Wow. I’m impressed with most patch trailers, but I loved this one. By talking about it, I’m spoiling it, so please watch the trailer before reading.

Okay?

Okay.

Taran Zhu’s back-and-forth with Hellscream was great. They seemed to take turns having the upper-hand. I liked when Taran Zhu brought up Grom Hellscream, although I’m not sure when he learned of Grom. I didn’t catch that he got impaled on Hellscream’s axe on my first watch. I also found it interesting that the trailer opened with butterflies and when the sha energies spread out from the heart of Y’shaarj, it corrupts a butterfly.

I’ve been wondering about something Hellscream said. Taran Zhu says “I have fought besides the tauren, trolls, and others. You are nothing like them.” Hellscream responds, “they are no longer part of my Horde!” Is Hellscream referring to those who are rebelling against him or to all tauren? Up to this point, it seemed like he was still accepting of tauren. He thought of them under orcs, but still felt they contributed. He seemed to consider them much higher than the other races of the horde. Hellscream tolerated the Blood Elves and goblins and largely ignored the pandaren and Forsaken. As far as I can tell, the Darkspear were no longer considered part of his Horde. By the release of patch 5.4, are we to assume that his Horde consists solely of orcs? It seems very plausible that he would have heard that Baine was working with the Darkspear Rebellion, so it wouldn’t be surprising.

The scene in which the navies arrive is also great. When was the last time we saw Horde (well, former Horde at this point) and Alliance forces so intermingled? I found the sails interesting. I see Horde sails, red with the black Horde symbol. The Forsaken are present with their purple sails. I assume both the blue and white sails belong to the Alliance, but I’m actually not positive. (Anyone who plays Alliance care to comment?) I wasn’t sure on black and red striped sails, but YouTube commenters pointed out that those ships belong to the Bloodsail Buccaneers. What are they doing attacking Orgrimmar too? Very interesting!

Blizzard does an amazing job with the story, and it’s in such an odd way as well. There’s really not that much story, and it’s usually not a huge deal in game. They’re excellent at creating background lore to hype people for playing. Escalation’s lore was also great in my opinion. There was a formal declaration of a Darkspear Rebellion led by my own racial leader – much deserved after Garrosh Hellscream declared martial law in the Echo Isles and rounded up the Darkspear in the Valley of Spirits. But in game, it just meant that I farmed Kor’kron in the Northern Barrens. That doesn’t change the fact that I was incredibly excited to be joining the Darkspear Rebellion just as I’m excited to come together with the other armies of Azeroth to bring judgement upon Hellscream.

I can’t wait for the Siege of Orgrimmar.