Embers of Neltharion, the upcoming World of Warcraft content patch, is merely a few weeks away, and Blizzard has prepared the next batch of Twitch drops for players to obtain in celebration of its release. A trend that many companies have recently picked up, Twitch drops serve as a way for games to receive even bigger exposure on Twitch, rewarding fans with exclusive rewards for tuning in to usually watch a preview of upcoming titles or updates. Blizzard especially has embraced Twitch drops for Overwatch 2 and World of Warcraft, though the implementation had some growing pains along the way.
Namely, many exclusive World of Warcraft TCG items became Twitch drops, previously considered somewhat of a luxury among player circles. While Blizzard has not backed down from using rewards from the Trading Card Game, Ion Hazzikostas has reassured players that the highly-coveted Spectral Tiger would retain its exclusivity.
This time around, World of Warcraft players can expect to earn the Ethereal Portal by tuning in for at least four hours of any Dragonflight content on any Twitch channel from May 2 to May 9. The more lucrative reward (valued at $1,000 in the TCG community) is the Blazing Hippogryph, which players can obtain in the next Twitch drops phase, starting from May 10, and lasting till May 17. It's important to remember that the rewards have to be redeemed within a week after being claimed, as they will otherwise expire from one's Twitch inventory.
With Embers of Neltharion releasing on May 2, and Dragonflight Season 2 commencing on May 9, the Twitch drops announced by Blizzard are perfectly in sync with all the major unlocks related to Patch 10.1. The latest World of Warcraft content update offers a sprawling new zone in Zaralek Cavern, situated directly underneath the Dragon Isles, and offering the entrance to the new Aberrus raid instance. Mythic Keystones are seeing major changes in Embers of Neltharion as well, with Season 2 removing seasonal affixes for the first time since Battle for Azeroth established them.
In terms of quality-of-life changes, Embers of Neltharion is introducing cross-faction guilds to World of Warcraft, further blurring the line between the Horde and Alliance in a way players have been hoping for since Legion. While the Alliance still suffers from a lack of people, cross-faction guilds will allow fans to not get punished by playing their favorite race, and hopefully will let the population disparity stabilize and shrink in the long term. Needless to say, players are excited about Dragonflight's overall direction, and they will be able to experience its next chapter firsthand on May 2.
World of Warcraft is available now for PC.
Source: World of Warcraft