The new collection ranges from enormous Shadowmoon willows and Nagrand trees to snow-covered Drustvar pines, Ardenweald foliage and the sort of hostile-looking Revendreth shrubbery that suggests the garden may have its own disciplinary procedures. the latest Patch 12.1.5 foliage datamine shows Blizzard pulling directly from the environmental identities of several older expansions rather than simply producing another group of generic green plants.
For Housing, that is a surprisingly important upgrade.
Draenor Is Bringing Some Very Large Trees
Warlords of Draenor provides some of the most immediately impressive additions.
Current PTR data includes:
- Pale Shadowmoon Willow
- Verdant Shadowmoon Willow
- Embaari Beech Tree
- Karabor Beech Tree
- Lunarfall Beech Tree
- Young Sentinel Tree
- Highmaul Sentinel Tree
- Mature Spiritwood Oak
- multiple Karabor hedges
- Shadowmoon flowers and glowing plants
- Nagrand ivy, wheat and clover
Some of these are genuinely substantial models. PTR Housing testers have noted that several trees needed to be scaled down simply to fit comfortably into screenshots. That makes them much more useful for creating actual forests, shaded courtyards and large garden structures than another ornamental plant that looks ambitious beside a coffee table.
The current vendor setup also gives Garrison Resources another reason to exist. Alliance-side foliage found at Botanist Taania in Shadowmoon Valley currently costs 200 gold plus 200 Garrison Resources for most smaller pieces, while the large trees cost 400 gold and 400 Garrison Resources. Horde players have a corresponding collection from Botanist Gril'ka in Nagrand at similar prices.
This follows the same pattern we saw yesterday when 84 Shadowlands Housing decorations suddenly made Reservoir Anima relevant again. Blizzard appears increasingly happy to use Housing as a retirement program for expansion currencies.
Garrison Resources have apparently found employment in landscaping.
Battle for Azeroth Gives Us the Snowbound Highroad Pine
Battle for Azeroth contributes fewer pure foliage pieces than Draenor or Shadowlands, but its Drustvar collection contains one of the most immediately useful additions: the Snowbound Highroad Pine.
Actual snow-covered trees have been a conspicuous gap for players trying to create winter builds. You could construct a cold-looking stone courtyard, cover it in appropriately miserable lighting and then place a perfectly healthy summer tree in the middle like somebody had misunderstood the assignment.
The new BFA foliage includes:
- Snowbound Highroad Pine
- Drustvar Leaf Clump
- Drustvar Leaf Patch
- Drustvar Shelfcap
- Drustvar Glowcap Cluster
- Lush Drustvar Witchfern
- Withered Crimson Oak
- Tall Crimson Oak
- Scarlet Drustvar Oak
- Scarlet Drustvar Thornwood
- Twisted Crimson Root
- Arching Crimson Ivy
Current PTR testing places these with Fenwir at Arom’s Stand in Drustvar, using War Resources. Prices range from just 10 War Resources for small leaf patches to 150 War Resources for larger trees such as the Snowbound Highroad Pine.
Again, this is exactly the kind of old expansion content Housing is uniquely good at reviving. There is no sensible reason to make War Resources part of Midnight player power. There is an extremely sensible reason to let somebody exchange them for a snowy tree.
One affects raid balance.
The other affects whether your garden looks properly miserable in December.
Shadowlands Adds Ardenweald Gardens and Revendreth Nightmares
Shadowlands provides the largest stylistic range.
We already covered the broader Patch 12.1.5 Shadowlands Housing catalogue, including Covenant furniture, architectural pieces and the return of Reservoir Anima as a decor currency. The foliage datamine shows just how much of that batch can be used outdoors.
Ardenweald includes:
- Leaning Wildgrove Tree
- Fae Lantern Blossom
- Blooming Celestial Dreamleaf
- Small Shimmering Moonvine
- Lush Wildgrove Fern
- Celestial Grovebush
- Hanging Wildgrove Ivy
- Starseed Sapling
- Fae Animashrooms
That gives Night Fae-themed houses a much better chance of resembling Ardenweald rather than a blue room containing three strategically positioned houseplants.
Revendreth moves in the opposite direction. Its new vegetation includes Lonely Banewood Pine, Nathrian Sinstain Oak, Nathrian Thicket Hedge, Endmire Anima Blossom, thorny briars, fungal rotcaps and several varieties of suspicious red shrubbery.
In other words, Ardenweald gives you a magical garden.
Revendreth gives you a magical garden that has probably committed a crime.
Large Trees May Become an Outdoor Budget Problem
There is one less glamorous number attached to many of these decorations: Decor Placement Cost.
A lot of the larger trees and hedges currently cost 5 placement points each. Small plants can cost only one, but building an actual dense forest from five-point trees can eat through an outdoor budget surprisingly quickly.
That matters because Housing players have already demonstrated that the intended use of an outdoor plot is not “place six things tastefully.” It is more commonly “construct an entire functioning civilization and then discover the game has concerns about object count.” We have previously seen players turn their Housing plot into a complete carnival with rides, stalls and minigames, which provides a reasonable indication of what will happen once Blizzard hands the same community twenty varieties of tree.
The new foliage therefore makes outdoor-budget improvements increasingly desirable. A single dramatic willow is easy. A convincing forest requires duplicates.
And Housing players understand the dangerous relationship between the words “convincing” and “duplicates.”
These Are Currently In-Game Vendor Rewards, Not Shop Trees
There is also a potentially welcome distinction between these plants and some of Housing’s earlier premium decor.
The currently discovered Draenor, BFA and Shadowlands foliage has in-game vendor sources and old expansion currencies. That is notable after the earlier backlash over cash-shop Housing trees and decor pricing.
At least in the current PTR build, the answer to “where do I get the Shadowmoon Willow?” is not “locate your credit card.”
It is “go back to Draenor and find some Garrison Resources.”
There are many criticisms one can reasonably make of Warlords of Draenor.
Being forced to remember your Garrison exists may now join the nostalgic category.
This Is Exactly What Housing Needed From Old Expansions
The best thing about this datamine is that Blizzard is using art that already gives old zones their identities.
A Drustvar tree looks like Drustvar.
A glowing Shadowmoon willow immediately changes the mood of an entire garden.
Ardenweald plants can build a Night Fae sanctuary without relying entirely on furniture.
Revendreth’s briars can make a courtyard feel hostile before you add a single gothic chair.
That visual specificity becomes especially valuable alongside Housing Blueprints that let players save and share elaborate designs and Artisanal Room Plans that already expanded the shapes builders can work with. More structural flexibility is useful, but it needs a sufficiently broad decor library to make two houses using the same floorplan feel different.
Plants are unusually good at that.
You can disguise edges with them.
Frame buildings with them.
Create forests, gardens and pathways.
Hide mistakes behind them.
Especially the last one.
Not Every Datamined Plant Has a Finished Model Yet
As always, there is a PTR warning.
Several of the newly datamined foliage items still have placeholder or incomplete model data. Prices, vendors, faction requirements, placement costs and even which items reach live servers can change before Patch 12.1.5 releases.
So this is not yet a final shopping guide.
But the direction is unusually clear. Blizzard is opening the environmental libraries of older expansions and turning the scenery itself into Housing rewards.
That may ultimately be more important than another furniture set. We argued before launch that Housing was becoming WoW’s next enormous collectible problem. Trees and foliage make that collection exponentially more dangerous because a table usually needs one copy.
A hedge does not.
A forest certainly does not.
Patch 12.1.5 is giving Housing players more trees.
The outdoor placement budget should probably begin preparing its statement.
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