World of Warcraft The War Within Pre-Patch Patch Notes Summary

World of Warcraft The War Within is almost here, and the Pre-Patch is the first glimpse into the future. Every expansion is heralded by one of these Pre-Patches, which tend to put the first bits of important expansion content into the game. In this case, it’s adding Skyriding, Warbands, and an absolute mountain of class balance changes. We’ll go over class balances at a later date because it’s simply too huge of a mountain to climb, but you can find the full patch notes on Blizzard’s website.

World of Warcraft The War Within may not launch until August 26, 2024, but the pre-patch will launch today (July 23, 2024). After this week’s regularly scheduled maintenance, players can start setting up their Warbands and so much more ahead of the MMO’s expansion in August.

World of Warcraft The War Within Pre-Patch kicks off the Radiant Echoes event

Ragnaros sure looks different (Image via Blizzard Entertainment)

World of Warcraft The War Within’s Pre-Patch will have a pre-expansion event kicking off later this week. Titled Radiant Echoes, it will be available from July 30 to August 26, 2024. This is a common occurrence ahead of an expansion, to set the tone and flavor of what players can expect in the future.

This event will let players collect a currency known as Residual Memories so they can purchase items for their Warband Collection. If you're Level 70, you’ll receive a quest that will take you to Dalaran. Those who are under Level 70 will simply be transported to Dalaran.

Four stages and cycles for this event take place in three zones. Thankfully, the World of Warcraft The War Within Pre-patch event will have portals to take you where you need to go. When a portal leads to an active event, it will have a golden glow. As you go through this event and collect Residual Memories, World of Warcraft The War Within players can use it to purchase various gear.

This includes Item Level 480 equipment, 32 slog bags, a 30-slot reagent bag, mounts, pets, and even an heirloom ring. There’s lots to be excited about, especially if you need to catch up for the expansion.

Warbands have finally come to World of Warcraft in The War Within

You can set whichever characters you prefer in the Warband (Image via Blizzard Entertainment)

Also read: 5 ways to prepare for WoW The War Within

Warbands are perhaps the biggest change of World of Warcraft The War Within’s Pre-patch. Warbands are a way to gather resources on a group of your characters, which makes grinding, crafting, etc. much easier. There will be items you can use on all these characters, and it’s an incredible change. You can set a group of four characters on your main character-select screen as your Warband and change it at will. Thereby, many of the game’s progression systems will be made easier.

You’ll have a specific Warband Bank, and Renown, Achievements, Collections, and even Class tokens from Legacy raids will be shareable. In addition, any equipment of any armor type will be unlocked in your item appearance, even if that character cannot normally wear it (e.g., A Mage unlocking Plate Armor appearances). You won’t even have to go through and login to everyone to begin this process, but there might be a bit of a delay as your characters are added.

Visions of Azeroth is the introduction into World of Warcraft The War Within

A new series of story quests begin today (Image via Blizzard Entertainment)

Also read: How to start the Emerald Dream storyline in WoW Dragonflight

If you’ve completed the final portion of the WoW Dragonflight story, you have a new series of main story quests awaiting you in World of Warcraft The War Within. The pre-patch introduces Visions of Azeroth. This serves as a prologue for what’s to come in the The War Within expansion. Players who have not reached the end of the story must do so if they want to experience this. It is likely not required to start the next expansion, but it will be a story worth taking part in.

Miscellaneous additions to World of Warcraft The War Within via Pre-Patch

Over 400 mounts will be able to swap between flying styles (Image via Blizzard Entertainment)

Also read: All new zones coming with WoW The War Within

It was teased early on that Dragonriding would continue to exist in some form or another, as Dragonflight ends. This was officially confirmed in the Pre-Patch notes, as Skyriding. Over 400 mounts can take part and fly using Skyriding. You will be able to toggle between Skyriding and Normal Flight as well, which is now called Steady Flight.

The number of talents were also condensed from Dragonriding, to be more manageable. Many of the older talents are now passive, and simply exist for the player. Druid Flight Form can even Skyride. In addition, flight speeds were adjusted, as were the levels they are triggered at:

Journeyman Riding (100% ground speed) is now learned at Level 10.
Apprentice Riding (60% ground speed) is gone.
Expert Riding now increases Steady Flight by 220% (was 150%) and is now learned at Level 20.
Master Riding now increases Steady Flight by 420% (was 310%) and is now learned at Level 30.

In addition, the “default” leveling experience now goes through the Dragonflight expansion, and will go from Level 10 to 70. Previously, it was Battle for Azeroth. Another interesting feature is that Guilds can now invite characters on different realms. In addition, Humans had their passive changed to No Place Like Home, which reduces Hearthstone cooldown by five minutes and receives an additional charge.

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Edited by Angad Sharma