The long-awaited XP boost in WoW TBC Classic is now available! But he’s not with us yet… Source: Blizzard

“Stay tuned!” – With these words, Blizzard tried to appease the WoW Classic community, which after the announcement of the Wind of Wisdom XP benefit for Retail World of Warcraft, of course, is also looking for a bonus. It was quickly conflated that the “compensation” for the Classic TBC endgame will be the “Joyous Journeys” event, which was announced some time ago and during which all characters will also receive 50 percent more experience from all sources.

There has been a lot of discussion and speculation over the past few days and weeks about when Blizzard’s Classic XP buff will go live on Classic realms. The start of the Classic WoW XP event is particularly important not only to satisfy the community, but also because community manager Kaivax in a blue post linked the start of Joyous Journeys directly to the release of the next classic expansion that brought Wrath of the Lich King. More on that in a moment.

Joyous Journeys is live! – At least in Oceania

The wait for the XP buff in TBC Classic and with it the chance to level up characters effectively and quickly before the next release of WotLK Classic is almost over. Those who play WoW Classic on realms in the Oceania region have been able to benefit for a few hours, because Joyous Journeys is already active there and can be found in players’ perk bars.

Everyone else still has to be patient, but the time until the start of the event now seems extremely manageable. In all likelihood, the 50 percent experience bonus will go live in Europe no later than Wednesday with the mandatory server reset, but maybe even sooner. This is not an official announcement from Blizzard yet, but anything else would be very surprising.

With any luck, the XP buff will even start with us today, in case the early activation is due to the time difference. After all, Australia is eight hours ahead of Germany, for example.

WotLK Released: No More Calculations Needed?

Blizzard may have hesitated before starting the event because the developer and publisher talked about a six to eight week period in the Joyous Journeys announcement, during which the bonus should remain active. Also, it was revealed that the event should go directly to the release of Classic WotLK.

After activation, it is theoretically possible for enthusiasts to calculate a rough launch period for the extension. In all likelihood, this will no longer be necessary, as Blizzard itself leaked the WotLK Classic release date a few days ago. The game’s official home page said “The Lich King returns September 26, 2022” for a short time. Although this was quickly removed again, the date of September 26 seems to be very realistic.

WoW Classic: WotLK Launch is Official! – Starts in September

Some experts and parts of the community were already expecting a release in September. This is mainly due to the fact that Blizzard’s fourth quarter is already peppered with two major releases: both Overwatch 2 and WoW’s retail expansion Dragonflight appear during this period. From a publisher’s point of view, it would be counterproductive to schedule a third major release in the last three months of the year. Instead, one should strive to be able to significantly improve the numbers again in Q3, which a WotLK Classic release can definitely achieve.

The date also lines up nicely with the start of this week’s XP boost, as September 26th is eight weeks away and July 27th is a few days away, when Joyous Journeys are expected to be live on the realms of the EU at the latest.

Big change also in August

Additionally, we know that Blizzard plans to make significant preparations in August, which could indicate a possible early patch. in one another blue post Kaivax revealed on June 7 that several TBC Classic realms are scheduled to merge for the August 9 maintenance.

Having already offered free server transfers to help maintain healthy populations, consolidations are another step in protecting players from dying servers. Almost empty realms will be dissolved and the remaining characters will be transferred to classic realms with a larger number of players.

The following servers are affected:

• anathema
• Bigglesworth
• Blaumeux
• devious delight
• fairbanks
• rock trike
• heart finder
• Herod
• Fires
• Kirtoños
• kromcrush
• kurinnaxx
• I hateb
• abyssal wind
• rattle
• reapers
• wax
• smolderweb
• estalagg
• Sul’thraze
• Thalnos
• raging thunder

From a purely organizational and practical point of view, the dissolution of these kingdoms could well go hand in hand with a previous patch. Blizzard has not yet given an official statement on the matter.

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