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

[ercarp]

He has given us another acronym! To your stations!

Dwarves of Avaloren! I knew it!

[Nyel]

Honestly this is most expansions we got since vanilla. I understand one can dislike the direction of the game, the setting, the pics (fake or not) but let's stop pretend we didin't do basically the same thing in every xpac, what really differs is the degree of unknowingness of the places we visit

And the importance of the ongoing events. Some expansions had an impact, others didn’t. Expansions like WoD and Shadowlands didn’t contribute anything or helped improving the overall perception of the World of Warcraft. For the greater context you could remove them from the expansion list and not much would happen as their impact is so meaningless. We don’t know where Dragonflight is aiming at, but right now it’s definitely more on the side of WoD and Shadowlands than it is on the side of something world-shaping like Cataclysm or Legion.

So even if those expansions felt similar to the ones before (we really cannot count Legion here as it introduced so many new things that are to this day part of the game), their overall lasting impression on the universe was way bigger.

[Nightshade711]

Just follow this hashtag on Twitter to see what crazy things people are capable of: https://twitter.com/hashtag/EpsilonW...=hashtag_click

This is a good fake leak, but it's not beyond the realms of what's possible for fans.

That is true. You know that if the picture of Undermine(?) were posted here after cropping out the chat window, certain posters would swear up and down it’s so legit.

[ercarp]

Dwarves of Avaloren!

Damn, beat me to it.

[Raetary]

He has given us another acronym! To your stations!

Doors of Awakening
Doom of Avaloren
Dusk of Ascension
Dreams of Avaloren
Donkeys on Azeroth
Dangerously overcaffeinted Adventurers

[Yarathir]

Yes, a group of dwarves, who never met with the clans we've known up to this point carved the same exact bird that wildhammer clan has. Makes a lot of sense.

Asset reuse is a thing, y'know.

The thing is that I can't tell for certain from here if it's an upgraded version or just smoothed out with photoshop and hidden behind other assets so people can't tell if it's the exact same model or an updated version.

[Nyel]

So much doom and gloom here. Four leaked screenshots and people are already claiming that the new expansion is DoA. Goes to show how jaded the WoW community is.

It rather shows how Blizzard has constantly lowered the bar and players‘ expectations of what Blizzard can and will deliver have plummeted accordingly.

[CaptainV]

Depths of Avaloren could be a name.

[Teriz]

Imagine taking 4 photos and creating your own “HEADCANON” to describe why this is bad, and WoW is somehow “dead.” This is insane.

How is it insane? Those pics look like a retread of the environments we’ve already spent almost a year in, and they simply don’t look interesting because we’ve already done it. If this is played on the big screen of BlizzCon as the new expansion, WoW’s going to take a massive hit, because this looks lazy.

[Yarathir]

Out of all the models in these screenshots, this one is probably the easiest to modify slightly to give more rounded edges.

Well, of course, and to uprez/redraw the textures. Sadly, I can't tell if that's the case in that screenshot.

[ercarp]

Yes, a group of dwarves, who never met with the clans we've known up to this point carved the same exact bird that wildhammer clan has. Makes a lot of sense.

Avaloren/Khaz Algar is just an excuse for Blizzard to add more dwarf lore/zones to the game. Of course they will have the same iconography, they also have gryphon riders and they named their home turf Khaz Algar (pretty similar to Khaz Modan). Blizzard is just trying to get ahead of the lore nerds who will point out how none of it makes any sense.

A contingent of earthen was sent by the titan keepers to investigate a geological anomaly in a fissure detected on Sector AR-938. In time, these earthen begun to display behaviors similar to those who had fallen under the influence of the flesh, despite being separated by a great distance and sharing no cultural ties whatsoever. To the keepers, the similarities were uncanny. Although both groups remained physiologically distinct, the earthen had started to refer to Sector AR-938 as Khaz Algar, and their behaviors, language, and demeanor showed many similarities to other former earthen groups.

[NikolaiShade]

And the importance of the ongoing events. Some expansions had an impact, others didn’t. Expansions like WoD and Shadowlands didn’t contribute anything or helped improving the overall perception of the World of Warcraft. For the greater context you could remove them from the expansion list and not much would happen as their impact is so meaningless. We don’t know where Dragonflight is aiming at, but right now it’s definitely more on the side of WoD and Shadowlands than it is on the side of something world-shaping like Cataclysm or Legion.

So even if those expansions felt similar to the ones before (we really cannot count Legion here as it introduced so many new things that are to this day part of the game), their overall lasting impression on the universe was way bigger.

Although I agree with you, it's all really subjective. When you talk about lasting impacts do you mean story-wise, in that sense for better or for worse SL and WoD become more relevant, from the gameplay side I could argue all expacks had an impact, except for WoD maybe. But even WoD added some feature we have today.

Edit: and indeed we don't know where DF is going so we can speculate all we want, but if Blizz decides a meteorite strikes azeroth and we must resettle to Avaloren then my kudos to whoever could figure that out

[Taurelius]

It rather shows how Blizzard has constantly lowered the bar and the expectations of what Blizzard can and will deliver of players has plummeted accordingly.

You act like Dragonflight was not a massive improvement to the game... removal of borrowed power systems, better patch cadence, listening to feedback. WoW is not as bad as you make it out to be.

[Yarathir]

Avaloren/Khaz Algar is just an excuse for Blizzard to add more dwarf lore/zones to the game. Of course they will have the same iconography, they also have gryphon riders and they named their home turf Khaz Algar (pretty similar to Khaz Modan). Blizzard is just trying to get ahead of the lore nerds who will point out how none of it makes any sense.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Them reusing a gryphon statue isn't necessarily a debunk in and of itself considering all the gryphon rider mumbo jumbo we've already heard about and seen.

[Teriz]

That is true. You know that if the picture of Undermine(?) were posted here after cropping out the chat window, certain posters would swear up and down it’s so legit.

Please keep in mind, I’m not saying these are fake, I’m saying if these are real, it’s a bad sign for the next expansion, because it looks like a lazy retread.

And yeah I’d be much more interested in seeing underground zones because it’d be something different.

[Nyel]

Although I agree with you, it's all really subjective. When you talk about lasting impacts do you mean story-wise, in that sense for better or for worse SL and WoD become more relevant, from the gameplay side I could argue all expacks had an impact, except for WoD maybe. But even WoD added some feature we have today.

Just story-wise, not in regards to any gameplay they added.

- - - Updated - - -

You act like Dragonflight was not a massive improvement to the game... removal of borrowed power systems, better patch cadence, listening to feedback. WoW is not as bad as you make it out to be.

When your last two expansions have been lows for your franchise, being a massive improvement is less spectacular than it sounds. Why compare it to the lows when we can and should compare it to the highs? And in that regard Dragonflight is at best middle of the road. At best.

[Cheezits]

So either the person who made the website leak made these as well, or both are real?

If the person is a very good modeler I can see them being the creator of the new models.

[huth]

He has given us another acronym! To your stations!

World of Warcraft: Dead on Arrival.

We're going back to the Shadowlands.

[Pheraz]

The more I look at that storm d0rf the more I think it is real....
Those arms evenly becoming those fist weapons looks very well made.
The blur on the outlines everywhere but the d0rf certainly comes from the camera moving around with the d0rf being the center I guess.

[Nebron]

I think Shadowlands, and definitely Zereth Mortis might be the first original locations to WoW.

I believe Shadowlands was mentioned before, but they re-imagined it to fit as an expansion, but yeah, Zereth Mortis is totally new one, yet it's still a single zone.
Avaloren seems to be a brand-new continent that has a variety of biomes in it. Interesting, altough the images don't look so exciting to me