Blizzard
Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve rolled out a series of hotfixes aimed at improving overall pacing and playability of the low-level (1-20) experience. We started by adding a number of modern conveniences to our low-level quest experience, and will continue to roll these improvements forward across other legacy content in the future. We’ve also made some improvements to the overall pace of combat at low levels: Due to the accumulated effect of years’ worth of max-level tuning adjustments, many classes were killing low-level enemies nearly instantaneously, even without heirloom gear or other advantages. A summary of the hotfixes follows:
- Most quest bosses from level 1-20 should now be multitap and will scale their health with the numbers of players fighting them.
- Added dynamic respawn behavior to most level 1-20 outdoor areas, so that spawns will be more readily available during times of high player traffic.
- Players who die in low-level dungeons should now release to the entrance of the dungeon, consistent with the practice in dungeons from more recent expansions.
- Level 1-10 enemy NPCs now deal slightly more damage.
- Reduced the bonus to out-of-combat health regeneration that players receive when below level 20.
- Reduced player damage at low levels to improve overall combat pacing. In general, Strength and Agility classes saw a larger reduction in damage than did casters. Damage dealt is unchanged from level 40 onwards.
We see these changes as the beginning, rather than an endpoint – much work remains to improve tuning and pacing of the old-world level-up experience, and our efforts will continue into Legion and beyond.
