WoW Midnight Adds Player Housing
World of Warcraft's Midnight expansion is now live, introducing player housing for the first time in WoW's history. Players can decorate and personalize their homes while exploring new storylines as Xal'atath threatens Azeroth. The expansion also brought a major visual overhaul to Silvermoon City after 20 years.
Player housing is an evergreen feature, intended to be expanded upon for years to come as part of the ongoing Worldsoul Saga. Each player's Warband can own up to two houses, one in the Alliance neighborhood of Founder's Point and one in the Horde's Razorwind Shores, for an initial cost of just 1,000 gold. The system launches with over 2,200 decoration items obtainable through quests, crafting, achievements, and reputation vendors from nearly every expansion. Fewer than 1% of the available decor items at launch will come from the cash shop. Decorations are account-wide and can be freely placed, resized, and rotated using both a basic and an advanced mode. This feature has been one of the most requested since the game's launch 20 years ago. Previous iterations like the Garrisons in Warlords of Draenor were criticized for isolating players and tying into player power. Midnight's housing is designed to be purely cosmetic and social, with no direct impact on a character's strength. The expansion's main antagonist, Xal'atath, the Harbinger of the Void, has a long history in Azeroth. Once an ancient entity bound to a dagger wielded by players in the *Legion* expansion, she eventually bartered for her freedom from the Old God N'Zoth. Her goal in *Midnight* is to consume the power of the Sunwell in the heart of Quel'Thalas. Recent revelations show Xal'atath was once a mortal child from a world devoured by the Void, a backstory explored in a new animated short titled "Supremacy". She now commands a massive army, the Devouring Host, in her assault on the blood elves' homeland. The update to Silvermoon City is its first major overhaul since its introduction in 2007. The revamp combines the Eversong Woods and Ghostlands zones into a single, unified Quel'Thalas. The Dead Scar, a mark of the Scourge's invasion, has finally been healed, reflecting the passage of time in the world. Previously, Silvermoon was built as a facade, with many buildings lacking backsides or roofs, making flying mounts unusable in the city. The city has been completely rebuilt from the ground up with high-fidelity assets and will now serve as a central hub for both Alliance and Horde players, though it remains a Horde-controlled capital.
