Learning from past mistakes, World of Warcraft has been continuously setting the bar higher for themselves to increase the transparency of what new content is coming and when so that their fans are always aware of what is next. The new year, 2024, is the most ambitious retail roadmap yet. Players will be finishing up the Dragonflight story and begin their journey deep into Azeroth through the new expansion, The War Within, through 2024. While the 2024 roadmap is big step in the right directory for retail WOW, this review will go over the pros AND cons of this roadmap.

A couple points to bring up before breaking down the roadmap month by month:

  1. Each big update (and small update) will contain class balancing. These changes are always a big deal, but no one will know what classes are getting changed and how until closer to the actual updates. Therefore, there will be very little about class balancing in this review.
  2. The 2024 WOW roadmap released by Blizzard only contains the season these updates will occur in; there are no hard dates for any of these updates so fans can only speculate.
Image from the Official Blizzard News web page.

Winter 2024 (January/February)

Being called the Seeds of Renewal (patch 10.2.5), this update will essentially wrap up the Dragonflight story as well as bring mechanics introduced by this expansion into the entire world of Azeroth. Here is what players can expect to see:

  • Dragon Isles Epilogues (i.e. quests that wrap up the Dragonflight story)
  • Reclamation of Gilneas
  • Dragonriding Worldwide
  • Follower Dungeons
  • Azerothian Archives
  • Outland Cup
  • Hearthstone Anniversary event

While items 1 and 3 are self-explanatory, the other items are not so easy to understand. The Reclamation of Gilneas is likely a PVP related event; Follower Dungeons are PVE related but could be related to Garrison missions from Warlords of Draenor; and Azerothian Archives are probably lore related quests. The other items are anyone’s guess as to what they could be.

In between patch 10.2.5 and the next major update, there will be patch 10.2.6 and The War Within Alpha. Blizzard made a point to add patch 10.2.6 into the roadmap but did not reveal anything about it. It could hold a nice surprise for WOW players.

Spring 2024 (March/April/May)

Players can expect season 4 of Dragonflight and patch 10.2.7, Dark Heart. This is the big downer update of the entire roadmap. Season 4 of Dragonflight will contain very little new content compared to the first three seasons and Dark Heart is basically just a filler patch before The War Within content starts to come in. Here is what content can be expected in each update:

Dragonflight Season 4

  • Dragonflight Raids Revisited (aka Fated raids – players can go back to the three raids they have already done in 2023 but it will be scaled to the new gear levels)
  • New PVP Season (PVP rating reset and new meta given class balancing)
  • New Mythic+ Season (M+ rating reset and potentially eight revamped dungeons from past expansions)
  • New Open World Rewards (probably new world quests)

Patch 10.2.7, Dark Heart

  • Timerunning: Pandamonium (likely timewalking Mists of Pandaria raids/dungeons/quests)
  • Harbringer Quests (lore related quests)
  • Troll & Draenei Heritage Armor (aesthetics)
  • New Holiday Event

Based on these notes, these updates are essentially recycled content scaled to current gear score. Not super exciting but if Blizzard pulls it off well, it could still be fun. Between these updates and the next big update, The War Within beta will be released and probably be on the PTR for all players to test.

Summer 2024 (June/July/August)

This is The War Within pre-patch, 11.0.1. It will tie the beginning of The War Within story into the end of Dragonflight and introduce new major in-game mechanics. Here is the overview of the pre-patch:

  • World Events (the tie in for Dragonflight and the War Within)
  • Warbands (HUGE UPDATE – achievements, items, gear, etc. can all be shared through all characters on a single WOW account. Gone are the days of starting from zero to make a new character)
  • Dynamic Flight (addition updates to Dragonriding)
  • Guild Updates (Cross-realm guilds and mythic raiding, more guild ranks, and more)

This is the best update of 2024 outside of The War Within expansion full release. The World Events should provide a lot of content and it won’t get old because Warbands will allow players to do it on multiple characters by only doing it on one. In preparation for The War Within, it will also be a great time to find a new guild or recruit for a current guild as millions of players will now be able to join.

Autumn 2024 (September/October/November/maybe December)

The War Within will be fully released during this time and a major patch of The War Within, 11.0.5, will also be released. Autumn 2024 is definitely the most exciting and content-filled season of 2024. All this will all come with a new level cap, tons of new content, and much more. Here is the overview of both updates:

The War Within Full Release

  • Campaign Story (hundreds of new quests related to the new expansion)
  • Delves (an alternative to raiding and dungeons for gearing, 1 to 5 players can do this together)
  • Hero Talents (additional talent trees based on class and specialization)
  • Earthen Allied Race (like Pandas or Dracthyr, another race to be able to play as that can be Alliance or Horde faction)
  • 4 New Zones (each zone with dozens of new quests, world quests, and lot of lore)
  • 8 New Dungeons (likely two in each of the four new zones)
  • New Raid
  • New PVP and Mythic+ Season (this will start three weeks after the initial launch of The War Within)

Patch 11.0.5

  • New Story & Quests (for The War Within expansion)
  • New Content & System Updates
  • The WOW 20th Anniversary Event (should be a HUGE event)

As new expansions usually do, these updates will bring in millions of new players to the game. With Delves, there will be more content in WOW than in any expansions release before. If you are interested in beginning to play WOW or are a returning player thinking about coming back, 2024 is the best time to join and experience all of the fun new content it has to offer.