WoW Dragonflight season three is here, and with it, the game’s best and brightest professional raiders will storm the newest raid, Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope, with another Race to World First title on the line.
Amirdrassil will be the final raid of WoW Dragonflight, meaning this will be the last chance guilds around the world have to etch their names in the history books before the franchise shifts gears toward The War Within in 2024. Although there will be a fourth season of Dragonflight next year, it will only feature fated versions of the expansion’s current raids. Amirdrassil will play host to what will likely be the last Race to World First event for at least another year, so whoever walks away from this one on top will hold the title for an extended amount of time.
As is the case with all Race to World First events, it’s going to come down to which team can pick up the most momentum in the midsection of the race and refuse to keep their foot off the gas pedal until the final boss is down. During the Aberrus race back in May, it was Team Liquid who earned a first-place finish after claiming clean kill after clean kill throughout the back half of the race. Now, they’ll be tasked with defending their championship as the game progresses into a new era.
Recent world first races have started off with underdog guilds getting themselves on the leaderboard early on in the marathon, while the game’s top teams emerge in the back half of the race, setting the tone for the final few days with a blow-for-blow bout. Liquid and Echo, in particular, have been at each other’s throats for the better part of the last two years, and heading into the finale of Dragonflight, we’re likely going to be in for another instant classic.
Below, you’ll be able to keep up with our live coverage of the Amirdrassil race, with everything from live updates to an up-to-date version of the race’s leaderboard and anecdotal analysis spread throughout.
Amirdrassil Race to World First live updates
Wednesday, Nov. 22
- 10:19am CT: After 435 pulls, Liquid downed Tindral Sageswift last night. He immediately joined the ranks of some of the toughest wall bosses in Race to World First history as it definitively took a full reset, fresh gear, and plenty of practice for him to go down. Now, Liquid will get a chance to look at the final boss of Amirdrassil, Fyrakk, while European teams use their reset day to catch back up to the curve.
Monday, Nov. 20
- 1:33pm CT: Despite nerfs to Sageswift, he’s still taking plenty of souls with him, as we’ve now gone well over 48 hours since the last progression kill. Liquid currently sit in the lead, as they have just eclipsed their 300th attempt on the boss, getting him down to just below 36 percent HP. Echo is not far behind, as they sit just a few percentage points out of the lead with approximately 60 fewer attempts.
Sunday, Nov. 19
- 3:49pm CT: Sageswift appears to have been nerfed, getting hit with a 20 percent HP reduction. Echo wrapped up raiding for a day, meaning Liquid will get plenty of time to get attempts in on the new-look version of the boss.
- 1:41pm CT: Tindral Sageswift has proven to be the first major “wall boss” of the raid tier, with Liquid and Echo both pouring in over 100 pulls each and counting. Method has also started to make progress on Sageswift, although none of the three guilds have gotten him down past the 60 percent threshold.
Saturday, Nov. 18
- 11:50am CT: With Method also cruising through the first six bosses, they’re now going to start Smolderon progression, as well. All of the top 10 guilds in the world are at least six-out-of-nine at the moment, with the leaderboard starting to be filled with familiar names.
- 11:48am CT: Before heading to bed last night, Team Liquid secured sole possession of first place in the race, becoming the first guild in the world to take down Smolderon. It didn’t take long for Echo to catch up during European hours, though, as they quickly burned through the first six bosses of the raid and are now just a few percentage points away from taking down Smolderon, too. We expect both guilds to spend the entire rest of the day progressing on Tindral Sageswift.
Friday, Nov. 17
- 2:09pm CT: Team Liquid have entered the race, and just two hours after starting off their run of serious progression, they’ve found themselves tied for the lead alongside Instant Dollars at the six-of-nine mark. Liquid did things a bit differently, opting to fight Larodar—arguably the toughest of Amirdrassil’s first six bosses—as early as possible. They then cruised into a share of the lead, needing just 17 pulls across the first six bosses to catch up with Instant Dollars and firmly establish themselves in the race.
- 10:03am CT: Two of last race’s top-five finishers, Skyline and BDG, entered the Mythic portion of the race last night and immediately climbed into the crop of teams sitting at four out of nine bosses. We’re still waiting for the top three teams—Echo, Liquid, and Method—to join other guilds in Mythic progression, although we have no doubt that when their split raids are finished, they’ll immediately skyrocket up the leaderboards.
- 10:00am CT: Overnight, the four-out-of-nine mark became the new plateau for guilds getting their feet wet in the early portion of the race, with the top 10 guilds in the race currently having reached that mark. Instant Dollars remain a major exception; they’re sitting at six of nine.
Thursday, Nov. 16
- 4:34pm CT: More outside threats have drummed up Mythic kills throughout the day, with Honolulu joining Instant Dollars at the four-out-of-nine threshold and several others earning their second and third kills on Mythic difficulty.
- 9:56am CT: Late last night, Instant Dollars pushed through a strong chunk of Mythic Amirdrassil, taking down four bosses and establishing command of an early lead in the Race to World First. Liquid and Echo have yet to enter the Mythic side of the race, but we expect those guilds to wrap up their split raids and start making serious progress at some point today.
Wednesday, Nov. 15
- 10:09am CT: We have a Mythic kill on the board, with North American guild Blue Shoe claiming the first boss of the race, taking down Gnarlroot and moving to one out of nine.
- 10:04am CT: Yesterday, teams dipped their toes into Amirdrassil by way of Heroic-level splits. Before any real progression begins, guilds all over the world will look to gear up and reach a point where they’ll comfortably be at the same power level as the bosses in the raid.
Monday, Nov. 13
- 1:45pm CT: Guilds around the world are preparing for the race to begin tomorrow. While there’s still going to be a one-day delay between Europe and North America this raid tier. EU’s top guild, Echo, will apparently start their efforts off by playing on North American servers on the first day of the race. How long that strategy will last remains to be seen, but at the very least, they’ll be jumping from the same starting block as their NA counterparts when the event kicks off.
Amirdrassil Race to World First leaderboard
- Liquid 8/9
- Echo 7/9
- Method 7/9
- Skyline 7/9
- Huoguo Hero 7/9
- Instant Dollars 7/9
- End Myth 7/9
- Conspiracy 7/9
- FatSharkYes 7/9
- BDG 7/9
- Gnarlroot: Blue Shoe
- Igira the Cruel: Instant Dollars
- Council of Dreams: Instant Dollars
- Volrocoss: Instant Dollars
- Larodar: Instant Dollars
- Nymue: Instant Dollars
- Smolderon: Liquid
- Tindral Sageswift: Liquid
- Fyrakk: Undefeated
Teams and storylines to watch in the Amirdrassil race
For the first time in over two years, Team Liquid are entering a WoW Race to World First as the defending champions. The team gathered momentum in the latter half of the Aberrus race, cleanly sweeping the back end of that raid and pushing through the final two bosses at a wildly efficient pace. For their efforts, Liquid captured their first RWF title since Castle Nathria in Shadowlands, when the guild was under the Complexity organization.
As is tradition, Echo will be consistently on their heels throughout the entire race. We fully expect the European juggernauts to bounce back and do everything they can to prove that Liquid’s Aberrus win was not a trendsetting event.
Although it’d be momentous if either Liquid or Echo fell out of the top two to close out the expansion, we’re not willing to count out a potential climb for guilds like Method or BDG. Method, who claimed world third last raid, progressed the final boss of Aberrus right alongside Echo and Liquid at one point, while BDG, who finished fourth, downed the boss in just as many pulls as Echo. Take that how you will, but we’re willing to say that those two guilds—while maybe not as stacked in raw talent or resources—could have a chance to sneak into the top two if the dominoes fall in their favor as the race winds down. If we end up getting an elongated race similar to 2022’s Sepulcher of the First Ones, it’s possible that guilds from outside the usual crop could make an appearance in the highest echelons of the rankings.
Last race, Skyline put up its third consecutive top-five finish, while FatSharkYes and Instant Dollars solidified themselves as top-10 guilds in the world. While we’re not ready to pencil in any of those names as title contenders just yet, we’re still very intrigued to see how they’re going to perform to close out Dragonflight.
The WoW Dragonflight Amirdrassil Race to World First will begin on Tuesday, Nov. 14.
Published: Nov 22, 2023 11:22 am