Why should the Mage Tower have all the fun? Here’s what we’d like to see make a Timewalking comeback

Scenarios should be the next thing returned to World of Warcraft during Timewalking, now that we’re getting the Mage Tower back in patch 9.1.5 when Legion gets its Timewalking glow-up.

Wait. You’re just saying it as the opening of the article? Not even going to tease people, ask what features could come back before putting the answers in the body of the post?

Nope. I’m going to talk about more than scenarios here, of course, but I’m not playing around. We’re going to just get into it. Bring back Scenarios — and not as occasional things that pop up during an open world quest, but as fully queueable group content with up to three players, no role restrictions, that reward loot.

Scenarios were the best thing from Mists of Pandaria

There was actually a lot to like about Mists. There was some really excellent questing, the dungeons and raids were all good to great — Throne of Thunder is a masterpiece — and the way subsequent patches delivered new content and actually changed the world was really amazing. I loved both the Isle of Thunder and Timeless Isle, and I greatly enjoyed Siege of Orgrimmar. The only real downside to the expansion was the content drought at the end.

But the best thing — better than Challenge Modes, better than the Timeless Isle’s catchup gear, better than the legendary cloak, and a lot better than that jerk Ordos and his shoulder hogging ways — absolutely has to be Scenarios. They were a radical departure from how we queued up for everything else in PVE content. You didn’t have to pick a role, and you could even queue for them and dungeons at the same time and your position in the dungeon queue would be paused while you ran the Scenario. Unlike dungeon queues where everyone waits on tanks or healers, nobody was tanking or healing Scenarios, so DPS players could get in and out, get their fix, and maybe even get some gear out of the box at the end.

It was an elegant solution to the problem of how do we keep players engaged and actually playing the game instead of sitting around waiting for something to happen and I eagerly spent tons of time in them. When Heroic Scenarios came out, I spent even more time in them. Bringing them back for Mists of Pandaria Timewalking would be a masterstroke, especially if there was a quest similar to the dungeon quest that allowed you to get a solid piece of gear for completing, say, fifteen scenarios. Why fifteen? because you could easily run three scenarios in the time one dungeon run takes. Easily.

You promised you had other ideas besides Scenarios

Absolutely I do. For starters, the original Battle for Undercity from Wrath of the Lich King? Bring that back. It was cool and I miss getting to see Varian, who is as you may remember super duper ultra extreme mega dead, so dead he hasn’t even popped up yet in Shadowlands. You know, the expansion where we literally go and see a lot of dead people? I’ve spent time with Thrall’s mom, Mograine’s dad, and of course everyone’s favorite evil maniac aunt Lady Vashj, so why not Varian? Well, if we can’t get to see him in the Shadowlands, we could get to go back and do the Battle for Undercity again. That’s almost as good.

Next up, when talking about content we’ve lost, why not bring back the originals of dungeons that we’ve seen removed for newer versions? Shadowfang Keep, Upper Blackrock Spire, Scholomance, the Scarlet Monastery have all seen updates over the years that have essentially replaced the original dungeons, and while I understand that time moves on I think Timewalking would be a great way to bring these original dungeon experiences back to the modern game. I mean, isn’t the whole point of Timewalking to let us experience past content?

My final suggestion? World bosses. During Timewalking, let Azuregos, Kazzak, the Dragons of Nightmare, and even Prince Thunderaan come forth. And while we’re at it? Throw in the various world events — the Scourge Invasion, the Elemental Unrest from Cataclysm, and the pre-Legion demonic invasions. Let’s have lots of open world chaos for players to enjoy during Timewalking.

These are my suggestions for content we should see return via Timewalking. Why should the Mage Tower have all the fun?