Blizzard is stopping WoW Classic layering abuse. Some WoW Classic players used the layering system as a tool to level faster. Layering was introduced in Classic, but retail WoW uses a technology called sharding and they aren’t the same. For a while, I thought that sharding and layering were the same until Blizzard clarified the difference in the WoW Classic AMA a few weeks ago.
When you log into WoW Classic you enter a layer. Basically, a layer is whatever copy of the game world you’re playing on. When you log in you’ll only see players who’re in the same layer. As long as you don’t log out or join a group in another layer, then you should stay within the same layer as you play through the game world. Which means you’ll see the same people as you journey through Azeroth.
Sharding is similar but different. You can be ‘sharded’ to another version of a zone. This occurs when there are either too many or too few players in your area. Sharding is supposed to make sure you never are alone in a zone. It’s because of sharding that we see players pop up and disappear in front of us. It’s nice to know we’re not alone, but of course, it comes with a price. That price was losing the community aspect of WoW.
The first player to hit level 60 was Jokerd and he exploited layering. Players who exploited the system were joining groups in different layers. This allowed them to fight the same mobs over again without waiting for them to respawn. Doing it this way meant they were receiving more experience points which meant they could level faster. Naturally, Blizzard was going to find this problematic.
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Blizzard Is Stopping WoW Classic Layering Abuse
Abusing layering in this way is certainly cheating. It goes against the spirit of WoW Classic. Blizzard has cracked down on anything which would ruin the authentic Classic experience. They’ve already stated they’ll add restrictions to the Classic LFG add-on. Classic LFG worked similar to retail WoW’s looking for group feature which means it helped players find people for group content.
Vanilla WoW didn’t have such systems as players were required to find their own groups and get to know other players on their servers. Many fans are also hoping to see a crackdown on the Spy Classic add-on which aids players in PvP encounters. Spy Classic alerts you when an enemy player is nearby. The add-on can tell you their race, class, and level. You can fix the add-on to even announce an enemy’s presence in chat channels.
Blizzard said on the WoW forums that the WoW Classic layering abuse isn’t bad. Apparently, realms only have a single-digit number of layers. Which must mean they don’t go over ten. This also means that most players aren’t using the layering to level faster or to farm more herbs and ore. Also, doing /who in your chat box won’t tell you how many people are on your layer. That’s because the realm population is what shows in the search results.
DDoS Attack
It’s great that Blizzard is stopping WoW Classic layering abuse, but I wish they could stop DDoS attackers. Yesterday, WoW Classic servers were attacked which kicked all the players offline. Not only were WoW Classic servers impacted but so was Diablo 3 and Overwatch. Blizzard spent the whole day scrambling to fix their servers. The person responsible hasn’t been confirmed, but a twitter user claimed to be doing the attacks. He sent out a tweet to warn everyone. His target was Twitch streamers, and the attacker also went after Twitch servers too.
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Happy hunting!
Spyells
