What to explore in the beta.

Treat the beta as a field trip. Follow a familiar road, look for a new turn, and leave useful notes for the next adventurer.

The announced starting lineup

Blizzard’s opening lineup includes the Skyborne, Zephras Isle, Hall of Thanes, and Ruins of Lordaeron. The announcement describes an initial level cap of 20, with 30 planned later.

The published testing window runs through October 21, 2026. This page summarizes that announcement; it is not a live realm-status feed.

Explore without a checklist race

Choose a small area and pay attention to how its quests connect. Notice travel time, enemy density, and how often you stop to recover. Those details shape a leveling experience just as much as the final reward.

If you revisit familiar locations, compare your memories with what you actually observe. Avoid labeling every difference a bug. New routes, revised dialogue, and pacing changes may be deliberate parts of the experience.

Plan a group session

Agree on a pace before entering a dungeon. A discovery run works best when everyone knows there may be pauses to read, test, or discuss. Bring questions, and leave room for teammates who are seeing an encounter for the first time.

Keep announcement and observation separate

When sharing findings, say whether the information comes from an official announcement or your own session. Include the date and realm for observations. This makes a report useful even if the next test build changes the result.

Keep a field log that survives a patch

A location name alone is rarely enough to explain a discovery. Use a short entry with the date, test build if visible, realm, character level, activity, and outcome. Keep the report small enough to finish while the experience is fresh.

Example template, not an observed bug: At [location], I tried [action] after [prerequisite]. I expected [result], but saw [actual result]. It happened [number] times in [number] attempts. After changing [one variable], the result was [outcome].

For a quest route, describe the point where the next destination stopped being clear. For a dungeon, distinguish a mechanic that was difficult from a mechanic whose cue could not be understood. Include what the game communicated before giving your interpretation.

Give the group a shared question

For a discovery run, choose one question together: can a newcomer identify the route, understand an encounter cue, or find the next objective? Let one person take notes while the others play normally. Rotate that role so nobody spends the entire evening documenting.

Finish by comparing notes without forcing agreement. If one player saw a clear cue and another missed it, the difference is useful context. Keep personal preferences beside the evidence rather than turning a single group experience into a universal claim about the beta.