From pre-patch to every Season 1 raid, here’s the release schedule for Midnight launch

Soon, it will be time for World of Warcraft’s Midnight expansion to launch, kicking off the second part of the Worldsoul Saga as baddie (in every sense of the word) Xal’atath invades Azeroth with an army of void creatures at her beck and call. It’ll be time to visit a revamped Silvermoon City, help the Haranir deep down below, and venture into not one but three new raids, all in Season 1. There’ll also be the usual bevy of activities to go with it — delving with our new pal Valeera Sanguinar, hunting down fresh new decor to go with the Elven housing exteriors coming in Midnight, and more.

Before we get into all that, there’s also a pre-patch event that will run for approximately five weeks, in which you’ll help Magister Umbric and Grand Magister Rommath ferret out a growing cult of Xal’atath devotees on Azeroth while they bicker like a couple of annoying schoolchildren. Let’s take a look at when exactly you can do what in both the leadup to launch, and the actual launch, of Midnight Season 1.

• Tuesday, January 20: The Midnight pre-patch launches! Expect to spend some time setting up your talents for every class and spec in your roster, as they’ve all undergone major changes. You’ll also likely be bidding farewell to a few addons — remember, you won’t be able to load any old addons after the 12.0 launch, so if it doesn’t update, you’ll have to do without. However, there’s a bevy of new stuff, too, not just changes:
  • Devourer, the new Demon Hunter spec, goes live! It’s a mid-range caster spec, using Intellect as its primary stat, and it plays really differently from either of the existing Demon Hunter specs. It brings with it a new set of Hero Talents, too — the Annihilator tree, which is shared by Devourer and Vengeance; Vengeance loses access to Fel-Scarred in the patch.
  • A short quest line that goes live with pre-patch will also enable Void Elves to be Demon Hunters!
  • A stat and item level squish goes live with pre-patch. As always, your power relative to enemies should remain the same, just with smaller numbers; as always, some things will inevitably get missed on launch day, so don’t be surprised.
  • While some addons are going to be defunct, pre-patch launch will also bring with it the much-needed updates to the built-in Cooldown Manager.
  • This also brings the new transmog system, so get ready to spend some time and gold setting that up.
• Tuesday, January 27: Two things, one large and one small, launch a week after the patch.
  • First, it’s time for the return of Winds of Mysterious Fortune, to help you gain even more experience from levels 10 to 79. I can’t imagine what you have left to level after Legion Remix, but hey, maybe it’s a new Void Elf Demon Hunter?
  • Secondly, the pre-Midnight event, The Cult Within, will be available in Orgrimmar and Stormwind. Grand Magister Rommath and Magister Umbric want you to help investigate rumors of an uptick in Twilight cultists — the ones we thought we beat back with the death of the Old Gods, but I guess there’s no keeping a good cult down. For yout troubles, you can earn catchup gear, a brand new tabard, and the title “Definitely Not a Cultist.” Heck, that title alone is worth it.

• Friday, February 27 (tentative): Blizzard hasnt’t stated this date for sure, but if you pre-ordered a version of Midnight that comes with early access, that starts a minimum of three days before the expansion’s official launch — most likely, then on February 27. Assuming this works like it did in The War Within, you’ll have access to the leveling campaign as well as normal mode dungeons and non-Bountiful Delves capped at a low difficulty level; one thing you are verified not to be able to do during early access, however, is unlock and play the Haranir Allied Race.
• Monday, March 2: Midnight launches! You’ll have access to all the same things as the early access folks at this point.
  • Four new zones: Quel’thalas, Zul’aman, Harandar, and the Voidstorm.
  • The revamped Silvermoon City, our hub of operations for Midnight.
  • Four leveling dungeons:
    • Windrunner Spire
    • Magister’s Terrace
    • Murder Row
    • Den of Nalorakk
  • Four max level dungeons:
    • Maisara Caverns
    • The Blinding Vale
    • Voidcsar Arena
    • Nexus-Point Xenas
  • Twelve new Delves, as well as new Delve companion Valeera, as well as a new Delve Nemesis.
  • The open-world Prey system — if you liked Heroic World Tier in Legion Remix, this is sort of akin to it, but you can push it even further as you hunt down your target (and are hunted in return at higher difficulty levels).

• Tuesday, March 17: Midnight Season 1 officially launches! It brings a slew of stuff with it that you’ll no doubt be chomping at the bit to dive into:
  • Heroic and Mythic 0 difficulty Season 1 Dungeons. Note that this does not include Mythic+ yet!  The dungeon pool is, as is tradition at this point, a mix of new and old dungeons:
    • Magister’s Terrace (Midnight)
    • Maisara Caverns (Midnight)
    • Nexus-Point Xenas (Midnight)
    • Windrunner Spire (Midnight)
    • Algeth’ar Academy (Dragonflight)
    • Seat of the Tiumvirate (Legion)
    • Skyreach (Warlords of Draenor)
    • Pit of Saron (Wrath of the Lich King)
  • Normal, Heroic, and Raid Finder (Wing 1) of the Voidspire raid.
  • Normal, Heroic, and Raid Finder of the Dreamrift raid.
  • Bountiful Delves open up with the launch of Season 1.
  • PvP Season 1 starts now, too.
• Tuesday, March 24: More raid difficulties open, as do Mythic+ dungeons.
  • Story Mode, Raid Finder (Wing 2), and Mythic Voidspire
  • Mythic Dreamrift (there is no mention of a Story Mode for Dreamrift, meaning there may not be one)
  • Mythic+ Dungeons, Season 1
• Tuesday, March 31: The final raid opens in several difficulties, and Voidspire is now fully open in LFR difficulty.
  • Raid Finder (Wing 3) Voidspire
  • Normal, Heroic, and Mythic March on Quel’Danas
• Tuesday, April 7: Everything is now finally open in Season 1!
  • Story Mode and Raid Finder March on Quel’Danas