Proof of next expansion inside (really)

[Muezick]

http://eu.blizzard.com/en/wow/townhall/worldmap.html

U can see Maelstorm in the map!

This map is unlike any map I've seen of Azeroth before.

Some one more skilled than I at Cartography should compare it to the physical lay out of Azeroth as it would need to be to allow flying mounts in Azeroth.

I wonder if they would be similar.

[fbghty]

I noticed this when logging into the game this morning:

http://i898.photobucket.com/albums/a.../maelstrom.jpg

Enjoy.

page not found

can someone re-upload image?

[Zherod]

page not found

can someone re-upload image?

[Roonweld]

the pic on the test realm says "Maelstrom 3 test"
sooooo, Maelstrom right now is already a realm, and the "3" could indicate it being the 3rd expansion? which, most of us has thought it was going to be for a while now.



thats what i think about it.....

[Norrath]

This map is unlike any map I've seen of Azeroth before.

Some one more skilled than I at Cartography should compare it to the physical lay out of Azeroth as it would need to be to allow flying mounts in Azeroth.

I wonder if they would be similar.

I think that map was pre-release. Look at the "features" you can check out. Plus, no Exodar, no Ahn'Qiraj, no Silvermoon City...

[elcher]

alright, so we came to the conclusion that :

1. Maelstrom is the next expansion
2. we will (probably) find out more at blizzcon.

soooo:

when is blizzcon again?

[Mektheb]

Everybody knows its Mealstorm next, and after that emerald dream >.>


who whas that guy on the internets who made a announcment about when and which exp where comming?, anyone remember ?

Anyhow he said in Vanilla that after vanilla TBC will arrive and after that Lichking, and so far he has bin correct

So i think will probly get towards lvl 100 and then go to another exsp and together with the factions of the naaru etc destroy the burning legions world..

[Faffin]

Everybody knows its Mealstorm next, and after that emerald dream >.>

Surely after "Mealstorm" would be "Puddingthunder" or "Snacklightning"?

[Mr.X]

Everybody knows its Mealstorm next, and after that emerald dream >.>


who whas that guy on the internets who made a announcment about when and which exp where comming?, anyone remember ?

Anyhow he said in Vanilla that after vanilla TBC will arrive and after that Lichking, and so far he has bin correct

So i think will probly get towards lvl 100 and then go to another exsp and together with the factions of the naaru etc destroy the burning legions world..

I can't wait for The emerald dream as a druid it will my heaven!
Heck I hope we get Arch druid class!!

[Mektheb]

Surely after "Mealstorm" would be "Puddingthunder" or "Snacklightning"?

http://www.loregy.com/world-of-warcr...emerald-dream/

"theory"

[Shonubi]

imo emerald dream will be with maelstorm.....

[elcher]

i posted a page ago a sumup, which sounded like this :

alright, so we came to the conclusion that :

1. Maelstrom is the next expansion
2. we will (probably) find out more at blizzcon.

soooo:

when is blizzcon again?


however, ALL of the posters that posted before me completely ignored it, thus leading me to the conclusion that everyone just reads the Op`s statement and posts their own opinion, WHICH IS COMPLETE BULLCRAP. a thread evolves, READ THE GODDAMN PAGES, theres only 10 of em, its not a lot.

yes, we know that the maelstrom will be next yada yada, however, when will we findout more about it??

(a.k.a. = when is blizzcon again??)

[Krothar]

Nobody seemed to understand my Post.

I was refering to them slipping up and letting players see the "Maelstrom 3 Test" realm, not the fact they copyrighted "Catacylm".

If the realm had anything to do with the next expansion, it wouldn't have been on Live Servers.

[Nathanyel]

Crossposting the following in every current thread about the "list", feel free to copy this to other websites:

Arguments for the authenticity of the "list":

• "Memories" of a certain number of people, who state they have seen this and exactly this string of characters before September 2007 already, and not other, similar speculations based on the previous games or the RPG books, which have always floated around the net.

Arguments against the authenticity: (oh god where do I begin)

• The most important thing: There is no factual evidence whatsoever that this very alignment of letters existed before September 2007. The earliest known reference is that infamous thread on Allakhazam which was posted not even 2 weeks after the Northrend zones were officially announced.
• There is also a screenshot of the supposed original post by Caydiem, but this only started to appear in 2009, too. It is likely based on this 2005 screenshot of several posts by Caydiem, the date in the first post is nearly the same as in the supposed 2004 screen, with differences just the year and the time.
• Supposedly this list was known since 2003, but Blizzard had all topics mentioning it deleted - this can only be true for the official WoW forums, not for independent sites. If Blizzard had pressed those sites to also delete postings of the list, you can be sure as hell one rogue site admin would've taken this as a proof for the authenticity, and would've posted it even more, spreading it to everyone who would've wanted to read it. Plus, archive websites like Google or web.archive.org would be able to find even those deleted threads.
• Strangely, the Northrend Set has 2 starting areas, a method which isn't really used in any other set - in fact, that Northrend has 2 entry zones came from the experience they made with Hellfire Peninsula, which was heavily overpopulated the first days and weeks after the release of BC.
• Azjol-Nerub had always been planned as its own zone, up until somewhere mid-alpha, it wasn't mentioned anymore when they officially announced the Northrend zones. If the list had been from 2003, it would sure still list Azjol-Nerub as a zone.

Rather neutral points, which still should get you thinking:

• Bloodmyst Isle is misspelled as "Bloodmyrk", suggesting that this zone was renamed during development, on the other hand this could be a deliberate misspelling.
• "The Deadlands" appear to be the Bone Wastes as their own zone, which actually appeared in 2.0 as a subzone of Terokkar Forest, again you can't say whether this was a change of plans or a deliberate addition to confuse people.
• All mentioned zones were well-known in 2007 through the previous RTS games and the RPG source books, every experience player could've produced a similar list on his own, with the expansions sorted by their possibility of being made - assuming Outland and Northrend are confirmed as expansions, the Maelstrom/South Sea is the next most possible expansion, rather closely followed by the Emerald Dream. The other "sets" might be too abstract for new players, WoW would need to gain a certain playerbase through "familiar" content/zones, close to known fantasy settings, before venturing into weird stuff as the Elemental Plane or the Legion-controlled nightmares of planets. This holds true for both years of origin, 2003 and 2007, but again it's a proof for neither.

[Trucidor]

Crossposting the following in every current thread about the "list", feel free to copy this to other websites:

Arguments for the authenticity of the "list":

• "Memories" of a certain number of people, who state they have seen this and exactly this string of characters before September 2007 already, and not other, similar speculations based on the previous games or the RPG books, which have always floated around the net.

Arguments against the authenticity: (oh god where do I begin)

• The most important thing: There is no factual evidence whatsoever that this very alignment of letters existed before September 2007. The earliest known reference is that infamous thread on Allakhazam http://wow.allakhazam.com/forum.html...12268058738816 which was posted not even 2 weeks after the Northrend zones were officially announced.
• There is also a screenshot of the supposed original post by Caydiem, but this only started to appear in 2009, too. It is likely based on this 2005 screenshot of several posts by Caydiem, the date in the first post is nearly the same as in the supposed 2004 screen, with differences just the year and the time.
• Supposedly this list was known since 2003, but Blizzard had all topics mentioning it deleted - this can only be true for the official WoW forums, not for independent sites. If Blizzard had pressed those sites to also delete postings of the list, you can be sure as hell one rogue site admin would've taken this as a proof for the authenticity, and would've posted it even more, spreading it to everyone who would've wanted to read it. Plus, archive websites like Google or web.archive.org would be able to find even those deleted threads.
• Strangely, the Northrend Set has 2 starting areas, a method which isn't really used in any other set - in fact, that Northrend has 2 entry zones came from the experience they made with Hellfire Peninsula, which was heavily overpopulated the first days and weeks after the release of BC.
• Azjol-Nerub had always been planned as its own zone, up until somewhere mid-alpha, it wasn't mentioned anymore when they officially announced the Northrend zones. If the list had been from 2003, it would sure still list Azjol-Nerub as a zone.

Rather neutral points, which still should get you thinking:

• Bloodmyst Isle is misspelled as "Bloodmyrk", suggesting that this zone was renamed during development, on the other hand this could be a deliberate misspelling.
• "The Deadlands" appear to be the Bone Wastes as their own zone, which actually appeared in 2.0 as a subzone of Terokkar Forest, again you can't say whether this was a change of plans or a deliberate addition to confuse people.
• All mentioned zones were well-known in 2007 through the previous RTS games and the RPG source books, every experience player could've produced a similar list on his own, with the expansions sorted by their possibility of being made - assuming Outland and Northrend are confirmed as expansions, the Maelstrom/South Sea is the next most possible expansion, rather closely followed by the Emerald Dream. The other "sets" might be too abstract for new players, WoW would need to gain a certain playerbase through "familiar" content/zones, close to known fantasy settings, before venturing into weird stuff as the Elemental Plane or the Legion-controlled nightmares of planets. This holds true for both years of origin, 2003 and 2007, but again it's a proof for neither.

Good post. A couple of points:

1. The screen shot from Caydiem, to me, seems completely made up as a weak attempt to give the list more credibility. If a Blizzard representative had really posted the road map to the game on the official forums in 2004, someone sure as hell would have remembered it and mentioned it in the two years (Sept 2007 to now) that we've been debating the list. The fact that a screen shot just now shows up, and not a single person can vouch for it = fake.

2. As far as the two starting zones go, after the experience of Hellfire Peninsula, Blizzard specifically said that they learned from it, and would be using two starting zones in LK. Yet, if we believe the list, Blizzard had planned to go with two zones since 2004. That doesn't add up. Either Blizzard is lying when they say that, or the list is a fake.

3. If I were creating a list like this, I wouldn't want it to be perfect. I'd throw in some incorrect spellings, some missed guesses. Not saying this is evidence of the list being fake, just a theory.

4. Even if the list has been around since 2004, and even if it is legit, there's no reason to take it as gospel. Blizzard changes plans. Faction changes, PvE -> PvP realm transfers, so and so forth. If the list is real, it is at best a very loose framework, and is certainly subject to change.

This debate probably won't be settled until the next xpac is announced, along with the zones and levels. If Maelstrom is announced (as it probably will be), that alone does not prove the list as real...almost everyone has been guessing that or Emerald Dream since LK was announced. If the list gets the zones and levels correct, or mostly correct, then we will have a pretty hot debate on our hands. Until then, I'm going to stay very skeptical.

[Uggz]

Ok, let me explain it for you in detail, seeing you're to dumb to realise it:

Blizzard always named servers after famous lore characters or villains, places, or events. They got a whole naming convention for what servers is called what, depending on their type (RP/RPPvP/PvP/Normal).

So just because yet-another-server is named Maelstrom, doesn't indicate anything!

Actually Maelstrom - Test does prove something, like in TBC wen they released stuff for WOTLK it was called Wrath - test or something i think, so if it was called Emerald Dream - Test the next expansion wud likely be Emerald dream but it isnt its Maelstrom

Edit: from what i have also heard Emerald Dream will be the Sunwell of WOTLK... not being an expansion although it is a HUGE place with HUGE bosses connected to lore... but so was Sunwell and KJ he was huge but didnt get that much attention from the expansion

[Nathanyel]

Actually Maelstrom - Test does prove something, like in TBC wen they released stuff for WOTLK it was called Wrath - test or something i think, so if it was called Emerald Dream - Test the next expansion wud likely be Emerald dream but it isnt its Maelstrom

Edit: from what i have also heard Emerald Dream will be the Sunwell of WOTLK... not being an expansion although it is a HUGE place with HUGE bosses connected to lore... but so was Sunwell and KJ he was huge but didnt get that much attention from the expansion

[Darkstép]

Link aint working :'(