A review of the WoW Demon Invasion so far

The Demon invasion event is well underway in World Of Warcraft, and some pretty interesting activities are taking place. Let’s have a look at the event so far. What can you get from the event?

There are a number of reasons to involve yourself in the event, most notably the exclusive rewards. One of the major aims of the event is to help max level players gear up for the upcoming expansion. Demon Invasions drop chests with pieces of gear that scale to your character level, with level 100 players receiving i700 gear and a possible chance to automatically upgrade to i710. Some chests will also contain Fel crystals, which can be used to permanently increase the i-level of Fel weapons by 5 permanently, up to a maximum of 725. Participating in these events also nets you a small amount of Nethershard, a special demonic currency. Whilst you may only get a few Nethershard per kill, it adds up very quickly. You can visit special vendors at Illidari camps and purchase various event exclusive transmog gear and even the limited edition Felbat Pup pet. An exclusive toy is also available.

Demon invasions - These are what you’ll be spending most of your time doing during the event. Invasions are massive, zone wide PVE events that involve taking on waves of demonic foes. There are three stages to each Invasion. The first stage sees you clearing a large amount of mobs until a meter fills up, and the second has you tackle two large demons and then a huge commander. The third is perhaps the most interesting stage as you have to move around the zone taking down Legion structures and disposing of elite mobs. All of the creatures scale to your character level, so anyone above level 10 can join in, but the elite mobs can deal devastating blows regardless, so it’s crucial that everyone works together to tackle the threats. Once you’ve again dealt with enough enemies to make a meter reach 100%, the final boss will spawn at the initial invasion site, and every single player involved has to band together to take it down. Invasions appear in semi-random locations, two at a time. They refresh every 4 hours, so you can complete the two available and then come back and take part in more a few hours later. Legion Invasions are certainly impressive at first, but quickly become tiresome and repetitive. They’re certainly not awful, but I can see them becoming slightly offensive after doing them on repeat for two weeks. Scenarios -

There are a few event exclusive scenarios players can take part in during the event. I’ve experienced two so far; a quest on The Broken Shore involving group combat and single player adventure through Karazhan. Both have been incredibly story driven and a real treat to experience. Without spoiling anything, there are some things that happen that will change the landscape of the lore forever. Both scenarios offered varied game-play elements, not just the standard ‘go there, kill that’ questing. I was riding around in a tank at one point and re-programming sentry drones another. Completing these scenarios also nets you limited edition gear, but they don’t seem to be nearly as powerful as the gear dropped at max level through the invasions.

Dalaran -

Perhaps the most annoying part of the Invasion is what’s happening with Dalaran. There are two major issues, but I’ll need to explain what’s actually happening first. Dalaran has moved, it’s no longer housed above Northrend and is currently floating above the tower of Karazhan. It’s only here temporarily mind you, with it moving permanently to the Broken isles with the release of Legion proper. The first major issue is the location. This is irrelevant of whether or not the city is positioned in Deadwind Pass or in the Broken Isles, the issue is that it’s no longer in Northrend. This is going to make visiting old content considerably frustrating. There is no longer a direct portal to Northrend, so running ICC, Ulduar and all of the other dungeons and raids in the area, not to mention camping for the illustrious Time-Lost Proto-Drake is going to be far more time consuming, and we’ll no longer have the convenience of Dalaran as a central hub for the continent and all of the services it offers. This also leaves Northrend without a major city, so we can only hope that a future patch brings something new to replace it. The other major issue, whilst only a temporary one, is that for story reasons none of Dalaran’s services are available at this time. There are certain things you can only do in Dalaran, and as of logging in yesterday all of the shops are shut and NPCs scattered.

Believe me when I say that I really am enjoying the Demon Invasion, and as a one-time event I think it’s a great idea, but there are certain aspects that could have been polished a little more. Regardless of anything negative I have to say about it so far, I’d highly recommend checking it out whilst you can, even if only for the exclusive pet. Better yet, it doesn’t even require the purchase of Legion to take part in. Addendum -

After writing this article I logged on again to explore Northrend only to find that the ‘old’ Dalaran was still there. This however is not clearly signposted, and all official new and press releases I have seen suggest that it is no longer there. Convenient? Perhaps, but in such a narratively driven event is it really ideal to lose artistic integrity by having two instances of the same city? Make of that what you will.