WoW Classic Season of Mastery Survival Guide (What's new in WoW Classic's Season of Mastery?)

The WoW Classic Season of Mastery will be the first seasonal patch for WoW Classic, introducing an accelerated timeline combined with a fresh start for everyone playing. Season of Mastery will feature a 12-month content cycle, with a new phase of content releasing every 2 months for its duration. However, with the accelerated timeline are several improvements designed to help everyone experience the content in a new way for the duration. Below is a short list of the major changes made for the Season of Mastery.

• Faster leveling speeds — the experience requirements to level will be equivalent to getting from 1-60 in TBC, which is roughly 25% faster than in WoW Classic. Additionally, Season of Mastery features a 100% buff to all quest XP for its duration.
• Most non-raid content from later phases will be available from the start, including the honor ranking system, Dire Maul, and the tier 0.5 dungeon sets.
• Ranking in PvP will be significantly faster, where reaching your desired rank will take roughly half the time as in WoW Classic.
• All world buffs are disabled in raid instances.
• Most raid bosses are being buffed or redesigned in some way to substantially increase the difficulty.
• Most forms of level boosting and solo AoE instance farming have been significantly nerfed.
• There is no longer a debuff limit on enemies.
• Meeting Stones at dungeons are now Summoning Stones, just as they are on all later versions of WoW.
• Increased Mining and Herbalism Nodes.
• The cost of the training and mount at Level 40 has been reduced.
• (As of Phase 3) Max-level Alchemists have a chance to create additional potions, elixirs, and flasks when crafting them.

Season of Mastery went live on November 16, 2021. Its third phase, containing the Blackwing Lair raid and the Darkmoon Faire, will go live on February 10, 2022.

You can read the full Season of Mastery announcement here.

There are no major class changes in Season of Mastery. While the various systems and raids have been majorly updated or had their timelines changed, the classes will all play the same as before. However, there will be significant power shifts in Season of Mastery, specifically with raids, due to the lack of world buffs and newly-buffed encounters.

The other major change will be with gear. Because of all the new content available from the start, the BiS and pre-raid BiS lists for most classes are going to be different than they were during WoW Classic.

As mentioned above, the meta is expected to shift significantly in raids for the Season of Mastery. If you want to read more about the new raid meta and how classes are performing, check out our tier lists linked below.

Among the changes in the Season of Mastery is the inclusion of a new system known as the Soul of Iron. This functions similarly to a hardcore system where your character can access a unique buff and an ability to show off never having died in-game! However, there is no benefit to your character's power in choosing to gain a Soul of Iron, so do not feel forced to use this system if you do not want to.

More information on this new hardcore system can be found in our Soul of Iron guide below.

As part of the Season of Mastery, raid bosses have had both their damage and health buffed. In addition, every boss within Molten Core, Onyxia's Lair, and Blackwing Lair has been given new mechanics to deal with. Some are simple, such as the addition of more adds to the encounter, while others may force you to adjust your strategy in a more significant way!

In addition, as of Phase 3, all raid encounters drop one additional piece of loot compared to their original versions.

You can read more about these encounter changes brought on by the Season of Mastery in our Classic raid guides.