The WoW/D&D Book Seems Very Ambitious: Lineages and "Hero Subclasses"

 I've been looking up interviews with designers on the WoW/D&D crossover book, and this one with James Wyatt gave us a lot more exciting and interesting details.

Hero Subclasses:

The Demon Hunter and Death Knight are being presented in the WoW book as subclasses for the Ranger and Paladin, respectively. Hearing that, I'd been a bit worried about how well that would really get the vibes and flavor of those classes across. While I think that the base classes they're attached to are fairly appropriate (I could imagine Demon Hunters as using the Warlock base class, but you'd need to force them to go Pact of the Blade somehow) subclasses can be somewhat limited in how much they change how someone plays the game.

The approach, however, to how WoW classes are represented in D&D is something that Wyatt touched on, saying that the approach varies from class to class. Mages of all three specializations are basically Evoker Wizards, but he says that they'll list suggested spells to take and even have new feats to support the playstyles associated with those specs.

But when it comes to these Hero Classes, while details are sparse, the idea is that you need to start the character at 3rd level to play one, and that the third-level features the subclasses have will go back and make some changes to 1st and 2nd level features from those base classes. The impression I get is that these subclasses will be more dramatically different than other subclasses - naturally, a Beast Master Ranger fits perfectly with the Beast Mastery Hunter from WoW, but a Demon Hunter is a totally separate class in WoW. If this subclass then makes more extensive changes to how the Ranger actually works, it might help differentiate itself more while still making use of the existing Ranger framework.

Sadly, we don't really have details on how this will work. My first guess is that Ebon Blade Paladins might do Necrotic damage instead of Radiant with their Divine Smite (maybe changing its name - perhaps Rune Strike?) But the potential is there for more extensive changes as well.

Lineages:

So, I'd assumed the path of least resistance for the way they handle playable species. And in fairness, some of the options will be 1:1 with the D&D ones. Wyatt mentioned that D&D Orcs and WoW Orcs are basically the same, so if you want to play an Orc who lives in the suburbs of Orgrimmar, you can just use the option from the Player's Handbook.

However, it appears that they're not going the simplest route on all of these. I'd assumed that the Night Elves would simply be re-skinned Wood Elves, and that the Blood Elves would be re-skinned High Elves. But evidently, they'll be including lineages for all five WoW Elf peoples - the Night Elves, Blood Elves, Void Elves, Nightborne, and the High Elves (curious to see if that one does just use the PHB version). In WoW, you can only play two kinds of Trolls, the Darkspear or Zandalari, but evidently there will be other options, like Forest Trolls (basically the Amani) and then perhaps the Ice Trolls (Drakkari,) Desert Trolls (Farraki) and Jungle Trolls (Gurubashi, though technically the Darkspear are from this lineage as well).

He mentioned specifically that the Draenei will have four lineages: "Exodar" Draenei (kind of the default) and Lightforged Draenei, both of which are playable in game. Then, you can play as a Man'ari Eredar (former demons who have rejoined their Eredar kin after the defeat of the Burning Legion, which is available just as a cosmetic option for standard Draenei in WoW) and finally the Krokul/Broken, who have been part of the Draenei people since they were introduced in Burning Crusade (2007) but have never been playable.

Regarding humans, they expect you to simply use the PHB version of the Human, but they're adding new Origin Feats to reflect different national backgrounds. I assume we'll at least get ones for Stormwind and Kul Tiras (the two playable humans in WoW, unless you count the werewolf-like Worgen and the Undead, both of which are former humans).

While the recent Lupin from Ravenloft: Horrors Within certainly could stand in for the Worgen, apparently the Worgen in this book will be an original species, though Wyatt described them as being based on the framework of the Shifter from Eberron, but narrowed down to exclusively wolf-themed features.

I believe Tauren were also mentioned, with lineage options for Taunka. Presumably, they'll include the Highmountain Tauren and possibly the Yaungol.

    The more I learn about this book, the more impressed I am at the high ambition it seems to reflect. This doesn't seem like a "let's just tweak things barely enough to make it fit in D&D's rules," but seems to be a really radical reimagining how how 5.5's rules work to best emulate the WoW feel.

My big criticism of D&D's direction over the course of much of 5E is that it could stand to be bolder. In other interviews, I've seen them talk about how they might bring ideas designed for this WoW book into the broader 5.5 systems, and that makes me excited that this will be far more than a corporate-synergy-friendly cash-grab, and might actually wind up being one of the most important books in 5.5.

Dungeon Bosses and the WoW Dungeons Coming in the D&D Book

 Yeah, I mean, you had to expect I'd be writing a lot about this, right?

With the exception of Azjol-Nerub, all the dungeons featured in the World of Warcraft D&D book are from the original release of World of Warcraft.

"Vanilla" WoW featured the two large continents of Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms. Broadly speaking, the continents were mostly home to one of the two player factions, with the Alliance having a larger presence in the EKs and the Horde having more territory in Kalimdor (but with each having a bit of territory on the other - the Undead control the fallen kingdom of Lordaeron, in the northern part of the Eastern Kingdoms, and the Night Elves' home territories are in the north of Kalimdor).

Anyway, the way dungeons work in WoW is that most have somewhere from 3-5 bosses. Boss fights tend to have special mechanics that players need to contend with to successfully defeat them (though admittedly there were some fights in the early days which were "tank and spank" fights that were extremely straightforward). Usually they're pretty linear, though sometimes you can beat some of the bosses in different orders, and occasionally (though I don't think any in recent years) there will be optional bosses. Each boss drops loot from a unique table, so if you know that a particular, say, belt you want drops from a boss, you might run that dungeon until that item drops for you. Between these boss fights are "trash," which are less powerful enemies that can still potentially be challenging, but are there to kind of pace out the dungeon. Other than the normal randomized loot that anything will have, these typically don't drop anything predictably. WoW, of course, can't have all the complex nuance of character interactions that D&D has, so its gameplay is almost entirely combat-focused, and a dungeon is a long string of fights.

In 2010, six years after the original launch, the Cataclysm expansion saw a major revamp of the original two continents, redesigning the questing experience and, in some cases, changing some of the dungeons to reflect the story's development. Some of these dungeons from Vanilla would also get revamps later on that weren't tied to Cataclysm. (One reason for the changes was that, starting in the first expansion, the idea of Heroic Dungeons was introduced, which let you set the difficulty of a dungeon up so that it would be appropriate for max-level characters. While initially this was only for dungeons from the latest expansion and within that expansion's expanded level range, starting in Cataclysm, they made heroic versions of dungeons you'd have visited at low levels, including Deadmines and Shadowfang Keep).

Which is all to say that some of these dungeons have multiple versions of them.

What I'm here to investigate, ultimately, is whether the 30 "dungeon boss" stat blocks are specifically meant for these dungeons, or if these will be more broadly 30 iconic dungeon bosses from across WoW's history.

So, let's total them up:

Azjol-Nerub: 3

The sole dungeon not in the Eastern Kingdoms or Kalimdor, it's instead up in the frozen continent of Northrend, home to the Undead Scourge put also the seat of the Titan Keepers, Ulduar. Underground, the spider-like Nerubians have their realm, which has been conquered by the Undead Scourge, including its Scarab Lord king, Anub'arak, who is its final boss. There's only one version of this dungeon, which has three bosses.

Blackfathom Deeps: 8

Big underground cave system with some Night Elf ruins buried in it. Naga and Satyr came to the caverns to claim the ancient power of the place, which was once a temple to Elune, the moon goddess worshipped by the Night Elves. The hydra Aku'mai, thought to be an ancient pet of the Old Gods, has taken residence here. In Vanilla (and in the currently-available "WoW Classic") the dungeon has 8 bosses, with Aku'mai as the final one. The dungeon got a sort of "light" revamp during Warlords of Draenor, but wasn't tied to that expansion's plot and not given a Heroic version, and it still has 8 bosses.

Deadmines: 6

Now, Deadmines got a pretty major revamp in Cataclysm, moving the timeline forward six years, and it's explicit that the conflict in it was caused by the events of the original version. Interestingly, the normal mode of the dungeon didn't have us confront Vanessa VanCleef, the main antagonist. It was only on Heroic mode (a difference of doing this at, like, level 15 versus level 85) that we had our bout with her. (She's also revealed to have survived in the Legion expansion six years after that, and can even become an ally for Rogue players). Anyway, the map of the dungeon remains the same, and I think there's a new boss in the place of each of the old ones (though I think "Captain" Cookie, the murloc, is in both).

Dire Maul: 16... Technically

Dire Maul's weird. It's actually treated as three separate dungeons now, and many of the bosses in the northern part, which is ogre-themed, are really more like mini-bosses with similar if not the same mechanics. If we cut them out, the total comes out to 12, which is still a lot, though only 4 per wing, which is more typical for a dungeon.

Onyxia's Lair: 1

This one was a bit of a surprise, because Onyxia's Lair is basically one big cavern with a fight against a powerful black dragon. There are a couple of trash pulls to get to her, but the main appeal to this back in Vanilla (and later when they brought it back for WoW's 5th anniversary during Wrath of the Lich King and boosted her to a level 80 challenge) was that you could go in, do a single raid boss, and be done.

Scarlet Monastery: 6 or 7

In Vanilla, Scarlet Monastery was actually four very short dungeons with one or two bosses each, the Scarlet Library, Scarlet Armory, Scarlet Graveyard, or Scarlet Cathedral. In Mists of Pandaria, which came out in 2012, they did a total revamp, basically rebuilding the place from the ground up as two more conventional 3-boss dungeons. The Graveyard and Cathedral were combined into what is now called Scarlet Monastery, and the Armory and Library were combined into what is now called Scarlet Halls. The reason the boss count here isn't the same is that the original Scarlet Graveyard began with a torture chamber and a boss there that was the lead torturer (whose name escapes me,) who didn't make it into the 2012 revamp. Interestingly, the "canon" of our previous fight through the Monastery was preserved, with bosses playing similar roles to the original ones but as different individuals, with the exceptions of the undead skeletal mage Tlanos the Soulrender (a former Scarlet inquisitor who succumbed to the Plague of Undeath) and High Inquisitor Whitemane, whose resurrective powers evidently allowed her to come back after being defeated the first time (fun fact, she earned her "redemption" by becoming one of the Ebon Blade's Four Horsemen, among its most fearsome Death Knights).

Shadowfang Keep: 5 or 10

Similar to Deadmines, Shadowfang Keep kept the same map, but underwent a pretty profound revamp to what was actually found in the dungeon. In Vanilla, it was mostly Worgen (basically werewolves) and Archmage Arugal, who went mad after he summoned the worgen to Azeroth to fight the undead Scourge and didn't realize the whole "infectious wolf-men" problem would be a thing. In Cataclysm, it's almost entirely different, with the treasonous Lords Ashbury, Walden, and Godfrey of Gilneas holing up there after betraying both Gilneas and the Forsaken. The dungeon currently has five bosses, but had twice as many in Vanilla (though some of those were really minor fights). The "new" (16-year-old) version of it ends with a fight against Lord Godfrey (an NPC who specifically shows up to mock Worgen players after they're infected in a cutscene, so we're really set up to despise him).

    Totaling it:

Obviously, the numbers here aren't consistent. But if we assume the simpler, smaller versions of each dungeon, it comes out to 41.

Given that we're only getting 30 "dungeon boss" stat blocks, I'm inclined to come to two conclusions:

One is inescapable: that some of these boss fights will not require bespoke stat blocks, and might be presented simply using either some of the 50 regular monster stat blocks or even existing D&D ones.

The second is not guaranteed, but would be my preference: that we get plenty of dungeon boss stat blocks outside of these dungeons. After all, only one of these dungeons is from an expansion (even if some got revamped with the release of an expansion). And these don't cover all the dungeons from Vanilla, either. Memorable bosses like Ook-Ook from Stormstout Brewery or Mueh'zala from De Other Side (who's also pretty important lore-wise) would be really cool to have.

Indeed, I'm sort of surprised that the dungeon list is so weighted toward Vanilla. Maybe they figure those are the most recognizable to WoW players how might have lapsed for some of the expansions, or maybe the books will primarily focus on the Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor (which is honestly pretty reasonable given how utterly massive Azeroth is as a setting, fleshed out enormously over 22 years and ten expansions). There is, of course, the Icecrown Citadel adventure being sold separately, which is meant for levels 16-20 (which, as epic as the Lich King is as a foe, I had thought he was a perfect "tier 3 endboss.") But I think Wrath content is nearly as universal as Vanilla stuff, given that the expansion came out so long ago and was, for many people, WoW's peak (personally I think it was Legion, though there's an argument that the Dragonflight/War Within period was even better. For me it's a matter of taste rather than my attempt to be objective).

Looking at the "Updated Subclass" UA with Warcraft Context

 In October of last year, we got an Unearthed Arcana that had a notably bland title: "Updated Subclasses." Nothing thematic tying them together.

These were all riffs on subclasses that had already appeared in 5E. The Spiritual Guardian, Warrior of Intoxication, and Storm Herald had all appeared (maybe with slightly different names) in Xanathar's Guide to Everything, and the Oathbreaker had been a subclass in the 2014 DMG meant for villainous NPCs (though I strongly advise DMs to use normal stat blocks rather than full character builds for NPCs.)

I had thought at the time that this was likely to presage an upcoming "of Everything"-style book that would just give us a bunch of new subclasses for 5.5. However, now that we know about D&D's crossover book with World of Warcraft, it's all coming into focus.

One of the really interesting things that seems implied by the subclasses being presented is that D&D will interpret WoW's Shaman class as Barbarians. Now, the Shaman in WoW is primarily a spellcaster, tied to primordial elements and the spirit world. In a lot of ways, they're similar to Druids as a "nature"-based class, but while Druids are focused more on living things (though also a bit of a celestial sun-and-moon-and-stars theme) Shamans are focused on the raw elements, throwing lava and lightning around.

Of the three "specs" for Shamans, two stand at range, casting spells. Elemental Shamans send out bolts of lightning and hurl lava, while Restoration Shamans use the power of water primarily to send waves of healing energy. (In WoW, healing works very differently - if you're the healer, you're probably spending most of your time casting healing spells, and only if your party is in great shape do you every turn your attention to damaging enemies - though some healing specs will incorporate damaging enemies as part of their healing strategy.) The third spec, Enhancement, is the one where you get into melee, dual-wielding and charging (or enhancing) your weapons with elemental power and also casting spells in melee.

I think that both the Spiritual Guardian and Storm Herald subclasses are thematically tied to the Shaman as a class, but it's interesting because a class that in WoW is very much focused on casting spells is, in D&D, going to be the class that truly can't (with the exception of Spiritual Guardian's outside-of-combat ritual spells).

At Gamecon, I believe they announced that the Storm Herald was getting a top-to-bottom redesign, which is probably for the best as the old subclass and its UA version were both cool conceptually but mechanically kind of sucked. 

The Warrior of Intoxication is clearly tied to WoW's Brewmaster Monk. In WoW, this is the tanking spec for Monks, thematically using Drunken Boxing techniques to stagger the damage they take, and then cleanse that "staggered" damage with purifying brews (essentially, the way it works is that you only take part of the damage of each hit you land, while the rest is spread out over time. On its own this makes you easier to heal, but you can also effectively get your "damage debt" forgiven by using a particular ability). It's not pure martial arts, though: Brewmaster Monks toss barrels of brew around, splashing enemies and then using Breath of Fire to ignite the alcohol and do damage over time against them.

Now, in this context, the Oathbreaker Paladin is surely what they were using to secretly test out the Oath of the Ebon Blade, which is how the book will represent Death Knights. In WoW, Death Knights are a full class with three different specs (the lore behind them is that your character was a hero of Azeroth who was then slain by the Scourge and selected to be raised as a Death Knight. However, while you fight for the Scourge in the starting experience, an attack on Light's Hope Chapel, a bastion of the heroic Argent Dawn faction, makes you realize that A: you were set up by the Lich King as fodder to draw out the Paladin Tirion Fordring, and B: that you have regained your free will and are not bound to serve the Scourge, allowing you to reform and become a heroic adventurer. (Note that if you place a race that was added post-Cataclysm, you don't get such a dramatic introduction and are just a heroic Death Knight from the start, serving the far more benevolent Lich King, Bolvar Fordragon).

Anyway, what is likely the playtest for the Oath of the Ebon Blade allows you to summon undead minions (likely 1 initially, and then 2 if you can get your Charisma modifier up to +4 or 5). This, I think, is meant to give you something equivalent to the WoW Death Knight's Raise Dead. For two of its specs, the tank-focused Blood spec and damage-focused Frost, the ghoul you raise with this spell acts as a temporary pet. For Unholy, the other damage spec, this is a permanent pet that fights alongside you, and some of your abilities can enhance its attacks.

I will say that I don't know how relevant this will be at higher levels given that the stat blocks don't scale.

It's interesting here that this UA actually included the Cavalier as well. I don't think the Cavalier was ever a terribly popular subclass, and it's not super obvious what it would be equivalent to for WoW. Possibly the Protection Warrior, which is the tank spec for Warriors (basically the WoW version of the Fighter, though I'd argue the flavor of the Fury Warrior is more like a Barbarian). Perhaps this subclass didn't score well enough to make it into the book.

Now, I will say that they only described the Spiritual Guardian, Swashbuckler, and Mystic Brews subclasses as updates to existing subclasses (Mystic Brews being the clearly better name for the Intoxication Monk). While the Path of the Elements is likely to have some similar flavor to the Storm Herald, as mentioned above, it's expected to be a total mechanical overhaul. But they also don't describe the Oath of the Ebon Blade as being an update, so perhaps it's less similar to this Oathbreaker than I thought.

Spirits and the Golden Order in Elden Ring

 The world of Elden Ring is haunted by disembodied spirits.

It's actually nuts: our horse (a horned horse, which is actually a detail whose significance only occurred to me just now) is a spirit that manifests when we blow on our ring-whistle. Melina is burned in body, with only her spirit able to meet us at Sites of Grace. We have summoned spirits via their Spirit Ash. Ghostly spirits are everywhere, even before you get to the Land of Shadow, where most of the Hornsent are shadowy spirits, slain in Messmer's crusade.

And then, the Erdtree is also a spirit.

It's never stated explicitly, but there is a lot of implication across the game that at some point in the past, the Erdtree burned to ash, and that the version we see towering over the Lands Between is, effectively, its ghost. Some NPCs ask if we see the Erdtree, which would be a ludicrous question if it were still a physical object, glowing brighter than the sun. However, it's implied that to see the Erdtree, one must also see the Guidance of Grace, and that is not something that everyone is capable of doing.

Now, it's not a perfect theory: in support of it is that Leyndell is already covered in ash, with alleys and backstreets mostly buried. Why, then, after we are the ones to burn it with either Melina's help or with the Frenzied Flame, is there significantly more ash, such that nearly the entire city is buried beneath?

(As a side note, something occurred to me: In Alchemical tradition, there's a stage in the Magnum Opus called the Rubedo, in which the sun turns red, which red also representing the highest of the elements, fire. In Elden Ring, the Erdtree has kind of usurped the role of the sun as the source of light, with a past "Sun Realm" era long fallen away. When we burn it, the tree still stands, but it is consumed with a deep red flame. Is this the Rubedo of our grand alchemical work to transform the world?)

Marika's reign can be roughly divided into two eras, one with Godfrey as her Elden Lord and one with Radagon. Notably, it seems that with Godfrey, Marika was kind of tied more to the physical world. Her sacred rite was to collect the sap of the Erdtree for people to, I assume, drink. Godfrey, being tied more to nature via the Crucible and his old barbarian ways, was thus paired with this more kind of nature/fertility goddess whose blessings were tangible nourishment.

With Radagon, however, the religion of the Golden Order became far more abstract and conceptual. Radagon promoted a more scholarly understanding of the Golden Order, existing beyond the realm of the physical and into the metaphysical. You can even see how the older Erdtree holy symbols were organic, making use of tree imagery, while the Golden Order Fundamentalist symbols are more geometric and less representational.

What if Radagon's influence on the Golden Order was a reaction to some catastrophe? What if it was the destruction of the Erdtree, the centerpiece to Marika's religious order, and the very boon that she granted to people that legitimized her as a god, required a radical redefinition about what faith in Marika actually meant.

Now, where within all of this the Night of Black Knives, the removal of the Rune of Death, the Shattering all take place is something I can't really say for certain (I've generally assumed the Shattering was a reaction to the Night of Black Knives, but that means it'd have to have been after the removal of the Rune of Death because the Black Knife Assassins needed that rune to do what they did... I think? Boy, what does it even mean for Maliketh to be guarding the rune in Farum Azula when bits of it are in Ranni and Godwyn's bodies?)

I'd argued earlier that Melina's total lack of fear in being the kindling for the Erdtree might actually be because her spirit won't be destroyed if she does so. It's not the Flame of Frenzy. Though, what's weird is that in the Lord of Frenzied Flame ending, Melina does appear, looking like he hair is singed by the fire, and seems to physically exist, which is... boy not even sure what to do with that.

Marika went on a war to conquer the Lands Between while Godfrey was her lord, and I believe the final battle was agains the Fire Giants, which led to a massacre not unlike that of the Hornsent.

Marika's animosity toward the Hornsent isn't hard to understand, given what was done to her people (and I think probably done to her as well - I think she's the "successful" Jar-Saint that the Hornsent were trying to make, and I guess it didn't occur to them that doing so would make an incredibly powerful individual who would hate you with a burning passion).

And you know what, this might also kind of explain her attitude toward death. The Hornsent were obsessed with spirits - with ghosts - and Marika built her entire Golden Order around the idea that no one would permanently die. You die, your body and soul are recycled through the Erdtree, returning to life as a real, living, breathing person, not some ghostly spirit.

But that's no longer possible when the Erdtree is, itself, a ghost.

It's interesting, because I think Radagon's transformation of the Golden Order is an allegory for the development of religious thought in human culture. Theologians over the past couple thousand years have described far more sophisticated and complex and, well, less grounded ideas that are dervied from ancient religions. I don't mean to say that ancient people weren't sophisticated, but there's a kind of rabbit hole of subtle distinctions that lead people into holy wars with one another, or having people executed for heresy, where if you're not well-versed in the intricacies of the theology, you might be confused as to why these people are even in conflict.

In other words, this kind of sophistication isn't necessarily progressive, and I think it's pretty strongly implied that the Golden Order under Godfrey was probably a lot better to live under than it was under Radagon (though maybe not so great for the people in the process of being conquered - like... better, but not necessarily good).

It's ironic, though, that Marika sought to build a world grounded in the physical reality, the familiar, living world, but her Order was then turned into this cerebral, abstract thing.

Is this the reason she decided to tear it all down?

Marika's motivations are one of the biggest enigmas in the game. While Melina is able to quote her at various churches, we never actually hear her or Radagon speak (let's just set aside the question of whether Radagon was ever his own fully independent person or not, or if he was always just Marika's male aspect).

When we make it to the interior of the Erdtree (which I didn't clock until someone online pointed it out, but we actually seem to start there in the opening cutscene before showing up at the Chapel of Anticipation) we see Marika crucified on a Rune Arc, with a massive lance the red color of the Rune of Death impaling her (very Spear of Longinus-coded).

Who did this to her? Truly, I have no clue. I doubt it was Radagon, as this imprisoned him just as much as it imprisoned her.

Still, I think that there's this interesting tension: the Fundamentalist version of the Golden Order might be totally antithetical to her original vision. But then, it also seems that she and Radagon, despite sharing the same body, are also at odds with one another.

Last little note:

Given these affiliations, it might be ironic, then, that Marika's Scarseal and Soreseal boost "mental" stats like Intelligence, Faith, and Mind, while Radagon's Scarseal and Soreseal boost physical stats like Strength, Dexterity, and Endurance, as you'd think they would be opposites. Maybe, and this is kind of a shot in the dark, but maybe it's that these are the qualities that they lack, rather than what they posses and grant?

Speculating on the Demon Hunter in D&D

 The Demon Hunter was introduced ten years ago as a playable class in World of Warcraft with the Legion expansion. Established in the lore in Warcraft III way back in 2002, the original Demon Hunter was the Night Elf Illidan Stormrage, who was actually twin brothers with Malfurion Stormrage, the first Druid. Illidan had begun his career as a Mage (basically Warcraft's version of a Wizard). While not Highborne (the ruling caste of the Night Elf society, under Queen Azshara, the most powerful mage in the world,) he consorted with their ranks thanks to his aptitude for arcane magic.

When Azshara was contacted by the Dark Titan Sargeras, the fallen god-like being who created the demonic Burning Legion in an effort to burn the universe to prevent the eldritch power of the Void from claiming it, she decided she had finally found a worthy partner to rule alongside her, and opened the way for the Legion to invade Azeroth.

While Malfurion and his and Illidan's childhood friend/the woman they were both in love with, Tyrande Whisperwind, led a resistance against the invading Legion, Illidan feigned loyalty to Azshara in order to learn all he could about the demons, ultimately learning how to use their Fel magic. Granted communion with Sargeras himself, the Dark Titan showed him such awesome terrors that the fel power burned Illidan's eyes out, but granted him a second sight.

While Illidan fought the Legion behind the scenes, his methods were extreme, and after the Legion was defeated, he was imprisoned for his demonic consorting. And that imprisonment lasted for ten thousand years. (It's notable that elves naturally over a thousand years in Azeroth, but the Night Elves in particular were blessed with immortality for those ten thousand years, so none of them aged in all of that time).

When the Legion returned (in the events of Warcraft III) Tyrande grew desperate for those with the knowledge of how to combat them, and raided the vault where Illidan was kept, releasing him. Illidan took his fight to the Legion, and consumed the poweran artifact called the Skull of Gul'dan (Gul'dan being a powerful and very dead orc warlock who died in Warcraft II). Doing so gave him the power to defeat Tichondrius, one of the most powerful Dreadlord demons, but transformed Illidan into a half-demon.

Later, Illidan left in exile to Outland (the shattered fragments of the Orc homeworld of Draenor) and gathered up loyal Night Elves and Blood Elves to train them in his ways. Playable Demon Hunters in WoW are members of this group, the Illidari.

In gameplay, Demon Hunters wear Leather (the equivalent of Light armor, if you consider "no armor" to be the equivalent of those who wear Cloth) and all dual-wield weapons. Until the current expansion, they only had two specializations (basically subclasses,) Havoc and Vengeance. Havoc was the damage-focused one while Vengeance was the tanking one. The new expansion added Devourer, which uses void magic instead of fel magic, and is more of a (very mobile) ranged spellcaster, though unlike all other spellcasters, they also dual-wield weapons.

Ok, all that background aside:

How do we make this into a Ranger subclass?

First off, we need to strip this down to its iconic essentials. That means probably making it feel more like the Havoc spec than the other two, which I consider the most "quintessential" Demon Hunter spec.

I actually think the Ranger does make decent sense as the chassis upon which the Demon Hunter is built, even if the class itself can sometimes struggle. I also wonder if the subclass is going to be flexible enough to allow for a ranged version. (In WoW, Rogues are all dual-wielding melee damage dealers, so it was honestly kind of weird when I first saw D&D Rogues using shortbows).

Naturally, as a Ranger, the Demon Hunter is going to primarily be making weapon attacks. I imagine, like the Hollow Warden, we might see some mechanics that nudge you toward playing in melee. One such thing might be Immolation Aura.

This is an ability in WoW that causes the Demon Hunter to deal pulsing fire damage to every nearby creature for a few seconds (it also generates Fury, their resource, though we're sure not to carry that over in D&D). Now, this could, for sure, just be a spell that they get, but if it's on the subclass spell list, it'd probably push them a little toward melee.

The next thing to consider is their eyes.

Like Illidan, all Demon Hunters have to, as part of their initiation, gouge their eyes out. The Fel magic they take into themselves lets them sense the world around them. In gameplay, this is really just cosmetic, but you get an ability called Spectral Sight that allows you to see invisible creatures and sense creatures and treasures through walls for a few seconds.

I think it would be cool if the subclass gave you Blindsight out to a short range at level 3 - like 10 feet, but that maybe at higher levels (14, or whatever the Ranger subclass capstone is) you'd get to make that into Truesight with perhaps a larger range for a certain amount of time some reasonable number of times per long rest.

One thing all Demon Hunters get is Metamorphosis - while they have demonic features like horns and cracked skin all the time, they can sometimes turn into hulking demons (this is your major "cooldown" ability in WoW, though Devourer does it a bit differently). Now, this could be a spell (probably at a higher level) but I could also very much see this being the main capstone feature for the subclass. The transformation might allow you to make more attacks, or add damage to the attacks you do, and/or perhaps give you some defensive benefits.

Eye Beam is one of the most iconic Havoc-specific abilities, where you shoot a beam of fel energy out in front of you. It's almost exactly a line-shaped spell. I think this could be done as a spell, or it might be a subclass feature.

Fel Rush is another ability you get early on, which shoots you forward and deals some damage to any enemies you pass through. I think this could be done either as a low-level spell (maybe 1st or 2nd level) or, if it's a subclass feature, maybe you get this at level 3 and get to use it, like, Wis mod times per long rest (or short rest, if they're feeling generous).

The only reason I'd find it unlikely a lot of these are made into spells is that it would be weird to see a Beast Master using spells like them. Might they be classified as Warlock spells that are then on the subclass-specific spell list? Perhaps.

We haven't seen a UA for this (indeed, other than the revamped/returning subclasses, I don't think we've gotten a playtest version of any of the brand new ones, unless that Oathbreaker one was sneakily the Oath of the Ebon Blade,) so we'll probably have to wait until November (or at least until we get the next season of Dungeon Masters) to really get a sense of how it will work.

Iconic Warcraft Monsters to Port into D&D

 Yeah, I know, I'm a sucker.

Like the Final Fantasy set for Magic the Gathering (which came out not long after my playthrough of all six Pixel Remasters, so I was pretty caught up on old-school FF lore,) my general distaste for corporate synergy has been overcome by a deep-rooted affection for the Warcraft universe and so I'm actually pretty hyped about the upcoming WoW/D&D sourcebook.

There's a ton to imagine - including a rather extensive list of subclasses (I don't think we're getting subclasses for quite all the classes, but I think it'll be the most subclasses in a single book since the Player's Handbook, and setting that aside, probably since Tasha's).

But I figured we could be relatively concise here and instead imagine what monsters we might see included.

The total number of monsters listed is 50 "monsters" and 30 "dungeon bosses." I'm assuming that the latter will be legendary creatures (will they be specifically from the dungeons being re-created for D&D? I think probably a lot of the boss fights in those dungeons will be dealt with as more standard encounters, which hopefully frees up iconic bosses from other eras of WoW).

50 Monsters is still a fair number, even setting aside those dungeon bosses.

The book is said to touch on all the eras of WoW from its launch in 2004 to the current Midnight expansion (the 12.0 version of the game, meaning the eleventh expansion). If we figure a good 10 at least are going to be perennial creatures that are found in nearly every expansion, that leaves 40 to spread out across those 11 expansions (if we imagine Vanilla was sort of home to the "standard" creatures). So, roughly four per expansion, which isn't enormous (though there might be some crossover).

I'll group those "perennial" monsters in with Vanilla. I don't promise to make a comprehensive 50-monster list, but it might not be that hard to do.

    Vanilla:

Murlocs:

Unofficial mascots of the series, Murlocs are fish-people who, yes, bear a bit of a resemblance to Kuo-Toa, but are kind of more colorful and... well, I wouldn't say they're goofier, but maybe goofy in a different way.

Abominations:

Most of the Undead Scourge can be handled with existing Undead stat blocks that already exist in D&D. Abominations are ostensibly Flesh Golems, but they're definitely either Large or Huge size and they very specifically have hooked chains they use to reel in foes.

Satyrs:

Yes, Satyrs exist in D&D, but they're very different. In WoW, Satyrs are demons that used to be Night Elves. They're somewhat unique among demons, though, as they tend not to be loyal to the Burning Legion (omnicidal high-tech demonic space army bent on burning the cosmos to a cinder) but are instead tied to the Emerald Nightmare, which seeks to corrupt the natural world with the influence of the Old Gods (think Great Old Ones).

Quillboars:

Standard common humanoid enemies, Quillboars are kind of pig-people who also have porcupine spines for some reason, and don't seem inherently evil so much as just aggressive.

Two-Headed Ogre Mages:

Ogres in WoW are a bit weird, because for the most part, they're the same big dumb brutes they are in D&D, but they also have a history of having a sort of vaguely Roman-coded empire with a strong tradition of arcane magic, which is most often the practice of two-headed ogres (maybe having two heads makes them smart enough?)

Naga:

The Naga are a common recurring threat: former Night Elves who would have been drowned during the Sundering ten thousand years ago (in which most of the world's surface was flooded) if Queen Azshara (the powerful and vain mage-queen of the Night Elves at the time, who had kind of opened the door to a demonic invasion by the Burning Legion) hadn't made a deal with the Old God N'zoth. Now, they're aquatic, serpentine people who are ruthless and vast in number, still serving their queen.

Keepers of the Grove/Dryads:

I think these are really basically the same species, but the males are called Keepers of the Grove while the females are called Dryads. Unlike D&D Dryads, these are kind of "deer centaur," and it was actually the union of one of them with an Earth Elemental that birthed the centaurs. Again, often affiliated with the Night Elves.

Drakonids:

Giant humanoid dragonkin, the Drakonids were created by the dragons to serve and protect them. Not to be confused with the Dracthyr, though Drakonids weirdly look more like D&D's Dragonborn.

Troggs:

Honestly, these could probably be covered by Grimlocks, but they're just different enough that I would maybe need something different.

Dragonspawn:

Very much like the Drakonids, these were created by the Dragons to serve them. Dragonspawn are... kind of "dragon centaurs."

Dreadlords:

Also known as the Natrhezim, these demons are the ultimate infiltrators (in a bit of lore that they almost seem to be backpedaling away from, they were even revealed to have not originally been demons, and infiltrated the Burning Legion). In many ways the classic demon-looking demons (kind of like a D&D Horned Devil).

    Burning Crusade:

Man'ari Eredar:

The corrupted Eredar from whom the Draenei split, the Man'ari are among the most powerful demons in the Burning Legion (while the Legion was ultimately led by the Dark Titan Sargeras, it was the Eredar Kil'jaeden and Archimonde who really ran its day-to-day operations.

Ethereals:

Former humanoids whose physical bodies were lost in an effort to defeat the Void Lord who invaded their home world of K'aresh, the Ethereals hold their form with magically-treated bandages, under which you can see the glowing essence of their spirits.

Fel Reaver:

Among the most terrifying constructs created by the Burning Legion, a giant mech, essentially.

Arrakoa:

Yeah, not Aaracokra, though if they sound similar, that's probably not a coincidence, as they're also bird people. At least in Outland (the present day version of the world that was once Draenor,) the only surviving Arrakoa are whose who were infected by the shadowy power of Sethe, and lost their wings and walk hunched and twisted. They have become practitioners of shadowy magic.

Broken:

Members of the Draenei who were afflicted by a curse (actually related to that of the Arrakoa) that has cut them off from The Light and broken their bodies, but are still part of Draenei society.

Naaru:

Celestial beings that look like giant crystal structures and are sort of the primary "entities" of the Light. While in theory it's extremely rare, players of WoW have often witnessed Naaru falling into their Dark/Void versions.

    Wrath of the Lich King:

Vrykul:

The viking-like giants and ancestors of humanity were originally Titan constructs before they were transformed by the Curse of Flesh. In Wrath, their ancient king was taken out of stasis by the Scourge and he led his people into an alliance with the Lich King.

Faceless Ones/N'raqi:

Towering tentacle-faced creations of the Old Gods, the Faceless Ones sow madness wherever they go.

Taunka:

Bison-like off-shoots of the Tauren people native to Northrend, the Taunka join up with the Horde, but they're a little less focused on harmony with nature than the Tauren.

Wolvar:

Wolverine-people!

Tuskarr:

Walrus people!

Var'ghul:

Undead vrykul who failed to become the elite Ymirjar and now serve the Lich King in death.

    Cataclysm:

Twilight Dragons:

One of Deathwing's experimental draconic hybrids, these dragons are linked to a mysterious "twilight realm," and are basically all crazy.

Stone Worms:

Earth Elementals that look like a series of gem-encrusted stone rings.

Earthen:

They actually show up in Vanilla, and they'll be playable, but we might get some stat blocks as well. The pre-Curse of Flesh version of the Dwarves. (They're actually quite central to The War Within).

Merciless Ones:

Aberrations that look like floating octopuses and latch onto peoples' heads to mind-control them.

    Mists of Pandaria:

Mogu:

Tyrannical ancient rulers of Pandaria who managed to reverse the Curse of Flesh to return to their original stone forms and wish to re-conquer the continent and subjugate all its people.

Hozen:

Monkey-folk who get swept into fighting the Alliance in the name of the Horde.

Jinyu:

Fish-folk who get swepet into fighting the Horde in the name of the Alliance:

Sha:

Monstrous spirits born from the dying curse of the Old God Y'shaarj who thrive on negative emotions and help spread those feelings.

Virmen:

Crazed rabbit-people who like to steal things and destroy farms.

Grummles:

Delightful mountain-folk who are vaguely ground-hog like.

    Warlords of Draenor:

Botani:

Vicious plant-people who seek to spread and take over everything, feeding on animal life.

Ogrons:

Cyclopean ancestors to the Ogres (who are themselves ancestors to the Orcs).

Gronn:

Cyclopean ancestors to the Ogrons.

High Arrakoa:

Warlords of Draenor takes place in an alternate timeline that's also displaced by 35 years, and these are the Arrakoa as they were before the curse of Sethe, who are pretty nasty and persecute those who have been cursed.

    Legion:

Drogbar: 

Subterranean ogre-like/troll-like people.

Withered:

Nightborne elves past the point of no return in withdrawal from lack of arcane magic, turned mindless.

Valarjar:

Vrykul warriors chosen after death to be given new metallic bodies in service to the Titanforged Keeper Odyn.

Inquisitors:

Among the many demons of the Burning Legion, these eyeless, floating demons are often accompanied by several floating eye-demons. Honestly, there are a ton of Burning Legion demons to go with, and we might start off with more perennial ones like Felguards, Infernals, and Doomguards, while we might be able to just reskin Hell Hounds as Felhounds.

Storm Dragons:

Existing outside of the five standard dragonflights, the Storm Dragons of the Broken Isles might be able to just be re-skinned Bronze or Blue dragons, but we'll see.

    Battle For Azeroth:

Drustvar Witch:

The witches of Drustvar are... it's not clear if they're actually human (maybe former humans). Their constructs might simply use something like Scarecrows. Though to be fair, they could also just be treated like Hags.

K'thir:

Well, the funny thing is that these could easily just be Mind Flayers, as they look exactly like them. Still, these more humanoid-like servants of the Old Gods feel like a possibility.

Sethrak:

Snake-people of the desert of Vol'dun.

Aqir:

Aberrant sapient insectoids who were created by the Old Gods.

    Shadowlands:

Kyrians:

Angelic beings of the realm of Bastion, the afterlife for those who dedicated their lives to the service of others.

Venthyr:

Vampire-like beings of the realm of Revendreth, the gothic purgatory of the Shadowlands.

Sylvar:

One of the fey species of the Night Fae in the nature-tied afterlife of Ardenweald.

Brokers:

Mysterious soul-traders that travel the Shadowlands, revealed recently to actually be another group of people from K'aresh, and are essentially the same as the Ethereals but with different containment suits.

Devourers:

Void beings that have broken into the Shadowlands to devour souls.

    Dragonflight:

Primal Dragons:

Dragons that are more elemental-like than reptilian, who rejected the transformation that the Titans gave to the original five Dragon Aspects.

Djaradin:

Giantkin who have long warred with the Dragons.

Niffen:

Underground mole-like people.

Infinite Dragons:

Warped versions of the Bronze Dragonflight. The Bronze Dragons were made guardians of the timeline, while the Infinite Dragons seek to create and explore infinite branching timelines. (Presented initially as chaotic evil, they're now kind of chill.)

    War Within:

Kobyss:

Humanoid kind of angler-fish people who seem totally insane, use necromancy, and rise from the depths to attack surface-dwellers.

"Ascended" Nerubians:

Certain Nerubians were remade with the void powers of Xal'atath to weirdly become more humanoid in appearance.

Scarab Lords:

I mean, we've touched on Nerubians before, but their giant Scarab-Lords would certainly warrant a stat block (and they showed up as early as Vanilla, if not WCIII).

Big Kobolds:

I can't recall if they're actually called Swolbolds, or if that was just a Tome of Beasts entry. Notably, Kobolds in WoW are more like rat-people, who have a cultural obsession with candles (important when you live underground and need to ward off creatures of darkness). Kobolds in WoW like to wear candles on top of their heads.

    Midnight:

Petalwings:

Well, there's a lot of creatures from Harandar that look like beasts but are actually plants. Petalwings are bird-plants.

Dominaar:

Beings from the world now simply known as the Void Storm, the Dominaar are treacherous and radical individualists, treating every relationship as one that is transactional and due eventually to end in one betraying the other.

Ultradons:

Bipedal beasts who seem to be the apex predators of the Void Storm, infused with the selfish, hungering essence of the void.

Pangolil:

Large pangolin-like creatures from the forested Troll nation of Zul'Aman.

Blood Elf Crystal Defenders:

The Blood Elves have long had arcane constructs that defend Silvermoon and Quel'thalas in general.

    Conclusion:

So, this is actually a bit tough, overall. WoW does tend to focus on villainous factions, so a lot of the things we fight are actually humanoids. I've generally skipped over a lot of those, figuring they can be handled by normal humanoid stat blocks, but the truth is that we'll probably get a fair number of WoW-specific humanoids among those 50 monsters.

I'm also sure I've left out some really iconic ones here, focused on doing a relatively even spread between expansions. In all likelihood, I imagine we'll probably get more stuff from the more popular expansions, like Wrath and Legion.

Anyway, it'll be interesting to see.

Scaring Your Players With Higher-CR Monsters

 Two caveats:

First off, the campaign I'm currently running is at level 19. The players have fought the Tarrasque and killed it (half the party was unconscious at the end of the fight, so I kept my pride). There is nothing that is too high in terms of CR for them to face, so this isn't something I can do in this campaign anymore.

Second, I find it really hard, like, on an emotional level, to stray much from the guidance on combat encounter difficulty. I take great care to ensure that my players always face reasonable challenges, even if they might be tuned "hard," which, in the 5.5 DMG, does actually make for some pretty tough fights.

And yet...

So, I often see DMs, such as Brennan Lee Mulligan when running Critical Role's Campaign 4, or when he did Dimension 20's A Crown of Candy, talk about intentionally not balancing fights for the players' levels. The idea here is that the world sort of exists beyond the player characters, and it's up to them to ensure they survive it.

I think this makes a certain amount of sense, but notably it always seems to be invoked when the players are low-level. If I took this attitude toward my design for my level 19 party, even a plane as nightmarishly deadly as New Phyrexia (where they currently are) would still probably be trivially easy for them to manage except, possibly, when facing the Praetors (to be fair, I have basically designed the adventure as focusing mostly on boss fights with these characters, as I don't want them to be stuck at level 19 for more than a year, which I think was the case for levels 17 and 18).

But let's turn things around again:

Here's the thing: while there is resurrection magic in D&D (though notably, in both the campaigns I mentioned run by Mulligan, they're not allowed to use resurrection magic,) PC death should feel fair. In-world, of course, it need not feel fair - a tyrannical regime or deadly monster killing someone needn't feel fair, but it shouldn't feel unfair to the players at the table.

After all, as a DM, especially at lower levels, it's trivial to kill your PCs. Throw an ancient dragon at a level 3 party and they'll probably all die to the first breath weapon (even if they succeed on their saves).

However, there's a downside to making sure every combat encounter is fairly balanced: by the time you face a monster, you're ready to fight it, meaning that it never really gets to impose a sense of terror and dread.

I think my affection for Death Knights as monsters is well-documented here (I also love the WoW class). I think the most direct, clear example of a Death Knight in fantasy pop culture are the Ringwraiths from Lord of the Rings. They're undead, or the kind of Tolkien equivalent (they lived far, far longer than they should have, and their spirits remained even as their bodies withered away into nothing) and were basically noble lords who allowed this desire for immortality to corrupt them (I'm generally against the idea of death, disagreeing with the "death gives live meaning" rhetoric, but I sure don't want to live in a world in which asshole oligarchs like Elon Musk live forever).

Anyway, I also like Death Knights because they work really well as the kind of figure who could move about in society and not immediately draw attention to themselves. The Riders in Black who show up in the Shire asking about someone named Baggins certainly freak the hell out of the people they meet, but there's just enough plausible deniability to imagine that they're just, you know, creepy dudes and not ancient undead terrors.

So, the first really obvious way to use a high-level monster to scare a low-level party is just to use them as an NPC. Combat, of course, is just one of three pillars in D&D, and while it's the one that has the clearest and most extensive rules, it's not what the game needs to always center around.

Not every monster just kills everything it sees. Especially in the case of intelligent monsters, they probably have an agenda.

Let's concoct a scenario:

A, say, 2nd level party has gotten a quest to deal with a gang of bandits who robbed a caravan. It's a sort of secondary detail that the caravan they hit was bringing some artifacts from a ruined temple to a museum in the big city. The message the party gets is that this is just one of many robberies attributed to this particular gang, and it's a standard bounty quest.

The party shows up at the bandit's hideout, maybe an old ruined fort in the woods. When the party arrives, something's off. First, they find one of the bandits dead on the ground, a giant wound through their torso and into a blood-stained tree, and that the tree itself looks a bit withered where the weapon pierced it.

They arrive at the hideout, and find that there are bandits guarding the entrance, but they're not facing outward - they're distracted by something going on inside. Maybe this gives the party a chance to get the drop on them, or maybe they try to engage with them socially. The bandits, panicked, are probably hostile and still likely to fight. Maybe in the middle of a fight, a previously-unseen bandit emerges, seeming to be there to join the fight, but instead just screams at the top of their lungs and runs out into the woods.

In the middle of combat, there's an explosion: a Hellfire Orb has detonated elsewhere in the fort, and the fortress' roof is now burning with strange fire (maybe green, maybe blue - something otherworldly).

At this point, the bandits are probably going to just run for their lives. The party may consider doing so as well, and if that's the case, well, you've made your point.

But if the party's curiosity gets the better of their sense of self-preservation, they might go into the fort to try to recover the artifacts.

There, you can describe a scene of slaughter. If the bandit encounter was tuned to be a reasonable challenge, the party finds twice as many bandits all dead, the floor slick with blood. If the bandits have some bruisers with them, like an Ogre, maybe there's an Ogre who looks like they were slammed onto a shard of wood and impaled, making it very clear that a monster that would have been pretty serious for them is trivial to whatever has done this.

The party goes further into the fort. Maybe they find a survivor who is just hiding and can fill them in: that a knight in black armor they had never seen before came in and attacked without warning. Maybe they follow the trail of destruction down into the fort's basement, where the artifacts were being kept.

There, they behold the Death Knight (could be a Death Knight Aspirant - still high-enough CR to demolish a level 2 party) who is singularly focused on going through the artifacts. The Death Knight ignores them, and if they just stand and watch, the knight finally finds what they're looking for - an ancient stone key or something - and, if the party remains non-hostile, the Death Knight just pushes past them and leaves the fort.

Now, if you feel like you really want to hammer home just how deadly they are, here's another trick: the Death Knight isn't done with their slaughter yet - the bandits' leader, a Bandit Captain, is facing off with the Death Knight. The party might come in mid-battle, so the Bandit Captain has already taken a hit, and so they come in just as the Death Knight hits them with a lethal attack - make the attack roll, and roll the damage, and declare it all so the party knows precisely how much damage this guy does.

Let's consider various scenarios:

If the party tries to speak to the Death Knight, they might just remain silent, not interested in engaging with the party, because they're singularly focused on their mission, or perhaps provide only a gruff response.

If the party attacks the Death Knight, at this point, I think you have license to punish them. The first character to attack (maybe not in initiative, but the first one to suggest attacking) should be the Death Knight's target. Put them down - maybe don't coup-de-grace them, but consider that a Death Knight Aspirant hits with a single attack for 24 damage, which will likely drop most 2nd level characters in a single hit (even a Barbarian with a +3 Con will typically have 25 HP, so maybe two hits).

If the party leaves the Death Knight be after this, maybe only tending to the downed party member, the message is clearly delivered.

If the entire party attacks the Death Knight? Well, I think this is where you might need to get creative. On a certain level, this is a TPK the party has well and truly purchased with their actions. But if you don't want the entire campaign to be derailed, here's another option:

The Death Knight goes to strike, but pauses, looks up at the beams holding up the ceiling, the crackling fire raging above (remember that the roof was on fire?) and rather than striking the party down, simply pushes past them to leave the fort. Maybe one turn (not round) after they do this, the roof collapses, and while it's a lot of scary damage and a challenge to get out of the burning rubble, you make it a more reasonable thing for 2nd level players to escape. By the time they get out from under it, the Death Knight is gone.

Again, the ultimate fail state of D&D is a TPK. But I think particularly as players have become more interested in the narrative possibilities of the game, a TPK can be an unsatisfying conclusion to a story. It's certainly something you should talk about in a session zero (and later too).

Establishing villains early on is a pretty important way to set the stakes for a more narrative-based campaign. I think that the key to making the game feel reasonable, even if it's not "fair" in the strictest sense, is to really telegraph when the party is dealing with something beyond their means to defeat (and motivate them to get more powerful so that they can!)