BlizzCon 2026 wrapped up with one of its biggest announcements: World of Warcraft: Forever, a new alternate-universe take on Blizzard’s long-running MMORPG. Designed around the slower, more deliberate style associated with Classic World of Warcraft, Forever aims to capture that nostalgic experience while offering players new encounters and progression instead of simply repeating familiar raids and dungeons.
Following hands-on time with the game at BlizzCon, lead Classic designer Tim Jones and lead encounter designer Mike Nuthals shared additional details about Blizzard’s plans ahead of World of Warcraft: Forever’s November 4 launch.
Forever Will Stay Closer to Classic Class Identities
Players hoping World of Warcraft: Forever would bring back some of the unconventional class and role combinations from Season of Discovery may need to adjust their expectations.
Season of Discovery introduced runes that allowed classes to take on roles traditionally unavailable to them, including shaman tanks and mage healers. Similar possibilities attracted attention after abilities such as Spirit Weapons and Molten Blast appeared on World of Warcraft websites.
However, Forever’s redesigned Shaman talent tree appears much closer to the traditional Classic philosophy.
Jones explained that although Season of Discovery contained “a lot of fun and exciting things,” some of its design decisions do not fit Forever’s priorities.
“There’s a lot of fun and exciting things in Season of Discovery, but even the design choices that we made in SoD, when we measure them against what our pillars are for WoW Forever, they don’t make sense in terms of the simplicity or the identity that we want for some classes to have.”
Blizzard Is Starting From a Simpler Baseline
Jones said the developers are working from “a baseline of simplicity that’s more adjacent to the Classic game than Season of Discovery was.”
That approach makes unusual combinations such as dedicated shaman tanks unlikely at launch. Still, Blizzard is not completely closing the door on future experimentation.
Jones said the development team wants to “keep the conversation open with players,” encouraging fans interested in unconventional class roles to continue providing feedback.
Every Raid Tier Will Include 10-Player and 20-Player Content
Forever will not feature flexible raid sizes, but Blizzard is attempting to give guilds and smaller groups more predictable options.
Nuthals confirmed that every raid tier will contain at least one 10-player raid and one 20-player raid. Some tiers may also include traditional 40-player encounters.
The decision could address one of the challenges experienced during Season of Discovery, when changing raid-size requirements made it difficult for established groups to maintain their rosters.
“If you’re a 10-man group and you don’t have interest in doing 20-man content, that is perfectly fine,” Jones said.
“We want to make sure that there is challenge and rewards in the 10-player content and there will always be a 10-player raid for groups every single tier forever.”
That means players who prefer smaller raid groups should have a consistent progression path rather than being required to expand their roster simply to participate in later content.
No Flex Raiding Planned
Despite the commitment to multiple raid sizes, Blizzard is not planning a modern-style flexible raiding system in which encounter scaling automatically adjusts to the number of participating players.
Instead, Forever will preserve fixed raid sizes while ensuring that each tier provides meaningful content for both 10-player and 20-player groups.
Mount Training Will Require More Gold
Another change involves one of Classic World of Warcraft’s most important progression milestones: learning to ride a mount.
According to information shared during discussions with the developers, training to ride will cost more gold in Forever than it did previously.
The change could make gold management increasingly important as players level their characters. In Classic-style World of Warcraft, obtaining a mount represents a major upgrade because it dramatically improves travel speed across the game’s large zones.
Higher training costs could therefore reinforce Forever’s slower progression model and make reaching the riding milestone feel more significant.
Blizzard Is Building Forever Around Classic Principles
The emerging details point toward a clear design philosophy for World of Warcraft: Forever. Blizzard appears willing to modernize and expand the Classic formula, but it is also placing firm boundaries around systems that could fundamentally change traditional class identities or raid structures.
The absence of Season of Discovery-style role experimentation at launch, guaranteed smaller raid options and changes to progression costs all suggest that Forever will prioritize deliberate advancement and recognizable Classic gameplay.
With World of Warcraft: Forever scheduled to launch November 4, players will soon see whether Blizzard can successfully combine the slower pace and social structure of Classic WoW with enough new content to make the alternate-universe experience feel distinct.
William Faulkner writes for Social Post News, covering news, politics, business, technology, sport, entertainment, and lifestyle. He focuses on clear, reliable reporting and useful information, helping readers stay informed about current events, emerging trends, and stories that matter.
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