Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Ersula]

I think there are only really two ways we could get playable ethereals in Midnight:

1. One of the base zones is K'aresh or another location instead of being in Quel'thalas
2. All of the work is done to embed them in the story before Midnight's release

I don't see (1) happening because it would split the "continent" in half, and every time an expansion has separated zones with loading screens or other travel between them it's poorly received. I could see it if part of K'aresh or Telogrus Rift were teleported to Quel'thalas, or if they implemented some new technology that worked flawlessly to transition between the areas without it feeling too clunky, like one of the zones having a Void version where the ethereals can live. But I'm not sure how much they want to digress from the elf storyline--(2) would mean we don't need the ethereals to feature heavily in the base story but can still be present in the greater plot without distracting from the elf storyline. We would also know if it's possible by the end of TWW.

I feel like the people who convinced themselves we'd be going to Karesh are the same people who were certain Chromatus would be a big deal in Dragonflight.... and then he didn't appear or was even mentioned. I'm pretty sure Chromatus.... Karesh... Dimensius... are all things the fans remember, but the devs don't. I know we're getting plenty of Ethereal content coming up, but most Ethereals fled Karesh ages ago. Hell, there's a considerable amount already living on Azeroth, ala the Nexus Legion Artifact questlines.

Wouldn't the Etherium be really eager to settle on Azeroth? Are they really that preoccupied to save a world that has already been turned into a void-scarred outland?

[Joshuaj]

Seems next Friday, there will be a panel at PAX East discussing the world of Azeroth. The panel will also talk about player housing, so hopefully this will provide our first look at Neighborhoods.

[Scyth]

Since this is a 3 part saga, what if we only get a very small part of K'aresh in 11.2 with the remaining part coming at Midnight launch? Since we obviously won't defeat Xal or the Void in 11.2. Highly unlikely as they have never done anything like that before though

[Darkarath]

So, with 11.1.7 most likely being shown today, do we have any final predictions? I know that it is a minor patch, but an important one IMO.

The Arathi and Faerin have been MIA since 11.0 (11.1.5 event is pretty bad), so my hope is that Blizzard would focus on them a little bit, because whether we go to K'aresh or the Rootlands in 11.2, they would not be relevant in any of these zones. Since we are getting this mid-season buff, with an increased Item Level and Dinars... may we get the Beledar as a mini-raid? It has been a while since we had one of those.

[Nymrohd]

My prediction is that the quest line will be encrypted and the only information we will get is from the splash screen which will be inconclusive.

[Dvalin]

Since this is a 3 part saga, what if we only get a very small part of K'aresh in 11.2 with the remaining part coming at Midnight launch? Since we obviously won't defeat Xal or the Void in 11.2. Highly unlikely as they have never done anything like that before though

I doubt that, because the Void seems to be the 'mid-Villian', and the Titans the final 'antagonists' we've been working towards. K'aresh is basically only connected to the Void, plotwise. That's why I think it would be odd if we'd visit it during TWW instead of Midnight (which will be about the Void versus Light).

I have the feeling we won't see anything today, but I'd be gladly proven wrong.

[Dvalin]

Apparently Towellie tweeted yesterday that today will be interesting, which MrGM has now retweeted.

Okay, now THAT's interesting.

[Dracullus]

My prediction is that the quest line will be encrypted and the only information we will get is from the splash screen which will be inconclusive.

And datamining alone could be misleading. Many people didn't noticed because most was on Undermine bandwagon, but 11.0.7 showed Orweyna on splash screen and devs directly said that new character will lead us to 11.1 content.

Biggest faux pas will be if Blizzard repeat mistake from Dragonflight and straight up spoil future zones in campaign name.

Okay, now THAT's interesting.

Would be, because he usually have some knowledge, but Towelliee learned trolling this thread is VERY easy.

[Khaza-R]

Feels like a lot of buzz for a x.7 patch, no? Unless they're also gonna drop a small teaser for Midnight and when the official announcement is.

I mean we do have the horrific visions returning to prepare us to face the unseeming which is directly tied to the black blood, and is also potentially Xal's blood from her original body being destroyed and was a driving force of her instigating conflict between us and the neurbians

It would be cool af if the end boss of TWW was Xal using the husk of her old body as a puppet to fight us

[Nymrohd]

Feels like a lot of buzz for a x.7 patch, no? Unless they're also gonna drop a small teaser for Midnight and when the official announcement is.

The buzz is mostly because people expect the PTR will give us some idea of what 11.2 will be. Because we are not really 100% sure it will be K'aresh.

[Cheezits]

Honestly I think the final nail in the TWW Rootlands coffin was that Orweyna was skipped out not once but twice for a short story, replaced by Locus Walker who is one of the biggest faces on the book.

Also it's fair to note that K'aresh was namedropped in this expansion (prologue) while the Rootlands still don't have an official name, unless its true name is "The Cradle". So the setup for its appearance in TWW specifically is already there.

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EDIT: Or maybe they're throwing us a huge curveball and we're circling back to the Rootlands in a later expansion which is why they hadn't actually done much (apparent) work on it during early TWW development.

I think this is very possible. Based on the very vague lore we got about Elun'ahir in DF, it could be in many different places where it looks like a tree was torn out of the ground. Rootlands may have been planned for the original concept of TWW but they pushed it back because it could easily be used for another expansion- likely TLT.

Sholozar Basin and Un'goro are both very possible locations due to their proximity to important things in TWS- namely Northrend and The Sword tm. They are big life-filled craters without a world tree... on the surface, that is.

[Nibelheimy]

It would be cool af if the end boss of TWW was Xal using the husk of her old body as a puppet to fight us

I'm certain Xal's old body has to be involved at some point. I do see Karesh as a possibility, but I don't think now is the right time to go there. The chronicle old god mural is too on the nose right now, even if it ends up to be unrelated to the current story. (If she's even that)

There's a few options for me that lead us to Midnight right now.

1. The Ethereals cause the fall to Darkness. Either by swapping world souls, or the essence of them. Although the dark heart has been shown to absorb energy, I don't see a reason currently why they would intentionally force darkness on our planet. However, if they remove the void influence on Karesh and no longer care about the dark heart, Xal'atath could be free to take the dark heart back and cause the fall to void herself with that essence.

2. Xal'atath causes the fall. Plenty of options here. But I early on suggested pre-expansion Alleria being possesed after Xals "Fall" and throwing herself into the sunwell causing the void invasion. Though I do think the Sunwell now will be kept untainted to serve as some sort of last bastion of safety against the void. The dark heart as suggested above could be used directly on the world soul to corrupt it, or she could re-awaken her original form to claim the world soul for the void. But either way here she won't be gone gone for now. I do think its a possibility her original body is in Beledar. It could also be cool if the rootlands is the roots of the tree, with the giant sprawling corpse of Xal'ataths original body intertwined among it. A literal ode to the chronicle old god border, similar to how Naz'jatar was originally designed to look.

Although as others have mentioned, this could be pushed further into the saga.

The missing stepping stone is how the world soul will fall to the void. Presumably, the dark heart is needed for that, otherwise we wouldn't have gotten such a focus on it. It is in the hands of the ethereals. They are presumably at K'aresh.

I don't see them saving a uncorrupted K'aresh for a patch zone or expansion later, although possible, and the only reason I can see them coming to our worldsoul before K'aresh is to steal the soul itself, or the radiant song.

If the worldsoul is missing, the void have no reason to pursue Azeroth any longer. But if the Radiant song is a different entity, perhaps a light based ward (to counter void) then the worldsoul would be vulnerable to corruption fully.

[Lady Atia]

Feels like a lot of buzz for a x.7 patch, no? Unless they're also gonna drop a small teaser for Midnight and when the official announcement is.



It would be cool af if the end boss of TWW was Xal using the husk of her old body as a puppet to fight us

Or they preview the .7 patch and tease the third raid tier at the end. Having Rootlands as catch up mini-zone and Karesh confirmed as propper 2.0 zone would be big.

[Ersula]

Or they preview the .7 patch and tease the third raid tier at the end. Having Rootlands as catch up mini-zone and Karesh confirmed as propper 2.0 zone would be big.

Do people actually like all these zones? Everybody returning to the game in season 2 has been complaining about having to do Siren's Isle.

[Mecheon]

Honestly I think the final nail in the TWW Rootlands coffin was that Orweyna was skipped out not once but twice for a short story, replaced by Locus Walker who is one of the biggest faces on the book.

Also it's fair to note that K'aresh was namedropped in this expansion (prologue) while the Rootlands still don't have an official name, unless its true name is "The Cradle". So the setup for its appearance in TWW specifically is already there.

Locus Walker's been pretty much a no-show in the expansion itself, whereas Orweyna's been a pretty constant figure with regular quests to herself. Frankly I'd argue its the other way around, Locus Walker being delegated to short stories and not in-game content makes him irrelevant for the most part.

I doubt heavily the next zone's going to be Karesh after we've spent an expansion traveling underground and they've got the massive plot thread of 'what are the haranir hiding'. We might get someone trying to use the Cradle to crack a portal to Karesh or the like, but I doubt we're scrapping every part of buildup the expansion's had to jump into space and go to a place and someone we don't even know, especially given how much of the expansion has focused on saving Azeroth. Kind of can't save Azeroth if we're a couple of galaxies over.

[Cheezits]

Locus Walker's been pretty much a no-show in the expansion itself, whereas Orweyna's been a pretty constant figure with regular quests to herself. Frankly I'd argue its the other way around, Locus Walker being delegated to short stories and not in-game content makes him irrelevant for the most part.

I doubt heavily the next zone's going to be Karesh after we've spent an expansion traveling underground and they've got the massive plot thread of 'what are the haranir hiding'. We might get someone trying to use the Cradle to crack a portal to Karesh or the like, but I doubt we're scrapping every part of buildup the expansion's had to jump into space and go to a place and someone we don't even know, especially given how much of the expansion has focused on saving Azeroth. Kind of can't save Azeroth if we're a couple of galaxies over.

You say that, but it's a small part of launch questing and then Orweyna quiet quits 11.1 with no fanfare, not even being featured in the finale cinematic.

There is enough in launch and 11.1 for there to be evidence of an original narrative pathway to Rootlands, but the finale cinematic and no overt Rootlands tease at the end of 11.1 point towards thing going somwhere else.

This all feels shockingly like how much Tyr was built up in DF launch and patch stories and then... clearly cut from the expansion. Again a decision connecting to Metzen as it was confirmed he changed Tyr's story.

[Dvalin]

You say that, but it's a small part of launch questing and then Orweyna quiet quits 11.1 with no fanfare, not even being featured in the finale cinematic.

There is enough in launch and 11.1 for there to be evidence of an original narrative pathway to Rootlands, but the finale cinematic and no overt Rootlands tease at the end of 11.1 point towards thing going somwhere else.

This all feels shockingly like how much Tyr was built up in DF launch and patch stories and then... clearly cut from the expansion. Again a decision connecting to Metzen as it was confirmed he changed Tyr's story.

This doesn't make sense, though. All those quests and cinematics with Orweyna were made after Metzen rejoined (remember: he came in when TWW was 10 months into production - that's not that long into the process). Her main connection is with the Radiant Song, and that mystery hasn't been fully uncovered yet, either. Her story isn't over yet, whether it will culminate in TWW or TLT is still the unknown. But we can very well go to the core of Azeroth/the Cradle in 11.2.

Tyr has not been indefinitely sidelined, either. It makes sense for him to take a break (have you interacted with him after the birth of Amirdrassil into Azeroth?), and probably turn up in TLT again. When the Titans take center stage.

[milkmustache]

I doubt heavily the next zone's going to be Karesh after we've spent an expansion traveling underground and they've got the massive plot thread of 'what are the haranir hiding'. We might get someone trying to use the Cradle to crack a portal to Karesh or the like, but I doubt we're scrapping every part of buildup the expansion's had to jump into space and go to a place and someone we don't even know, especially given how much of the expansion has focused on saving Azeroth. Kind of can't save Azeroth if we're a couple of galaxies over.

But is the Haranir's secret the buildup of the expansion or just a buildup? I think there's an easy argument there that the Ethereals have just as much (if not more) of a buildup in 11.0 with Ky'veza and some of the Ethereals in Azj'Kahet along with 11.1's campaign and ending cinematic.

[Lady Atia]

Do people actually like all these zones? Everybody returning to the game in season 2 has been complaining about having to do Siren's Isle.

I would rather take another forbidden reach than having another zone cancelled like if they had eaten a WoD-memberberry.

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This doesn't make sense, though. All those quests and cinematics with Orweyna were made after Metzen rejoined (remember: he came in when TWW was 10 months into production - that's not that long into the process). Her main connection is with the Radiant Song, and that mystery hasn't been fully uncovered yet, either.

Tyr has not been indefinitely sidelined, either. It makes sense for him to take a break (have you interacted with him after the birth of Amirdrassil into Azeroth?), and probably turn up in TLT again. When the Titans take center stage.

Since Tyr uses the light I think we will see him in Midnight, that way he can also be a bridge between Midnight and TLT like Alleria will be between TWW and Midnight.

[milkmustache]

This doesn't make sense, though. All those quests and cinematics with Orweyna were made after Metzen rejoined (remember: he came in when TWW was 10 months into production - that's not that long into the process). Her main connection is with the Radiant Song, and that mystery hasn't been fully uncovered yet, either.

Tyr has not been indefinitely sidelined, either. It makes sense for him to take a break (have you interacted with him after the birth of Amirdrassil into Azeroth?), and probably turn up in TLT again. When the Titans take center stage.

Sure-- and by this logic, Orwenya can also be placed aside for a point later on when we unveil more that motivates her character, especially the Radiant Song.

Tyr wasn't indefinitely sidelined per se, but they did confirm that his story took a major pivot from where it was originally planned. It looks like the same is happening for the Haranir.