Blizzard Entertainment will not allow dungeon grinding to become the primary leveling path in World of Warcraft: Forever, holding firm on progression balance despite preparing a modest experience point boost for group content.
The adjustments, revealed during a recent developer podcast and elaborated on by Blizzard developer Aggrend on X, target experience rewarded for slaying dungeon creatures. While the incoming tuning will make instanced combat yield slightly more experience than it currently does, the returns will remain well below what players experienced in original iterations of the MMO. Aggrend noted that while some players wish to “dungeon cleave” directly to level 60, allowing that strategy to become the most efficient leveling method violates the development team’s core design principles.
Blizzard emphasized that the open world of Azeroth is intended to remain the centerpiece of the experience, rather than having the player base spend the entirety of their character progression enclosed in instanced caves. The topic has sparked divided opinions across the player community, with some advocating for dungeon parity to nurture tank and healer roles before reaching the level cap, while others favored keeping pace with open-world quest lines so traditional adventuring does not feel inefficient.
The stance highlights how World of Warcraft: Forever is diverging from standard WoW Classic, which remains active alongside it. Although the Forever project continues to incorporate select features and items carried over from the experimental Season of Discovery run, Blizzard is establishing strict boundaries around how players traverse the world to reach the level cap.
Source: PC Gamer
