Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Cheezits]

Imagine if in Harrandar besides the roots of the world trees, there were also separate subzones with rotting pieces of each Old God, decaying and spilling Black Blood, choking the zone in corruption. Each of the Old Gods was digging deep to get to exactly this place (Before the Titans moved the World Soul into the Manifold)

Conceptually a cool idea but very difficult to not be different color Expedition Zone 9s in various formats.

[allegrian]

I'm starting to suspect that the recent "light bad" stuff they're pivoting to is setup for the future Evil Arathi Emperor as the next multi-expansion main villain.

Like many of you said before, it looks like blizzard gets excited about a new story, pivot current and next expansion to setup that story, but then when the actual story arrives, they are already pivoting to setup the next story they have thought about. Thus, we only get setups for stories that get abandoned or half-assed with no payoff.

[Nymrohd]

Conceptually a cool idea but very difficult to not be different color Expedition Zone 9s in various formats.

Expedition Zone 9 was a delve. I mean it was cool but it was just a delve. What I am suggesting is that you keep about two thirds of Harrandar as it currently is and replace all the Light stuff with Old God stuff. You then extend the Rift of Aln into a final raid in which Xal'atath tries to animate something down there (if she is the Fifth old God, her own corpse; otherwise an amalgamation of Old Gods) we stop her by killing that thing and instead of killing her, we imprison her since she does a classic "Wait, I know of an even bigger threat! Remember the Dark Heart?"

Then Midnight is a Shadowguard invasion with Dimensius attacking instead of Xal and us forced to help her out. Voidstorm becomes the third zone where we search for the origin of the Voidstorm over Quel'thalas and we find out it is K'aresh with K'aresh serving as the fourth zone. First season of Midnight ends exactly as Season 3 of TWW did; with us killing Dimensius and Xal absorbing him. Instead of her just betraying Locus Walker, she also overwhelms Alleria or whatever the fuck was happening there leading to a Quel'danas S2 for Midnight with Void Alleria assaulting the Sunwell.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm starting to suspect that the recent "light bad" stuff they're pivoting to is setup for the future Evil Arathi Emperor as the next multi-expansion main villain.

Like many of you said before, it looks like blizzard gets excited about a new story, pivot current and next expansion to setup that story, but then when the actual story arrives, they are already pivoting to setup the next story they have thought about. Thus, we only get setups for stories that get abandoned or half-assed with no payoff.

What it looks like to me is like there is no longer a manager in the room making final calls. I assume it used to be that someone had a veto in the room and whoever they were replaced with is trying to let all the devs do their thing. Instead of a focused story, it is going every which way.

- - - Updated - - -

You're annoying me with how much better this could flow and how much of this was actually set up pretty directly before the pivot.

My other thing would have been to make Azj'kahet multicultural instead of Nerubian. So aqir from Ahn'qiraj and Manti'vess that were disillusioned with the Black Empire would have also joined their nerubian fellows and formed Azj'kahet as a united aqir kingdom with all three varieties. Then we could finally get some lore to the Qiraji. That said I still hold hope TLT might include a revamped Silithus that includes them.

That way we can have Azjol'Nerub down the line without it being a rehash though I think if TLT does Azjol'Nerub it will be a huge ruin, not a recovering civilization. The nerubians were devastated after all so it makes sense for them to never be able to recover. They'll have a settlement and go exploring down the ruins but that's it.

[milkmustache]

What I don't understand is why everyone is assuming a hostile light situation is a pivot?

There has always been speculation that some form of Light zealotry could enter the plot, but the notion of "LIGHT IS BAD NOW!" is fully constructed within this thread. Every single cosmic magic influence has proved to be bad in overwhelming doses in this Saga. That's the entire point. We're coming out of this with Azeroth the World Soul a being of her own free will. It's not light bad, it's void, light, death, life, order and disorder bad because they're monolithic and all encompassing in the purest forms.

We'll almost certainly go towards an Evil Arathi Empire expansion following this saga, but that doesn't mean that Light is now 100% bad. People didn't react the same to Legion even though they've played Warlocks for a decade prior.

This is more to why the way they've handled and prioritized the cosmic powers is so fundamentally bad for the game. People see only black and white (or in this case, gold or green, yellow or purple, black (teal?) or green).

[Vakir]

I really don't know where this very extreme interpretation of Light Bad from some people comes from.

Arator is insufferable and Turalyon's resolution of faith in WC2 appears to be getting retconned to be more questionable, but nothing really indicates they're going in that heavy of a direction just because there's some overzealous or bad actors.

EDIT: GET OUT OF MY HEAD

[Rosstafa]

That + black blood stuff was both tied to an early storyline that was scrapped, is why. Which is why Khaz Algar and the Haranir were teased in Dragonflight. They are one and the same issue.

This stuff hasn't necessarily been scrapped. The worldsoul saga was supposedly shuffled around when Metzen came in, so some of that stuff may still be coming later. I wouldn't be surprised if we see the whole blackblood thing addressed in Midnight (maybe it's connected to the possible 12.1 Amani raid), and the dragons/oathstones and whatnot will almost certainly be relevant in The Last Titan when Iridikron comes back. I'm curious to hear what he thinks about the aspects having their powers returned to them by Azeroth and not the titans.

What I don't understand is why everyone is assuming a hostile light situation is a pivot?

There has always been speculation that some form of Light zealotry could enter the plot, but the notion of "LIGHT IS BAD NOW!" is fully constructed within this thread. Every single cosmic magic influence has proved to be bad in overwhelming doses in this Saga. That's the entire point. We're coming out of this with Azeroth the World Soul a being of her own free will. It's not light bad, it's void, light, death, life, order and disorder bad because they're monolithic and all encompassing in the purest forms.

We'll almost certainly go towards an Evil Arathi Empire expansion following this saga, but that doesn't mean that Light is now 100% bad. People didn't react the same to Legion even though they've played Warlocks for a decade prior.

This is more to why the way they've handled and prioritized the cosmic powers is so fundamentally bad for the game. People see only black and white (or in this case, gold or green, yellow or purple, black (teal?) or green).

Everything in its extreme has the potential to be bad, and light is just the last of the cosmic forces we're yet to see that from. But this stuff has been hinted at since Legion. It's really not much of a leap to imagine the faction all about crusading and judgement etc might get a little bit caught up in themselves.

Blizz does have a bit of a problem with pitting us up against big cosmic forces. It's why they struggle to keep upping the stakes. You can only fight god so many times before you start to run out of gods. The conflict should be coming from the people and how they use those forces, rather than taking the fight to the forces themselves.

I really don't know where this very extreme interpretation of Light Bad from some people comes from.

Arator is insufferable and Turalyon's resolution of faith in WC2 appears to be getting retconned to be more questionable, but nothing really indicates they're going in that heavy of a direction just because there's some overzealous or bad actors.

There have been quite a few instances of light-based extremism in WoW recently, most notably with the Arathi. It clearly has a bigger potential for evil than people thought. I think an Arathi Empire raid is probably going to be a thing in Midnight.

I think it is perfectly fine to have a Light bad angle in Midnight. I also think it is weird that it feels Light Bad is more prominent than Void Bad though.

That said, I've heard a lot about the main story of the zones but almost nothing of the side quests. Historically, the best lore is in the side quests.

Midnight - the battle between the void and the light. Both forces at their peaks. We're going to see the worst of both sides.

[Nymrohd]

What I don't understand is why everyone is assuming a hostile light situation is a pivot?

There has always been speculation that some form of Light zealotry could enter the plot, but the notion of "LIGHT IS BAD NOW!" is fully constructed within this thread. Every single cosmic magic influence has proved to be bad in overwhelming doses in this Saga. That's the entire point. We're coming out of this with Azeroth the World Soul a being of her own free will. It's not light bad, it's void, light, death, life, order and disorder bad because they're monolithic and all encompassing in the purest forms.

We'll almost certainly go towards an Evil Arathi Empire expansion following this saga, but that doesn't mean that Light is now 100% bad. People didn't react the same to Legion even though they've played Warlocks for a decade prior.

This is more to why the way they've handled and prioritized the cosmic powers is so fundamentally bad for the game. People see only black and white (or in this case, gold or green, yellow or purple, black (teal?) or green).

I think it is perfectly fine to have a Light bad angle in Midnight. I also think it is weird that it feels Light Bad is more prominent than Void Bad though.

That said, I've heard a lot about the main story of the zones but almost nothing of the side quests. Historically, the best lore is in the side quests.

[Super Dickmann]

My other thing would have been to make Azj'kahet multicultural instead of Nerubian. So aqir from Ahn'qiraj and Manti'vess that were disillusioned with the Black Empire would have also joined their nerubian fellows and formed Azj'kahet as a united aqir kingdom with all three varieties. Then we could finally get some lore to the Qiraji. That said I still hold hope TLT might include a revamped Silithus that includes them.

That way we can have Azjol'Nerub down the line without it being a rehash though I think if TLT does Azjol'Nerub it will be a huge ruin, not a recovering civilization. The nerubians were devastated after all so it makes sense for them to never be able to recover. They'll have a settlement and go exploring down the ruins but that's it.

My vain hope in respect to Azjol'nerub and Forsaken relevance is that Blizzard pick up the seed planted with Voss telling Neferess to get used to being ascended and see it as a second chance and have her and the Forsaken pop in to make contact and support the Northrend nerubians to mirror her letting them die to the Scourge. Then you'd also be able to follow up on the plot beat about (the) Harbinger being able to assume direct control of those exposed the blood which never went anywhere either and won't now, as all her followers are blobs. All the undead in the previously main undead-blood elf team-up zone being unemployed or being dungeon mobs we kill for the temerity of doing the same thing we're doing doesn't fill me with confidence though.

[allegrian]

What I don't understand is why everyone is assuming a hostile light situation is a pivot?

There has always been speculation that some form of Light zealotry could enter the plot, but the notion of "LIGHT IS BAD NOW!" is fully constructed within this thread. Every single cosmic magic influence has proved to be bad in overwhelming doses in this Saga. That's the entire point. We're coming out of this with Azeroth the World Soul a being of her own free will. It's not light bad, it's void, light, death, life, order and disorder bad because they're monolithic and all encompassing in the purest forms.

We'll almost certainly go towards an Evil Arathi Empire expansion following this saga, but that doesn't mean that Light is now 100% bad. People didn't react the same to Legion even though they've played Warlocks for a decade prior.

This is more to why the way they've handled and prioritized the cosmic powers is so fundamentally bad for the game. People see only black and white (or in this case, gold or green, yellow or purple, black (teal?) or green).

The thing is that most of the base midnight release content focuses on that, which has nothing to do with void, Xalatath or world soul and titans. The story has no focus.

[Super Dickmann]

The thing is that most of the base midnight release content focuses on that, which has nothing to do with void, Xalatath or world soul and titans. The story has no focus.

To be fair, two out of three raids are about the Void, and the void is face first in ZA, the intro and Voidstorm, with the Light as a slow burn part to it. We're not even close to approaching levels of total irrelevance that are say, Highmountain or Azsuna.

[Vakir]

The story has no focus.

Which is a separate issue. But "Light Bad" remains kinda reductive.

Unless people mean "we're going to have a Light antagonist at some point in this expansion" when they say that. But that's ...both very different and also already true with several bosses.

Edit: Eh, I wouldn't say Aszuna is irrelevant. It's still the major center of elf society we're visiting in the Broken Isles, we're still dealing partly with Naga who are aligned with someone who was buddies with the Legion during the War of the Ancients, etc.

Highmountain stands...as absolute crap, yeah.

[milkmustache]

I really don't know where this very extreme interpretation of Light Bad from some people comes from.

Arator is insufferable and Turalyon's resolution of faith in WC2 appears to be getting retconned to be more questionable, but nothing really indicates they're going in that heavy of a direction just because there's some overzealous or bad actors.

EDIT: GET OUT OF MY HEAD

I'm sorry, I just signed a lease for your frontal cortex. I'm stealing all of your thoughts.

The thing is that most of the base midnight release content focuses on that, which has nothing to do with void, Xalatath or world soul and titans. The story has no focus.

Does it though? Or is it a flavor to the Void story? If Light is always in direct conflict with Void, then naturally Void at it's highest power (which is what we're told the Devouring Host and Voidstorm is) must also spark an incredibly strong reaction from Light, which we're being shown as overwhelming, thus the Lightblinded. And it's not like this wasn't pitched to us; we were quite literally told that when the Void comes to snuff out the Sunwell we would stand with the forces of the Light to attempt to banish the Shadow forever... and things don't go according to plan. It's all in plain writing. If it had been a goody two shoes heroic Light army, we'd have complaints of a story with no depth. If it were full of Titan themes, we'd have complaints that it's 4 Titan expacs in a row.

This current writing team has a lot of area for critique, but the outrage over the writing of the Light specifically is almost entirely manufactured and misplaced, IMO.

[allegrian]

Which is a separate issue. But "Light Bad" remains kinda reductive.

Unless people mean "we're going to have a Light antagonist at some point in this expansion" when they say that. But that's ...both very different and also already true with several bosses.

Edit: Eh, I wouldn't say Aszuna is irrelevant. It's still the major center of elf society we're visiting in the Broken Isles, we're still dealing partly with Naga who are aligned with someone who was buddies with the Legion during the War of the Ancients, etc.

Highmountain stands...as absolute crap, yeah.

Highmountain is a pretty good story which is related to the war of the ancients and deathwing. It doesn't feel like filler or completely unrelated to the broken ilses and Legion vibes.

[Cheezits]

You (colloquial you) have had since Legion (Xe'ra) and BFA (Yrel) to cope with the idea that there are beings of the Light that aren't good and are causing people to go crazy. This is not a new development.

I understand being miffed at the Turalyon WC2 change, but Lightblinding, while a dumb name, is not at all a new concept.

They are also speaking to the audience (Arator questline) that the Light is not bad, even if some agents of it are, or something is making it turn people bad. And considering how Metzen handled the Void Lords (they are all beaten except one, who gets beaten) there is very, very likely not an evil Light Lords/Legion faction out there.

[Vakir]

Highmountain is a pretty good story which is related to the war of the ancients and deathwing. It doesn't feel like filler or completely unrelated to the broken ilses and Legion vibes.

I hate it and I can't explain why I hate it as much as I do, other than I guess the drogbar sucking as a race and the verticality of some sections.

It has some past tense relevance in filling in some cool lore, Huln is neat, but in the present of the Legion conflict, it kinda doesn't matter. Huln is dead. Ebonhorn is just kinda there. The only thing we need is the hammer back from a smelly diversion.

At least Farondris and that entire deal are still living in the same conditions as where they started when we get there and it informs Azshara's cruelty and their place before the isles were raised. Same with the Withered, it helps give a lot of character to Suramar ahead of time and is leaps and bounds ahead of how little I gave a shit about the "tell don't show" hunger of the Blood Elves by comparison.

I'm sorry, I just signed a lease for your frontal cortex. I'm stealing all of your thoughts.

Awesome. Now I can't be held responsible.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

The idea that it is a leftist revolution is itself wrong. I take the piss out of it being about trade unionism, but nu-Gazlowe isn't a Bolshevik, he isn't even Attlee, he's just boring, as are his peers and as are non-greedy, non-destructive goblins. Despite all of the imagery, the actual powers toppling Gallywix, the ones who take power, are established and rising cartels, corporate powerplayers, who can and should vary significantly in terms of interests and relevant morality. But they don't, they all hold hands together for a better tomorrow, except the Venture Co

I think Blizzard is owed its due for communicating the bold and groundbreaking moral that corporate leaders will, entirely of their own volition, reform in ways that may undercut their short-term profit for ethical reasons, and it neatly coheres with the End of History-style global trend to world peace brought on by the shared understanding we all benefit more when we're friends.

I'm continuously impressed with how CDev has boldly endeavored to give us the worst of both worlds by aggressively scorching the setting into compliance under the guiding desert sun of California liberalism while ensuring that anything that could pass for the commentary, heft, or nuance needed to make that kind of imposition work is smothered in its crib in the name of ensuring bland and universal Twitter-compliance.

[Foreign Exchange Ztudent]

I was led to believe that there would be a final clash between Light and Shadow, but instead it seems its delayed to 12.2 since it seems Base Midnight will just be another "Slurp & Run"?

I mean, it could still be that the final clash between Light and Shadow happens in the background during the Quel'danas Raid but I mean that's really lame considering everything and how marketable and incredible hype moments that could've been generated to bring some sparks and potential reestablishing passion in the franchise. But, alas.

I'm genuinely confused and concerned, if they made Voidstorm to circumvent creating any IP value then how the fuck is The Last Titan which has so many potential hype moments going to be circumvented like slalom??? Like will they just create mini-zones to dodge any spending on Cinematics and IGCs that are "too much" for the budget?

I genuinely don't really care about the Light Bad thing because at the end of the day all the Cosmic Forces are bad as they want to control Azeroth due to being attracted to her for the whiteouting of the Universe under a singular forces control.

Honestly, I'm more upset about the potential Troll pivot.. The fan servicey pivots are absolutely baffling because I'd understand if we had 3 Major Patches then sure, you can do a fan service pivot but to have only 2 Major Patches and you always dedicate 1 Major Patch to fan service pivot regarding memberberries its' just kind of baffling and clearly showcases how flawed this product model has become.

[Nymrohd]

I think Blizzard is owed its due for communicating the bold and groundbreaking moral that corporate leaders will, entirely of their own volition, reform in ways that may undercut their short-term profit for ethical reasons. I'm continuously impressed with how CDev has boldly endeavored to give us the worst of both worlds by aggressively scorching the setting into compliance under the guiding desert sun of California liberalism while ensuring that anything that could pass for the commentary, heft, or nuance needed to make that kind of imposition work is smothered in its crib in the name of ensuring bland and universal Twitter-compliance.

Bringing End of History theory to a fantasy setting is a bold move, but it's a move that needed to be taken.

I mostly see them as forming a cartel between them to fully control Undermine.

[Cheezits]

I was led to believe that there would be a final clash between Light and Shadow, but instead it seems its delayed to 12.2 since it seems Base Midnight will just be another "Slurp & Run"?

In a live service game this was always destined to be a bald faced lie. Lol Metzen. We even have the Legion coming back.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

I mostly see them as forming a cartel between them to fully control Undermine.

Your optimism is a bright and shining light in these dark times, though it's unfortunately most likely an unintended (if substantiable, precedented, and reasonable) conclusion that CDev didn't mean to allude to. I'd argue even having them be completely straight-laced but have their method of enforcing reform be muscling into territories and sweeping up other Cartels in the name of Bellamyite "Great Trust"-style praxis would be a fun pitch, but I have a hard time believing they'd even go so far as having their good guys develop any strategy other than blandly sauntering around persuading the people who can be persuaded and killing the undefined caricature baddies who can't.