Today was a day with significantly fewer big reveals - instead, panels focused on behind-the-scenes information to give us more insight on how things are made, what's up next for some IPs, and even more information on Classic+. We've had tons of liveblogs, coverage, and great Blizzard surprises, but BlizzCon has too much information for everyone to know everything. We're rounding up the info about what you might've missed while you're at the con, or at home enjoying things virtually!
Classic+ Coverage Continued
Today's focus was less on Retail announcements and more on the world of Forever. From a deep dive first thing in the morning, to a technically impressive display by MSI showcasing graphical updates, to explanations of game design philosophy on how Blizzard wants the world of Forever to truly feel, these teasers gave us enough to think about that we can't wait for the beta to start in a few short days.
There’s still more adventure waiting in the world where it all began. During the World of Warcraft: Forever Deep Dive, Associate Production Director Clay Stone, Senior Game Designer Josh Greenfield, Lead Software Engineer Ana Resendez, and Principal Game Designer Kris Zierhut shared how this full new World of Warcraft game set in a reimagined original Azeroth is being shaped around the moments that make the world feel alive.
Building Deeper into Azeroth
World of Warcraft: Forever begins with a familiar promise: Azeroth is still a place worth getting lost in. Here, Azeroth is the main character, and every road, campfire, dungeon, and familiar name along the way is part of the story. A core foundation of World of Warcraft: Forever is serendipitous interactions: the kind of chance encounters that can turn another player on the road from competition for an herb node, mining node, or enemy tag into someone worth stopping for.
Camping builds on that foundation by reimagining the simple Cooking Fire as a Basic Campfire, creating campsites where players can rest, sit for a moment, gain useful benefits, and contribute crafted objects that make a roadside meeting feel useful, social, and worth remembering. That promise carries through the everyday parts of the adventure, from stopping at a campfire in the wild to leveling another character, finding value in professions, choosing how and where to play, and recognizing familiar names out in the world.
Systems That Bring Azeroth to Life
Several systems come into focus in World of Warcraft: Forever, beginning with Camping. The system expands the simple Cooking Fire from the Cooking profession into a Basic Campfire, giving players a reason to pause together in the world before heading back into adventure. Professions are also gaining more depth, with over 600 new recipes across professions and level ranges, adjusted crafted food that can grant a small experience bonus and stat boosts, and advanced Blueprint recipes from dungeon bosses.
Camping and Professions
The Basic Campfire turns those roadside pauses into something players can build together. Placing a campfire creates a campsite where players can rest and gain access to useful benefits such as vendors, repairs, profession workspaces, and one-hour buffs. To gain those buffs, players will need to slow down, sit by the campfire for a few moments, and get rested before heading back into adventure. It is also a natural place to refresh food buffs, which have received a major update in World of Warcraft: Forever.
Choose your campsite carefully, though—some parts of Azeroth are better suited for a quiet rest than others.
A Basic Campfire allows up to three special crafted objects to be added by nearby players. Each player can contribute one object, and those objects share a one-hour cooldown. Every profession has three different objects learned at different skill levels, and each profession provides its own buff or utility no matter which object is placed.
Blacksmiths, for example, can place a Sharpening Wheel that increases Attack Power, Tailors can place a Faction Banner that increases Spirit, and Herbalists can place an Incense Candle that increases Intellect. These effects are variants of, and do not stack with, buffs normally provided by specific classes.
The first campsite objects are learned once a profession reaches skill level 20, either from special nonplayer characters (NPCs) who introduce players to camping or from profession trainers, while more advanced objects come from Blueprint recipes that drop from specific dungeon bosses.
Alchemists can learn to place an Alchemy Lab, Leatherworkers can place a Tanning Rack required for more advanced Leatherworking recipes, and Cooks can learn upgraded Campfires that allow five or 10 objects to be placed at a camp. Together, these additions give professions more depth, purpose, and visibility throughout the world.
The Legacy System: Rewarding Every Journey
The Legacy System grew out of one of the team’s favorite parts of Hardcore: seeing so many players constantly leveling and making the world feel active, lively, and full of possibility. For World of Warcraft: Forever, the team wanted to capture more of that energy in a way that rewards players for beginning the journey again without asking them to face Hardcore’s deadly consequences. The result is a system designed to make leveling alternate characters (alts) more exciting, emphasize the journey over the destination, and give players new challenges that reward progress across all their characters.
Players earn Legacy Points by completing Legacy Challenges across several categories, with examples including leveling a specific class or reaching a particular skill milestone. These challenges are not meant to force players into strange tasks disconnected from the game. Instead, they are designed to complement the existing journey, reward the ways players already enjoy adventuring through Azeroth, and add new goals that make each repeat journey feel more meaningful.
Legacy Points can be spent in Legacy Trees, beginning with Professions, Adventure, and Resourcefulness. As players earn points, they can shape each character’s path through these trees based on the playstyle that fits that character best.
In the Adventure tree, players can find the “Well Rested” talent to increase rested experience gains and raise the rested experience cap, making it especially useful for leveling alts. In Professions, players can find the legacy talent “Bountiful Harvest” to increase the materials gathered from mining, herbalism, or skinning.
Deeper in Resourcefulness, powerful perks such as Reagent Economy can remove reagent requirements from class abilities, making buffing easier while still asking players to make meaningful choices about where to spend their limited points.
What makes the system especially flexible is that Legacy Points are shared across all alts, while each character spends those points separately in their own trees. Players who want to create many alts can earn points across a wider selection of legacy challenges, taking on new goals such as leveling a different class, while players who want to focus on maximizing a particular character can dive deeper into the categories and complete more complex challenges. Players can also do both, engaging with the system in the way that feels best for their journey through Azeroth.
At launch, each character can spend up to 16 points in their Legacy Trees. The cap is intended to keep players from feeling pressured to do everything at once and to help new players avoid feeling too far behind. Players can still continue completing challenges beyond that spending limit and earn up to 65 Legacy Points at the start.
Those additional accomplishments contribute to the Legacy Reward Track, where accumulating points over time unlocks special cosmetic or prestige rewards, such as the Spectral Bear Cub, without providing a competitive gameplay advantage. World of Warcraft: Forever is also adopting the Burning Crusade-style mount-cost approach, shifting the up-front mount cost into training and granting a mount when players learn the riding skill.
The Legacy System is also built to grow. Over time, the team expects to add new challenges, new perks, additional ways to spend points, expanded spending caps, new columns within existing trees, and potentially entirely new trees. Whether players want to build an army of alts, focus deeply on one character, or discover a new path through Azeroth each time, the system is meant to keep the journey feeling rewarding long after the first trip to maximum level.
Playing Together in a Realmless Azeroth
World of Warcraft: Forever is also taking a new approach to how players choose where they play. For many players, that first realm choice has always carried a lot of weight: pick the right one and you can adventure with your friends, join the right community, and find groups more easily; pick a different one and you might discover too late that the people you wanted to play with are somewhere else entirely.
Instead of asking players to make that decision before creating a character, World of Warcraft: Forever is going realmless, making it easier to connect with friends while still preserving the community feel that has always made realms memorable.
Rather than choosing from a long list of realms, players will choose a ruleset that matches how they want to experience Azeroth:
Normal: The baseline World of Warcraft experience with a focus on cooperation, where player-versus-player combat requires mutual consent
PvP: For players who want every trip into contested territory to carry more danger, excitement, and world conflict.
Roleplaying: For players who want to lean more deeply into the fantasy of Azeroth and seek out like-minded adventurers.
Hardcore: Available after launch for players seeking the ultimate challenge, where every decision matters and death carries lasting consequences.
Each ruleset functions more like its own large ecosystem than a single traditional realm. This is not one giant realm for everyone, and cross-ruleset grouping is not supported. Factions remain separate, so Horde and Alliance players still cannot group together. Players can group, run dungeons, and raid with others who have chosen the same ruleset. Hardcore will remain a fully enclosed ecosystem, but if a Hardcore character dies, that character can transfer to another ruleset, including PvP.
Collections and Legacy Points remain account-wide across rulesets, with Hardcore as the exception. Progress, collections, and rewards earned in Hardcore can become available in other rulesets, but progress from other rulesets will not flow back into Hardcore. This keeps Hardcore’s ecosystem distinct while still letting players carry accomplishments forward if they move out of it.
The realmless structure is meant to combine the benefits of larger populations with the sense of belonging associated with realms. While leveling, questing, and exploring, players should still cross paths with familiar names over the course of play—whether they helped complete a quest, raced toward the same mining node, or simply waved while passing by. The goal is for strangers to become familiar faces and for familiar faces to become part of a community, even at a much larger scale.
As part of the server updates, characters will also use two-part names, similar to having a “first name” and “last name.” Because names will be unique per region, this gives players more room to create original character names, such as “Ana Forever,” while keeping those identities recognizable across the larger connected environment.
Players will also be able to choose a language preference and encounter others who share that preference. For the PvP ruleset, faction balance remains an important consideration, and World of Warcraft: Forever will include systems intended to support Horde and Alliance balance similar to the approach introduced in Season of Discovery.
Taken together, these infrastructure changes are intended to reduce the pressure of choosing the “right” launch realm, lessen the tradeoff between long queues and lasting communities, and give players the benefits of a larger connected world while preserving the feeling of belonging in Azeroth.
Transmogrification and Player Choice
Player choice also guides how transmogrification works in World of Warcraft: Forever. Transmog is an important tool for players who want to show off accomplishments or express their characters in a specific way, but the team also recognizes that it was not part of the original game and that outlandish outfits can affect immersion for some players. With that in mind, the system is being designed to support both perspectives: players who want to fully engage with appearance collection and players who would rather experience the world as if transmog does not exist.
Players can visit a transmogrifier in certain cities to configure transmogrified outfits or disable the system entirely. In practical terms, opting out means players will only see others around them as they are, in their equipped gear. Players who choose Classic Mode when first launching the game will have transmog disabled automatically when they enter the world. Even while the system is disabled, players can continue collecting appearances from new gear in case they decide to use transmog later.
The team also considered how appearance collection could affect player behavior in group content. If a bind-on-pickup Uncommon or Rare item drops in a dungeon, its appearance will be granted to all eligible looters when the item is looted. That means someone who needs an item as an upgrade should not have to worry about another player rolling against them just to collect the appearance.
For epic raid drops, appearances are granted on acquisition only to the player the item binds to, preserving the prestige of higher-level rewards and leaving organized loot decisions in the hands of raid groups.
For players who want to fully engage with transmog, the basic functionality should feel familiar, with a few Classic-minded adjustments. Items of Poor or Common quality grant their appearance as soon as they are looted and do not need to bind to the player first, allowing lower-level or unbound appearances to be shared more flexibly.
Transmogrification still follows item-type rules, so plate transmogs to plate and cloth transmogs to cloth. A Paladin wearing a cloth chest such as Robes of the Exalted would need to use another cloth chest appearance for that item. Low-level characters also cannot use high-level appearances until level 60, when level restrictions are removed for valid appearances in the collection. Cosmetic-only items are the exception, though they will be rare in World of Warcraft: Forever.
Disabling the system does not prevent players from configuring and displaying their own transmog if they want to hide a specific slot such as a helm or cloak or show a particular appearance without enabling the full system for themselves. Players who have transmog disabled will still see other players’ hidden helm and cloak settings, preserving the original World of Warcraft functionality around those display choices. Ultimately, the goal is to give players maximum flexibility over what they see in their own game, whether they want to collect and customize or play as though the system is not part of their moment-to-moment experience.
Combat, Classes, and Itemization
Combat in World of Warcraft: Forever remains rooted in the feel and pacing of World of Warcraft: Classic. The team’s goal is not to change how combat feels, but to preserve what makes it deliberate, tactical, and class-driven. Classes are intended to stay simple while still offering engaging depth, and each class should remain distinct, with its own strengths and weaknesses rather than feeling homogenized.
That philosophy shows up in the pace of play. A solo player can expect an ordinary creature to take roughly 10–15 seconds to defeat, giving individual pulls room to matter. Dungeon gameplay is also meant to stay tactical, where crowd control can be the right answer when there are too many enemies for a tank to safely control at once. Polymorph, Banish, Fear, Root, and similar tools continue to have a place, and damage dealers still need to respect Threat, focus targets carefully, and use area damage only when it is safe.
Itemization is changing with the same goal in mind: keeping the gameplay of Classic while “unsolving” the path through it. World of Warcraft: Forever keeps the familiar stats from Classic, but reworks several of them and adds new ones so gearing choices can vary more based on role, activity, and playstyle. Spell, melee, and ranged hit chance are combined, as are spell, melee, and ranged critical chance. That helps hybrid specializations such as Retribution Paladins and Enhancement Shaman, while also letting Warriors, Hunters, and Rogues benefit when improving the reliability of tools such as Taunts, Poisons, and Traps.
Weapon skill still works as it always has, but items with weapon skill offer less of it per item so they are not always the obvious best choice. Bonus healing now also includes one third as much bonus damage, giving healing specializations more support when questing and adventuring in the world.
New stats broaden those choices further. Some items can reduce the chance for attacks to be parried or dodged, while spellcaster-oriented weapons now grant spell damage and healing so spellcasters can look forward to level-up weapons in the same way Warriors, Rogues, and Hunters do.
Trinkets are being pushed toward more varied, situational effects, with examples such as the Worgenbane Talisman showing how different trinkets can matter in different circumstances. New effects also tie item choices to specific environments, such as Woodlands, Mountains, or Deserts, and to specific creature types, including examples like X’caliboar.
These itemization updates reach across the entire game. Every dungeon drop has been re-examined, memorable items remain memorable, less exciting items have been adjusted, and hundreds of new drops have been added. Unique dungeon boss items are now blue quality and set bonuses have been improved to feel more useful and exciting.
Quest rewards have also been updated or expanded to support more classes and roles. Mor’ladim’s quest in Duskwood, for example, still offers a two-handed sword, but now also grants the Ladimore Heirloom Ring for spellcasters. Hemet Nesingwary’s quests in Stranglethorn also include new options such as the Master Hunter’s Spellsword. World-drop epics have been improved, hundreds of new rare-creature drops have been added, and items throughout World of Warcraft: Forever are intended to feel more varied and interesting than ever before.
New Paths for Races and Classes
Racial abilities help each race feel different and give players a reason to experience the journey from a new perspective. In World of Warcraft: Forever, racial abilities have been reworked to feel stronger, more distinct, and more meaningful without pushing every race toward the same strengths. The team is also adding six new class-and-race combinations to explore: Gnome Priest, Human Hunter, Dwarf Shaman, Orc Mage, Troll Warlock, and Undead Paladin, with more planned for future updates.
Each race now has two active abilities and two passive abilities, tuned to provide a similar amount of offensive power while preserving signature utility.
Dwarves, for example, keep Stoneform’s focus on removing and granting immunity to Bleeds, Poisons, and Diseases, but its defensive bonus now reduces Physical damage taken instead of increasing Armor, making it useful to more classes. Find Treasure can now remain active alongside other tracking abilities, Mace Specialization increases critical strike chance with all spells and abilities while a mace is equipped, and Big Game Hunter grants increased damage against Beasts, giving Dwarf characters moments where they can shine in the right encounters.
Undead racial abilities are being reshaped with the same design goals. Will of the Forsaken still removes Charm, Fear, and Sleep, but no longer grants immunity to those effects. Cannibalize now restores Mana as well as Health, increasing its usefulness for mana-using classes such as Mages, Warlocks, Paladins, and Priests. Underwater Breathing remains unchanged but continues to matter in old and new underwater combat situations, while Touch of the Grave gives Undead characters a new damage-focused racial with a survivability edge by giving attacks a chance to drain life from enemies.
Talent trees are being revised with the same Classic-minded approach: familiar structure, the same number of rows, and one-point milestone talents at 11, 21, and 31 points, now joined by a new 16-point milestone. Some talents remain exactly as they were in patch 1.12, some have been adjusted or improved, and talents that granted key class buffs—such as Divine Spirit, Blessing of Kings, and Improved Mark of the Wild—are now baseline for their classes.
A Closer Look at Paladins
Paladins offer one example of the wider class update philosophy: give each specialization new tools while preserving meaningful gaps in the class toolkit. Across the class, Paladins gain Holy Strike at level 6, an instant weapon strike that deals Holy damage on a 12-second cooldown. Seals are no longer consumed by casting Judgment, reducing the busy work of recasting them, while Seal of Fury gives Protection Paladins a tank-focused Seal that favors fast weapons, grants small absorb shields, and causes Judgment to taunt while the Seal is active.
Consecration is also baseline at level 20, serving as both a tanking and damage tool with high damage and threat on the first four targets it hits and lower damage and threat beyond that.
Holy Paladins gain tools that encourage more varied healing and support occasional damage-focused play. Improved Holy Strike reduces Holy Strike’s cooldown, Voice of Truth grants temporary immunity to Silence and Interrupts, and Reverence allows Paladins to regenerate Mana from Spirit while casting.
Infusion of Light rewards Holy Shock and Flash of Light critical heals by reducing the cast time of Holy Light, encouraging healers to mix their spells rather than repeat the same cast. Holy Shock moves to a 10-second cooldown, Consecrated Ground causes enemies in Consecration to take increased Holy damage, and Light’s Vigil gives Paladins a high-cost cooldown that can reset Holy Shock and trigger either extra damage against enemies or party-wide healing through an ally.
Protection Paladins gain more ways to sustain Mana, recover from missed taunts, and survive dangerous moments without becoming a copy of another tank. Improved Seal of Fury grants Mana when Seal of Fury absorbs damage, Shield Specialization grants additional Mana on blocks, and Swift Judgment can reset Judgment once per minute so a missed taunt does not end the moment.
Templar’s Bulwark gives Paladins a powerful absorb shield based on maximum health while interacting with Forbearance, Reckoning has been redesigned to work for tanks who are immune to critical hits by also triggering from blocks, and Iron Creed lets timed Holy Strikes reduce incoming damage for a short window.
Retribution Paladins gain stronger melee identity while still leaving room for hybrid Holy damage options. Vindication now reduces enemy Attack Power while increasing the Paladin’s own, Sacred Arbiter empowers Holy Strike and refreshes Judgments on the target, Champion of the Light increases spell damage based on Intellect, and Instrument of the Law reduces threat generation while making Holy Wrath instant.
Twist of Light supports Seal Twisting without requiring a swing-timer add-on by letting a new Seal echo into the next melee swing, while players who prefer a different path can lean into Holy Shock for ranged, spell-powered play.
Those updates give Paladins more tools, but they do not erase the class’s limits. Paladins still lack an interrupt, still cannot slow targets the way some other classes can, and still rely on the Seal and Judgment system to access their taunt rather than pressing a single-purpose button. They remain especially strong against Undead and Demons through spells such as Exorcism, Holy Wrath, and Turn Undead, while having fewer ranged options against other enemies.
The goal is to make Paladins effective as tanks, healers, or Retribution melee damage dealers without smoothing away the edges that make the class feel distinct. More class and race details are planned through future videos and articles, giving players a deeper look at the vision for each class and specialization.
Azeroth has always invited players to wonder what waits just beyond the path. A mountain trail that seemed to keep going. A sealed gate. A name on the map. A ruin tucked behind trees that felt important, even if no quest ever sent you there. With World of Warcraft: Forever, we’re looking back at those familiar corners of Azeroth and asking how they can become the starting point for new adventures.
The idea of “found photos,” first coined by Chris Metzen in early conversations about adding new stories to Season of Discovery, is about uncovering moments, places, and mysteries that feel as though they may have existed all along.
The World as a Found Photograph
WoW: Forever begins where original World of Warcraft begins: in the early “Year 1” period of Azeroth, before Kazzak reopened the Dark Portal and before later journeys to places like Northrend reshaped the timeline. Rather than rushing forward, the team is building from the original level 1–60 world, expanding events, characters, and locations that exist—or could have existed—within that foundational era.
We call that approach “found photographs”: discovering story threads that feel as though they may have been part of Classic Azeroth all along. The philosophy favors local mysteries, grounded conflicts, and underused characters—the kinds of stories that make the world feel large, textured, and full of possibilities just beyond the road.
WoW: Forever occupies its own “time bubble,” allowing the team to explore those possibilities without disrupting original Azeroth’s foundational stories. That choice gives the team creative freedom while still painting inside the lines of Warcraft lore, preserving the spirit of Classic even as new paths, characters, and conflicts come into view.
Anticipated, New but Familiar, and Unexpected
The team looks at new content through three broad categories:
Anticipated: Places players have long known about or wanted to explore, such as Mount Hyjal.
New but familiar: Fresh stories grounded in Warcraft history and existing locations, like the Riverglades.
Unexpected: Surprises used more sparingly, added in ways that feel right at home within the fabric of WoW: Forever.
Together, these categories help guide how each addition supports the feeling of returning to original Azeroth while still giving players something fresh to discover.
While some additions allow players to step into long-imagined places, others deepen storytelling opportunities in established settlements, factions, and well-traveled roads in a living, breathing world. A smaller number introduce cultures or locations that expand Azeroth without overwhelming what makes Classic feel like Classic.
From that foundation, those ideas begin to show up throughout the player journey itself.
New Beginnings
Whether players begin in the Valley of Trials, Shadowglen, or another starting area, WoW: Forever adds NPCs, quests, profession hooks, recipes, and small moments designed to sit alongside the original experience. These flavorful additions are meant to give every starting path something fresh without taking away from the Classic memories players may already bring with them.
New Ways to Travel
As players venture beyond their starting zones, they’ll discover ship routes that preserve the feeling of crossing a large world while making it easier for friends to meet, quest together, and explore at their own pace. Stormwind Harbor to Auberdine opens an early path between the Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor, while Menethil, Southshore, and Auberdine add another route with more flexibility for leveling.
The final route begins with the Steamwheedle Cartel in Tanaris, pointing players beyond known shores toward the Riverglades: a mid-level zone roughly the size of Stranglethorn Vale, built from a previously inaccessible part of the Classic world and filled with nearly 200 quests for Horde and Alliance players.
Riverglades and the Roads Between
The Riverglades is one of our first major examples of “new, but familiar” content: a land connected to surrounding regions like the Burning Steppes, Redridge Mountains, the Swamp of Sorrows, and the Badlands, but previously beyond players’ reach.
Its port, Powderfuse Port, ties directly into the new Steamwheedle route and gives the journey across the sea a destination that feels both fresh and rooted in Azeroth.
Once there, players will find a zone built to blend into the living world around it. Gnoll camps continue the conflicts of neighboring lands, fresh ogre threats create points of tension and opportunities, and groups like the new Powderfuse goblins, the Twilight’s Hammer, and the Brotherhood of the Horse help connect the area to Warcraft’s history in different ways.
We’re also returning to well-traveled places with renewed attention. Wetlands gains quests and opportunities to build upon existing characters and threads, while Desolace’s centaur faction quests receive additional content and faction rewards. South of Desolace through the Valley of Bones, the addition of Shen’dralas opens a fresh, new area, exploring the characters and stories connected to Eldre’Thalas.
Mount Hyjal
Mount Hyjal carries that sense of long-awaited discovery, inviting players to explore the aftermath of the Battle for Mount Hyjal, meet emerging factions, form alliances, and begin to see where those threads may lead. It is one of the clearest examples of giving players access to a place that has held meaning and mystery since Warcraft’s earliest stories.
Forsaken Paladins and Stories Close to Home
That grounded approach extends from places to people, including Forsaken paladins. Their path rolls directly out of the new Warcraft III campaign Forsaken Kingdom, beginning at a time when these former paladins are deeply mistrusted by other Forsaken and still learning what it means to channel the Light in undeath.
Bandarion Keep in the Whispering Wood of Tirisfal Glades becomes a key location for that experience, grounding the Forsaken Paladin Journey in a local struggle for acceptance, identity, and purpose.
At level 60, Forsaken paladins will also embark on their own epic mount quest. Whereas Alliance paladins claim their epic charger in the name of Redemption, the paladins of the Forsaken ride in the name of Retribution.
Their story reflects our broader commitment to character moments that feel specific to this version of Azeroth: not sweeping campaigns for their own sake, but grounded conflicts that grow from the world’s history, fears, factions, and unanswered questions.
Zephras Isle and the Unexpected
For one of our more unexpected additions, players will discover Zephras Isle and the Skyborne, also known as the shen’dorei or hidden people. Their history begins with rebels who fled Eldre’Thalas after the War of the Ancients and eventually found refuge in Skywall, where wind spirits anchored their island home in the elemental plane.
When players encounter them in WoW: Forever, the Skyborne are in crisis. Their elemental benefactors have vanished, the pylons that hold Zephras together are failing, and portions of the island have begun falling into ruin and darkness.
Several groups are vying for control of Zephras Isle as the crisis deepens, including the Windshapers, the High Order, and the Al’Aketh. Together, they help shape Zephras as an unexpected addition that still fits within the larger fabric of WoW: Forever.
Zephras Isle is intended as a surprising but self-contained experience—unexpected, but added with care and restraint.
Made With the Community in Mind
Across these additions—from starting-zone updates, world travel, Riverglades, Mount Hyjal, Forsaken paladins, and Zephras Isle—the throughline remains the same: Azeroth should feel like a real place with adventures worth discovering together.
This is a journey through Azeroth’s history, giving players new reasons to gather, explore, discover new paths, and come away with stories that belong beside the old ones.
WoW: Forever launches globally on November 4, 2026, with beta beginning September 17, and we look forward to continuing this adventure through Azeroth with you.
Blizzard has a forum thread dedicated to every video recap you'll need, so if you missed a panel, you'll find it there!
Official Blizzard Forum Thread for Forever Recap Videos
What's Next for Diablo 4?
While yesterday was about the hype of Diablo 5, today's Diablo panels were more focused on the current game. Legendary content creator Rhykker sat down with Blizzard on the What's Next panel for the franchise, talking about everything from Rebirth to the upcoming Season of Hell's Legacy.
Legendary content creator Rhykker sat down with Senior Game Director Brent Gibson, Live Service Design Director Dan Tanguay, and Lead Encounter Designer Owen Leach at BlizzCon 2026 on September 13 at 11:00 a.m. PT. They added detail and additional philosophy behind the development of Season of Hell's Legacy, celebrating Diablo's 30th Anniversary by reliving some of the most iconic moments, places, and characters in the history of Sanctuary. The team also shared an exclusive look ahead at upcoming plans for future Seasons. To learn more about Season of Hell’s Legacy, the Season Overview and Patch Notes are linked below.
In addition, Rhykker talked with Brent, Lead Game Producer Lily Gardner, and Senior Lead VFX Artist Jayne Johnston about the development, artistry, and design philosophy behind the 2027 return of the Amazon, the fan-favorite class with a long and storied history.
To watch this panel, please visit our Twitch and YouTube links at the end of this recap.
Codex
Season of Hell's Legacy
The Amazon Enters the Battle in 2027
More About Season of Hell's Legacy
Season of Hell's Legacy
Season of Hell's Legacy marks the pinnacle of Diablo's 30th Anniversary celebration. To lead off the recap, Brent introduced the premiere of the Season of Hell's Legacy trailer:
Seasonal Questline and Theme
The Pandemonium Rifts from the Season of Death Awakening were just the beginning. The dark rituals and the Death Cult are growing stronger, and now they're bringing souls lost in time from the very depths of Sanctuary's past.
Deckard Cain's lost soul walks in Sanctuary once again – although a bit confused by the journey. The dark wanderers have returned, and Cain calls upon you to redeem their lost souls. In doing so, you'll face the Echoes of the Prime Evils Mephisto, Baal, and Diablo by revisiting their iconic thrones in Worldstone Chamber, the Durance of Hate, and the original Diablo’s Tristram Cathedral.
Once you do this, assume a Splinter of Evil of one of the three Prime Evils and become a dark wanderer yourself! This allows you to pursue reputation tracks that give you additional powers to fight the very Prime Evil whose stone you bear – as well as attract his unwanted attention.
Nightmares Awaken
The team revealed information about the Waking Nightmares, dungeons reliving epic battles and iconic encounters from Diablo's illustrious past. In addition to confronting the Echoes of the Prime Evils, you’ll be visiting memorable settings from Diablo I, Diablo: Hellfire, II, III, and Diablo Immortal, all recreated with gloriously updated graphics.
By defeating the most difficult Waking Nightmares, you can earn a rare resource to switch whose Splinter of Evil you bear. This allows you to change reputation tracks, earn different rewards, and try out new powers, unlocking new modifiers and upgrades through War Plans.
The largest Waking Nightmares are introduced in the questline but can be replayed as Capstones. At the highest Torment levels, you can open these as Pinnacle Capstones, where only the most brave or foolhardy wanderers tread.
Dungeon-sized Waking Nightmares are fixed features and recreate iconic locations and encounters. Single-room Waking Nightmares can also pop up in the overworld, offering adventure and loot as you fight past bosses and mobs that have never been seen before in Diablo IV.
Nearly twenty bosses such as Nihlathak and the Maggot Queen, as well as a a host of heroes such as Leah from all previous games above, also return to share renowned nightmares of the past and reveal the potential impact on Sanctuary's future.
In addition to familiar faces, nine legacy Uniques, from Leoric's Crown to the Stone of Jordan, also make their permanent debut in this season.
Rebirth
Rebirth returns to Diablo, a fan-favorite feature that allows you to carry on a character's identity and legacy from season to season.
Mythic and Crafting Updates
Mythic Uniques and Iconic Uniques also received some additional attention, as a result of PTR feedback. The team thanked the community for input that led to changes to Mythic and Iconic crafting. In Season of Hell's Legacy, you’ll be able to do the following:
Use the Horadric Cube to upgrade an item directly from Unique to Mythic with all affixes intact.
Acquire Mythic Charms, which have a small chance to drop whenever a Unique charm drops.
Visit the Blacksmith to purchase two different Mythic caches, one for all class-usable Mythic Uniques and one only for Iconic Mythics.
In addition, two new Horadric Cube recipes were introduced to allow alterations on gear, charms, and Seals – one targeting Affixes without altering Greater Affixes, Enchants, or Tempers; the other is focused on randomizing base affixes on Charms and Seals.
Shared War Plans
Starting in Season of Hell's Legacy, War Plans progress will be shared among characters on your account within the shared partitions of Seasonal/Eternal, Non-Hardcore/Hardcore, and Normal/Solo-Self Found. You’ll be able to allocate shared points across each character’s own set of War Plans, similar to how Paragon points work.
Future Seasons
The team also shared a BlizzCon-only sneak peek at a few plans for upcoming seasons.
Season of Hell's Legacy and upcoming Seasons carry on the Season of Death's Awakening story of the dead returning to life and the dire purposes of the Cult of the Dead.
Future seasons will see further refinements and additions to War Plans, such as playlist customization and Seasonal variety, as well as itemization and customization expansion to support new build variety.
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The Amazon Enters the Battle in 2027
The team offered our first look at the female-only Amazon class for Diablo IV. From artistic and design creations to fulfilling the class fantasy we glimpsed among the Amazons of Skovos in Lord of Hatred, they shared the history, responsibility, and joy of envisioning the Amazon for today’s Sanctuary.
Three design pillars informed the creation of the Amazon: battle expertise, unrivaled athleticism, and mythical magic. She is a fiercely disciplined warrior first who also leans into her mystical connection to her sister Amazons and Askari ancestors for magical aid when needed.
Four archetypes for the Amazon are shaping all facets of this class, along with the thought processes and ideas behind all facets of the vision and creation. From appearance to animation, down to the naming of skills, the Amazon's history creates the strong foundation for a class with deep and powerful roots.
The Champion: the sword-and-shield melee fighter using buffs to reinforce both herself and her allies
The Skirmisher: a lithe and agile hit-and-run combatant tearing apart her foes with the Javelin
The Ranger: a precision tactical archer who snipes and cuts down enemies from a distance
The Commander: a general dominating the field with phalanxes of Valkyries at her call
The Amazon will join Diablo IV with a Class Pack in the first half of 2027. Class Pack details and purchase details will be available next year closer to release.
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More About Season of Hell's Legacy
To watch this panel, please see our Twitch or YouTube:
Twitch.tv/Diablo
YouTube.com/Diablo
To read the Season of Hell's Legacy Overview blog with in-depth season details and the 3.2.1 Patch Notes, click here.
Our deepest thanks to every fan and player: none of this is possible without you.
—The Diablo IV Team
