Two Warlocks reached the championship match, two Shamans finished immediately behind them, and Warlockguy took the title after losing to the same opponent earlier that night. He beat Neepzen 3–1 to claim the $50,000 champion’s prize from The Forever Open’s $100,000 pool. These were level-30 duels on the WoW Forever beta. Here is how the tournament unfolded, who made the top eight and which classes actually won their games.
The top eight: Warlocks first, Shamans next
The 36-player finals bracket ended with the following standings. Shared places reflect elimination in the same round; there was no fifth-place playoff.
| Place | Player | Class | Race |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Warlockguy | Warlock | Undead |
| 2 | Neepzen | Warlock | Undead |
| 3 | Cdewx | Shaman | Orc |
| 4 | Oddwaffletv | Shaman | Orc |
| 5–6 | Minpojke | Druid | Tauren |
| 5–6 | Azzu | Paladin | Undead |
| 7–8 | Lamelol | Paladin | Undead |
| 7–8 | Jázggz | Warlock | Undead |
The final: lose 1–2, then return to win 3–1
Neepzen won their first meeting 2–1 in the upper-bracket final. Warlockguy had to go through Cdewx in the lower final, won that series 2–0 and earned another shot at the same Warlock. The championship had no bracket reset: one best-of-five would settle it.
Neepzen also won the opening game of the grand final. Warlockguy then took three straight duels: 0–1 became 3–1. The final game was recorded at 02:35 UTC on October 19, or 04:35 in Berlin and 22:35 on October 18 in New York. The October 18 finals therefore ran into Monday morning for European viewers.
Warlockguy’s route: 14 duel wins, three losses
Warlockguy entered as seed 20. Four straight 2–0 series put him on the brink of the championship before Neepzen stopped the run. Across the finals he finished 14–3 in individual duels: 82.4%, including Warlock mirrors. That is a player record, not the class-wide percentage below.
| Opponent | Class | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Skeelz | Shaman | 2:0 |
| Lamelol | Paladin | 2:0 |
| Jázggz | Warlock | 2:0 |
| Minpojke | Druid | 2:0 |
| Neepzen | Warlock | 1:2 |
| Cdewx | Shaman | 2:0 |
| Neepzen | Warlock | 3:1 |
Class win rates: the finals, not the qualifiers
We counted individual completed duels in Raider.IO’s finals data: 117 in total. Removing 15 same-class duels leaves 102 cross-class games. Each win contributes a loss to the opponent’s class. Unplayed games and advances without an opponent are excluded; series are not counted as single duels. Snapshot: October 19.
| Class | Wins | Losses | Duels | Win rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Warlock | 26 | 7 | 33 | 78.8% |
| Shaman | 19 | 11 | 30 | 63.3% |
| Paladin | 16 | 13 | 29 | 55.2% |
| Druid | 12 | 14 | 26 | 46.2% |
| Priest | 9 | 12 | 21 | 42.9% |
| Hunter | 7 | 11 | 18 | 38.9% |
| Rogue | 5 | 11 | 16 | 31.3% |
| Warrior | 4 | 11 | 15 | 26.7% |
| Mage | 4 | 12 | 16 | 25.0% |
What happened to the classes
Warlocks led the finals on both measures that matter here: first and second place, plus 26 wins from 33 non-mirror duels. Both finalists submitted 5/21/0 talent distributions: five points in Affliction and 21 in Demonology. Their exact allocations differed, so calling the builds identical would be wrong. The result supports Demonology’s strength in this event; it does not show that every win came from the same spell sequence.
Shamans supplied the strongest chase. Cdewx lost 0–2 to Azzu, then beat Luuxiå, Lamelol, Minpojke and Oddwaffletv in four straight single-duel elimination matches. Warlockguy stopped him in the lower final. Oddwaffletv started as seed 31, had to play the opening round, and still finished fourth. He eliminated Fvp, Korleone, Jázggz and Azzu along the way.
Paladins finished above 50% against other classes, with Azzu in joint fifth–sixth and Lamelol in joint seventh–eighth. Azzu beat both leading Shamans in the upper bracket, but lost to Neepzen and then to Oddwaffletv in their rematch. Minpojke was the highest Druid: he knocked top seed Korleone out of the upper bracket before losing to Warlockguy and Cdewx.
The remaining classes did not reach the top eight. Priests won 9 of 21 cross-class duels, Hunters 7 of 18, Rogues 5 of 16, Warriors 4 of 15 and Mages 4 of 16. Those are small samples from four finalists per class, not a probability that any random player will win a duel. In particular, a 25% Mage result here describes this bracket and these opponents.
Why qualifier percentages can look different
The woah.market qualifier snapshot covers 4,585 decided games between different classes: Paladins won 551 of 879 appearances (62.7%), Warlocks 587 of 979 (60.0%), and Shamans 663 of 1,449 (45.8%). That is a different field and stage. The finals narrowed the field to four players per class, and the Shamans who made it went much further than the overall qualifier average suggests.
This was level 30. Level 60 remains an open question
The concrete result is clear: Warlocks won this tournament, and Shamans filled the next two places. Turning that into a launch-wide tier list would skip the missing high-level abilities, complete talent builds, later gear and the differences between duels and team PvP.
There is no confirmed post-tournament nerf list in the material checked for this article. Blizzard is already adjusting beta mechanics: its October 15 notes changed Paladin Reckoning to store up to four charges for the next auto attack. Further changes may alter these matchups, but naming a future nerf as a certainty would be speculation.