The Legion of the Dawn's Grand Cathedral by Briggette

Briggette got in touch with me to visit her cathedral. I confess I was slightly apprehensive, yet intrigued.

So I blocked off my memories from my town's nearby Scarlet Cathedral and made the trip over to the Americas to see hers for myself.

This is not simply a large cathedral with a few rooms attached. The whole complex was built around the purpose of the guild itself: a holy military organisation that travels Azeroth aiding those fighting evil.

The Legion of the Dawn's Guild Hall is a place of worship, care and knowledge.

- Briggette

That requires somewhere to pray, somewhere to recover and somewhere to store all the suspicious books its adventurers inevitably bring home.

Obviously, this place has all three.

A quiet garden

I meet Briggette outside her Grand Cathedral, in a garden surrounded by hedges.

She tells me it's meant to be something of a hedge maze, though it feels less confusing and more secluded. There are little corners where I could happily disappear with a book for an afternoon.

At night, the moon rises over the nearby mountain.

Unfortunately, we're here during the day, so I don't get to see the moon rise.

Briggette asks if I'm ready to head inside.

Quite the entrance

The first room certainly makes an impression, both visually and, if you happen to be living-impaired, painfully - the Holy Light's presence is strong. But this housing reporter isn't easily deterred.

The Legion of the Dawn has very firmly committed to its gold and black colour scheme. Large black and gold … cover the floor of the hall, golden statues stand beside them and candles illuminate practically everything.

I love how she repurposed the … into statues and managed to give them an ominous but holy appearance.

My guide tells me it took some work with lighting to get rid of its usual green tint, but the result fits surprisingly well into the room.

Straight ahead lies the cathedral complex. The library is to the left and the infirmary to the right. At this point I still don't know how large this place is.

As I'm admiring the entrance hall, Briggette beckons me forward.

The cathedral

The main chamber continues the gold and black theme of the entrance hall, with tall columns and rows of seating beneath the lights.

I get distracted almost at once: The pillars are absolutely gorgeous! The simple combination of … and a … achieves such a grand look!

Briggette tells me there is a lot to see and to take my time - a dangerous thing to tell me.

As I'm admiring the pulpit, Briggette tells me it was inspired by an old church in England.

There is also an organ tucked into the back of the cathedral. Briggette can't take credit for its design: it was based on a creation by Epiphania.

Officers, choir and other faiths

Upstairs are a series of small booths for the guild officers, complete with books for them to follow along with the service.

Across from them is the space reserved for the choir.

Briggette: We're not a strictly Light guild - I have two little rooms here for other "religions".

From the main worship space we move through the rooms used by the clergy: through one door there's an office, the other takes us into a small resting room and space dedicated to other faiths.

It's a small part of the overall complex, but I like it, particularly the space dedicated to Elune. It attracted all manner of nature spirits. One even gives me a little fright, making me jump, when I spot him. It's good to know my reflexes still work - some of them, anyway.

The addition of pets to housing adds a little extra life to rooms and make them feel more lived in - I love to see how builders are using them!

I can't help but notice there isn't a similar space of worship for Shadow faiths. But I don't say anything. At this point I'm pushing through the pain of my own Light sensitivity to ask more questions... and I'm debating whether someone like me should be here at all.

Confessions

Then Briggette takes me to the confessional.

I have never liked confessionals - They're cramped, uncomfortable and I never know what to say.

I'm also having flashbacks to the Scarlet Monastery near my hometown. They were always very eager to get people like me through their doors.

Getting back out was the difficult part.

Fortunately, Briggette quickly reassures me that the Legion of the Dawn is much more welcoming. She points out that one of their library caretakers is a Death Knight. I take that as a good sign.

There's also a small memorial area, again making good use of statues, before a garden that connects this side of the cathedral back towards the front of the complex (and leading to the infirmary).

Briggette admits she needed something to join the spaces together. It works.

Rather than feeling like a collection of disconnected rooms, the little garden gives the whole place a sense of continuity, almost like a little courtyard in the middle of a monastery.

From there, we head towards somewhere I feel like I might actually need.

The infirmary

The infirmary is larger than I expected. And it's further away enough from the cathedral that I can feel my Light sensitivity easing.

We begin in the waiting room, followed by an office (or clinic?) and a research room, where I notice a strange machine attached to the wall - the guild members are always conducting one experiment or another.

Further inside is the surgery. A bright light hangs over the operating area, although Briggette is still trying to find suitable doctor's tools for the room.

I suggest knives and forks, but on reflection, perhaps don't take medical tooling advice from me - I typically use whatever's at hand to re-attach my limbs.

The connecting hallway doubles as a triage area, leading into the recovery room.

It really drives home that this isn't a token medical corner attached to the cathedral. The infirmary has been designed to support the guild's role as a military organisation.

Members go out into the world to fight and sometimes they come back with more holes than they started with - and they'll always have an infirmary waiting for them.

The library

The third major part of the complex is the library - this one might be my favourite.

Bookcases aren't simply pushed against the walls. Briggette uses some of them architecturally, turning them into pillars and making the books part of the room itself.

There's a separate office for the librarian, filled with maps. I ask whether the head librarian has a particular interest in cartography.

Briggette: Have to know where in the world to find more knowledge

Fair point.

The library is filled with reading and study spaces, along with an archive room and still more areas to sit down with a book.

There's also a restoration table.

Adventurers aren't exactly known for handling ancient manuscripts with archival gloves. If you're going to recover forgotten knowledge from ruins, tombs and dungeons, presumably some of it comes back slightly singed.

Or covered in blood.

Or cursed.

Which brings us neatly to my favourite room.

The dangerous books

Of course there's a restricted section.

As soon as I saw how large the library was, I wanted to ask if they had a section for dangerous books, but I didn't want to seem too eager.

The room is locked away from the rest of the collection and access is restricted. Not everyone gets a key.

I am given access to the room which is part exciting and part terrifying. I have no idea what sort of books are in here and I can feel Briggette's eyes following every movement I make inside.

It's a shame we can't currently set conditions for opening doors. A locked archive like this would be perfect for puzzles, hidden mechanisms or genuinely restricted sections of a house.

Still, even without that functionality, the room helps sell what the Legion's library actually represents.

This isn't only a collection of books for casual reading.

The Legion travels the world, collects knowledge and brings it back here to preserve and, when necessary, secure it.

You can tell they go to great lengths to ensure some of these books are well protected - some are locked behind chains, others behind magical wards.

The Legion of the Dawn

After touring the entire complex, Briggette and I sit down to talk about the guild behind it.

The Legion of the Dawn has existed since around the end of Warlords of Draenor.

Briggette: Our Guild Leader has since the beginning of the guild had an idea of what our guild's island was like. Housing gave us the opportunity to actually build what he had only described.

In spite of that, there weren't detailed architectural drawings to follow, so Briggette worked from those written descriptions, input from the Guild Leader and another officer, then filled in the gaps with her own ideas.

The result reflects the three things the guild needs from its home:

• They hold mass in the cathedral.
• Their troops are cared for in the infirmary.
• And the knowledge they recover during their adventures is collected and secured in the library.

Briggette: This is definitely meant to be a place of worship, care, and knowledge.

We welcome any who want to pursue any of the three.

Building a Guild's Grand Cathedral

Briggette didn't simply sit down one weekend and made it all happen.

She estimates that it took around a month to get everything where she wanted it, working on the hall for several days at a time. Even after she was "done", the Guild Hall kept changing as Briggette gained housing levels: The cathedral was originally smaller; The library once consisted of only the stairwell room.

Both have since grown into the much grander spaces she took me through.

She describes the project as a labour of love for both the guild and WoW Housing.

That seems about right - you can lose an astonishing number of hours on something you love. One moment you're adjusting a bookshelf. Then you look outside and the sun has risen.

The Guild Hall itself keeps evolving - it is used for roleplay when the Legion of the Dawn isn't out adventuring in the world, so the build isn't just a representation of their lore either: It's an actual stage for it and one that changes as the story unfolds.

What's next?

The cathedral had previously reached its maximum decor budget, which limited how much Briggette could continue changing.

With housing now going up to level 12, she intends to revisit several areas once she has levelled the house and collected some of the newer decor.

The infirmary office and triage hallway are on the list. So is the locked room.

She already has ideas, although they're longer-term plans.

Given that it has already grown from a much smaller cathedral and single-room library, I'm curious to see where she takes it next.

Briggette's throughts and advice

Briggette is quite open about taking inspiration from other builders.

Briggette: Usually when I have an idea I want to try to create, I go looking to see if anyone else has done something like what I'm thinking and then I kitbash from different ideas with my own.

It's less about copying a finished room and more about learning another builder's solution to a problem.

Later in our conversation she mentions, WoWKEA, Building Mouse and Cottage Wizard as creators whose work she particularly enjoys.

For anyone inspired to build something equally ambitious, Briggette's advice is simple:

Briggette: Don't be afraid to experiment, to borrow from other creator ideas or to just play with something before you finalize it.

She started working on the Guild Hall during beta and continued tinkering with it every time she gained another housing level.

If something doesn't work, try something else - especially with blueprints.

If another builder solved a problem you are struggling with, learn from them.

And if you create something elaborate that you might want again someday, save the blueprint before taking a sledgehammer to it (I heard that can be therapeutic).

Blueprints change everything

The big news in Housing have been the introduction of blueprints and I've been asking builders how they have changed their approach to decorating.

Blueprints have made Briggette much more willing to experiment: Previously, dismantling a complicated build meant potentially losing hours of work. Now she can pack something away and bring it back later.

She gives me an example from her Horde house, where she built a troll dungeon for an RP event. Once blueprints became available, she packed the entire thing away.

Maybe she'll use it again. Maybe she won't.

But after putting that much work into it, she understandably doesn't want to lose it.

Blueprints also mean she can temporarily dismantle parts of her builds to test new ideas, knowing she can restore them afterwards.

Briggette also hopes blueprints will help players who don't feel confident decorating at the same level as some of the more experienced builders.

Rather than seeing them as something that could reduce creativity, she's excited by the idea that they may allow more players to take part.

Both new and experienced builders alike can use blueprints to learn from each other, to borrow ideas and to experiment with their own: a blueprint can be a starting point, or a way to dissect and learn a new technique.

Sometimes the easiest way to understand a complicated build is to pull it apart and see what's underneath.

A home for the guild

Before I leave, Briggette tells me that she was initially a little shy about sharing her build, but seeing @...'s article on Thorne's house inspired her to reach out to us.

I'm really glad she got in touch! I love seeing what players can do with Housing, and the Legion of the Dawn's Grand Cathedral is a perfect example of that.

This is the sort of build that demonstrates what Housing can add to a roleplaying guild which has spent years building its own history.

The Legion of the Dawn's island existed long before Housing: It existed in written descriptions, roleplay and the imaginations of its members.

Now you can actually walk through it.

You can attend mass in the cathedral, research in the library, recover in the infirmary and wander through the quieter gardens connecting everything together.

And if you're particularly trustworthy, you might even get a key to the dangerous book room.

Briggette hopes that sharing her Guild's Grand Cathedral inspires somebody else to create something of their own.

After spending quite a few hours exploring it, I hope so too!

See you on the next build... maybe it'll be yours!