Hallow's End

Hallow's End is World of Warcraft's Halloween holiday, held in the second half of October. It arrived with patch 1.8 in October 2005, and in Classic it was a celebration of trick-or-treating at inns, costume masks and wands, candy quests for two sick children, and a Forsaken festival in Tirisfal Glades built around a burning wicker giant. The Headless Horseman boss most players now connect with the holiday did not exist yet.

Background

When Hallow's End was introduced, the game described it as a Forsaken holiday: the anniversary of the day the undead under Sylvanas Windrunner broke free of the Lich King's control. Nothing explained why the Alliance celebrated it too, and the Alliance's own citizens grumble about that in their holiday gossip. Later books retold the holiday as an old human custom from Lordaeron, in which a wicker man was burned to let go of the year that was ending, and which the Forsaken kept after their deaths.

During the holiday, the capital cities hang jack-o'-lanterns, candles and orange lights, and the inns of Azeroth become the center of the fun.

Trick or treat

Once an hour, any player could ask an innkeeper for a "Trick or Treat!" The answer was either a trick, which turned the character into a random creature for a while, or a [Treat Bag]. The bag vanished on logout, so it was meant to be opened on the spot, and it held one of a handful of prizes:

• Candy, such as [Candy Corn] and [Candy Bar], which turned the eater into a skeleton, pirate, ghost or something similar.
• A flimsy mask for one of the eight playable races and either gender, such as [Flimsy Male Human Mask] or [Flimsy Male Orc Mask]. Wearing one made the character look like a member of that race.
• A hallowed wand with five charges, which put a costume on a party member: [Hallowed Wand - Pirate], [Hallowed Wand - Ninja], [Hallowed Wand - Leper Gnome], [Hallowed Wand - Ghost], [Hallowed Wand - Bat], [Hallowed Wand - Skeleton], [Hallowed Wand - Wisp], or [Hallowed Wand - Random], which picked one at random.

The prize most players hoped for was rarer still. The [Pumpkin Bag], a sixteen-slot bag shaped like a pumpkin, dropped from creatures of level 30 and up during the holiday, at a time when sixteen slots was a very large bag.

Two vendors sold sweets and Hallow's End Pumpkin Treats: Katrina Shimmerstar for the Alliance and Rachelle Gothena for the Horde.

Candy for Jesper and Spoops

Two sick orphans who could not go trick-or-treating sent players around the capitals to collect candy for them. Jesper in Stormwind City wanted a candy from each Alliance city for Hallow's End Treats for Jesper!, and Spoops in Orgrimmar wanted the Horde set for Hallow's End Treats for Spoops!. Each candy came from an innkeeper or a local character who first demanded a trick:

The rewards were the candies themselves, and Jesper and Spoops traded a bundle of Pumpkin Treats for the full set.

The Wickerman Festival

The Forsaken held the Wickerman Festival just outside the Undercity in Tirisfal Glades, where a towering wicker figure stood between banners and pumpkins, guarded by elite Wickerman Guardians. Burning the Wickerman gave Horde players at the festival a buff that raised their experience gain and stats for a while; Alliance players who sneaked in to join the fire received it too.

From the festival, Darkcaller Yanka sent Horde players of level 25 and up to make trouble in the Alliance town of Southshore in Hillsbrad Foothills:

• Stinking Up Southshore: throw a stink bomb into the middle of Southshore.
• Rotten Eggs and Ruined Kegs: sneak rotten eggs into the main keg of the Southshore inn to ruin its ale.

In Southshore, Sergeant Hartman answered for the Alliance. In The Power of Pine he handed out a pine-scented cleaner for scrubbing away the Forsaken stink bombs, and in Crashing the Wickerman Festival he sent players to scout the Wickerman Festival. Both sides were paid in Pumpkin Treats, and on PvP realms Southshore and the festival grounds turned into small battlefields for two weeks.

Later history

• Patch 2.2.2 in October 2007 added the Headless Horseman as a holiday boss in the Scarlet Monastery Graveyard, along with fire attacks on towns.
• Patch 4.2 in 2011 reworked the holiday with daily quests, candy buckets in every inn and an Alliance Wickerman outside Stormwind.
• In World of Warcraft Classic, Hallow's End returned in its original form, without the Headless Horseman.

Sources

• Hallow's End, Warcraft Wiki
• Treat Bag, Warcraft Wiki
• Wickerman Festival, Warcraft Wiki
• All the in-game holidays that are part of WoW Classic, Blizzard Watch