World of Warcraft

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World of Warcraft is a Massively-Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game created by Blizzard, based on their popular series of Warcraft real-time strategy games. It's also an avatar of what Blizzard games are all about: expansions, expansions, and more expansions with only minute changes from the original game (or in underage b& terms; "DLC, DLC, DLC"). It's the most popular MMO of all time, with millions of players spread across multiple servers in multiple regional groupings and setups. The game costs US$15 a month to play and currently has a level cap of 100.

While it used to be a pain in the ass, requiring up to a year to get to level cap or $300+ to cheat and have someone play your game for you (why?), more recent changes to the game have streamlined the leveling process, made it easier to find groups for content, made it easier to obtain decent enough gear to stand a chance against other players, and slowly attempted to reduce the amount of research that must be done in order to play the game (as there was no tutorial for almost anything originally, and quite a few details one would have NO fucking clue about by themselves). While some complain that it's making the game more friendly for casuals (as an insulting term), others praise it as being able to be enjoyed by people who aren't obsessive competitors (also an insult). Oh, and now if you have a character already at end cap, you now get one free boost of any character (including a newly created one) to level 90, which will come with a set of equivalent gear and a tutorial on how to play.

The proof is in the black pudding.

With this, Blizzard makes an ECKSMETALBAWKS HUEG amount of money, just multiply 15 by the Oct 2010 number of 12 million (Jesus-Fucking-Christ) subscribers. That number doesn't include their profits from in-game vanity items and other IRL WoW merchandise and novelties AND this is just their profit for a single month. 180 megadollars multiplied by 12 months -- and now a moment of silence for the death of what is sane and right in the world. In a year, they make a little over two billion dollars off of the monthly fee alone. The sobbing you hear in the corner is Scrooge McDuck crying from pure envy.

Like Everquest before it, WoW is also a soul-sucking virtual parasite that leaves those who dedicate their lives fully to it to be no more than a mass of flesh of what once resembled a human, turning them into disfigured abominations living on instant noodles and chemical drinks and devolving them into socially retarded weeaboos living in quarters that makes shanties made in cities look like a 5-star hotel suite (without even the paint fumes emanating from miniatures to make them feel something resembling warmth on their lonely nights masturbating to greenskins).

It is often suggested that Wizards of the Coast was strongly influenced by World of Warcraft (and possibly other similar MMOs) when designing the 4th edition of Dungeons & Dragons - in particular the power-based combat system. Whether or not this is a good or bad thing depends on what you think about World of Warcraft. But most of the time, 4th is indeed viewed with abject and all-encompassing rage by most D&D veterans who do not wish to turn their once proud game of infinite possibilities into another restrictive MMORPG whore. Moving on... As one can guess, Warcraft's popularity and history have lead to it being a popular target of hate and bile, especially among it's greatest fans. Expect a fair amount of rhetoric and Skub to follow.

Game and expansions

WoW is notorious for sustaining their game with expansion packs, which really doesn't do anything but further clusterfuck the game and ruins it as it goes by, along with inducing filthy rape on lore since Blizzard is too retarded to keep things coherent which adds on lore not or loosely hinted at, sometimes coming with retcons.

Vanilla

The story of World of Warcraft begins shortly after Warcraft 3 ends, after Orgrimmar has been established as the city of the modern horde. Stormwind's king is missing, with a paladin named Bolvar Fordragon and a woman named Katrana Prestor (oldfag Warcraft fans recognize the name immediately) ruling in his stead. The game's plot didn't really build toward a single story, rather most zones were independent with quite a few questlines leading you all over the world ten times over. Each race and faction had a story, which you stumbled into rather than being yanked by an invisible collar to. Many of the biggest in scale however were actually unfinished, ending seemingly in the middle of the plot (this was because several different writing teams worked on the game, and there were inter-department communication issues).

At the start of the storytelling, the Warcraft team gave two important things to rely on for creating content; the first was to avoid typical fantasy situations that make players feel very unimportant at the start like killing rats in sewers, and the second was a general direction for the storytelling. The Horde is a bunch of outcasts and former (with some present) sinners who must build a civilization from scratch and survive, while the Alliance was a group of strongly united allies who have fallen on hard times working to retake their hard-won territory from usurpers and to rebuild what's been lost. Each starting area sets up this feel along with giving players a strong incentive to continue onwards (other than Trolls and Gnomes who shared plots with Orcs and Dwarfs for the most part respectively) and the trend continued on until they found themselves saving the world and plumbing ancient sites of antiquity. The players are members of their faction's armed forces who's quests are oftentimes taking orders from members of their faction, or allied factions. Each class had quests beyond that which gave players a sense of place in the world; Warlocks straddled the line between control and their own destruction while increasing their power via risks and generally keeping their activities secrets from the populace, Shamans connected themselves to the world and sought deeper understanding of balance, Druids fought against the enemies of nature and attuned their spirits to the wild, Warriors tested themselves against powerful enemies, and even in professions players would undertake long and perilous journeys to learn another recipe to make a robot squirrel or fry an omelet. Players actually had to finish the plotline that lead into most dungeons before they could even enter them as well. The fact that many, many plots left very little explanation as to where to go or what to do required players to actually read any and all flavor text.

The initial buildup lead the plot in two directions. In the first, the king of Stormwind was kidnapped by the the Defias bandits, and in the meantime his son and the regent were being manipulated by the dragon villain Deathwing's daughter Katrana Prestor/Onyxia who had organized his kidnapping. He later finds his way back in a comic book. The quest to rescue him on Alcaz Island is never finished, leaving players wondering why he just showed up. In the second, a third of the Dwarf race (the original inhabitants of Blackrock Mountain, which has meant Orcs since Warcraft 2) called the Dark Iron clan had started a three-way civil war over three hundred years ago and when they were losing had summoned the fire servant of the mysterious Old Gods named Ragnaros who incinerated their foes, fucked up their land until it was nothing but volcanoes and lava with animals made of fire, and turned their skin gray, hair black, and eyes red. They then worshiped him as a god. Players invade Blackrock Mountain in it's three wings, then the actual pit itself where Ragnaros regenerates himself for a war on the rest of the world. An unfinished plot point involved gaining favorship with his opposite, Neptulon of the water elementals (you gain the help in killing Ragnaros, but the politics and aftermath are ignored, even when Neptulon shows up later).

After that, Warcraft added giant corrupted dragons and Demons that randomly wander the world to kill.

Player VS Player content (other than grinding as fast as possible to the level cap of 60 and violently violating new players doing their very first quests in the game) was added, involving a capture the flag and king of the hill mode each that represented skirmishes breaking out between the Horde and Alliance (who were at an armistice after the end of Warcraft 3) in the home of the Night Elves due to Orcs building a whole fucking civilization needing more wood than their desert and prairie home provided, and a war between the Dwarves of Alterac Valley (devoid of humans since Warcraft 2) and the Frostwolf Orcs with the former having been there first and wanting to rediscover their past via archeology and the latter having settled there during Warcraft 2.

A further addition to Blackrock Mountain involved Onyxia's brother Nefarion who was in charge of the remaining Warcraft 2 Orcs in the mountain (and has sired incest babies with her due to the low numbers of the black dragons left alive). He was attempting to create a master race of dragons like his father wanted, although his methods included misunderstood blood transfusions, magical metal, and the general Frankensteining of dragon corpses.

Another battle location was added, Arathi Basin which featured battles between humans and undead from the same region over who had the rights to the farmland. It was accompanied by a new raid and plotline involving the Trolls of the jungles south of Stormwind, which were worshiping what was probably a servant of the Old Gods named Hakkar (this mention of which meant players would come to expect more Old God nonsense in each update, and be correct time and time again). Players were tasked by the most civilized race of Trolls, the Zandalar who come from an island in the ocean, to wipe out the Gurubashi tribe and the smaller tribes they'd absorbed. Hakker required blood and soul sacrifice, and his followers had taken control of the Loas (gods) of the jungle.

More Dragons and Demons were added to the game, and soon after the first event began. In Gates of Ahn'Qiraj, players fought back against the unnatural insectoid worshipers of the Old Gods called Silithid who had been invading the rest of the world via their Starcraft Zerg style of spread. Sealed away in ancient times by the Night Elves and their natural allies (plus Dragons), the Gates needed to be opened with a magic hammer which had to be forged through a fucklong questline. After the gates opened, the Horde and Alliance as well as the Druids of the world battled back the insect threat which was represented by players server-wide completing quests of gathering supplies, then handing them over to NPC's. Upon the Gates being opened, the Ruins and Temple of Ahn'Qiraj raids were added. In Ruins, players fight the leadership of the Qiraji armies including their general and spiritual leader. In Temple, players descend to kill the source of the Silithid and finally the very wounded but recovering Old God named C'thun, who consists of eyestalks and tentacles surrounding a giant eyeball that shoots lasers inside a giant black pyramid hundreds of miles below the surface of a giant black pyramid. All of the above was hinted at, very vaguely, in the expansion pack to Warcraft 3 where the undead somehow got a hold of mysterious obsidian Egyptian statues that ate magic (from the insect people's northern spider-cousins).

After that, Naxxramas was added. Furthering the plot of Warcraft 3 with the Scourge, Naxxramas was the single greatest of the flying magical pyramids/castles the Scourge use as bases. It floated above the remains of Lordaeron's kingdom, not far from the capital city, and unleashed hell on the remaining defenders both living (crazy, sane, and asshole alike) and undead. Players venture inside and kill powerful creatures representing the Scourge forces in a War quarter containing the Death Knights and skeletons, a Spider quarter, a quarter dedicated to the spread of the Blight and general ickyness, and finally a quarter dedicated to the patchwork golems called Abominations. This was followed by a giant ice dragon skeleton boss, and finally the second in command of the Scourge Kel'Thuzad (he got better, as did literally everything else).

The Dark Portal Opens event ended Vanilla Warcraft and lead into Burning Crusade, as Demons spread throughout the world and invaded a fair number of zones at random. At launch, the Dark Portal became a swirling vortex again and Burning Crusade launched.

Vanilla WoW was when WoW was still a somewhat timeless adventure game since you actually had to work like a bitch to get anywhere, and the areas were relatively good. The game was dead 'ard overall and relied a lot on raiding different long, hard, and yet still entertaining dungeons and instances as end-game content. But still, the game is extremely overrated. It had endless daily quests (not the kind of today, the kind of "daily quest" that took a large chunk of a day to complete usually by a shit load of grinding) that were not that rewarding, raids that would take hours to complete and you could consider yourself among the luckiest persons in the server if you even saw an epic item flash on your monitor regardless of whether it was for your class or not, not to mention getting that item yourself with a 40-man raid... Faster mounts were rare (yes, there was a time when mounts DID NOT SCALE YOU CHEAPSKATE!!!!) and required over a thousand gold pieces when bought together with Journeyman Riding (good luck getting that much in vanilla, that's like 100k in MoP). Whenever you wanted to enter an instance, raid, or battleground, you would have to walk there with your team you found from spamming trade chat for two hours, offering your hard-earned gold for people to come join your group. Using a ground mount. With a 60% speed increase. To a place that was on the opposite side of the continent. No, that OTHER continent. That's not even counting the world bosses, which needed to be tracked and planned for and other players could (and would) fuck up for your entire group two hours into a fight with a single giant monster. In addition to this, NPCs were mostly killable for the other faction and players derived a great deal of joy essentially stopping the questing experience for the other faction at certain levels for up to weeks at a time. Ah, the memories. Vanilla really was awesome!

Burning Crusade

BC was the first expansion of WoW and was centered around a couple of quasi-goat-alien creatures known as the "Draenei", a race of peaceful, holier-than-thou squid-faced goats who were devout to the Light but mutated whenever constantly exposed to Demon-energies. The other race was the "Blood Elves", a race of magically addicted, metro-sexual elves who crave magic like crack-whores. It also featured the Outland from Warcraft 3, which is the remnants of Draenor from Warcraft 2, which is a world of floating rock after a giant magic explosion caused by opening too many portals near each other ripped the planet apart. The game used a fair number of things from past Warcraft content, including heroes (and villains) from the RTS Warcrafts long since forgotten like Danath Trollbane and Kargath Bladefist.

When BC was released was when many players felt the loreraep came into play. BC practically abused the lore, pinned it down, had dirty BDSM-themed buttsecks with it, and threw it aside like a used glove. Draenei, previously just green humanoids that became strange mutants became "Eredar," the first race of Demons in the setting which looked like a typical depiction of Satan. Eredar were apparently not even early in the Legion's history (having not even been demons when the Legion was founded), but simply made themselves the ones in charge after joining due to being fuckstrong in magic and magiteck. Sargeras went from being a Satanic looking demon to being a fallen Titan made of molten bronze and "terrible to behold" and so forth. Draenei, the vaguely humanoid whale-faced tribal monsters from Warcraft 3, became space Jews that split from their evil cousins as a subrace of Eredar that became 90% paladins and 10% shamans that learned magic from Orcs while the original mutated ones became mindless morlock mutant versions of the Draenei. Oh, and the anti-heroes from Warcraft 3 went mustache-twirling evil to justify villains who weren't the Legion (not like you don't fight a metric fuckton of them in the expansion anyway though).

The game also become a lot more enjoyable with numerous aspects of the game revolving around points and badges, rather than raiding for gear your faction could never even use (paladin and shaman gear). Basically, re-tuned for casualfags normal people who have a life outside the game. That is, right up until you had to grind for your netherwing drake (sparkly dragons) because that shit takes months. On the good side, with the previously faction-exclusive Paladin and Shaman classes now open, you didn't have to worry about doing raids and getting Paladin/Shaman gear as a Horde/Alliance character. You also had the magnificence of Draenei horsecock booty shaking, and a simple way to track who the tryhards in the game were; they were the ones playing Barbie elves. Oh, and you could FLY. That alone was a huge deal back then.

The plot began with the two new races; Draenei, a mostly-extinct race, were attacked by Blood Elves (the ones you played back in Warcraft 3) because...reasons, and took their...one of their five magical flying crystal castles called the Exodar (okay, not a TERRIBLE idea since the same thing was used a fair amount in the 80's where Chris Metzen got stuck developmentally) in which they'd been hiding from the Orcs in since the Orcs tried to genocide them (being so successful they managed to pave a road halfway across the world two-columns wide with their bones), and flew it away. Actually, the castles belonged to the Naaru and the Draenei were hiding in a swamp, but it was theirs in the initial drafts and nothing says how they got from the swamp to the ship. As the Blood Elves slaughtered the fuck out of everyone like SS in Paris, the ship careened out of control and ended up above Azeroth. The ship continued careening across the majority of the planet until it finally crashed onto a small island off the coast of the Night Elf home. The Draenei set about finishing off the invading Blood Elves, then cleaning up the environmental effects of their ship crash (which includes riding elephants for some reason), which earned them the respect of the hippie elves and an invitation to join the Alliance despite the fact they looked like Demons and explained the fucking Burning Legion is lead by their distant cousins. Meanwhile, the Blood Elves who stayed in the ruins of Silvermoon get in contact with the Forsaken to join the Horde because they need allies to survive until the rest of their race rejoin them and bring back whatever vague "salvation" was hinted at by their prince. To sustain their racial addiction to magic, they have been suckling at the blood and energy of captive Demons while controlling the citizenry, who need to keep themselves focused at all times or they'll devolve into Elf Ghouls that chew on magic wands just to suck out the last bit of magic, with propaganda and more than a little bit of mind control when someone gets uppity. As Blood Elves have lost their connection to the Holy Light, Kael'thas had (shortly after the end of Warcraft 3, and as we find out shortly after attacking the Draenei) sent Silvermoon City a gift of a strange living being made of light named M'uru, who the Blood Elves also drained to utilize holy magic again.

The plot kind of goes on hold as new Draenei and Blood Elves go about experiencing original content as if they had been there all along (an awkwardness that would continue in each expansion), until reaching vanilla level cap (60). There, they are directed to the Dark Portal which has JUST reopened (despite quite a bit of time passing for Draenei and Blood Elf players) after it opened for some reason (a demon used an artifact to open it, but the artifact was never mentioned, instead, his minion leads a counterattack to find an unrelated sword that was never mentioned again). Demons have streamed out, so the Horde and Alliance have pushed in and rejoined their long lost kin from Warcraft 2.

You reach a continent called Hellfire Peninsula best described as the surface of Mars, but with green fire and lava everywhere. After a brief skirmish, the old Alliance and new Horde come to a ceasefire in order to deal with the Demons. Players muck about for a bit here, coming into conflict with birdmen called Arakkoa who are apparently users of shadow magic which is all the explanation you need that they're bad, kill a lot of Demons and the mutated wildlife, and probably get stepped on five or six times by the giant Demon robot that wanders the zone. The Horde learn that the natural Orc skin color is actually brown after meeting a small group of tribal isolationist Orcs, and the green skin that's always been seen so far is the result of Demonic taint which carries generation to generation. The bulk of the zone fighting is against "Fel Orcs", which you come to find out are Orcs which have suckled the blood of a very powerful Demon players beat as Illidan back in Warcraft 3 named Magtheridon to mutate even further than their green-skinned red-eyed kin into hulking brutes with red skin and spikes painfully sticking out of their bodies. The area is home to a massive fortress players assaulted back in Warcraft 2 called Hellfire Citadel, containing multiple wings (Ramparts to the fortress, a lab where they inject Orcs against their will with Demon blood, the garrison within where you kill their leader Kargath, and finally the room where the Demon is kept as a raid where you kill him once and for all).

Players are then lead to Zangarmarsh, a giant mushroom swamp hearkening back to Warcraft 2 where giant mushrooms were everywhere and you harvested them for lumber. If you had gotten sick of the colors red and green, you're in for a treat; everything is now blue and yellow for the next several weeks of your life! Players meet mushroom men called Sporeggar who look like mushroom Gnomes and are about as capable of defending themselves as the Polish. They also reconnect with the Druid organization which has for some reason decided to defend the animals of this world too. Like the last zone, the player spends most of the area killing wildlife without much progress towards the main plot other than "you were here". Horde players find that the Trolls have established a town for the purpose of hunting, and the Alliance find some Draenei who built a small town on top of one of the giant mushrooms to hide from the Orcs. The main plot involves the Naga of Warcraft 3, who have drained most of the water out of the surrounding area to make themselves a giant steam-powered underwater facility because...reasons. To control water supplies. Really. One dungeon against plant monsters within the steam machine, one against the slavers taking captive mutated Draenei, and one against the garrison of Naga leading to the raid where players kill Lady Vashj.

After that, players find themselves in Terokkar Forest. Filled with more animals to kill, and the Arakkoa make a reappearance (as well as a few friendly ones that fled from their kin, with still little to no explanation as to why either group behave the way they do). The players meet back up with the members of their faction who are actually trying to get shit done with the Blood Elves and Humans having both established towns to strike at some evil Orcs in the area. Also in the zone, two giant mostly-destroyed Draenei cities. Auchindoun being a giant Draenei mausoleum city full of their ghosts, which thanks to the mucking about of the Orcs back in Warcraft 2 was filled with Demons. A few years earlier, it had blown up for no known reason (except the sound god they summoned, but the area was there before that, so whatever) leaving a giant ash and bone strewn waste around it. Inside are four dungeons, one being fighting against insane Draenei priests and ghosts, one against...energy mummies who are interested in commerce, one against Arakkoa in which you collect relics of a mysterious god-king named "Terokk" to prevent his resurrection which would apparently be a bad thing, and finally a wing against Demons and Demon worshipers. The second Draenei city is Shattrath, which was retaken from the Orcs by Draenei not long ago. An army of Blood Elves were dispatched to take it from them, but after receiving a vision of the future their prince was leading them to they swore loyalty to the Sha'tar, the Naaru (giant angelic living runes made of pure light) who guard the city. Shattrath was the first in a long tradition of a single city where Horde and Alliance both use, with a buff preventing them from fighting each other within the city (although not preventing rude emotes). Players pick between two factions, the Blood Elf Scryers or the Draenei Aldor to grind rep with representing a political divide in the city. No matter your choice, you still work on reputation with the Lower City refugees of all races from Dwarf to Arakkoa, and the Sha'tar defenders of the city. At level cap, after learning to fly in Outland, players could access cliffs where Arakkoa have set up a city and attempt to do vague shadow magic which is a threat to Shattrath for reasons, slaughtering the fuck out of them every day and bombing their village to earn enough reputation to buy a pet, a mount, and cosmetic tabard (great life lesson).

Players then progress to Blades Edge Mountains, the dominant feature of which is giant dead Dragons impaled on giant spikes everywhere. Also, more volcanoes and some forest. The area is mostly populated by Ogres, which players discover are actually the devolved kin of giants called Gronn, the first of which was a mountain that came to life (no explanation given beyond that) named Gruul which players kill in a raid. Alliance sees their own Druid forces take an interest in the wildlife, while the Horde gets the bulk of the story as they reconnect with the lost Thunderlord Clan, which is now lead by the old Warcraft 3 favorite Rexxar. At level cap, players can access a mountain range where the minds of the Ogres have been uplifted by mysterious Apexis Crystals. Calling themselves "Ogri'la", they seek to bring the Ogre race to Nirvana. Players get involved in the action by collecting large bunches of the crystals by killing everything that moves, then either using them to bait down large monsters to kill or by playing a game of Simon on mysterious ancient devices where you get electrocuted if you fuck up. The energy mummy Ethereals are also here, because reasons.

Players then progress to Netherstorm, resembling a giant purple Hellfire Peninsula but with lightning instead of lava. Once again, you will hate the color by the time you're done. Here players take their missions either from Goblins who have established a town called Area 52 dedicated to launching rockets and having Men In Black Goblins wiping your memories periodically (if you don't take a flying mount in anyway), and Ethereals which have set up "Eco Domes" and created jungles within because reasons although players finally learn some of the backstory of the Ethereals; creatures of the void called Voidwalkers (which Warlock players use as their damage-taking pet) destroyed their home planet ages ago, and only by becoming beings of pure energy could they survive and thanks to all the magic everywhere have taken an interest in Outland. Most of the fighting (that isn't mutant animals) is against the Blood Elves of Kael'thas, which by now you have found out are up to something shadowy and against the interests of Shattrath and the Horde/Alliance. At the culmination of the zone is another set of grouped dungeons and a raid, which are the four floating crystal castles (the Exodar was the fifth in the set). One is Blood Elves with a botanical garden growing abominations with magic for reasons, the second is a giant prison for Demons and other monstrosities, and the third is a garrison full of Demons and Blood Elves. In the raid, players find that Kael'thas has separated himself from Illidan (although both are utilizing Demons and have the plan of wiping out everyone else, Kael'thas has apparently decided that Illidan's plan is stupid and has relied more on magitek to...do all of jack shit other than siding with the Burning Legion itself over Illidan and his rebellion against it). Players kill him. You may have noticed by now that most of Outland follows a pattern.

Players then hoof it to Nagrand, which by polls from Blizzard was proven to be the best zone in the entire game according to the player base. Looking mostly like Africa except with floating rocks and beams of magic in the sky, Nagrand is home to the bulk uncorrupted Orcs called the Mag'har. Thrall travels to Outland and sees how his people once lived, and while there meets a whiny little emo kid named Garrosh that players have been trying to cheer up. Thrall, after finding out Garrosh is the son of Grom Hellscream, takes him back to Azeroth and appoints the sad crying hunter boy to be a member of his cabinet. Meanwhile, the Alliance quest for a group of Draenei in a city called Telaar. The zone continues the tradition of fighting Orcs, Ogres, animals, Demons, and Ethereals on behalf of other Ethereals as apparently the GIANT diamond ship the Draenei first used to reach Draenor, the Oshu'gun, draws Voidwalkers and enterprising Ethereals like a magnet. In the center of the map is a ruined Draenei city on a hilltop surrounded by cliffs called Halaa, which Horde and Alliance fight over for...reasons.

The final zone is Shadowmoon Valley, the place where the original Orc Warlocks originated. The entire land is dark gray/black and green with molten green lava on almost every surface. Kurdran Wildhammer, the Warcraft 2 crazy Dwarf riding a gryphon, runs the Alliance garrison in the area while the Horde are a newly established site. Demons and mutated wildlife are almost the entirety of the zone, with evil Blood Elves making up the last bit. The area is full of Draenei ruins as the bulk of their race once lived there. Scryers and Aldor both have towns in the area, and fight against the Blood Elves loyal to Illidan. In the southeast, a floating rock is home to a race of Dragons which were the mutated eggs left by Deathwing in Warcraft 2 which were cleansed of their "Always Chaotic Evil" curse as well as mutated by the magic radiation bathing the land. These "Netherwing Drakes" represent the single longest grind most players would undertake, doing multiple daily quests and hunting for their eggs to return for reputation in order to earn some as mounts. In the easternmost part of the zone is the Black Temple, once the Draenei equivalent to the Vatican which was taken over by Orc Warlocks when the genocides began and has since become the single most evil place anyone could visit, with the golden crystals turning black from pure evilness. Here Illidan has made his palace, and has given fully into insanity. Players undergo a long quest chain, starting with Akama and Maiev Shadowsong from Warcraft 3, and ending in gaining access to the temple via a broken hole in the courtyard where players slip in while the Sha'tar and a Naaru bolstered by both Aldor and Scryter battle the endless waves of Demons as a distraction. Beginning in the sewers, players slaughter their way through the remaining Naga, then wipe out the command of the remaining Fel Orcs from behind, and make their way into the temple where the kill the reborn Teron Gorefiend as well as a harem full of succubi and inebriated Blood Elves, finally working their way up to Illidan himself where players kill him. Logically, this would be the end of the expansion; all of the main villains dead, every single plot thread explored and finished.

Blizzard then released one addition; a zone existing north of Silvermoon was added, Sunwell Plateau consisting of an island full of Blood Elf buildings plus the building containing the Sunwell. The Blood Elves of Kael'thas regrouped and attacked the Well, slaughtering all of their player-faction Blood Elf kin they met and stole M'uru along the way. Here they seek to summon Kil'jeaden into the world through the Well, effectively fucking over Azeroth in it's entirety; all in a bid to save the Blood Elves loyal to him from what he sees as inevitability (full-retard reliant storytelling). The Aldor and Scryers finally unite into one faction, the Shattered Sun Offensive, and fight to take back the Sunwell. Each day players would complete daily quests, and each contributed towards an unlock point where players would take more and more of the city, eventually pushing the Demons back to the Sunwell itself. A dungeon on the island contained more Demons and Blood Elves, the final boss of which was none other than the partially undead Kael'Thas himself. After his defeat (whereupon he apparently used magic to trick players into thinking they'd CUT OFF HIS FUCKING HEAD AND PRESENTED IT TO THE SHA'TAR) he wound up with magical crystals embedded in his body, keeping him barely alive. Players kill him again, permanently this time, then move onto the raid. After fighting your way through a metric fuckload of Demons and Blood Elves, players come to the Sunwell room proper. The plot that follows is completely reliant on a Warcraft manga that had wrapped up not long before, where the Sunwell energy had formed into a human girl named Anveena with amnesia who fell in love with the crown prince of the Blue Dragons Kalecgos. Players fight M'uru, who was drained so much of his magic that he reversed polarity and became a being of pure darkness instead of light. Upon entering the Sunwell chamber, players find Anveena suspended in midair. Kil'jeaden claws his way through the portal and his upper half fights the players (one can't help but imagine his army on the other side of the portal watching his legs flop about as he fights) before they defeat him and he is pulled back through the Sunwell. The girl sacrifices herself to once again become the Sunwell, which is purified by the leader of the Draenei Velen and the leader of the Blood Elf Blood Knight Paladins Lady Liadrin by adding what remains of M'uru to it, making it both a source of holy and magical magic (arcane is the generalized unflavored magic of the setting). Thanks to being bathed in magic once again, the Blood Elves no longer drink from Demons and the Demonic taint is burned from them thanks to the holy magic of the Sunwell (although they keep the green eyes, as apparently that's permanent). Both races kiss and make up, then none of this is ever mentioned again except in one quest chain for a fucking magic sword later that just kind of goes "yeah, that happened" as Blizzard mainly focuses on the new groups before reverting back to Orcs and Humans being the main characters of the setting.

Of course, there was a side diversion where in the old Warcraft world the "Caverns of Time" was opened in which players were sent by the Bronze Dragonflight (guardians of time) to go back in time to important events in disguise and prevent shadowy mysterious Dragons from mucking up time. Thrall's initial escape from the Humans, Me'divh opening the Dark Portal, and finally the big climactic Warcraft 3 battle where the Night Elves, Alliance, and Horde fight the Burning Legion.

Maiev Shadowsong becomes free again in the aftermath of the expansion and appears to have schizophrenia as she spends half her time teamkilling and half her time thinking about teamkilling.

The plot continues in a comicbook series (western this time, although really REALLY shitty) when the king of Stormwind named Varian Wyrnn came back and acted like a whiny little bitch causing there to be tension between the two factions when they had already done everything except SIGN a fucking treaty (A trade agreement consisting of lumber and food from the alliance for ore and exotic goods from the horde specifically. It's seriously that fucking simple apparently to have world peace). In the time between Nagrand and this, Garrosh has completely abandoned his weepy persona and has instead become a roid-rage dick who spends half his time openly criticizing his leader in front of foreign dignitaries, who he greets by telling them they are inferior to Orcs. Despite this Thrall just shrugs his behavior off.

In another post-expansion patch, the giant tower of Medivh (guy who kickstarted the entire plot of Warcraft off) which exists as a giant mindfuck of magic temporal anomalies and undeath was added to the game as a raid. Inside players fight ghosts, Demons, Ethereals, and numerous other things before reaching the top of the tower which instead of leading to the top of the tower leads to the fucking asteroid void of evil where the Burning Legion makes their home. Yikes. Hints existed that like Castlevania, there was a second inverse tower which players could bug their way into (usually exploring a bit before receiving a big fat ban for breaking the rules) although it was never implemented.

The expansion ended with a leadin event to Wrath of the Lich King (which was covered in the comics as well) where the giant floating pyramids of death used by the undead appear outside of racial capitals and spew undead (as well as a zombie plague that affected players). Eventually, the king of Stormwing rides a gryphon and crashes the one outside his city while Thrall (pissed his duel for leadership of the Horde with the uppity Garrosh was interrupted) simply throws the Doomhammer at it causing it to blow up. Both factions remember who the main villain of the setting has been built up to be. The Alliance sends Bolvar Fordragon, the regent in charge of the city while Wrynn was away that players remember fondly for being the guy to turn in those fuckhard dailies to in vanilla while for some reason Thrall appoints Garrosh to a position of authority over the Horde forces (alongside the Horde's Bolvar equivalent, Varok Saurfang). Que Wrath.

Wrath of the Lich King

WotLK was the second expansion of WoW and centered around the North po....I mean Northrend, tons of undead gubbins, Norse mythology, and Death Knights.

Follows the main plot of Warcraft 3 when the Scourge, sick of the Legion and random fucking jungles in the middle of nowhere getting all the attention, attacks both Stormwind and Orgrimmar by releasing another undead plague and using giant flying castles (which in the comics are killed by one fucking gryphon, and Thrall getting pissed and throwing a hammer at it). Both factions then remember who the main bad dude of Warcraft is (With the Burning Legion dead or MIA, Arthas) and invade Northrend. But along the way, a new fuckwad son of Grom that Thrall met in Outland was promoted to a fucking command post, and he immediately attacked the Alliance which at that point was pretty on board with the horde.

Then, after players manage to get everything important done FOR the entire armies of their faction (which consists of 70% humans/orcs and 29% dwarfs and trolls, barring the occasional gnome/tauren while Sylvanas brings in a few Forsaken to try and settle her vendetta with Arthas and a few Blood Elves try to restore an ancestral sword of theirs; sadly the draenei and night elves pretty much sit in the corner and hum quietly) the main two leaders of the horde and alliance forces (the son of a very important and popular horde character, Varok Saurfang, and good old Bolvar Fordragon) call a truce and try to take the Lich King on themselves. This goes about as well as one would expect, with Arthas curbstomping Saurfang JR without much buildup then making it clear he's about to kill the shit out of two whole armies for lulz. Then a group of Forsaken attack both sides, teamkilling everyone. Wrynn throws a hissy fit and attacks the Undercity while Thrall is told by Sylvanas "Yeah, we did a lot of evil shit you told us not to do and it's biting us in the ass, we need halp plox ty". Wrynn sees the massively fucked up shit that the Forsaken have been doing, and declares war on the Horde while Thrall stands there wondering why his faction is so fucked up.

Then come a subplot that eats up about six months of player's lives where you find out that Titans created Dwarfs and Gnomes, and viking giants named vrykul who are the ancestors to humans, as robots to help them keep the natural races of the world (mostly trolls, plus a group that mutated and became the first elves; night elves) in line. Then Cthulu monsters (which before were just some minor thing not really important to the plot) made them fleshy for reasons and the robots forgot their entire purpose and started having sex and building castles instead. Then you kill another Old God made of mouths and tentacles, this one being responsible for apparently most of the bad shit that's happened in the world. Here's where most fans agree the lore rape really starts to pop in as a result.

Then another detour where you help establish a jousting tournament right outside the Lich King's castle. Yeah. That goes about as well as you'd expect.

Then, you finally help the Death Knights and Paladins of the world kill the Lich King...nah, not really. Turns out he was baiting you along the whole time trying to lure the best and brightest in the world directly to his doorstep to make a new generation of Death Knights capable of fucking EVERYTHING. Oh, but then Tirion Fordring (a character important to a vanilla Warcraft questline, and had two books involving him from the Warcraft 2 era) gets empowered by the light, goes all 'DEUS EX MACHINA!' and breaks Frostmourne. The newly-freed spirits rebel and weaken him to the point that the players (or Tirion) can deal a finishing blow. Or, well, at least for to deal the final blow. Arthas's father forgives him for killing him, then he dies. Meanwhile, MASSIVE amounts of undead that apparently Arthas was holding back on using for reasons are still around for no reason. Your friend and mine Bolvar Fordragon, charred to a crisp and barely alive/undead, puts the helmet on and condemns himself to a personal hell of keeping those undead from doing anything forever.

Players then fuck off back home, with the Death Knights keeping vigil in case Lich King Bolvar turns evil. However, expanded lore stated that Lich King Arthas' body and the pieces of Frostmourne mysteriously went missing, along with the phylactery of his right-hand Lich/Husbando, Kel'Thuzad... in a plot thread that Blizzard has left hanging.

Wrath continued the badge/point system introduced in TBC, and was actually one of, if not the, best expansions for fixing many of the problems in Burning Crusade (primarily HUGE amounts of grinding and availability of gear). Yeah, that's pretty much it.

The expansion was notable for doing something not seen before in an MMO where it would have the main villain appear through the main story to make it look like the player was making progress in defeating him prior to the final raid against him. While this worked in most players eyes, it also pretty well de-fanged the Lich King as a threat since all his appearances had him getting driven off or defeated and just shrugging instead of vaporizing you on the spot (something he does to his own minions literally standing RIGHT next to you for the price of failure), sometimes because of him being uncharacteristically dumb, and supposedly this was all part of some master plan to use the heroes that fight him the raid as new champions, even though the plan involved sacrificing a bunch of powerful minions he already had that could have killed the heroes if he sent them all after them at once. Then again, since undeath is his M.O, after reanimating the heroes as his new champions he could've brought back those powerful minions the heroes killed as well. Afterall, he apparently does bring back an old dungeon boss as a raid boss so it's clearly something he can do.

Whatever.

Cataclysm (Otherwise Known as TRYING TO BE "World of Warcraft 2")

Cataclysm is the third expansion of WoW and centered around the revival of a brood of EEEEEEVVVIL dragons known as the Black Dragonflight the return of the black dragons' big daddy: Deathwing; a business SO FUCKING serious that said returning tore the Vanilla continents apart... Or at least that was the excuse to revamp the "Old World" and try to make questing easier, and update the plot so you aren't reliving everything from vanilla Warcraft every new character.

The main plot of this expansion was that the Twilight Cult, who appeared in every expansion as some crazy cultist fucks worshiping the Old Gods, have finished healing another very important villain from Azeroth's past (for all the information about him, and his defeat, refer to an external novel; seriously, Warcraft by this point had made a habit of making the gameplay more in-game, while driving the setup for in-game plot into novels and comics). Deathwing then fucked up magnets in the Elemental Plane of Earth pissing off the main earth elemental Therazane, brought back Ragonoros from the Elemental Plane of Fire to fuck the world for lulz, and involved the Naga in their bid to take over the Elemental Plane of Water from Neptulon, the poppa water elemental. Also the Elemental Plane of Air guy Al'akir was there for some reason. He never really got much plot.

Players then drag their ass all over the world again, from the bottom of the sea to ancient Egypt populated by cat-taurs (not even joking), many of whom turned evil because they want to be robots (again, not making this up). You visit Mount Hyjal (meaning Blizzard finally remembered the Night Elves, as Hyjal's on their turf and Ragarnos popped up there with plans to turn the World Tree into kindling), which is awesome, then visit the Twilight Highlands, which is even MORE awesome since it brought the Wildhammer Dwarfs (crazy CRAZY shirtless gryphon riders) and Dragonmaw Clan (crazy CRAZY grey-skinned dragon riding Orcs) into the game.

You fight a shit ton of elemental monsters, Twilight Cultists, Lovecraftian beasts, and dragons leading up to Deathwing himself. Also, a detour (which is fine for once since it involves Trolls, and Warcraft Trolls are awesome ties into an ongoing plot for once).

Thrall gives up Warchief-hood, but becomes an even bigger Mary Sue in the process by becoming the savior of the world. He decides to put that fuckhead son of Grom, Garrosh, in charge for reasons (apparently it's because the horde is mostly full of jackass racist Orcs, and Garrosh was the only non-old Orc he trusted). Garrosh proceeds to turn the end of the world into one giant war against the Alliance where he begins somewhat noble and wanting more land for Orcs (though said land belongs to the Night Elves), and quickly goes into baby-eating insane when he imposes martial law, going from "get more land for orcs" to "kill all Night Elves".

The game also brought two new races into the game. Worgen, werewolves that are humans half the time and speak in a Cockney accent, and Goblins (long demanded by fans), who push that even further and have essentially a toxic wastedump of a racial home covered in neon signs, rockets, cars and giant robots everywhere. Surprisingly, this isn't lore rape so much as it is a complete sidetrip into comedy (it was still considered one of the best parts of the expansion by fans however, with MANY angry that the Worgen and Goblin plots, like the Draenei and Blood Elves before them, simply stop in favor of more Human/Orc bullshit).

In the end, you kill Deathwing and severely cripple another Old God. The Dragon Aspects relinquish their demigod powers to mortals, with Thrall becoming the new Aspect of Earth. He also gets married and becomes a father. Yay, that was sure important.

Now all that said, Deathwing does manage to be the threat the Lich King should have been. His appearances have the NPCs of note trying all failing to kill him throughout the story and prior to the patch that introduced the raid where you kill him, he would randomly show up in the sky and autokill everything in an entire region of the world in flames.

Thanks to all of the revamping (removing one-sided hills and broken textures in areas players weren't meant to go) you could finally fly in the vanilla Warcraft world, something players had wanted since Burning Crusade.

It made the game more challenging (until the dreaded patch 4.2.0, which took the game's difficulty straight to hell, hell being piss-easy and brainless grind tailored for mouthbreathers. Remember gearscore? THAT'S the kind of retardedness I am talking about...and I don't want to even mention patch 4.3.0... patch 4.2.0 which broke down the barriers keeping players who spend all day on the game from reaching the level of players who do not by steamlining class mechanics and implementing the ability to simply que for dungeons rather than actually have to find a group for them). Excellent expansion for the MOST casual of players, whose mindset is simple enough to withstand mindless grinding in the same six TWO instances day after day for months, doing the same daily quests over and over, watching those same bots in the auction house cut out your auctions over and over without Blizzard ever responding to your reports, and playing those two new battlegrounds to the point of madness...

Unfortunately, as great as some of the newer features were, Blizzard ran into a BIG snag; by spending the time of the devs working only on the revamped vanilla, they only ended up with a small amount of endgame content which reused assets as much as possible along with a big update-less gap where players simply continued the same course of action (same few dungeons and dailies) for months. Many players disliked the new plots, and wanted to replay the content they knew and loved. Furthermore, playing a new character and feeling like a new part of the world was great until level 55 where they suddenly went back in time to Outland, and back in time to Northrend at level 75. Many fans consider Cataclysm as the worst expansion as a result not of actual mistakes, but of dropping the ball on content so badly.

Mists of Pandaria

The fourth expansion for WoW, one that is widely regarded as the best thing to happen to it in...well, ever. Turned the game slightly less easy and ensured the complete death of Star Wars: The Old Republic and Warhammer Online], leading to even more rage from nerds and neckbeard hipsters who hated the popular thing. The continent of Pandaria was surrounded by mists for ages, which just decided to part a few months after Deathwing was killed. This place is full of drunken, happy, jumpy, fat-arse panda people, which are a playable race consequently leading to every goddamn furry who plays to spend $25 to race change on release so they can stare at a fat jiggly arse while their character engages in the horrid ritual of Caramelldansen. Alongside these disgusting creatures live some magic fish people (who are re-skinned Wood... Night Elves, and plot-wise are the evolved form of those annoying fish monsters that have been raping your corpse since your first day playing vanilla Warcraft), talking monkeys that are obsessed with feces, rabbits who have replaced those annoying fish monsters in the exact same role that like carrots but not turnips for some reason, Lizardme.. err..."Sarlok"-I mean "SAUROK"-who kill and torture shit for fun, some race of all-male statue dudes called Mogu that like to torture pandas because they're ANOTHER RACE OF TITAN ROBOTS who are gigantic douchebags because they were supposed to be Robocops but lost the plot and became ED-209s, some unimaginative AZN style dragons, and yet another Tauren reskin.

While the whole thing was certainly more interesting than it sounded, with the storylines actually bringing players in to a degree not seen since vanilla Warcraft, many players were left pining for high resolution models that Blizzard teased would come (as the face of the Pandaren female had as many polygons and moving parts as the entire Human model did).

While in Pandaria you find out that the place has an infestation of these Sha monsters which appear as black and white smoky-tar skeletons, which manifest in negative emotions. Stub your toe and next thing you know a bunch of black and white crawly bitches will be flying out of you and ripping up your shit. You find out quickly that they are the mortal remains of the only Old God that was ever killed prior to vanilla Warcraft, and kill each of the papa emotions (pride, fear, anger, doubt, hatred, despite, and violence) which results in mostly having finished off the still-living corpse of Y'Shaarj. The Horde and Alliance are at full out war by the end, and you the player are manipulated by the last surviving black dragon (who Blizzard flat out said is meant to be morally gray and neutral, and something of a mob boss personality. Way to let your players figure shit out of their own Blizzard). Garrosh finally flips his shit, consuming the heart of an Old God and fucking up a huge amount of Pandaria just to be a prick. The Horde revolts against him, with the Alliance joining along as an ally of the freedom fighters. You massacre a very large chunk of the Orc population (which has massacred a large chunk of the rest of the Orcs) before defeating Garrosh himself. Vol'jin, the old fan favorite Horde leader, is appointed the new Warchief while the Alliance (who's king had a huge chunk of plot development to become not as much of an asshole at the cost of good ol'Jaina Proudmoore flipping her shit and damn near starting an anti-Orc KKK while Night Elf military leader Tyrande Whisperwind somehow forgets her thousands of years of military experience to zerg rush an orc-held temple) finally suggests peace between the two factions again. Of course we know that won't last, since they forgot that old lumber for tiger pelt agreement they had way the fuck back when.

Wrathion is FURIOUS, as he wanted the Alliance to crush the Horde then admit it's leaderless races into it's ranks to become one faction. He flies off, saying he will be more direct next time. Then players get sidetracked to visit an island that exists outside time to...fuck around. Kill shit, get loot. Like Valhalla kind of.

The plot continues in a book (you were doing SO good there Blizzard...) in which the Horde and Alliance try Garrosh for war crimes (despite the fact that more redeemable villains, such as Nazgrim, were killed for less). Garrosh is then given a time amulet you the player helped forge on the Timeless Island by a dragon who likes experimenting with time magic because reasons. He uses it to go back in time, and sideways into an alternate universe, where he prevents the Orc race (specifically his own father) from joining the demons prior to Warcraft 1. He gives them modern blueprints for warmachines used by Goblins along with techniques for modern armor and firearms, then after a few years uses the amulet to connect the Dark Portal to our present day Azeroth where the Iron Horde (the Warcraft 1 Horde, but with advanced technology and no demon worship) attacks seeking to conquer all timelines and universes for...reasons. Fuck, what a mess, and after such a good expansion too...

Since both the Horde and Alliance want Pandaria to be theirs, negative emotions are hardly a rarity, which leads to most of the expansion where you aren't fighting back the giant insects of tigers of the Vietnamese national forest being fights against big black and white crawly bitches popping up everywhere along the way or possessing other races to fight you. The first area in the continent has a reasonably nice storyline about said war but that only lasts for the first level, and then you'll just be killing bugs and picking up carrots until level 90 (this is actually fucking fun though, as the immersion and plot threads were well-done). You are also expected to listen to one shitty and mediocre cool and relaxing Chinese restaurant backround track set at different pitches for every new area until you crave Asian food and by the end of the expansion plump up until you LOOK like a Pandaren. Blizzard seems to think this is amazing and endlessly makes forum posts titled something like "You have your in-game music turned OFF?!?!". But still, Blizzard really saved the entire franchise with this game after the retardness that was post-4.2.0 Cataclysm.

The game implemented new systems everywhere, from new "for fun" items found all over the fucking place to hidden items which give you a few paragraphs of storyline info to Pokemon-style minigames involving cosmetic pets (not making this up). Most players find themselves giving up on being an adventurer, and retire for months on end to farm like it's Harvest Moon (again, not kidding). So many changes were made to the game it's hard to even list them, most of which were positive. Content (as in, the story) can now be experienced by even the most casual while the REAL challenge (and cosmetic rewards) still exists for hardcore gamers. But thanks to the ease by which players can simply que for content (including role-less, short three-man dungeons) players are now socially interacting at a minimum, seeing the game as mostly single player with multiplayer cooperation needed to attain their own goals. Players don't even fight over loot anymore, as you are automatically awarded something only you get (usually gold). In addition, Pandaria's plot was never fully clear; the Sha are bad, but you more or less stumble on them and kill them as they appear. Obviously the Horde/Alliance conflict is important, but it's only even mentioned every other update with one being exclusively dedicated to it. In addition, the Pandaren themselves, while adorable mixed with kickass, flit between condescending about their fully neutral attitudes and entirely reliant on you to wipe their asses for them.

Warlords of Draenor (Otherwise Known as "World of Warcraft 2")

After a clusterfuck of a lead-in, Blizzard rolled out the 2014 Warlords of Draenor. The expansion is mostly noteable in it's massive increase in visual quality for the game, and the fact Horde and Alliance have separate storylines for the bulk of the questing. Side-stories are also tied directly into most player quests, so players aren't left wondering why they put off their orders of destabilizing the Lich King to participate in jousting or forgetting they've been ordered to the frontlines against the other faction in favor of growing turnips a mountain range over.

The lead-in event brought players to the Blasted Lands where the Dark Portal had been closed off from Outland and was rippling with new magic. The portal had been reconnected to parts unknown, and out of it charged Orcs with brown skin (meaning 100% free from any past Demonic taint in them or their parents, a rarity among all known Orc populations barring a small number in Outland) bearing weapons forged from unknown metal and utilizing advanced warmachines. They struck fast and hard, taking over outposts as well as making a beeline for Blackrock Mountain. The Horde and Alliance, now formally at truce, quickly determine these mysterious Orcs are being lead by Garrosh. Khadgar, the expert on all things pre-Warcraft 3, determines the portal now leads to an alternate timeline Draenor. The Horde and Alliance pick a team of heroes (mostly representing players) lead by the big name characters Thrall, Maraad, Khadgar, Vereesa, Baine, and others including YOUR character who is in charge of the entire expedition. Specialists are also brought, who become the subordinates of the player. After fighting your way to the other side of the portal, you find the Iron Horde has near limitless reinforcements. You quickly shut down the Dark Portal by freeing the evil warlocks (same old faces from Cho'gall, Gul'dan, and pre-Death Knight Gorefiend) who were being used as living batteries to power it.

After taking massive casualties, the bulk of the player stand-in NPC's are left to make a final stand so everyone with a useful skill or action figure can escape into the jungles. After making your way through you encounter each of the Warlords of Draenor and fuck up their plans. Alliance players along the way meet Yrel, described by Blizzard as "Draenei Joan of Arc" whom you eventually use as your second in command after several shared experiences as well as a Draenei Exarch (governor paladin) who brings you into meet and become an ally of the undestroyed Draenei race, while Horde players save Drek'thar's past self and he brings you in as savior to the Frostwolf clan as it faces extinction.

After blowing up the Dark Portal structure and ensuring the Iron Horde cannot invade Azeroth without going through you, Horde and Alliance go their separate ways via commandeered battleships (as this Draenor has oceans rather than outer space between it's continents). The Alliance sail to Shadowmoon Valley, a deep foresty place bathed in both holy and void magic due to the presence of many Naaru as well as one fallen Naaru in a stationary place in the sky over the area who causes it to always appear to be nigh. Shadowmoon is where the bulk of the Draenei race are settled and as a result much of the early questing involves proving the Alliance is not only trustworthy, but the only ones who can defeat the Iron Horde. After accomplishing this they supply your growing army, and you establish a garrison (which grows with the player until it's a fortress with a castle). Before long you encounter Ner'zhul, who split his clan along a faction that swears loyalty to the Alliance (yes, delicious chocolate Orcs in the Alliance) and his own clan which looks to void magic through the fallen Naaru to destroy not only the Horde and Alliance, but the Iron Horde as well to ensure his people's safety forever. He tries to accomplish this by sacrificing the souls of the bulk of the Shadowmoon Orc ancestors, and his own to take control of the Naaru before the Velen of the past sacrifices himself to cleanse the fallen Naaru after deputizing Yrel as a Vindicator (minor paladin). The player, their army, and that newly reborn Naaru travel to Karabor (the past version of the Dark Temple, before being taken over by Orc Warlocks and becoming Dark) where the bulk of the Iron Horde's navy destroys itself trying to take it.

The Horde travel to Frostfire Ridge, the half-volcanic half-tundra home of the Frostwolf clan. Thrall meets his alternate parents, although he keeps his identity a secret (at one point Drek'thar compliments himself by saying that Thrall's teacher did his job well).

Both factions then progress to Gorgrond, the past version of the Blade's Edge Mountains and Netherstorm. Gorgrond is essentially if Australia and Vietnam had a baby which was raised by Mount Doom, being a place of savage jungle complete with treemen worshiping GIANT treemen who want to mulch all intelligent life and in possession of very potent mind control fungus, the a large chunk of the Ogre (and almost all of their derivatives, the Tarrasque-level Gronn and the chubby Xenomorph Gronnlings) race, and finally the Blackrock Clan of Orcs. After establishing an outpost (or two) and pushing back the wild, players mount an attack on the Blackrocks and damage their infrastructure enough that their ability to replenish the rest of the Iron Horde is greatly diminished. Horde players ally themselves with the old Laughing Skull clan, which has experienced a change of leadership as a result of the attacks from the Iron Horde after their refusal to join. Alliance players find the Dark Iron Dwarfs are not only allies of the Alliance, but active members of it as they do the bulk of the non-Draenei heavy-lifting in the zone.

Players then travel to Taledor, part of the past version of Terokkar Forest. Here, players fight to repel Iron Horde invaders that have besieged Shattrath (which players sadly cannot enter and use as a city) while an alternate Burning Legion summoned by Gul'dan lay siege to past Auchindoun (the massive burial complex and afterlife waiting room for the Draenei) for the purpose of eating Draenei souls. Most Draenei towns and cities have been destroyed by one faction of villains or the other, and players find themselves with a fair number of friendly Draenei refugees (yep, Horde gets Draenei now). At the culmination of the zone story, the Horde and Alliance big name character regroup and lead an attack on the Iron Horde spearpoint force, fighting their way through to Blackhand's own battleship. The past version of Orgrim Doomhammer realizes that Blackhand will only lead the (Iron) Horde to ruin and challenges him for leadership of the Horde (just like in the original timeline). This time however, he faced a Blackhand armed with magical Truesteel armor and was killed. He is immediately engaged by Yrel, Maraad, and Thrall's father Durotan while the players and the other big names take a battleship nearby. The player is teleported to the main battleship, where Blackhand defeats everyone present (and kills Maraad) before grabbing Yrel and giving a monologue before snapping her neck. She throws her weapon to Durotan, who attacks Blackhand from behind allowing the characters to be teleported to the second ship which blows up Blackhand's. The Horde and Alliance reaffirm their truce. A subplot in the zone involves the player helping Arakkoa refugees, who in Burning Crusade were Tzeentchian Dark Crystal Skeksis you slaughtered wholesale because of a vaguely described plot involving them using shadow magic and dark powers which was a threat to Burning Crusade Shattrath. The Arakkoa form you've seen since then is a devolved state due to a curse, and you see in Warlords that the uncorrupted Arakkoa use the curse as a means of weeding out undesirables in their society which gives them an excuse to commit genocide on them periodically.

Players are then sent to the Spires of Arak, making up the other half of old Terokkar Forest (and more). Players enter the zone by walking along a path with refugees they saved in Taledor, and upon reaching a ridge where a visible ornate city/nest sits on a mountain spire in the distance, a laser shoots from it burning away a large section of the forest in a literal localized exterminatus. The refugees flee to the city, where you meet a scholarly Arakkoa named Reshad along with his Kaliri (owl-things the Arakkoa use as companions you used to slaughter literally in hundreds in Burning Crusade) named Percy. Shortly after meeting him, the city is attacked by uncorrupted Arakkoa, slaughtering every defenseless civilian they can find. Until the player steps out of Reshad's hut, and reverses the situation (as well as finding relics of Terokk, old quest items tied to an instance in Burning Crusade). The zone questing continues along these lines, helping the corrupted Arakkoa and fighting the uncorrupted Arakkoa who seek to wipe them out. Many of the terms vaguely given in the old expansion, as well as characters who served only as boss fights, are fully elaborated on and the Arakkoa mythology and history is told.

Originally the race had three deities; Sethekk (the name given to the undefined birdy evils in BC), Rukhmar (new term), and Anzu (old BC secret boss that Druids had to kill to earn the ability to turn into a bird who also later dropped a mount version of himself). Rukhmar was a sun-loving giant Arakkoa, Anzu was the god of giant ravens that only roosted in the dark, and Sethekk was a being of evil and misery caught between both where he was chilled by the dark and burned by the light. Sethekk one day chose to kill Rukhmar, and enlisted Anzu's aid; Anzu instead informed Rukhmar and fought with her to defeat Sethekk. To stop the spread of Sethekk's dying curse, Anzu ate his body leaving him only a giant skeleton surrounded by cursed pools of his blood. Rukhmar then created the Arakkoa race players have been fighting based on a similar race on an unknown continent to the west which harnessed the power of giant crystals called Apexis (another old term from Burning Crusade that meant nothing until now) to run their great technology including giant robots (because it's fucking Warcraft, of course it has giant robots somewhere). The newborn Arakkoa fought constantly with most other races. At one point, the greatest king of the Arakkoa named Terokk lead his people into a golden age but his subordinates grew jealous and threw him into the cursed pools of blood near Sethekk's body. There, he lost the sun-blessed powers he once possessed and crawled through the muck trying to think straight with his addled mind. The rest of his followers were thrown in, and the council flew back to their nest-cities to lead the remaining Arakkoa into a decadent lifestyle which abandoned the knowledge of the Apexis. Upon finding the broken body of his daughter within one of the pools, Terokk surrendered to the curse of Sethekk. Anzu, observing the fall and abandonment of the greatest of his sister's followers, took pity and blessed them with clarity and shadow magic to replace their lost faculties and holy magic (seems dark/light is a theme of the expansion) while those too damaged to ever be sane again where taken by his wife Ka'alu to live among the giant ravens who were their mortal devotees. Terokk lead his people to establish nests on the ground, far from the eyes of their uncorrupted kin before losing his mind many years later and becoming the aspect that the player would one day fight against the resurrection of in the original timeline.

But in this new altered timeline, the player saves the refugees and gathers them into an army. After summoning Anzu and Ka'alu, players recover the artifacts of Terokk and by both reliving his life and at the same time forcing him into reliving yours, his spirit is cleansed. Together he and the player deal a crippling blow to the assassin forces of the Kargath Bladefist (one of the Warlords). Terokk, having lost the bulk of his remaining power, appoints the player as leader of his people. You then lead the ravens and corrupt Arakkoa to conquer two cities of the uncorrupted Arakkoa and destroy the giant sun lasers they use to burn the cities of the corrupted Arakkoa, invading the final city and putting the thread of Rukhmar's people down for good. You also establish a town for your faction, and save a town full of Goblins from their own fuckups. Tying back to the major plot, the groups you saved (Arakkoa and Goblins) now aid your faction. Players also find that the Alliance town established by their own quest-giver Admiral Taylor has been destroyed by Necromancers in service to the Cult of the Damned (yes, they apparently still exist). He joins the players as a follower posthumously (in the end, you wind up with a total of three ghosts wandering your garrison saluting you).

In the final zone available at launch, Nagrand (which largely resembles the original albeit without floating rocks and bands of evil light in the sky) players establish a final outpost. Players find the original Alliance town of the zone, Telaar, destroyed by the past Warsong clan who are intent on destroying every race and clan not their own and taking Draenor and all other lands for themselves. After stopping a plot to use the Oshu'gun (giant crystal spaceship the Draenei first used to reach Draenor) to summon Demons via void magic (as if you didn't know that was coming), calming the elements of the zone, destroying the leadership and the bulk of the Burning Blade clan of samurai Orcs before finally breaking their spirit by taking out their greatest champions in single combat (barring their new female leader who swears she will be the one to kill you), saving the souls of the Orcish ancestor spirits of the Warsong, and finally participating in gladiatorial arenas (the first because the prize money will aid your garrison, the second because the Ogres once had an empire here which they are trying to rebuild and it teaches the dumber clans not to rejoin out of fear of having their shit slapped by you personally) you reach the zone finale. Your faction gathers a fuckhuge army and assaults the Warsong clan base, wiping out most of the resistance and taking Garrosh prisoner. Garrosh and Thrall challenge each other to finish the duel to the death they started immediately before Wrath. After a beating back and forth, Garrosh hulks out and claims that only a warrior can lead the Orcs to their rightful place as masters of all creation. Thrall responds "fuck you, mono-faction development settings are shit!" and causes a giant fist to rise out of the ground to hold him in place while he's electrocuted by a massive lightning strike from the sky. The Horde and Alliance big name characters once again meet and affirm "yep, we're still working together in a friendly way" before deciding their next moves. To prove Garrosh really is dead, his corpse is actually left in-game within the giant stone fist only feet away.

The expansion changed quite a bit of the game's dynamic by focusing all professions on items that can only be made once per day, giving players access to NPC's who can craft the minor recipes of any other profession whether the player has it or not, and giving players renewable sources of raw crafting materials which made gear much more accessible to the community and ensured the players who have no life aren't as much above the players who do. The focus on a garrison with a fair number of different options as they are built added a choice and specialization dynamic to characters outside their fighting style. The most drastic gameplay changes were the addition of a "toybox" which converts old "for fun" effect items into spells rather than something to carry, a readjustment of stats in the game to reduce the numbers of some stats (which were approaching and surpassing millions) down into three digits without causing an effect on the actual PLAYING (so the simplification was to make gear easier to understand) which came with retooling abilities across the board. Each class was given more survival abilities while healers were nerfed to the point of having to choose when to heal rather than just spamming healing at all timies. Players were given new storage spaces for crafting materials of all kinds in their bank and items were made to stack in bunches of 200 rather than 20. Garrisons replaced any centralized city players would use, and gave the player a heightened sense of importance in the world. Rare spawns were retooled greatly, respawning quite often and being a somewhat expected part of the playing experience.

Oh, and flying mounts cannot be used in Draenor to promote exploration to find hidden treasures and quests rather than flying from point A to point B. Player reaction was mixed greatly.

Perhaps the most popular part of the new expansion, players received high resolution models, where player faces have a look and can emote rather than being a painted face on a flat model with flapping lips resembling a rhombus. Cut scenes make up a large part of the game's storytelling, with models which can actually make facial expressions like a Steam Film Maker model.

Playable factions and races

In WoW, you have the option of siding with either the Alliance or Horde. Since Blizzard ultimately wants to sever every last kind of social interaction between players, you cannot roll another character for the opposing faction on PvP servers and the two factions cannot communicate with each other, ensuring that you cannot make friends on the other side and exploit the social function of the game (note that this ONLY applies to PvP servers; as achievements are account wide now, and you can easily enable yourself for PvP for a limited time, you can easily take advantage and get a high level character on one side, boost on the other side, and take advantage of your friends on both sides to get achievements for all your characters).

Alliance

The Alliance are portrayed as the "more-civilized-than-thou" faction in the game. They've got similar flaws to the Horde's, they just cover it up (Mary Sue leader; check, disagreements over integrating new factions; check, committing war crimes; to a lesser degree than the Horde but still. They get castles/tree-forts and all other things. Races include:

Humans

Since we're playing an MMORPG, the squishy 'oomies can't be absent. Since humes are always the Mary Sue, their racial powers are overbalanced. They include: instant escape from any root effect (making them almost unstoppable in PvP, though the REAL benefit of that comes from a freed up gear slot), a +10% bonus for reputation gains (and the end-game is ALL about reputation grinding), and being better at using swords and maces than non-humans (in a sword-and-sorcery game, where axes are usually just as good and usually more common. Also, several non-humans have been around longer, so have been using axes, swords and maces for longer than humans have existed). and instead of worshiping Half-dead Guy that sits above toilet. As far as it's known, humanity worships a semi-conscious entity comprised of collective will called the Holy Light(which may or may not be a photon based being called a Na'aru).

Ironforge Dorfs

The half of the good-guy dwarfs. They like shooting with guns and hitting stuff with hammers. Ohh and they also have large noses, greedy sneers on their faces, and the passive ability to find treasure(not anymore, now it gives bonus to...acquiring relics), which always ends up with jokes pertaining to a certain religious minority group.

Night Elves

Purple-skinned elves. Essentially, their storyline is humorously based off the Elfdar but instead of hedonism, they delved in magic and accidentally attracted an army of demons called the Burning Legion to Azeroth, who nearly wiped out all life on the planet, and were only stopped when the well that was source of magic was destroyed, which blew up a continent. The ones who clusterfucked the NE race by going rampant with magic became the Naga (a serpentine-humanoid hybrid), another group of said magic addicts but a little more sensitive became the High/Blood Elves and the conservative, druid became the Wood el...I mean Night Elves. In game, 80% of them are rogues hunters and 90% of that population will have names that are related to ninja-themed animu and/or nite, bladez, nitebladez etc.

Notably, back during Warcraft III's story they were depicted as a faction that in its own right was an equal in numbers and power to the Alliance or the Horde. Like a lot of other things, and moreso than most, they got de-fanged in WOW and depicted as a pretty insignificant race, who for the most part get used a punching bag for new threats, due to having story-breaking power and that the Night Elves would otherwise be running the Alliance instead of the humans, and the anthropocentric people of Blizzard Entertainment can't have that(on a side note it could be explained by being fucked up by the invasion of both Archimonde and Grom, but that didn't seem to hurt the humans, who got fucked pretty badly by the Scourge and Legion as well).

Gnomes

Like dorfs, but shorter and more agile. Look like toddlers and sound like 8-year old kids. Pedophile jokes ensue. Even Blizzard Game Masters joke about them in-game. This is a true story. They're Alliance's resident Tech-heads, oftwn tending towards Weird Science-esque inventions like shrink rays, death rays, mind control helmets, robot ostrich mounts, and spider tanks which you never get to use. Blizzard is notorious for sweeping Gnomes under the rug, leaving them with next to no lore or culture besides standing in the shadow of other Alliances races, metaphorically and literally. Blizzard has recently attempted and failed to make a bit more gnome lore involving the scuba-crew of Gnome troopers trying to retake Gnomeregan from the ebil clutches of the RADIATION TYRANT that has been killed multiple times in lore, once in a canon short story and untold billions of times by players. He's still alive in lore and being used as an excuse for blizzard to do absolutely nothing to help with taking their joke race seriously. Gnomes aren't as populous as Goblins, but are smarter (according to what little lore they have that Blizzard ignores) and tend to kill themselves with their own inventions 90% less.

Draenei

Squid-faced, holier-than-thou hippie goats....IIIIINNN SPPPAAAACE!

One should note that neckbeards get ROCK HARD over Draenei women, and would give up all of their dice and their favorite 40k army to fuck one. Often said to possess massive horse cocks, but these rumors tend to originate from /d/.

Worgen

Cockney werewolves. While the image of Michael Caine transforming into a dire wolf sounds awesome, it's more along the lines of Dick Van Dyke's chim-en-ney sweep with some fur glued on. Though their racial ability is called "flay," which is weird for one of the 'good' races. It should be noted as well ideas of furry fun with any of the female Worgen will get you send straight to the nearest high level dungeon by yourself with no party support.

The Horde

Despite what some people believe, there is no evil playable faction (it was revealed the Orcs weren't all evil in Warcraft III). The Horde is in some ways as good or bad as the racist and oppressive Alliance. The exceptions are Garrosh and the elements of the Horde loyal to him for no good reason. The Horde is portrayed less sympathetically than the Alliance for three reasons; 1) Garrosh 2) Sylvanas 3) The Alliance has a human faction and the Horde doesn't.

Orcs

Shamanistic warriors who live in the city of Orgrimmar and who, unlike 40k Orkz, are not entirely made for fighting and winning actually use their brains (almost never), and as well they have females, which means they can reproduce by methods other than scratching their asses. Basically all that "Storm, Earth, and Fire" shit combined with "Victory or Death"- mentality. They tend live in grimdark black metal buildings with red lighting. Famous for building their capital's front gate for over two years now, but FINALLY completed it. To break with the mold of most fantasy settings they are not outright evil like other orks but morally grey like humans. Yes you may pick yourself up from the floor spasming like that at the shock of the idea.

Tauren

Minotaurs that were getting beat up by centaurs until the Orcs took them on as a welfare case. Basically HUEG beastly, American-Indian (plains speficially) bulls who walk on two legs. Roll one as a warrior and watch the rage mild annoyance as you use your racial stun and have 5% more health than anyone else. They used to be pretty badass in Warcraft III, but like the other Horde races who aren't orcs, they're pretty insignificant now and spend most of their time acting like idiots.

Forsaken Undead

They're zombies who regained their free will from Arthas' mental grip on them, and now rally to kill him for vengeance great justice. Basically independent from the Horde, but since Blizzard decided Horde needed a scary race so the kids would stay at the Noblebright Alliance side, they were included as a playable race. Have a boner for Chemical weapons, building bizarre monsters out of multiple bodyparts and, after Tirion wtfpwned Arthas, have been trying to conquer the entire Eastern Kingdoms. Basically half way there, as their plot armor is mythical. But hey, maybe the Alliance can go live on the islands like they do in Kalimdor? No islands near the Eastern Kingdoms? Well, fuck you too Blizzard. Also have a racial power called Will of the Forsaken which works the same way as the Humans' Every Man for Himsel-(COWARDICE!!!! THIS IS HERESY!!!!!), in other words removing any charms/stuns. They also get the hilarious "Cannibalize" racial, which they eat a human or undead corpse for a massive self heal, and it's recommended that you reserve it for your friends' corpses, or, if you revived close by, your own.

Trolls

No, no, not the internet kind, the mythical trolls. Compared with the usual variety, these guys are more comparable to orcs in the setting, except they're skinnier and come in a variety of colors depending on where they're from. The guys are ugly as fuck with canines bigger than their own heads, but the girl models are just humies with remarkably bigger and hotter booties and petite tusks. They're all exaggerated Rastafarian/Jamaican/Haitian, who can regenerate as fast as you HIT THEM WITH YOUR SWORD cold molasses going uphill. As with the Draenei, most of /tg/ would sell their house, their mother, and themselves just for the chance to fuck a female male troll. They're voiced by Steve Motherfucking Blum. Also, female trolls are fucking horny, as their /flirt dialogue implies. Troll hunters get pet DINOSAWRS.

Also worth noting is that back in the Warcraft II days, they got portrayed a bit sympathetically despite the Horde being straight up bad guys.

Blood Elves

As already mentioned, N.Elves are snob Eldar and the BEs are prick Dark Eldar. They had a culture-wide addiction to arcane magic, and overused it enough to cause an Eye of Terror opening up in the ocean. They don't have a degenerate god reminding them their souls are forfeit, but they do have did have an abused angel in the basement they'd molest for their paladin powers. All BElves are still addicted to arcane magic, and their racial power is to mana-drain the target for a little "pick-me-up." They originally sided with the Alliance, but because a certain Alliance dick named Garithos who wanted to kill them because he was a racist piece of shit, BE ragequit and sided with Illidan. They kept to themselves, until the Lich King tore up the white picket fence keeping everyone else out, and they allied with the Forsaken to repel the invasion, later joining the Horde with them.

BElves are pale-skinned pansies who looks more like humans than wood elves. If you meet a female BElf in the game, there's actually a 50/50 chance the player is a girl, because the other races are "too icky," and BElf girls look exactly like the fucked-up self-image that women's magazines are pushing on teenage girls. Most of the noobs in Horde are BElfs. One third of all BElves are paladins because they used to be the only Horde race that can be paladins, and noobs think palliess are easy-mode. Nearly every BElf's name will be based off some animu or LoTR. And EVERYONE (/tg/) would sell their 40K armies, their WoW account, their house, their friends, their family, themselves and their children just for the slightest chance to fuck a female Belf. Update: now they can have facial hair; woo, progress. And their leader is awesome while not being a mary sue, further progress.

Goblins

Imagine dwarfs, but green, slightly shorter, and 200% more Jewish stereotype than usual(since Blizzard fed up with Goblin archetype being portrayed as Barbaric species, so they ends up portrays Warcraft Goblins in that way to makes them seem like the mob had a baby with Jersey shore.). Goblins are one of the most technologically-advanced races in the setting, next to gnomes (introduced as counterparts), although most of their tech is built for war, as that's their main market because of the Alliance's and Horde's running conflict. Goblins, however, aren't the most mentally stable of individuals, so their tech has this slight propensity to explode into a burning wreck on occasion. They're basically a fluffy hybrid of Skaven, Grots, and Ork Mekboys all rolled into one, crazy package that is nether the less still more stable then it's component parts.

Pandaren

Introduced in the Mists of Pandaria were the Pandaren who unique get a choice on if they want to be Alliance or Hoard. The Pandaren's fill the role of being a far east analogy, (as if being Pandas was not obvious enough). Despite looking like a literal furrys dream race, the Pandaren are not that bad, to be sure if your going to make a man bear, Pandas (since they already have a quasi thumb) are not a bad place start, though they were likely chosen to drive in the duel nature of Pandaren philosophy by literally being black and white.Pandarens have two Philosophies, one the focus doing not waiting, and the other that focus on meditation and training. In practice this means one Alliance philosophy and one Horde.

Classes

Just like almost every other RPG (except Eve Online), you must choose a career when you create a character. The distinction is minor, since people in your raids and pick-up groups don't give a shit about fluff; the only classes that matter are "tank," "ranged-dps," "melee-dps" and "healz." Old players complain that patches homogenize classes in these roles when the patches claim to bring "balance to the force." Each of the following classes have a choice of "talents" to specialize as they level up, but most everyone takes only what "maximizes damage output" which is why it's fucking hard to find a non-retarded tank or healer for your pick-up groups. The Lich King expansion brought multiple talent specializations, so your healer might actually have healing talents. The Panda expansion made talent selection simpler, so raid leaders won't scrutinize you to make sure you spent each of your 20 talent points in exactly the prescribed manner.

As of patch 5.1.0: This patch basically saw the destruction of PvP, and this time, it is really more than just a ltp-issue. For the first time in WoW history, rogues are now completely and utterly ruined as are retribution paladins, while mages and Priests continue their march of victory. Many classes have had their PvP survivability reduced to almost zero, as PvP power no longer affects both healing and damage on hybrid classes. Melee classes are an exceptionally funny joke, and tend to just sit on the edge of the BG watching mages and hunters have all the fun. Occasionally a paladin passes bubblegum to everyone, and the meleee classes sigh and think back how they used to own. Occasionally a monk or a death knight comes along to laugh at them. The shaman is nowhere to be found not just from the BG, but from Azeroth itself. Others suspect he has retreated back to his ancestors, and will return when he can actually heal or Dps properly. Others suspect they are still around like tauren rogues, but have ascended to a higher form of existence. The druid just stays silent and hopes no one will notice how he owns. Mages and Shadow priests are just bashing the keyboard as usual.

Warrior

You're generally okay in DPS and good in tanking. You also run on rage. (No seriously, they even have a "rage counter" in-place of mana) to generate most of special attacks, which you gain as you take damage and/or attacking someone.) You can stun-lock people to death with your OP abilities, especially if you roll a Tauren. Troll spell-casters and especially Paladins by rolling for spell-damage gear and saying "I can use it, can't I?" during raids. Survivability is a little questionable in PvP, but with good heals you will have little to worry about.

Paladin

You can tank better than a warrior and your DPS is generally middling. Can't hold two-weapons at the same time, but who gives a shit about that, considering you are a motherfucking holy warrior of The Light (something that's so vaguely described that it's even brought up in universe that almost nobody knows what it exactly is) with fiery wings on your back all the while you are tossing hammers made of light and judging your enemies with magic doing tons of damage. Imagine an Imperial Preacher on steroids and buffed up by the power of the Empra.

Death Knight

Now the DK is what you get if you combined the Paladin and Warrior. A lulzy combination of spell-spamming and melee-skill spamming, all the while having damage that would put the two classes to shame, the only difference is that you can only heal yourself. You can now also tank without using shields. A Blood DK in PvP is the definition of broken. IT WON'T DIE! BWAAA! *runs into a corner to cry.* A Frost DK is a grimdark, kinda tragic character whose whole body is covered by rime and ice, and who can freeze his blood to become immovable and harder to kill. Frost DKs are surrounded by a swirling blizzard that freezes solid anything it touches. But that talent is available only at lvl 90. An Unholy DK is the master of death and decay. Imagine a Plague Marine with magic. Has rotten unholy minions and dons an armor full of aggressive little insects that attack nearby enemies on sight. Also rots the ground beneath it.

Hunter

Schizophrenic ranged DPS that combines physical durability, role flexibility, and strength. Oh yeah, you also get a pet. Troll Rogues, Shamans, Druids, Warriors, and Paladins in raids by rolling for their epic DPS gear and saying yelling "It's hunter gear noob", even though you could have had better performance by rolling for two-handed DPS gear. (While this WAS an amazing troll tactic, as of MoP, hunters can no longer wield melee weapons.) Hunters are all over the DPS charts with every single patch (hence "schizophrenic"), but they still demand a certain amount of experience to be played correctly. Mediocre in PvP (At best, you're only doing fire support), excellent in raids. Compare to a rogue, who is the king of the world in PvP but sucks ass in raids, no matter your spec or gear. More like a crippled hunter if anything else. A hunter can literally beat rogues at absolutely anything while scratching his balls, plus can do it more efficiently. Besides that, hunters are pretty much built to fuck up rogues and use them as pipecleaners. If you're a troll you get a DINOSAWR.

Rogue

2nd most overused class (second to the hunter, but as of 5.3 the second least played class). You get to cloak, you wear dark-colored leather gear, you ambush opponents, you get to use poisons, and go mad fast with attacks. Basically, they're D&D Rogues. Rogues are quite demanding class to play as of 5.1.0, as Blizzard's idea of balancing/buffing classes to be equal against each other involves either buffing them so high they bitch slap god himself or then stomping their face to the dirt with the power of a buffalo herd, the latter being the fate of rogues. They are strong against other players, but in a prolonged fight a rogue's best option is to retreat back into the shadows (to turn invisible) and wait until their prey shows a weakness, only to strike again to finish them off as their survivability is so shit that they die from one auto attack. Possibly even when you unsheath your weapon if all of their three-minute CDs are up. But fear not, my fellow rogues. Patch 5.2.0 seems to give them a fuckhuge boost to their DMG, if not that ill-famous survivability. They get extra treasure thanks to lockboxes that only they and characters with the engineering profession can open.

Druid

You're a hippie who gets to morph into different aspects to suit your spec; either into a cat for Feral DPS, an owlbear for balanced spellcasting, a bear for tanking, and a walking tree-like thing for healing, something like a Grot equivalent to the Ent from LoTR. Basically, the Paladin version of rogues, but you can only play with either the Indian Cows or Wood El...I mean Night Elves. Blizzard later gave the druid class to the Worgen because they were halfway there anyway and the Alliance needed another druid race and also to the trolls Horde-side because why the fuck not? Is the only class to have four talent specializations: one for feral DPS, one for tanking in bear form, one for healing as a tree of life, and one for balanced spellcasting as a Moonkin. Play a druid if you want to be able to do everything, but not very well (except healing... Jesus, 'dem HoTs).

Shaman

You're a close-combat spellcaster who can go melee using badass totems and firetongue weapons to empower you (Which is the only way for shamans to get any real damage done), heal using natural powers such as water or earth or use lightning and fire elemental attacks to attack players at range. The Shaman is kind of a jack-of-all-trades type, it can double for DPS, RDPS, and heals, but they can't really outperform any other class that excel in those departments, even if they are completely specced and geared for it, and are mostly relegated to support duties in both PvP and PvE.

Though, your transmogrification gear looks awesome (to some people). The Shaman has been one of the (if not the) weakest classes since mid-Cataclysm.

Priest

The least played and most demanding class of all, owing to the fact that, well, healer classes in general take a while to enjoy since they only start to get fun during the end-game. This problem is solved by leveling in instances, however. You're really just expected to heal in raids, don't bother to spec for DPS although that can also turn out to be awesome. As a DPS you are a badass shadow of your true self, and you cast spells which cause severe pain and slowly eat away the life of your enemy. As a healer you are either a divine saint with an angelic form and auras of light, or a disciplined spellcaster who protects his allies with barriers and shields of holy magic. A lulzy character to fight when using melee classes, as it heals itself so much you will in the end just turn around and say "AAAAH, forget it!". The best healer in game, but BEWARE if you are playing for the first time. Also noted for being wtf-rage levels inducing in PvP when played as DPS, thanks to the multiple spells that allow for complete damage tanking. Yes, that is a cloth-wearing priest, and yes there are five people hitting it. No, it won't die. Ever. EVER. Also, do not ever. Ever. Ever roll a discipline priest, unless you want to get instantly kicked from PUG raids and instances, and wish to have everyone including (and especially) the enemy laugh at you during battlegrounds. That moment when you realize a Retribution paladin has healed himself more than you have healed the entire team...

Mage

Has the ability to negate stuns, enhance their armor with skills, and be an overall bitch to anyone that really needs to get close to them to do damage, but casting silence spells on them will ensure hilarity as mages are usually just bashing the keyboard while surfing porn, so they usually won't even notice they haven't been able to cast for the last ten seconds. As a Frost mage you get a water elemental, and some additional shields to use against damage. As a fire mage you are a pyromaniac who sets things on fire and burns entire sections of land with area of effect spells. Finally, an Arcane mage specializes in the pure essence of magic and can teleport, cast cosmic powers on their enemy, or slow them to death.

Warlock

Like the mage, but is fully optimized to nuke the shit of whatever it's giving a mean look with AoE and DoT spells. Also slows like there is no tomorrow. Is a satanic, twisted character who calls forth demons and nightmarish creatures to battle his enemies. Warlocks have a bad reputation in-universe since they use the magic of the demons, said demons who have been trying to destroy all life on Azeroth and have are responsible in some shape or form for nearly everything bad in the setting, even if the warlocks themselves aren't evil. Uses damage over time spells, rips their enemies' souls away, or calls freaking meteors from the sky upon them. Their minions helps in this task however: in the Fireball-spamming flavor of the Imp, the Tanking and self-healing of the Voidwalker, the crowd control(Read: Bitching) of the Sucubbus or the mana-OMNOMNOMNOMing of the Felhunter (a demon doggy). You can also summon both an Infernal and a Doomguard for extra rape, but in the event you fail to enslave them upon summoning, things may go bad for you and everyone in your general area.TL;DR The Heresy class.

Monk

A new class introduced in Mists of Pandaria, Monks embody the spirit of tranquility, harmony, and drunkenness (seriously, their tank is called a "brewmaster"). In game terms, monks are the foremost class for the Pandaren race, as they invented the fighting style thousands of years ago to fight their oppressors with any means possible, be it fists or farm implements. Every race but Worgens and Goblins can be monks. They use Chi as an energy source and tend to be wiser-than-thou dicks in-game. Generally one of the stronger classes, but not to the lulzy levels the other expac class (DKs) tend to be.

See Also

• Pauldrons
• Warcraft

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