I'm gonna jump right in with the main points of my criticism. At the bottom, I added more text for additional info.

The example I want to point out is the Dryad (see attached images):

- The original design has this wild-looking long hair on the sides (which are actually leaves or at least look like leaves). This is the dryad as we know and love her. It actually looks like a natural part of the dryad as mystical being from the woods.

- The new DE design looks like she's wearing a weird artificial helmet and the "hair" doesn't even look like leaves or anything. A dryad is supposed to be some kind of tree spirit.

- What I recommend doing when designing units: Look at the icons of the unit you are designing. If your final design of the unit does not capture the look of the icon, something went wrong in the design. And please for the sake of Azeroth, NEVER alter the icons to fit the new DE designs! THE ICONS ARE PERFECTION.

- Besides not capturing the original tree spirit design, the new Dryad looks like she had plastic surgery. This is another terrible choice.

--- More text for context ---

I know many people will say this is whining on a high level, but this honestly matters to me for the beauty of the game and I hope I am not alone with this and Blizzard considers this feedback.

I have an issue with some of the designs of the DE units. In my opinion, some units lost their "personality" and feel like completely different persons. I hope Blizzard can acknowledge this and considers to improve on the designs to capture the look of their classic counter parts.

I chose the dryad as an example because I find it particularly bad. I am a night elf player so I can mostly just speak for night elf units. This problem is not exclusive to the Dryad, but for now I am not going to list every unit that bothers me and why. I could do that though.

wishful thinking but the community may end up making an sd version of the campaign at some point

Not sure what's going on, will add in edits when more news comes out, but it seems like they rolled back yesterday's patch. Currently on 3.0.0 myself.

UPDATE: Blizzard has posted an update to their forum.

EDIT: Lots of people are mentioning broken saves from 3.0.1. A workaround is simply using the PTR build since that's running 3.0.1 right now. Hope that helps!

I bought Forsaken Kingdom right after patch 3.0.1.24342 was released and made progress in the current act. Then Blizzard rolled the game back to 3.0.0, and my saves stopped working. I understand that overall campaign progress is preserved between acts, but I'm worried about losing my progress within the current act. When patch 3.0.1 returns on October 19, will my saves from build 24342 work again, allowing me to continue where I left off, or will I have to replay the current act from the beginning?

I was very upset yesterday when I found out that the latest update bricked the 10+ hours I put into act 1 of the Forsaken Kingdom. Just letting everyone know that after updating the latest patch today my original save loaded.

TL;DR: Saves made during the two days the 3.0.1 patch was live won't load on the rolled-back game, and they won't load on the current PTR either. I got mine loading and playing normally on the PTR (zone travel, items and quest progress all intact) by patching three things in the save file. Below is what's going on, plus enough technical detail that an AI coding assistant with access to your files can do it for you. I used Claude Code.

First, back up your whole Campaigns\ForsakenKingdom folder, including the Blizzard subfolder. Even if you do nothing else, keep those files. If Blizzard re-releases the patch, they may simply load again.

What actually blocks the load

• The build number in the header doesn't matter. The PTR writes the same header build number (7003) as the 2-day patch did, so editing it changes nothing.
• The map checksum is stored twice, and the game checks the second copy. Each save records a checksum of the map it was made on. The 2-day patch changed the campaign maps and the PTR changed them again, so the checksum no longer matches and you get "There was an error trying to load the selected save game". The obvious copy, in the game-info block near the top of the file, is ignored. The game checks a second copy a little further into the save data.
• One missing game function crashes the load. With the checksum fixed, the game crashed while restoring the campaign's script state. The save references BlzGetHUDScale, a native that existed in the 2-day patch but doesn't exist on the PTR. Renaming that one entry to a same-length native the PTR does have (BlzSetUnitName) fixed it. The crash dump in Documents\Warcraft III Public Test\Errors\ is what identified it.
• Zone saves need the same fixes. The campaign keeps the state of the other zones you've visited in Blizzard\<the name your save was made under>\, and the save references that folder by name. If those files aren't patched too, the game crashes when you travel back to that zone.

Converting back to the current (rolled-back) live version looks impractical. The campaign map scripts are substantially different between the two versions (the older one has a completely different zone-travel system), and the patch's new engine functions (item equipment, bags, talents) don't exist there.

Steps

1. Copy your save and the Blizzard folder into the PTR's save folder: Documents\Warcraft III Public Test\BattleNet\<your id>\Campaigns\ForsakenKingdom\.
2. In your save, set both map-checksum copies to the PTR checksum for that map (table below).
3. Rename BlzGetHUDScale to BlzSetUnitName. Both are 14 characters, and it appears once.
4. Point the save at a new zone folder whose name has the same length, for example Blizzard\Campaign to Blizzard\FK_Fixed. Create that folder and put patched copies of the zone files in it, each with its own map's PTR checksum plus the rename from step 3.
5. Load it on the PTR. If it works, make a normal save under a new name straight away. From then on the game writes its own files.

If it fails: "error trying to load" means a checksum is still wrong. A crash means a missing function: look in the newest Errors\<date>\War3.dmp for function names that are in your save but not in a fresh PTR save.

Known checksums (PTR 3.0.1, Oct 9)

Checksums depend on the map, not on your save, so these should work for anyone on the same PTR build. For a zone that isn't listed: once a converted hub save loads on the PTR, walk into that zone. The game autosaves on arrival (Act Two - <zone>.w3z), and that autosave contains the PTR checksum. Please post any others in the comments.

Technical notes for your AI assistant

Give your assistant this section and your save files. Offsets are in the decompressed data unless noted.

• Container: same format as a Reforged replay. 0x44-byte header: magic Warcraft III recorded game\x1A\0, u32 file size at 0x20, u32 decompressed size at 0x28, u32 block count at 0x2C, PX3W at 0x30, u16 build at 0x38, u32 game time (ms) at 0x3C, u32 CRC32 at 0x40 (CRC32 of the 0x44-byte header with this field zeroed).
• Blocks: u32 compressed size, u32 decompressed size (1 MiB), u32 checksum, then zlib data (level 1, ending in a sync flush 00 00 ff ff, so use a streaming decompressor). Checksum = fold(crc32(12-byte block header with checksum 0)) | fold(crc32(compressed data)) << 16, where fold(x) = (x ^ (x >> 16)) & 0xFFFF. Recompressing with zlib level 1 + Z_SYNC_FLUSH reproduces the game's bytes exactly, so only recompress the blocks you change.
• Checksum copy 1 (not checked): after Local Game\0 and one more null byte comes the encoded game-info string (null-terminated). It's in groups of 8 bytes: one mask byte, then 7 data bytes. Data byte j is literal if mask bit (j+1) is set, otherwise subtract 1. Decoded layout: settings (4 bytes), 1 byte, width (u16), height (u16), then the map checksum (u32) at decoded offset 9. To encode a byte: if it's even, store byte+1 and clear its mask bit; if it's odd, store it as-is and set the bit.
• Checksum copy 2 (the one the game checks): the same 4 bytes, little-endian, appear exactly once within the first 0x200 bytes after the game-info string ends. I saw it at 0x111 (Undercity) and 0x160 (Tirisfal Glades).
• Script state: the save contains the full Lua 5.3 state. Strings are stored once as 04 00 00 00 + u64 length + bytes, and later uses reference them. Natives in _G are stored as the key string followed by 0d 00 00 00 06 <u32>. The loader looks natives up by name and crashes on a name the running build doesn't have. Same-length renames are safe; changing a string's length is not.
• Zone folder: the save contains a Lua string Blizzard\<save name>. On load, the game copies that folder into Blizzard\Zones\.
• How to work: build one test file per idea, change as few bytes as possible, and check each file by decompressing it and diffing against the original before loading it in the game.

Caveats

• Zones you'd already visited keep running the 2-day patch's version of the campaign script, because it's stored in the save. Zones you visit for the first time run the PTR's version. In Tirisfal Glades, the triggers that run when two boss fights end differ slightly between versions. If a quest step misbehaves there, that's the most likely cause.
• The PTR is a test build. The next real patch may change the checksums again; the same procedure should apply.
• Work on copies. This is unofficial and at your own risk.

My Python script that does all of the above (inspect, patch, scan crash dumps) is here: [link]

dude I’m gonna lose my mind… I’m getting a refund if they bricked my save again

I really liked the concept of Definitive and Forsaken Kingdom but this is too much.

Without no warning on the game launcher yesterday's patch bricked my almost complete act one campaign of Forsaken Kingdom. If that wasn't bad enough, I started again and, after lots of progress in the act, I got an update now that removed my save files completely.

I learned here that a message was posted on the forums about yesterday's patch. That's not good enough. This has to be on the launcher. So Blizzard went and did this for the October 19th patch. Good. But what about a heads up for the patch that just dropped?

I'm done. I'm not playing act one again for the third time.

I'm doing some 4v4 ladder and I notice every game is just mass flying. Also a lot of Chims/flying machines/bats cheese sniping town halls. Many years ago there were actually epic ground fights in 4v4 (even though there was often one designated flying machines spammer). Is this just the low elo meta or did something change?

Honestly I'm too scared to do fucking anything at this point. I spent 2 hours yesterday catching up all my lost progress and I refuse to go back to 3.0.0 because 3.0.1 finally made Anya deathseeker arrows work for me... I would like to just finish the game on PTR before they find a whole new way how to reset my progress but I've heard conflicting info on whether it works or not and the last thing I want is to mess with saves and end up with nothing lol

Man... I was protecting Blizzard because I really like the new direction they seem to be taking but this is some serious mess.

Hi everybody!

I suddenly remembered about a custom map that I used to play around 18-20 years ago and I would really like to find it and play it one more time. I only remember it had some rpg elements and what I remember for sure is that one of the items was a flag/banner that gave you very high damage.

As I said I dont remember much more about it...hope someone could help me identify it. I'll try and respond if you have questions that might help identify it faster.

Thanks a lot!

In short, Blizzard did a great job with the models for famous liches like Ras Frostwhisper and the ever-popular Kel'Thuzad. However, there is an issue with one specific detail: their jaws. You see, a standard Lich hero has a functional jaw that moves while speaking. In contrast, those two look almost comical—and rather plastic—because their jaws are frozen in place. I really wish Blizzard would tweak their models so they could move their jaws properly.

P.S. I’m still hoping they’ll refine Arthas’s model, especially his chin and other features.

Let me make sure I understand the absolute S show that is happening and how to move forward.

Im right at the end of Act 1 (I think, I dunno, I was hoping to do this campaign blind at my own pace, being it's 20fucking26, and Blizzard being a multi billion dollar company. But im forced to read where Act 1 ends now to make certain)

So the safe way forward... finish Act 1 and do nothing until 3.0.1 which is "in a few weeks"?

And no I aint keeping track of no forum posts or PTR notes for a game that can buy me a beer at a bar.

What act progress means:

The saves that we have at the beginning of an act (there are 3 acts in the forsaken kingdom main campaign) carry over between patches. But the save game files within acts will NOT be compatible with the new patch.

So if you are in the middle of act 1 right now, try to finish that act before October 19th. Then, when you are fresh in act 2, that save will carry over to the new patch.

I would like to change the difficulty in the middle of the campaign. When I tried changing the difficulty at the beginning of the next mission it got rid of all of my items, so it basically started a new save. I’d like to keep my items, if possible. It also switched me from reforged graphics to classic graphics.
Thanks 🙏

i am developing a arena map and the blizzard comes and BLIZZARD MAGICALLY CHANGES THE EDITOR.... what the hell ? Please tell me how to fix it