Announced at this year's BlizzCon, Chains of Domination is described as a major
update for World of Warcraft: Shadowlands, itself the eighth major
expansion to the original title. The PTR is where developers place
updates for players to test before they are released to the public.
Unfortunately, the timetable is usually unspecified and updates can
spend weeks or even months in testing.
Community manager Bornakk (real name Liam Knapp) wrote in the forum announcement that "There will
be a wide variety of content to check out for Chains of Domination," and
that players testing it out and providing feedback will be an important
piece to finalizing it. In this update, players join the world after
the defeat of Sire Denathrius, the master of Revendreth and King of the
Venthyr. Players will unravel more of the Shadowlands story, explore
more of The Maw, and progress the Covenants' storylines. With two weeks
to go, World of Warcraft players must prepare for a new 10-boss raid
Sanctum of Domination, the Veiled Market, and can look forward to flying
across the Shadowlands.
Already delayed due to the pandemic, Chains of Domination coming to the PTR likely means that there will be at least
a month before update 9.1 is actually brought out to the public.
Players suspect and comment on the forum post that this points to a
possible July release for 9.1 but this is unconfirmed. As the first
major update to World of Warcraft: Shadowlands, the developer is going
to have to balance getting the bugs and issues out of its release and
getting it public as soon as possible.
This news will probably surprise a great deal of World of Warcraft players as the pandemic
delays made it seem like this update was going to take even longer.
Getting it to the PTR by mid-April is exciting but should leave players
wary of what state it might be in at this time despite the exciting
content it promises. Ideally Chains of Domination doesn't need too much
work and it can be fully released by the summer.
But no one can guarantee that the time this update spends on the PTR will be short. The
pandemic has disrupted many industries and it would be more likely than
not that this update has been hindered in development because of it.
All players can do right now is count down the days and hope for the
best.
