There was a time when getting into a World of Warcraft beta required an invitation, a remarkable amount of patience, or knowing somebody who knew somebody who might possibly have received an extra key. Most of us simply watched screenshots, read forum arguments and pretended we weren't jealous.
On October 19, Blizzard is throwing that particular tradition out of the window.
World of Warcraft: Forever will open its doors to everyone for a free stress test on Monday, October 19. You do not need an active World of Warcraft subscription, Game Time, a beta invitation or one of Blizzard's paid Forever packages. All you need is a WoW account, the Battle.net launcher and a little spare time.
The European test begins at 19:00 CEST (7 PM Danish time) and will run for a few hours. Blizzard has not announced a fixed ending time, so the event could finish earlier or continue longer depending on how the servers behave.
And if the original Forever beta launch taught us anything, it is that servers occasionally have their own opinions about schedules.
Blizzard Wants Everyone to Break the Servers
Unlike the existing beta, this test will run on the regional production infrastructure that Forever is expected to use at launch. Blizzard will temporarily shut down the normal beta environment, open the production servers to the public, and invite as many players as possible to log in simultaneously.
The objective is not to complete a particular dungeon or defeat a difficult boss. Blizzard wants people to create characters, complete quests, trade items, chat, form groups and generally behave like thousands of enthusiastic Warcraft players who have just discovered a new version of Azeroth.
There is a very good reason for the experiment. As we reported in our investigation into the technical problems during Forever's September beta launch, Blizzard encountered several unexpected bottlenecks involving Battle.net connections, database performance and world servers that were consuming far more resources than intended.
Some completely empty maps even continued running after players had left, gradually eating away at server resources. It was a wonderfully authentic return to Classic, provided your favorite part of 2004 involved staring at a loading screen.
Blizzard fixed those problems, but a few thousand players testing normally cannot reproduce everything that happens when enormous crowds arrive simultaneously. That is why Monday's event matters.
How to Join the WoW Forever Stress Test
Getting started should be straightforward, although Blizzard recommends updating your graphics drivers and Battle.net launcher before the event begins.
- Open the Battle.net desktop application and select World of Warcraft.
- Find the Game Version menu above the Play button.
- Under In Development, select World of Warcraft: Forever Stress Test.
- Click Install and allow the client to download.
- Once the test begins on October 19, select Play and choose an available test realm.
- Create a new character and enter Azeroth.
You do not need access to the existing Forever beta. The stress test is a separate opportunity for anyone with a World of Warcraft account to participate.
If this is your first look at Forever, our complete guide to everything changing from Classic is a useful place to start. Forever includes new quests, redesigned classes, additional dungeons, expanded professions and several systems that did not exist in the original game.
We also published a hands-on assessment of the Forever beta, including some of the things Blizzard has improved and a few areas that still need attention before release.
What Should You Actually Do During the Test?
Blizzard is encouraging ordinary gameplay rather than asking everyone to stand motionless in a capital city. Create a character, explore a starting zone, complete several quests, use the chat channels, trade with another player and form a group.
Grouping is particularly interesting because Forever deliberately preserves Classic's traditional mob-tagging system. When thousands of players descend on the same starting areas, competition for enemies will become part of the experience. Blizzard wants players to group up rather than simply receive shared credit for attacking the same creature.
That also makes this a good opportunity to examine Forever's Recent Allies system, which remembers people you have grouped with and makes it easier to reconnect with them later.
Another important feature is Forever's new realmless infrastructure and two-part character names. The game replaces traditional realm selection with larger ruleset-based populations, making Monday's crowded environment an especially useful test of how those systems behave under pressure.
Of course, there is one important warning.
Everything created during the stress test will be deleted. Characters, names and guilds will all be wiped when the event ends. Monday is an opportunity to explore the game and help Blizzard test its servers, not an opportunity to get a head start on leveling or permanently reserve your favorite character name.
The Final Countdown to November 4
After the stress test, Blizzard expects to reopen the regular beta, with October 21 serving as its final full day. Early Name Reservation then begins on October 27 for eligible players who have purchased qualifying Forever packages.
As we previously explained when discussing the optional Skyborne upgrade packages, those purchases are not required for the base Forever experience, which will be included with a normal WoW subscription or Game Time when the game launches globally on November 4.
For anyone who has been curious about Blizzard's ambitious attempt to build a new future for Classic Azeroth, October 19 is therefore the easiest opportunity yet to see what all the excitement is about.
You can try the new systems, explore the world and perhaps even make a few friends without spending anything.
And if the servers collapse under the weight of everybody trying to kill the same six wolves, try not to be too disappointed.
For once, that is exactly what Blizzard wants you to help discover before launch.
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