The way Blizzard is doing this is weird and confusing. This is the start of Season 2, it’s still patch 8.1. Kultirans and Zandalari don’t get released until 8.1.5, which will probably be March or April.
if you can go by what’s been data-mined from the PTR in ref the changes coming for the children’s week event the patch is going live on the April 29th maintenance
Maybe I’m misunderstanding, but that guide says that “Fly out to meet them” (the last quest of the achievement) comes before the “Battle for Drazar’alor” quest, which sends you to the raid. Which means that you unlock trolls right before the quest that sends you into a raid.
if you can go by what’s been data-mined from the PTR in ref the changes coming for the children’s week event, the patch, (8.1.5) which contains the newest allied races an their unlock quest-lines, is going live on the April 29th maintenance.
so it’s safe to say players will have done at the least a LFR version of the new raid well before the new allied races even become available.
Indeed! According to WoWHead, You DO have to RAID to unlock the new Allied Races in 8.1.5. The War Campaign requires Alliance to kill Rastakhan to unlock Kul’Tirans and Horde to kill Jaina to unlock Zandalari. You can not unlock the races until 8.1.5 and we don’t know when that will drop. And, you should be able to complete the war campaign on LFR difficulty. Of course, that will timegate the release but it doesn’t matter until 8.1.5 drops. I imagine, because of that, 8.1.5 will not drop until after wing 3 of the LFR opens in 5 weeks - so that Kul’Tirans and Zandalari can be opened at the same time instead of Alliance able to unlock Kul’Tirans before Horde can unlock Zandalari.
Well, if wowhead is correct, you do need to do the raid.
With Battle of Dazar’alor being released, the Tides of Vengeance War Campaign continues. You’ll be able to pick up the final section of the War Campaign which is separated into two parts, separated by a Raid Quest to defeat King Rastakhan (6th boss) / Lady Jaina Proudmoore (9th boss).
Completing this final part of the Tides of Vengeance War Campaign awards Tides of Vengeance. This achievement is required to unlock the Zandalari Troll and Kul Tiran Allied Races which will be released in the next major patch!