World of Warcraft Forever’s beta marches on, and all evidence points to it being a massive success ahead of the official release date next month. But it’s worth remembering this is a beta, and a beta is for players testing the game’s boundaries and developer Blizzard reacting when those boundaries are broken.
Enter one of the best World of Warcraft griefing tactics I’ve seen in Forever so far.
Player jamesja12 took to the WoW Forever subreddit to post a screenshot of their death. That would be nothing worth writing home about under normal circumstances — you die all the time in World of Warcraft. But this was a screenshot of their character after they had died during the intro cinematic, because one cheeky player had placed a campfire exactly where new players spawn.
For the uninitiated, when you create a character in World of Warcraft — and World of Warcraft Forever — you get a snazzy intro cinematic that sets up the part of the world you start in, as well as your role within it. The camera does a fly-by of the local area before resting behind your freshly spawned character, ready to set out adventuring.
In WoW Forever you can craft and place campfires, which are — normally — all about helping other players out. Sit next to a campfire and you’ll receive a useful buff and maybe strike up a conversation with another player doing the same. Campfires are really cool social tools, as well as great buffing machines. I like campfires!
But they also cause a little damage because, well, they’re fire. If you run through a campfire, for example, you’ll take damage, as most WoW players will know well. Pop a campfire down where new characters spawn and they’ll strip that low HP away pretty quickly.
“Someone made a campfire where new players spawn. It killed me during the intro cinematic,” jamesja12 said, matter of factly, while posting a screenshot of the evidence of the crime scene. Pretty annoying? Well, most of the reaction is from players who are pretty impressed by this griefing tactic, rather than outraged.
“This is diabolical. I love it, although it’s pretty mean,” one player said. “My orc was grunting during the intro and I had no idea why lol,” jamesja12 replied, referring to the noise characters make when they take damage.
“Brings new meaning to the term ‘spawn camping,’” another player said. “I can’t even be mad at that,” added another. “This is peak classic wow, amazing,” commented another.
This is World of Warcraft, so war between the Horde and the Alliance is part of the game. I was questing in Westfall last night as it was being raided by a high level Horde player who was killing quest-giving NPCs. Some were complaining in the chat, others saying this is part of the game. These are 20-year-old debates, rekindled once again in WoW Forever, and it’s great fun to see.
But this is orc-on-orc griefing, so perhaps Blizzard will take a dim view of it. I expect the developer will patch it out in some way — especially after this reddit post blew up (6,000 upvotes and counting!). I totally respect the effort to grief here. Yes, it’s annoying, but this is a beta after all. Best not to get too upset about anything. Now, if this becomes a widespread issue when Forever launches proper next month, that’s another thing. But for now… well done everyone! Jamesja12 indicated they used the in-game tool to report the “bug,” so it’s probably not long for this world. Enjoy it while it lasts.
The WoW Forever beta was inundated with players, and Blizzard has suggested its popularity took even the developers by surprise. It’s had to increase the beta population cap multiple times already. Yeah, this is going to be a big one.
Wesley Yin-Poole
Director, News
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].
