World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Review
World of Warcraft: Shadowlands seems to have Resurrected World of Warcraft after the disastrous expansion of Battle for Azeroth. While you get familiar faces, with the true return of Bolvar (outside of being a Death Knight in Legion), as well as main characters from last expansion. This time it took more of page from Legions book returning to the Player Story, though not as amazing as having a different story per class, still having four different versions to see the game from it’s perspective is cool. Not to mention all the cool abilities you get.
For the past two years it has seemed like something has been missing from the game, maybe it was the story, or maybe the immersion aspect. However, something has been missing, making it not so interesting to play. I will be honest I probably played more World of Warcraft: Classic then I did World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth. I made it through the story and it felt so bland and overwhelming, I eventually came back just before Pre-Patch for Shadowlands. Something to note is I did also have Beta Access for Shadowlands, however I barely touched it as I didn’t want to ruin the story for myself. So what exactly was the issue with game and how did Shadowlands fix it?
How does it improve the game?
To put it simply, Blizzard looked at multiple things one being the huge grind it was from level 1 – 120 and decided that is just insane and did a level squish. While they have done stat squishes in the past this is the first time they straight up changed character levels. The first time I logged in and saw my 120 at level 50 I was kind of sad. However, it was sadly needed for the life of the game. Next thing they did with the stat squish is improved the leveling experience by giving us a true New Player Experience. While I hoped it to be different depending on Horde or Alliance, the only real difference there is the characters you meet.
New Player Experience
The New Player experience jump starts you into the game, has some decent transmog/green items to start you off and it just straight up refreshing for players new and old. What else did they do? Well they also gave us the option to go through any Expansion (save for Vanilla sadly) and level there in that era. What’s great is by the time you are done with all the zones for the expansion you should be at Level 50. The caveat if you hit 50 before you complete the zone it will teleport you to your capital city. Luckily you can stop this by doing a Level Lock at level 49 and finish up quests you may have missed for that sweet Loremaster Achievement.
While I just talked about some major improvements on the leveling and New Player experience. It doesn’t really say what Shadowlands as an expansion has added yet. We are just getting to the meat and potatoes of this. With the PrePatch event we had learned that many of the Faction Leaders had been abducted by Sylvannas and taken to the Shadowlands. Time to go to the Afterlife!
Welcome To The Afterlife
Going to the new Expansion is very easy, hit level 48 (recommended level 50) and go to you Capitol City of Stormwind or Orgrimmar and it will pop up. After a few Great Scenes with Papa Bolvar we are whisked away with the Helm of Domination fragments and Mograine to The Maw. What is the Maw you ask? Well it’s basically where all the non-redeemable souls go, I would say it’s closer Tartarus then it is Hell. Both are pretty hardcore places to end up.
After a few, scenes and quests. you end up rescuing Jaina, Thrall, Anduin, and Baine. As you push forward through the Maw, you learn a little bit more about the Jailer the one who is pulling the strings around this place. He is clearly a bad bad guy. Eventually you get to a Lodestone and it looks like you are home free until the Jailor shows up. Anduin does that Priest Shield thing he does and buys you time to escape. Just like before you are on your own.
The Drought
Next thing you know you are in the Bustling city of Oribos, with some strange beings. If you have been playing WoW for a while then this shouldn’t be something to new to you. The guards (living or automated?) take you to their leader and to meat the Arbiter. What you end up finding out is that the Machine of Death is broken. Meanwhile, the Attendants don’t know what’s going on, so what do they do? They send you on a quest to figure things out, but not before you bring in reinforcements from the Living World.
With this you begin your initial quest through the shadowlands to one of the four lands starting with Bastion and moving on. Each of the four areas introduces you to the major players, as well as abilities for each Covenant. At 60 you will get to choose one, so make sure you look at which story and area Aesthetic fits you. While those who wish to do Dungeons, and Mythics will choose based on DPS and other factos. In the end it is all up to you for that choice.
Back to the Maw
Without the risk of spoiling the game, you return to the Maw in the Maldraxxus Story, and again in the Revendreth Story. You will meet a mysterious Broker, who tells you not to trust anyone period. Yet you should totally trust them. During the Revendreth bit you will also get your first taste of Torghast, a dungeon crawling place similar to Diablo III’s Rifts.
Now you have completed the introduction story, what now? Well you need to pick your covenant to complete your story. You will also be going further into the maw between quests for the Broker and Torghast. Something to keep in mind is the Maw has a Grand Theft Auto system. The more you do there, the more the Jailor notices you. Eventually you will not be able to heal and will take increased damage. This resets daily, and don’t worry it seems the Broker quests can be completed over several days.
What Next
As I am writing this the Covenant stories first bit have been completed and we are waiting for the first major patch Chains of Domination. This is still a great time to get into the game and begin getting your gear. and completing the story. I will say this, through the leveling process I was gripped on the edge of my seat for the story. This did not happen with Battle For Azeroth. The Last time was with Legion, which let’s be honest was amazing. Even if you don’t have a lot of time most of this stuff can be completed over just a few short hours.
End Game Stuff
- Covenant Story
- The Maw
- Professions
- Torghast
- Dungeons
- Raids
I listed out the major things to do at Level 60. This is not the end all list, however it’s a good start. Also make sure to be logging into the WoW Mobile App to collect your quest rewards from your mission table and sending out those followers.
Professions
The final thing we will talk about is the Professions. While in previous expansions it was sorta useful, but not really. In Shadowlands it has been revamped, with that you can actually level up past gear to level 50. What this does is make it relevant for using Chromie time. The other thing that makes Professions useful again is they are needed to craft the Legendary Items. Which that means you don’t have to necessarily raid to get them just do Torghast and professions.
