Eight Classic races, one new people, and six new race/class combinations. Every race now carries two active and two passive abilities.
The shen’dorei — the hidden people — descend from Zephras Isle, their skybound starting experience at levels 1–12. Their shared passive, Wind Blessed, grants 2% Haste.
Highborne exiles who fled Eldre’Thalas after the War of the Ancients forged a pact with elemental wind spirits and built a civilization inside Skywall, anchored to Zephras Isle. Their benefactors have vanished and the pylons holding the island together are failing.
Descendants of the first shen’dorei to receive the wind spirits’ gift of elemental skysight. They return to Azeroth to solve the mystery of their missing elemental mentors and restore the wind spirits and their way of life.
Classes: Warrior, Hunter, Rogue, Druid + Shaman
Descendants of the ancient Highborne scholars of Eldre’Thalas. They concluded that total dependence on the wind spirits left the Skyborne dangerously vulnerable, and return to reclaim lost arcane knowledge so the shen’dorei become self-reliant.
Classes: Warrior, Hunter, Rogue, Druid + Mage
No Paladin, Priest or Warlock for either branch; the faction choice is made at character creation. Skyborne have new racial customizations, voices, their own /dance and a new emote set (/cackle joins /laugh, /flirt, /silly and the standards), feather and tattoo options, and new race-specific Druid forms created for the race.
Pack prices (Battle.net Shop, US): Heroic $29.99 · Epic $59.99 · Collection $79.99.
Launch values. Where a racial changed during beta, its earlier values stand beneath it.
Cooldown was 2 min at reveal; reduced to 90 sec in the Oct 15 beta build.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Value | New race — no Classic Era counterpart | Glide downward through the air for 10 seconds. 90 sec cooldown. |
Published at 1% (Sep 22), raised to 3% (Oct 15), settled at 2% in the Oct 26 final pass.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Value | New race — no Classic Era counterpart | 2% increased melee, ranged, and spellcasting Haste. |
Unchanged in every official note.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Value | New race — no Classic Era counterpart | Damage against Elementals increased by 5%. |
Published as +100% regeneration (Sep 22); castable-while-moving and a 30 sec minimum duration in the Oct 15 build; final values set Oct 26, raid rule added Oct 27.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Value | New race — no Classic Era counterpart | +50% Health and Mana regeneration for 15 sec. Attuned: using it at a Ley Line also grants Attuned for 1 hour, raising the regeneration increase to 100% while Attuned. Attuned persists through death and is removed on entering a raid. Cannot be used while Innervate is active. |
Published at +10% (Sep 22); castable while moving (Oct 15); final values and the Charged mechanic arrived Oct 26.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Value | New race — no Classic Era counterpart | +15% movement speed for 15 sec. Charged: using it at an elemental convergence also grants Charged for 1 hour, raising the increase to 30% while Charged. Persists through death; removed on entering a raid. |
56 combinations in Forever against 40 in Classic Era. Six cells are new.
High Order Skyborne — Alliance. Classes (5): Druid, Hunter, Mage, Rogue, Warrior. Click a race row to inspect it.
New in Forever (6): Human Hunter · Dwarf Shaman · Gnome Priest · Orc Mage · Troll Warlock · Undead Paladin. Warrior is available to every race — that was already true in Classic Era, so no Warrior cell is marked new. Paladin now exists on both factions (Undead) and Shaman likewise (Dwarf). Blizzard has said more combinations are planned for future updates. Source: client CharBaseInfo; “Create the Hero You Want to Be”, 2026-09-22 (updated 2026-10-29).
Every race: two actives, two passives. Gone entirely: Diplomacy, the racial weapon specializations, and the resistance racials.
stealth detection, 20 sec (3 min CD)
removes all Stun effects (3 min CD)
+1% critical strike chance (Oct 26)
+10% Spirit (Oct 26)
clears Bleeds, Poisons and Diseases; now reduces Physical damage taken instead of adding Armor
tracking; can run alongside other tracking; chance of extra items from most chests (Oct 15)
+1% hit chance with spells and attacks (Oct 26)
increased damage against Beasts
10 sec CD; 2 min if used in combat
+10% critical strike chance for 15 sec (3 min CD)
+1% dodge, +2% run speed (now stacks with other speed increases, Oct 15)
75% faster movement while dead
breaks movement-impairing effects, 3 sec immunity (2 min CD)
8 sec: −10% resource costs, +10% direct damage and healing; also benefits Power Word: Shield (2 min CD)
+5% maximum Mana, Rage and Energy (was +5% Intellect in Classic)
devices more reliable
2 min CD (Oct 27 restored the Classic value)
dispels Curses and Banes; −5% magic damage taken (Oct 15)
stun resistance
+5% pet damage for Hunters and Warlocks (re-added Oct 26)
removes Charm, Fear and Sleep; no longer grants immunity afterward; blocked under Scatter Shot
now restores Mana as well as Health
attacks can drain life; 15 sec internal CD (Oct 27)
unchanged
90 sec CD (Oct 15)
15 min CD (Oct 15)
+5% Health only (Oct 26; the hit and critical-damage modifiers are gone)
+2% speed per stack to 60%, requires continuous movement; no longer boosts mounted speed (Oct 26)
15 sec duration (Oct 27)
client-listed second active; no Blizzard prose found
health regeneration bonuses raised 10% → 20% (Oct 15)
increased damage against Beasts
One naming inconsistency: the Oct 15 notes write both “Touch of the Grave” and “Touch of the Dead” for the Undead proc; the client lists Touch of the Grave.
Weapon skill was not deleted — it changed three separate ways at once: racial specializations, item values, and merged hit and crit.
In Classic, your weapon skill (capped at 300 at level 60) was compared against the enemy’s Defense. Against a raid boss three levels above you, a large share of your white attacks — about 40% — became glancing blows that landed for reduced damage, and the size of that reduction was driven by the skill gap. Weapon skill clawed the penalty back point by point, and also counted toward your effective hit chance. The full +5 from a racial specialization was therefore worth several percent of a melee’s total damage against bosses — raid-defining, before a single item entered the picture.
Items amplified it. One pair of gloves became the most argued-about drop in Classic raiding:
In Era, [Edgemaster's Handguards]! is an Epic pre-raid chase item precisely because +7 to three weapon types at once collapses most of the glancing problem for the weapon types that matter. In Forever, the same item keeps its shell — Leather Hands, same icon — with no stats and no attached effects. Any equip line at launch is server-side; the +7/+7/+7 package is gone.
The racial +5 specializations are gone. Their replacements passed through three published states — Deep Dive (Sep 13): Dwarf Mace Specialization softened to crit-while-wielding; Oct 15: Human Sword → Ruthless, Orc Axe → Savage, Dwarf Mace → Earth Fury; Oct 26: Savage and Earth Fury removed. End state: Human — Ruthless, +1% crit. Orc — Command, +5% pet damage. Dwarf — Artisan’s Precision, +1% hit.
The stat still functions exactly as it always has; items simply offer less of it per item, so no single item is the obvious best choice. Forever ships a new family of small weapon-skill effects — +1 to +4 per weapon type, with no Era counterpart — alongside survivors like [Devilsaur Claws]!, whose +4 Fist Weapons equip effect is unchanged between the two clients.
Spell, melee and ranged hit chance are now one stat; spell, melee and ranged critical chance are one stat. Bonus healing also grants one third as much bonus damage, and new stats reduce your chance to be parried or dodged. A point of merged hit now serves every attack a hybrid makes, so weapon skill’s narrower, type-locked benefit no longer wins by default.
“Weapon skill still works as it always has, but items with weapon skill offer less of it per item so they are not always the obvious best choice.” And on the racials: specialization racials are the exception to restoring racial identity, because “it is not healthy in the long run for future raid and dungeon loot tables to be evaluated through the lens of ‘required’ weapon types.”
An empty shell in Forever: no stats, no attached effects. Any live equip line is server-side.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Equip effects | +7 Axes · +7 Swords · +7 Daggers | None in client data — no stat row, no effects attached |
A survivor: the +4 Fist Weapons equip effect is present in both clients.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Equip effect | Increased Fist Weapons +4 | Increased Fist Weapons +4 — unchanged |
A new family of small-value weapon-skill spells — +1 to +4 per weapon type — with no Classic Era counterpart.
| Classic Era | Forever | |
|---|---|---|
| Availability | Did not exist | +1 to +4 per weapon type, on items |
Your race no longer chooses your weapon. A Human or Orc swinging the “wrong” weapon type loses nothing; loot councils stop pricing drops by who was born holding them. Weapon upgrades are judged on their actual stat lines — damage, speed, merged hit and crit — with weapon skill as one modest line among them rather than a gate. Nobody needs a specific pair of Epic gloves to be allowed to raid.
Every batch, every reversion, every value — set against Classic Era 1.15.9.
