The Legacy of Garrosh Hellscream (MASSIVE Spoilers for Warlords of Draenor)

The Warcraft lore fan-forum Scrolls of Lore has unearthed a shocking discovery. Forum poster Gurzog completed the quests in the newly opened Nagrand zone on the Warlords of Draenor beta. Nagrand is the final zone in Draenor, and where players will reach level 100.

Unlike past expansions simply giving players some fireworks and a letter from a lore character for hitting the level cap, Warlords of Draenor will have something much larger. Finishing the leveling quests in Draenor will reward players with an event of Wrathgate/Battle for the Undercity proportions: a quest chain referred to in the zone achievement as “The Legacy of Garrosh Hellscream”.

This questline comes across as a conclusion for the first chapter of WoD’s story, and thus has INCREDIBLY MASSIVE SPOILERS. If you choose to read on, know that you have been warned. All credit for the following images goes to Gurzog on Scrolls of Lore.

Thank you for documenting this for lore fans everywhere.

Note: Gurzog only did the Horde version of these quests, and due to how faction oriented they seem to be, it’s possible they might be significantly different Alliance side. Once the Alliance version of events have been documented, this article will be updated, or a followup article will be made if the differences are extensive enough.

Garrosh’s presence in Draenor is almost immediately felt. In Frostfire Ridge, the Iron Horde are working to recover an artifact called “the Soulgrinder” under orders of “Prophet Garrosh”. In Shadowmoon Valley, he and his father Grommash are shown forcing Ner’zhul and the Shadowmoon Clan to serve the Iron Horde, or die. It comes to a head in Nagrand, where the player arrives at the garrison outpost of Wor’var with Thrall and Aggra.

They’ve come (Aggra against Thrall’s wishes, likely as a reference to the “boy’s trip” comment made by Metzen at BlizzCon last year) to finish off Garrosh once and for all. He’s become the Warlord of the Warsong Clan while Grommash directs the Iron Horde’s operations at large. Once players have completed the other Nagrand quests (which also have some very interesting lore, but I won’t spoil everything in one article), they are given “And Just for Thrall,” telling them the time to end Garrosh has come.

Upon arrival at Grommashar, the Warsong capital, players will find a massive army composed of the Frostwolf Clan, along with the army forces from your garrison and/or Ashran ready to begin the battle.

The battle begins by breaking through the gates of Grommashar, and all chaos errupts. Horde and Frostwolf soldiers face down the Warsong clan’s army while Garrosh taunts you from his throne atop Grommashar. Eventually, the player meets up with Aggra, who suggests that they’ll split their forces. Aggra, the player, and the army will create a diversion while Durotan goes to confront Garrosh.

After helping Aggra with the Warsong forces, the player is sent to meet back with Durotan. Garrosh sends wolves to stop you, but the Sunreavers are able to contain them.

Upon reaching Durotan, the two of you must fight your way to Garrosh’s throne, which is being guarded by a familiar face for anyone who quested in Nagrand during The Burning Crusade.

Once Durn is slain, you and Durotan head to Garrosh’s throne room alone, while Aggra and the army stand guard to stop any reinforcements from arriving.

Even injured from the Siege of Orgrimmar, Garrosh manages to gain the upper hand. He is about to kill the defeated player character and Durotan when rescue comes in the form of Thrall.

To save the player and Durotan’s lives, Thrall challenges Garrosh to a mak’gora, a one-on-one duel to the death. Per ancient orcish tradition, Garrosh agrees with one condition. They will fight at the Stones of Prophecy, the very place he and Thrall first met. The Frostwolves and garrison forces finish off the remaining Warsong while Thrall and Garrosh depart. The player travels with Durotan, Draka, Khadgar, Aggra, Yrel, Rangari D’kaan and Cordana Felsong to witness the duel. Once you arrive, nothing happens with a notice that a currently unimplemented cinematic is meant to be played. What exactly happens in the cinematic isn’t hard to guess, as you can immediately see the result of Thrall and Garrosh’s duel.

Garrosh Hellscream, crushed to death by the very land he’d been so obsessed with. All that remains is to turn in the quest to Durotan.

With his chilling point that Garrosh’s death will only have incited Grommash’s further anger, it’s clear that an end has been reached, but a new chapter has just begun. The other characters can be talked to and will share their comments about what should be done next.

Yrel says that with the Warsong defeated, they should strike at nearby Highmaul to deprive the Iron Horde of their ogre allies. Durotan thinks they should attack Blackrock Foundry, before the Iron Horde has a chance to retaliate. Khadgar and Cordana will devote themselves to hunting who they see as the even greater threat to Draenor, Gul’dan. Draka admits that the idea of orcish unity the Iron Horde created is a good thing, but it must have a moral center. She pledges that the Frostwolves will be that moral center. Most interesting of all is the comment made by Rangari D’kaan:

This sentiment makes a lot of sense actually, why should the draenei trust us? Garrosh came from Azeroth and is the cause of all their present troubles, we’re fighting a war between ourselves off the coast on Ashran, Orgrim Doomhammer claimed to have visions that the Azerothians will destroy Draenor… I can’t help but feel that this might be foreshadowing something later in Warlords of Draenor‘s story. Will some of the draenei turn against the Alliance and Horde? It certainly would give us something to fight other than orcs and ogres. And so ends the tale of Garrosh Hellscream. Though its clear his death means little in the overall story to come. The Iron Horde is still a massive threat, both to Azeroth and Draenor. We can only guess what will come next.