The World of Warcraft Dragonflight 10.2.5 patch released today - hooray! This week in The Mana Regen:
new events, quests, and lore with 10.2.5
M+ and raiding Amirdrassil (maybe mythic?!)
What to do with a retaken Gilneas...
SPOILERS AHEAD!!!
The Post-Amirdrassil Story and Taking Back Gilneas
Alexstrasza has a quest for you in Valdraken. Go to the top of the Seat of the Aspects. There's a cinematic. You get a title. Yay.
All of the aspects (including Vyranoth who is? an aspect now, too) are there.
Look at Ebyssian in his new aspect form.
You'll also get a quest to find Tyrande and Shandris in Amirdrassil.
Everything in Bel'ameth is just phenomenal: the art, the layout, the music. Just... well done, Blizz. 10/10.
So many feels during this cinematic and knowing that this doesn't mean we'll never seen Teldrassil again.
And, um, look who's back:
Tyrande is quite happy to see him.
Taking Back Gilneas
Look in the suggested content screen you can call up to find this quest. It might even pop up for you as soon as you log in for the first time in the new patch.
It was coming into Stormwind that I remembered Dragonriding is now everywhere static flying had been.
Once you meet Genn above the Stormwind Harbor, it's off to Gilneas. And when you arrive, you find out who is currently squatting there - the Scarlet Crusade!!!
There are Forsaken delegates, including Lilian Voss and Calia Menethil, waiting to help in the cause. It's a goodwill gesture that Genn wants no part of, but he cedes leadership of the campaign to Tess.
There is a great callback for those of us who remember the starting zone quests as Worgen. Nice touch.
There are a few phases of quests to complete before you'll eventually face off against the Scarlet Crusade leadership, Inquisitor Fairbell, who has some Disney villain energy with a side of right-wing Evangelical nationalism. Wholesome.
Tess Greymane will disappear and reappear a bit at times, which can make staying out of combat and turning in quests a little difficult. I don't love that, but it's a small gripe.
The scene between Tess and Genn is moving enough, if perhaps predictable?
Genn then goes full old man reflecting on the past mode at Liam's grave.
And then that's... it? I did find the Crowleys, but the space, overall, is vacant. In fact, Lord Darius Crowley's lines when you interact with him remark on the emptiness and how it reminds him of how many were lost.
So what will become of this space? I'll offer some thoughts on that below.
Azerothian Archives
I took Caelcas, my worgen mage, over to the Azerothian Archives to check out what this new feature is all about.
TL;DR - it's archeology in a way.
It's interesting, and I'm sure there will be some neat cosmetics, pets, and mounts we can find in the assured grind that will ensue.
But the progression here isn't especially intuitive. At the end of the first dig, you're told to go to the Concord Observatory.
You complete the goggle technoscryer stuff there.
And then you go off to The Forbidden Reach, but I'll be honest - I haven't done that yet.
This seems like it could be fun. It's picking up on the Secrets of Azeroth event in some ways, too. I'll play around with it, I'm sure.
M+ and raiding Amirdrassil
M+ affixes this week include tyrannical, afflicted, and bolstering.
It's not a terrible week. It's not a great week. I stand by what I wrote in my last post: some sort of M+ refresh in the .5 patches would be good. Things are feeling a little stale.
Perhaps shorter "seasons" would be a good idea. Can you imagine if we refreshed all of the dungeons at the .5 patch each tier? I feel like that could be a boon to player engagement.
I know. I KNOW! There are the uber-sweats out there who won't like this idea because it means they can't achieve 3.7589999K io to get their ultra special bestest player in the world ranking, but wouldn't it just mean the io for that threshold would be lower? Is that a bad thing? Can we at least try this out?
Doomforge Brewing has begun mythic Amirdrassil, the Dream's Hope progression.
We've killed Gnarlroot, but Igira has proven a little tricky so far. I'm told she is the most difficult of the first four bosses, and so perhaps our progression will pick up a bit after.
The guys over at The Starting Zone in their most recent episode were discussing how mythic raiding is just a different beast from heroic. They're right. There are nights where you don't make any progress at all. I think it's important to communicate that to your raid team before going in. That seems to have kept people's irritation in check so far.
What to do with Gilneas, Reclaimed
I think the safe bet is that Gilneas will become a hub for the alliance during 12.0 when we return to Quel'thelas. I don't remember where I heard this speculation before, and so my apologies for not citing the source.
It makes a lot of sense, geographically. Gilneas would be alliance base of operations; the Undercity or Silvermoon would be horde base of operations.
But beyond what it could be in 12.0, I do hope we see something done with this space before then. It has a great vibe, and I feel like it could make sense to have a portal from Bel'ameth here given the kinship between the night elves and worgen.
I wonder if this might, too, be a space for player housing. I'll return again to Lord Darius Crowley's bemoaning the emptiness of the place because of those lost. Well, you'll notice that most of the emptiness in Gilneas is... houses.
Just a thought.
Anyway, with that, I'm OOM.
Thank you for reading. For Azeroth!