With the The Burning Crusade (TBC) beta entering its final phases, the expected release of the TBC prepatch (and TBC itself) looms ever closer. Last week we had open beta testing level increased to 70, and from April 13 to 15, we will have the first 3 raids available to be tested. These raids include Gruul’s Lair, Magtheridon’s Lair and Karazhan. Once these raids are all tested, there is nothing more that need to be tested for the first phase of TBC.
For those who have only played on Classic, TBC will introduce many new features. The most notable of these is a raise in the level cap, from 60 to 70, the introduction of flying mounts, class balancing, and an entire new region, The Outland, to explore. Raid sizes will also be reduce from 40 to 25 for the large raids, and from 20 to 10 for the smaller raids – so filling out a full raid should be far easier than it is now.
When the prepatch is released, you can expect to find changes to the talent tree for your class, as well an expansion in debuff slots. As of now, according to a leak, it is predicted that the prepatch will drop from May 18th, though there is good reason to believe that it will drop earlier than that.
The release of TBC Classic has created a lot of controversy within the WoW community because of the introduction of a once per account paid boost to level 58. One side argues that this cuts out the levelling experience and destroys much of the progression in the game, as well as creating an unfair advantage, while others contend that the advantage is minimal and that the levelling experience has already been ruined through the presence of mage boosting. Regardless of what side you find yourself on, the boost is a certainty, and how it will affect gameplay is yet to be seen.
