Your favourite xpac for levelling (storywise)

[Soon-TM]

As title says. What is your favourite expansion when it comes to storytelling/lore? This is not which expansion is the fastest or more efficient to level at, but rather the place with the best stories, landscapes, ambiance, music, etc. I am personally very fond of BC, even if the content is quite outdated... but even so, nostalgia is quite a thing. Also, dat soundtrack :3

But cast your vote bois/gurls, and elaborate as you deem necessary

[tommyhil622]

Just Curious, why isn't Shadowlands included?

[Armourboy]

Wrath probably overall for me, but that probably has as much to do with just being Northrend as the actual story.

[loras]

Depends on my rp ideas for the specific character, but all around i prefer legion due to its class centric stuff, otherwise TBC and WotLK for nostalgia

[Armourboy]

Just Curious, why isn't Shadowlands included?

Well it's not complete at this point is my guess, but I'm not OP so can't really say.

[tommyhil622]

Well it's not complete at this point is my guess, but I'm not OP so can't really say.

That's possible, only reason I said it was that you can level to cap with the existing SL content.

- - - Updated - - -

I voted for Wotlk. I remember having a great time getting to cap. There were some disappointments along the way but in general it was a great time for me.

[Creadosk]

Close one but going with legion then wraith than shadowlands. The artifact weapons side story and class hall nudged out wraith for me.

[Arrashi]

MoP, purely for Valley of four winds and chance to met the great one.

[Soon-TM]

Just Curious, why isn't Shadowlands included?

Because I was referring to TW campaigns, plus the optional BfA content. Since SL isn't optional (not at this point, anyway) I left it out.

[tommyhil622]

Because I was referring to TW campaigns, plus the optional BfA content. Since SL isn't optional (not at this point, anyway) I left it out.

Understood, I didn't know.

[Shadowferal]

The storyline is fairly consistent to up through MoP. However I had the most fun tracing out the story on both WotLK and MoP. Wrath edges out on the fun factor, but MoP was more interesting.

[Lieutenant Commander]

Kul Tiras followed by Northrend.

[BBellew]

In terms of just narrative and the story being told, I'd say Wrath by a mile. I was familiar with Warcraft's story prior to Wrath, but that expansion made me want to deep dive into every little detail I could find. Exploring Dragonblight and discovering areas from the WCIII campaign was incredibly cool. The Wrathgate quest chain and conclusion with Battle for the Undercity was mind blowing at the time. It had a ton of zones, with (mostly) interesting stories to uncover. I am also probably one of the few people who actually enjoyed the concept of the Argent Tournament. I found the Renaissance fair feel of it to be really cool (great night music too). I still like to just fly around those zones from time to time because of the atmosphere.

Based purely on story and atmosphere, I'd probably rank them like this: WotLK > Legion > MoP > BC > BfA > WoD > Cataclysm

Legion had a clearly defined story arc and all of the wonderful class specific/artifact weapon stories. It felt like a breath of fresh air after the story drought of WoD. I was super impressed with the amount of story they packed into the initial patch and I don't think I've ever been as eager to level my alts in any other expansion.

Mists of Pandaria introduced new lore that I think worked really well. It also had a nice arc from patch to patch with a mostly satisfying resolution. I know there are some people that hate on the goofy Pandaren (not me), but even ignoring them, the Mogu, Old God and Sha stuff was very interesting to me.

Burning Crusade was decent and tied up some lose ends from WCIII, but it felt disjointed from patch to patch. Some cool story bits that were surrounded by what I found to be mostly uninteresting zone stories (Shadowmoon and Nagrand stood above the rest story wise to me).

Battle for Azeroth suffered from being pretty scattershot as well. Half the zones had fun and had interesting stories, while others were completely forgettable. I felt like they pretty much wasted the villains in this expansions, similarly to Cataclsym (see below). The overall narrative trope of "Remember the faction conflict? Well it's back!" was incredibly tiresome by this point.

Warlords of Draenor's time travel to an alternate universe story was stupid when they announced it and remained stupid throughout. The zones were beautiful and their individual stories were good, but the overall narrative of the expansion was just incredibly dumb to me. I do think WoD had the best music in the entire series however (fight me).

Cataclysm absolutely squandered Neltharion and barely had a narrative arc. There was so much potential with him as a villain, but he barely even existed in the story until the final patch. There was almost no build up to him and when he did finally show up he was a completely one-dimensional giant monster. The zones mostly bored me with their stories (except for Vashj'ir which I loved-fight me again). It was obvious that they were stretched too thin reworking old zone stories to really put as much effort into the new zones.

[Soon-TM]

@BBellew I agree with most of your points, although I'm going to say that I found the levelling in Legion too formulaic. Besides, places like Stormheim and Highmountain, neat as they may be, were completely pulled out of Blizzard's rear, and frankly they didn't mesh at all with the rest of the expansion. Stormheim in particular looked like it was there just as a trailer for Shadowlands... and maybe give Warriors some background for that pathetic excuse of a class hall they got.

[Shadowferal]

Cataclysm's narrative had me almost forget Vashj'ir and Uldum, the two zones I had the most fun with in that expansion. The naga battle maiden quest chain in the former was fascinating..and Harrison Jones' quest chain in the latter was amusing.

[Queen of Hamsters]

I was going to click MoP but I clicked Legion... -_-'

Oh well. I loved MoP's story. Still do, especially the Mantid and Mogu slavery stuff. My list probs goes: MoP > Legion > BfA > SL/WoD (for its mechanics rather than Draenor story) > Cata > WOTLK >> Classic

Only leveled in BC when it was already outdated content, but I suspect it won't be better than Classic. Endgame will be though which is why I'll go through it on TBC servers, assuming they do happen.

[Itori]

Always wrath

[Shedaar]

Warlords of Draenor for the first time.

[McNeil]

WotLK for me. I'm way more into its theming and that the pacing of dealing with treats feels rather smooth. You have your main goal to reach Arthas but you still have to do local stuff for others. It feels less overdramatic and more grounded which makes Northrend and its world building feel huge.

[Soon-TM]

WotLK for me. I'm way more into its theming and that the pacing of dealing with treats feels rather smooth. You have your main goal to reach Arthas but you still have to do local stuff for others. It feels less overdramatic and more grounded which makes Northrend and its world building feel huge.

While I still prefer BC, I won't deny that I still have a soft spot for WotLK, even after all these years. The one regard in which WotLK was actually better, MUCH better than BC, was world building. It certainly feels a lot more believable, more organic than anything else in the game, with the sole exception of MoP.