World of Warcraft Patch 8.1 Livestream Transcript

NEW RAID: SIEGE OF ZULDAZAR

Ion: Now aside from new stuff, we also have traditional mainstays of World content. And so, Tides of Vengeance is also going to be bringing a new large raid zone to World of Warcraft. Now this is quite different from any raid we’ve done before. This is the Raid: Siege of Zuldazar… name not necessarily final, but location definitely final.

Historically, in World of Warcraft, the way the big bad villain is expressed is often as a raid boss. Right? Whether it’s Burning Crusade: facing Illidan in the Black Temple; or a Wrath of the Lich King… you eventually ascend Icecrown Citadel, and you fight the Lich King himself… that’s the ultimate expression of combat against a foe.

Well, here if the foe is the opposite faction, many players have rightly noticed: “Hey, we’ve been spending a lot of time fighting the forces of G’huun. What about the Alliance? What about the Horde?”

Well, that’s all about to change, because the enemy in this raid is the opposite faction; and what that means is: a bit of a unique take on what a raid can be in World of Warcraft.

We actually have two completely separate experiences, whether you are Alliance, whether you are horde. So the story here, some slight spoilers (but this will all be datamined soon enough)… so one of the big things that the Alliance war campaign (the war effort) is building towards is this strike. A first strike. A pre-emptive attack on the Zandalari fleet (on the city of Zuldazar) to cripple the new Horde alliance, and make sure the Alliance maintains the upper hand.

And so all of the events are leading to this. And so you as an alliance player will join Jaina, join the Alliance forces, land in the harbor of Zuldazar, fight your way through the city up into the pyramid… (including a new inside of the pyramid that we haven’t seen before), eventually ascending to the top to confront King Rastakhan.

Meanwhile, Horde players learning that the Alliance is attacking their city will rush to its defense beginning on the far northern side of the pyramid and the jungles of Zuldazar, as they fight through the pyramid, fight through Alliance attackers.

And for them, the events around Rastakhan are actually as the midway point, and the rest of the Horde raid is them actually fighting back down towards the harbor through Alliance forces fighting different bosses… the remains of the Alliance attack; and eventually, culminating in a battle against Alliance commanders including Jaina herself on the high seas.

So two separate six-boss experiences.

Now after that, we also want to give players a chance to see the other side of the story. So once you’ve finished this raid in its entirety, you’ll return to what remains of Zuldazar, or if you are Alliance, you will return to Boralus where you will learn from Scouts (from soldiers) who are on the frontlines what happened in your absence. As a Horde player… what did the Alliance do before we got there?

And through the vehicle of them retelling the story, you’ll be able to experience the three bosses on the other faction’s side that you didn’t get to witness firsthand.

So what that means is: whether you are Horde, whether you are Alliance… you’ll have a total of 9 boss encounters as you go through this raid, and this is telling the story, the very real conflict in the Horde and Alliance in a way that we’ve never done before.

We’ve had the occasional faction champions-type fight, or really even in Siege of Orgrimmar it was both factions sieging Orgrimmar, because they had a common enemy in Garrosh. Very, very different story here.

NEXT: NEW RAID: CRUCIBLE OF STORMS

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