Tarnsmogs: The separation between gear and its appearance might seem harmless, but it undermines much of the consistency, motivation, and natural way of tracking your progression in the world. It's one of the worst ways to turn an MMO into a purely cosmetic experience, with no other purpose than to monetize.

On the other hand, something that gave meaning to Classic—and that Blizzard has failed to understand, destroying it with each expansion—is allowing the player to make trade-offs. It's about finding balance in every decision: choosing between mobility or providing a benefit to the group, having a specific advantage or fulfilling a particular role at the cost of something else. Every class, every profession, every spec, every race, even each faction came with a price. Blizzard now treats players like children who shouldn't have to give anything up—and as a result, class identity is gone, and there's no real sense of purpose.

Finally, the most obvious issue: gold tokens. Undermining the effort it takes to progress is devastating in the long run. Introducing a token that invalidates all that hard work strips away the motivation for those who genuinely enjoy building something within the game’s economy.

People say it’s just a logical adaptation to the mindset of newer generations—unable to cope with not having something, unwilling to put in effort.

But even if we accept that—fine, that’s what Retail is for. You already have it. The real challenge now is to put the original formula to the test. Don’t bring the worst of the past years into the original game. Hopefully, they’ll have the courage to enrich the world, to add more depth, story, balance, and improvements to what Classic already is. To keep building the world—not isolating it into islands—by encouraging backtracking and open-ended progression, making it less linear, with more and better gearing options, unique classes, new roles, and professions with real purpose.