The Horde Family Event is a three-week event that runs from June 11, 2025 until July 2, 2025. During the event, players complete Horde-related challenges and missions, and earn the new Horde Leader Thrall!
In this event guide, I will show you the best rewards and optimal path through the reward tree and provide strong army comps for the special event missions.
Horde Challenge Tips
The challenges seem to work well this time. Here are some tips for the least clear ones:
- You need a minimum of 4 Horde minis in your army for the dungeon battles challenge
- Nashala and Whitemane are good for the challenges to play Horde minis (they will be changed to 5 completions instead of 10/15 in a future patch)
- Killing Footmen with Grunts can be done against Marshal Redpaw (Westfall) or Tirion (Plaguelands) both of which summon Footmen on regular basis
- The Orcs you need to heal are: Grommash Hellscream, Orgrim Doomhammer, Frostwolf Shaman, Warsong Grunts, and Warsong Raider
Horde Event Missions
You access event missions directly from the event island: open the Horde Family event, and you will see a Missions tab in addition to Challenges and Rewards.
Event missions can use any existing maps in the game, they can be timegated and progress-gated, and use various modifiers to make the encounters more difficult.
In the Horde Family event, there are three difficulty levels for event missions. Event missions are unlocked by completing the previous mission. Each difficulty level is based on your average army level:
- Normal: 2 levels below your average army level
- Heroic: Same as your average army level
- Mythic: 2 levels above your average army level, no lower than one level below your highest-level mini
Because both your average army level and your highest-level mini affect the mission level, you may want to off-slot some minis to keep their levels close together.
Blizzard has not announced how the protection against skewed armies works, but the current top hypothesis is that all minis that are more than -4 levels from your highest-level mini will count as -4 levels from it for determining the opponent's level. The average army level shown in your army screen does not matter, and the enemy level shown in the mission list may be incorrect if your army is heavily skewed.
As practical consequences:
- You can have one mini that is +1 compared to the boss in Mythic (Assuming all other minis at -4 from the highest, with a total of 3 levels available to use between them on top)
- You can have up to 3 minis at the same level as a Mythic (Assuming other minis at -4 from the highest, with a total of 2 levels available to use between them on top)
- You can usually offslot 2 (sometimes 3) minis, preferably ones that bring utility, to lower the mission level by 1
- You cannot significantly outlevel Mythic missions
Betrayal at Thunder Bluff - Heroic Magatha - Mythic Magatha
The first mission pits you against Magatha Runetotem, but this time she is on Cairne’s map. This includes the unkillable Darkspear Trolls that only shoot at air minis near the boss.
Magatha’s army consists of the following minis:
- Darkspear Troll – Headhunting
- Frostwolf Shaman – Earth Shield
- Harpies – Infectious Swipes
- Prowler – Pack Leader
- Stonehoof Tauren – Pummel
- Witch Doctor – Amplify Curse
Neutral Stonehoof Tauren spawn every 30 seconds and join whoever beats them up. You can drop Whelp Eggs on them or shoot at them from the high ground with Plague Farmer.
A Stonehoof Tauren (with a poisonous attack and Momentum talent), a Witch Doctor, and a Frostwolf Shaman spawn every 60 seconds in Heroic and Mythic and head down the right lane.
At 50% health, Magatha summons a Totem that deals 400 Elemental damage on a radius of 5 every 3 seconds for 15 seconds.
This Arthas army works against Magatha at all difficulty levels. I actually cleared everything in Normal and Heroic with this, and only made changes for the remaining Mythic missions:
Horde Event Magatha Mythic Arthas: rumblo:CF4QABoECEQQAhoECF0QABoECFkQAhoECEYQABoECB4QARoECFgQAQ==
Use Arthas to survive the initial assault. Depending on Magatha’s opening hand, it may come from both left and right, and you may need to defend close to your base to catch both groups.
Capture the neutral Taurens with Whelp Eggs or Plague Farmer from the high ground.
Take the Tower and attack Magatha.
Gazlowe’s Fire Sale - Heroic Gazlowe - Mythic Gazlowe
In the second mission, you meet Gazlowe with his rockets, but this time, the action takes place on Charlga’s map.
Gazlowe’s army:
- Chain Lightning – Brilliant Flash
- Darkspear Troll – Serpent Sting
- Frostwolf Shaman – Lightning Mastery
- Harpies – Talon Dive
- Stonehoof Tauren – Momentum
- Warsong Grunts – Blood Pact
- Witch Doctor – Spirit Ward
Goblin Sappers spawn every 45 seconds; in Heroic, they come with a Stonehoof Tauren, and in Mythic, there are two groups of them. Luckily for you, both groups come through the right: one from the canyon, and the other takes a detour by the right Tower. This means that when you control the high ground around the canyon, you can easily take them all out.
Stationary Darkspear Trolls spawn on the bridges every 50 seconds (heroic) or 40 seconds (mythic). They are a minor inconvenience for your high-ground control, but nothing more.
At phase changes, Gazlowe cleanses himself and clears the board around him. There is one phase transition in Normal, two in Heroic, and three in Mythic.
This Arthas army can take Gazlowe out in no time:
Horde Event Gazlowe Mythic Arthas: rumblo:CF4QABoECEQQAhoECF0QABoECFkQAhoECEYQABoECB4QARoECCQQAg==
Defend against the first wave, and then proceed to take the Towers. Earth Elemental can distract the Towers so that your damage dealers can take them out.
Once you have control over the high ground, you can shoot any minis that try to go through the canyon from above.
Gates of Orgrimmar - Heroic Thrall - Mythic Thrall
Gates of Orgrimmar is a new map where you fight against Thrall.
Thrall’s army does not currently have any talents:
- Darkspear Troll
- Execute
- Ogre Mage
- Stonehoof Tauren
- Warsong Grunts
- Warsong Raider
The main mechanic in the map are Duelists. In Normal, they are Shaman who respawn every 90 seconds, and in Heroic and Mythic, they are Warsong Grunts who respawn every 25 seconds.
The Duelists will challenge your minis to a duel, much like Orgrim Doomhammer. Other minis can help, but this duel takes place enough on the side that it can be hard to get your other minis to engage. Whoever wins the duel, captures the nearby Towers.
Note that the Duelists will be happy to challenge your Kobold Miners too, so be careful when you send small minis to the side lanes.
There are also Warsong Raiders and Goblin Sappers that attack through the middle lane at 2:30 and then every 90 seconds.
At phase transitions, Thrall cleanses himself and summons Swole Trolls for all three lanes.
While it is possible to complete this mission with Arthas, Onu is an even stronger option, especially with Barkskin. An Armored Onu will not lose a duel!
Horde Event Thrall Mythic Onu: rumblo:CEMQABoECFkQAhoECEYQABoECF0QARoECEQQAhoECB4QARoECE8QAg==
Send Onus to duel and capture Towers for you. Apply pressure on Thrall from all sides.
This Onu army is also strong for the War at Orgrimmar co-op mission.
You can see all of these armies in action on YouTube:
Challenges and Tickets
Full reward tree cost: 26,550 tickets
Tickets from Event challenges: 46,400 tickets
Tickets from Daily Offers: 500 tickets each
While there are challenges like upgrade to Legendary and Epic in the event, the vast quantity of tickets means you can get everything without them.
The Reward Tree
Available rewards:
- 16 Thrall stars
- 31,000 Arc Energy
- 1300 Coins (1950 with Booster)
- 1 Rare Core
- 1 Epic Core
- 1 Rare-O-Matic
- 3 Modest Tomes
- 3 Major Tomes
- 1 Mega Tome
- 1 Mythic Tome
- 26 Grom stars and 26 Sneed stars
- 5 stars for each Horde troop (12 x 5 = 60 stars)
Note that Blizzard has promised to increase the number of Thrall stars to 19 to make them a better match with the paid bundles for an Epic upgrade. It is possible to get the entire tree with reasonable effort, so you don't have to make hard choices if you participate in the event.
Optimal Path Through the Reward Tree
Step 1: Get Thrall!
Step 2: Work your way down the tree to the other Thralls, noting dead ends you must work around
That’s all Thrall stars for a total of 9,100 tickets
Step 3: Start picking up other good rewards, like the Coins circled in green
Note that there are many dead ends in the middle, you cannot just go straight down.
How to Get Thrall Stars
Thrall is a seasonal Horde Leader for season 15: during the current season, you can only get Thrall stars from the event reward tree and from paid bundles. Thrall will be added to the Grid in season 16, the first Horde week of which starts on July 26.
You can get 16 Thrall Stars from the reward tree, enough to get it to Rare. You will need another 23 stars for Epic and 48 stars for Legendary, but Blizzard has said they will add 3 Thrall stars to the tree to reduce the number of additional stars needed for Epic to 20.
The bundles available for Thrall include stars as follows:
- 10 stars for $19.99(incl. Legendary Thrall skin)
- 40 stars for $59.99(incl. Legendary Thrall and Tower skins)
- A chain of bundles that unlock
- 10 stars for $9.99
- 10 stars for $19.99
- 10 stars for $29.99
- 15 stars for $39.99
If you want to get a Legendary Thrall during season 15, you should buy the 40-star bundle and the 10-star bundle ($69.98 total).
For an Epic Thrall, assuming Blizzard will add those promised 3 stars, it is enough to buy two 10-star bundles that cost $29.98 overall.
Without spending real money, you cannot upgrade Thrall beyond Rare until season 16.
