Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Pyrophax]

I'm interested in how a decentralized Kirin Tor would work out.[/spoiler]

That could bring more diversity into mage ranks. If you think about mages in Warcraft - you imagine Jaina, Khadgar and Kael. All of them are from Dalaran. Dalaran became too centralized. Now we can have Stormwindian mages, Kul-Tiran mages, Forsaken mages, Elven mages etc.

For Kirin-Tor 2.0 I expect new counsil from major centers of magic. Like new Counsil of Tirisfal, with headquarters in Karazhan (serve as main meeting point for counsil AND univercity of magic, where Khadgar Xavier will teach advanced magic for all nations. Think Warcraft'y Strixhaven or An Arcanum or College of Winterhold.
Silvermoon, Suramar, Stormwind, Ironforge, Telogrus, Gnomeregan, Orgrimmar, Boralus, Capital - all of them could be training their own mages.

With Kirin-Tor could be counsil of deans of that schools.
New Kirin-Tor could be - Khadgar as chairman, Mage from Kul-Tiras (not Jaina, as she is Lord-Admiral, not dean of magic univercity), Rommath as leader of Magisters, Meryl as leader of Scholomance (where Forsaken mages study), Mordent Evenshade from Eldre'thalas, some dudes from orcs and dwarves and Kalec from Blue Dragonflight.

[Swarzsinne]

Not surprised. Mobile gaming is huge in asia compared to the west. What we say "make WoW for consoles" would them be "make FF14 for mobile". Vastly different gaming preferences. I think from a recent FF14 Live Letter it was shown that the majority of japanese players play with controller/on console, compared to the US/EU were it was nearly only keyboard+Mouse/on PC.

That said, WoW on mobile could be a great hit in Asia

There was a survey a little bit ago asking about what add-ons were considered necessary. The only way to make WoW work on consoles would be to bake in some add-ons that they currently do not. You can play WoW without add-ons, but it's nowhere near as smooth as FFXIV without add-ons, so that would have to be addressed. A completely different version of the game might do that.

[elbleuet]

That could bring more diversity into mage ranks. If you think about mages in Warcraft - you imagine Jaina, Khadgar and Kael. All of them are from Dalaran. Dalaran became too centralized. Now we can have Stormwindian mages, Kul-Tiran mages, Forsaken mages, Elven mages etc.

For Kirin-Tor 2.0 I expect new counsil from major centers of magic. Like new Counsil of Tirisfal, with headquarters in Karazhan (serve as main meeting point for counsil AND univercity of magic, where Khadgar Xavier will teach advanced magic for all nations. Think Warcraft'y Strixhaven or An Arcanum or College of Winterhold.
Silvermoon, Suramar, Stormwind, Ironforge, Telogrus, Gnomeregan, Orgrimmar, Boralus, Capital - all of them could be training their own mages.

With Kirin-Tor could be counsil of deans of that schools.
New Kirin-Tor could be - Khadgar as chairman, Mage from Kul-Tiras (not Jaina, as she is Lord-Admiral, not dean of magic univercity), Rommath as leader of Magisters, Meryl as leader of Scholomance (where Forsaken mages study), Mordent Evenshade from Eldre'thalas, some dudes from orcs and dwarves and Kalec from Blue Dragonflight.

We don't need a representation of every race. Who cares about orc mages ? About tauren mages ?

The Kirin Tor was humans, dwarves, gnomes, blood & high elves. Let's keep it the way it used to be.

And the Magisters are a separate organization from the Kirin Tor.

[Pyrophax]

We don't need a representation of every race. Who cares about orc mages ? About tauren mages ?

The Kirin Tor was humans, dwarves, gnomes, blood & high elves. Let's keep it the way it used to be.

And the Magisters are a separate organization from the Kirin Tor.

Right now - yes. If new-Kirin Tor will be counsil of magic schools, not political power - why not? Why not unite Sunreavers and Magisters?
Orcs and taurens magi are indeed rare, we could remove them. But Thalyssra and Rommath is must have. I think Meryl is safe bet too. Mordent Evenshade is fresh air too.
Khadgar, Rommath, Thalyssra, Jaina, Meryl, Umbrick and Mordent. 3 Alliance members, 3 Horde ones, neutral (mostly) Khadgar.

[Telogrus]

Ye, me. Not sure they would do yet another World Tree being in the focus of expansion climax. TWW is literally the best moment for us to physically reach World Soul, and that would be more than enough.

Why would we be going to the World Soul in Act 1? We won’t even learn about the Titan conspiracy until TLT.


A vast, chaotic. underground root system is quite a different setting from the orderly section of the Emerald Dream we visited in DF

[Golden Yak]

Imagine if "Rootlands" is a giant red herring.

Now that it's looking increasingly like 11.2 content, I feel more doubtful about it. Would they really do a "Guardians of the Emerald Dream" repeat so soon?

What about it would be different? Thorny stuff? More primeval? Dark and depressing?

I think that, plus lots of Titan facilities as we approach the Worldcore, and huge Black Blood infestations worse than anything we've seen so far.

In fact I'm pretty sure that some of the screens we got in the Undermine reveal are actually stealth previews of this future 11.2 zone



There's some goblin structure in one shot, but all the Titan and Black Blood stuff is more Khaz Algar elements.

[Cheezits]

I expect Azshara to survive to the next saga as there is no way they would kill her off before tying her back to Kalimdor, which is currently irrelevant.

[Joshuaj]

Imagine if "Rootlands" is a giant red herring.

Now that it's looking increasingly like 11.2 content, I feel more doubtful about it. Would they really do a "Guardians of the Emerald Dream" repeat so soon?

What about it would be different? Thorny stuff? More primeval? Dark and depressing?

If they do it, I hope it's a very vibrant zone that still manages to feel different. Big, beautiful leaves in autumnal colours, like those seen on Harronir clothes and buildings.

But if they're not doing it, and it ends up being a dungeon or something, then it'd be cool if we instead want below the sea or nearby the worldcore.

Who says it has to look like the Dream at all?

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Why would we be going to the World Soul in Act 1? We won’t even learn about the Titan conspiracy until TLT.


A vast, chaotic. underground root system is quite a different setting from the orderly section of the Emerald Dream we visited in DF

Because Xal'atath wants to claim the Worldsoul? Also pretty sure one of the Blizzard dev press things mentioned us going to the Worldsoul in TWW.

[Cheezits]

I think that, plus lots of Titan facilities as we approach the Worldcore, and huge Black Blood infestations worse than anything we've seen so far.

In fact I'm pretty sure that some of the screens we got in the Undermine reveal are actually stealth previews of this future 11.2 zone



There's some goblin structure in one shot, but all the Titan and Black Blood stuff is more Khaz Algar elements.

I think this is actually part of the new dungeon in Ringing Deeps. It seemed to be primarily using reused assets and the fauna/titan facility checks out with Khaz Algar.

[Khaza-R]

Why would we be going to the World Soul in Act 1? We won’t even learn about the Titan conspiracy until TLT.


A vast, chaotic. underground root system is quite a different setting from the orderly section of the Emerald Dream we visited in DF

To me it seems like the Void is after the worldcore. Thus its an immediate threat that has to be dealt with. We'll obviously stop them. Then they will probably try to go after the Sunwell to summon Dimensius directly to Azeroth. The titan conspiracy will probably more cover the Manifold anyway.

[Kiivar86]

Saw a comment about this on Reddit, but y'know, with Housing, one can really see Blizzard using the Trading Post for stuff that you'd put in your house.

Better save up...

[huth]

Why would we be going to the World Soul in Act 1? We won’t even learn about the Titan conspiracy until TLT.


A vast, chaotic. underground root system is quite a different setting from the orderly section of the Emerald Dream we visited in DF

Going to it i could see. Probably not going to achieve much though. Maybe not even understand what we're looking at. And then everything goes lopsided for Act 2.

But they already told us about the Worldcore.

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To me it seems like the Void is after the worldcore. Thus its an immediate threat that has to be dealt with. We'll obviously stop them. Then they will probably try to go after the Sunwell to summon Dimensius directly to Azeroth. The titan conspiracy will probably more cover the Manifold anyway.

I could see it going the other way around, where the attack on Quel'danas is the actual goal and the whole plan in Khaz Algar is just a feint. Keep us distracted while the actual plan goes completely unnoticed.

[Auxis]

I think this is actually part of the new dungeon in Ringing Deeps. It seemed to be primarily using reused assets and the fauna/titan facility checks out with Khaz Algar.

The new dungeon in Ringing Deeps is a goblin operation attempting to blow up a dam. We've seen footage of it. It would have to take a WILD turn to go from the Black Blood/Titan stuff to an Earthen dam.

[Golden Yak]

Could be. But how would that explain the Harronir having leaves and stuff? If the zone is just an Old God hellscape, I mean. Do you think it transformed recently?

What I imagine is, the Worldcore is down there, at the end of the Coreway that was built where the tree Elun'Ahir was removed. The Roots of Elun'Ahir sort've grew back around it, and that's where the harronir live now. The Black Blood infestation is more recent and threatens to overtake everything.

So the zone will be made up of those three elements - Titan facility, root growth, and Black Blood.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

The new dungeon in Ringing Deeps is a goblin operation attempting to blow up a dam. We've seen footage of it. It would have to take a WILD turn to go from the Black Blood/Titan stuff to an Earthen dam.

couldn’t it just be that the dam is holding back abunch of black blood that’s bled into the waterway?

[Telogrus]

Going to it i could see. Probably not going to achieve much though. Maybe not even understand what we're looking at. And then everything goes lopsided for Act 2.

But they already told us about the Worldcore.

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I could see it going the other way around, where the attack on Quel'danas is the actual goal and the whole plan in Khaz Algar is just a feint. Keep us distracted while the actual plan goes completely unnoticed.

The Worldcore will be saved for TLT

[Cheezits]

The Worldcore will be saved for TLT

I really doubt it. The Worldcore plot is now tied to Brinthe and Dagran, two TWW characaters, and it fits the Underground theme for the expansion. Even if we don't actually interact with the world soul in this expansion vs TLT I think we will go to the facility that houses it, during the expansion it was directly introduced in. It also saves the last raid from being a direct repeat of Amirdrassil.

This isn't like K'aresh and Dimensius who are getting small teases, it's a direct plotline of TWW. The Sword is the bigger fish to fry in TLT which has been directly confirmed by Metzen/Ion.

[Telogrus]

I really doubt it. The Worldcore plot is now tied to Brinthe and Dagran, two TWW characaters, and it fits the Underground theme for the expansion. Even if we don't actually interact with the world soul in this expansion vs TLT I think we will go to the facility that houses it, during the expansion it was directly introduced in. It also saves the last raid from being a direct repeat of Amirdrassil.

This isn't like K'aresh and Dimensius who are getting small teases, it's a direct plotline of TWW. The Sword is the bigger fish to fry in TLT which has been directly confirmed by Metzen/Ion.

TLT is about the Titan conspiracy. It makes much more sense that the obvious prison for the world soul will be saved for then. There’s no reason why Dagran and Brinthe can’t also feature in TLT.

[The-Shan]

Exploring Azeroth already retconned it and said there was scattered groups still surviving spread out in Zul’drak.

I look at it less as a retcon and more of it being information that the Zandalari/that survivor didn't have, it's completely possible it was just assumed since people went there, took a look around, and didn't see any Drakkari, then assumed they were all dead.

[Zardas]

The Worldcore will be saved for TLT

We could have a look at it for 11.2, but fail and come back to it more succesful in TLT.