For a few weeks now, the alpha of Dragonflight, the upcoming expansion of World of Warcraft, has been running. MeinMMO editor Benedict Grothaus is diligently testing and often notices details that make his heart soar.
WoW has made me somewhat bitter over the last few years, though I can’t really explain why. Somehow, the wonderful world in Battle for Azeroth and Shadowlands just lost its shine. Everything felt … too serious somehow.
Sure, there were cool Easter eggs like the Witcher in Ardenwald and quirky scenes with the giant “Best Buddy” in Revendreth. Also, Flynn (or Finn in German) in BfA always had a witty remark to share.
But completely dull ideas like the quests from Kadghar in Legion, who needs EXACTLY 4.986 crystals because anything above or below would be absurd, have not stayed with me from the last expansions.
For me, the humor in the details makes the world of Warcraft, be it Easter eggs reminiscent of the Lost Vikings, appearances by porn stars and Hitler himself, or just quests like: “I TAKE candle!”
All of this has made me chuckle again and again over the years I’ve been playing WoW, and Dragonflight achieves that again. Just from my short test sessions, I’ve already thought of 3 situations that I love to recount as anecdotes.
Warning! I’m sharing some details about the content of Dragonflight here. If you want to be surprised, don’t read on. You have been warned!
The strongest Tuskarr, defeated by dinner
My first test session was together with Mary from GameStar during an event. There, I tested the new class, the Evoker, for 7 hours and checked out the Azure Span.
While questing, we came across the “strongest Tuskarr warrior,” a rare opponent marked with a star on the map. Compared to other enemies and even elite mobs, he has quite a lot of HP.
If you want to see what an Evoker looks like in action as they heat up enemies – here you see gameplay of the new class:
A big weapon, a mount, and a special name are signs for every experienced WoW player that this opponent has more to offer than others. So, we prepared with buffs and potions as best as we could. It should be a tough fight.
We thought…
In fact, we had to fight him for quite a while until he was suddenly defeated. But not by us, rather by his little son, who came by and called dad for dinner.
The mighty Tuskarr laid down his weapons, apologized and said we could continue another time. A bit dumbfounded, we watched him disappear and then amused ourselves greatly over the absurd scene.
If you’re wondering what Tuskarr are doing in Dragonflight: the 14-year-old NPCs are making a return and you can even play them – but not as a real race. The Tuskarr are more frequently encountered on the Dragon Isles and even offer boat rides:
A small note: Unfortunately, my recordings of this scene have disappeared and the area is no longer available. Therefore, I sadly can’t show you a video of it…
Permit me? Alexstrasza, Queen of Dragons. I don’t read quest texts
The second memorable scene came a bit later into the alpha. There are phases here with different content for testing. On July 26, the Awakening Coast was introduced as a new area as well as gem cutting and leatherworking as professions to try out.
By the way: Professions are getting a major overhaul with Dragonflight and even receive their own skill system. In the video, we explain how the professions work in Dragonflight:
However, what’s really exciting in the new area is that here dragon riding is learned and developed. The unique flying dragons can be customized here via a kind of forge. However, questing is required for that.
And it is exactly in the quests where a little moment arises early on that could easily be described as “sheer nonsense.” Exactly the dull humor that I love about World of Warcraft.
I’m supposed to sign the guest book of the inn to make a well-meaning dragon happy. It hasn’t happened in so long. So I can write my real name: Vaszyxia. Or…
Well, let’s just say I had some much funnier options available, both for my name and for the reason of my presence – and even the timing of my arrival. And, typically for Blizzard, there were humorous options involved.
In short: Alexstrasza, the Lifebinder, Queen of Dragons, is now a guest at the nice innkeeper. She arrived “just when she intended to” and the innkeeper can explain the reason for her presence himself. Because: “I don’t read quest texts.”
Here are the options for the quest
How did that go again? Always add water to acid?
For the third anecdote, I don’t want to use too many words, after all, I already explained in a separate article how I blew myself up. Still, I want to touch on why I find the story so remarkable.
Professions have simply not been exciting for many expansions now. Dragonflight aims to change that with a quest system, profession gear, and returning specializations. But then there are interesting and funny details as well.
As an alchemist, I need to research to learn new recipes. That’s how it should be, after all, I’m a pioneer of science! But experiments are not always safe, especially when unknown substances are involved.
The result: After some discoveries, something goes wrong and I fly into the air. I am nearly done for. Literally, I’m left with one health point. A death sentence in the open world. What one does for progress…
You can see the explosive scene here:
World of Warcraft has always had such humor in the game that is hidden somewhere in the world. You just have to find it. Personally, it seemed to me as though this humor was somewhat obscured in BfA and Shadowlands by the extremely serious stories.
I mean, we have to fix the machinery of death itself, lose the leaders of our factions (again!) and something EVEN nastier is already looming on the horizon. There’s nothing to laugh about there.
That’s why I’m pleased that Dragonflight seems to be taking a more relaxed approach to this. Of course, I want a good story, but I also would quite enjoy more of those little, funny details that I love about WoW.
That Dragonflight wants to go “back to the roots” is evident in many areas, including humor. Want another example?
WoW Dragonflight brings a world where Murlocs have won everything
