Guess what the next expansion will be.

[Nyel]

a - Garrisons were a very bad feature, as far as features go: it was relatively noniteractive, boring, had no bearing on story, no challenge, actually it offered nothing except filler
b - Draenor perks were incredibly limited in scope, including them as "class gameplay" makes sense only if you stretch the concept to its limits, and anyway every expansion brings at least some class and spec redesign that has much more bearing on how classes are played than the silly perks
c - splitting hairs, really - it was awkward because it was one step removed from our "main" Azeroth; and played quite badly (alt Velen thrown under the bus, alt Doomhammer being irrelevant, alt Ner'zhul being irrelevant), the entire premise collapsed during the leveling process anyway - we started from "OMG AN ENDLESS INTERDIMENSIONAL INVASION" and got to us stomping on the whole Iron Horde zone after zone
d - I have no beef with flying, although the world was notably empty and there was little reason to go anywhere anyway, so flying was mostly for sightseeing
e - designs are fine, the only thing I'd do is spread all the zones a bit, give them more room to breathe - they seem to compact and too tightly packed, but this is indeed 100% subjective
f - orcs everywhere were fucking horrible, this was probably the worst several years in WoW: remember, WoD followed in the footsteps of the longest-lasting final tier lull of SoO (14 months of orcs)
g - here I agree, everything in WOW is and isn't a clone, you can argue both ways and never get to a conclusion

Thanks for giving answers I'd given as well. Except for g). WoD felt like a cheap copy of TBC (for me).

[elaina]

Baddie Fatigue is a thing blizz wants to avoid so i doubt it will be demon related.

As for void lords as interesting as that sounds its sounds more like something they will want to keep nearer the end if we truly do defeat sargeras in Legion.

So my money is on a Lich King themed xpac with maybe some naga thrown in as a side show.

There is just way too many hints that the Lich King is up to no good in Legion for him not to be an antagonist in the future plus we aint seen a undead themed xpac since wrath!

As much as I like how they are blending new expansions into the last, it is greatly feeding into bad guy fatigue. Orcs and now Demons are now both on "please, not again" list. This is because the longest tiers (the last: siege, hfc) are already wearing on people before the next big showcase arrives (iron horde, legion).

Void can be divided into two expansions: Azshara or Black Empire with Nzoth, here on Azeroth, and then a very late (last?) cosmos-spanning army of light v void lords expansion. If they remotely plan on doing another RTS or make a WoW2 they should probably pocket the latter.

I think most agree a return to northrend or LK expansion is down the road, but it still feels too early and meme-y to do it now. It would be an underinspired nostalgia-train cash grab (harsh words, sorry). Much more build up is needed in order to get that story anywhere near expansion carrying again. Kinda like harvesting a crop way too early. The seed was sewn right after ICC but we are only just now starting to see sprouts of story from it in Legion.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

As much as I like how they are blending new expansions into the last, it is greatly feeding into bad guy fatigue. Orcs and now Demons are now both on "please, not again" list. This is because the longest tiers (the last: siege, hfc) are already wearing on people before the next big showcase arrives (iron horde, legion).

Void can be divided into two expansions: Azshara or Black Empire with Nzoth, here on Azeroth, and then a very late (last?) cosmos-spanning army of light v void lords expansion. If they remotely plan on doing another RTS or make a WoW2 they should probably pocket the latter.

I think most agree a return to northrend or LK expansion is down the road, but it still feels too early and meme-y to do it now. It would be an underinspired nostalgia train cash grab. Much more build up is needed in order to get that story anywhere near expansion carrying again. Kinda like harvesting a crop way too early. The seed was sewn right after ICC but we are only just now starting to see sprouts of story from it in Legion.

Pretty sure even if we do a return to a Scourge themed expansion again even if it took forever from now(5 years) it would be considered a cashgrab or uninspired. Old Gods seem likely but when 7.3. reveals all of its bits we'll know where things are going.

[nanoneo]

Next will be Naga/Troll filler expansion, last boss will be N'Zoth leading to Void expansion. what do you think?

[Deleted]

I suppose, but it still feels like a step down doesn't it? From the Burning Legion, one of the greatest threats in the universe, to... Naga? I mean I guess there's no real way of doing it unless they somehow strip us of our powers and weaken us. I suppose one could argue that we've been made more powerful due to the artifacts and, once they're gone, we're back to being just everyday heroes. Idk.

You have to remember that Azshara was as strong as Kil'Jaeden back when she was just a highborne. And while most of the naga are cannon fodder at this point I am sure she keeps her strongest followers close to her palace. And that's not even getting into what other creatures might lurk underwater.

[Jokubas]

I'm still not ready to commit to an idea, but a lot of times I start looking for really interesting hooks and the expansions end up a lot more simple, so I'm going to try to think about how to make a simple version of the next expansion.

Theme: Void
Villain: N'Zoth

Story: N'Zoth breaks out and we get ominous evidence of it everywhere as a pre-launch event. N'Zoth (not necessarily personally) attacks, and we lose a major lore character. Then we go on the attack, heading to a new location to slowly fight back against the minions of N'Zoth.

Continent: Ny'alotha
The artifact says Suramar is nothing compared to it, and Suramar is practically a zone-sized city, so Ny'alotha could be continent-sized. Ny'alotha might be underwater, it might be raised to the surface, or it might be in another dimension, but even in the first scenario it would exist in some sort of bubble so it wouldn't be underwater content.

[Deleted]

As someone who mained a Warrior in WoD: LOL ARE YOU SERIOUS?!

WoD class design was garbage.

Warrior was one of the few exceptions. Very few actually improved with legion, but i'll give you that fury and arms in particular did.

On the other hand, you lost gladiator stance.

- - - Updated - - -

No, they're not but they're outstanding things. New models were nice but for sure no feature that could carry an expansion. And come on, mission table and apexis missions as some kind of feature? Most of it was connected to the garrison and the garrison was one of the biggest failures of WoD.

Yes, I might be biased but is it bias when most players agree with me? When WoD was overall the worst reviewd expansion? When the drop in subs was the biggest? I don't really see this as bias but as common sense when talking about the massive failure WoD was.

Legion didn't have flying, that's right, but the zone design was different and much more approachable by grounded mounts than in WoD. And players were used to "no flying" because of WoD. Vanilla didn't have flying? What kind of argument is this? Yes, it had no flying but we weren't used to flying in Vanilla.

The zones were critically acclaimed? Sure.

Class design was at it's best? What? That's something everybody has their own opinions, I really like MoP / Legion class design more because in MoP it still felt fresh (most specs stayed the same in WoD) and Legion added a massive new class design aspect with artifact weapons. WoD was just a carry over of MoP class design. And those 4 Draenor perks... lol.

I value gameplay more as well. And WoD had by far the worst gameplay of all expansions tied to the worst storyline and world building ever in WoW.

Okay, I despise WoD. But WoD delivered a massive amount of reasons to not like it.

The zones were critically acclaimed. The leveling was critically acclaimed. Maybe you need an injection of reality:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/wo...rds-of-draenor

For comparison sake, here is Legion:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/wo...arcraft-legion

I completely and utterly disagree with the class design and i think it's even easy to prove that is factually wrong just by the ammount of choices that you had back then in viable talents and the ones you have today in legion. But alas, suit yourself.

[FelPlague]

Obligatory South Seas expansion.

Blizz, just give us naval gameplay like AC Black Flag or Sea of Thieves in WoW. PLEASE.

there is an icon added in 7.3 that is an anchor
why would we need an anchor icon on argus?

[Nyel]

The zones were critically acclaimed. The leveling was critically acclaimed. Maybe you need an injection of reality:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/wo...rds-of-draenor

For comparison sake, here is Legion:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/wo...arcraft-legion

I completely and utterly disagree with the class design and i think it's even easy to prove that is factually wrong just by the ammount of choices that you had back then in viable talents and the ones you have today in legion. But alas, suit yourself.

Class design in WoD was (imho) mostly horrible - this is a point we can agree to disaggre. But come on, Draenor Perks? Those were the worst addition to classes in the entire history of WoW. Let me give you some Draenor Perks: You heal for 3% health while Camouflage is active - Increases the health you reincarnate with by 50% - Increases your Block Chance by 10% - 90% of all Perks were just awful. Most of them were as bad as Classic talent trees giving 1/2/3% Hit chance.

Yeah, the leveling was critically acclaimed because it was flashy. It was the only thing that was acclaimed in WoD (well, even I liked it for the first or second character, after that it was... painful).

I think we shouldn't spam this discussion with our love or hate for WoD, we already talked about it too much...

[Utigarde]

I'm honestly hoping that instead of just de-powering our artifacts, that they also de-power us. I know it's the natural progression, but I kind of want us to go back to being the "slightly powerful" hero instead of the "saving the world single handedly" hero.

[Echocho]

Return of the Lich King, with more RNG than anyone could ever imagine.

[Al Gorefiend]

I'd like a break expansion too. Something that brings us out into the world doing more Warcraft classical things, like fighting dragons, questing out across all of Azeroth, where there isn't an immediate world ending threat and we can just chill out a bit.

I'd like something sillier this time around, like a gnomes vs Goblins expansion

[Hctaz]

World of Warcraft: Hour of Twilight

The Hour of Twilight was prevented. They wouldn't name it this or ever go back to that phrase again. The aspects all lost their powers stating that, since the Hour of Twilight was stopped, they had no more use of that power.

[Nibelheimy]

From what I gather so far I'm expecting the final battle in the last raid to be an escape from Argus sort of thing. If that happens, i don't see us heading straight back out into the nether.

We could lead to a nether/void expansion after an Aszhara/return to northrend expansion, I just don't see us dealing with the void first, & then returning to deal with those threats. It would feel strange. MoP-WoD-Legion was an unexpected, but interesting arc. It could be the same again. Fresh area-return to established area-taking on the big threat = Aszhara-Return to Northrend-Void.

I'm not suggesting that's their actual formula.

People are now expecting dreadlords to lead us to a return to Northrend, yeah, I could see us heading that way. I would love an azjol-nerub expansion with Magni + Bolvar. But now the Titans have been datamined, they could just as easily lead us to N'zoth.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

From what I gather so far I'm expecting the final battle in the last raid to be an escape from Argus sort of thing. If that happens, i don't see us heading straight back out into the nether.

We could lead to a nether/void expansion after an Aszhara/return to northrend expansion, I just don't see us dealing with the void first, & then returning to deal with those threats. It would feel strange. MoP-WoD-Legion was an unexpected, but interesting arc. It could be the same again. Fresh area-return to established area-taking on the big threat = Aszhara-Return to Northrend-Void.

I'm not suggesting that's their actual formula.

People are now expecting dreadlords to lead us to a return to Northrend, yeah, I could see us heading that way. I would love an azjol-nerub expansion with Magni + Bolvar. But now the Titans have been datamined, they could just as easily lead us to N'zoth.

I think a Northrend related storyline won't be for awhile. Develop it on the sideline? Sure that makes total sense. I like to say Old Gods are on the rise but things may change.

[Muapa]

I'm not Sure i mean we know the end boss and it's not the legion leader not even close, plus in 7.3 during a boss fight we actually go into the void. There so so much room for anything to happen who really knows which direction they will take it. i just want it to be good

[Grimo]

Sure but does that feel epic? Not really... Coming from Legion (which is amazing and maybe the second best expansion ever) something like another faction war would just be... meh. Boring.

I suppose it's a matter of taste. The big-world ending stuff is too abstract to be epic for me. The stakes are so high that they feel silly - I still don't feel like we're facing an unlimited army because we are destroying them so easily. A great inversion of this is in the Witcher - the Nilfgaardians actually ARE an invincible tide, and the game isn't about stopping them, but dealing with the fallout of their dominance. But that wouldn't work in an MMO. But you CAN explore stuff like that with the factions.

But amazing faction-based quest lines like the Wrathgate, Stonetalon Mountains, Landfall campaign and Western Plaguelands, where immediate futures are on the line and there is moral ambiguity, and what it means to be Horde or Alliance is explored, that has stakes. That feels epic to me.

[Deleted]

Class design in WoD was (imho) mostly horrible - this is a point we can agree to disaggre. But come on, Draenor Perks? Those were the worst addition to classes in the entire history of WoW. Let me give you some Draenor Perks: You heal for 3% health while Camouflage is active - Increases the health you reincarnate with by 50% - Increases your Block Chance by 10% - 90% of all Perks were just awful. Most of them were as bad as Classic talent trees giving 1/2/3% Hit chance.

Yeah, the leveling was critically acclaimed because it was flashy. It was the only thing that was acclaimed in WoD (well, even I liked it for the first or second character, after that it was... painful).

I think we shouldn't spam this discussion with our love or hate for WoD, we already talked about it too much...

Isn't that very similar to the artifact trees? Either way, what made it better was how you had actual choice of talents for different situation. Most were viable aswell. It was based on the boss you were facing. The rotations themselves were more fun aswell. For example, with Ret you had to weave between finishers depending on wether or not you procced empowered divine storm. Nowadays itS ST: spam TV, AoE: Spam DS.

But... fair enough. I'm not defending WoD for beeing a great expansion or anything, but i do think the new models and the class design was more enjoyable to me, and it's something often overlooked amongst the barrage of criticisms.

[Deleted]

there is an icon added in 7.3 that is an anchor
why would we need an anchor icon on argus?

Excellent tinfoil, I approve. Although sadly, we can probably safely assume the anchor is for the Felslate Anchor (http://ptr.wowhead.com/item=151709/r...teaches-recipe), a Blacksmithing leveling catchup item. As you can see the current icon is a placeholder most likely.

[FelPlague]

Excellent tinfoil, I approve. Although sadly, we can probably safely assume the anchor is for the Felslate Anchor (http://ptr.wowhead.com/item=151709/r...teaches-recipe), a Blacksmithing leveling catchup item. As you can see the current icon is a placeholder most likely.

for an item called "felslate" it sure looks blue doesent it?
but i did not know about that item, that is cool though