World of Warcraft: Shadowlands has been met with mostly positive responses thus far, with players applauding the high number of activities and collectibles currently available. But just because the Shadowlands are full of new content doesn’t mean players gave up on the old.
In the previous Battle for Azeroth expansion, players were able to complete Island Expeditions. This was an activity generally done in groups of three and came in different difficulties, each offering different rewards.
Unfortunately, the group is required, and players that are trying to complete the activity now have found their way in much more difficult – or tedious, at least.
Players have to rely on the group finder to set them up with an automatic group, depending on the difficulty. For the higher tiers, players need to find their own group.
The issue is, with this content being obsolete, there aren’t a lot of players waiting around to jump into the next Island Expedition. Because of this, queues are extremely long, at times fully blocking players from being able to do the content they want.
If it’s so obsolete, why bother doing it at all? The answer is simple – collectible items. There are mounts, transmogs, toys, and battle pets that can only be obtained by completing certain Island Expeditions, leading many players to continue farming them.
Due to the inability to get in without a group paired with the difficulty of actually finding a group, players have been asking Blizzard to make Island Expeditions able to be played solo. This would immediately remove this issue and allow players to hop in at their own will.
The issues are exacerbated by Island Expeditions not being unlocked until later on in the Battle for Azeroth content. Once players have unlocked the expeditions, they’re ready to move on, so it’s really only farmers that are completing this old content.
Paired with the fact that the main reward is Azerite, which is now utterly usseless, players really only have collectibles to gain from completing Island Expeditions. With so few players able to get anything, the queues will remain incredibly long until Blizzard fixes this issue.
At this point, the content is just sitting there in a barely-playable state due to a lack of interest and relevance to the average player. With any luck, Blizzard will listen to their player base and adjust the requirements for the Island Expeditions so that the players interested are able to complete the content and earn the rewards they want.
