Sooner Than Expected: Battle for Undercity!

Well, it's a little dull by comparison, but at first I thought the coolest thing I'd see today was Rokhan, who you may remember from the Rexxar campaign in Warcraft 3:
To start the Wrath Gate event, you actually have to do a surprisingly small number of quests from Dragonblight. You start with the Taunka escort quest chain in Taunka'le, and from there do every quest chain that starts Agmar's Hammer. You'll have short detours to Venomspite and Wyrmrest Temple, but you do not have to complete the unrelated quests there.
After you resolve all the quest lines in Agmar's Hammer, you'll be sent to the Wrathgate to start the event. After you watch a loregasm-inducing cutscene, you're greeted by none other than Alextrasza and Krassus in their dragon forms:
She asks you to return Saurfang the Younger's battle armor to his father at Warsong Hold. Saurfang tells you Orgrimmar is in a state of martial law, and when you arrive you find the city flooded with Forsaken refugees. Upon arriving in Thrall's chamber, Jaina Proudmoore appears.
Varian Wrynn wrongly blames the entire Horde for the death of Bolivar Fordragon, thus completing his transformation into a stereotypical racist, warmongering, and arrogant Warcraft Human. Thrall teleports you to Undercity, where Vol'jin is leading the siege of the city. You may have to wait around a bit, but eventually Thrall and Sylvanas appear and the battle begins.
Thrall cleanses the poisonous blight in Undercity by calling upon the elements of Air and Water. In the courtyard you are greeted by Varimathras, who currently for some reason has been replaced with a blue and white checkerboard pattern cube (Blizzard working on a new model, perhaps?).
Varmiathras runs away, and sends out several waves of Abominations and Apothecaries. Not that it really matters, but you can do a whole lot of damage on the trash waves as Unholy, because it's a very strong AoE build. After a while The Blight Aberration emerges.
Once you lay the smack-down on him, you descend into Undercity proper. Thrall airlifts you down the elevator, which has been essentially converted into a punji trap. When you reach the entrance to the Royal Quarter, you fight trough another bunch of trash waves, until Khanok the Misnomer emerges, is killed, and you pass right by him.
Varimathras tries to shut you out once more by collapsing the tunnel leading to the Throne Room, but Thrall summons the Earth element to clear the way.
In the throne room you see Varimathras (still a cube), channeling several open Burning Legion portals. At this point it's very apparent that The Legion is as adamant as ever to get into Azeroth.
Before you square off (or should I say CUBE off?) against Varimathras, you have to deal with several more trash waves. Finally, Varmiathras's "Unseen Master" scolds him for his failure. Apparently his plan was to summon this master into Undercity itself. Varimathras comes down to face you, and is handily defeated.
You celebrate a bit before deciding to head off and face Putress.
Before you can leave the throne room, you are stopped by Varian Wrynn, who has already defeated Putress and is now determined to defeat Thrall (as if he could).
I did my best to get in a few shots at Varian (who is unfortunately unkillable) before Jaina intervenes and teleports Varian and company out of Undercity.
Thrall is upset at the prospect of open war with the Alliance, since he actually wants what's best for his people unlike that douchebag Varian. After a short event between Thrall and Saurfang you are sent back to the zeppelin tower in Orgrimmar.

All in all, this event is AMAZING. However, I don't think the long-term implications are very well developed upon. You head back to Northrend and ignore the fact that the Horde and Alliance are practically in open warfare AND the legion is still very active in trying to find a way to enter and destroy Azeroth.

Also, sorry about my fragrant pro-Horde bias, but what can I say, Blizzard did a good job of giving me lots of reasons to hate Varian. I do like how the Horde, who are sometimes perceived as the "evil" group, are actually seeking peace, while Johnny-come-lately Varian Wrynn thinks it's worth catastrophic warfare because his friend died. Taking a running tally of how many of Thrall's friends have died? It's a lot.

Anyway, good job Blizzard!

- Andtaxes