Strong indication that 6.2 won't be the final raid tier/content (spoilers)

[Nirox]

Who cares about Grommash, Guldan and Azshara.
Gimme Lich Bolvar King expansion Blizzard, pls.

Blizzard writers hire me.

Gul'dan comes to our reality and takes refuge in northrend, The Lich King (Ner'zul part of him anyway) remembers Gul'dan and sends an unholy amount of undead at him and we are sent there to find out what the ruckus is about. BAM! new LK expansion

[Treno]

I'm mostly going off the whole theme that they're running off of. The Orcs always drank the demon blood because they have to, Grom is going to die heroically to make up for his follies against a demon because he has to, Gul'Dan is going to escape in search of greater power because he has to.

I think the entire theme of the expansion is basically like you said: Time repeats itself because in the Warcraft universe, it has to. It's an aspect of the make-up of existence like the oceans and the sky and the pantheon. You can't escape your fate just like Grom and Gul'Dan can't escape theirs.

Though that does bring into question why characters like Ner'zhul, Kargath, Blackhand and especially Velen have a different fate. I haven't been able to clearly define what is and is not deterministic in this AU world, or an exact pattern which determines what must stay the same.

Back to the topic. I'm questioning if Blizzard internally is prepping themselves for an additional content patch, raid or no. It's hard to say for sure, but the additional pvp gear and upgrade to the ring seem to indicate some possible infrastructure additions to accommodate another patch.

[Pua]

Yeh it's hard to come up with something like demonslayer.

They'll use his title, "Defiler". You heard it here first.

Or apexis crystals are far easier to come by in 6.2.

They just need multiple sources that can be farmed. I can’t believe they still haven’t done it yet.

The origional plan was thrown out the window before wod even launched. Doesn't matter what the og plan was.

The in-design calamity might have caused many things, but it doesn’t strike me as likely that they’d change raid bosses. If this is the last tier, I think it’s likely that Gul’dan will survive and Grom will sacrifice his own life to save ours.

My point was that coming up with the title isn't hard. I don't want to get carried away. I just really hope they make more than 2 raid tiers. I'll feel cheated. 6.2 can't be the end of wod.

I’m a bit torn about it, honestly. Half of me thinks it’d be an extraordinary rip off to charge extra for such an embarrassingly light expansion, but the other half of me wants this disastrous expansion over with as soon as possible.

just noticed this area in the Hellfire Citadel called "Grommash's Torment"

Good spot.

I've listened through the audio files on Wowhead and although nothing with archimonde in it seems to play, I can say that Grom is being tortured, resists, thanks for freeing him, and tells us to fuck off so he can make a trophy out of his torturer's skull or something, and also that Gul'dan resurrects Mannoroth to keep us busy while he goes to summon Archimonde.

Okay, so, Grom's now a good guy for the end of this expansion and Gul'dan probably escapes.

And what will he get from the tomb that Illidan didn't already obtain in the MU? The tomb of sargeras is emptied of anything of value. All he'll find is a few skeletons of Wardens that Illidan sealed in it.

Great point. There’s nothing in there anymore, as Illidan already removed the Eye of Sargeras when he tried to break Northrend apart.

What I did mind was how they hyped up how incredibly dangerous the Iron Horde was and kept emphasizing how this was a "suicide mission" and "so incredibly savage" and we land in a world in which we almost immediately get interdimensional backup through portals, have plenty of workers building for us and the planet isn't particularly more dangerous than Azeroth.

I think by “dangerous”, they really meant “wide aggro range on mobs that’ll pull when you try and run past them”. Sadly, these mobs are laughably easy to melt.

My bigger issue is the fact that we’re running around in a land where Khadgar can solo most of the enemies we fight, yet he stands around doing nothing. It’s a real problem with Blizzard storytelling, actually; too many characters are simply too powerful and/or omnipotent. Thrall’s the worst, but he’s not the only one.

Maybe, just maybe, there is a turn around and Grom Hellscream joins anew. Then has another son in our Timeline, named Garrosh. So he gets another chance.

No.

There are no reasons to believe that the next expansion is going to be in Q1 of 2016. I mean, come on. We have No announcements on it at this time which means alpha testing and beta testing havent even begun. It would have to be announced really darn fast, like within days, in order to get in in Q1 of 2016 which at the latest is 9months away.

It’ll be announced at BlizzCon, and touted for a Q2 launch. It’s not entirely inconceivable that they’re already putting an alpha together, given the terrible volume of content in WoD, and the worst major patch (6.1 “The Patch with no Name”) since voice chat.

No, that's a total disaster. The worst thing that can happen is bringing primary enemies into a next expansion. They obviously haven't learned from the failure that was Garrosh's survival.

Garrosh wasn’t a primary enemy until the Siege of Orgrimmar. We, the players, knew he was; our characters didn’t.

I don't think Grom will be a boss, more likely he's redeemed.

And then dies. Because time.

This is Blizzard we’re talking about, the king of middle fingers. I’m actually expecting to see Grommash die in a Mythic-only phase of the Archimonde encounter.

Everyone else, well, there’s YouTube.

Maybe some "young, visionary" guys have to take over at Blizz...

Yes, they desperately need some new designers. The ones they’ve got are entrenched in the “Blizzard Bro” culture, are too busy in self-congratulatory dick-sucking, and are too set in their ways. Sadly, they weren’t very talented to begin with, either.

Anyway, that’s enough reading through. 6.2 is the final raid tier, I think. Grommash will be redeemed and then killed (probably by Archimonde), Gul’dan will survive, and we’ll maybe get a filler patch without a raid before the next expansion is launched in Q2/Q3 after being announced at BlizzCon. They won’t wait too long after the movie release to get another expansion out.

[Myrthrall]

Blizzard writers hire me.

Gul'dan comes to our reality and takes refuge in northrend, The Lich King (Ner'zul part of him anyway) remembers Gul'dan and sends an unholy amount of undead at him and we are sent there to find out what the ruckus is about. BAM! new LK expansion

Oh man I haven't even thought of that. Still sticking with possibly going to the Tomb because idk he died there maybe he wants to connect with himself not to mention there are still insanely powerful demons there, Azshara senses the Legion presence and becomes prominent again and then Ner'zhul senses him and has Bolvar send his undead forces. Suddenly it becomes a huge clusterfuck that the old gods (read N'zoth) would surely take advantage of.

[Deleted]

if Bolvar and Gul'dan ever meet, Bolv'zhul would go: "Guldan? It's me, Ner'lvar" and Gul'dan proceeds to corrupt him with fel-fire.

[Deleted]

If they were to continue this storyline is either Gul'Dan escapes his fate and finds a "Power source" or something entirely which we don't know yet due to either Legendary Quest or Mythic ending of HFC.

[archkiller]

The movie was pushed back to June 2016, which makes it more likely that there will be a 6.3 new raid which also explain the 795 legendary ring.

[Pua]

The movie was pushed back to June 2016, which makes it more likely that there will be a 6.3 new raid which also explain the 795 legendary ring.

Ultimately, however, there’s nothing left. Gul’dan is the only loose end to tie up, and I find it likely that he’ll survive the expansion for reasons already cited in this thread. Mainly, I think he'll survive in order to avoid the "filler expansion" criticism being wholly vindicated.

The movie change makes it more likely, to me anyway, that they’ll look to release the next expansion (to be announced at BlizzCon) in Q2 of 2016. If 6.2 comes out in late June or early July they'll give themselves eight to nine months to get 7.0 ready. The cynic in me thinks they'll release in mid-July, just so that anything before that in 2016 will see them avoid the dreaded "final patch year".

If there's a 6.3, it'll look like 6.1.

In other words, an anaemic patch with some more shipyard missions and no actual content to speak of. Something that can be knocked up in fifteen minutes just like, again, 6.1.

[Life-Binder]

The movie was pushed back to June 2016, which makes it more likely that there will be a 6.3 new raid which also explain the 795 legendary ring.

I agree absolutely

X-pac announcement Fall 2015, release ~May/Summer 2016

6.3 with a mid-sized raid release Q1 2016

[Deleted]

The delay to the movie gives Blizz a bit more time to polish the new expac, but that's it. At this point, I'd much rather they did that, than trying to scrape together something for a second content patch for WoD.

[Pua]

I agree absolutely

X-pac announcement Fall 2015, release ~May/Summer 2016

6.3 with a mid-sized raid release Q1 2016

The expansion will be announced at BlizzCon; always has been, and always will be. If anyone wants to put a store bought pet on it with me, we can do so (PM Tekkommo about me paying such debts).

My question is this:

Do you honestly believe Blizzard will aim for a May release for the expansion, and put another raid tier in for three to four months? There’s absolutely no chance they’ll do that, when we know their ideal time for a raiding tier is double that.

Here’s my thinking:

1) They’ll announce the next expansion at BlizzCon ‘15.
2) They’ll want to release it prior to the movie, but relatively close.
3) 6.2 is likely to launch mid-June, going off blue Tweets talking about “months” in the PTR.
4) If the expansion is released in June ’16, they’d need to launch the next raiding tier in (roughly) December in order to make the tier worthwhile.
5) They want raiders in beta to test their new content, and betas never launch during progression.
6) To get the expansion ready, beta would NEED to start around December.

All of this is me being pragmatic, but also giving Blizzard a lot of good faith when you consider previous end of expansion cycles. At the end of the day, however, this tier is going to last until the end of the expansion and a “new tier” will be provided by a beta test arriving somewhere around December/January. If anything happens with the legendary ring, it might end up being a cut-scene or something that’s related to some new expansion event before moving on. Of course, it could just be a problem with datamining information with no context.

This is the second and final tier for this expansion and, quite honestly, we’re probably better for it. Warlords of Draenor will forever live in ignominy amongst Blizzard’s pantheon of work for being the worst piece of rubbish they ever had the cheek to release and actually charge people money for.

[Jessicka]

They pushed the movie back because they have more faith in it than they originally gave it, it has nothing to do with WoW expansion scheduling. WoD was always going to be a 2 tier expansion, and they've been going on about how the next one was in the works before this even happened; and given how lacking this one is, I find it very unlikely they'd waste development time trying to fix it, and cause delays and similar issues with a lack of content and features the next time around.

Again, with the work so far done on the next expansion, they're not going to rip up that plot just to squeeze another semi-tier in to give some kind of closure for Gul'dan - since he's probably the tie in anyway.

[Deleted]

Guldan was a red herring. Archimonde is the final boss. Guldan will travel to the tomb of Sargeras to initiate the Eye of Azshara expansion.

i keep saying this will happen! aha

[Xtrm]

i keep saying this will happen! aha

I think most of us are hoping for this, mostly for story closure. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Azshara one of the only storylines from Warcraft 3 that is still incomplete? (Besides Burning Legion and Old Gods, but I feel like they'll always be a threat there.)

[Deleted]

They pushed the movie back because they have more faith in it than they originally gave it, it has nothing to do with WoW expansion scheduling. WoD was always going to be a 2 tier expansion, and they've been going on about how the next one was in the works before this even happened; and given how lacking this one is, I find it very unlikely they'd waste development time trying to fix it, and cause delays and similar issues with a lack of content and features the next time around.

Again, with the work so far done on the next expansion, they're not going to rip up that plot just to squeeze another semi-tier in to give some kind of closure for Gul'dan - since he's probably the tie in anyway.

Pretty much, what can happen is a unexpected delay.. Then they'll might have to snuck in a sort of Ruby Sanctum stuff.

But I think for the first time we're gonna get a faster expansion cycle. Hell they mentioned they were already working on the zones of the next one when they released WoD.

[Jessicka]

Pretty much, what can happen is a unexpected delay.. Then they'll might have to snuck in a sort of Ruby Sanctum stuff.

But I think for the first time we're gonna get a faster expansion cycle. Hell they mentioned they were already working on the zones of the next one when they released WoD.

Exactly this. At most we'll see an 'experimental' boss scratched together from various pre-existing tests, like Ruby Sanctum, that has no real meaning or purpose within the overarching plot. Even then, only if the expansion runs on late for some reason.

- - - Updated - - -

I think most of us are hoping for this, mostly for story closure. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Azshara one of the only storylines from Warcraft 3 that is still incomplete? (Besides Burning Legion and Old Gods, but I feel like they'll always be a threat there.)

But once that's closed, they'll have to write something entirely new to progress the story. The past couple of expansions haven't exactly displayed anything really to give any confidence that they'd either do that well, or have left any proper loose ends to tie up again.

[Life-Binder]

I dont believe in another year long raid

so either faster expansion or a 6.3

[Blade Wolf]

Is there any solid proof that the legendary QL ends in 6.2? I mean someone uncovered a potential power up for the ring after the legendary stage so it jumps from 735 to 795 which could indicate something beyond Hellfire Citadel. Tbh i wouldn't put anything past blizzard at this point when they stated in 3 separate interviews that Grommash was the last boss of this expansion and now we get Archimonde as the final boss in Hellfire Citadel.

Edit: http://ptr.wowdb.com/spells/187958-power-infusion legendary ring power up.

[Deleted]

Is there any solid proof that the legendary QL ends in 6.2? I mean someone uncovered a potential power up for the ring after the legendary stage so it jumps from 735 to 795 which could indicate something beyond Hellfire Citadel. Tbh i wouldn't put anything past blizzard at this point when they stated in 3 separate interviews that Grommash was the last boss of this expansion and now we get Archimonde as the final boss in Hellfire Citadel.

Have we managed to datamine the ending of LQ yet?

[KhazzahK]

Its ARCHIMONDE as the last boss people.

That should be the one and only indicator that 6.2 is the last raid tier.