So where exactly is the Blade of the Black Empire now?

[sighy]

Xal herself seems to be set up to be a twist on the Nyarlathotep concept. Which given her vast influences and relatively detatched attitude driven by aliances of convenience is something i would see fitting her well. Her form depending on where she would wish to blend in, with a Ren'dorei likely being the most obvious, as it would allow her to use a portion of her real power, without much scrutiny.


The dagger kinda depends. It's been known to be very slippery, when xal was still within so it still being somewhere out there is not outside the realms of possibility. And let's be honest the Adventurers don't have a great track record with this kind of stuff. *ahem* Kel'thuzad's Phylactery *ahem*. That said the ending of the Ny'alotha patch was rather final overall, in regards to the Old God presence on Azeroth, as we knew it so outside of wink wink nudge nudge kind of hints i sincerely doubt we are going to see much from them, for quite some time.

[Varodoc]

Based on the cutscene before the Carapace of N'Zoth encounter, it would seem that the Xal'atath dagger was lost when Wrathion plunged it into N'Zoth's avatar in Ny'alotha. When Wrathion is thrown back he no longer has the dagger, and looks quizzically for a moment at the hand that held it. The dagger exploded in a blast of white light before throwing Wrathion several feet away - so presumably it was either destroyed in the process of opening the way to the Carapace itself, or was absorbed into the substance of N'Zoth entirely. Since Ny'alotha collapsed with the death of N'Zoth the dagger is presumably gone either way, destroyed either in the blast that Wrathion caused or deleted along with Ny'alotha upon his death. The dagger wasn't really material anymore, though; since the entity known as Xal'atath had left it at that point to points unknown.

Why would the blade be destroyed just because it pierced N'Zoth's carapace though? It seems kind of a random development. Was it the explosion from N'Zoth's carapace that destroyed it? If so, why wasn't Wrathion wounded in the explosion too?

I wouldn't be totally against the dagger containing a fragment of N'Zoth who is then released from the dagger in a more ''humanoid'' form like Xal'Atath. He could then be a more grounded, realistic villain that we can interact with on a more realistic level. I feel like in this form, he could make for a much more compelling, personal villain, leading armies etc and even at times be an unwilling, antagonistic ally when we have mutual interests - think Ba'al from Stargate SG1.

Question is, which WoW race would he fit well as his ''avatar''? Both playable and non-playable.

I'm sure N'Zoth would be more popular if he became an E-Boy:



Like Xal'atath, he could possess the body of an elf.

[sighy]

Next expansion involves the dragonflights, dragon isles, tyr, ulduar -- there's a very big chance we'll see some old god stuff.

Also, all of BfA has led us largely to the events of Shadowlands, which is about to come full circle with Zovaal attacking Azeroth. In fact, nearly everything that's been going on in World of Warcraft since the get go is leading to that moment. If people actually stop to think about things, the storylines from the past expansions and Shadowlands are actually very good, and it's leading to some exciting things.

The Dragon Isles concept was very heavily Old God, when they were planning to do it, for like Cataclysm or something, but that's somethign which could ahve substantially changed given the ending of 8.3. Then again revoking the depowerment of the aspects already is backtracking on definitive endings so yeah.

[Aucald]

Why would the blade be destroyed just because it pierced N'Zoth's carapace though? It seems kind of a random development. Was it the explosion from N'Zoth's carapace that destroyed it? If so, why wasn't Wrathion wounded in the explosion too?

In the cutscene, once it pierces N'Zoth's avatar it appears to be drawing power into itself, glowing with intensity and it does so until there is an explosion that flings Wrathion off the mass of N'Zoth and reveals the actual Carapace entity stepping forth from a cloud of darkness. Wrathion appears to be flung clear and is no worse for wear (he's a powerful dragon after all). There's no way to be sure if the dagger itself was destroyed in the explosion it seemed to create, or was absorbed by N'Zoth when he reforms into a smaller avatar-like form. If it was absorbed, then it was likely destroyed along with the whole of Ny'alotha on the defeat of N'Zoth since there's no evidence of it having been retrieved, if it even could be.

[Varodoc]

The Dragon Isles concept was very heavily Old God, when they were planning to do it, for like Cataclysm or something, but that's somethign which could ahve substantially changed given the ending of 8.3. Then again revoking the depowerment of the aspects already is backtracking on definitive endings so yeah.

In BfA, the "Blacktalon Agent", an Agent of Wrathion, stated that Wrathion was looking for the Dragon Isles. So the concept definitely hasn't been abandoned by Blizzard.

Hello, I was told to expect you, Kindly hand over the scale.

We will, of course, compensate you.

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.

Should you uncover anything further in your travels, we will be awaiting a visit, with payment in kind.

And second, in this Azerite you are seeking. Here, a hefty sum for your troubles.

The Dragon Isles are thus associated with Wrathion; Wrathion is associated with the Black Dragonflight, N'Zoth (master of Deathwing), the fight against the Old God. Yet the Dragon Isles, WHICH WERE MENTIONED IN EARLY BFA, never appeared in the end.

Unless, Blizzard was planning to do much more with the Old God plotline. Beyond BfA of course.

Ion in recent interviews also said he wants to create a sort of balance, between being a "great hero" but also more "grounded stories":

At this point, your characters are heroes and there is no way that they can go back to being anonymous adventurers, but the team also wants to go back to simple core fantasy and not so much more escalating cosmic adventures.

Thereby, a future expansion could take place on the Dragon Isles (grounded location, speculated for years, inhabited presumably by the Dragonflights we're all familiar with), but the isles are under attack by N'Zoth and/or his Void masters. Thus creating a balance between the Cosmic and Azeroth storyline.

The Blade of the Black Empire is a possible way to tie all of this together.

> N'Zoth is "defeated" by the Heroes
> His essence lives on inside the Blade ala Xal'atath
> Something something happens and he comes back
> He invades the Dragon Isles for whatever reason (that's for Blizzard to figure out, keeping in mind that N'Zoth has always messed with the Dragonflights, just think about everything he's done to Neltharion/Deathwing)
> Cue new expansion

The set-up is there, because we know that N'Zoth's bargain with Xal'atath involved him keeping the empty Blade for whatever purpose; and then, when he had his minion Dark Inquisitor Xanesh torture Azshara, he let her keep the Blade. Instead of destroying it, the one weapon that could hurt him (and he knew it could hurt him, because he knew of Azshara's betrayal).

- - - Updated - - -

In the cutscene, once it pierces N'Zoth's avatar it appears to be drawing power into itself, glowing with intensity and it does so until there is an explosion that flings Wrathion off the mass of N'Zoth and reveals the actual Carapace entity stepping forth from a cloud of darkness. Wrathion appears to be flung clear and is no worse for wear (he's a powerful dragon after all). There's no way to be sure if the dagger itself was destroyed in the explosion it seemed to create, or was absorbed by N'Zoth when he reforms into a smaller avatar-like form. If it was absorbed, then it was likely destroyed along with the whole of Ny'alotha on the defeat of N'Zoth since there's no evidence of it having been retrieved, if it even could be.

Ny'alotha being "destroyed" and what happened to all things there is another can of worms entirely. Since Ny'alotha is technically a vision/alternate dimension, it is rather ambiguous what happened to the blade there. Did it also dissolve with the rest of the city because it was affiliated with the Old Gods or something? Who knows, but I do hope Blizzard hasn't dropped the Old God storyline completely. There are many questions that remain unanswered.

[GreenJesus]

We forgot about it so someone can pick it up and use it as a plot device. Just like Azshara did with the tidestone. "The heroes of azeroth kind of forgot about the tidestone."

[TheFirstOnes]

The dagger or the person? Cause I am highly certain the Dagger blew tf up.

[sighy]

In BfA, the "Blacktalon Agent", an Agent of Wrathion, stated that Wrathion was looking for the Dragon Isles. So the concept definitely hasn't been abandoned by Blizzard.


The Dragon Isles are thus associated with Wrathion; Wrathion is associated with the Black Dragonflight, N'Zoth (master of Deathwing), the fight against the Old God. Yet the Dragon Isles, WHICH WERE MENTIONED IN EARLY BFA, never appeared in the end.

Unless, Blizzard was planning to do much more with the Old God plotline. Beyond BfA of course.

Ion in recent interviews also said he wants to create a sort of balance, between being a "great hero" but also more "grounded stories":

Thereby, a future expansion could take place on the Dragon Isles (grounded location, speculated for years, inhabited presumably by the Dragonflights we're all familiar with), but the isles are under attack by N'Zoth and/or his Void masters. Thus creating a balance between the Cosmic and Azeroth storyline.

We don't really know how much of the old concepts they decided to keep or discard. The zone apparently was supposed to heavily revolve around Old God nonsense and the Nagas, which with the Titan facility assessment of "All Corruption vanished" leaves it rather questionable to what degree we would be dealing with the Old Gods. Unfortunately that'S one of the many things BfA's rushed plotpoint dumping kinda ruined. Given that until that point there was no real way of disposing of the Old Gods let alone their corruption, with the final breath of Y'shaarij still plaguing Pandaria to some extent since the Ordering of Azeroth.

The Blade of the Black Empire is a possible way to tie all of this together.

> N'Zoth is "defeated" by the Heroes
> His essence lives on inside the Blade ala Xal'atath
> Something something happens and he comes back
> He invades the Dragon Isles for whatever reason (that's for Blizzard to figure out, keeping in mind that N'Zoth has always messed with the Dragonflights, just think about everything he's done to Neltharion/Deathwing)
> Cue new expansion

The set-up is there, because we know that N'Zoth's bargain with Xal'atath involved him keeping the empty Blade for whatever purpose; and then, when he had his minion Dark Inquisitor Xanesh torture Azshara, he let her keep the Blade. Instead of destroying it, the one weapon that could hurt him (and he knew it could hurt him, because he knew of Azshara's betrayal).

N'zoth's resurgence would require a fundamental shift in how the Old God forces operate and overall likely have a great deal more covert approach than up until now.

Ny'alotha being "destroyed" and what happened to all things there is another can of worms entirely. Since Ny'alotha is technically a vision/alternate dimension, it is rather ambiguous what happened to the blade there. Did it also dissolve with the rest of the city because it was affiliated with the Old Gods or something? Who knows, but I do hope Blizzard hasn't dropped the Old God storyline completely. There are many questions that remain unanswered.

I believe the Mother, int he patch's epilogue claims that all the Old God corruption has vanished.

[TheFirstOnes]

Oh jeez, more of the "iT WaS a ViSioN" stuff. God, I hope you all realize just how inferior the Old Gods are right now...

This is me establishing an actual fact, btw. The fact that the Old Gods are fodder.

- - - Updated - - -

"I believe the Mother, int he patch's epilogue claims that all the Old God corruption has vanished."

Yeah...until you realize his presence is still out there, apparently. No different to Y'shaarj, but still.

[Varodoc]

We don't really know how much of the old concepts they decided to keep or discard. The zone apparently was supposed to heavily revolve around Old God nonsense and the Nagas, which with the Titan facility assessment of "All Corruption vanished" leaves it rather questionable to what degree we would be dealing with the Old Gods. Unfortunately that'S one of the many things BfA's rushed plotpoint dumping kinda ruined. Given that until that point there was no real way of disposing of the Old Gods let alone their corruption, with the final breath of Y'shaarij still plaguing Pandaria to some extent since the Ordering of Azeroth.



N'zoth's resurgence would require a fundamental shift in how the Old God forces operate and overall likely have a great deal more covert approach than up until now.




I believe the Mother, int he patch's epilogue claims that all the Old God corruption has vanished.

To be fair, I believe it was Magni who said something like "Finally Azeroth is free from the Old Gods". But Magni is a very naive and foolish character.

"The king of Diamonds has been made a pawn"

Magni was a pawn of N'Zoth for the entirety of BfA. He was doing N'Zoth's dirty work for him, charging up the Heart of Azshara by assigning us WQs, so that the Azerite juice we gathered (under Magni's orders) could then be used to free N'Zoth.

So in other words Magni's word is useless, it can be thrown out of the window. It wouldn't be the first he's been deceived by the Old God.

N'zoth's resurgence would require a fundamental shift in how the Old God forces operate and overall likely have a great deal more covert approach than up until now.

Would it?

Arguments presented in this thread have made me realize that it is possible the Blade was destroyed, in which case my theory falls completely.

But if the Blade wasn't destroyed and N'Zoth somehow did something with it, it wouldn't be lore-breaking. We have already seen a Void entity, deprived of her body, survive within the Blade (Xal'atath). N'Zoth, being the most cunning and elusive of the Old Gods, could have set up a similar contingency, which would explain why he told Xal'atath to leave him the empty blade. As part of their bargain.

We don't really know how much of the old concepts they decided to keep or discard

Their plans might have changed since BfA; however the fact that the "Dragon Isles" were mentioned by Wrathion's agent for the first time in-game has made people speculate. And it honestly wouldn't surprise me if this was some kind of set-up. By virtue of having been named, an expansion about the Dragon Isles would already feel less random than WoD.

[sighy]

To be fair, I believe it was Magni who said something like "Finally Azeroth is free from the Old Gods". But Magni is a very naive and foolish character.

"The king of Diamonds has been made a pawn"

Magni was a pawn of N'Zoth for the entirety of BfA. He was doing N'Zoth's dirty work for him, charging up the Heart of Azshara by assigning us WQs, so that the Azerite juice we gathered (under Magni's orders) could then be used to free N'Zoth.

So in other words Magni's word is useless, it can be thrown out of the window. It wouldn't be the first he's been deceived by the Old God.

Would it?

You're right, it was Magni. However his source of information was Azeroth herself and possibly the titan facilities built specifically to monitor it. If there was a massive resurgence of Old God crap so soon they would not only look supremely stupid, but also completely failing in their single purpose. Not the first time Blizz would have done that, but good writing it is not. So a more covert/by proxy manipulations seem more fitting than the usual situation of tentacles everywhere.

[ro9ue]

I wanted it to be a pokeball for N'Zoth and then we can use it in a later Artifact system with his essence and have him talk to us like Aluneth/Xal.

[DoggoTheBobby]

Afaik there are no humanoid forms for old gods

[Varodoc]

Afaik there are no humanoid forms for old gods

Leaving Xal'atath aside (since we don't know if she's an actual Old God), didn't Yogg-Saron use a vrykul's body as host?

[TickTickTick]

We probably just left it somewhere like we did with the Tidestone for someone to just take it. Neither the important NPCs nor us ever learn.

[ExtremelyCrusty]

The writers haven't thought that far ahead yet after the patch where we free her from the blade. Don't expect them to provide any conclusion to it

[Powerogue]

I'd say if they pick the plot thread up again, Xal'atath (entity) might get a hold of xal'atath (old god imbued dagger) and use it to cause havoc.

[Narwhalosh Whalescream]

It enlisted in the south seas pirate navy and found a new life as a bottle opener.

[Mic_128]

Leaving Xal'atath aside (since we don't know if she's an actual Old God), didn't Yogg-Saron use a vrykul's body as host?

I dunno, it felt more akin to a lure on an anglerfish to me.

[Kharnath]

# 1 - Void sees all futures.

#2 - N'zoth "You are free, but the dagger MUST remain..."

#3 - Dagger disappears after being stabbed into Nzoth.

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Why the hell would N'zoth, whom has seen that outcome, choose that outcome, that leads to his defeat?

Unless there's more...