I’ve wrapped up my two primary areas of interest in the latest World of Warcraft expansion (delves and main story), and have been reflecting on the expansion overall. After a rough year, I’ve thrown myself back into World of Warcraft, which has provided a comforting escape. This is a game I’ve been playing off and on since beta over 21 years ago, and this may be my favorite era of the game.
I’ll start with the previous expansion. Dragonflight was charming, polished, and enjoyable throughout, but as a primarily solo player, I didn’t get a whole lot out of it. The story was good, but the highlight of the expansion for me was dragonriding, which thankfully carried over to The War Within.
There’s a lot going on in TWW’s story and not all of it clicked for me, but the core conflict between Xal’atath and Alleria has been a highlight of Blizzard’s storytelling. As part of a trilogy of expansions, I initially struggled to find the through line among seemingly disparate story beats, but by the time I wrapped up the final major story patch, I was immensely satisfied, and excited for the next expansion, Midnight.
One of the best parts of TWW’s storytelling is that it gives all players an opportunity to experience it, regardless of their play style. Aside from when I pop over to WoW Classic, I’m generally a solo player these days. I’ve done my share of both PUGs and the guild life in my 21 years with the game, but without any IRL friends playing anymore and a new level of apprehension regarding strangers online, I generally keep to myself. Blizzard seems to recognize that a significant portion of their playerbase has grown up and is now providing more solo content than ever before. NPC companions in dungeons and even a major raid allowed me to see the type of content that I had previously avoided in recent expansions. But the highlight for me has easily been delves.
These mini-dungeons not only provide scaling difficulty, but give solo players a proper endgame. Delves can be completed with a group, or your NPC companion (who levels up beside you). After wrapping up each major story beat, I found myself sucked into the “bountiful delve” gameplay loop of weekly content. I’m currently soloing tier 9 delves, and plan to continue for as long as possible. Not only are delves satisfying in the sense that I feel like I’m always making progress, but I feel my skill increasing as well. These are my favorite solo content ever in WoW and I’m so glad they are continuing into Midnight.
I would be content with delves through March, but then Blizzard went and introduced another endgame: housing.
Not only does housing include the robust neighborhood and construction systems, but also a new profession / gathering metagame. In order to get materials needed for decor, you need to either travel to previous expansion locations to gather, or pay exorbitant prices on the auction house. This creates a great opportunity to revisit old content, and to potentially make some money in the process.
I don’t want this post to just be a “list of new features,” but I can’t overstate how literally game-changing the single-button assist has been. While WoW has gotten more complex over the years, my eyesight, processing, and keyboard dexterity has gotten worse. This feature levels the playing field and makes the game even more accessible. There are inherent penalties which keep it from being viable for content at the game’s skill ceiling, but that’s obviously not me, so it’s not a problem.
While nothing will ever recapture the feelings I had playing WoW 20+ years ago, I’m grateful the game has grown up alongside me. The War Within has been exactly the right expansion at the right time in my life, and if this approach continues, it will ensure that I continue to be invested in the game for years to come.
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