Do you think next Expac/10.0 will usher in a world revamp?

[Hobbidaggy]

We have had Cataclysm zones longer than we have had Vanilla zones in Warcraft now. The story in these zones is very outdated and doesn’t really fit into the story of “the world” as it stands. With the current ability to play any expansion fresh out of the box so to speak using Chromie Time, I feel that they should revamp the world, they can keep cataclysm in the game as they can just instance this away now and this won’t impact other people, this is already happening with the current game and works well in places. This will also allow a fresh new perspective to be undertaken. Allow the Allied Races to have buildings around the world and camps/towns. Give Gilneas, Exodar, Silvermoon an update and allow them to be cities people can venture into repaired and rebuilt (as the all are except for Gilneas in Lore)

The absorption of the new Studio will allow blizzard to assign extra devs to assist in rebuilding. It doesn’t need to be a ground up build like Cata was as the foundation is there now, where cata did not have this backbone and needed a full rebuild.

The excuse being thrown around that “shadowlands time flows differently” is the perfect excuse for this to take shape and unless we have another “cataclysmic event” I don’t know how we can expect a revamp as such but using the “time excuse” is they can easily get away with it. They could even install some tech to some zones to have the ability to be replaced in the future for other expansions down the line, ie Zidormi can just phase the single zone like Silithus and blasted lands etc

[Soon-TM]

We have had Cataclysm zones longer than we have had Vanilla zones in Warcraft now. The story in these zones is very outdated and doesn’t really fit into the story of “the world” as it stands. With the current ability to play any expansion fresh out of the box so to speak using Chromie Time, I feel that they should revamp the world, they can keep cataclysm in the game as they can just instance this away now and this won’t impact other people, this is already happening with the current game and works well in places. This will also allow a fresh new perspective to be undertaken. Allow the Allied Races to have buildings around the world and camps/towns. Give Gilneas, Exodar, Silvermoon an update and allow them to be cities people can venture into repaired and rebuilt (as the all are except for Gilneas in Lore)

The absorption of the new Studio will allow blizzard to assign extra devs to assist in rebuilding. It doesn’t need to be a ground up build like Cata was as the foundation is there now, where cata did not have this backbone and needed a full rebuild.

The excuse being thrown around that “shadowlands time flows differently” is the perfect excuse for this to take shape and unless we have another “cataclysmic event” I don’t know how we can expect a revamp as such but using the “time excuse” is they can easily get away with it. They could even install some tech to some zones to have the ability to be replaced in the future for other expansions down the line, ie Zidormi can just phase the single zone like Silithus and blasted lands etc

Would I like to see a world revamp? Sure, the textures in the Arathi warfront were superb, and I'd love to see all of EK/Kalimdor reworked in a similar fashion. Furthermore, while Chromie time is cool if you want to experience old xpacs (even if it has a few issues of its own), it is quite weird to go outside the capital cities and see that the world has changed almost nothing in 10+ years of constant warfare.

Now, am I expecting to see another world revamp? Not by a long shot. It's pretty clear to me that the team doesn't have the wish/budget/manpower for such a big undertaking - as a matter of fact, the first thing Ion did after his "time flows differently in SL" was to immediately walk it back in order to make clear that we shouldn't be expecting nothing close to a Cata-like revamp.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

The excuse being thrown around that “shadowlands time flows differently” is the perfect excuse for this to take shape and unless we have another “cataclysmic event” I don’t know how we can expect a revamp as such but using the “time excuse” is they can easily get away with it.

There will not be a time skip.
https://www.wowhead.com/news=316889/...t-swapping-tim

In a past interview, some hints were dropped that time worked differently in Shadowlands, which led to speculation that when we return from the Shadowlands, there is a huge timeskip coming in a future expansion. Ion clarified this, saying that time is perceived differently in Shadowlands, like a dream where you sleep for six hours but in the dream state you experience events covering a wider range of time. It's not like every day in the Shadowlands is equivalent to five days in Azeroth. "Don't read too much into the timey-wimey-ness of it."

[Hobbidaggy]

There will not be a time skip.
https://www.wowhead.com/news=316889/...t-swapping-tim

I didn’t see this before. So I guess that means they had a really cool idea and they were starting to drop hints and then changed their mind and had to explain it away hahaha

Damn...I would have liked to see a revamp occur so badly

[Razion]

It could happen and it does seem a good a time with as good an excuse as any, but people were hoping for a revamp after WoD, too with the exact same mindset and reasoning.

Certainly Cataclysm is really showing its age, now. And there are a LOT of separated landmasses that aren't "all one instance" in the same kind of cohesive release that the game initially launched with. One of the better pluses for this kind of revamp would be that theoretically areas like all the landmasses like Pandaria, Northrend, Broken Isles, Lost Isles, Kalimdor, Eastern Kingdoms, Kul Tiras & Zandalar and all the other small islands could all exist as one instance and there wouldn't need to be any different loading screens to visit these newer versions of these landmasses. The issue with updating more and more of the planet comes with the increasing burden of updating all the zones to have at least some questing. But, perhaps appealingly this means not as many things are stuffed all together and they can take advantage of all of that free space and geography. There are other games out there with really really huge maps, so even if would-be zones like Northrend and Pandaria and so on would have only some isolated questing, it would still be a marvel to see the entire world for once in the same phase of time all at once, so that we know where everything is at and what everyone is up to and how everything has advanced and what has changed and where all the new status quos are.

One issue that comes to mind is how such an expansion could perhaps focus on any kind of one individual threat in such a revamp expansion that crosses the entire planet and all the places we've been to before -- would it be like some kind of grand chase, or would it be a case of us searching high and low trying to find the source of evil? Before in Cataclysm, Deathwing's Twilight Hammer cult went the world over so would another kind of cult like this be needed? The elements were a very fine tool in Cataclysm because the elements are everywhere, so they could act as an enemy anywhere. N'Zoth has already been used, so all the landmasses being in some way surrounded by water can't necessarily be used unless there's a new underwater deep enemy that rises to the surface. I suppose a theoretical Azshara expansion may be the kind of premise that could make THAT angle work if they really wanted to. Another theory could be a true Emerald Nightmare expansion, and us trying to heal the various forests and groves of the world to stop the spread of further corruption to the Emerald Nightmare from, say, invading Thros forces or something else. Arcane is another force that is everywhere on Azeroth - leylines, for example, could become prime hotspots after the Azerite fiasco and the Silithus sword wound. We may have to go around the world to kind of clean up Arcane threats, and one gigantic huge maddened Arcane force could be one angle.

I'd be interested to see what kind of baddy they would use for such an expansion. But maybe considering they doubled-down on Faction conflict recently maybe we'd just get a good old fashioned Warcraft expansion with lots of varying threats riddled with a bit of faction conflict here and there. It may make sense, considering Sylvanas is still active right now - so like Garrosh or Gul'dan she may have another expansion in SL of build-up before she is ultimately resolved. Though I'm not sure how Sylvanas could be relevant to Azeroth around the world unless she was, maybe, trying to like get the World Soul of Azeroth or something. Maybe another more realistic baddy we could see is Void Lords arriving on Azeroth to try and muddle things up. A bit different from Old Gods, perhaps, or as a lot of people have theorized a Light Invasion of some kind, so maybe that might work too. Lots of angles that could work for a world revamp now that I think about it. I guess it could be anything if they really wanted it to be, they all kind of justify it.

[Pawpurr]

they've already said they will keep revamping old locations here and there, when it makes sense.

TBH 8.3 got a lot of flak for recycling zones but if they had done 1 in 8.2 and 1 in 8.3, and split up mechagon and nazjatar, I think people would have appreciated that more.

Expect visions of n'zoth and warfront style revamps, not cataclysm style. My hope would be 1 new zone and 1 revamp zone each patch. Plenty of places in EK and Northrend that could tie into the SL story.

[Unbelievable]

If it's a Cataclysm 2.0 (Dragonflights, Elementals, Void) like the Shadowlands cinematic hints at, then yes. I could see a revamp coming.

[AngerFork]

I don't see the new studio having any sort of effect on whether or not WoW does a revamp. Rumor has it that they are largely in place to help with a Diablo 2 Remaster and try to make it better than the Warcraft 3 Remaster. Even if some of those devs join the WoW team, the work has already started on whatever the 10.0 expansion is and they likely wouldn't be ramped up to make a massive impact for a few months.

But to your other thoughts about how time flows differently in the Shadowlands and whether we see an Azeroth revamp, I could definitely see it. Even though I know Ion talks about not reading too much into how the time flow works, he didn't exactly discard it there either. He merely clarified the time setup so that people didn't 100% expect a revamp. As far as expansion requests go, an Azeroth revamp does seem to be one of the most common requests. Blizz has also not been shy about revamping zones when the story calls for the revamp (Silithus, Arathi, Darkshore, Tirisfal, etc).

I don't suspect it'll happen as the lore seems to be going more towards the cosmology chart and Cata showed how thin that revamping time can make the endgame, but I could still see it happening.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

Blizzard mentioning that time moves differently in the Shadowlands does not explicitly mean that there will be a guaranteed time skip next expansion. It does not even guarantee a time skip in the expansion after the next expansion. All it does is put forth the notion that a time skip is justifiable in the lore.


People took that quote and ran with it.


Personally, I feel like them having to clarify that bit on "don't read too much into it" is Blizzard's attempt to throw us off of the trail of a time skip.

[NineSpine]

I don't see the new studio having any sort of effect on whether or not WoW does a revamp. Rumor has it that they are largely in place to help with a Diablo 2 Remaster and try to make it better than the Warcraft 3 Remaster. Even if some of those devs join the WoW team, the work has already started on whatever the 10.0 expansion is and they likely wouldn't be ramped up to make a massive impact for a few months.

But to your other thoughts about how time flows differently in the Shadowlands and whether we see an Azeroth revamp, I could definitely see it. Even though I know Ion talks about not reading too much into how the time flow works, he didn't exactly discard it there either. He merely clarified the time setup so that people didn't 100% expect a revamp. As far as expansion requests go, an Azeroth revamp does seem to be one of the most common requests. Blizz has also not been shy about revamping zones when the story calls for the revamp (Silithus, Arathi, Darkshore, Tirisfal, etc).

I don't suspect it'll happen as the lore seems to be going more towards the cosmology chart and Cata showed how thin that revamping time can make the endgame, but I could still see it happening.

I used to work at Vicarious Visions. It's a large studio. It has over 200 people. They are being dedicated entirely to Blizzard support. 200 people are not working on just a Diablo remaster. That would take MAYBE 50 people, 75 at the extreme.

[Kiivar86]

If it's a Cataclysm 2.0 (Dragonflights, Elementals, Void) like the Shadowlands cinematic hints at, then yes. I could see a revamp coming.

How'd the cinematic hint at that? I must have missed something.

Or thinking of the wrong cinematic.

[Fistfighter]

No


But I wish it did

[Unbelievable]

How'd the cinematic hint at that? I must have missed something.

Or thinking of the wrong cinematic.

Glad you asked:

Dragon Isles (Cataclysm 2.0)

"First in information. Have you heard of the Dragon Isles? Few have, and fewer have been there.

We have not found others of the master's kin... forthcoming in information."

Black Dragonflight:






Ragnaros:

"Anvil-Thane Thurgaden says: This is grave news, <name>. Grimstone and his fanatics workin' tae bring Ragnaros back... Thought he'd know better."





Bronze Dragonflight (hard to match the color palettes but, you get the idea):




Void:










You have to pay attention to these small details in the Cinematic Trailers and, most often, last raids of an expansion.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

-snip-

I don't understand this post. Your evidence is simply color pallets?

[Cæli]

no because they learned from cataclysm. select zone addition + zidormi to switch between zone versions, is the reality going forward.
I hope they have some people protecting the game against newcomers who want to reshape everything according to their non wow related taste
one example of major disgust is the new arathi textures, zidormi saves it by leaving options.

op: missing the fact that new people don't automatically fit in a proper wow team. creating wow is a skill. you DON'T take a bunch of artist and create the next mona lisa. you either have the level or you don't. new artists showed that in terms of skills, they mostly don't have it. different artists, different game. stop destroying wow.

[valax]

Glad you asked:


You have to pay attention to these small details in the Cinematic Trailers and, most often, last raids of an expansion.

Holy tinfoil hat batman , I don't know what's more silly , comparing Bolvar to Deathwing just because he's crispy now and has a fiery chest or the fact you think Sylvanas uses void magic .

[Mojo03]

I've been saying this for a while. I think it'll be a 2.0 in the way Overwatch is doing a 2.0.

How they do it, I'm not totally sure, but the game badly needs it.

My guess is updating old textures and revamping the engine, but I have no idea.

The game is currently missing a lot of flavor customization, so I could see them implementing things like unique animations, sets, spells, etc. This of course opens the way for more stuff on the shop too, which makes me think its for sure coming.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Maybe a selective one, but otherwise I think it would be too much work to revamp everything. I think they will keep telling new stories in some zones going forward like they did in BfA. Having to restrict flying in zones where you could already fly would be akward enough, but doing it on a global scale.. just nah. I can see the appeal from a narrative PoV and I personally wouldn't mind if we get to use the wide world of Azeroth with new stories and life, but at the end of the day finding new places to explore is as much a part of expansions. I certainly don't see a cataclysm style of world revamp happening again. The new leveling system is already making that pointless if we go by the arguments for it back then and the Blizzard of today would never put that much effort into a side project that doesn't affect the current endgame. The new starter island is the absolute peak of effort you can expect in that regard.

- - - Updated - - -

Blizzard mentioning that time moves differently in the Shadowlands does not explicitly mean that there will be a guaranteed time skip next expansion. It does not even guarantee a time skip in the expansion after the next expansion. All it does is put forth the notion that a time skip is justifiable in the lore.


People took that quote and ran with it.


Personally, I feel like them having to clarify that bit on "don't read too much into it" is Blizzard's attempt to throw us off of the trail of a time skip.

A timeskip is practically out of question if Blizzard were to stick with their currently established lore of the expansion. The portal is more than less canon right now and the existence of all players and mortals is acknowledged in Oribos. In fact the presence of Taelia and Calia is as well and they were not part of the initial arrivals. We have an active supply line back to Azeroth, so getting a time skip with a surprise like "Lorthemar turned elf hitler this time and turaloyn is stalin" because "alot has happened while we were away and unaware of it" would be more than strange.

[Triceron]

No, and for the simple reason that it's simply not cost effective.

A World Revamp suits one purpose- bring in new fans who have never played the game. Getting existing players to go through the 1-60+ slog is not intuitive design, since there are better ways to keep them in the game by focusing on new content and allowing people to progress the characters they've already built strong attachments to, and not by diverting their attention away to making new alts just to see 'more of the same' world.

In an ideal situation a revamp would be great if it didn't take the team's time and resources away to accomplish. Say, making the whole thing modular and outsourcing quest design to a smaller team (inside or outside the company) to just churn out leveling content for people to experience. Otherwise, we're going to run into the Cataclysm problem of all that revamp taking time away from End-game features, and leaving the whole thing incomplete as a result.

We LOST entire raid tiers because of the Cataclysm revamp. They had to fill in the gaps with bringing back Zul'Aman and Zul'Gurub as patch raid content. Firelands was designed a lot smaller than it should have been. Abbysal Maw (Throne of Tides Raid) was completely cut, and Neptulon's story was never completed and even left on a cliffhanger. War of the Ancients raid was also planned and left out completely; consider that the whole Hyjal questline was meant to hype up the return of the Ancients and give us context to going back and fighting the Legion in the past. Instead, it was cut down into mini-dungeons focusing on Illidan, Malfurion and Tyrande instead. Deathwing raid was probably by far the worst offender, containing no new boss models except for Deathwing himself, and having only 8 boss fights in the entire 10-month span that this raid ended up lasting for. It was a mess because they split their focus so many ways.

If they just focus on revamping the world, then they would have to make it end-level viable content, and frankly I'm not sure that's a strong sell considering we've pretty much explored the world multiple times over and I don't know if we want to go back to fighting the new Centaur Khans or taking on the new Trogg King. The focus of expansions should continue to be on progressing the story and focusing on the end-game.

[Cosmic Janitor]

I didn’t see this before. So I guess that means they had a really cool idea and they were starting to drop hints and then changed their mind and had to explain it away hahaha

Damn...I would have liked to see a revamp occur so badly

Even if there were some kind of time dialation, it would actually have to be the opposite to make sense. The time in the shadowlands would have to flow way faster than outside, because that is the only logical way how you could handle the flow of souls from countless worlds. All of the processes in the shadowlands take suppsedly aeons, like for Kyrians to ascend or souls in Revendreth to atone for their sins. Even if time were 1:1 it would cause runaway exponential issues, let alone if reality > shadowlands. Not that I believe for even a second the writers at Blizzard would spot such an issue .