---
title: '24 Hours Before Midnight & Blizzard Just Did WHAT?! | World of Warcraft'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=Ufuf-jp9bwM'
video_id: 'Ufuf-jp9bwM'
date: 2026-08-09
duration_sec: 534
---

# 24 Hours Before Midnight & Blizzard Just Did WHAT?! | World of Warcraft

> Source: [24 Hours Before Midnight & Blizzard Just Did WHAT?! | World of Warcraft](https://youtube.com/watch?v=Ufuf-jp9bwM)

## Summary

This video discusses major World of Warcraft: Midnight changes announced just 24 hours before launch, including Mythic Zero dungeons being available at launch, a staggered prey system, healer spell visibility fixes, and crest-saving strategies for gearing.

### Key Points

- **Mythic Zero Dungeons Available at Launch** [00:01] — Blizzard confirmed non-seasonal Mythic Zero dungeons will be available immediately at launch on March 3rd, instead of being staggered. The full non-seasonal dungeon pool will be open for two weeks before Season 1 starts on March 17th.
- **Potential Gear Track Concerns** [01:24] — If Mythic Zeros drop champion track gear, players could gear up almost fully before Season 1, potentially making content trivial. Normal raid gear and Tier 8 bountiful delves also drop champion track gear, so this could flood players with high-level loot.
- **Prey System Staggered Difficulty** [03:12] — Prey difficulty unlocks in stages: Normal mode during early access (level 90, after main campaign), Hard mode at journey rank one after March 3rd reset, and Nightmare mode at Season 1 launch on March 17th. Gear drops scale: Normal gives adventurer track, Hard gives veteran, Nightmare gives champion.
- **Healer Spell Visibility Fix** [04:46] — Blizzard announced that many healer spells will no longer be treated as secret auras at launch, restoring visibility in raid frames. This is a temporary fix until a long-term filtering system is implemented, and Blizzard will not break API workarounds.
- **Save Your Crests** [06:50] — Players should save all crests at launch and not spend them on gear that will be replaced quickly. Instead, save crests until hitting achievement brackets to convert them into higher-level crests, accelerating progression.

### Conclusion

The video emphasizes that Blizzard's pre-launch changes aim to balance pacing and player experience, but players should be strategic about gearing and crest usage to maximize progression in the first weeks of Midnight.

## Transcript

release, but we just got some massive changes literally 24 hours before the announcing some crazy stuff. Starting off first, the big headline of today, Blizzard has confirmed that non-seasonal Mythic Zero dungeons will be available
immediately at the full midnight launch on March 3rd instead of this content being staggered. Now, listen, historically, that first week or two of a little bit drawn out. You hit max level, you do your campaign, run some
your grinding rep, whatever the case may be, and you're basically sitting around waiting for season 1 to start as you're exploring the expansion. Allowing Mythic Zeros right away completely changes the pacing of everything. The full
non-seasonal dungeon pool will be open for those two weeks before season 1 launches on March 17th. So, the second you hit max level, you can jump straight in the Mythic Zeros. Now, listen, on the surface level, this can sound good. It
It gives players, you know, something real to do, I guess, in terms of hard content. Here's where I think the real conversation starts because now, at this really optional, kind of like how heroic dungeons were previously. Now, they're
definitely feel left out or behind if you don't do your Mythic Zero world tour. Now, personally speaking, it does change how I'm going to approach you are going to feel the same way. If Mythic Zeros potentially drop champion
track gear, and we're not 100% sure on this yet. There is a chance it could be that's when things get pretty damn messy, in my opinion. Let's not forget here, normal raid gear is at champion level track. Tier 8 bountiful delves
with the key gives you champion track gear. World quests will give you veteran, which are twice a week. So, if Mythic Zeros also drop this champion track gear across the board, players can do two full world tours in those two
weeks and be pretty much almost fully tracked of champion gear before season 1 everything. Now, listen, the only reason I'm even making this video is because we yet and we all know how Blizzard is a little bit sometimes during crunch time.
and I just want everyone to be on their toes with what could be potentially it's going to make gearing great and you won't feel super weak going into the hand, it pretty much just tells players to dive into Mythic Zeros and spam them
don't fall behind. At this point, we also currently have made these gearing non-seasonal dungeons only drop veteran gear, but confirmation from Blizzard over on this article yet, so I'm not entirely sure.
personally, I would think would be opening the Mythic Zeros on March 3rd. It's great, but only let it be veteran gear. Let people enjoy world content, reputations, crafting, and pinnacle gear first. Let them enjoy the expansion
first before you have to dive into dungeons, pushing, and start doing crazy it's not Champion on March 3rd because kind of, let's be honest, shitty. I absolutely need to hear what you all
below because this is a big pacing decision right before launch and I could right after that Mythic Zero announcement, we also got clarification on the prey system, which is Midnight's new open world opt-in boss hunting
system. Now, in a recent developer interview, they did officially confirm that prey difficulty is going to unlock in stages. Normal mode will be available during early access, which is tomorrow, once you hit level 90 and finish the
main campaign. Hard mode will unlock at journey rank one after the first weekly reset on March 3rd. Then nightmare mode, which is the last one, unlocks at launches on March 17th. So, it's important to note here that players will
season one begins, which means nightmare mode is intentionally being locked until your four hunts per week, you're getting your reputation and your journey You don't have to grind this for endless hours on end. The reason we're bringing
mythic zero conversation a little bit ago, and I want to talk about gear and for prey will drop immediately and it will give us adventurer track gear. Hard mode, which drops on March 3rd, will drop veteran track gear, but nightmare
mode is dropping on March 17th, and that will give champion track gear. So, normal mode drops adventurer, hard mode veteran, nightmare mode on champion. So, that Blizzard's pacing here is straightforward. I don't think they want
to try to powerhouse and flood us with gear right before season 1, and by gear, I mean champion track level loot. All signs of this for now points to veteran track loot until season 1 begins. Personally, I love the idea of there
know what you guys think about the staggered release in the comments it should be staggered a little bit so everyone can enjoy the experience? Or do hell at this point? Let me know what you think. And then lastly, this next
section is going to get a little bit complicated, but for healers, you guys Midnight because Blizzard also just announced a big change literally right just announced that a large number of
healer spells will no longer be treated as secret auras at launch, which regain visibility and better control over what actually shows on their raid frames. If you've been healing since the pre-patch of Midnight, you already know
add-on lockdown, raid frame, you know, customization getting hit really, really hard. Healers rely on instantly seeing specific buffs and debuffs. Obviously, echoes if you're preservation, riptide if you're shaman, and other ones.
Without proper filtering of these buffs, your raid frames become cluttered and really frustrating. Blizzard tried to solve this with their automatic sorting logic, but one universal system, I mean, obviously isn't going to work for every
highlight very specific spells, while others, you know, want them to just not doing right now in the short term is they're actually flagging a bunch of with duration buffs and stuff, which means that the add-ons and the default
UI will be able to detect and display them again. This change is coming uh launch if you guys see on screen here, which is crazy. So long term, Blizzard filtering system that players will be able to, you know, hide and filter stuff
add-ons to guess this sort of spell behavior. Another important detail here is that Blizzard specifically said they are not going to break the API calls workarounds. They acknowledge that the situation is more about UI customization
competitive advantage. So they're treating it more like resource visibility. Think of it like Holy Power or or even Maelstrom for Shamans or stuff like that. The simple translation and the wrap up all this is they realize
lot of and they're giving a temporary full solution for now until Overall a W, got to like it, enjoy it. Moving on next, we have one last thing guys go. Something very important to remember during the first couple weeks
of launch, please listen to this and pay attention. You want to save all of your crest as much as possible. Do not make the mistake of taking your crest and dumping them into gear that you're most likely going to replace in literally no
possible. A neat little trick on how a lot of pro retail wild players progress very quickly is they save their crest until they hit the crest achievement brackets and then they trade in those said crest to convert into higher level
crest as fast as possible. Yes, technically there are still caps on somebody who doesn't play that often, unlocking these achievement brackets are enormously critical to progressing your character as fast as possible. So as you
progression midnight season 1 road map made by Trojan, you can see that the second all of your equipped items hit rank 233, you do not need to use adventure level crest anymore. When you don't need to use them anymore, you can
convert them at the vendor into veteran crest. The same concept goes for the next bracket. The second you hit 246 on every piece, you do not need to use veteran track crest anymore and you can exchange them at the vendor for champion
track pieces. Same goes for champion track crest when you hit 259 and the hit the next item level bracket. So, definitely at the launch, you definitely want to try to save all your adventure and veteran track pieces loot until you
season one launches easily. When you're doing things like tier eight battle for raid, pray, whatever have you. Do not waste your crest on upgrading adventure yeah, ladies and gentlemen, that is going to wrap up today's video. I
videos like this, like quick thought videos, but I thought some of these Literally less than 24 hours before the release. I thought it was a little bit important. Also, I did get my midnight epic edition today to arrive, which is
this bad boy up later on stream tonight. So, if you guys want to hang out right the live. Oh, watch me wield this crazy Shalmane. Check this bad boy out. Oh, the way. Anyways, much love, guys. God bless. I'll see you at the stream
tonight. Good luck on launch day. Have a good one. Peace.