World of Warcraft Shadowlands has had quite the interesting run, with a lot of ups and downs. With the latest patch 9.1.5 giving players what they’ve asked for since the beginning of shadowlands it would seem that Blizzard is heading into the right direction to wrap up Shadowlands. We had the opportunity to join in on an interview session with Steve Danuser (Lead Narrative Designer) and Morgan Day (Lead Game Designer). There, we got to dig into what’s to be expected for the FINAL patch of the Shadowlands expansion, and where the players are headed in their quest against the Jailer in this “final act” of the Shadowlands expansion
World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Patch 9.2 Features
The new features in the latest patch coming to Shadowlands include the following
- New Zone: Zereth Mortis — As the devs described it, will be a “zone like we’ve never seen before”. It is the land of the “first ones” The main inhabitants the “Enlightened” have similarities to the brokers of the shadowlands we’ve seen before, however they are on a “pursuit of knowledge” and treat their home as a sacred place, according to blizzard. They will be the main faction players interact with for this patch.
- New Raid: Sepulcher of the First Ones— The new raid for Shadowlands will be Sepulcher of the First Ones, featuring 11 raid bosses leading up to a fight against most likely the jailer, a long-awaited confrontation players have been waiting for. Interestingly though the first week of normal and heroic mode raiding will only have the first 8 bosses (up to Anduin) while the full 11 boss raid will be available by the second week when Mythic difficulty and the first wing of LFR releases.
- TIER SETS! — The return of tier sets has been a long requested thing of players, that sense of “agency” with your class and collecting a strong, and cool looking set of gear. The tier sets definitely look great from the preview (looking at you rogue set!) but players who don’t raid do not have to worry! You can obtain tier sets also through PVP and Mythic+ as well.
- Solo Q, kinda.— PVP has been in a weird spot for the past expansions, while Blizzard has tried their best to appease all aspects of the game, one thing players have been asking for is a Solo Que system. In 9.2 Blizzard will be doing sort of a test with their idea of solo q through a brawl “solo shuffle” The gist is to have 6 players solo que, throw them in a pool, shuffle them in a 3v3 arena, and the one with the best rating at the end of every combination possible will come out winner. Interesting take, and a good experiment for the PvP community.
- Mythic+ Dungeons Season 3 – with a new major patch comes a new Mythic plus, and pvp season. Also the mega dungeon Tazavesh will be added to the Mythic Dungeon rotation being split into two, a lot like the Mechagon dungeon in Battle for Azeroth.
The Final Chapter
With no official release date yet for patch 9.2, speculation has a release date sometime around February. With everything going on in Blizzard’s corner we can only speculate, however this has been quite the rollercoaster for players throughout the Shadowlands expansion and it seems like Blizzard is setting us up to end on a high note.
With this patch players are finally going to go head-to-head the Jailer, and even face off against a dominated Anduin, and with the Final cut scene of the new raid the “Sepulcher” we’ll get a closing to a very long and interesting story arc for the Warcraft universe, which will also give the players a glimpse at where we could be headed next. Overall, there will be a lot to offer here for players. A new zone, a new raid, new collectibles, tier sets, and much more. It will also be a good time for players who took a break from WoW as there will be good catch-up mechanics to get into the action and play through the story of the Shadowlands. Blizzard seems to be doing their best to appease the player base in all aspects, here’s to hoping that Shadowlands ends on a high note.