9.0 General Discussion

[Sondrelk]

Was anybody able to see the supposed Naaru getting tortured in Revandrath?

Pretty sure it will only be as part of a dungeon, and seeing as the dungeon is not available yet I am going to go out on a limb and say that no, noone has seen the Naaru yet.

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Speaking of Denathrius. That sword he has looks eerily similar to Frostmourne, I wonder whether it will be a running thing where the various leaders of the Shadowlands has a named weapon, possibly even all having swords.

[Raetary]

Was anybody able to see the supposed Naaru getting tortured in Revandrath?

It's part of the Sanguine Depths dungeon which isn't available yet.

So, no.

[Blayze]

Speaking of Denathrius. That sword he has looks eerily similar to Frostmourne, I wonder whether it will be a running thing where the various leaders of the Shadowlands has a named weapon, possibly even all having swords.

If so, they were likely all made by the same guy.

[huth]

Speaking of Denathrius. That sword he has looks eerily similar to Frostmourne, I wonder whether it will be a running thing where the various leaders of the Shadowlands has a named weapon, possibly even all having swords.

It really doesn't look all that much like frostmourne beyond what you'd expect based on the general style of Revendreth and it being a sword.

[Hugnomo]

Anyone else super curious on what the patch zone(s) will be?
Like they'll have to be a new afterlife. And my main bet is on a banshee inspired afterlife, in the same way there's val'kyr, san'layn inspired afterlives. It'd just really fit to continue Sylvanas storyline by delving into the lore of banshees and maybe having an original, proto banshee in the same way kyrian and ventyr are original versions of val'kyrs and san'layn. I'd love to see a new take on the banshee concept and how they would flesh it out visually and plot wise. Like, what would that afterlife be about?

[tristannarutofan]

Because otherwise there's just nothing. Something is better than nothing imo, despite the contrary opinion that is gaining popularity. They don't have the budget for all prerendered, I'm assuming if this wasn't here they'd just be standing there in the room and then turn to you when you appear, emote and disappear.

yep. they are exactly like in the past when you'd just show up and the characters would Dialogue Box At each other and then one would do an attack animation and then something else would happen

but with better camera angles and more emoting.

its not them skipping time/money/budget whatever on not doing more cut scenes, its them elevating crummy quest moments that are lame into more of a scene than....2 npcs dialgoue boxxing at each other.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Maybe something for the orcish ancestor inspired afterlife?

Since they pretty much waste bwonsamdi with a dungeon and the loa in ardenweald I doubt we will be getting the obligatory troll patch, even though it might have actually been interesting for once.

Maybe we raid the pocket dimensions of stewards of death, like odyn the crazy mother fucker or hellya again. Maybe something to do with the traders faction, etherals and some void an light incursions.

Personally I hope one of the patches will expand the maw, because currently it looks rather pathetic..

[Raetary]

Personally I hope one of the patches will expand the maw, because currently it looks rather pathetic..

Pathetic how?

It looks just how one would imagine it to look like.
Menacing, vast, ravaged, a wasteland meant for the vilest of people.

[Sondrelk]

Anyone else super curious on what the patch zone(s) will be?
Like they'll have to be a new afterlife. And my main bet is on a banshee inspired afterlife, in the same way there's val'kyr, san'layn inspired afterlives. It'd just really fit to continue Sylvanas storyline by delving into the lore of banshees and maybe having an original, proto banshee in the same way kyrian and ventyr are original versions of val'kyrs and san'layn. I'd love to see a new take on the banshee concept and how they would flesh it out visually and plot wise. Like, what would that afterlife be about?

Depends on where the story goes with the various covenant endgame storylines.
One option is a light focused one with Forsworn, another is one centered around all the Ardenweald stuff leftover like possibly Hakkar and the Drust. Personal guess though is a resurgence of the Scourge featuring Kel'thuzad.

For the last patch I am still pretty confident in it taking place at least partially in Azeroth itself, with at least part of the final raid taking place there.

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Thinking about it I wonder if the 9.2 area might actually be Drust by way of Vrykul and Helya. We did have confimration she is still active in the Shadowlands, so not mentioning her when we are in her realm seems like a bit of a wasted effort. Could potentially tie more into the Drust being seafaring Vrykul.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Pathetic how?

It looks just how one would imagine it to look like.
Menacing, vast, ravaged, a wasteland meant for the vilest of people.

It's just a bunch of islands, bridges and ruined IC structures. I was expecting something more like a sprawling desolate hellscape instead of another icecrown with a bit of ruined city aesthethic. I don't get anything even remotely close to vast from looking at it. How should I put it? It might look large (and probably is if measured), but it's mostly because everything is oversized. It's a bridge post here, a little spiky fort there, some collapsed ruines over in this corner, a rock formation in the other one - oh and a big tower in the east. It doesn't feel like it has outgrown all the other zones of the shadowlands and virtually threatens to swallow up all of the shadowlands

Oh and another patch zone I could see: Long lost precursor zone that explains the origins of the shadowlands and it's power structure or something like that. Maybe that is what I'm thinking of when I say the rest of the maw.

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Thinking about it I wonder if the 9.2 area might actually be Drust by way of Vrykul and Helya. We did have confimration she is still active in the Shadowlands, so not mentioning her when we are in her realm seems like a bit of a wasted effort. Could potentially tie more into the Drust being seafaring Vrykul.

I wanted to put drust as well, but I'm unclear how much they will already use in Ardenweald.

[EbaumsTipster]

It's just a bunch of islands, bridges and ruined IC structures. I was expecting something more like a sprawling desolate hellscape instead of another icecrown with a bit of ruined city aesthethic. I don't get anything even remotely close to vast from looking at it. How should I put it? It might look large (and probably is if measured), but it's mostly because everything is oversized. It's a bridge post here, a little spiky fort there, some collapsed ruines over in this corner, a rock formation in the other one - oh and a big tower in the east. It doesn't feel like it has outgrown all the other zones of the shadowlands and virtually threatens to swallow up all of the shadowlands

Oh and another patch zone I could see: Long lost precursor zone that explains the origins of the shadowlands and it's power structure or something like that. Maybe that is what I'm thinking of when I say the rest of the maw.

Maw would be larger if they completely dropped support for BFA, so there's that. The only reason Suramar was as good as it was was because they added nothing for Warlords.

[Hugnomo]

Maw would be larger if they completely dropped support for BFA, so there's that. The only reason Suramar was as good as it was was because they added nothing for Warlords.

Any proof of this? Or just guesses?

[Makabreska]

Any proof of this? Or just guesses?

Well, that's the guy who said that majority of player base is for world revamp, simply because they play pre-Mists races. So figure it out for yourself.

[gunner_recall]

It's meant to float behind him judging by his Encounter Journal. Remornia (the sword) fights separately from Denathrius for much of the fight.

You mean he has a stand?

He's a JoJo villain?

That's the hypest shit I ever heard. This expansion is already 10/10

[EbaumsTipster]

Any proof of this? Or just guesses?

Considering that WoD got no new areas or dungeons (as Tanaan was already in at launch) and the final patch was an area revamp plus one raid that was mostly large square halls, I'm going to chalk it up to a logical guess.

Fewer/smaller patches in an expansion lead to more work on the next one. 8.3 was small because workload shifted, 6.1 and 6.2 were the same thing and explains why the Broken Isles were so big and detailed (as the art team wasn't doing shit during post-launch WoD).

I guarantee that if 8.2 hadn't been so big then Shadowlands would be bigger, because resources would end up going there instead.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Considering that WoD got no new areas or dungeons (as Tanaan was already in at launch) and the final patch was an area revamp plus one raid that was mostly large square halls, I'm going to chalk it up to a logical guess.

Fewer/smaller patches in an expansion lead to more work on the next one. 8.3 was small because workload shifted, 6.1 and 6.2 were the same thing and explains why the Broken Isles were so big and detailed.

I guarantee that if 8.2 hadn't been so big then Shadowlands would be bigger, because resources would end up going there instead.

I don't really think it works like that, MoP had a lot of content and it lead to wod which was still in this "We want to do yearly expansions" nonsense and since that stopped BFA still well resulted in well...yeah.

And WoD having little to no content was why Legion was big, yes. Because the devs had their time and money put there instead.

Smaller expansion means the next one is bigger. Gone are the days of back to back massive expansions.

Just like using Warcraftrealms as a source

Its also ironic considering how some people think Shadowlands is small(Cause no big mega truck feature).

[EbaumsTipster]

Wod also was shorter in content then even BFA. No extra content patches either. You can't really guarantee anything.

And WoD having little to no content was why Legion was big, yes. Because the devs had their time and money put there instead.

Smaller expansion means the next one is bigger. Gone are the days of back to back massive expansions.

[Makabreska]

Considering that WoD got no new areas or dungeons (as Tanaan was already in at launch) and the final patch was an area revamp plus one raid that was mostly large square halls, I'm going to chalk it up to a logical guess.

Fewer/smaller patches in an expansion lead to more work on the next one. 8.3 was small because workload shifted, 6.1 and 6.2 were the same thing and explains why the Broken Isles were so big and detailed (as the art team wasn't doing shit during post-launch WoD).

I guarantee that if 8.2 hadn't been so big then Shadowlands would be bigger, because resources would end up going there instead.

Dude, you are on the rise with asinine theories lately. Raid geometry? All raids are mostly squares/rectangles/circles, any even shapes really, ESPECIALLY boss rooms, which count the most.

[Dracullus]

Personally I hope one of the patches will expand the maw, because currently it looks rather pathetic..

Imo most likely 9.2 will introduce 1-2 new Shadowlands realms and 9.3 expand Maw, so in new part we would have Jailer final raid.

[EbaumsTipster]

Dude, you are on the rise with asinine theories lately. Raid geometry? All raids are mostly squares/rectangles/circles, any even shapes really, ESPECIALLY boss rooms, which count the most.

My point was that HFC is incredibly low detail compared to most modern raids which shows the art team was not taking it incredibly seriously.