The content they're paying for lies in Northrend.

World of Warcraft was designed from the beginning to be a game that changes, to evolve over time. People that complain when something changes are playing the wrong game.

Old content is purged, new content is added. It's called the circle of life. And once again, they're not getting rid of anything. They're simply altering it so it can be enjoyed by more people. I promise you the members of those guilds have many 80s toons who will head into this instance post-haste. So they're not losing anything.

Regardless of how many people are playing which content, there are still people paying $15 a month to enjoy Vanilla content, and I think they should have the right to keep playing it that way if they choose. I understand that minor changes are made to the game in the name of balance, but taking a dungeon I previously payed for, re-packaging it and requiring me to pay for two expansions if I want it back is shady. It's also demonstrates laziness on Blizzard's part: they doesn't have to fork out the money to design an entirely new encounter, and they get away with it because players think it's cool.

And yes, I took issue with Blizzard removing vanilla Naxxramas as well for the same reasons.

People do think it's cool, a lot of players have asked to see old content re-tuned to be a challenge for their level 80 mains, and Blizzard is actually trying to cater to people who loved this fight when it was the big endgame thing by bringing it back. I understand your disappointment, but you don't have a "right" to a static game world in an MMO, especially when you're choosing to focus on outdated content. I can cap my EXP at 70 and spend as long as I like in Outland, which happens to be my favorite part of the game, but if two expansion packs from now Blizzard comes back and completely revamps Outland to be a major hub for space travel between a kazillion worlds, tough cookies for me.

Playing outside the box is fun, and cool, but you've got to accept the risk that the game world will evolve in a way that serves the majority of the player base. Blizzard designs the game with the assumption that the majority of players will buy their new content. They -want- people to buy their new content. Not only because it's profit for them, but because they worked hard on the expansion packs and want to move the story forward. If they have a fun new design for a particular dungeon or zone in the old world, it makes more sense from their perspective to go ahead with it because they want to encourage people to move forward. There's really nothing shady about that.

Tyrsenus: "and they get away with it because players think it's cool."

Yeah, God forbid they do something that people think is cool. What are those idiots thinking? Making content people enjoy. Next thing you know they'll be implementing the vehicle combat people have been asking for for so long....wait...

...Sarcasm malfunction...

the people you keep sympathetically referring to are paying for a game that is continuously progressing forward. its not the fault of blizzard that they've decided to stunt their progression and fuck around old content no longer relevant to the majority of players.