Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Santandame]

Let’s be totally honest we all know deep down whether want to admit it or not that next expansion is Avaloren or the other side of Azeroth with no more than 5 zones at max.

[Ersula]

I wonder if Blizzard is going to expand support post-Augvoker. People speculated that they could add support specs to existing classes, but would Blizzard add a new class with a support spec in 11.0 right after Evokers? Perhaps a new class with a support spec for Mages, Hunters, and Shaman and a 4th role for group content.

I think they'll conceptualize Support as a spectrum. Shadow Priests, Frost Mages, Survival Hunter, Feral druid, etc will probably fill the same current niche but may get more supportive damage buffs.

That being said the Bard Class is definitely coming in 11.0 or 12.0

[Lorgar Aurelian]

“Classic dragon - I’m in love with a ghost”

That didn’t happen until Cataclysm. Our only dealings with dragons in classic were those that were world bosses or dungeon/raid bosses. Chromie being the outlier. They still possessed an air of superiority, mystery and ferocity about them there. The change in how they were presented happened during Wrath.

Damn you right, that ruins my almost matching lines.

Though I’d say the change happened in tbc not wrath when we got a whole manga about how Kal was trying to bang the sun well in human form.

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But there's a difference in how they present themselves. DF has so many of them being silly and cutesy and stuff.

That’s because there are so many more dragons then we ever had in the past, like not counting evil dragons we have had like what 25-30 named dragons in all of Classic-cata?

When your expanding to try and show the whole of dragon kind and not just a couple dozen you need to give them varied personality’s or they become one note.

[username993720]

Everyone is humans. Just a different shade. Take the recent Night Elf heritage quest for example. Lysander, a 20 year old male night elf who we're stuck with, who talks about his feelings. They have tons of races to choose from to tell a story like this, but instead they choose the race that lives for thousands of years. It's literally a human with a different size ears and different shade of skin at this point. Not to mention the preachy "tradition changing" lesson that felt so forced throughout this quest.

I swear, it's the same writer who wrote Pelagos and Talia. Has to be. No, Talia. I don't give a shit about your stupid gryphon. "Omg so relatable, woooow." That's not how you make a character interesting. Show me them doing something cool either through actions or dialogue and I'll care then. And then you can explain their whole damn backstory.

I've already told someone else. That guy looks like a hipster, not a Highborne:

[milkmustache]

Let’s be totally honest we all know deep down whether want to admit it or not that next expansion is Avaloren or the other side of Azeroth with no more than 5 zones at max.

I'm leaning this way with a colonization aspect to it. Not sure about the 5 zones max thing, but it tracks.

[Sondrelk]

“Classic dragon - I’m in love with a ghost”

That didn’t happen until Cataclysm. Our only dealings with dragons in classic were those that were world bosses or dungeon/raid bosses. Chromie being the outlier. They still possessed an air of superiority, mystery and ferocity about them there. The change in how they were presented happened during Wrath.

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Gul’dan isn’t indicative of the Legion? Mate, come on. This is next level reaching even for you.

Our two major Legion expansions (WoD and Legion) Gul’dan was a major antagonist of. The only other prominent Legion expansion(moreso an Illidari expansion) was TBC and Gul’dan literally couldn’t be apart of it because he was dead. Even then, Blizzard still found ways of including him in some form.

Not that Dragons weren't more aloof back in Vanilla, but even at their most aloof it always felt more like the Bronze Dragons simply didn't like people coming into their cool cave than it did them thinking us insignificant.

You also seem to be generalizing a bit overall. Dragons came in all kinds back then. Some liked gold and dank caves. Some liked humans and wanted to help us.
If your argument is that we have lost the nuance of dragons in that we don't see many outright antagonistic dragons then sure, but that doesn't seem to be it.

The only thing they seem to have truly lost is the mystery. Them having a society was always hinted at, even if not to the same degree they have in the Dragon Isles.

[Cheezits]

Yeah if next expansion is just Mists 2 and a brand new island again, but with factions, I may have to check out until the revamp. What a lame anniversary.

[Sondrelk]

I think they'll conceptualize Support as a spectrum. Shadow Priests, Frost Mages, Survival Hunter, Feral druid, etc will probably fill the same current niche but may get more supportive damage buffs.

That being said the Bard Class is definitely coming in 11.0 or 12.0

Bard still seems like a stretch to me. I cannot think of any big WoW heroes that embody the Bard theme, especially not in a way that evokes the DnD Bard that I think people imagine.
Even Evokers are more about stretching the definition of a Dragon in order to make them playable than it is about Evokers having a long and stories history in WoW.

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Yeah if next expansion is just Mists 2 and a brand new island again, but with factions, I may have to check out until the revamp. What a lame anniversary.

This is honestly the strongest argument for a world revamp to me.
What a way to kill the anniversary buzz. New continent that players have only heard about in a hidden book in a dungeon I doubt many players ran more than once or twice.
A continent filled with people we have no idea about, and never heard about until whenever the announcement is.

The most interesting but about it currently is the idea that the Scarlet Crusade is there. And even that is just made up by players to extract the slimmest chance of engagement.

Blizzard has had years to plan this anniversary, and I doubt they would just let it fizzle out with an idea based on a meme.

[milkmustache]

This is honestly the strongest argument for a world revamp to me.
What a way to kill the anniversary buzz. New continent that players have only heard about in a hidden book in a dungeon I doubt many players ran more than once or twice.
A continent filled with people we have no idea about, and never heard about until whenever the announcement is.

The most interesting but about it currently is the idea that the Scarlet Crusade is there. And even that is just made up by players to extract the slimmest chance of engagement.

Blizzard has had years to plan this anniversary, and I doubt they would just let it fizzle out with an idea based on a meme.

Ding ding ding. I agree wholeheartedly, but god I'm nervous we're wrong lol

[Teriz]

I just think this is the furthest of stretches. There are soooo many themes that come before "underground" with Thrall.

Such as?

I know it's speculation, but there isn't a whole ton of indication that Blizzard would do an "undermine expansion". I mean, this entire subject came up from a comment Towellie made on stream, which is the strongest evidence as of yet.

Well that and Zalarek Caverns where Blizzard stated that it could lead to future underground content. There was also the Mecha Kobold thing for Blizzard's mobile game which is pretty left field, yet fits into an Undermine theme which is underground and tech-based. Gallywix is still also on the loose, and Thrall does work within a concept of us going underground. The RAF gear from earlier this year was decidedly Goblin-based for some reason. Finally, Towellie also put out a picture showing people in a cave, and stated that a revamp isn't happening.

In short there is evidence, and I always veer on the side of concise expansion concepts instead of nebulous expansion concepts that don't really have a solid foundation beyond the force of the cosmos that we'll supposedly be up against.

Even with "No pirates.", there's far more evidence of a seafaring expansion, more evidence of an Other Side of Azeroth and Titan expansion, and even more evidence for a revamp expansion (which I know, can be a feature amongst the rest).

I really, really think Undermine would be awesome. I really hope they add it in the future. This is just a hell of stretch to make it a reality.

The thing is, any evidence for something in the south seas could be applied to Undermine, since it is also in the south seas.

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Yeah, I’m struggling to follow Teriz on this. He was previously dead set on next expansion being a Lightbound / w Yrel invasion with his belief that Thrall on the key art indicated that (not sure how). Now he’s jumped ship on it being an underground/Undermine expansion next, with somehow Thrall being on the key art indicative of that - that being an even bigger stretch than him being indicative of Yrel.

The Yrel expansion is still a possibility as well. I don't completely shut off an expansion possibility simply because another one arises.

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I think they'll conceptualize Support as a spectrum. Shadow Priests, Frost Mages, Survival Hunter, Feral druid, etc will probably fill the same current niche but may get more supportive damage buffs.

That being said the Bard Class is definitely coming in 11.0 or 12.0

Blizzard already said that they're not going to use existing specs for support. Any support specs will be new specs.

Also Bards don't really fit any future expansion concept that I'm aware of.

[micwini]

Didn't someone say Towellie has called expacs wrong in the future? I know he got the timing right for a 10.2 announcement, but I wouldn't put a ton of stock in what he has to say.

I think I'd read this more as WoW 2 is not happening, which doesn't rule out a revamp. I've never considered world revamp = WoW 2/Azeroth Reborn.

He got the timing for the 10.2 announcement wrong.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

He's only ever been sometimes reliable about patch/PTR/alpha start dates. He doesn't have a 100% track record on that, and the only other thing he ever does is basically just imply he knows things or has seen things without talking about what the things are. Shit like "there's gonna be a lot of changes" or "I think people will like it".

I genuinely don't know why people treat him as a source for upcoming information. By the time he actually hints at a date (often a couple weeks prior), the entire community has it already dialed in to likely be +-1 week of that date, and because he is high profile and sometimes works with Blizzard, he is even more stringently not allowed to talk about whatever insider knowledge he might sometimes get.

This underground/water thing would be the first time he's ever provided information on the order of spoiling the theme/location of upcoming content.

That seems fair. I definitely remember that he was treated as a little unreliable in the past, and I did get the hint that this was a departure from his usual method. There's a pretty significant gap in getting information about something as simple and relevant to a prominent streamer as patch dates and getting information about the next expansion. I also do recall that he was a little reliant on Barnum statements, especially leading up to Dragonflight; on top of that, even if it did prove to be the case that he knew, it would be unreliable because such vague statements can be taken as nothing more than opinion, with no inherently useful information attached to them.

[Cheezits]

He got the timing for the 10.2 announcement wrong.

I think he accurately said it was the Thursday after patch release.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

I think he accurately said it was the Thursday after patch release.

Either way, definitely not as substantial as an expansion theme. This all seems more like the sort of thing a streamer would be in on than an expansion, so it casts a bit of doubt if this is really his level of clearance.

[Nibelheimy]

I distinctively remember Teriz saying that the light bound expansion was most likely next due to all the evidence, clues and foreshadowing the game is giving us, so I'm sure he won't go back on that claim. Although it would be kinda sad if a underground expansion with an undermine ciry/zone finally came and weeks prior he was absolute with it being Yrel. After alll these years of tinker speculation that would be madness. This is not a post trying to insult, it would just genuinely be unfortunate.

Thrall means many things. Although he could be related to an underground zone/goblins in general (he brought them into the horde) he's also just a main face of warcraft, and when you see him you think of 10 or 20 other things before you think of underground, this is true.

Claiming the dragons are the same now as they've always been is also madness. The dragons appearing more human than dragon both physically and emotionally is a very common complaint about the feel of this expansion. An incredible amount of people share this opinion, there is a different feel, and for all of dragonflights successes. None bar 1 are characters, lore and storyline. (the blue dragonflights quests are good, they're not amazing - if blue dragonflight fans are happy with getting just that as development on a dragon focused expansion, more power to you) I'm seeing a lot of inferring that not sharing the idea that dragonflight is amazing is some sort of toxic masculinity mindset. That is reductive and ignorant of the problems the expansion and wow is actively facing.

In truth, Dragonflights content cadence is the best that getting content has ever been. Story development and characters however, is off. If the expansion is indeed a 'palette cleanser' ' that's fine, but as much as I'm flying around enjoying the content itself, I hard fast click cancel world quest dialog and frankly couldn't care what happens to 90% of characters rn in the setting.

[micwini]

I think he accurately said it was the Thursday after patch release.

He hinted "sept 5 is a good date" and it was announced on sept 7.

[Teriz]

Undermine is more Goblin themed than Thrall with the earth element
I don't agree with you but everyone has their own point of view

If I wanted to be as disingenuous as you are I would say the same thing about Illidan, his return was not necessarily indicative of the return of the Legion...
Do you see how stupid this kind of reasoning is? Well I won't venture further into this area with you because that's not the subject

The only reason Blizzard would bring Illidan back to life would be for a Legion invasion. Also his return pretty much assured a Demon Hunter class. This is why Illidan appears on the cover of the expansion. Him being on the key art pre-announcement would be giving the game away. In this case, a likely scenario is Thrall in the key art and Gazlowe on the expansion cover (if Undermine is the expansion). As an aside, Thrall and Gazlowe go pretty far back, having been created by Blizzard at around the same time.

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I distinctively remember Teriz saying that the light bound expansion was most likely next due to all the evidence, clues and foreshadowing the game is giving us, so I'm sure he won't go back on that claim. Although it would be kinda sad if an underground expansion with an undermine ciry/zone finally came and weeks prior he was absolute with it being Yrel. After alll these years of tinker speculation that would be madness. This is not a post trying to insult, it would just genuinely be unfortunate.

Well once again this is ALL speculation and nothing is 100%. I would argue that a Lightbound expansion is still the most likely, but you really can't ignore the evidence for an Undermine expansion either. The wild thing is that Thrall fits in both areas in different ways, which I find to be rather interesting. If you twisted my arm, I would say the safe bet is Yrel. However, Toweliee is making some pretty bold statements that point in a different direction, and as I stated that mecha kobold, goblin-centric RAF stuff from March, and the Tanaris wasteland set is just weirdly themed material unless you're hinting at an Undermine expansion.

Thrall means many things. Although he could be related to an underground zone/goblins in general (he brought them into the horde) he's also just a main face of warcraft, and when you see him you think of 10 or 20 other things before you think of underground, this is true.

I agree.

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Either way, definitely not as substantial as an expansion theme. This all seems more like the sort of thing a streamer would be in on than an expansion, so it casts a bit of doubt if this is really his level of clearance.

Unless Blizzard gave him permission to do it. Blizzard has given influencers information about their future releases before. This is especially true of Hearthstone streamers.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

Unless Blizzard gave him permission to do it.

I wouldn't be too surprised if they're deliberately playing with leakers now, since they're 100% letting some information get through to build up hype, but I think using a prominent streamer and such obvious cues as pictures of sprawling caves seems too obvious. Mind you, I get why one would speculate it's an underground expansion after Zaralek perfectly built it up, but I'm not inclined to trust it only on the basis of Towelliee's word.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

I distinctively remember Teriz saying that the light bound expansion was most likely next due to all the evidence, clues and foreshadowing the game is giving us, so I'm sure he won't go back on that claim. Although it would be kinda sad if a underground expansion with an undermine ciry/zone finally came and weeks prior he was absolute with it being Yrel. After alll these years of tinker speculation that would be madness. This is not a post trying to insult, it would just genuinely be unfortunate.

Honestly, I maintain this and will die on this hill: he's right that tinkers are perpetually a reasonable choice for the next class. They are a class that's been in the lore for a while and that would be pretty thematically distinct. The only real impediments are that (1) there's a significant opportunity cost to every new class, so every new class has to be weighed against and deemed more interesting than every possible competitor, and (2) every new class has to be thematically consistent with the expansion it's supposed to sell us on, and it's difficult to imagine any plausible expansion other than a world revamp or maybe a titan-centric expansion that tinkers would suit.

I'm extremely skeptical of an Undermine expansion, though. It's a bit thematically-alienating on its face and sounds a bit aesthetically-unpleasant. While goblins are very fun in the right doses, having too much of them all the time may get a little grating. While the size of the Undermine isn't much of an impediment, as Dragonflight was made effectively from whole cloth and BfA turned two islands into mini-continents, I think it's still a bit conceptually-limiting on its face. While Blizzard could make up anything on the spot to justify it, it still feels a bit difficult to buy entirely.

[Nebron]

That's interesting, because this popped up a few days ago for Warcraft Rumble;



Mecha Kobolds, which I thought was rather strange, but its not so strange if we're talking about Kobolds in Undermine.

And if you're reading into something Towelliee says as legit, well, he also posted this cave around the same time