Here's the list so far. If you can remember some fond (or not-so-fond) memories of World of Warcraft during the beta and first couple years of retail, please let me know.
- Block values were added to shields. Blocking an attack used to avoid ALL damage of an attack.
- There were Shields and Bucklers. Pallies/Warriors had shields & Rogues/Shamans had Bucklers.
- Rogues had the "Block" ability in their skillset.
- There were "Spear weapons" and Druids could use them. Druids could also equip Polearms.
- Players earned skill points based on experience points from killing monsters. Skill points could be spent on tradeskills (changed to "Professions" later), weapon skills, purchasing mounts, and to increase attributes!
- "Plainsrunning" was the Tauren's only Racial Trait. Here's an excerpt from Blizzard on mounts: "Mounts are expensive and race specific, but players can spend skill points to learn how to ride other mounts. Mounts can be bought or acquired through quests. In order to summon a mount, you must use a specific scroll. Upon dismounting, the mount disappears (though the scroll remains in your inventory). Mounts come in a variety of colors, shapes, and sizes, and provide an armor bonus." Taurens did not have mounts, they "instead have a special racial ability called Plains Running which allows them to run very quickly for a certain amount of time."
- Zeppelins and Boats frequently dropped you into the sea (sometimes resulting in death depending how far out you were).
- You auto-dismounted on all STV bridges.
- Hunters had focus, not Mana. (Note: this is making a comeback in Cataclysm)
- Dwarf Mages! Although this was removed at one point, players were able to keep their Dwarf Mages until end of beta. (Will be coming back in Cataclysm, yay!)
- Mages had the spell "Sleep". Polymorph replaced it later.
- Cross faction mounts (Gnomes on Wolves).
- Frost Armor and Ice Armor Stacking.
- Mages had the Invisibility spell at earlier levels. There was Lesser Invisibility, Invisibility and Greater Invisibility. They could also cast while invisible. (Invis Pyroblasting FTW.)
- Undead spoke [Common], not [Gutterspeak].
- Shamans had spell "Molten Blast".
- The Warlock talent Ruin was called Holocaust. (Guess why it was removed.)
- Innerfire gave Attack Power.
- Cities had no maps and guards didn't provide directions. Difficult to navigate cities.
- Quest rewards were not soulbound. High levels were paying well for [Sticky Glue] from newbies.
- There were no auction houses.
- Guild Creation by just typing a command.
- Before BGs, massive raids on enemy cities. Hillsbrad still hasn't changed much.
- Alliance outnumbering Horde by atleast 3:1 (in some cases 4-5:1) on all beginning servers.
- Warlocks could summon anyone from anywhere.
- Spell damage had no "up to" coefficient so you could cast level 1 spells for 5 mana and 1 second cast times and get crazy dps.
- Mage Frost Nova looked like a blue shackle. (YouTube Link: "Warcraft Beta Mage".) Remember those ogres?
- Mana ALWAYS regenerated.
- Shaman Water Walking did not break on damage. Could stay in Ghostwolf form while on water too. (They re-introduced this as a Glyph, except for dmg part)
- SM Cath was the endgame.
- Warlocks could heal themselves and resurrect other players.
- Undead Players were completely immune to Sleep, Charm, Fear, Polymorph, etc (Passive ability). Shackle Undead and Turn Undead worked on them.
- Rogue Feign generated a combo point.. and it didn't break Sap.
- Warriors could charge anywhere, in or out of combat, and didn't need a target.
- Instant cast Mind Blasts.
- Warlock DoT "Mind Rot", Mages had spell "Phantasm".
- Lockpicking was a tradeskill that anyone could learn.
- Weapons/gear had no durability.
- Killing guards gave Honor points.
- Bandages could not be interrupted. You could run while 'casting'.
- You could sap multiple targets, and it could be used while they were in combat.
- Enchanting took herbs.
- Warlocks could speak Demonic.
- The sludge in UC has harmful to non-Undead.
- The character models looked human, and not cartoonish.
- Warlocks could banish Humanoids.
- Hunter pets grew bigger and bigger as they levelled. Caused raiding problems, unable to target.
- Undead could breath underwater indefinitely.
- Shadowform increased damage by 20%, and reducing damage taken by 20%.
- There were human druids.
- Shamans could lay down as many totems as they wanted, not just limited to 1 per element.
- Warlocks could wear leather.
- Outdoor world PVP was actually fun.
- Could cast "Curse of Doom" on players.
- Captain Placeholder! (YouTube Link: The Lament of Captain Placeholder)
- There was no language barrier. You could gank and trash talk players.
- Rogues had "Feign Death" ability, and Druids had "Play Dead" while in Cat Form.
- Polymorph affected Beasts, Dragonkin, Dragons, Giants, and Critters.
- Priest ability: "Brainwash"
- Mind Control was amazing. Could use all of the enemy's abilities, and you could buy items/mounts with enemy NPCs.
- BoP was called "Bind on Acquire"
- Bodies decomposed slowly when you rezzed.
- Players could use Ghost Form to travel long distances, and rez at far off locations.
- Blizzard said that at level 40, you could specialize in skills to become a Hero Class. The available hero classes would depend on your base class and race. Human Paladin became Death Knight, Dwarven Warrior became Mountain King, Night Elf Hunter became Demon Hunter, Orc Shaman became Far Seer, etc. (This was all long before TBC keep in mind. You can still see old WoW posts via archive.org)
- Blizzard promised that they would fix player ganking by introducing Dishonor Kills (DK). This was changed to Battlegrounds a few months later and ganking was never fixed.
- Blizzard promised Player Housing.
- Blizzard promised substantial new content each month. There were supposed to be major content patches every month with "new quests, new items, and new adventures" (Link) as well as new zones/dungeons/etc.
- "Track Humanoid" was called "Man Tracking".
- You could eat or drink while engaged in combat.
- Levels were capped at 45, and then 50, and so on.
- Shamans were once the most overpowered class by far.
- Classic Shaman bugs: Sentry Totem trick, no fall damage, and lava swimming without taking damage.
- The naming policy was very strict and heavily enforced. You wouldn't be able to get away with the name "Spam", "Teabag" or "Chucknorris". All names had to be unique, and not named after "real life" words or names. Special characters were also not permitted.
Old WoW Webpage #1
Old WoW Webpage #2
Old WoW Webpage #3
*UPDATE: I found the Gamefaqs.com appeal email. Tee hee..
ORIGINAL ARTICLE POSTED - 5/6/2008 9:27:53 AMApparently, 3 moderators (who really knows if it was more than 1 person though) decided that WoW beta nostalgia didn't belong on the WoW Forums. It was also posted on the Official AoC webpage forums though (there was a discussion and comparison to WoW prior to launch), and ended up getting over 5,000 views, 250 views, and I received ~50 private messages thanking me for the post. The moderators there didn't even have an issue with it.
TOPIC DELETED BY MODERATOR - 5/6/2008 5:29:01 PM
Action: Topic Deleted
Reason: Off-Topic Posting
Status: "Upheld - This moderation has been upheld by another moderator. This means that two different moderators have agreed that this message is a TOS violation."
TOPIC DELETION UPHELD BY 3RD MODERATOR - 5/10/2008 3:18:34 PM
"It was a topic about the WoW beta mainly."
Apparently there weren't too many lists out there that collected this type of information. It always gives me warm fuzzy feelings everytime I look at it though since I was in the closed beta myself. I hope you have fond memories as well reading this. (If I missed anything, let me know.)