Detective: great title or best title? How to get the Detective title in World of Warcraft

World of Warcraft has always had secret hunters. In the early days it was people doing wall climbing to find hidden areas like the Ironforge Airfield or GM Island. Blizzards response to these intrepid explorers has varied over the years, with people getting suspensions and bans for going to places they shouldn’t, to the more recent deliberate placement of secrets to engage those players. Secrets haven’t always had rewards beyond the bragging rights, but in with the launch of the Legion expansion, the first of deliberate secrets with rewards entered the game, with multiple mounts and pets and transmogrification items being made available to diligent players. This reached new levels with Dragonflight having an entire in-game event called the Secrets of Azeroth in September 2023.

It’s fitting that the World of Warcraft 20th Anniversary event includes a series of in-game secrets, with the meta-achievement rewarding the warband-wide title Detective, which is possibly the coolest title ever. The Guest Relations achievements have you assisting Alyx, the much put upon Volunteer Assistant Guest Relations Manager, whose title appears to flex to add an ever-increasing series of responsibilities. She is desperately trying to ensure everyone has a great time at the 20th Anniversary event, against all unreasonable odds.

To earn the title you need to complete the 20th Anniversary Guest Relations meta-achievement Azeroth’s Greatest Detective, which requires that you complete two out of the four following sub-achievements:

• Assistant to the Assistant Guest Relations Manager — Complete all of the hidden Guest Relations local stories.
• I Saved the Party and All I Got Were These Lousy Hats — Complete the Guest Relations storyline.
• Crate Insurance Agent — Find and return 6 Celebration Crates.
• No Crate Left Behind — Find and return all Celebration Crates.

The obvious ‘easy’ win here is to collect all the Celebration Crates as this will get you two of the four sub-achievements. These sub-achievements are heavily entangled, and it is likely that you will complete parts of each of them even if only trying to complete the crate achievements.

Celebration Crates

At time of writing we have seen six of the crates so far. These are all accessible, and while you can simply go to the final location, it is generally far more fun to follow along the clue paths. Once you have collected the crate, hand it to Alyx to get credit. The crates we know of so far:

• Soggy Celebration Crate — this crate is in the mouth of Gerald the Clam located near an underwater Tortollan Dive Bar in Zulzadar, you need to bribe the clam with a Clam Digger, purchased from the Talekeeper Nikto directly below him.
  /way #862 54.2 54.3 Soggy Celebration Crate
• Hazy Celebration Crate — located in Desolace, you need to be dead to see this crate.
  /way #66 54.11 58.05 Hazy Celebration Crate
• Battered Celebration Crate — located in Howling Fjord, follow the directions in the torn note to find it.
  /way #117 29.41 6.36 Battered Celebration Crate
• Dirt-Caked Celebration Crate — located in the Crypt under Kharazhan in Deadwind Pass.
  /way #42 39.8 73.9 Entrance to the Crypts
  /way #42 33.5 70.7 Entrance to Semi-circular Tunnel
  /way #42 30.2 81.3 Cross the water-filled room
  /way #42 22.6 83.7 Dirt-Caked Celebration Crate
• Sandy Celebration Crate — purchased for 500g from Vashti the Wandering Merchant who wanders along the eastern coast of Azsuna along the main road.
• Waterlogged Celebration Crate — located behind a bed on the upper floor of an underwater tower off the coast of Tanaris. Be careful to avoid touching the lift platform as there are many repots of it triggering disconnects.
  /way #71 69.17 68.64 Waterlogged Celebration Crate
• Charred Celebration Crate — located in Hyjal near the daily quest to rescue bear cubs that are stuck up trees. The crate is under the trampoline.
  /way #198 13.6 33.5 Charred Celebration Crate
• Mildewed Celebration Crate — collect the Potion of Truth from the top of the mountain next to Lord Magmathar in Ashenvale, then fly to Dire Maul. Note that you can not use teleports or flight points, and must fly directly. The Potion of Truth buff lasts for 5 minutes and is required to see the chest.
  /way #63 47.9 38.4 Potion of Truth
  /way #69 60.42 35.40 Mildewed Celebration Crate
• Crystallized Celebration Crate — located in Oshu’gun, in Nagrand (Outland).
  /way #107 35.85 67.20 Oshu’gun entrance
  /way #107 35.27 74.73 Crystallized Celebration Crate
•  Surprisingly Pristine Celebration Crate — The first step of this secret is in a cave on the coast behind Ahn’Qiraj: The Fallen Kingdom, after collecting some bones, you will need to take them with you to bury them respectfully. To find the bones, you will need a beast family Dog battle pet, the easiest one for most people to get is the Perky Pug. Take the bones to Stormheim, near the crashed Alliance warship. The grave is nearby, burring the bones will reveal the crate.
  Note: the map will behave oddly for the first step of this secret, the cave is near the bottom of the cliff, the bones you are looking for are in the back of the cave behind Andrestrasz, and won’t be visible unless you use the Torch of Pyrreth and have a valid pet out.
  /way #12 40.43 93.12 Cave Entrance
  /way #12 40.71 92.83 Mysterious Bones
  /way #634 37.39 47.64 Grave of the Fallen Warrior
•  Ghostly Celebration Crate — This last quest is located in Maldraxas. Note that if you are completing this quest on a character that did not play through Shadowlands, avoid using the skip to jump past the prologue in the Maw, as it is currently bugged and won’t progress to a point of unlocking flight points.
  /way #1536 49.99 73.81 Ghostly Celebration Crate

Local Stories

These are being released one at a time on a staggered schedule, at time of writing we have seen three of these events. There are six more to go, which we’ve also listed below for the sleuths.

• The Case of Misfortune —  collect a series of Hearthstone cards lost around the 20th Anniversary Event. UIpon completion Alphonse Constant will tell your fortune daily.
• The Case of a Good Book — collect the missing pages of the Green Hills of Stranglethorn that have been scattered around and stolen by some elite mobs in the area (you can also take a short cut and buy a completed book from Cravitz Lorent who is lurking below the Fashion Frenzy stage).
• The Loud and Smelly Case — you have been tasked to hunt down a missing pet, rewards Gizmo the Pure battle pet.
• The Case of Missing Mementos
• The Case of an Old Soul — help Scrollsage Nola reach the water one last time.
• The Case of Great Aspirations — a Black Dragonflight Whelpling has aspirations to follow in Deathwing’s steps. Show him the consequences of those choices.
• The Case of a Feathered Friend — find all the missing feathers scattered around Draenor (WoD). The last feather may be bugged for Horde players who have build their WoD Shipyard, you may need to Party Sync with someone who has not completed this stage of progression in this zone.
• The Case of Pet Games — find two missing pets that are loose in Pandaria and return them to Jepetto Joybuzz at the 20th Anniversary celebration site.
• The Case of Staged Disaster — help Dapperdew find a number of missing props scattered around the Star Lake Amphitheatre in Ardenweald. Note that if you are completing this quest on a character that did not play through Shadowlands, avoid using the skip to jump past the prologue in the Maw, as it is currently bugged and won’t progress to a point of unlocking flight points.

Guest Relations Storyline

These storylines are longer, more complex mysteries. Each chapter to date has been staggered over multiple quest lines over several days. You can complete them all in a single pass once the last step has been made available. Expect to be travelling all over Azeroth, in some cases visiting locations we haven’t been to in quite some time.

There are four chapters in the achievement, and a Tutorial storyline not counted in the achievement but required to unlock all the other Secrets of Azeroth tools and quests.

• Chapter 1 — mostly takes place in Tanaris and Borean Tundra, Northrend
  • Thoughtful Pursuits
  • The “Great” Detective
  • The Trail’s Gone Cold
  • Spot the Difference
• Chapter 2 — mostly takes place on the Dragon Isles
  • Operation Toy Rescue
  • The Toy Thief
• Chapter 3 — part one takes place mostly in Booty Bay, part two requires gathering fish from number of different expansion zones.
  •  A Pirate Predicament
  •  Pirate Foods and Superstitions
  •  A Pirate Missive
  •  Pirate Gastronomy
• Chapter 4 – part one takes place in locations around Tanaris, part two takes place around the celebration area, and then on the beach where this whole storyline began.
  •  Buried Tweasure
  •  A Surprising Investigation

Rewards

While the capstone reward is the Detective title, this isn’t the only reward on offer. Other items include:

• Idol of Ohn’ahra — reward from Guest Relations Tutorial quest line, teaches the same toy as previously rewarded in Patch 11.0.5
• Torch of Pyrreth — reward from Guest Relations Tutorial quest line, teaches the same toy as previously rewarded in Patch 11.0.5
• Tricked-Out Thinking Cap — reward from Assistant to the Assistant Guest Relations Manager, teaches the same toy as previously rewarded in Patch 11.0.5.
• High-Alert Thinking Cap — reward from I Saved the Party and All I Got Were These Lousy Hats
• Bright Ideas Thinking Cap — also a reward from I Saved the Party and All I Got Were These Lousy Hats
• Gizmo the Pure — an undead raccoon pet, rewarded from the side story A Loud and Smelly Case

At time of writing, the 20th Anniversary event is approximately halfway through its duration. Many of the secrets and their clues have been concealed and time gated. There are likely to be more rewards that haven’t yet been revealed.

What Next? The next secret!

If you have completed all the other 20th Anniversary Achievements, you will find there is one achievement left — Ratts’ Revenge. The ultimate reward from this achievement will be the Incognitro, the Indecipherable Felcycle. This secret is still in progress, and will take us a while to solve yet. It does require the Detective title to start.

If you want to get more actively involved with researching and hunting for clues in World of Warcraft. You can join the hard-core secret finders on the WoW Secret Finding Discord, a Discord server that focuses entirely on connecting the dots and driving ourselves mad when we notice that tiles don’t line up properly — there must be a meaning to that, right?

If you don’t want to solve all the clues yourself, Wowhead is maintaining a step-by-step guide you can follow along to find all the notes and stories and other neat events.

Last Updated: 24th November 2024.