14 DAY TRIAL // Blizzard Entertainment is apparently going to remove the level requirement for creating a Death Knight class character in World of Warcraft.
The Death Knight class was introduced in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, back in 2008. It was a novel idea, a so-called Hero Class, that roused the anger of the player base of the massively multiplayer online role-playing game, due to the fact that it was completely overpowered.
The Death Knight had its own instanced (your very own holodeck adventure, without outside interference) mini-campaign to go through before entering the "real world" of Azeroth, and it started at level 55.
Throughout the mini-campaign, you would play a scenario were you gradually got your spells, abilities and talents, so that you learned the ropes of the new class seamlessly, which still didn't stop many Death Knights from entering the regular game without having a clue.
In any case, Blizzard addressed the unstoppable nature of the class and now it has around the same level of balance as the other classes in PvP do, and there are even some DKs that can actually tank or do damage in raids. Incredible, right?
No more level requirement for creating DKs
The only caveat of the class was that, due to the fact that you started out at level 55, you had to have another character of at least that level already created, which meant that, if you wanted to get a Death Knight, you had to level another class and then abandon it.
As DKs were essentially paladins who pledged their souls and allegiance to the Lich King, it made sense to have new players experience some of the leveling grind before taking on their role, but now Blizzard seems to think that enough time has passed to bury that hatchet and remove the requirement.
"With availability of the level 90 character boost, we feel the requirement to have a character level 55 or higher to unlock the Death Knight as a playable class is no longer relevant."
"The plan right now is to remove the limitation sometime next week, at which point players will be able to start a new Death Knight (which still begins at level 55) without first having to reach level 55 on another character," Community Manager Nethaera wrote on the game's forums.
However, things didn't go as planned, due to the need to make some client-side adjustments in order for the feature to work, and its introduction has now been postponed to an upcoming content patch.
