- Author: Luxrah
- Date: December 19, 2024
- Updated: December 19, 2024
- Expansion: WoW Classic
Blizzard has been teasing some new content for Season of Discovery beyond Naxxramas, with a Scarlet Crusade theme being featured heavily but no hints as to whether it would be a new dungeon, raid, or event. With Phase 7 content now on the PTR, we may have just found our first hints of what’s to come.
A visit to Tyr’s Hand, the elite Scarlet Crusade area in the southeast corner of Eastern Plaguelands, reveals a big surprise. Not a dungeon or raid portal or a handful of new NPCs, but what appears to be an entirely new area of the map, currently blocked off by an invisible wall. If you’ve played Wrath of the Lich King and beyond, you may know exactly what lies in this part of the map later in the game: the Death Knight starting zone, the Scarlet Enclave.
That doesn’t necessarily mean we can expect to see Death Knights in Season of Discovery. It’s more likely that this will be something a bit different specifically for this version of the game, perhaps filling in this area’s story as it existed before the Death Knights descended upon it. Either way, it’s exciting to find completely new content being added to the game, especially as we near the end of the Vanilla content phases.
In the screenshots below, you can see the area where the gate has been added as it appears in different versions of the game. In WoW Classic, that area is just a solid wall. From Wrath of the Lich King on, it’s an open gate that leads to the new Scarlet Enclave area. The Season of Discovery PTR features the gate, and also has some new NPCs added with some carts. Perhaps part of whatever quest or event is planned for this area.
Attempting to pass through the gates, you’ll hit an invisible wall. If you come back as a ghost, you’ll be able to pass through the wall, but there’s not much to see. It’s just an empty and unfinished version of the Scarlet Enclave as we know it from Wrath and beyond. Acherus, the Death Knight necropolis, is nowhere to be seen, and the landscape doesn’t quite seem to line up. Whatever is planned for this area is still a work in progress. It’s also possible that the gate will eventually contain a portal for a dungeon or raid.
But, that’s where wild speculation comes in! Here’s a more modern map of the Scarlet Enclave. What could Blizzard have in mind for this area in Season of Discovery?