The Queue: Gobble Gobble Eve

As many of you know we’ve run into a bit of issue lately with ad revenue (among other things). As part of it we’re looking into different ad providers, and a new one has just started — so if you see any major issues (autoplaying ads, for example) please let us know in the comments or on Discord. We ask that you are patient for the next few weeks as we suss out the new system and try a few different things. Thanks for all of your support!

Tomorrow may be a holiday in the US but today is a working day so let’s ask and answer some questions!

I believe Blizzard thinks so, and The War Within is a perfect example of this. The first zone and main hub are populated with Earthen, who are related to the Alliance Dwarves. Sure, Horde will be able to play Earthen after they’re unlocked, but the aesthetic is going to be way more familiar to Alliance players than Horde players.

Then while adventuring we’ll meet a group of o.g. Humans called the Arathi (of whom the Highlands are named after). Speaking of humans, King Anduin Wrynn of Stormwind is going to be front and center in this expansion fighting his own “war within”. Joining him in the double meaning is High Elf and Alliance champion Alleria Windrunner who will likely be the one directly squaring off against Xal’atath.

Sure, Thrall is on the cover of the box and got to show up in the announcement cinematic, but barring unknown narrative directions in the expansion he’s there almost as if to make sure the Horde don’t feel left out.

You could think Midnight is designed to counterbalance the Alliance-heavy The War Within since it takes place in Quel’thelas, home of the Blood Elves, but we already know that *all* Elf races will be involved in that plot.

So yeah, the story team seems to have clearly moved past the point of required faction parity.

All that said, there will most definitely be complaints.

It’s easy to say “just play the game” but that’s not 100% true. Besides making sure to do as many world quests as possible and using the Contract for additional rep, there’s a trick with Dragonflight renown when you receive a lot of the reputation via campaign quests and tokens.

The trick is what I call the “rep slingshot” and it works like this:

1. Designate a primary alt to earn Renown on first.
2. After the primary alt reaches Renown 10 (where the Essence of a Worthy Ally buff kicks in for other characters, doubling your reputation reward) that’s when you start gaining Renown with your main. Because so much reputation comes from the Campaign, you quickly reach Renown 10 while still having plenty of Campaign quests to complete. If you time when you use a reputation token to pass 10 correctly, you can reach Renown 15 on your second toon.

It’s important to note that this works best with the Loamm Niffen and the Dream Wardens, and while something similar can be done with the original Dragonflight factions it’s not as effective.

Probably the Azerothian Archives event. We still don’t know a lot about it, and while I’m always happy for new collectibles and such I really hope we get a chance to really dig deep into the Dragon Isles history. War of the Scaleborn was so good — probably my second favorite tie-in novel after The Last Guardian — and it’d be awesome if we could get that sort of information in-game.

I’m also hoping it becomes a semi-regular event and eventually leads to a “library” tab for our characters (yes, yes, others have been asking for this for awhile but I’ve wanted one for almost a decade now), and if it includes the ability for me to replay my Death Knight getting her Legion mount I would be ecstatic.

While I’m not as hopeful as Cory about Heroes of the Storm making a comeback I’m still rooting hard for it. Because of its uncertain status, though, it’s tough to answer with my first choice (Moira Bronzebeard Thaurissan) because I would want the first new hero in forever to be one that generates excitement in conjunction with the other franchises. If it had been over the summer I would’ve gone with Lilith but the Diablo 4 hype has died down now so I’m going to look at WoW instead.

There are four candidates at the top of my list:

• Vyranoth: as the Primal Incarnate we’re now allied with, she’s a prime candidate for adding a Dragonflight reference into HotS. Like Lilith, though, her addition would be after “maximum hype” for the expansion has been reached so she wouldn’t benefit the game numbers much.
• Alleria Windrunner: one of the cover heroes for The War Within, Alleria would be a nice tie-in. However I’m not sure her toolkit would be that much different from Sylvanas and it’d be hard to make her really stand out on the battlefield.
• Xal’atath: everyone’s favorite “knaifu” is being marketed as the next expansion’s main adversary and she could definitely be designed as a unique hero, but she’s not my top choice.
• Azshara: I didn’t originally have her on the list because it didn’t occur to me that she wasn’t already a hero until I checked and to my surprise found that she’s not in the game. The heck? It’s Azshara. The answer is clearly Azshara.

If we went outside of Blizzard franchises I would add five new characters at once and just wait for the money to pour in: Shadowheart, Lae’zel, Gale, Karlach and Astarion.

This question gives me too much power but like Spider-man while Uncle Ben was still alive I’m going to ignore the responsibility and answer it twice: once for what I would think would be best for the game narratively, once for that I think would be best for the game systematically.

First off, the big one: Sylvanas doesn’t jump to her death after the Lich King is defeated. This is in my estimation the singular most impactful event in the history of Azeroth since the Sundering. Without her death, Sylvanas doesn’t meet the Jailer and that is huge. Her actions don’t change much through the early part of Legion (if you haven’t read Sylvanas she doesn’t actually start “working” for the Jailer until after the Broken Shore assault) so the events still transpire as before — we go to Pandaria and Draenor, she still flees from the battle ensuring Varian’s sacrifice — but Vol’jin no longer names Sylvanas his successor as Warchief. Stormheim becomes a much more enjoyable leveling experience. The arrival of Azerite does cause friction but it wouldn’t result in the Battle for Azeroth we experience — the core features of that expansion remain, but the Horde vs Alliance aspect are mostly gone. Teldrassil does not burn. Tyrande doesn’t go full Night Warrior, and we never get black eye customizations for Night Elves.

I do think we eventually go to the Shadowlands — Argus is still slain by us during Legion, gumming up the Arbiter’s works — but it’d be in a wholly different fashion. The Dragon Isles still awaken and The War Within is still imminent, but Anduin probably isn’t sporting a beard while sitting on the Throne in Stormwind. And when Midnight comes around, Sylvanas Windrunner would be at the Sunwell defending it.

System-wise I’d get rid of the Draenor Shipyard. You’re welcome.

That’s all I’m able to answer without the Queue breaking unfortunately. For those in the US have a good holiday and please drive safe. Everyone make sure to ask questions for Matt as the Queue will still be happening tomorrow. Also on Friday if you can try to #OptOutside if only for a little while for your mental health. Have a great one, friends.