What was going on in World of Warcraft this time last year? Back in the Day looks into the past of WoW Insider and brings back posts notable, controversial and sometimes humorous reflecting the state of the game one year ago this week.

For the week of January 20 - 26, 2007:

The Burning Crusade had gone live just the week before and the race to have the first level 60 Draenei and Blood Elf was on. In less than four days posts were flying across message boards to claim the title of being the first. This feat is either impressive or pathetic depending on your point of view. Either way, the thrill is gone since the pre-60 increased leveling rate introduced in Patch 2.3 made it easier than ever to level up a new toon in no time at all.

Debates raged over two new issues brought on by the expansion: should the Draenei heal-over-time racial ability be usable by Draenei Priests in Shadowform and should Blizzard increase the spawn rate of quest mobs in Hellfire Peninsula to deal with the influx of half the player base after the same target?

For the first, Draenei Priests felt it was unfair to be cut off from Gift of the Naaru due to their spec choice while priests of other races didn't think it was right for blueberries to get a heal in Shadowform when no one else did. Blizzard didn't back down on this and kept the ability disabled for Draenei Priests shifting into the dark side.

For the second issue, Blizzard told the players that they would make no changes to the spawn rates and that players would move on eventually. And that they did. To Zangarmarsh where they fought over those quest mobs. At least Blizzard learned a lesson from this expansion and have planned two points of entry into Northrend instead of funneling the player base into one.

And Patch 2.0.6 hit the PTR's nerfing damage for Hunters, Priests and Mages. But on the upside Counterspell was taken off of global cooldown, fixing an unpopular change made in Patch 2.0 and Mana Shield now prevented magical damage, as well as physical. But none of that good news could overshadow player reaction to the damage nerfage Marksman Hunters were getting to cut down on their burst damage in PvP.

In non-expansion news, we asked you:

• who gets to choose your tier set from raids, you or your guild?
• what class is your arch nemesis?
• and where you thought the next expansion would take place (the first two commentors nailed it with Northrend)

Finally, we posted an AddOn spotlight on a popular hud, ArcHud. It sings! It dances! But mostly it takes your critical information (health, mana, rage, energy, spell casting bar, etc.) and puts it around your character instead of in the far reaches of your peripheral vision. Ah, basic UI, how little you service us.

It was a frenzied week overall as we were trying to sort out the barrage of information that came with the expansion. Players were sharding purples for greens, overanalyzing new talent specs and trying to keep up with their friends who were playing non-stop since launch day. And the fun just kept coming.

In next week's Back in the Day: the race to 70 continues along with new Hunter pet skills and EBay's decision to delist gold selling accounts.

Tags: arc-hud, archud, counterspell, gift-of-the-naaru, hellfire-peninsula, mana-shield, northrend, patch-2.0.6, racials, raid-tier-sets, shadowpriest, zangarmarsh

Filed under: Hunter, The Burning Crusade, Draenei, Expansions, Add-Ons, Blizzard, Analysis / Opinion, Priest, Mage, Back In The Day