World of Warcraft’s Most Frustrating Secrets Explained

World of Warcraft has dozens of riddles and mysteries hidden within its deepest corners, and players have always leaped at the opportunity to solve them. Some reward mounts, titles, or pets upon their completion, while others are yet to be unraveled, but all show how dedicated fans are to meeting every challenge.

Despite unwavering efforts, some of World of Warcraft’s secrets proved too complex and random for players to crack. It isn’t always clear if a mystery is a distinct secret trail leading to a reward. Sometimes, there is no special explanation for something existing in the game, all the more frustrating for those poised to solve it. It’s a wild journey of trial and error, insane ideas, and shots in the dark coming from thousands of collaborators.

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By  Eric Law

WoW Secrets Are Only Solved By Working Together

World of Warcraft: Legion was famous for its abundance of riddles, and every expansion since has littered deliberate clues for secret hunters to pick up. No single person could have solved these treasure trails, and everyone who owns mounts like the Lucid Nightmare or Riddler’s Mind Worm can thank the countless other members of WoW’s unofficial secret-finding Discord server. Here, players share theories, failures, and clues, where many minds make thinking outside the box a guarantee.

Some Secrets Reintroduced Removed Content

Aside from the smattering of cosmetic rewards that players have come to expect, the most recent expansions have found a way to reintroduce old content that was removed from the game. Players have already figured out how to access the original Scholomance dungeon, which was a feat in and of itself. But following this, a new questline opened up involving the Argent Dawn, a Vanilla WoW faction with which players can gain access to long-lost Naxxramas transmogs and even a unique mount. The same feature exists for the troll dungeon Zul'Gurub, which was removed years ago. Both of these instances were hidden behind layers of intense riddles and obscure clues, but are now public knowledge for anyone to emulate.

Some, But Not All, of World of Warcraft's Wildest Secrets

The Owls of the Watchers Proved Impossible to Crack

Some mysteries were simply too difficult. The owl statues of Aszuna proved so impossible that, even eight years later, little progress had been made. Eventually, after a few more hints telling players there was more to uncover, World of Warcraft developers tweaked the puzzle to make things just a tad more obvious. It was still a mountain to climb, but players quickly caught on and reignited their search.

As it turned out, clicking the unique Owl of the Watchers statues on a large island in south Aszuna alongside a specific owl pet was only one part of the puzzle. Players also had to look for visual cues to tell if they’d done it in the right sequence, and incorporate the Vault of the Wardens dungeon into their search, where another infuriatingly complex puzzle involving owl statues had to be solved. One talented player even made a website with a third-party bot to help other people solve it once they’d figured the puzzle sequence out.

Incognitro, The Big Daddy of WoW Mysteries

For perspective, this convoluted and time-consuming solution was the answer to just one of the riddles for Incognitro, the Indecipherable Felcycle. There are over a dozen of them, some of which still haven’t been solved, but luckily, only twelve are required for the reward. The mount itself has even more mysteries attached, as inputting certain numeric sequences can make it do all sorts of neat tricks, like shooting fireworks. Only a handful of these effects have been discovered.

Nonsensical riddles and vague allusions to tiny details are rife in World of Warcraft, culminating in Dragonflight’s official recognition of the hobby. Secret Finding became an actual pastime for all players, now adding questlines and trinkets to help them solve any lingering riddles. The Indecipherable Felcylce, Incognitro, arrived just in time for WoW’s twentieth anniversary.

Needless to say, the Secret-Finding Community's tireless commitment allows the average player to skip to the sweet stuff and add these mounts and pets to their collection. But that being said, even thousands of players putting their brightest ideas forward have met their match, as there remain some mysteries tantalizingly out of reach.

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World of Warcraft

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Released

November 23, 2004

ESRB

T for Teen: Blood and Gore, Crude Humor, Mild Language, Suggestive Themes, Use of Alcohol, Violence (online interactions not rated)

Developer(s)

Blizzard

Publisher(s)

Blizzard

Engine

Unreal Engine

Multiplayer

Online Multiplayer

Cross-Platform Play

pc, ps

Cross Save

yes

Expansions

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Classic

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DIGITAL

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MMORPG

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