The Dragonblight
Former WarCraft III fans may remember the Dragonblight as a bonus map. In Wrath of the Lich King, this is going to be an epic zone. In Warcraft lore, it’s the place where dragons come to die, and thus is littered with the hulking skeletons of the fallen beasts. Naturally though, a lot of them haven’t been allowed to fade away - what with the Lich King living next door. So it’s a definite that there’ll be some kind of higher-level encounter with undead dragons, drakes, and smaller draconians. This isn’t to say there won’t be living dragons - the Blue Dragonflight, led by Malygos, is nearby and has declared war on all magic kind, making Dalaran a prime target, and all of you pansy Alliance mages, too. In fact, though you’ll also have to tangle with the rest of his Blue Dragonflight to approach him - Jeff Kaplan has confirmed that Malygos will be a level 80 raid encounter in Coldarra.

As for people pitching their tent in Dragonblight though, the Scourge have colonised the North, toward where the Icecrown Glacier begins, as well as the entrance to the fallen city and instances of Azjol-Nerub. Regardless of the huge scale of the zone, it still offers content for players in their low-70s.

Death Knight
Everyone and their cat is going to dash to get the first Death Knight, and while Blizzard has said “everyone can do it,” let’s not be too hasty there. Death Knights are the bad boys of the Lich King, and you can bet your sweet behind that it won’t be an easy path to become one. We could be talking a time sink something in the region of the keys needed to access some of the dungeons of The Burning Crusade. Perhaps not that bad, but certainly something your casual player won’t just be able to solo their way through and post on the internet about. Although, of course, we will be soloing our way through it and posting about it on the internet.

Caverns of Time
While not strictly part of Northrend, the culling of Stratholme featured in the Caverns of Time is based on the fifth mission from WarCraft III, revitalized as a five-man, level 80 instance. It tracks the beginning of Arthas’ downfall as he culls the city of Stratholme’s Scourge-infected residents, with the final part taking on the powerful Dreadlord Mal’Ganis.

There can be no doubt that some artistic license will be taken with the difficulty (it was a breeze back in the RTS days) since the Caverns of Time difficulty curve so far has been much like being beaten with a hammer. A beautiful, fascinating and tightly scripted hammer - but a hammer nonetheless.

The deal with games like WoW is that they change, and sometimes change a lot, as anyone who has sat through almost a gig of patching can more than testify to. To this end, Blizzard introduces tons of tweaks, animations, and new dungeons on a (fairly) regular basis.

An obvious change for a returning hero, meanwhile, is the fact that the UI has been updated - letting you search for particular salesmen or quest holders on your minimap while gifting your screen a smattering of extra icons. Small-fry stuff, admittedly, but hugely convenient as soon as you notice its newfound existence. But what of the groundbreaking changes that have been made since the last time you logged on?