After taking a break from Valhalla for a while, I have finally come back to it and completed the first big expansion for it. Wrath of the Druids takes players to Ireland where a distant cousin is looking for some help building up his small town of Dublin into a massive trading post hub and becoming a worthy part of the new High-King’s land. I expected was there to be lots of weird magic because of the Druids and just something new to experience, but what I got was a bunch of green smoke and the same story we got in the base game.
Read on, but beware! Spoilers are in here!
Beginning the story of Wrath of the Druids is easy. Someone docks at your port in Ravenswood and you join them for the long trip over. When you arrive in Dublin you will meet your distant cousin, Bairid. I genuinely really like Bairid. He isn’t a hard ass and seems to understand that fear isn’t always the best way to stay in control. There are times when he definitely should be tougher on his enemies, but overall his good-natured personality gets him pretty far.
Honestly, most of the other characters are fine but forgetful enough that I don’t remember their names at all. You have the new High-King that everyone is rallying around, a one-eyed merchant who has an issue with her old merchant friend, and of course, another sexy redhead lady who likes to sing. You can romance this redheaded lady, and of course, I did. Randvi doesn’t have to know.
Wrath of the Druids story is just a rehash of the base games mechanics. You need to get all of Ireland on this new King’s side, but you have to fight a secret organization at the same time. The secret organization is filled with Druids that you would think can do some wild shit, but honestly, the craziest thing I saw was one of them turn themselves into a boar. We’ve already seen this trick when Eivor went to Asgard in the base game, so it wasn’t surprising. Every encounter is just swarmed in green hazy smoke which gives the illusion of something mystical happening, but it is just an annoying aesthetic that ultimately doesn’t work very well.
Taking out the secret organization works the same as taking out the Order. Find clues, find where they’re hiding, eliminate them. It takes a decent amount of time, even when trying to just fast travel to each location closest to the clues. Gives the ability to explore more of the area and to get things you might have missed, but it still feels like busywork. The grandmaster of the Druids turns out to, once again, but the guy that you expect at the start of the game. No surprises there, just kind of boring.
The best part of this expansion is the trade posts. Clearing out trade posts and building them up is satisfying to me. It reminds me of Assassin’s Creed 2 and building up the castle town area. Whatever it was called. Unfortunately, it’s not that deep of a system. Gathering resources doesn’t take a lot of time, and maxing out the three upgrades at a trading post is incredibly easy. I guess it was more fun seeing Dublin grow instead of trying to get another King more friends.
Overall I still enjoyed my time in Ireland. It’s just more exploration in a land that I find interesting. The rehash of the base games’ mechanics is disappointing, but the gameplay is still fun enough for me to enjoy cutting down enemies and getting a really dope electrified spear. Besides, I bought the expansion pass already, might as well get in and play through more content.
I’ll be playing the Siege of Paris expansion next. Not sure what to expect, but my hopes are pretty low. If it’s another ‘befriend towns to your cause’ sort of situation again though…
Sorry I don’t have more screen shots of my time in Ireland. I honestly forget to take screen shots and I have been away from writing on this blog for so long that it never even crossed my mind. I’ll do better with the next post, promise!
The Tired Obsidian 
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