Some WoW Forever beta players are frustrated by frequent layer switches and are detailing their experiences on Blizzard’s forums.
WoW Forever implements a new approach to realms, letting players choose to be grouped by rulesets rather than individual servers. In the current beta, players can choose Normal, Player vs. Player (PvP), or Roleplaying rulesets.
There are several benefits to this new system. So long as the same ruleset is chosen, players no longer need to worry about selecting the same server as friends to play together or be in the same guild. Realm-specific population issues are also bypassed with this change.
WoW Forever features many quests that require looting relatively uncommon quest items from enemies, meaning players will end up killing a significant amount of mobs before completing the quest. With highly populated zones and tagging restrictions, it can take quite a while to complete quests, even in a group. Layer refreshing can be helpful for this, but you can also end up in a new layer where mobs have yet to respawn and there are more players competing for tags.
And while these ruleset-based realms help manage the impressively massive WoW Forever population, they also create a new issue: frequent layering/sharding that disrupts gameplay, breaks immersion, complicates communication, and undermines world PvP. Conversations in the open world can be cut short by a refresh, groups can be pulled out of a phase mid-fight, and players participating in PvP can simply run across a zone border to escape danger.
The refresh popup isn’t the only thing that prompts a layering change. Inviting another player, even one that is already in the same layer, can force a layer change for an entire group, which is particularly disruptive when getting tags on quest mobs in populated areas.
Several players say they otherwise enjoy the beta but want the layer switches addressed. Blizzard has already announced a Hardcore ruleset for Forever coming some time after launch, and with the amount of issues and player deaths already being caused by layering, the community is being vocal about the downsides of this system.