Warcraft Leak™: Return of Aqir, tBC servers and more.

[themaelstorm]

Recently, I approached a totally real™ friend of mine working in Blizzard and convinced this friend to tell me more about BlizzCon. I said "I'm going to be there anyway" and followed "I wouldn't post them on anywhere lol!" and my friend caved in. And although I did mean what I said… I'm only human and I can't hold all these leaks. So here goes. Please don't share with anyone though.

World of Warcraft - Return of the Aqir
The first and biggest thing for retail is the new expansion: Return of the Aqir. At the end of this expansion, we attempt to kill N'zoth. In the cinematic cutscene, the heroes realize that this puts Azeroth in great pain and we realize we need to imprison him anyway. However, the heart of Azeroth is pretty much depleted, so we also utilize the Titan facility for it and end up not only weakening Azeroth, but also a complete shutdown of the Titan power lines. While the cat's away, the old gods come out to play: Despite their weakened state, they send their pawns, the races of Aqir to attack. Through the expansion, we'll be trying to get titan facilities online while fighting the enemy. We will be in sort of a panic mode since Magni isn't around. Mechagnomes will appear a lot.

The expansion is half underground, in the tunnels of Qiraji beneath Silithus and the wondrous empire of Nerubians under Northrend, but also feature a few revisited zones. There is no new continent, but more of a rework and rearrangement of the land, similar to Uldum and Twilight Highlands.
We'll see the return of old Qiraji and Nerubian models in greater forms and variety, with elemental infusion and forgotten one themes added on top of them.

There will also be some more "primal" aqir that are the more base, less advanced models of the creatures.

The Horde and the Alliance decide on a ceasefire, but old wounds are still there, so fights erupt (which explains pvp lorewise.) In fact, the hateful groups are the PvP factions. On Horde side it's the Blightcallers (after completing a quest where you prison-break Nathanos) and on the Alliance side it's the Warriors of Night (led by Tyrande in secret, after a quest where she's instructed by Malfurion himself.)

There is no artifact mechanic this time but the talent and skill system is apparently revisited to be closer to diablo 3. This apparently allows a combination of utility and freedom, also allowing players to decide the balance between "class fantasy" and "spec fantasy" ie a fire mage could choose to have a firefrost bolt, empowered fireball or an arcane blast at a certain level.

WQs still exists, Warfronts come back as a faction-neutral activity (against the enemy, and there is a Qiraji war in Ahn'Qiraj), Island Expeditions are now Titan Exploration (where we explore secret, satellite Titan facilities. This is done by mechagnomes and goblins, and still has a pvp element.) There is apparently going to be a new system that will be hinted in 9.0 and arrive in 9.1: Constructing a new titan facility, which will be a psuedo housing element.

Another Azeroth faction exists, but Magni isn't around. Brann will be the interim "leader" of this faction, using his titan knowledge to help us. He seems to know where Magni is, and he is worried.

The undead Nerubians apparently act as sort of a forsaken and they did not follow Bolvar. They are a faction that we will side with against the Nerubians and apparently, Bolvar is angry about that.

The fight against Qiraji will be led by the renewed Cenarion Expedition: Cenarion League. They are also working with the Earthen Ring to heal the sword wound.

Kirin-Tor is back. Dalaran isn't here but Khadgar's Chosen is a group of mages, surprise, chosen by Khadgar to study Sargeras' Sword. Also, Dalaran has disappeared. There is a hint that there will be something about them in a future patch. Apparently, there will be a small flying outpost near the hilt.

A surprise is The Accursed. These are titan constructs that were experimented on by the Old Gods. Some of them are ancient, among those who first felt the curse of flesh and others have been transformed back and forth between stone-metal and flesh. While many of them are still pawns of the old gods or mindless monsters, one faction will aid us. They are the "late game" faction of 9.0.

Another surprise race is something like the Vengeful (name is subject to change apparently.) The Vengeful are a group of trolls, plus titan creations including mogu. They aren't necessarily good, but they were somehow screwed by the Old Gods and they are out for blood. They will be a dark faction, except something like the start of DK area.


Allied Race Death Knights
Oh, also, Bolvar is basically "recruiting aggressively," the way he did in Legion. That's where the new DKs come from. The risen heroes, similar to old DKs. There are three questlines. One is really short and it's for non-DK characters where we witness Bolvar raising people and it looks bad. Another one that's really short and that ties current DKs to the third questline somewhere in middle. Third one starts as the new DK starting area, then ties to a common DK quest. In the starting area we learn that the nature of Scourge raised by Bolvar is different. It finally leads to another aggressive move by Bolvar, where DKs raid a magic cache guarded by Kirin-Tor. In the end, Bolvar tells all of them to go back to business as usual for now.
They also want to add an option similar to warlock green-flame for DKs where they can switch to a fiery-cosmetic that comes with Bolvar. However, the questline may not make it in time for 8.3.

Classic WoW
Not much to say about classic itself, but a fully-fledged plan will be revealed. What's more important is that they'll reveal the next step: Burning Crusade servers will be a thing in future, with the option to move your characters to there, at least they'd like to do that. Likely that we'll have all sorts of servers once they are on top of the technology.

Warcraft 3: Reforged
Nothing new here except that they'll actually be adding many more models, including iconic WoW characters and in future, Starcraft ones. There will also be a page like a highlighted map of the day, voting options etc. This will also be integrated to the game UI next year.
That was all for Warcraft. Later, I will be back for the other franchises!

PS: In case it wasn't clear to you until this point, I'm not trying to be a legit leak. I made this up as something that "could happen." You know. Just sharing thoughts, looking forward to see what people have to say about the ideas.

PPS: I wrote this partially yesterday and didn't see the leaks. Then I just watched the cutscenes. Apparently N'zoth dies. But this doesn't really matter. N'zoth's death could still have the same affect one way or the other (titan facilities shutting down, hoa depleted, magni gone)

PPPS: People mentioned Tinker. I already posted my rough design, its in my sig.

[Magicon]

So No New race or class? Else ut sounds cool

[Soulwind]

Not terribly original, although it's a break from all these Northrend/Shadowlands leaks. The name is very bland, though, you could have done better.

[Teriz]

An underground expansion without Undermine seems rather improbable.

[wargone]

You know. This wont happend but i like the idea of this. +1 for creativity THIS is the kind of fake leaks i come here for.

[Villager720]

The timing of this is humorous and sad.
We have datamined broadcast texts AND as of quite recently, cut scenes that disprove this.

Why waste so much of your time OP?

[Soulwind]

An underground expansion without Undermine seems rather improbable.

Totally forgot about Undermine, and I had my own idea of it being this subterranean desert with wild west themed trains and towns...

Ah, probably not happening.

[unbound]

TBH, this one is tempting. It has all the hallmarks of Blizz laziness (no new class, minor rework of the world half restricted to underground and the rest in existing lands so polishing the world for flying is less effort, DK rework mostly being skins, continuation of boring Warfronts, IE renamed but largely unchanged). If this turns out to be accurate, then there is zero chance I'll return to Retail.

Classic WoW is also realistic (just lay out timelines better and mention BC servers).

[Theangryone]

"Hey buddy tell me about Blizzcon, I won't tell"

"Hey sure, but instead I'll give you a bullet point reveal of the next expansion"

[Begrudge]

Nope, there is a portal to shadowlands in ice town citadel in the 8.3.5 build already

[Will]

If the next expansion isn't Tuskarr of the Black Empire then it can GTFO.

[Rivex]

The recently leaked Epilogue cut scene after the raid (in the heart chamber after the N'zoth cut scene) has already debunked this lol.

[Asaliah]

so bland and unexciting that it might be true

[Firedemon]

Doubt™
Also .. can't bear yet another expansion involving titans .. give it a break already.

[Mosotti]

No Blizzard employee is that dumb.

[Keristrasza]

I'm calling fake just from the first few words "Recently, I approached a totally real™ friend of mine working in Blizzard" >_>;;

[Mic_128]

An underground expansion without Undermine seems rather improbable.

Like a 'South Seas' expansion without Kezan?

[Doffen]

The expansion name give it away. The Aqir "race" isn't important enough.

Better title would be The Black Empire Strikes Back.

[VinceVega]

Why do these "leaks" always have so baaaaaad names?

[Orby]

We need a leak sub forum, we really do or at least mods need to rename these threads to 'speculation'

Seems we get one of these threads every day