World of Warcraft: Shadowlands is approaching quickly, with the prepatch having finally released yesterday. To say that it was a smooth release would be… an outright lie, really, considering the servers are still constantly hitting issues a full day later.
In fact, Blizzard has even begun compiling a list of known issues – a list that gets longer and longer by the hour. While they work towards fixing the patch, though, there’s still plenty at work, and the game remains playable if the servers stay up!
One of the things the prepatch has accomplished is making World of Warcraft much more beginner-friendly. With a new leveling system and a rehaul of heirloom gear, as well as massive changes to trial accounts, Blizzard is making it a good time to get started.
They’ve just begun their Guide mentor system as well, going live with this prepatch. This new system helps link new players that need help or guidance with veteran players that know the game through and through and are offering to help.
To be clear, there are currently no rewards for Guide players, and it’s an opt-in service. The service is only for people who want to help, and the reward is exactly that – helping. This helps prevent players from opting in and doing nothing to help while reaping rewards.
That said, not just anyone is going to become a guide. To opt into the service, players will need to be well-accomplished and know their stuff through and through – you’ll never see a guide that just joined up, put a few hours in, and decided they could help.
Players will need to be level 50 at a minimum, which currently is the max level after the recent level squish. They’ll also need to have completed the achievement for completing 3,000 quests all in all.
Past that, guides need at least two of the following achievements:
- Terrific Trio (Max level with at least three classes)
- Rival: Battle for Azeroth Season 4
- Battle for Azeroth Keystone Conqueror: Season 4
- The Waking Dream (Defeat N’zoth and Carapace of N’zoth in Ny’alotha)
- We Have the Technology (Purchase all research items in the Titanic Research Archive)
If you don’t have the two Season 4 achievements, you’re out of luck – prepatch officially ended season 4, and the achievements are no longer obtainable.
Once you have these achievements, guides can access the Newcomer Chat once they’ve opted in, a chat that newcomers can ask questions in with hopes that a guide will answer them. If you ever get tired of helping for some reason, simply visit the Guide Recruiter again to leave the system without punishment, able to rejoin again whenever you wish!