Blizzard has revealed the release date of World of Warcraft Classic’s dreaded Hardcore mode.
As reported by ComicBook, Hardcore realms go live on August 24, 2023. That gives existing World of Warcraft players about three weeks to play modern in anticipation of the classic mode, with all of its quirks and difficulty curves.
Well, Hardcore mode in World of Warcraft Classic is pretty much what you imagine it to be. If your character dies, it is deleted permanently, and you have to start over. There is no way to find your old body and reclaims everything you earned this time; if you die for any reason whatsoever, it’s just all gone.
Blizzard has also revealed the other rules that will govern modern day World of Warcraft Classic Hardcore experience. For example, PvP battles are, thankfully, opt-in. You won’t have to take another player on unless you really want to, so no worries about getting caught unawares by players levels above you.
Blizzard definitely takes this seriously, as they also point out that behavior like zone disruption and malicious player killing out of consensual PvP won’t be tolerated on the Hardcore realms. Presumably, Blizzard has systems in place to monitor this specific player behavior, but the playerbase is about to put those systems to the test.
On top of that, PvP Battlegrounds and Battlemasters are disabled. Once again, this is a rule that’s been implemented to protect the players from themselves, or perhaps we should say, protect them from each other. Higher level players could very easily take advantage of lower level players to level up easily.
It’s easy to see that for Battlemasters, as those are NPCs, but it’s especially true for Battlegrounds. Higher level players can definitely join up in strong teams to bully and destroy other teams in domination.
To further keep things tolerable, dungeons below level 60 will have a minimum 24 hour timer. Also, if you leave an area, most creatures are going to leash. It was notable that Blizzard said ‘most’ here. It certainly makes one wonder what creatures Blizzard decided to set free.
Finally, Blizzard did add one feature for violent and bloodthirsty players. There will be a Duel to the Death! For now, we have no description of this feature or what it requires. It would certainly be interesting if seconds, for example, where deemed a necessity to set up these duels.
With the pending acquisition by Microsoft of Activision Blizzard King on the horizon, it will certainly be interesting to see where Blizzard takes World of Warcraft in particular. While a console port isn’t likely or practical, Microsoft may opt to make this game part of PC Game Pass, so all the things current players have could be enjoyed by Game Pass subscribers in the near future as well.
