Having a Title
Unlike in other ages where King’s easily bestowed titles upon the rich, WoW doesn’t have titles for gold or even many for accomplishment. Some MMO’s give titles for the easiest of accomplishments like killing several hundred rabbits for the title Rabbit Slayer or Wanderer for discovering new areas. But in WoW titles are difficult to obtain and most require PvP. Let’s take a look at them.
Non-PvP
There are four titles in the game that do not require PvP. They are Scarab Lord, Champion of the Naaru, Of the Shattered Sun, and Hand of A’dal.
The first title “Scarab Lord” was introduced before the Burning Crusades Expansion when patch 1.9 came out. There was a server wide event introduced to open the 40 person raid Temple of Ahn’Qiraj. The first person to complete the difficult series of quests used a gong to open the temple. And the first couple people within ten minutes to do the same thing got the title “Scarab Lord”. This only happened once per server. And only about one to three people per server got it. At last count there were only 150+ people in the world with it. Rare indeed.
There is some confusion over whether it is possible to still get the title. You definitely can not if you’re server has already opened the temple. Or if you are on a new server because they all have the temple unlocked by default. But you may be able to get the title on one of the few servers that have not opened the temple.
The title “Champion of the Naaru” requires you to complete the most difficult instances in Outland on Heroic. Prepare yourself for Shattered Halls, Steam Vaults, Shadow Labs, and The Arcatraz. After this you will have to complete two 25 person raids, Gruul’s and Magtheridon’s Lair. Intimidated? It’s not for everyone, but it is unique. It appears after your name, it’s non-PvP, and and shows you have done at least two of the 25 person raids. The quest line to get the title used to be a requirement to raid The Eye and SSC, but since Blizzard removed the attunement requirements they added this title for completing this chain instead. It’s unlikely your character will be able to get this title above level 70 or after the next expansion so don’t expect to come back and get this later.
The title “Of the Shattered Sun” and was added in the 2.4 patch. And it’s the only title you can buy. It becomes available for 1000 gold after completing the quest A Magnanimous Benefactor and reaching exalted with the Shattered Sun Offensive. It’s been called the welfare epic of titles, because after the server wide event it will essentially be available for money and reputation rather than some of the more difficult requirements the other titles have. But this title may not be available when the Shattered Sun Offensive is over, when the statue commemorating the fallen is raised. So it may be rare in the future.
The last title “Hand of A’dal” was added in the 2.4 patch as well. The Hand of A’dal works much like Champion of the Naaru. It was added when attunement for Mount Hyjal and The Black Temple was removed. To get this title you must complete the same attunement quests as before which among other things includes killing the final bosses in Serpentshrine Caverns and The Eye, Lady Vashj and Kael’thas. However, this has been made easier because you no longer have to kill all the other bosses in the instance to get to them.
Arena
At the end of the season you get an Arena title if your team is ranked in the top 35% on your server. Depending on how highly ranked you are, you can choose from Challenger, Rival, Duelist, Gladiator, and Merciless Gladiator. At the end of Season 3 there may be Vengeful Gladiator instead of Merciless. These titles are difficult to get mostly because you compete with other people for them like the old ladder system in battlegrounds.
Battlegrounds
There are two types of Battleground titles. The old ladder ones which you can not currently get but occasionally see around and the new reputation ones.
The old titles have names like Corporal, Knight, and Marshall. They were awarded on a ladder system which was removed when the Burning Crusades Expansion came out. Players that received these titles in the past can still display the highest one they had, so you still see characters in the game today with them. Blizzard has said they may bring back the ability to get these titles again in a different way in the future.
The new reputation based titles are Justicar (Alliance) and Conqueror (Horde). You can get one by becoming exalted with the three reputations for Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, and Alterac Valley.
Having a title is one of the few ways in the game to make you high level character unique. But they are also difficult to obtain, unless you are a friend of the Kings.
Article updated to include Hand of A’dal from patch 2.4
Article updated to include Of The Shattered Sun title from patch 2.4
The title “of the Shattered Sun” is not guaranteed to be available after the town has been built, nor is it available just for money - you need to be Exalted with the Shattered Sun Offensive during phase 4 (the final phase) of the reclaimation of the island. You won’t necessarily be able to buy the title after the statue commemorating the fallen has been built
Thanks Dan, I edited it to include that it might be unavailable in the future. It would be disappointing if it was. I know people who would still like to get the Scarab Lord title.