Mostly, though, what I've been doing in World of Warcraft are those damned Legion invasions. They're essentially just organic kill quests, where you and five hundred of your closest friends pummel demons for ten to 20 minutes. They're all nearly identical, and they only occur in the same six places across Azeroth.

That's a bummer, since none of them are set in zones I've never visited. Northrend, central location of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, continues to exist only as a name on a map to me. The same goes for Draenor. And while I visited Outland during The Burning Crusade, there's no good reason for me to return.

Instead, at the behest of my friends that never stopped playing WoW, I just ran those damned demon invasions over and over. Visually, they're very impressive, further showing just how far Blizzard is stretching their tech. But today’s game seems driven more than ever by the need to grind out those experience points and to hit that level cap. I was actively encouraged to skip past most of the game's deeper content—dungeons, raids, PVP, etc.—because it will all be moot once Legion comes.

I'm well aware that's largely "the way of things" for an MMO, but to see all the raw numbers condensed like that into a single week was something else entirely. Hopefully Legion itself will be worth this particular slog.