First big Shadowlands patch will take us places "unlike anything we've seen or done before in World of Warcraft"

As foretold by yesterday’s leak, Blizzard has revealed details of the first major content update for World of Warcraft: Shadowlands in its Blizzconline streaming event. The patch is called Chains of Domination and will focus on a drive deeper into the Maw, the terrible domain of the Jailer, the mysterious bad guy disrupting the balance of the Shadowlands – Warcraft’s afterlife – and threatening an invasion of all reality with the help of disgraced Horde warchief Sylvanas.

I had a chance to chat to game director Ion Hazzikostas and art director Ely Cannon about Chains of Domination earlier this week. Characterising the thrust of the update, Hazzikostas said: “Now we are beginning a full frontal assault, returning to the Maw, not trying to hide but letting the Jailer know that we’re here… In the process, we’re going to explore a range of epic environments that are unlike anything we’ve seen or done before in World of Warcraft – and learn much more about the nature of death, the nature of the Jailer and the foe that awaits us.”

Shadowlands: Chains of Domination – “Kingsmourne” Watch on YouTube

The Maw has so far been a different, tougher kind of adventuring zone for WOW players: you can’t summon your mount there, you need to avoid the Eye of the Jailer (a kind of alert or ‘wanted’ system) and you drop currency when you die. But the new Maw area added in the patch – Korthia, the City of Secrets – will be, it seems, more relaxed, “blending some of those elements and some of the thematic elements of the Maw with the traditional outdoor gameplay that we have built up over the years,” Hazzikostas said.

Alongside this extension of the main Shadowlands campaign, the four Covenant campaigns will also be continued (and players can earn new Covenant cosmetic armour sets). There’ll be a new 10-boss raid, The Sanctum of Domination, which will offer chances to fight the Tarrague – the terror which hunts down players in the roguelike-style dungeon Torghast – as well as the “true Eye of the Jailer” and Sylvanas herself, in what is being called a “fateful confrontation”. Would this mark an end to the contentious Sylvanas arc that has dominated WOW lore for several years now? Can she be redeemed? Of course, Hazzikostas wouldn’t say, but he indicated that it would be a definitive moment for that character.

Just as exciting, perhaps, is a new eight-boss “mega dungeon” called Tazavesh, the Veiled Market. Venturing into the bazaar of trans-dimensional traders the Brokers, players will go on a “mind-bending” heist that Hazzikostas likened to the legendary Return to Karazhan dungeon – itself a playful remix of the equally legendary Karazhan raid from 2007. “Think of it like a Harry Potter, Gringotts heist inspired dungeon,” he said. “Going into [the Brokers’] dungeon is gonna be a whirlwind tour of reality… it’s not just a single location, right, it’s going to span the reality of Warcraft as we know it.”

As has become tradition, the patch will also allow players to unlock the power of flight in Shadowlands, and it sounds like it will be easier to achieve than in the past, “simply by continuing and completing the campaign, no reputation grinding required this time, just play through the main story,” Hazzikostas said.