Justin Wagner
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It’s long been a running joke in the World of Warcraft Classic community that the Ashbringer, known by lore nerds as the legendary sword wielded by Tirion Fordring, can be obtained by fishing in just the right spot. Or killing just the right amount of arbitrary mobs. Or doing a secret quest to cleanse the Corrupted Ashbringer. People have lots of ideas, really.
Back in the day, the only version of the weapon you could actually get was the Corrupted Ashbringer in Naxxramas, but that didn’t stop anyone from wishing for the real thing. In the live version of WoW, paladins eventually got their hands on it in the form of an artifact weapon when Tirion Fordring got melted by a demon and dropped it at the beginning of the Legion expansion, but it was drained of its power and disposed of with all the other artifacts when Legion’s last patch rolled in. It seems like Classic players will finally get their hands on the old-school legendary item that was hinted at and datamined by sites like Wowhead but never implemented.
Fast-forward 20 years and Season of Discovery’s version of the weapon was datamined along with a whole host of Scarlet Crusade-themed loot in advance of Phase 8—I’ve fallen for that one before—but in a post today, Blizzard teased a new legendary questline which will culminate in a grand reward for warriors, paladins, and hunters.
While it’s possible this is a fakeout, there’s only one named weapon with any thematic ties to the Scarlet Crusade that seems suitable to stand alongside WoW: Classic’s, uh, legendary lineup of legendary weapons, and that’s the Ashbringer. The blurb in the news posts asks: “Will you succeed, or will this storied weapon remain shrouded in darkness? The future is uncertain.” And at this point, it feels like I’m being deliberately toyed with.
On top of that is the fact that this weapon is available to hunters, a class with a long-standing reputation for both relying on ranged weapons rather than swords and attracting players that love to loot weapons they don’t really need; the cheeky approach to this reveal is certainly befitting the Ashbringer’s history as a magnet for silly speculation.
All this hubbub is making me wonder if I should stop torturing myself with WoW Classic’s new Hardcore servers and get back on the Season of Discovery hype train while it’s still around. After all, the previous WoW Classic season only lasted for a year and with Phase 8, Season of Discovery is reaching that point where, theoretically, things should be winding down. Whether that will actually come to pass remains to be seen, though, so keep an eye out for any legendary swords on your way through New Avalon.