Logic does not really gel that well with the forums discussing leaks. We can be confident Death will play a part in the next expansion, but other than that there is little we can actually say for sure.
It could be Dragon isles, or that could be the theme of 10.0, it could be a return ot Northrend, but it could just as easily be a world revamp expansion. There is no way to say for sure with these things beyond the vaguest of details, just as it used to be when people are adamant that foreshadowing will be cashed in on instantly.
I am sure everyone was sure the expansion after Cata would be about defeating N'zoth, or that the expansion after MoP would be about stopping a Legion invasion, or just recently when everyone was sure this expansion would be about defeating Azshara when that was only a small part.
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One of my most therapeutic things i have saved is a link to an old messageboard discussing how BC ruined WoW forever, and that WotLK looks awful and will be the end of WoW.
It is just as funny each time to go back and look at the same arguments being used back then as they are used now to try ot explain why current WoW is awful, the next expansion will be worse, and previous expansion was the best.
Probably.
As you said, the Shadowlands and the Dragon Isles sound like the most logical elements to explore next, so if a leak shows up talking about completely different stuff, people won't pay attention to it. Particularly if it's also a small post made during the last few hours before the announcement, within a huge thread that's getting 5+ posts per minute. A few will ignore it, most won't even know it's there.
I'm still waiting for my Infinite Dragonflight expansion... just sayin'...
On 27/10/2017 was the first piece of information regarding BFA, though the author's mistake on Nordrassil (clearly meant Teldrassil) meant it is understandable why he was dismissed so readily.
The thing is, the same thing should happen again now. We will start getting tidbits of information in the next expansion megathread in about a week, week and a half...and we won't be able to pick them out from the spoofers until after the reveal.
As much as I despise the idea of a Shadowlands expansion, it's only the second leak (the one with the Stormwind raid) that can be properly dismissed. That leak appeared to piggy-back on the first one.
The original leak with the map is unfortunately seeming more and more likely, especially considering it directly states that Bolvar is the one who brings us to the Shadowlands, and that it now also has been revealed that the Frozen Throne is a gateway to the Shadowlands. All the new Lich King related datamining isn't helping, either. And much like how 6.2 Fury of Hellfire brought a lot of new demon assets before Legion, this might be the same case for the new Old God-related models we're seeing.
The Warlords of Draenor leak is my favorite. Mostly because it proves so many people wrong when dismissing leaks. This was a picture taken of a screen, and it was real. It looked like it was painted in 5 minutes in photoshop, and it was real. The description is the perfect example of how an expansion's plot can sound ridiculous when summarized, but turn out to be very real.
I still haven't ruled out the possibility of another time-travel expansion. There was a spoof a few years ago about "Highlords of Lordaeron" being a new expansion (Alliance-themed WoD, essentially) and... it seems silly, but it would coincide pretty well with the release of Warcraft III Reforged.
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Damn, they even misspelled Terokkar and it was real...
and its not rly out of the table, in legion we travel to many worlds to stop the argus invasions, even the "return to draenor" expansion is a possibility.
logic does have some credibility here, see, if someone say brought a leak saying one race of each faction will be made non playable, instead we will get murloc race playable, everyone get a race chance and so on, without hints, by logic we know that will never happen, but if someone say the next expansion will be based around dragons and you will get a dragonborn like race, that is not impossible, we have some hints that this could be a thing, make sense, have a bit of logic on it.
if we are getting lots of hints about either dragon isles with wrathion and dragons, shadowlands with sylvanas and bolvar stuff, then by logic, those options are possible.
seeing the other leaks, the point is never be 100% about something, but don't dismiss everythingI am sure everyone was sure the expansion after Cata would be about defeating N'zoth, or that the expansion after MoP would be about stopping a Legion invasion, or just recently when everyone was sure this expansion would be about defeating Azshara when that was only a small part.
And ogreen crag don't even exist or does? what make me recall that some map like that was leaked sometime ago about shadowlands, even had the sylveran place, based on the sylverian wing mount
maybe that shit is true after all.
ti was not that bad, the execution was, time travel is good when tis done right, the concept of going back to draenor before exploded was awesome, but they did awful.
How can you say that the Shadowlands leak is more credible now when it states
Azshara is still alive, the Old Gods are not sleeping in Ny'alotha and nothing in 8.3 hints at N'zoth redirecting souls to revive the old Old Gods. Also, the way Ny'alotha works as of 8.3 does not really match up with the leak.But also certain villains. The Old Gods are not dead. They are sleeping in Ny’alotha. N’Zoth has been redirecting souls to fuel the Old Gods’ ascension back into the world. The Black Empire will rise again very soon. This is what Azshara saw when she died.
If they didn't release 8.3 info before blizzcon it would've probably made a real leak harder to stand out since people would just jump on Black Empire/Nyalotha/Nzoth leaks, but now after 8.2.5 and 8.3 people are jumping ship to Death.
#1 Hype-Thread Shitposter - Overlord of the Hypethread
I'm not going to argue what's real or not, especially not for an expansion concept I don't even think sounds very fun. But leaks this early are rarely 100% accurate. The first iteration of Garrosh's Iron Horde consisted of gnolls, kobolds and troggs. Karabor was supposed to be the Alliance capital in WoD. Argus wasn't originally meant to be the final patch of Legion. Just a few months ago, N'Zoth was an enormous landmass in Nazjatar. Would you say any of those things were fake? Because they weren't.
We can discuss whether Azshara truly died and was resurrected in The Eternal Palace or whether the other Old Gods are still out there till the cows come home. It doesn't change the fact that Blizzard can do whatever they want, and that entertaining several possibilities, no matter how ridiculous (as the WoD leak proved) is a sound approach.