Warcraft Ratings

This is many peoples last stop in Azeroth. I find the zone sort of hard to navigate with the large mountain pass making you have to loop around. Though the zone even now is interesting. The rep grind for the majority of Argent Crusade is pretty enjoyable for a rep grind. Sadly I never had the patience to see it through and before I know it I fly to space :P

Like the Western Plaguelands, the Eastern Plaguelands were once beautiful and brimming with farms and small villages. The regional government was centered around the city of Stratholme, the largest city in Lordaeron. Also nearby were the towns of Darrowshire, Corin's Crossing, and Tyr's Hand, and to the east of Stratholme was the pass leading into the southern boundaries of Quel'Thalas. At this time, it was known as the Darrowmere Forest after the lake with the same name to the south.[citation needed]

In the opening hours of the Third War, the investigations into the origins of the Scourge led Prince Arthas and Jaina Proudmoore through the Tirisfal Glades and what is now the Western Plaguelands (more specifically, the towns of Andorhal and Hearthglen), where they confronted the necromancer Kel'Thuzad and his Cult of the Damned. Kel'Thuzad told Arthas to seek out the leader of the Scourge in Lordaeron, the Dreadlord Mal'ganis, at Stratholme. While en route via Hearthglen, Arthas and Jaina were joined by Lord Uther, master of the Silver Hand. When they arrived at Stratholme, Arthas realized that the villagers had been infected with the Plague of Undeath. When Uther refused to obey Arthas' command to purge the city, Arthas relieved Uther of command and disbanded the Silver Hand, then slaughtered the townsfolk himself. After hunting down Mal'ganis in Northrend, Arthas returned as one of the Lich King's death knights and toppled the Kingdom of Lordaeron by murdering his own father, King Terenas. After the fall of Lordaeron's capital, the plague spread throughout the northern regions of Lordaeron, turning them into the blighted lands they are today.

The resistance against the Scourge was particularly bloody at Darrowshire, where the ghoul Horgus the Ravager and the death knight Marduk Blackpool (alias Marduk the Black) led an army of Scourge against the town. Only surviving paladins under Davil Crokford and the Darrowshire militia under Captain Joseph Redpath were able to stand in their way. Though they put up a valiant fight, the defenders of Darrowshire were not enough to stave off the endless legions of Scourge. Davil managed to defeat Horgus in combat, but he succumbed to the horrific wounds the ghoul had inflicted. Captain Redpath fell to Marduk's necromancy, his soul taken from his body and corrupted into the service of the Scourge, where he proceeded to turn on his fellows and tear Darrowshire apart, killing everyone who hid in their homes.

After the fall of Lordaeron, the Scarlet Crusade attempted to retake the shattered Kingdom of Lordaeron from both the Scourge and the undead renegades known as the Forsaken. In the Eastern Plaguelands, they took control of both the town of Tyr's Hand and the western districts of Stratholme, where they battle the forces of Baron Rivendare to gain control of the destroyed city. In recent months, the master of the Scourge in Lordaeron made his return in the blighted lands. From his citadel of Naxxramas, floating over the Plaguewood near Stratholme, he prepares to continue the work he began in the name of his master, the Lich King. To this day, only a select few know what evil plan is forming in the mind of the lich once known as Kel'Thuzad...