17 years after ‘Corrupted Blood,’ a new debuff is spreading through WoW’s open-world zones

A new plague has begun to spread across Azeroth. The Contagious Cowardice debuff, a spreadable status effect that can deal heavy damage to low-level players, is making its way through World of Warcraft’s population in droves. 

Contagious Cowardice is picked up by enemies throughout the Dragon Isles, most of which are bosses from Grand Hunts. Dozens of open-world enemies can apply the debuff to players, who in turn can spread it to allies. 

Contagious Cowardice can be identified by a small blue ring that encircles your character. While affected by the ring, your character will take Shadow damage every three seconds. Any other player standing near the ring will receive the debuff when the circle expires when it expires after 12 seconds. 

This new “plague” affecting WoW is nothing new for the game. Back in 2005, a debuff called Corrupted Blood spread through Azeroth like Wildfire, killing low-level players and turning major cities into unescapable graveyards. Contagious Cowardice, however, appears to pose less of a threat to the game’s population at large, as its damage is far less threatening than that of the Corrupted Blood debuff.

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What made the Corrupted Blood plague so unique in 2005 was that it took a debuff from an instanced zone and made it a threat in the open world. Contagious Cowardice, however, doesn’t have the luxury of being contained to a dungeon or raid. Since the debuff is picked up from an open-world enemy, it poses a threat to any player. Even doing the inverse and hiding from the debuff in a dungeon would only temporarily save you, as there’s a chance you’d encounter Contagious Cowardice once you got back into the open world. 

Blizzard has not provided an update on the status of the Contagious Cowardice “plague,” and any potential changes were not mentioned in last night’s hotfixes. But players have begun to notice that its stranglehold on major cities such as Valdrakken has begun to loosen.