This article is based on a full dig through Forever's client-generated data and the simulator repository's commit history: every conclusion is checkable, with the methodology notes at the end.
One reversal first: 105 → 16
The first pass of the dig used "no classic-era spell ID" as its filter and came out with 105 Forever-custom abilities. A later data check overturned that number:
"89 of the 105 stubs were Season of Discovery abilities, not Forever's."
The cause: the Forever client ships with Season of Discovery (SoD) data, and rune abilities sit on the class-native spell lines, which the first filter failed to exclude. The real criteria turned out to be two:
- Granting spell: every SoD ability has an
Engrave <slot> - <name>(rune engraving) spell behind it; - ID band: SoD uses the 398196–469145 range, while Forever's own content sits at 1214168 and above.
The SoD content miscounted as "Forever new spells" includes: mage Rewind Time, Living Bomb and Frost Orb; warlock Metamorphosis and Chaos Bolt; paladin Divine Storm and Horn of Lordaeron; rogue Shadowstrike and Blade Dance; druid Starfall and Starsurge — all of them SoD runes, not Forever originals.
The 16 abilities Forever actually created
| # | Spell | Class | Spell IDs | Ranks |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Revive | Druid | 437138, 1237948-51 | 5 |
| 2 | Frostfire Bolt | Mage | 401502, 1237312-13 | 3 |
| 3 | Chastise | Priest | 1277331-35 | 5 |
| 4 | Confounding Flash | Priest | 1277455 | no ranks |
| 5 | Contingency Plan | Priest | 1277462, 1277634, 1277638-40 | 5 |
| 6 | Dark Sacrifice | Priest | 1277324-28 | 5 |
| 7 | Divine Grace | Priest | 1277370-78 (gapped) | 7 |
| 8 | Enchanted Flare | Hunter | 1221404 | no ranks |
| 9 | Pinch | Hunter pet | 1264745-52 | 5 |
| 10 | Tendon Rip | Hunter pet | 1265043-48 | 5 |
| 11 | Mine! | Hunter pet | 1265059-64 | 5 |
| 12 | Dismember | Hunter pet | 1264937-72 | 5 |
| 13 | Savage Rend | Hunter pet | 1265831-36 | 5 |
| 14 | Swipe | Hunter pet | 1264727-32 | 5 |
| 15 | Web | Hunter pet | 1265887-92 | 5 |
| 16 | Dust Cloud | Hunter pet | 1265907-13 | 5 |
Structural conclusions:
- Half of them (8/16) are pet skills — Forever redesigned the hunter pet system: vanilla pets had the Claw/Bite/Cower trio, Forever gives them 8 full five-rank abilities.
- Priests gained the most new active abilities of any playable class (5), and Divine Grace goes to 7 ranks — well beyond the usual vanilla 5-rank ceiling.
- 14 of the 16 abilities have values in the client's generated tables; 2 are not yet ranked.
- None of the new spells are wired into class logic yet — in the repository's own words, "wiring in unimplemented abilities would crash the whole class on login"; placeholder first, construction later.
Spell re-issues: vanilla abilities returning under new IDs
Beyond the brand-new spells, Forever also re-issues a batch of vanilla abilities under new IDs — not additions, not removals, but a data-layer costume change:
- Fire Blast rank 1 exists simultaneously as 2136 (vanilla ID) and 400618 (re-issue);
- Paladin Exorcism rank 1 is stitched together from vanilla 879 and SoD 415068, with the disambiguation rule "the one taught by trainers is the real one" deciding which applies;
- Ground-effect spells (Consecration/Blizzard/Flamestrike/Hurricane/Rain of Fire/Volley) hide a shadow sub-spell carrying the damage ticks behind every rank — Consecration rank 5's ticks live on 1280349, for example.
The talent layer: taller trees, marked "new in Forever"
- Tree size: each spec's talent tree is 16–19 rows deep (mage 18/17/19, priest 18/17/18) — far deeper than the vanilla/TBC-era trees.
- The code marks 223 talents with
new in Forever. The marker's real meaning is "appears in Forever's tree but unimplemented in the TBC port" — a mix of two kinds: vanilla talents the TBC simulator never implemented (Warrior's Iron Will / Piercing Howl / Blood Craze, for example), and Forever's genuinely new or reworked talents (table below).
The Forever redesign log
| Talent / mechanic | Forever's change |
|---|---|
| Feral Instinct | Bear-form threat bonus removed; the whole talent reworked |
| Improved Expose Armor | Expose Armor switched to an energy cost |
| Moonfury | +2% Arcane/Nature damage per rank (client wording) |
| Hurricane | No cooldown (the client data row simply has none) |
| Damage bonus surface | Covers all spell schools (mask 127), no longer physical-only |
| Triggers | Talent procs fixed at a 100% rate |
What Forever cut from vanilla/TBC
TBC spells are removed wholesale: Steady Shot, Kill Command, Dragon's Breath, Cold Snap, Slow, Summon Water Elemental, Avenger's Shield, Avenging Wrath, Crusader Strike, Divine Guidance, Improved Divine Spirit, Sanctified Aura, Seal of Blood/Seal of Vengeance, Shadow Embrace, Envenom, Mutilate, Seed of Corruption, Shadowfury, Unstable Affliction, Felguard, Fel Armor, Commanding Shout and Wrath of Air Totem.
Vanilla spells were cut too: Bloodlust (deleted outright — raid balance is designed without lust), Earth Elemental Totem/Fire Elemental Totem, and Force of Nature.
The "Forever 60 vs vanilla 60" spell diff in summary
| Layer | Difference |
|---|---|
| Removed | All TBC spells + Bloodlust + elemental totems + Force of Nature, roughly 30 spells |
| Truly new | 16 (8 playable: Druid 1 / Mage 1 / Priest 5 / Hunter 1; 8 pet) |
| Re-issued | A batch of vanilla abilities return with 1.2M+ IDs, including shadow sub-spell structures |
| Talents | Trees deepened to 16–19 rows; 223 added markers; Feral Instinct and others reworked |
| Values | The client-generated tables rule; all hand-copied values discarded |
| Port progress | Warrior is the only fully ported class; the other 8 classes keep their old implementations as comments (8,253 lines) awaiting Forever-value ports |
Why this list is trustworthy
- The data is self-declaring: every ability stub file states its spell IDs, rank count and whether a generated table exists — no guesswork;
- The criteria survived one self-correction (105 → 16), with the final standard (SoD band + rune-engrave granting spell + Forever ID floor of 1214168) fully argued in commit messages;
- Cross-checked against the client's generated tables: 14 of 16 abilities match;
- Every conclusion can be re-verified in the repository — the relevant commits and file locations are listed in the methodology notes at the end.