Highlights
- World of Warcraft introduces Warbands, a new feature that connects all characters from a player's account under a unified system, addressing major annoyances when switching between alts.
- Warbands allow players to share reputations and automatically unlock transmogrification pieces across their entire Battle.net account, making farming old raids more convenient.
- The upcoming expansion, World of Warcraft: The War Within, aims to respect players' time by introducing features like dynamic flying, the Earthen allied race, and Delves as a new outdoor endgame activity. Players can expect the expansion to be released in late 2024.
World of Warcraft has announced The War Within, part one of its Worldsoul Saga, and one of its features will finally connect all characters from a player's account under a single, new, unified system called Warbands. World of Warcraft players have campaigned in favor of more alt-friendly features for a long time, and years of feedback have finally yielded Warbands, the evergreen feature coming in World of Warcraft: The War Within.
As a contrast to the era of borrowed power, Blizzard has resoundingly pivoted in the opposite direction for both Dragonflight and the Worldsoul Saga. Given the controversial reception that Shadowlands received over the course of its content cycle, it is arguably an obvious choice for Blizzard to make. On paper, Warbands are meant to provide a solution to all the major annoyances that players have had when switching from one alt to another. Given how important alts can be in World of Warcraft, this feature from The War Within may well be its most important one, at least when it comes to ensuring the game's longevity. The way the Warband system accomplishes this is simple.
World of Warcraft Teases Next 3 Expansions Making Up Worldsoul Saga Storyline
At BlizzCon, World of Warcraft reveals three new expansions, which together form the Worldsoul Saga in a multi-year storyline.
World of Warcraft Characters Share Reputation Through Warbands
Not only will World of Warcraft players finally have shared reputations across all their characters, but thanks to the Warband system, any transmogrification piece that players unlock – even if they can't equip it on their current Class – gets automatically unlocked across the entire Battle.net account for World of Warcraft Retail servers. Farming old raids in World of Warcraft has gotten even more convenient thanks to Warbands, and player reception to the feature has been nothing short of overwhelmingly positive.
As pointed out during the BlizzCon 2023 panel for The War Within, the guiding philosophy for the new expansion (and beyond) is about respecting the player's time behind the keyboard. In addition to the Warband system, features coming to World of Warcraft: The War Within include dynamic flying for all non-draconic mounts, the new Earthen allied race (available to both factions), and Delves – which will be a new outdoor endgame activity complete with Great Vault support.
It cannot be denied that World of Warcraft players are excited about the Worldsoul Saga, and having Chris Metzen on stage once again to unveil the next chapter set the tone that World of Warcraft was returning to its roots with renewed vigor. Though it remains to be seen if The War Within will stick its landing, players can expect to play the next expansion in late 2024.
World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft is an incredibly successful MMORPG that has been going strong for almost two decades. It's one of the highest-grossing franchises in history and is widely considered the most popular MMORPG ever made.
