft You'll slay kobolds you'll give lazy peons a bonk all the kind of normal things you do when starting fresh in World of Warcraft When you get to around level two however in the starter zone your class trainer will offer you a new quest And this is to go find your first room We'll talk about rooms in a little bit more in a minute But after that the inch after that intro quest the game simply tells you go find more and that's kind of where discoveries come in Discoveries are essentially secrets hidden throughout the game world. They usually aren't quests in the traditional sense There's nothing on your map to show them to you This is classic after all and some may be as simple as a treasure coffer deep in a kobold mine But many are small events kind of unto themselves often times record requiring more than one player a little bit of creativity Or some keen observation skills to obtain one of the things we love about Azeroth is the sense of awe and wonder it inspires It's a massive world But due to the kind of solved nature of original Wow It's in sometimes feel a lot smaller than it did when we first started our adventures Discoveries are our way to disrupt that a bit keep the world familiar Comfortable but add enough new things to find to evoke that sense of adventure and exploration We first felt when we step foot in Azeroth be on the next hill deep in the next crypt or cave Something exciting could be hidden One other thing we love about discoveries is this social and information sharing aspect for those first few weeks of each phase We hope to find secret finding communities pop up both in and out of game As players scour Azeroth to find all these little hidden things We can't wait to read general chat as players begin sharing what they found with each other in real time We think that social and info sharing aspect is super exciting and we can't wait to see how long it takes for all these little secrets to be found In order to preserve this sense of discovery we will not be holding a public beta or PTR for season of discovery Thank you We want day one a season of discovery to feel as fresh and full of surprises as we can So we're taking a chance here to keep those first few weeks as exciting as possible The last thing we'll say about discoveries now is that we wanted to craft them in a way that really felt at home and original Wow many times when play testing amongst ourselves We'd find a new NPC or an object and someone would hesitate and say like is this from 2004 Is this is new or like yeah, it's new like that's new to the season and to us That's a great success the idea here is that these things feel as like a natural part of Azeroth as it was at this point in Wow's history Next let's talk a little bit about level banded content phases and what that means in essence Level banded content phases are how we're going to approach the level up journey Season of discovery when we initially launch the level cap and season of discovery will be level 25 After a number of weeks the level cap will increase to a higher level for the next phase So why a level cap of 25 to start with well our inspiration for this actually came from the wild classic beta in 2019 We saw how much fun the game was when the level was capped at a lower level and our players would find new and exciting Talent and item combinations to optimize around and this is something we've always looked back fondly on and it's something We've wanted to sort of explore ever since We also realized how approachable an initial level cut lower level cap could be we talk a lot internally about Approachability on my classic and respecting players time There's a major goal of this level banded approach to to really give you a chance to get into it one of the things we really consistently see on forums or social media to is is it too late to start and oftentimes we'll hear this literally within a day or two of a new release and Obviously, it's never too late to start playing classic. Wow, but as we've all you know grown into additional responsibilities and found ourselves spending maybe a little less time playing games that we used to We can definitely feel that sense of kind of fear of missing out or FOMO When we log in after a long week and see our friends 10 or 20 levels ahead of us And for that this level banded approach is perfect There will be plenty to do in each new new leveling journey With from the quests and dungeons and battlegrounds We all know and love to finding all the brand new things to discover across And then later on leveling new alts to find all of their hidden discoveries as well There's lots to do But we're hoping that you won't ever feel that sense of being behind just because you couldn't play on a given day We also plan to give a very sizable experience boost to the previous level band every time we raise the level cap This is kind of similar to Joyce journeys and wrap classic if you're familiar with that So even if you miss a phase or once a level and all you'll be able to catch up to your friends in no time So the next thing we want to talk about is in game at level cap So when we decided on this level banded content approach We had to kind of sit down and ask ourselves What is in game when the level cap is 25 and first I think it makes sense to talk a little bit about about our inspiration And this is something we really kept keep coming back to a lot on classic since this is a version of original wow We wanted to start out grounded in familiar locations and put the focus for the new stuff on fresh gameplay and mechanics in those iconic dungeons and locales To that end our first raid and season of discovery will be the iconic dungeon black fathom deeps Reimagined as a 10 player rate instance Thank you Next one of our main goals is to ensure that these are fully featured deep Satisfying raids and not simply the addition of a few mechanics to existing encounters as they were in 2004 All of these encounters are a full ground-up redesign and should feel like proper raid encounters And of course with new raids comes lots of new loot In addition to raids we also really want to play up that PVP aspect and as a result We're planning to had several outdoor PVP events to the game as the level caps increase Thank you Lastly one of the things we're most excited about is where we go when we start getting to higher levels We are leaving the door open to the possibility of completely new Experiences and the prospects of exploring previously unfinished or unused locales for future raid and dungeon content We think the level 25 is going to be full of great Memorable gameplay that feels right at home in original wow, but this is just the first step and we think the best is yet to come I guarantee so next let's kind of change gears and talk about rune engraving a little bit So this is one of the most exciting new things about season of discovery One of the most consistent pieces of feedback We've gotten from previous iterations of original wow such as our season of mastery is that many players would like to try some adjustments To their favorite class respect We really wanted to take a chance with season of discovery and go kind of wild here and we did that's where rune engraving comes in Rune engraving is a new skill that all season of discovery characters know automatically on character creation Rune engraving allows you to gather learn and apply new class abilities directly to your equipment kind of like enchants in The initial one through 25 experience You'll be able to discover runes in your chest legs and glove slots And as the level cap increases additional runes for other item slots will be discoverable over time Once learned runes are permanent and can be applied and reapplied to your gear at will just out of combat One of the most exciting things about these runes is that they exist completely outside of the talent system meaning that you could very Realistically splash in you know damage abilities with a healing talent specs You can so a little bit better or you could swap maybe to tanking ability runes to round out the tank spot You're five player group if you're missing one We you may also encounter previously faction specific paladin and shaman buffs as runes Which helps bring some parody to each faction without those classes losing their unique flavor or the factions losing their unique flavor In order to also streamline the talent system to go along with runes We do plan to adjust the respect cost to be much more nominal in season of discovery particularly at low levels And that's all that's all Who knows maybe just maybe someday you won't be constrained to just one talents back in season of discovery So overall we've been playing this a ton internally we've been having so much fun with it It's everything we love about classic plus so much more at this I'd like to hand this off to over to one of our lead software engineers norvaletta to talk about some specific Abilities you may encounter on the different classes as well as to talk a bit about our PvP plans for season of discovery Take it away I'm actually turning around thanks Josh hey blizzcon my name is norvaletta and along with Anna I'm a lead software engineer on wow classic there There are over a hundred runes in the 1 to 25 leveling bracket across all classes And we'd love for you guys to go forth and discover them on your own However to give you an idea of what to expect. I have a few to share with you today First things first. I want to share some of the things we had in mind when designing runes and season of discovery One is to shake up the meta our seasonal content is a great opportunity to deliver wow classic With a twist with our non-seasonal content We try to deliver a classic experience close to the original but with seasons We have the freedom to experiment with what if scenarios such as what if roads could tank what if paladins did heaven and have a taunt On that point We wanted to introduce abilities such that each class has something special Something that other classes can point to and go dang that's so cool. I wish I could do that Many of the runes you find our greatest hits remixes of popular abilities from various wow expansion So many of them will be familiar to you that said some of these familiar abilities may actually behave a little differently than you remember Some spells and abilities you'll discover have never been introduced before in any wow expansion for these We were careful to make sure they were an appropriate fit for class fantasy Most importantly we want classic to continue to feel like classic Many of the iconic spells and abilities you've seen in various wow expansions feel fitting for that expansion or fitting for modern Wow, but would feel out of place in classics So we tried to avoid introducing anything with a to modern feel and made adjustments wherever it made sense Anyways enough of that Let's take a sneak peek at some of those abilities Druids Season of discovery you have an interrupt called skull bash which can be used in cat or bear form Fury of storm rage removes the mana cost of wrath dealing damage with wrath has a chance to make your next healing touch instant Wild growth applies a heal over time effect to your target and up to five nearby party members Hello hunters Beast mastery will increase your pets damage health and focus regen growl is now a proper taunt Explosive shot is a range damage over time ability and Lone wolf gives you a damage boost if you have no active pet Here this was dual wielding and you've got yourself a mean melee hunter Mages Ice Lance is an instant frost spell that deals triple damage to frozen targets Living flame causes flames to erupt and chase a nearby enemy leaving a burning trail in its wake and Regeneration is a heal which marks your target with a temporal beacon Another rune ability called rewind time will heal the damage taken over the previous five seconds You can heal other people with this by the way, not just yourself, so I hope you've made room on your roster for mage healers Paladins In wow classic they don't have a taunt, but here it is Season of discovery and the reckoning is your taunt Knowing this ability will also increase the threat bonus of righteous fury and cause you to gain mana when healed by other players Crusader strike is a weapon attack It's a weapon attack which costs no additional mana and instead regenerates your mana slightly with each hit and Seal of martyrdom can be activated to cause melee attacks to strike other nearby targets You'll lose health when inflicting damage with this However nearby party members will gain mana based on the damage you take priests You can channel penance to hear heal near nearby friendly targets or deal damage to enemy targets Prayer of mending heals your target the next time they take damage or receive healing Afterwards, it'll bounce to another friendly player nearby Hamunculi Animates three miniature copies of your character which will attack your target with a mace a sword and an axe Reducing their attack speed attack power and armor respectively Ro from stealth Shadow strike allows you to teleport behind your target and strike for a nice big chunk of damage and Venom is a finishing move It deals poison damage based on your deadly poison doses on the target and also increases the frequency of applying instant poison for some time afterwards Just a flesh wound is our rogue tank ability You generate way more threat you take reduced physical damage while blade dance is active You're less likely to be critically hit by melee attacks and your faint ability turns into a taunt called teas shamans Law of a lash deals offhand weapon damage Offhand in season of discovery enhancement shamans can dual wield with the help of another room not pictured here happy hunting Healing rain is a gradual AoE heal which can be placed on the ground or on a lamppost or on the ceiling Way of earth allows you to perform the coveted role of shaman tank With this you'll deal increased threat. You'll take less damage and earth shock becomes your taunt warlocks Haunt deals damage Increases all shadow damage you deal to the target and heals you for the damage it dealt once it's dispelled or expires Chaos bolt sends a big beefy bolt of fire at the enemy It always hits it can't be resisted and it causes all of your fire spells to pierce through absorption effects and Metamorphosis This is your shape shift allowing you to transform into a demon similar to a druid's bear form Increasing your armor and reducing your chance to be critically hit Searing pain becomes instant shadow bolt becomes a melee cleave and curse of recklessness is your taunt Warriors Victory rush is a weapon attack that can be used after killing an enemy. It will heal you for a certain percentage of your health Devastate will cause your thunder armor to deal main hand weapon damage increased for each stack of thunder armor already on the target and Raging blow is a vicious strike that deals heavy damage, but can only be used while enraged now This is just a taste of all the abilities coming to classes in season of discovery and really bottom line We want everyone to feel okay anyways Enough about runes Let's instead turn our attention to the ancient forest of Ashen Vale in northern Kalimdor Ashen Vale is known for its beauty its rich natural resources And its role as a hotly contested territory between the Horde and the Alliance in Season of discovery earning kills while in Ashen Vale will trigger a zone-wide PvP event During this event a leader will appear in the zone for each faction A farce here for the Horde and a priestess of the moon for the Alliance. Your objective is simple It's to defeat the enemy leader Now this is easier said than done These leaders are tough so you'll have to work together to take them out In addition to the main camps where those faction leaders reside various other camps will spawn across the zone for each faction The priestess of the moon and the farce here are each buffed by respective leaders in those smaller camps The more of the small camps you can take out the weaker your enemy's faction leader will become Sounds familiar. It's much like Alterac Valley This event is an awesome way to earn honor as well as reputation with Warsaw and Gulch factions Which allows you to unlock some of the best level 25 here in the game You'll also be able to earn a mount which you can actually use at level 25, but only in Ashen Vale It will increase your speed by 50% giving you the extra boost you need to seek and destroy the enemy So come kick some ash in Ashen Vale. I'll see you there I've done enough talking. It's time for me to pass things off to Tim Who's gonna talk to you about raids and the PvE endgame take it away Tim Thank You Nora Able's con My name is Tim Jones, and I'm the assistant lead designer on World of Warcraft Classic Whoo the multiplayer content is the heart of World of Warcraft whether we're questing together Running a dungeon crafting an item for a friend Or chatting in guild about where to find that new metamorphosis rune for warlock Wow offers one of the richest multiplayer experiences across all of gaming and Season of Discovery aims to deliver on providing new group content. That's both challenging and rewarding Now first I want everyone to take a moment with me and imagine Alongside the Zorm Strand on Ashen Vale's north coast lies the ruins of an ancient elven temple to the goddess saloon Evil stirs within drawing the likes of the Naga and the Twilight's hammer in search of power and anything that could hasten the coming of the old gods You know, maybe you've been here before maybe not no matter your familiarity with this place It's hard not to be drawn in by the mystique the rich art level design as well as a robust creature and spell ecology of black fathom deeps Now on the classic team we couldn't help but ask ourselves could this amazing location be more than just a five player dungeon So we're excited get your level 25 previous equip your runes find nine of your best friends and get ready The classic team is proud to announce level-up raids new instance challenges for raid groups to experience the max level for each of Season of Discovery's content fans At level 25 black fathom deeps is the first the first level up raid that you'll experience in Season of Discovery You know groups should be easy to form grab a couple tanks and healers make a party of 10 You're good to go. God knows every one of their mom can tank and heal in Season of Discovery now, so that shouldn't be a problem In content phases in Season of Discovery won't be as long as traditional classic expansion patches either And we want you to have as many opportunities to explore and plunder the riches within and as such black fathom We'll offer a three-day lockout much like the raids will group The story is the same Location and creatures may be familiar familiar to some but the challenges and rewards are brand new Seven new bosses are here to both entertain and test your skills And how could we not make red content without new loot? Existing quests and rewards have also been updated for the raid as well And you'll even be able to find secrets within the raid. Can you solve the mystery of the twilight artisan? Can you find the recipes for black fathom sharpening stones and wizard oil? And will you be the first group to access the new world buff boon of black fathom? Okay, I love your guys's enthusiasm. This is amazing Let's be behind the curtain at what challenges await players in black fathom, you know Or else we affectionately call it BFD not to be confused with BRD or BFA or BWL or BWD You guys get the idea Baron Aquinas guards the entrance no longer a simple quest NPC You must challenge his elemental lieutenants that inhabit the fathom stones and defeat him and in doing so You may face off against Aquinas himself atop the infamous jumping puzzle You know and jump you must to get in range of the Baron But beware both the boss and your teammates because there are many apparel that may knock you off In all honesty this boss is lightly tuned and there are some hidden power-ups below the water to help you return to the platform Next off you must face Against Gamura the fearsome turtle that's been swimming in the enchanted waters of the deeps for a long long time You know exposure to these energies has granted her both power and size But most importantly she's now protected by a magical barrier that protects her against almost any attack Break through this barrier and start blasting for massive damage get your orange parts You know all this commotion will bring you to the attention of Lady Saravus a Powerful and reckless Nagasi which who commands a legion of black fathom lead in Mirmidon's She's a formidable foe that will overwhelm you unless you find a way to turn her own spells against her and her minions You know these three bosses round out the prologue of black fathom deeps and in all three are available to fight in our demo in Hall D Check it out and that's not it Witness the corruption of galley haste and take on the march of the void murlocs Break past logis jets magical barriers and corrupted totems conquer your dreams as you challenge Twilight Lord Calriss and Good luck against the giant void Hydra. Seriously. You're going to need it And not to forget there will be glittering prizes awaiting you including some of these fancy items Now telling you all this is great But I think we'd rather just show you so it is my pleasure to provide a quick sneak peek video of the raid Edited by the team itself as though it was pulled straight from a community website in 2005. Please take a look Did for today guys, we're looking forward to okay, sorry, we should have that's it for today On behalf of the classic team and there's on a mention at the top Nothing that we do in WoW classic would be possible without all of your support and your voice Thank you so much for making the dream of WoW classic and all the experiences. We're working on a reality We can't wait to see what else we have in store for the future. We can't wait for you to see So please stay tuned for a hearthstone What's next coming up right after this and we hope you have enjoyed this look ahead at what's next for WoW classic I want to reiterate. This is just a taste of all that you're going to uncover in season of discovery And for those of you here at BlizzCon We hope you get to take on the first three bosses of our Black Featherm Beach raid on the show floor and for everyone else We're so excited for you to experience it when season of discovery launches worldwide in just a few short weeks This is classic plus beta. I'm so freaking hyped here. I actually think it's gonna be good man I I do actually it's gonna be good. This is classic plus beta. That's what I'm that's what I'm calling it I know it is. This is a hundred percent Classic plus beta season discovery season of discovery is a hundred percent classic plus beta They said there's no beta or anything for this last because this is the beta Okay, and you saw the sprinkles you saw scarlet monastery. Okay. I told you what I said that's gonna be level 40 cap They're gonna do a raid. That's what my prediction is Karazhan Crips hell. Yeah, dude like That dude I'm telling you it's like they're not there But there's so much like you can see the light at the end of the tunnel and that's so hyped dude I'm like I'm like freaking out into it