Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Cheezits]

I hope that Murder Row being a dungeon based around hunting down fel wielding Blood Elves is actually a trick by Light aligned zealots instead of the Blood Elves overwhelmingly turning their back upon darker powers altogether.

They're such an interesting race when they're allowed to have some grit, though it is looking more and more likely that Void Elves are getting all the cooler aspects and the 'fight fire with fire' mentality.

I think it's going to be Warlocks culling flagrantly obvious Warlocks, because their whole thing is operating in the shadows. Or they are doing something so stupid/bad that even the Warlocks have to put them down.

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Not forums, their official site. Where people go first for new information.

I think this media tour shows they are advertising primarily to potential new players this round. Hence why the race is something completely new and they are posting everything on less-hardcore-fanbase media sources. Housing definitely fits with this.

[Xilurm]

Not forums, their official site. Where people go first for new information.

Yeah that's the thing though. There's 36 comments on the Midnight article on the US site and 12 on the EU site. The shorts got hundreds of comments. They are just seeing where the most engagement is. As unfortunate that is. I had to remove my shorts blocker in order to see these.

[Timester]

I hope that Murder Row being a dungeon based around hunting down fel wielding Blood Elves is actually a trick by Light aligned zealots instead of the Blood Elves overwhelmingly turning their back upon darker powers altogether.

Murder Row is also the base of operations for the Prey system. So most likely there is a Murder Row zone and a Murder Row dungeon, connected with the dealing happening there.

[milkmustache]

On second day, most if not all of my issues stem (ba dum tss) with Midnight's reveal have to do with Harandar and Haranir. I may just be allergic to OC races at this point.

Netherstorm has potential. Haranir are another "they're new, but lets get the audience to love them!!!!" take on an old concept (Dark Troll) that smacks of the SL-TWW team which I just can't abide by. No thanks.

At least this frees up future Midnight and TLT zones to NOT be Rootlands.

I'm a bit more okay with Harandar and the Haranir, and I think I'll be fully okay if we miraculously get Ethereals before Midnight.

Im honestly pretty disappointed with the visuals of the Voidstorm and Void in general. The flat faced blue Scooby Doo Cyber Chase looking guy is so strange to me. What about this is Void? Nothingness? The Maw had far better and more harrowing visuals than these guys. I don't really like the void glassifying blue rock look to everything. Zul'Aman and what I can only assume is a new Twilight's Hammer looks good. Hope we're seeing a lot of early drafts.

[ImTheMizAwesome]

Great find. God I need an Amani Shaman so bad. Please don't fumble this Blizzard.

Oh hell yeah, amani shaman full beard with maybe heritage armour like this would go hard.

[Timester]

Yeah that's the thing though. There's 36 comments on the Midnight article on the US site and 12 on the EU site. The shorts got hundreds of comments. They are just seeing where the most engagement is. As unfortunate that is. I had to remove my shorts blocker in order to see these.

My problem isn't that they are doing Shorts and Reels. As long they also centralize everything on their website, it's easy to put those shorts and reels on their website.

[Cheezits]

Im honestly pretty disappointed with the visuals of the Voidstorm and Void in general. The flat faced blue Scooby Doo Cyber Chase looking guy is so strange to me. What about this is Void? Nothingness? The Maw had far better and more harrowing visuals than these guys. I don't really like the void glassifying blue rock look to everything. Zul'Aman and what I can only assume is a new Twilight's Hammer looks good. Hope we're seeing a lot of early drafts.

Ironically that is very likely the main race there, the Domanaar. And yeah... questionable choice of aesthetics.

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That armor looks shockingly like player armor. I am almost certain they will be an AR.

Now I hope they have something for Alliance like Broken to go with them, because Amani in Alliance would be too far. That may actually be why they are delayed? Kind of like Vulpera being delayed so long?

[infinitemeridian]

I see that we are continuing the trend of most dungeons / raids now just re-using outdoor areas instead of having actual instances crafted for them. Shame.

[Andromedes]

I'm glad that Alastor has an important role.Seeing a Magister Terrace under Quel'thalas control is wonderful.

It is actually Astalor..''Blizzard'' cant even spell their own character right.

[Khaza-R]

I'm a bit more okay with Harandar and the Haranir, and I think I'll be fully okay if we miraculously get Ethereals before Midnight.

Im honestly pretty disappointed with the visuals of the Voidstorm and Void in general. The flat faced blue Scooby Doo Cyber Chase looking guy is so strange to me. What about this is Void? Nothingness? The Maw had far better and more harrowing visuals than these guys. I don't really like the void glassifying blue rock look to everything. Zul'Aman and what I can only assume is a new Twilight's Hammer looks good. Hope we're seeing a lot of early drafts.

The void enemies are really uninteresting. At least based on the limited stuff we've seen. I think we knew this a bit going into the saga but I had really expected them to flesh it out a bit more rather than be like, here's 14 different shapes of voidwalkers glhf

[Vakir]

Some of the delves we have names for even have some pretty blatant ZA names, so there's absolutely delves there

Atal'aman kind of only can be in one zone

Yeah, but it's not on the list of the 7+1 versions.

Some have 10, some have 7. It's weird. It's a good example though of "we don't need to tell you there's class changes and progression ffs, it's a given now."

[milkmustache]

Ironically that is very likely the main race there, the Domanaar. And yeah... questionable choice of aesthetics.

It's just so oddly saturated and polished. "Banish the Shadow forever!" The Shadow? You mean the blueberry popsicles we're fighting? I'm just confused by the design choices on these guys. It feels very cartoony.

[Dvalin]

I'm a bit more okay with Harandar and the Haranir, and I think I'll be fully okay if we miraculously get Ethereals before Midnight.

Im honestly pretty disappointed with the visuals of the Voidstorm and Void in general. The flat faced blue Scooby Doo Cyber Chase looking guy is so strange to me. What about this is Void? Nothingness? The Maw had far better and more harrowing visuals than these guys. I don't really like the void glassifying blue rock look to everything. Zul'Aman and what I can only assume is a new Twilight's Hammer looks good. Hope we're seeing a lot of early drafts.

It seems they've taken some inspiration from the likes of the Inbetween from Stranger Things (and similar inspirations). All beasts and monsters we've seen share some thematics, as well (either reptilian, insectoid or a combination of both, chitinous, multiple eyes, razor sharp appendages,etc.).

[Santandame]

First, I would change Liadrin's face to be more feminine. The chad jaw Western devs like to use all the time is tiring. Also her oversized lips are weird. Blood Elves are supposed to be beautiful and attractive.
Then, the cinematic. Starts the same, music is more subtle, Liadrin doesn't mumble but just stares into the Sunwell with a defeated look on her face.
Lorthemar comes by - "Liadrin, it's time"
They both go on the wall to oversee the ongoing battle, before joining it themselves. It's rough. Liadrin gets mortally injured. Lorthemar is gravely injured as well. Situation is dire as the remaining elven forces lose hope, watching their leaders fall.
Then boom, Velen, Turalyon, the Army of the Light, show up in a rebuilt Exodar.
Turalyon: "By the Light... quick, Velen, get us down there!"
They all get teleported on the battlefield. Turalyon and his troops immediately charge into battle. Velen checks up on Liadrin but it's too late. He then rushes to Lorthermar which is barely still alive and is seen slowly carrying him to safety.
But not even Turalyon and his troops are able to hold back the forces of the void for long.
Then, boom. Azshara and the naga show up. She only makes eye contact with Turalyon, they acknowledge each other with a simple head nod, before she slithers away into the shadows.
With new naga troops to bolster their ranks, Turalyon and the Army of the Light are finally able to drive back the evil. Xal'atath, realizing she's outmatched, sends one last wave of her minions before fleeing herself.
The cinematic ends with a final shot of the battle, before a naga does a charged attack towards the "camera" at which points the cinematic ends and the expansion logo shows up. The end.

Features
Spellbreaker class, 1h/shield, magic/physical, tank/healer roles, instead of a DH spec
Shaman for all races
Paladin for all races
DHs open to VE, Draenei, Orcs and Nightborne
Silvermoon City as a Horde hub
New Exodar as an Alliance hub
Naga as neutral allied race. Starting zone: new underwater zone off the coast of Isle of Queldanas, instead of Harandar and Harronir
New customization options for existing races
World tier difficulty system. Applies to all world content and all old dungeons and raids. Want to breeze through an old dungeon just for transmog or face an actual challenge for better, more relevant rewards? This system would help with that.
Exiles reach is removed. Revamped starting zones for each race
Revamped class order halls, now an evergreen feature
Housing

Now, I'm just a random poster, not a story writer or anything. Compare what I just laid out with what was unveiled by people getting paid 5-6 figures working at a multibillion dollar corporation. We're not even talking anything revolutionary here, just things that pretty much any person part of the WoW community and with common sense plus 2 braincells knows would generate a lot more hype.
They're really, utterly and completely out of touch with what WoW players actually want, and what they want to see on their screens. Whoever is feeding information and feedback to managers and execs, is either getting it from the wrong places, or they're lying to them on purpose.

I also don't buy housing being a thing as a copout for the lack of features. As far as I understood, it's mostly if not entirely being developed by the studio in Boston which Blizzard bought not too long ago. It's also been announced almost a year ago. And by their own words, they have been at it for a long time.
So what is the rest of the WoW team doing? TWW itself was full of recycled assets and content from BfA and SL. Siren's Isle is literally BfA content. Undermine was put together with mostly BfA assets. K'aresh with SL assets, but purple. Not to mention that it's not even really an ethereal patch in a true sense, it's more of a broker patch. None of the major patches in TWW had anything groundbreaking besides the usual. The minor patches had nothing notable either. XP/collection FOMO events which is just tuning some numbers, shit like Dastardly duos which was completely forgotten already or recycled Horrific visions.
So given all this, and the way they hyped up the expansion, using language like "truly monumental cinematic" and advertising Midnight as having features that "will knock players' socks off", I am sitting here looking at what they actually revealed, wondering, what the fuck happened?
A feature that would've actually knocked players' socks off would be a dye system for armor.
The radio silence from Metzen is also unsettling, given that it's a new expansion being unveiled and he's nowhere to be seen. Not even a tweet, or a retweet of something. I have a weird feeling that he will leave soon, he seems completely checked out. Holly looked uneasy on stage as well, and the last minute restructuring, where the initial panel with Ion, Holly and Metzen was scrapped, is weird. So what the hell is going on?
Where is the development going to? Why was TWW gutted for this?
How can Legion release with banger cinematics, M+, artifact weapons system, order halls for each class, an entirely new class with lots of new customizations and gameplay, more dungeons, world quests, actual strong features in patches like Mage Tower - 10 years ago, with less employees and most likely worse tech.
I am honestly baffled. Blizzard needs to come clean with all this because to me it makes no fucking sense. Or they've simply given up.
I had my suspicions that the Worldsoul saga is nothing more than a marketing stunt and they used Metzen's charisma to sell it. It's basically turning out to be a single expansion cut split into 3 with some new and mostly old content sprinkled in. But this is worse than even that. And Midnight is supposed to be the big one out of the 3.
This is so fucked. I had such high expectations for this expansion, being the first one with Metzen in a fulltime role again and all the hype they were building up, and honestly it's more underwhelming than even TWW. Like there really is no hype and you can tell. The live audience was completely dead. It's disappointment at worst and meh at best even on WoW fansites. Everywhere.

My only post on this thing as I have nothing else to say.

I wish you formatted this post better because you make some excellent points but I struggled to get through it and I think people will sadly skip it because it’s just one huge wall of text.

[milkmustache]

The void enemies are really uninteresting. I think we knew this a bit going into the saga but I had really expected them to flesh it out a bit more rather than be like, here's 14 different shapes of voidwalkers glhf

I don't even mind if there's all sorts of voidwalkers, but make them feel more like creeping shadows, not an unbottled lava lamp Osmosis Jones. There's nothing threatening about them. It's the least cool cosmic direction they could have gone with the Void.

[Dracullus]

I think this is the failure of Blizzard this time. Why paste everything on social media and not on the fricking site? Centralize the information, ffs.

Oh yeah. During Legion they went on stage and brag about every small shit like giving back flying and class mounts. Now they randomly drop stuff like transmog for slot (and for free).

There should be one single WoW panel. With cinematic, feature reveal, zones, systems, all small wins. WoW crowd would be there anyway, casual crowd simply doesn't care about WoW.

[Cheezits]

I like the void space monsters we've gotten in 11.2 and will be getting in 12.0 but the Domanaar definitely need another design pass, even if it's just making them shadows.

No complaints otherwise on designs. Rootlands monsters look great even if Haranir are boring.

[blaatschaap]

It's just so oddly saturated and polished. "Banish the Shadow forever!" The Shadow? You mean the blueberry popsicles we're fighting? I'm just confused by the design choices on these guys. It feels very cartoony.

somebody speculated earlier they might be allies, but I don't think that's true because the description of one of the dungeons has one of these guys like a sadistic dude who makes animals fight eachother.

[Khaza-R]

I don't even mind if there's all sorts of voidwalkers, but make them feel more like creeping shadows, not an unbottled lava lamp Osmosis Jones. There's nothing threatening about them. It's the least cool cosmic direction they could have gone with the Void.

Yeah, there's a kind of flubber effect to them. It seems like Voidstorm might be the most unfinished zone though. So I think there's the most potential for maybe some it to be early drafts and hopefully the finished product will look better.

[milkmustache]

I like the void space monsters we've gotten in 11.2 and will be getting in 12.0 but the Domanaar definitely need another design pass, even if it's just making them shadows.

What? You don't think all consuming shadow and nothingness should actually manifest from bright blue snot people?

somebody speculated earlier they might be allies, but I don't think that's true because the description of one of the dungeons has one of these guys like a sadistic dude who makes animals fight eachother.

I think they're totally gonna either be Xal'atath's original people or some original Void group.

Yeah, there's a kind of flubber effect to them. It seems like Voidstorm might be the most unfinished zone though. So I think there's the most potential for maybe some it to be early drafts and hopefully the finished product will look better.

I think it's just an ugly design, and I hope you're right. They just need a bit more... horror.