Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[Hitei]

These were the old Blizzard days... Metzen was such a legend:

I still remember being worried when he left, and I was right to be...

Because panels are slightly more awkward?

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

The guy that made the bottom photo admitted it was a joke

Knowing this thread this image will turn up again next week out of the blue with "found this on 4chan, big announcement this week?"

[Revamp Man]

Knowing this thread this image will turn up again next week out of the blue with "found this on 4chan, big announcement this week?"

Nah but it will next season just like awakenings

[Luck4]

Because panels are slightly more awkward?

Yes, in his awkwardness he was truly dedicated and passionate about the lore, and I liked his direction. The only thing that I really disliked under Metzen was "Draenor is free! ", but that compared to the number of letdowns since 7.3.5 cinematics is laughable.

Anyway, this is just my taste. I prefer true villains and true heroes in fiction, instead of gray moral drama on both sides, for me drama is like real life, and I think real-life is boring.

[Nyel]

How do those names not make sense?

"Shadowlands" is self-explanatory, the expansion takes place in the realm known as Shadowlands.

"Warlords of Draenor" refers to the main villains of the expansion, the Warlords of the world "Draenor" who formed the Iron Horde.

"Mists of Pandaria" refers to the magical mists that surrounded Pandaria for 10000 years, the expansion happens because of their disappearance.

"Empire of Dragons" doesn't make sense, unless the dragons randomly decide to start an empire.

Which is out of character for them because, in case you didn't know, empires are built on conquest and bloodshed. By definition, an empire is a collection of conquered kingdoms. I don't see Alexstrasza and co. randomly starting to conquer people. That would certainly make them no better than their nemesis N'Zoth.

We didn't know about the Warlords of Draenor before Warlords of Draenor.

We didn't know about the Mist(s) of Pandaria before Mists of Pandaria.

Empire of Dragons makes as much sense as the others when it's introduced in the expansion as a new thing. So a new Dragonflight trying to establish an empire. Wrathion trying to establish an empire by uniting the dragonflights. Murozond trying to establish an empire. Nozdormu trying to establish an empire to fight Murozond.

I can go on and on and on. Empire of Dragons make a lot of sense when it's the main theme of the expansion.

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Not sure why everyone keeps debating the empire of dragons logo. The person who posted it continues to read this thread and hasn't said a word about it since they posted it. Was also the first and only source of the image. Just put it to rest already lol

The logo is way too good for a fan made logo. If it's indeed fake, it's a 10/10 job. That logo easily rivals every other official expansion logo in quality and design.

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This is there speculation thread so I'm speculating:

I don't know how we get there but I'm sure Azshara will be brought back. I hope in the context of a new kaldorei empire. 0

On context of the last pages: those fake images are really fun!

They brought Vashj back for a reason in Shadowlands. If she doesn't interact with Azshara, I would be baffled. I mean why do they put so much emphasis on Azshara in BfA and Vashj in Shadowlands when both are not going to interact?

[Revamp Man]

Kalecgos is growing concerned with the recent resurgence of the twilight cult in northrend and has reached it to his sister Alexzstraza to help take care of them. There’s rumors that the cultists are planning an attack to reclaim the body of chromatus but with both the red and blue dragons working together there is little to fear…or so they thought. The twilight cult has a secret weapon the two aspects did not expect, twilight dragons that were magically aged to maturity. The battle was long and it seemed like a victory for Kalec and Alex but the attack was merely a distraction for the cult to sneak forces in and remove the body using the underground tunnels dug by the nerubians still faithful to the fallen old gods.

We follow the tunnels and find the spot where the cult teleported away and the two aspects are furious and follow with no extra forces. What they find are the cultists siphoning the power from what seems to be hundreds of twilight eggs and into the lifeless body of Chromatus. The two aspects and the hero attack but it was a trap. The cult begins siphoning power from the two dragons and it causes a stirring in Chromatus soon a new head begins to form but it holds the coloring of a twilight dragon. We free the aspects with the help of Wrathion’s Talonguard agents that he had planted in the cult but it is too late….Chromatus rises and all 6 heads roar. Kalec attacks with magic but the twilight head absorbs it. Alex turns into her dragon form and attacks him with fire but it has no effect. Chromatus then strikes the dragon aspect with a breath attack from his new head weakening her and now wrestling with her using his heads to pin her. She tells Kalec to go even though he refuses she roars at him and he gets all of us out and to the Ruby Shrine mourning her death until a Talonguard agent tells him that she wouldn’t be killed as an aspect is too valuable to the cult for the continuation of their plans.

3 storylines so far that are infinitely better than what we will actually get

[Relapses]

Just for comparison, I searched for the 2015 live stream announcement:



Here's the leaked one:



If these EoD logos are fake, then people are really invested in making them...

Oh I like this game: Spotting the differences --

• Wrong gradient used for "See what's next"
• Inexplicable "04th" instead of the grammatically correct "4th"
• "AM" is lowest case for some reason and "PT" and "CET" are mismatched in abbreviations
• Expansion logo is obviously a blacked out version of the other "leaked" expansion logo, not a heavily shadowed gradient which would be indicative of a reveal

That's just a few. I'm sure there's more.

It did get the vibe right, though. So I can't blame people for being duped by it.

[Alanar]

It is worth noting that, in the Ren'dorei player intro, Alleria Windrunner cites the Dragons as an example of creatures who could not resist the whispers of the Void and were broken.

Maybe she could appear in a Dragon expansion to mock and roast the Dragons, like the Queen she is

No not worth mentioning... to much fanboying here to make sense.

[Relapses]

The guy that made the bottom photo admitted it was a joke

Well fuck. I guess we can't have nice things.

[Luck4]

The guy that made the bottom photo admitted it was a joke

The EoD logo that was posted previously too?

Anyway, people are doing better mock-ups every year, soon or later we won't be able to tell the difference.

[Revamp Man]

We didn't know about the Warlords of Draenor before Warlords of Draenor.

We didn't know about the Mist(s) of Pandaria before Mists of Pandaria.

Empire of Dragons makes as much sense as the others when it's introduced in the expansion as a new thing.

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The logo is way too good for a fan made logo. If it's indeed fake, it's a 10/10 job. That logo easily rivals every other official expansion logo in quality and design.

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They brought Vashj back for a reason in Shadowlands. If she doesn't interact with Azshara, I would be baffled. I mean why do they put so much emphasis on Azshara in BfA and Vashj in Shadowlands when both are not going to interact?

Because the covenants were all designed to have nostalgic characters in them. Vashj also isn’t returning to life so she can’t interact

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The EoD logo that was posted previously too?

Anyway, people are doing better mock-ups every year, soon or later we won't be able to tell the difference.

Not the logo
So far there’s nothing more from him

[Alanar]

Man I remember coming out of WoD everyone talking big things about Argus, Ogres, an AU Azeroth where Humans drank fel blood, sky was the limit on the madness.

At the time we were young and naief, ofc blizzard would never pull something like that off with the knowledge we have today. Its funny how late people discovered expectations ad own stories would always be better then the dissapointments we got over the years.

Really.. pretty much all false hope if you think about it.

[Revamp Man]

At the time we were young and naief, ofc blizzard would never pull something like that off with the knowledge we have today. Its funny how late people discovered expectations ad own stories would always be better then the dissapointments we got over the years.

Really.. pretty much all false hope if you think about it.

That is literally what speculation is

If we only ever guessed worse than blizzard produces there would be no fun in it

[Luck4]

At the time we were young and naief, ofc blizzard would never pull something like that off with the knowledge we have today. Its funny how late people discovered expectations ad own stories would always be better then the dissapointments we got over the years.

Really.. pretty much all false hope if you think about it.

I dunno, Legion fulfilled my expectations, and I can say the same about WOTLK, and these expansions were over six years apart from each other.

Actually, Legion hyped me up in every ending cinematic, with a glorious ending conclusion in 7.3.

And the build-up of WOTLK was also really good.

[Hitei]

That logo easily rivals every other official expansion logo in quality and design.

It really doesn't.

[Nyel]

Because the covenants were all designed to have nostalgic characters in them. Vashj also isn’t returning to life so she can’t interact

We... basically don't know that. Same about Ysera. If we get Dragons next expansion, Ysera for sure will come back.

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It really doesn't.

It absolutely does. But I'm sure you gonna dissect why it does not, so here we go.

[Revamp Man]

Hyjal is under attack by what seems to be the nightmare manifesting and the green dragons need our help. Wrathion volunteers to give them aid but the new leader shuns him because his father. We find out her sisters have been corrupted and it’s from the fragment of nightmare that we didn’t remove because we left the roots. She says there may be a way to purify her sisters but it requires a sacrifice. She turns on us and says that she must use our life force to cleanse her sister’s and save the emerald dream and thus the world. As she has us trapped Wrathion appears and severs the magic explaining that she can save her sisters with a potion he created from the one he used on abyssion. She refuses blaming everything on Wrathion and his flight thus allowing the nightmare to slowly creep into her mind turning her into a nightmare dragon and she attacks Wrathion but due to his experience and mental stability out maneuvers her and flies away with us in his claws. He says that now saving them might be more difficult but he believes he knows someone who can help and takes us to Val sharah where an angry malfurion resides. Wrathion tells Malfurion that only Tyrande can save the dream now because of her connection to Elune and her responsibility is to revive Ysera who merely needs a conduit to travel back to the dream since her connection to Elune was severed. Malfurion says no but Tyrande quickly agrees and we begin the ritual in the travel network from the legion class hall. Nightmare dragons attack but Malfurion, Wrathion, and the hero hold them off long enough for Ysera to return and show the full fury of an aspect now empowered by the winter queen.

We eventually reach the daughters of Ysera and she tries to reason with them but ends up attacked. We fight back and slay each one until we reach the eldest and Ysera has decided that it is time for her to pass the title of aspect on and she blasts her daughter with a blue and green breath attack that slowly purifies her but costs Ysera her life. She begins to fade and her daughter cries saying she isn’t strong enough and Wrathion puts his hand on her shoulder saying “we can’t be our parents but we can be better”

[Dracullus]

I dunno, Legion fulfilled my expectations, and I can say the same about WOTLK, and these expansions were over six years apart from each other.

Actually, Legion hyped me up in every ending cinematic, with a glorious ending conclusion in 7.3.

And the build-up of WOTLK was also really good.

Both Wrath and Legion were culminations of story told in Warcraft III and Frozen Throne, especially Wrath is pretty messy without that foundation (imagine last hour of LoTR starting with tournament in Mordor and Sauron randomly showing up there).

Shadowlands are completely on the opposite, it's strange to me that Wrath nostalgia is so underused if this is continuation of that thread anyway. You clearly see that potential in Uther storyline that is arguably best thing connected to main plot.

And yeah, Legion was great with end of raids big events - Illidan resurrection, Argus showing up on the sky (we all knew this will be 7.3, but no one expected it visible on the sky all the time) and sword in Silithus. Let's hope 9.2 will have some return of form in this field, cause last few cinematics were full of missed opportunities and made you feel "that's it?" instead of "hell yeah" (but don't forget it's WoW community and there is always shit ton of people saying "that's it?" even after Antorus end).

[Revamp Man]

We... basically don't know that. Same about Ysera. If we get Dragons next expansion, Ysera for sure will come back.

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It absolutely does. But I'm sure you gonna dissect why it does not, so here we go.

Vashj doesn’t have a body and in terms of the thought process of the queen she is a failure and a discarded tool

[Nyel]

Both Wrath and Legion were culminations of story told in Warcraft III and Frozen Throne, especially Wrath is pretty messy without that foundation (imagine last hour of LoTR starting with tournament in Mordor and Sauron randomly showing up there).

Shadowlands are completely on the opposite, it's strange to me that Wrath nostalgia is so underused if this is continuation of that thread anyway. You clearly see that potential in Uther storyline that is arguably best thing connected to main plot.

And yeah, Legion was great with end of raids big events - Illidan resurrection, Argus showing up on the sky (we all knew this will be 7.3, but no one expected it visible on the sky all the time) and sword in Silithus. Let's hope 9.2 will have some return of form in this field, cause last few cinematics were full of missed opportunities and made you feel "that's it?" instead of "hell yeah" (but don't forget it's WoW community and there is always shit ton of people saying "that's it?" even after Antorus end).

I totally agree here. Every main raid in Legion felt very impactful and build up towards the upcoming raid. Not counting Emerald Nightmare, because that was a hit and miss, but the others were excellent.

Nighthold, in itself already one of the top raids in WoW, was a perfect build up towards Tomb of Sargeras. Tomb of Sargeras continued the storyline and culminated in what leads us to Argus. It was just a very well-executed build up towards the grand finale.

That wasn't the case in BfA at all, due to various reasons: Uldir felt very detached from everything, BoD - while being a great raid - had the faction-theme and didn't fit into the overarching narrative. Eternal Palace was an okay raid, but the ending felt very, very weak in comparison to the Legion build up of upcoming raids.

Shadowlands felt samey. Castle Nathria wasn't really part of the overarching narrative at all (although Denathrius was connected to the Jailer). Sanctum was okayish I guess, but the ending wasn't very climactic either.

I find it so weird that they seem to have found the pinnacle of WoWs modern design in Legion and then just abandoned basically every good aspect of it in the following expansions.