Blasted Lands

The Blasted Lands are a red, cracked wasteland at the southeastern corner of the Eastern Kingdoms, for characters of roughly levels 45 to 55. This is where the orcish Horde first came into Azeroth through the Dark Portal, and the land still bears the scars of the demonic magic that opened it. In Classic the portal is dark and silent, watched over by the fortress of Nethergarde Keep, while demons of the Burning Legion gather in the south.

Geography

The Blasted Lands are cut off from the rest of the continent by mountains. The only way in by land is a pass in the north from the Swamp of Sorrows.

• Nethergarde Keep, in the northeast, is a fortress built to watch the Dark Portal. It has an Alliance flight point and a few vendors. Miners work the hills around it.
• The Altar of Storms, in the northwest, is a ruined orcish altar.
• Dreadmaul Hold and the ogre camps around it fill the western half of the zone.
• The Rise of the Defiler is the tallest mountain in the zone, topped by the lair of a demon lord.
• The Tainted Scar, in the southwest, is a demon-held crater where the Legion has gathered.
• The Dark Portal sits at the southern end of the zone, at the top of a long stone stairway.

History

The Blasted Lands were once the southern half of the Black Morass, a swamp joined to what is now the Swamp of Sorrows. Here the sorcerer Medivh and the orc warlock Gul'dan opened the Dark Portal, and the orcs marched through to start the First War.

After the Second War, the Alliance tried to hold the portal. When the orcs on Draenor began opening new portals, an Alliance expedition led by Khadgar went through and destroyed the Dark Portal from the other side. The explosion scorched the marsh into the wasteland of today. The Kirin Tor had Nethergarde Keep built nearby so that no new invasion could catch Azeroth by surprise.

After the Third War, the demon lord Lord Kazzak gathered what was left of the Legion's forces in the Tainted Scar. His lieutenant, Razelikh the Defiler, rules the high mountain in the middle of the zone.

Quests and notable NPCs

The Blasted Lands have few traditional quests but some of Classic's most useful repeatable ones.

The Bloodmages. Bloodmage Drazial and Bloodmage Lynnore study the zone's animals and turn their parts into potions. Players bring snickerfang jowls, boar lungs, scorpok pincers, basilisk brains and vulture gizzards in quests such as Snickerfang Jowls and The Basilisk's Bite. The rewards are strong one-hour buffs:

These were a standard part of raid preparation for Molten Core and Blackwing Lair, so the zone saw a steady stream of max-level players farming hyenas and boars.

Kum'isha. Kum'isha the Collector, a draenei hiding near the Dark Portal, takes the draenethyst found on the zone's creatures. Rare Flawless Draenethyst Spheres go to To Serve Kum'isha, and the common fragments to Everything Counts In Large Amounts.

The Fallen Hero. At the border with the Swamp of Sorrows stands the Fallen Hero of the Horde, the restless spirit of a disgraced Horde soldier. His long chain, open to both factions, begins with Fall From Grace for the Horde or Petty Squabbles for the Alliance, after which both sides hear his story in A Tale of Sorrow. It sends players to free the lost soul of Kirith the Damned, collect the pieces of an amulet from the demon lord's three servants (Grol the Destroyer, Lady Sevine and Archmage Allistarj) in Uniting the Shattered Amulet, and finally climb the Rise of the Defiler to summon and kill Razelikh the Defiler.

Nethergarde. The keep's quartermaster, Quartermaster Lungertz, receives a time-limited crate of powerstones carried from Duskwood in Supplies for Nethergarde.

World boss

Lord Kazzak is a level 63 demon who stands in the Tainted Scar with a crowd of lesser demons. He is one of Classic's outdoor raid bosses, meant for a 40-player raid. He drops epic armor and weapons, and his ability to heal himself when he kills a player made him infamous on busy servers.

Getting there

Walk south from Stonard in the Swamp of Sorrows, along the road through the mountains. Alliance players can take the flight path to Nethergarde Keep once they have it. Horde players fly to Stonard and walk the rest of the way.

Later history

The Burning Crusade expansion reopened the Dark Portal, and it became the gateway to Outland. The zone was redesigned again in later expansions.

Sources

• Blasted Lands, Warcraft Wiki
• Lord Kazzak, Warcraft Wiki
• Quest data from WoWDB (patch 1.12)