D&D’s World of Warcraft Designer Hid a Personal Easter Egg in Plain Sight

Dungeons & Dragons: World of Warcraft lead designer James Wyatt included his own Night Elf character riding the Spirit of Eche'ro in the book’s illustrations. The personal Easter egg reflects a broader effort to bring familiar details from the game into D&D while adapting them for a co-operative tabletop experience.

In World of Warcraft, obtaining the spectral moose involved hours of Archaeology work, but in the D&D book characters can find six fragments and assemble them into a staff that casts Find Steed. Another of Wyatt’s hard-earned mounts, the Cenarion War Hippogryph, is available through Renown with the Cenarion Circle. The book also includes nods to characters such as Sylvanas Windrunner and carefully checked depictions of Azeroth, with the team balancing representation of the Horde and Alliance.