There was a time when winning a duel outside Orgrimmar earned you a few cheers, perhaps a new rival, and almost certainly somebody explaining why your victory didn't count because you used the wrong trinket. Classic World of Warcraft PvP was never particularly elegant. It was a chaotic collection of talent builds, engineering gadgets, racial abilities and personal grudges, usually settled by two players beating each other senseless while a small crowd offered deeply unhelpful advice.
Twenty-two years later, somebody has attached $100,000 to the same basic activity.
The Forever Open concluded on October 18, and Warlockguy walked away with the $50,000 grand prize after defeating Neepzen 3–1 in the championship final. Both players were Warlocks. Both were Undead. And after two days of competitive dueling, thousands of dollars in prizes and an impressive collection of carefully prepared character builds, World of Warcraft: Forever's first major PvP tournament ended with two people demonstrating just how unpleasant it can be to fight somebody who has a demon for a friend.
The result is entertaining enough on its own. But it also raises a question that Blizzard may find considerably less amusing: are Warlocks already too strong?
Warlockguy Takes $50,000 in a Warlock Mirror Final
The tournament began on October 17 with 1,380 checked-in competitors fighting through six qualifying rounds. Only 36 players advanced to Sunday's finals, with four representatives from each of Forever's nine classes.
As we explained in our original tournament preview, the competition was deliberately old-fashioned. Every participant played a level-30 Horde character on the Forever beta's PvP ruleset. No modern Arena ranking system, no elaborate team compositions and no hiding behind a healer while somebody else did the difficult work.
Just two characters, a duel and rather a lot of money.
Warlockguy's path to victory was not entirely straightforward. Neepzen actually defeated him 2–1 in the upper-bracket final, forcing Warlockguy into the lower bracket. There, he overcame Shaman player Cdewx to earn another opportunity against his fellow Warlock.
This time, Warlockguy won the best-of-five championship series 3–1, securing the $50,000 first-place prize and the community-awarded title of Death's Duelist. Neepzen received the Warlock class prize, while Cdewx and Oddwaffletv completed the top four, both playing Shaman.
The official Raider.IO tournament bracket contains the full results, while Warcraft Tavern has published the winners of the individual class awards.
Four Warlocks Entered the Finals Undefeated
The warning signs were already visible during Saturday's qualifiers. All four Warlocks who advanced to the finals had won six consecutive duels. Paladins achieved the same remarkable result, while Priests also performed strongly.
Warriors, meanwhile, struggled considerably. They were the only class without an undefeated representative in the final 36, which probably came as little surprise to anyone who has ever attempted to duel a well-prepared caster as a poorly equipped Classic Warrior.
There is a reason old Warcraft players developed such a complicated relationship with Fear.
Warlocks have always been dangerous in one-on-one combat. Their combination of damage-over-time spells, crowd control, demons and self-healing makes them particularly effective when an opponent cannot simply abandon the fight. Forever's redesigned class talents have added new possibilities to an already formidable toolkit.
We covered those changes in our breakdown of Forever's Druid, Warlock and Priest redesigns. One particularly important adjustment is the earlier availability of Soul Link, allowing Demonology Warlocks to gain substantial defensive benefits within the level-30 talent budget.
When the objective is surviving a duel rather than topping a damage meter, being remarkably difficult to kill is an excellent competitive strategy.
Unfortunately for everyone else, Warlocks are also quite good at making sure their opponents don't survive.
Even Blizzard's PvP Changes Couldn't Stop the Demons
Forever's PvP balance is already different from traditional Vanilla Warcraft. Earlier beta testing revealed a hidden modifier that reduces the additional damage dealt by critical strikes, making certain burst-focused strategies less effective than players might expect.
That matters because Warlocks don't necessarily need enormous critical hits to win. They can apply sustained pressure, control their opponents and survive long enough for their damage to do its work. In a tournament where many competitors had prepared extensively for particular matchups, that combination proved extremely powerful.
The organizers had already been forced to address several questionable pieces of equipment. As we reported when the tournament banned Spider Swarm, Goblin Sapper Charge and Truthseeker's Bow, Classic-style PvP contains enough unusual items to make balancing a competition rather more complicated than simply comparing talent trees.
Yet even after removing some of the most troublesome equipment, Warlocks finished first and second.
That doesn't automatically mean Blizzard needs to reach for the nerf hammer. The tournament took place at level 30, with incomplete talent trees, beta equipment and rules designed specifically for one-on-one dueling. The final results tell us something meaningful about the current beta, but they don't establish how the same classes will perform at level 60.
That distinction will become particularly important as the inevitable demands for class changes begin appearing across the community.
The Community Built an Esport Blizzard Didn't Ask For
There is another wonderful contradiction hiding beneath the results.
Blizzard has explicitly confirmed that WoW Forever will launch without Rated PvP. Rather than recreating modern Arena rankings, the developers want players to focus on world PvP, Battlegrounds and seasonal Honor progression.
The community's response was apparently to organize a $100,000 tournament before the game had even launched.
The Forever Open was organized by Tips Out, with Esfand and Xaryu involved in the broadcast. TimTheTatman helped double the original $50,000 prize pool, transforming what might have been an entertaining beta competition into a remarkably serious event.
And perhaps that is the most encouraging part of the entire weekend. Forever is trying to rebuild the social character of early World of Warcraft, where players created their own rivalries, events and traditions rather than waiting for the developers to provide a structured activity for every occasion.
Here, the community took one of Warcraft's oldest mechanics and turned it into a major spectator event.
Admittedly, it also demonstrated that giving a Warlock access to Soul Link and a substantial prize pool may be an excellent way to make eight other classes reconsider their career choices.
Does This Mean Everyone Should Roll a Warlock?
Probably not. At least, not solely because two Warlocks reached the final of a level-30 beta tournament.
Forever's maximum level will be 60, and the developers still have opportunities to adjust talents, equipment and PvP mechanics before launch. Battlegrounds also reward abilities that matter less in individual duels, including mobility, group support and objective control.
Shamans finishing third and fourth demonstrates that other classes can compete at a high level. Paladins dominated parts of the qualifying stage, while individual matchups and player skill remained important throughout the event.
Still, Warlockguy's victory has given the community something substantial to discuss. Forever's redesigned classes are no longer theoretical talent calculators and optimistic developer presentations. Players have now competed for real money using those systems, and the results have exposed some interesting differences in their current effectiveness.
Whether Blizzard responds with balance changes remains to be seen.
For now, the inaugural Forever Open has delivered exactly what competitive Classic PvP always did best: memorable duels, unexpected results and an argument about which class is overpowered that will probably continue long after everybody involved has forgotten the actual fights.
Somewhere, an old Warrior player is watching the results, remembering every duel lost to Fear, and quietly deciding that perhaps November 4 would be a good time to try a Warlock.
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