WoW – Who makes the mythical run under the Christmas tree?

On November 24, 2020, the current expansion of World of Warcraft Shadowlands will finally be released. The late launch date, originally scheduled for the end of October, not only increased the excitement of numerous pre-ordinators and fans, but also presented top raiding guilds with a special challenge in the race for world records: the holidays.

When Blizzard announced the new Shadowlands launch date, many were surprised. Most players were expecting the release a week earlier or even December 30th. The release of the first raid falls on normal and heroic difficulty levels on December 9, 2020 (EU), which pushes the release of the mythical raid on December 16 “dangerously” close to the holidays. For many veterans, memories of the first raid in WoW: Cataclysm have awakened, the release of which fell in the same time window.

EU Raid Schedule for Shadowlands Launch (Schloss Nathria)

• December 2020 – Normal and Heroic difficulty levels
• December 2020 – Mythical difficulty

There is already some information on the internet about the first Shadowlands raid “Castle Nathria” in Revendreth – the home of the Venthyr Covenant – but of course we don’t want to spoil you here. Depending on the difficulty of the various bosses, a clear can probably take more than a week. Traditionally, the first raid of a new expansion was a bit simpler, so there is room for improvement for subsequent raids in the same expansion. It remains to be seen how it looks in Shadowlands.

What is Race to World First?

The World First title race – whoever successfully completes a raid first – has a long tradition in WoW (and other MMOs) and represents a highly competitive aspect and top of PvE content as opposed to those controlled and controlled by Activision . With cash prizes featuring eSports Arena World Championship formats in PvP and Mythic Dungeon International in PvE, Race to World First (RWF) takes place among the best guilds in the community, without a direct organization from Blizzard.

Guilds that fight for the title of the first kills every time a new mythical raid is released, invest a lot of time, money and passion in preparation. Last but not least, they also rely on the community, which promotes gold for crafting materials, among other things, and players who take part in heroic divided races and give their loot to marauders. Without this support, preparation would hardly be possible. It’s not uncommon for top guild members to move from server to server to scour auction houses for bind-on-equip (BoE) items that players can use to get the last missing stat point from the their gear to get their To take the game to the next level. Because when raiding at this difficulty level, every little part has to be tweaked in the game to win the race in the end.

In order to really mix at the top, professional guild players usually need to take at least two weeks off so they can fully focus on their game. The support of a professional esports organization can help immensely, not only financially but also in the past with running the match on the spot, so that players can focus on exactly one thing: the game.

The appointment causes some sorrow

It’s all a huge effort, so it’s no wonder not everyone is looking forward to rescheduling their vacation. Due to the crown pandemic, fewer players should have a hard time explaining, as the family celebration may not take place this year. But who wants to explain to grandpa why you have to sit at your PC as uninterrupted as possible on Christmas Eve, and not just for the Christmas zoom call with the whole family to celebrate and sing, but to play World of Warcraft. What should not be forgotten is that Asian players were used to raiding during the Chinese New Year. For this region, the release date is potentially a boon this time around.

The second point of criticism from professional guilds is the following: in Race to World First, bugs often arise with raid bosses, who have escaped the quality guarantee and become noticeable only after being tested by raid guilds. In the past, Blizzard has been able to fix this very quickly with hotfixes, often through direct communication with guilds. Hopefully the race will be decided quickly (where’s the fun in that?), Or that the developers will forgo the Christmas dinner too.

Raider.io asked some members of the competitive guilds for their opinion on the release date. The common opinion is that the hope is to overcome the raid by December 24, within a week. There are very different assessments of the possibility of creating a clear in time. Many believe Blizzard still won’t make the raid too easy to “tick off” before the holidays. Siory of Complexity-Limit (USA) remembers that in the first Cataclysm raid, the development team only fixed the bugs in the new year after returning to the office. The hope is that remote work facilities strengthened by the pandemic will help this time to correct errors quickly, even if the office is still closed. BDGG’s Glade (US) also sees the nomination as a sign that Blizzard is confident that it has polished the raids enough that no one has to work during the holidays. According to Zzr from JTH (Asia) and Erxi from Alpha (Asia), the planning has virtually no effect on them this time around.

This is what Blizzard says

WoW game director Ion Hazzikostas has already commented on the critical release date rumors on Twitter: try to avoid such scheduling conflicts if possible – ideally, the expansion would appear in time for October. Since it was not possible now, this is the best possible program under the circumstances. If the start of the mythical raids were to be delayed after the holidays, that would spoil the pace of the expansion, players would have to wait weeks for the raid content after reaching level 60 and playing Shadowlands. Postponing the release of the entire expansion further to avoid the holidays would not do justice to all the fans who would have waited so patiently despite the delay.

The best progress guilds at a glance

For years, almost exclusively one guild has established itself on the square of the World First Fame sun: Method (EU). Since 2018, your streams have allowed hundreds of thousands of viewers to experience RWF up close. Before that, this long process with hundreds of attempts was hardly ever seen by outsiders. Only the video of the killing, in which the leader was found, was released. More and more guilds are now reviewing their cards and organizing Race to World First as a streaming event with moderators and analytics, providing their World of Warcraft channels and record numbers for the raid release on Twitch.

The raids of the latest expansion, Battle for Azeroth, were dominated by Method until just before the end, and even before that, world firsts were firmly in European hands, despite the time advantage U.S. guilds have at the time of release. , as the patch was finished during server maintenance Hours ago. The Americans of the Complexity-Limit Method snatched BFA’s latest raid boss N’Zoth in Ny’alotha raid just under the nose and were able to get the first World First Kill of a raid end boss from the 2012 for the United States.

Method were meanwhile in de facto dissolution after they were faced with a full-blown scandal over allegations of sexual violence (including against minors) by two members and the hypothesis that the organization’s management was aware of this. According to the official website, it looks like Method should be rebuilt under previous leadership until the end of Shadowlands, but most of the former raid squad will be under a new banner and new management as a new guild Echo compete in Shadowlands for the first world race: the first sponsors have already arrived.

Complexity limit, the conquerors of N’Zoth, have been part of the eSports Complexity Gaming organization since 2019. The guild is giving a lot of credit to this partnership for their first worldwide kill of N’Zoth earlier this year, because players they could focus on the game, as the org supported them financially and organizationally on the spot. The limits of complexity are one of the clear favorites for the next race.

Other guilds at the top of the world’s first kill rankings are the Russian guild Start is Pieces (EUROPEAN UNION). The two Chinese guilds were also very good in the race for the BFA First Kills JTH is Alpha.

It is important to watch them Big stupid gold guardians (formerly Big Dumb Guild), which announced its partnership with the eSports brand Golden Guardians of the NBA Golden State Warriors in June 2020. It will be interesting to see what support an organization can offer for a guild that was not previously among the first 5.

Does the first world race qualify as eSport?

Many players would like Blizzard to officially elevate the Race to World First in eSport, after presenting the current editions of the Arena World Championship in PvP and the Mythic Dungeon International (MDI) in other titles as well as in World of Warcraft itself. already participate in PvE. According to WoW chief Ion Hazzikostas, the chances of Blizzard taking the reins in their hands are currently low. The content of the raid is considered the maximum of the equipment and mastery of your characters, which would take a back seat under special tournament conditions.

Streaming the race through guilds puts a new focus on this highly competitive aspect of World of Warcraft’s PvE, making it much more accessible. The growing interest and involvement of eSports organizations offers corporations the opportunity to further professionalize their game. We can’t wait and look forward to an exciting race from December 9th 2020!

What do you think, who is your favorite and will compete before the Christmas and New Year holidays? Will you take a foray during the holidays? Are you interested in competitive PvE, should we go deeper into this?