Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Hitei]

Even then, that's not implying anything too different. We still got the Battle for Lordaeon.

Yeah, but that's a pre-patch event. It's like getting Theramore hints before Mists of Pandaria. I'm not even sure it was intended to be a 4th war reference as opposed to just general Warcraft-y stage decoration to make the place look nice for tournament coverage.

I'm actually wondering if the faction war part of it was meant to evoke the same hype WoD initially had? Someone for sure thought Aszhara/N'Zoth can't carry the announcement since afaik they weren't mentioned at all. Which is just super weird for me tbh. And the "we wanted to surprise you guys with it" argument is just weak, since we are talking about two of the most hyped up bosses the game had since Cataclysm, aswell as two zones which were usually used as the setting of a whole expansion leak (Nazjatar and RIP Nyalotha).

This was never a thing outside of misinformation spread in memetic format (i.e. "there are no old gods in BfA!").

They literally showed Azshara at Blizzcon at the end of the announcement.

[Lady Atia]

Yeah, but that's a pre-patch event. It's like getting Theramore hints before Mists of Pandaria. I'm not even sure it was intended to be a 4th war reference as opposed to just general Warcraft-y stage decoration to make the place look nice for tournament coverage.


This was never a thing outside of misinformation spread in memetic format (i.e. "there are no old gods in BfA!").

They literally showed Azshara at Blizzcon at the end of the announcement.

Well tbf, I thought the Aszhara picture was from the Blizzcon after that, similiar to the Argus tease, but maybe I'm indeed remembering it wrong.

[Hitei]

Well tbf, I thought the Aszhara picture was from the Blizzcon after that, similiar to the Argus tease, but maybe I'm indeed remembering it wrong.

https://youtu.be/An8IuS_vFwI?t=3564

[Auxis]

Tell me then, why haven't we ever seen that armor set before?
The WoW arena is unconnected... but the armor is presumably an unseen game asset!

.. it is ingame. The chest is from DF, the pants are from Cataclysm if memory serves (mail starting equipment since Cata revamp up until SL unless they still keep the Cata gear as rewards?), and the sword is an old Vanilla model, Stone-something. Cant remember atm but I'll source the equipment when I get on my pc (on mobile atm, way too difficult to navigate wowhead lol)

[Helothar]

We'll see. In the end, it would be a HUGE mistake if they did a void expansion.

It would be a huge YESS! for me that would finally be able to get my interest in the game back. If they did some proper Void stuff finally, I would totally sign up for a 6-month subscription then.

[Foolicious]

I'm actually wondering if the faction war part of it was meant to evoke the same hype WoD initially had?

I always had the feeling marketing bfa this heavy as an faction war expansion was to cater to the classic crowd. Maybe it's just me, but them trying so hard to make open world pvp happen and going back to horde vs alliance when most players stopped caring about it always felt like that.

Someone probably thought they could convince a few private server players to play bfa until classic servers where ready.

[Sondrelk]

.. it is ingame. The chest is from DF, the pants are from Cataclysm if memory serves (mail starting equipment since Cata revamp up until SL unless they still keep the Cata gear as rewards?), and the sword is an old Vanilla model, Stone-something. Cant remember atm but I'll source the equipment when I get on my pc (on mobile atm, way too difficult to navigate wowhead lol)

They didn't have the tech to make pants look like that in Cataclysm. It's either the guard set you get on the shop, or a similar looking set of mail pants from SL.
The shoulders are from the Mail dungeon set from Legion.

So yes, it's all in-game, and either cosmetic or Mail only. If anything it's weird that they make a full Mail set, usually they mix and match without concern for whether it's actually possible to transmog for players.

[Makorus]

They didn't have the tech to make pants look like that in Cataclysm. It's either the guard set you get on the shop, or a similar looking set of mail pants from SL.
The shoulders are from the Mail dungeon set from Legion.

So yes, it's all in-game, and either cosmetic or Mail only. If anything it's weird that they make a full Mail set, usually they mix and match without concern for whether it's actually possible to transmog for players.

The legs are mail questing gear from Shadowlands. Source: I used them in most of my transmogs because they are 3d.

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Yeah, but that's a pre-patch event. It's like getting Theramore hints before Mists of Pandaria. I'm not even sure it was intended to be a 4th war reference as opposed to just general Warcraft-y stage decoration to make the place look nice for tournament coverage.


This was never a thing outside of misinformation spread in memetic format (i.e. "there are no old gods in BfA!").

They literally showed Azshara at Blizzcon at the end of the announcement.

Nothing annoys me more than people spouting the whole "there are no old gods in BfA!" or "BfA is a Faction War only expansion!" bs (as if Blizz actually said or implied that) considering both factin stories deal with the Old Gods.

[Auxis]

The legs are mail questing gear from Shadowlands. Source: I used them in most of my transmogs because they are 3d.

There we go! The only weird thing about it now is the sleeves part of the ensemble. They look really puffy and not skin tight like most shirts/chest piece sleeves are.

[Kiria]

It would be a huge YESS! for me that would finally be able to get my interest in the game back. If they did some proper Void stuff finally, I would totally sign up for a 6-month subscription then.

me too tbh, would rather void over underground, underground just sounds boring also my 6 month sub ends at the beginning of Nov so after the reveal I will know whether to resub or not.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

Nope. This is giving me Argus and Shadowlands vibes. Terrible direction to take the game if this turns out to be real.

I personally think the idea of a high-concept setting is an interesting one. The only problem is that CDev just either can't or won't write that decently. Usually, I think high-concept fantasy is the best kind, it's just that it's not been well-executed thus far with WoW. If only we ditched the compartmentalized cosmic forces and went for something more esoteric, it could be a pretty good thing to explore.

[username993720]

While i think these images are AI. I always find it funny when people think "otherworldy & space-y" isnt part of Warcrafts core identity. Warcraft has been dealing with otherworlds since day one see Draenor and the orcs for the best example. On top of that the Titans are literal planets that have either directly created or indirectly every single player race in WoW. Hell Demons in Warcraft arnt even traditional demons BUT ALIENS

Yes, but aside from Outland, the Orcish world of Draenor was pretty standard. It's when it gets Star Wars, Star Trek, Starcraft and Zereth Mortis kind of vibes is when it gets weird.

[Valysar]

OMG POSSIBLE REVAMP COMING??? (at least for Lordaeron)

Official WoW Blizzcon Tweet showing an NPC in very Classic styled armor!

Here on twitter: https://twitter.com/Warcraft/status/1705313777099448456

Classic style ?
The shoulders are from woD I guess, the chest is from DF, the legs are from SL, only the sword can be classic

[Teriz]

I've been vocal about not liking goblin aesthetic but I admit a fully underground city has started to worm its way into my head a bit.

Will need to see variety within it before I'm fully on board, if so.

Well it's a Goblin controlled area. Pretty much every goblin controlled area is cosmopolitan and full of different people. I refer back to how Blizzard portrayed Gadgetzhan in hearthstone, where each district was lived in by different groups of people, and that led to a very diverse mix of races and cultures. In the case of Mean Streets it led to a gang war, which was pretty fun. You ended up with a Pandaren-style Chinatown (with Hozen, Jinyu and Virmen), Trolls, Blood Elves and Draenei running what was pretty much a drug network, and you had Ogres, Dwarves, Goblins, Orcs, and Tauren being straight up enforcers. I always felt that Mean Streets was a pretty close portrayal of how Undermine would look, just underground instead of above ground;



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I personally think the idea of a high-concept setting is an interesting one. The only problem is that CDev just either can't or won't write that decently. Usually, I think high-concept fantasy is the best kind, it's just that it's not been well-executed thus far with WoW. If only we ditched the compartmentalized cosmic forces and went for something more esoteric, it could be a pretty good thing to explore.

Part of the problem is that there's no way for Blizzard to effectively create an entirely different world in a single expansion. It worked in TBC because Outland was a destroyed world, so only have 5-6 zones makes sense. When you start to get to WoD or Shadowlands, it gets silly because we're going to what is essentially different worlds and we're only getting 5-6 zones. For example in WoD we never venture to the Ogre continent which is on the map because Blizzard simply couldn't handle that much extra work in a single expansion. When you get truncated material like that, it just feels off, and the world you're supposedly venturing into just feels like a theme park visit instead of a new world. This isn't a problem for Azeroth-based expansions because you have so much of the old world already established in the game, and this new continent you're exploring just feels like another part of the world you know and love.

[Santandame]

If the images are real then people in this thread are jumping the gun a little bit. The entire landmass won’t be that aesthetic, it’s likely just one zone or even a section of one. Blizzard have never made an entire landmass just one theme and aesthetic and there’s no reason to think they would start now.

[ChronoSul]

Yes, but aside from Outland, the Orcish world of Draenor was pretty standard. It's when it gets Star Wars, Star Trek, Starcraft and Zereth Mortis kind of vibes is when it gets weird.

U literally just proved my point. Outland is Draenor and without them u dont have the orcs & Again Demons are Aliens in Warcraft. There is no getting away from that element. People were shocked at the space/dimension ships in legion and yet they have been a thing since TBC. Warcraft cant exist without those elements if it did literally none of the playable races would exist or the majority of the plot.

[Teriz]

If the images are real then people in this thread are jumping the gun a little bit. The entire landmass won’t be that aesthetic, it’s likely just one zone or even a section of one. Blizzard have never made an entire landmass just one theme and aesthetic and there’s no reason to think they would start now.

So you honestly believe that a void world isn't going to look like a void world? As soon as you deviate from the thematic (Void), you lose the immersion.

[Auxis]

U literally just proved my point. Outland is Draenor and without them u dont have the orcs & Again Demons are Aliens in Warcraft. There is no getting away from that element. People were shocked at the space/dimension ships in legion and yet they have been a thing since TBC. Warcraft cant exist without those elements if it did literally none of the playable races would exist or the majority of the plot.

It's funny how Star Wars/Star Trek/Starcraft is too far, but the basis of WoW's lore are space-wandering gods who built immense technological marvels of machinery on worlds which - in some circumstances - are capable of terraforming planets incases of irreparable infection.

[Santandame]

So you honestly believe that a void world isn't going to look like a void world? As soon as you deviate from the thematic (Void), you lose the immersion.

Oh Teriz give it a rest. We get it you don’t want it, or in your head you’re resigned to the belief that it won’t happen so it can’t. You don’t need to continuously make things up to fit your agenda. You know full well that whenever Blizzard have made a new landmass that it’s always been varied and never had only one theme going throughout it. Even Argus had variation. There is zero to indicate that if Blizzard gave us a void aligned world that the entire aesthetic throughout would be blue and purple. With even the tiniest bit of imagination and creativity it could easily be explained.

For all you know the images are from either Nathreza or K’aresh which would absolutely be diverse in zone aesthetic. It has just as much credibility and chance for zone diversity as your conceptual Undermine expansion does.

[Teriz]

Oh Teriz give it a rest. We get it you don’t want it, or in your head you’re resigned to the belief that it won’t happen so it can’t. You don’t need to continuously make things up to fit your agenda. You know full well that whenever Blizzard have made a new landmass that it’s always been varied and never had only one theme going throughout it. Even Argus had variation. There is zero to indicate that if Blizzard gave us a void aligned world that the entire aesthetic throughout would be blue and purple. With even the tiniest bit of imagination and creativity it could easily be explained.

For all you know the images are from either Nathreza or K’aresh which would absolutely be diverse in zone aesthetic. It has just as much credibility and chance for zone diversity as your conceptual Undermine expansion does.

I simply asked a question, and even the "variation" you speak of on Argus still had thematics that matched the entire sub continent. Also this;

There is zero to indicate that if Blizzard gave us a void aligned world that the entire aesthetic throughout would be blue and purple.

is a ridiculous statement. If Blizzard is going to make a void aligned world, then yes the world will match the aesthetic one way or another. Will it be entirely blue and purple? Maybe not, but it will have void concepts throughout. That's simply a fact.