Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Ateo]

Its still EXTREMELY cheap marketing for them. They have never had the goal of making money with the event. Its a fantastic marketing tool. Nothing more. That wont change with them losing a little more money than normal. Still very cheap by marketing standards.

If the marketing tool isn't selling out, it means the market is not reacting to your marketing.

Aka, it's a failed campaign.

[Teriz]

5.1 didn't come out until late November.

So him being on the keyart for Blizzcon 2011 was supposed to hint at content from after 2012. Interesting

Uh MoP released on Sepetember 25, 2012, and 5.1 came out on November 27, 2012. What are you talking about?

The point is that your assertion that Thrall had "nothing to do with MoP" is resoundingly false.

[Darkarath]

Why the hell did this thread get 30 new pages over night

Do not worry, nothing relevant at all. We are just eager to get anything at this point. I would say that it would get even worse until things start to improve.

We need something tangible.

[Hitei]

If the marketing tool isn't selling out, it means the market is not reacting to your marketing.

Aka, it's a failed campaign.

Do... Do you think that the goal of Blizzcon is to market to the people that physically show up to the convention? Lol?

[Gloriandus]

I still like "Eclipse"; perhaps in-game it's unlike a normal eclipse, something catastrophic, anger of Elune or whatnot. We're forced into the oft-rumored underground world, eventually resurfacing in a later patch to find Azeroth changed.

It would be terribly unpopular given the "Night Elves always get screwed over" trope, but maybe the Titans once again rip the nascent world tree out which triggers Elune's wrath and that's what kicks it off. I still don't like the "the Titans are the true villains" stuff they've been pushing in the story, though. Hopefully they themselves are just deceived...but then again I''m weary of the "there's a bigger badder out there!" trope, too.

[ImTheMizAwesome]

Do not worry, nothing relevant at all. We are just eager to get anything at this point. I would say that it would get even worse until things start to improve.

We need something tangible.

i think it will be kinda interesting if we end up without any leaks besides algarian stormrider until the reveal.

[Nyel]

Honestly, why would Blizzard send out "clues" this time? They've never done it before. Everything that leaked for previous expansions was accidentally or through datamining (?) and not official hints.

[Santandame]

???? Chen was barely even relevant in the expansion. What a reach lmao.

We could have Tyr hook us into the expansion, or Odyn or whoever. Obviously, we don't know who because the expansion isn't out yet. Or 10.2. Or 10.2.5. Or 10.2.7.

What, do you assume we just go there and no one is gonna be there?

He’s hardly irrelevant.

As well as an entire zone based around his story, he plays a significant role in the Dread Wastes campaign as well as Vol’jin’s entire story in MoP, particularly the Escalation patch.

That’s not to mention the opening cinematic. As well as all of the above he shows up in various other misc quests and events throughout the expansion. He’s the most represented Pandaren character after Lorewalker Cho and Taran Zhu, and they were arguably the main characters of MoP alongside Garrosh and Vol’jin.

[Ateo]

Do... Do you think that the goal of Blizzcon is to market to the people that physically show up to the convention? Lol?

Do you seriously think it isn't?

They could run another prerecorded blizzconline for a fragment of the price.


Gtfo with this backwards thinking.

No matter how you cut it. Blizzcon is a failure this year compared to every one of its predecessors and it's performance will absolutely dictate if we see another one/how much is invested into future blizzcons.

Stop white knighting like some blinded fanboy and have a real conversation.

[Hitei]

i think it will be kinda interesting if we end up without any leaks besides algarian stormrider until the reveal.

The last few expansions have only leaked names and very minor points. I can't remember the last time we got an actual in depth story leak. WoD? I think the NGA leakers for Legion probably had a lot of information but they only allowed out small details about who/what was going to show up. BfA feature leaked but I don't recall there being much beyond that. SL only very barely leaked and DF only leaked the absolute largest features.

[Teriz]

This brings up another point; If Avaloren revolves around Tyr and Odyn, wouldn't that indicate another expansion cinematic with titan constructs doing stuff after we had the opening cinematic of Dragonflight where titan constructs were doing stuff?

[Murlocos]

Will you say that after every second quest has a five-minute scene of ethereals talking about their feelings with no facial expressions and a monotone voice?

Well, you hit the actual issue there. The character design isn't so much important as the voice and cutscene direction. My pet theory for why the dialogue has become so stretched out is that they're trying to emulate the CGI cinematics nowadays without understanding that it works there due to those cinematics being carried by action and also only being released once every other year.

[Trazzle]

Honestly, why would Blizzard send out "clues" this time? They've never done it before. Everything that leaked for previous expansions was accidentally or through datamining (?) and not official hints.

The decor they teased look more relevant to the current xpac than anything new. It doesn’t have to be related to a new xpac. But intriguing none the less. Hope it’s a fun con.

[Nebron]

Honestly, why would Blizzard send out "clues" this time? They've never done it before. Everything that leaked for previous expansions was accidentally or through datamining (?) and not official hints.

Because leaks and speculations are important factors to build up the hype, which value could be perceived as a marketing tool. And since this leak season is pretty dead, they want to create some noise, so that the metrics for interest skyrocket. So they must take the matters into their own hands.

[Santandame]

This brings up another point; If Avaloren revolves around Tyr and Odyn, wouldn't that indicate another expansion cinematic with titan constructs doing stuff after we had the opening cinematic of Dragonflight where titan constructs were doing stuff?

Just like we had demons doing stuff in the opening WoD cinematic as well as WoD and then later demons doing stuff in the opening Legion cinematic as well as Legion?

Or Sylvanas with BfA and SL?

[Lady Atia]

The decor they teased look more relevant to the current xpac than anything new. It doesn’t have to be related to a new xpac. But intriguing none the less. Hope it’s a fun con.

Yeah, we literally know they have a "corridor of time" or something, so it's just for that haha.

[Hitei]

Do you seriously think it isn't?

They could run another prerecorded blizzconline for a fragment of the price.
Gtfo with this backwards thinking.

No matter how you cut it. Blizzcon is a failure this year compared to every one of its predecessors and it's performance will absolutely dictate if we see another one/how much is invested into future blizzcons.

My guy. The point of Blizzcon is not to convince the <50,000 people who actually go there to buy new expansions or games (especially since the sort of people who spend 300 on a ticket and pay for hotel rooms and pay for plane tickets to attend are going to buy those games anyway). Just like the point of announcing a game at E3 isn't to convince those <70,000 people to buy that new game. The point is to sell the game to the millions of people who will watch streams of the event, or watch the trailers from the event later on youtube, or see a summary of the event on some games' journalism site later, or hear about it on twitter or through a friend who does any of the above.

The point of Blizzcon is to have a spotlight event to sell the idea of upcoming products to people at home, not to whoever shows up in Anaheim.

A physical event with an actual stage is more exciting than a pre-recorded sit down at a table. It gets more journalism coverage and more tweets and more buzz. 10,000 people could show up and it would still serve its function. Don't be daft.

Stop white knighting like some blinded fanboy and have a real conversation

"I don't have any actual sort of counter argument, so here's a bunch of low effort buzzwords in an ad hominem".

That's a cute projection, bud. But I'm trying to have a real conversation here.

[Nebron]

This brings up another point; If Avaloren revolves around Tyr and Odyn, wouldn't that indicate another expansion cinematic with titan constructs doing stuff after we had the opening cinematic of Dragonflight where titan constructs were doing stuff?

Well, if for example there's an Old God sealed beneath the land of Avaloren, I can easily see a dark-themed cinematic revolve around it

[Paula Deen]

If the marketing tool isn't selling out, it means the market is not reacting to your marketing.

Aka, it's a failed campaign.

I was unaware you are only to be marketed to if you are in person. Ill just turn my 15 adblockers off real quick LMAO

[Samin]

Ways to contribute:

• Keep an eye on social media accounts, both from Blizzard official sources and content creators. There might be clues.
• Browse hashtags etc online to see if some partner of Blizzard (doing BlizzCon prep or whatever) slips something.
• Scan through trademark databases in search for new names from Blizzard.
• Look through the merch shop to see if new products are released that spoil anything.
• Check out the Blizzard websites to see if any new subdomains appear, or if anything slips in the code.
• Keep checking sources like MMO-Champ, Reddit and 4chan to see if anything leaks there.

Anything I'm forgetting?

• Create well thought out/creative fake announcement notes, logo or other artwork "leaks"

We need some entertainment in case Blizzard is keeping things tight for the rest of leak season.