The War Within 11.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Hitei]

I mean, the point is that the Void wins in this timeline. So even if we defeated all those external threats, we were still headed for armageddon. The idea here is that yeah, the Lich King sucked. Sargeras sucked. But we beat them once. The Void, we weren't able to. So our only hope was to go back, despite all of it.

The void "wins" because your proposal is that it be written as winning to necessitate the pointless reset that isn't doing anything. That isn't an indication of the narrative or gameplay value of resetting or justification that it's necessary, it's a proposal of how to explain in universe why a reset is happening.

[Worldshaper]

I'm saying what's been known and what's been rightfully clowned on back then.

To this day, people REALLY dislike the Cata ending specifically.

I'll be the first to admit that we weren't always happy with the story back then, either. But it sure as heck was better than what we've got today. It was impactful, bombastic, made you pump your fist in the air, and kept you hooked.

Whereas now, I'm still eagerly awaiting any type of vital sign from the expansion's antagonists beyond "Hee Hee, burn another tree!" or "right, that's it for this patch's 3 minute story, see you in 8 weeks everybody!". And the fact that this is an improvement from Shadowlands' "everyone's a robot, nothing is real, nothing matters" type of storytelling is bizarre.

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The void "wins" because your proposal is that it be written as winning to necessitate the pointless reset that isn't doing anything. That isn't an indication of the narrative or gameplay value of resetting or justification that it's necessary, it's an explanation of how to explain in universe why a reset is happening.

Not really, no. If you've been keeping up with the story, it does seem like the Void is winning.

It's the last one out of the universe's three major antagonistic forces to make its big play. So there's something final about it. We're also seeing the Titans undermined like never before, the pillar representing everything that's "good" traditionally. We've also got plenty of hints over the years to suggest that the Old Gods are a step ahead of us, corrupting Azeroth's world-soul wirthout us knowing, and so on. Not to mention the fact that we've run out of expansion ideas and landmasses. Shortly put, we're approaching the end of WoW's original storylines. Whatever comes next will be different.

[Santandame]

Sometimes it feels like y'all want WoW to be like Star Wars, wanting them to keep banking on the old shit and not doing anything new cause "nostalgia is cool".

What the hell are you going on about? Do you know anything about Star Wars? You clearly haven’t been following any of the new shows and direction because they’ve moved away from the original trilogy to focus on different characters and environments.

[Shadowferal]

I mean... what if?

What if they've decided, fuck it. We ran out of lore. Like Ion said, we dug ourselves into a corner (paraphrasing).

What if the new expansion is this:

- We lose. The Void wins. Our timeline is effed. Finally, we met an enemy that was just too far ahead of us. The Old Gods really did do their homework, and there's nothing we can do. Except...

- Chromie or somebody does a thing. We see one of those time-rewind effects, moving back through history at a rapid pace.

- *THUNK* The effect stops. A cinematic plays. We hear the first few musical notes of an enhanced Elwynn Forest soundtrack. We open our eyes. We've been given a second chance to stop the Void.

- The expansion is literally Classic+, but in the modern engine. Perhaps a few features are altered, but in general it's still the same game.

Lore is reset. Ton of characters and locations return. We set out on a new journey, and it's all in glorious HD.

I like this!
Too much to hope for, but I think it'd get a lot of former subscribers attention.

[Reive]

Yes. A lot of people.

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yeah not really. Most cinematics in dragonflight struggle to break 400k views when in the past 1m was the bare minimum. story is boring

"Make us adventurers again"

Lmaooo you did not play Dragonflight

Dragonflight was supposed to be a "slow burn" expansion like mop where you start as an explorer/adventurer and then the story starts to ramp up. Also strenght wise the primalists/raszageth were not comparable to villains like titan+++ jailer or n'zoth.

[Cheezits]

https://x.com/mrgmyt/status/1706774792597324160?s=46

UHHHHHHHHH

[Reive]

Yeah, but on the other hand to say that Dragonflight is 'wholesome and cutesy' is an overstatement imo. I'd rather blame it on Dragonflight being filled with half measures an so far, unmet conclusions. We'll see what 10.2 has to offer and if there's any continuation afterwards, but so far, Tyr's story is purposeless, Iridikron story is nowhere to be seen or he just serves as "see what comes next", Vyranoth making a snap decision without any significant build-up, Nozdormu and Murozond having no meaningful influence on the story apart from the MacGuffin void artefact that is in Iridkron's possesion.
There are simply too many parallel storylines that aspire to be grand and well resolved, but end-up being an obstruction to main story development.

The execution is just lacking in my opinion.

Agree with almost everything, but i still think dragonflight's vibe is incredibly off. It's incredibly evident when you play both classic and retail. retail feels way less serious (and cool)

[Dismayxz]

It's pretty much the same color, but that doesn't really mean a lot.

How so? It quite often actually means a lot in WoW. And the Left Wing and Arm being weird isn't exactly taking it either direction (AI or no AI), because that would also be expected of what clearly is a Void-related being? Faceless are essentially Void Related, they aren't exactly the Champions of balanced body proportions.

[Xilurm]

2004-2014 was sloppy as shit, and it took current expacs to course correct some of the shit that occurred from there.

Legion made Illidan into a proper anti-hero again, Shadowlands fixed the stupid asf "there must always be a Lich King" ending from Wrath, Dragonflight quite literally fixed the shitty Cataclysm ending, etc.

What am I even reading. Yes, they made stupid decisions. But if you think that Vanilla-MoP was worse than what we have now you're out of your mind.

WoD - Alternate universes, but make the legion the same in all of those anyway. It actually ruins everything, literally.

Legion - So called infinite Legion gets the floor wiped with them after we attack their home planet like it's nothing. In a damn patch.

BFA - Makes Sylvanas a villain for no reason, commit genocide for shock value. So called "4th war" (which should've technically been called 7th) doesn't even last that long and they quickly skip through things like Nazjatar and Azshara, and N'zoth which should've been their own expansions.

Shadowlands - You're delusional if you think that expansion brought anything good to this game. " fixed the stupid asf "there must always be a Lich King" ending from Wrath". No it didn't because the scourge is still running rampart as Bolvar said. Also they introduced a villain who apparently takes all the credit for uh, literally everything that has ever happened in the warcraft universe and then just fucking dies.

[Houle]

@Worldshaper

"If we think about it, has World of Warcraft really improved Warcraft's lore over the past decade?"

Lmao wot?

WoW quite literally expanded the Warcraft universe in ways the RTS never could. New threats are being made, new futures are being started, and old threafs have been eliminated thanks to WoW. Like, what do you mean???

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Also, remember when people thought we'd see Y'Shaarj or Yogg-Saron in DF?

Jesus fuck...

Everything that WoW did, an RTS couldve done better, story-wise.
In an RTS, the factions couldve actually been disbanded or changed over the years (as they logically should). The only reason the Horde and Alliance still exist as they do now is bc of the MMO format, no matter how little sense it made sometimes. In an RTs, the villains could win in some form every now and then (and they did, looking at both WC2 and WC3, where Ner'zhul ended up as the clear winner both times). In an MMO, we know the villain wont win or survive long-term, we know theyll eventually end up as raid bosses and get rekt.

New threats being introduced in an actual world-changing way, old enemies finally defeated for good, all of that wouldve been just as possible or more in an RTS, but on better scale and with ACTUAL consequences for the world, its races and factions. The world is allowed to change more. Thats just a fact.

Oh, and about that before: most people arent saying stuff like Maldraxxus or Torghast or the Fist Ones dont feel like WoW - what most people are saying is that they are simply cheap, weaker copies of the original stuff.
The First Ones basically got the role the Titans had before, as the mysterious, super-powerful beings above evertyhing else, of which we have very little information through their ancient artifacts and myths.
Maldraxxus and Torghast were shamelessly ripped straight from the Scourge, and then presented as the "original" version of it in the story.
Thats what people dont like - its stuff we had before, but without the build up, and desperately presented as "bigger and badder this time". And all of that is made even worse by the fact that the player character visited and basically lived in the fckn afterlife of the story - which is 99% of the time a shit idea for fanatasy stories, bc it devalues death in the overall story, both before and afterwards.

What dosnt feel like Warcraft, at least not the original, is the concept of neatly ordered "cosmic forces". They are straight up comic book material, and would neatly fit into Marvel or DC. But thats Chronicles (and thus partly Metzens) fault really, and thus cant be blamed on SL. SLs fault is doubling down on it.

[ChairmanKaga]

https://x.com/mrgmyt/status/1706774792597324160?s=46

UHHHHHHHHH

Yeah, what the...

[Hitei]

Not really, no. If you've been keeping up with the story, it does seem like the Void is winning.

It's the last one out of the universe's three major antagonistic forces to make its big play. So there's something final about it. We're also seeing the Titans undermined like never before, the pillar representing everything that's "good" traditionally. We've also got plenty of hints over the years to suggest that the Old Gods are a step ahead of us, corrupting Azeroth's world-soul wirthout us knowing, and so on. Not to mention the fact that we've run out of expansion ideas and landmasses. Shortly put, we're approaching the end of WoW's original storylines. Whatever comes next will be different.

Everything about this is wrong though.

The Void was the first to make it's play at the start of the planet's history. The Titans were completely undermined 15-30,000+ years ago when their prisons when the Void was so overbearing that it turned one of them insane, and they continued to be undermined throughout history, with their prisons being completely ineffectual containment and all of their servants being corrupted or transformed into new races.

The titans have never traditionally been the pillar represent "everything that's good". They've been the pillar representing creators. The Light is the pillar that has traditionally represented everything that is good.

Shortly put, we're approaching the end of WoW's original storylines. Whatever comes next will be different.

No, we already passed that. It was called Shadowlands.

[Raetary]

https://x.com/mrgmyt/status/1706774792597324160?s=46

UHHHHHHHHH

Interesting.
Very interesting.

[Catastrophy349]

https://x.com/TheWindstalker/status/...271182554?s=20

[Santandame]

Regardless of what is revealed at Blizzcon, I’m sure we’re all going to be extremely hyped.

[Catastrophy349]

Regardless of what is revealed at Blizzcon, I’m sure we’re all going to be extremely hyped.

For sure! We got a little bit of everyone in this forum. Light, Void, Revamp, Avaloren, the HYPE is real!

[Shadowferal]

What am I even reading. Yes, they made stupid decisions. But if you think that Vanilla-MoP was worse than what we have now you're out of your mind.

I'm getting am impression from a few here that any improvement on the lore/story areas won't be welcome. (I'm agreeing with you if I came across vague)

[Valysar]

https://x.com/mrgmyt/status/1706774792597324160?s=46

UHHHHHHHHH

Blizzcon's reward ?

[Cheezits]

Time to check the Dream/Nightmare leaks...

[ChairmanKaga]

https://x.com/mrgmyt/status/1706774792597324160?s=46

UHHHHHHHHH

Wait is this confirmation of this leak?

https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads...raft-Awakening

1. First classic+ expansion
2. $49.99
3. the whole idea is a "what if " the dark portal didn't open after vanilla
4. Chris Metzen is the main head behind the project
5. will reuse assets from BC/Wrath/Cataclysm to maintain the visual aspect of the classic era
6. New models will look like the "Reawakened Phase-Hunter mount"
7. level cap is 70
8. without new continents, Hyjal and Emerald Dream will be new zones
9. The idea is to finish the various vanilla questlines that were lost in time with the arrival of Burning Crusade
10. High Elves and Ogres are the new races respectively for the Alliance and Horde
11. The first raid tier will be agains the Scourge
12. Cataclysm Classic will happen after Wrath

You can consider me a liar, see you on November 3rd