Two dated additions to the scene, both read at source today.
Project Reforged puts a date on its Classic+ launch: November 6
Project Reforged now runs a launch countdown on its own front page reading "Starts 06.11.2026 18:00 CET". That converts to 17:00 UTC on November 6 2026, since European clocks are back on standard time by then.
The countdown sits beside a realm widget reading Bronzebeard Online on a Low-Rate x1 realm, and the project's own realm statistics page, read today, shows the realm up with 32 characters created, 6 Horde and 25 Alliance, and 0 players online at the snapshot, on a reported uptime of 0 days, 17 hours, 30 minutes. Its online-players page reads "There are no players online."
That combination is worth stating plainly rather than smoothing over: the realm is reachable and joinable, but it is empty at our read, and the operator is still advertising a November 6 launch. We have recorded the realm as reachable since September 11, so read the countdown as the project's own launch or fresh-start date rather than the first day the realm answers.
The project's October 3 news posts frame it as an expanded classic experience rather than a different game: "new and reworked zones, additional quests, challenging dungeons and raids, dynamic events" that "feel like a natural part of Azeroth". A separate post that day is a recruiting call for developers, Discord moderators and in-game staff. A community post on r/wowservers dated today describes the project as Classic+ with 8 additional playable races; that race count comes from the community post, not from the site pages we read, so we record it as an unconfirmed detail.
Evergreen HC opens a one-life vanilla realm
A second project published its site this weekend: Evergreen HC, a permanent Vanilla 1.12.1 hardcore server at evergreen-hc.com. You supply your own unmodified 1.12.1 client (no launcher, no custom patches), set set realmlist evergreen-hc.com, and register on the site. It describes itself as blizzlike, free, with zero pay-to-win, permanently on patch 1.12.1 with normal experience rates and no seasons and no wipes.
The hardcore ruleset is the whole product, and it is unusually specific:
- One life. On death the character is flagged and cannot be revived. Resurrection abilities still cost mana and play their animation, but do nothing, and the release-spirit resurrection window is gone.
- Server-wide death announcements. Every death is announced to everyone with the character's level and cause, including falling, drowning and pet-caused deaths, with a themed sound. Reaching level 60 is announced to the whole realm.
- Rebuilt leashing that the site says follows official hardcore server rules. Leash timers are tracked per player rather than one shared monster timer, monsters work a threat-ordered leash queue, and the initial no-break radius is cut from 50 to 31 yards, with a 1,200-yard cap for open-world elites and bosses. Leash duration runs 11 seconds at levels 1 to 29 up to 15 seconds at 60. Linked packs share one timer, and the assist window is reduced from 1,500 to 500 milliseconds.
The clearest limitation is the one the site states itself: "A small, new project. Our population is still growing." No player counter is published, so we record the population band as unknown rather than guess at it.
SOURCES: Project Reforged's own front page, news posts (both dated October 3 2026), online-players page and realm_statistics/1, all read October 18 2026, plus the r/wowservers post of the same date for the "8 additional playable races" line, attributed above. Evergreen HC's own homepage and its Changes and Connect pages, read October 18 2026. Related: the launch calendar, the tracker, and the October tracker census.