1. June 7, 2021  

    In defense of Warmane

    Greetings everyone,

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    first of all, I want to say that I'm posting this here because I couldn't find a better forum section for this kind of topic. This is somewhat WoW related, but I feel the Off-Topic section best suits what I'm going to talk about.
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    In defense of Warmane. Why? Let me explain.

    Recently I've been more active on this forum, reading people's posts and opinions, sharing my two cents on topics that I feel I'm kind of knowladgeable about, and interacting with both forum users and moderators. As my activity on the forum grew, my awareness on players' unrest and sheer anger did too. Unrest and anger directed towards anonymous Warmane staff members, forum moderators, or GMs in the first place, but towards other users and players too.

    Let me say, I don't get this. I truly don't get this. I don't get why people are angry and irritated. And while I don't get this anger, I also understand that this is the Internet, this is a videogame's forum and as always people feel empowered by having a keybord and a screen that protects them from real world consequences. I also understand that more often than not people are willing to express their resentment instead of their satisfaction or happiness, just as it happens on E-Shopping websites, where the majority of people simply doesn't rate a product if the product itself is decent enough. I totally understand all of this. But, for god's sake, grow up.

    I consider myself a new member here, compared to some veterans. I started playing WoW probably around 2007-2008 on a now-extinct private TBC-WotLK server. A friend of mine, still one of my IRL best friends, told me to try "this cool game".
    "You can be whatever you want!" - he said - "I'm a Draenei Mage!"
    "What's a Draenei?" - I replied.
    "A race of blue-skinned humanoids. They're all about crystals, and gems... They're cool!"
    "Yeah, that sounds cool!" - I replied again, already picturing myself in an epic fantasy environment.
    I remember all the installation process, all the CDs and the anticipation. I created a Night Elf Druid, and started my journey in Azeroth.

    Flash-forward to 2015. My relationship with WoW had been inconsistent up to that point, alternating between extremely hooked periods and times when I had other stuff to do. But after a prolific stay on Arena-Tournament, where I honed my PvP skills, I finally joined Warmane, ready for another adventure. I started on Icecrown and I played for 2-3 years quite consistently, mainly focusing on PvP. Then I got caught up with University stuff, love affairs, family problems, and I left.

    Flash-forward again to 2020. Now there's a pandemic going on. I'm home, I can't go out, I can't go the University, I can't see my friends. I feel the need for a world that welcomes me, a world in which the compass works without problems, because in that moment I felt that my IRL compass was broken. You know the answer at this point. Azeroth. I still had the Warmane client on my PC. I couldn't uninstall a game that up to that point had been a somewhat important part of my life. I was ready again. I joined the Lordaeron experience and I created my new character (Szekely, Undead Warlock, if anyone wants to reach out in-game). I was there again, with all the Azeroth story and lore, all the light-hearted conflicts that traverse Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms. I wanted to take it easy, slowly leveling my way up, reading all the quests and earning a well-deserved spot in a story that I still love.

    Yes, I was ready again, but most importantly Warmane was too. If Warmane had died while I was away, I certainly wouldn't have started playing once again. You cannot imagine the feeling of joy and peacefulness when all I had to do was double-click on the WoW icon sitting on my desktop in order to jump into Azeroth again. During all that time when I had IRL stuff to care about, Warmane kept going. Yeah, I know that Warmane doesn't even acknowledge my existence as a human being, but all the staff kept going with this project of keeping alive the best WotLK server out there. They kept going without asking for a single penny, without asking for anything, keeping my account alive and everything so that I was again ready to play.

    I know that Warmane has its problems and difficulties. I am fully aware of the problems regarding the coin system, the ninja-looters, the bugtracker, the ban appeals and what-not. I know. But I honestly think that the advantages outnumber and outweigh by a mile the downsides of this community. Honestly, they do not ask for anything in exchange. I have countless hours of pure enjoyment on this server, and I didn't have to pay anything. ANYTHING. That's absolutely crazy, let me tell you. Especially in 2021, that's astonishing. I created an account for free, I played for free, I left for free, I rejoined for free, I am currently playing for free. And most importantly, I am having a blast absolutely for free, both by myself and with friends. With friends too! Warmane gives me the opportunity to play with friends that live hundreds of miles away from me, friends that I am not able to visit and see because of IRL stuff, because of COVID, etc... My mind goes crazy when I think about this.

    Now someone is probably thinking: "Well, they're not heaven-sent! They too get money for this!" Yeah, so what? Anyone needs money to live. This is their job. Running a private WoW server. The point is: I am able to enjoy the game that I love with the people I love basically for free. All I need is a PC and an Internet connection. That's it.

    So, going back to the beginning, I don't get all this unrest towards Warmane staff when they're offering us enjoyment while at the same time not asking for anything in return. All I say is that if there are people who are having a bad experience, it can't be because of Warmane. Probably it's their own fault, probably they're toxic players and toxic community members as well. When you're having a problem with Warmane or with WoW, remember that this is just a game. Remember all the good things in your experience. Remeber that, in the end, these things won't matter at all. If you're exhausted about something, go for a walk, talk with some friends, hug your loved ones. Just don't rage-type in the forums or in global chat, please. When I think of Warmane, all I can think of are good and positive feelings.

    To sum up, thank you Warmane for what you do. Thank you moderators, thank you GMs, thank you developers, thank you kind members of the community, thank you all. You're the absolute best. Please, keep doing what you do, because what you do is awesome and priceless. Remember that I'm not alone in this, there are people who would thank you till the end of time for your work. I know some of them.

    THANK YOU WARMANE.

    Love,
    Ghortan
    Edited: June 7, 2021 Reason: spelling

  2. So, to sum it up, you're young, you're naive, and you don't know the full history of this server. You're thanking a FOR-PROFIT venture. I suggest looking up old posts (which hopefully still exist) so you can get a hint as to why people are angry. Lots happened here, lots of changes and sleezy behavior. Keep in mind, we're not allowed to disclose anything, you have to do the work yourself. Goodluck with your reality check.

  3. Purpose of any business is to serve. It serves players who play for free, it serves players who donate and it serves people who keep it running. It would have crashed and burned long time ago otherwise. All the other stuff is just fine-tuning and drama that comes from it.

  4. Are we ? TBC outland server started with x20 rates like items drops/golds and after two weeks it was down to x0.25 or smth.
    that is some quite fine-tuning indeed.

  5. Yes, that's perfect case. It didn't serve at least one party and died. Was it rates, changes, TBC itself, people not buying things enough to justify it's existence, competition or anything else? We can only speculate.

    Might even be that "TBC the best expansion omg that's true", but people actually don't play it, just parrot it with a hint of nostalgia, agreeing with some imagined "general agreement" that it's the best. It was quite popular at the start, but in few months people obviously started to wander where is that "amazing TBC experience" and just vanished.
    Edited: June 16, 2021

  6. More funny, same thing is happening on retail TBC, ppl have discovered that beside rep grinds and attunements there is nothing to do. Outland itself is small, same raid meta with only few good classes and unbalanced professions.

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