World of Warcraft to Give Away Level 80 Characters

Greg Tito

PR for Dungeons & Dragons
Sep 29, 2005
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World of Warcraft to Give Away Level 80 Characters



The revamped "Scroll of Resurrection" promotion allows you to join your friend's server and automagically boost your character to level 80.

Update: The World of Warcraft website confirmed the free offers below and the "Scroll of Resurrection" is now live. Some new tidbits: the rewards for the player inviting you to come back into the Azeroth fold gets a Spectral Wind Rider or Spectral Gryphon flying mount, presumably based on your faction, and the resurrected get a week of free play time. Also of note, the new scroll will only grant the big-time freebies for the next 90 days, after that the Scroll will go back to only granting the free play time.

More can be found out sending the bugger. [http://us.battle.net/support/en/article/scroll-of-resurrection-faq]

Original: What do you do when your subscription numbers are lagging? You hold a firesale and make everyone happy. World of Warcraft has always had ways for friends to connect in Azeroth, and the Scroll of Resurrection promotion was a way to get lapsed players back into the game - and give bonus playtime to the currently paying customer. The Scroll went offline recently and rumors on WoW fansites swirled that Blizzard was busy coming up with a new plan. The new and improved Scroll of Resurrection surfaced briefly on the official WoW site earlier today before Blizzard took its whole account services section down for maintenance - which is always on Tuesday for Blizzard games and websites - but not before we had a chance to look at the perks.

The Scroll of Resurrection is basically an invitation you send to a friend who no longer plays Wow. If they accept and become a paying customer again, the person inviting them gets a special pet or mount as a reward while the invited player would get the following benefits under the new scheme:

Free Cataclysm upgrade
Free server transfer
Free faction change
Free leveling up to level 80

Now, never mind the monetary benefits of the switches (totaling at least $55, more if you haven't bought Cataclysm yet) the thing that makes me pause is the auto-leveling. Sure, it stinks having to run the gauntlet of leveling your toon, not even getting to play with your friend as he or she runs the top-level instances and raids, but that's what an MMO is. If you can just give someone the experience needed to be level 80 now, then what was the point of playing that whole time?

On the other hand, I understand that WoW is a service and not strictly a game anymore. I know paying customers have been enjoying all the various content and systems for all that time, and suddenly making a character level 80 doesn't diminish that experience. I know that in my heart. But, come on. Really? Free leveling?

The gold trimming on the World of Warcraft logo has begun to tarnish. After peaking at around 12 million subscribers in 2010, Blizzard's flagship MMO started bleeding subscribers like a stuck pig. The Irvine, California-based company that's now half of Activision tried all kinds of tactics to keep users glued to Azeroth and the efforts were successful in reducing the hemorrhaging to a trickle as subscriber numbers have only decreased by about 100,000 between September and December of 2011, according to the latest released numbers.

Maybe, just maybe, The Old Republic stole a little more subscribers than Blizzard is comfortable with, and this new Scroll of Resurrection is a way to combat that. Or, maybe one of the higher ups realized that this scheme might not be that great of an idea.

Source: WoW Insider [http://wow.joystiq.com/2012/03/06/scroll-of-resurrection-revamp-active-includes-free-level-80-cha/]

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rapidoud

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Feb 1, 2008
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Just... wow.

WoW is a sinking ship, panderia looks like SSDT (same as cataclysm), SWTOR lied to our faces, now we all just 'wait for GW2' which is spreading due to word of mouth.

They need to decide whether to appeal to hardcore fans, or casual fans, they cannot do both much longer (the hardcores like to think they're better than everybody thus need content hard enough on a game big enough to prove it, whereas casuals just want to chill out, so they have to appeal to the kind of freaks that can clear content in a week to those who will get around to it in a few months).

If only dark millennium online hadn't been cancelled.

Also: Lol @ captcha, 'cheese fries', something I can actually read for a change.
 

80Maxwell08

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rapidoud said:
Just... wow.

WoW is a sinking ship, panderia looks like SSDT (same as cataclysm), SWTOR lied to our faces, now we all just 'wait for GW2' which is spreading due to word of mouth.

They need to decide whether to appeal to hardcore fans, or casual fans, they cannot do both much longer (the hardcores like to think they're better than everybody thus need content hard enough on a game big enough to prove it, whereas casuals just want to chill out, so they have to appeal to the kind of freaks that can clear content in a week to those who will get around to it in a few months).

If only dark millennium online hadn't been cancelled.

Also: Lol @ captcha, 'cheese fries', something I can actually read for a change.
Dark Millennium Online didn't get cancelled right now they were looking for people to help fund it due to their current financial situation but they never said anything was cancelled. I hope Darksiders 2, the South Park game and their other games coming out help them out of this. I seriously do not want Dark Millennium to be cancelled it's my most anticipated MMO coming out even more than Guild Wars 2. I also wish THQ didn't blow so much money on stupidity like the advertising for Homefront and that fortune that went into the Udraw. Seriously publishers know what you are putting your money into.
 

codeg

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Apr 23, 2011
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I used to play WOW awhile ago and my friend is still an avid WOW player.
I'm afraid he will send me this invitation. I...I don't know if I could resist this offer.

Nah, I'll be fine
 

oldtaku

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Jan 7, 2011
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I would have loved this a few years ago. I really hated having to run through all the comparatively crappy lower level stuff to get to Lich King content with a new char (Cataclysm certainly helped).

But now I just don't care. I was really hyped for Cataclysm and enjoyed the quest stuff, but I don't think Pandas can overcome the WoW ennui.

Bring on Titan!
 

Kargathia

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RT-Medic-with-shotgun said:
WoW is in trouble, Blizz is taking a hit requiring 600 people to be fired to maintain current straits, and now they must be in real trouble.
WoW is indeed entering the final stages of its cycle, but for that to imply Blizzard is actually in trouble... not so much. One might do well to remember that WoW irrevocably will go down as a massive success - even if its popularity slowly starts declining, years after it was expected to kick the bucket.
 

Robert Ewing

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Erm... Why? Seems very desperate plea to kick the sub numbers back up... This will no doubt anger the already paying subscribers who had to actually PLAY the game...
 

Xannidel

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Well they still have their version of DoTA and also Titan to look forward with to help with sales but I am sorta not sure what the point of playing an MMORPG if you skip like 80-90% of the game just to hit lvl 85 (which in all honesty, does not take that long) and then you hit the raids.
 

KeyMaster45

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Jun 16, 2008
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Xannidel said:
Well they still have their version of DoTA and also Titan to look forward with to help with sales but I am sorta not sure what the point of playing an MMORPG if you skip like 80-90% of the game just to hit lvl 85 (which in all honesty, does not take that long) and then you hit the raids.
Fun fact: The people with friends who will send them this have probably already played that 80-90% of the game on like 4 different characters. Not that it makes the perk any less head scratching mind you.

OT: It's always fun when articles like this come up and the people come out in droves screaming "LOOK LOOK!! WOW AND BLIZZARD ARE ON THEIR LAST LEG!!! WE TOLD YOU IT WAS A SHIT GAME AND THAT ACTIVISION WOULD RUIN THEM!!!!" and you people have been screaming something along those lines for how many years now?

...

Yeah, that's what I thought. WoW is never going to go away, if anything it will end up like Everquest and just continue on in obscure mediocrity after it's time in the spotlight ends.

rapidoud said:
SWTOR lied to our faces
You're going to have to elaborate on that, exactly how did they lie to our faces? Because I've been playing it on and off for a few months now and it's pretty much what I expected from the advertisements.
 

Nyaoku

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Jan 7, 2012
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Time to play the Devil's advocate ...

Ok, just hear me out for a second. People like mmorpgs for various reasons. One thing a lot of people agree on is that the grind is the plague for them all. For a few characters, WoW is getting rid of the grinding. You're still getting to customize your build, exploring all those areas, and it's still an mmo. Just give the people who did grind gold for the trouble and we might have a major breakthrough here.
 

Trishbot

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May 10, 2011
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I'm surprised WoW lasted as long as it has... and it's certainly not dead yet.

Is it as good as its glory days? No. But remember it's been nearly a decade. How many games can boast that they have millions of people playing them 10 years later?

But it WILL go down eventually... and Blizzard will just have to do what they USED to do... make more, newer games instead of relying on just ONE game to keep them afloat for a decade.
 

enzilewulf

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Jun 19, 2009
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Well I think this just seals the coffin. Its not going to die, but I think it will go to a new circuit, or big 3 in this case. (Note I am just taking this off of mass hype, subs, and what we are currently seeing in the MMO market.) It seems like it will be TOR, WOW, and GW2. TOR did pretty damn good even after release. WoW is still going to have a nice sub base and don't they also have another expansion on the way? I know plenty of people who usually come back for a month or two after a expansion. GW2 has gotten a lot of hype and I can see why. It is doing some pretty unique things in terms of MMO's, and it isn't subscription based and I know that is drawing me to it. One more mention would be TERA online. The game looks good and has a very unique combat system, so there isn't any excluding of it just yet, considering it is only in BETA at the moment. WoW had a fucking great run though. Considering it is so old and would demolish mostly anything that even tried to compete even thought WoW is what, 6 years old? Now I would be very intrigued if they worked a on a newer MMO. I mean the always have starcraft, right? I still say congratz to Blizz. They have had a hell of a run.
 

razer17

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I might acutally back into WoW in the summer, even just for a month, to try a fully levelled character, do some PVP and raids. I could never be bothered to get there because levelling is a grind, but I always enjoyed the dungeons.
 

dyre

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Mar 30, 2011
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RT-Medic-with-shotgun said:
Kargathia said:
RT-Medic-with-shotgun said:
WoW is in trouble, Blizz is taking a hit requiring 600 people to be fired to maintain current straits, and now they must be in real trouble.
WoW is indeed entering the final stages of its cycle, but for that to imply Blizzard is actually in trouble... not so much. One might do well to remember that WoW irrevocably will go down as a massive success - even if its popularity slowly starts declining, years after it was expected to kick the bucket.
Blizzard will be in trouble. As shown by the major drop of subscribers and the following firing of 600 employees. They lacked the ability to keep as many workers because of a drop in subscribers while maintaining the current setups. Yeah they have DIII and SCII but warcraft is the big earner. A big CONSTANT earner. Starcraft and Diablo will only make so many sales and expansions take time. WoW was a constant income source. Blizzard as it is now and as it wants to be is in trouble.
It'll have to make some cuts, but that's not necessarily a sign of trouble. It could just be cutting unnecessary workforce. In any case, Blizzard has an extremely loyal fanbase and if it needs money, it can always try releasing newer games faster.

I highly doubt Blizzard expected WoW to keep making revenue forever. In fact, I'm sure it has surpassed all reasonable expectations. Blizzard probably has preparations for a post-WoW era, and is just making as much money out of WoW as possible before it falls.
 

Domehammer

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Jun 17, 2011
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Blizzard starting with Cata seems to have been experimenting with WoW to a great deal. This could have them using WoW has a guinea pig due to Project Titan or that is not related at all. This seems like a bit pointless of a move though. If someone doesn't know how to play they will be putting one friend or both through stress of learning the game. Which can be harsh on new players.
 

Sylveria

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Nov 15, 2009
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Seems like a sound idea to me.

I don't understand the outrage over insta-leveling the recipient. Since when has leveling in WoW been anything more than the barrier to entry to the "real" game? The vast majority of WoW players and WoW developers believe the game starts at the level cap; the act of leveling is a 5-7 day chore that you just have to slog through.

I also don't understand the claims that the game is on it's last legs, not making revenue or getting the last nail in the coffin. I can't stand the game, don't get me wrong, I've been away from it for 2 years and have no desire to return, but it still has around 10million subs, right? Not to mention that they can throw $25 flying mounts on their cash-shop and still sell hundreds of thousands of them; far more than enough to make up for lost the subs they've lost in the past month or two.

I'm sure the game is still extremely profitable, so profitable that if the game was in the hands of anyone but Activision, they'd be pleased beyond words with the performance even now. But it isn't. It's in the hands of Kotick and if the stock dips even a penny a share, he has to buy a few less kilos of cocaine that week and that just can not be allowed to happen which is why hundreds of employees got laid off just last week.
 

Sylveria

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Trishbot said:
I'm surprised WoW lasted as long as it has... and it's certainly not dead yet.

Is it as good as its glory days? No. But remember it's been nearly a decade. How many games can boast that they have millions of people playing them 10 years later?

But it WILL go down eventually... and Blizzard will just have to do what they USED to do... make more, newer games instead of relying on just ONE game to keep them afloat for a decade.
How many games has Blizzard made in the past 25 years? 10? Less? Their whole business model has been to stay afloat on one or two titles for years at a time... it seems to work pretty well. I can't fathom why, but I can't deny the reality of things.