Battle for Azeroth

Battle for Azeroth was the seventh expansion of World of Warcraft. Blizzard revealed it at BlizzCon on 3 November 2017, and it went live on August 13/14, 2018. It was the first expansion to open at the same moment in the Americas, Europe, Taiwan, Korea and Australia/New Zealand, and it sold more than 3.4 million copies on its first day, a record for the game at that time.

After the Burning Legion was beaten in Legion, the trust between the Alliance and Horde broke down and the old war started again. Magni Bronzebeard could not convince the faction leaders that the wounded world needed saving, so he turned to the players, who received a gift from the titan of Azeroth herself. A War Campaign storyline for each faction runs through the questing zones.

The expansion added two island lands. Kul Tiras is a human island nation in the Great Sea, west of the Eastern Kingdoms, famous for its navy; the Alliance came to win its fleet. Zandalar is an island in the South Seas and the homeland of the Zandalari trolls, which the Horde courted as a new ally. Each faction leveled in its own land and reached the other side's zones at level 120 through world quests and emissaries. Zone scaling let players do the zones in any order.

The old world changed too: Teldrassil burned and the Undercity fell in phased versions of the zones, Arathi Highlands and Darkshore became Warfront areas at max level, and patch 8.3.0 brought N'Zoth assaults to Uldum and the Vale of Eternal Blossoms.

Battle for Azeroth introduced Allied Races: new playable races that start at level 20. The pre-order, opened on 30 January 2018, unlocked the first four. The rest came at launch or in later patches.

• Heart of Azeroth: a necklace powered by Azerite, which also feeds the new Azerite armor.
• War Mode: a PvP switch that replaced separate PvE and PvP realms. Turning it on gives the Enlisted buff and adds bounty hunting and air drops.
• Island Expeditions: 3-player scenarios on unmapped islands, played against AI rivals or enemy players. 11 islands rotate, 3 per week.
• Warfronts: a 20-player PvE mode with two battles, Stromgarde and Darkshore; Heroic difficulty came later.
• Level cap raised to 120, plus a second squish of stats and item level.
• PvP: three new arenas (Hook Point, Mugambala, The Robodrome) and a reworked Honor talent system.
• The First Aid profession was removed; its bandages moved to Tailoring and its anti-venoms to Alchemy. Communities and, in 8.2.0, mount equipment were added.

Launch Dungeons and Instances: Freehold, Atal'Dazar, Tol Dagor, Waycrest Manor, Shrine of the Storm, Siege of Boralus, Temple of Sethraliss, The Underrot, Kings' Rest and The MOTHERLODE!!. Operation: Mechagon followed in patch 8.2.0.

The next chapter, Shadowlands, followed in November 2020.