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

[Teriz]

We’ve been to it’s island several times. It would be silly to think it’d look any different than “Kezan but underground”

Pretty much every source has stated that Undermine and Kezan are two different places.

How dare blizzard use a similar statue for the dwarves that have started behaving like our dwarves! Grr

Except its the same statue, just with smoother textures which isn't hard to replicate given modern tools. The other statue with the axe looks like another existing WoW statue stitched together and placed in the background.

Four still screenshots, likely one of each zone isn’t enough to say it’s a “rehash of existing content”, because you can do that with every expansion.

I guarantee we can find reused assets in every expansion reveal.
But you know, doomers gonna doom

Yeah, because the zones literally look like DF content. As I said, when I saw Shadolwands, BFA, Legion, etc. content for the first time it was rather easy to tell we were looking at a new expansion and location. This looks like stuff we've done and seen before.

[blaatschaap]

I really, really, really doubt the title will be storms of avaloren. They've never used something not already established firmly in lore as (part of) the title for an expansion (well, cataclysm I guess, but even then the shattering book came out before the expansion launched). It would really surprise me a lot.

[Rathwell]

I guess Iridikron tries to do a thing and we stop him from doing the thing.

Iridikron goes there to find this massively powerful super Titan-destroying weapon that was built by the heretics. We go there to stop him, but just as he's about to die he falls to his knees and explains that everything he did, he did to protect Azeroth from a far greater threat. The Titans are not who they'd have us believe they are. We then destroy the weapon, but OH NO! The sky goes all dark with teal swirly magic stuff happening and a storm gathers, then BAM! The Titan return to Azeroth, and they're not happy with what we've done to the place.

If only we hadn't so foolishly slain Iridikron!

[Teriz]

Found it on 4chan, looks kinda ugly

LoL! Fake as hell.

Also that name is terrible.

[MyWholeLifeIsThunder]

The amount of people who think re-used asset = fake really goes to show they just have absolutely zero clue how game development works. Re-use of assets is very normal for a game development cycle. Do you expect 10000 new tree models and textures for them too any time there is a new continent? Whoever brings up "re-used" assets as an excuse that something is fake is not to be taken seriously.

No... the problem is the almost complete lack of anything that could be considered wholly original (even the Dwarf is derivative of something that already exists) that's what giving people pause.

It looks great, very much WoW, but because it's using pieces that already exist in the game, nothing entirely new.

So it's either a real leak that for some reason doesn't show anything really *new*, or a very well made fake that uses already existing in game assets for the verisimilitude.

[Wangming]

Antorus was not available until after Blizzcon, so the whole Sargeras-stabbing-the-planet thing was unknown. All we had was a datamined Silithus crater and a teeny tiny encrypted box in the middle, iirc.

To be fair even 10.2 won't release until after BlizzCon.
I just realized this.
So that would be weird, won't it?

"Hey guys, this is the next expansion, but we can't talk about what is going to happen there cause that would spoil the ending of the next two patches."

[Raetary]

Tbh the tree is one of the few things that just seems wrong.
It looks incredibly low res compared to the rest, but who knows idk.

It's not low res, the branches are just thin so it appears lower quality than it actually is because the image itself is blurry.

The tree is a DF asset, as ercarp pointed out:

@Demonly and I did some snooping around and found that the tree used in one of the screenshots already exists as an asset in-game.



It's called 10can_tree_burnt_b01_off.m2 and it's found in the Waking Shores.





My question is, has Blizzard reused this many assets in the past when going into what's supposed to be a brand new expansion?

Combining this finding with @Marlamin's earlier analysis, it seems like there's an unusually high amount of assets from Dragonflight. It almost makes it seem like Avaloren (if real) should be 10.3, not 11.0.

[Pheraz]

I can't believe sitting here and praying to the Warcraft gods (lolz) that @Teriz is right xD Go cave go!!!

[Selorian]

Oh, even a 10.3.5 on top of 10.3? And 10.3 just lasting for 6 months? And then it being supposedly such a huge patch? Suuuuuuure.

6 months is as long as every other season/raid tier

Not saying it will definitely happen--I personally think 10.2 is gonna be the last raid and at most we get a fated-like thing--just that it's not impossible.

[Nightshade711]

Pretty much every source has stated that Undermine and Kezan are two different places.

Not every source, as in-game we’ve seen the entrance to Undermine on Kezan. And other goblin starting zone stuff.

Except its the same statue, just with smoother textures which isn't hard to replicate given modern tools. The other statue with the axe looks like another existing WoW statue stitched together and placed in the background.

Still haven’t even seen the whole statue, only one side of it that’s mostly obstructed.

Yeah, because the zones literally look like DF content. As I said, when I saw Shadolwands, BFA, Legion, etc. content for the first time it was rather easy to tell we were looking at a new expansion and location. This looks like stuff we've done and seen before.

Not really. As mentioned before, the first screenshot you mentioned doesn’t look really much like Azure Span. I just don’t see any VALID comparisons. Unless “oh no both zones have orange rocks!!” Means they’re both waking shore.

At most it reminds me of Kul Tiras in a way but I can’t put my finger on it.

[Raetary]

Found it on 4chan, looks kinda ugly

This is so fake and ugly that whoever made it should feel ashamed.

[Wangming]

So it's either a real leak that for some reason doesn't show anything really *new*, or a very well made fake that uses already existing in game assets for the verisimilitude.

Yeah, this is what my rambling about the money shot was trying to convey, but you did it a lot better.

If i wanted to leak stuff, I would leak something interesting. Not just "Bugger me sideways, looks like 11.0 will have trees and rocks."

[ercarp]

That depends? Are these harpies native to Avaloren? Cause they may not have been exposed to other harpy cultures since....forever I guess. This is like asking how many writing systems could humans have.

I was being somewhat facetious as I feel like Blizzard tends to use harpies as more of a random hostile mob type for the players to kill rather than a species that actually has some nuance and cultural differences across groups. I would love for them to expand more on harpies and make them into something more than a bunch of half-bird half-something creatures that screech and shoot lightning at you.

[JMitchy96]

The amount of people who think re-used asset = fake really goes to show they just have absolutely zero clue how game development works. Re-use of assets is very normal for a game development cycle. Do you expect 10000 new tree models and textures for them too any time there is a new continent? Whoever brings up "re-used" assets as an excuse that something is fake is not to be taken seriously.

I mean, you are right in saying that's how gamedev works. But how many times have blizzard shown off new content in trailers with this many reused assets? Afaik, the scale of reuse we're seeing in these images is completely unheard of.

Old World revamp has always been a background buzz, but it's something that only really became widespread in Dragonflight.

It's hard to hit a mark that showed up years after work on the expansion already started.

You think? World revamp has been one of the most requested/anticipated expansions since around BFA iirc, that's not exactly a short amount of time.

[Murlocos]

I was being somewhat facetious as I feel like Blizzard tends to use harpies as more of a random hostile mob type for the players to kill rather than a species that actually has some nuance and cultural differences across groups. I would love for them to expand more on harpies and make them into something more than a bunch of half-bird half-something creatures that screech and shoot lightning at you.

If the leak is real, I bet 10 trader's tendies that the harpies are equivalent to the Ohn'ahran centaur. Race that was previously almost entirely hostile getting a friendlier, more soft variation for a faction.

[Ansi]

Did they present Dragon Isles, Kul Tiras and Pandaria as “continents”?

I’d call Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimor continents. I wouldn’t call Dragon Isles a continent.

Imagine Avaloren being the size of Kalimdor.

EDIT: According to Wowpedia these are continents:

Azeroth's continents

• Eastern Kingdoms
  
  • Lordaeron
  • Khaz Modan
  • Azeroth
• Kalimdor
  
  • Northern Kalimdor
  • Central Kalimdor
  • Southern Kalimdor
• Northrend
• Pandaria

[Rathwell]

If i wanted to leak stuff, I would leak something interesting. Not just "Bugger me sideways, looks like 11.0 will have trees and rocks."

I mean, leakers don't really get to pick and choose what to leak, they can only leak what they have access to. If these zone photos are real it's not like a leaker would go, "Better not leak these, they're not sufficiently interesting". If boring zone photos is what Blizzard provides then that's all they can leak.

[Ersula]

10.3 is dead, the game model is going to Tom Chilton and Bobby Koticks Annual Expansion format!

If your game's big 20th anniversary was in November 2024, why wouldn't you release the expansion then? Even if you had to make a filler raid tier, you would.

[Dismayxz]

I can't believe sitting here and praying to the Warcraft gods (lolz) that @Teriz is right xD Go cave go!!!

Okay, this is a sign. You need to take your hopium-d and copium-c, you are slipping into dangerous territory.

[Wangming]

If only we hadn't so foolishly slain Iridikron!

Yes, it was a mistake. Like we killed poor Illdian. And Poor Zovaal. And we imprisoned Sargeras wo just wants to protect us from the Void Lords. How foolish mortal we aaare!