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

[Dismayxz]

This one, sorry to double post. I didnt know how to quote another and you

The reason is popped back up is because of the Trading Post items looking like "Azerite" sword/daggers and a "Void" staff

I mean it checks out as far as connections go, albeit still speculation. The November TP has some precedent (even if there is no Trend, given what TP has been so far) to be Blizzcon-adjacent or related in some form, so on-the-nose Weapons as a monthly Reward works fine. It can act as both a teaser and in hindsight, very fitting reward for what they would announce, especially for those who will earn these rewards after the announcement and don't actively follow Discussion/Speculation and spoilery shit.

Toweliee for what it's worth (I still think he wouldn't just blurt it out like that) has hinted at Silithus/Underground shit.

It also works better with general expansion seeding. Take the Iridikron + Xal'atath angle, where one is void, the other just wants to shit all over the Titan's backyard and the immense Hype Blizzard Devs are building for the announcements (which doesn't have to be tangibly related to Gameplay itself, but seeing a fully rendered Cinematic with Sargeras pulling out the Sword and the whole Pantheon just sounds hype af on it's own) and suddenly this Leak makes some basic sense.

It's also apparently flown under the Radar, seeing as it was already a thing 600 Pages back. It still ironically follows the "SoA" naming convention, which in my book is more of a negative, but eh. The name itself is more evocative of BFA. Battle for Azeroth felt clunky, so why couldn't Shadow over Azeroth be a thing.

And Avaloren/West could still be 12.0, which would, for what it's worth, as people have gone back and forth on the legitimacy of Avaloren and such, would be a whole lot more like previous expansion seeding. The Dragon Isles were re-seeded in BFA, there was a whole 'nother Expansion inbetween. Seed Avaloren now, go Underground and deal with World Soul stuff for an Expansion with Void vs Titans, then transition into titan heretics with a Pantheon made whole and take another breather from something Cosmic with the other side of Azeroth. Cosmic - Breather - Cosmic - Breather. Etc.

[Reive]

didn't ion say that a full blown old god expansion was unlikely?

[Wangming]

I truly dread the day we get the "evil light" expansion, should it ever come

maybe an evil light major patch

Not saying the writing team at Blizz has my trust, but on FFXIV side the best received story for an expansion was about evil light. And it was fucking brutal. Shadowbringers is a meme for how often it traumatizes a player.

Here. From October 27th.

I...don't hate this. And it makes sense in a way. Last time WoW wasn't in a good place Illidan came to save it.
Also besides the HoA returning it doesn't talk about features. It doesn't claim to know all of it. Which is a good sign.

[kavikor]

The Heart of Azeroth coming back is so out of left field, it seems absurd to put it in a fake leak.

i also kind of wonder... how would have Earthern/Dwarves gotten so deep into Azeroth? Deep enough to construct what we presume is a city/old god prison, without any major hole. Afaik the biggest hole was the Well of Eternity, so deep it went... literally into Deepholm.

But I guess if they can keep saying we find new islands in the mists, we can find a new hole

[Shadochi]

Fun fact, Dragonflight leak season also saw one leak named "Shadows Over Azeroth", posted January 27th, 2022. But it was mostly about dragons...

I assume they're both referencing the same Shadows over Camelot board game.

I assumed it was referencing The Shadow over Innsmouth

[ercarp]

I assumed it was referencing The Shadow over Innsmouth

Actually... that's probably far more likely.

It's also capitalizing on the idea of a more unorthodox answer to the acronym. Everyone expects "X of Y", but as we saw with "Battle for Azeroth", that's not always the case.

[Woke it Up]

Name is Shadow over Azeroth. It has to do with one of the void lords casting sort of a void barrier thing over Azeroth. Illidan comes back to warn us just before and Sargeras is out of his prison. He's not redeemed from what I gathered but is working alongside the other titans now that they've realized the threat of the void. He pulls out the sword out of Silithus and through the hole we travel to Uldaz. There is a teleporter pad there which takes us to Khaz'Algar, which is underground, like way waaay underground. The earthen have become "corrupted" by being too close to the titan soul of Azeroth.
Heart of Azeroth is back and Khaz'Algar can only be entered if you have the neck equiped. Major world revamp with lots of void portals opening all over similar to Legion Invasions.
Fun Fact: The trailer is narrated by knaifu.

The features cinematic is just all the fires from cataclysm having the color shifted to purple. The maelstrom starts flushing the other direction.

Illidan and sargeras exit wow to star in their own buddy cop show. Demon P.I. Showing after zork and pals

[Harbour]

The Heart of Azeroth coming back is so out of left field, it seems absurd to put it in a fake leak.

Maybe 'leaker' loved it so much back in BFA, he fantasized about it coming back.

[klaussf]

https://twitter.com/Qwik/status/1719425623993798753

[kavikor]

Not saying the writing team at Blizz has my trust, but on FFXIV side the best received story for an expansion was about evil light. And it was fucking brutal. Shadowbringers is a meme for how often it traumatizes a player.



I...don't hate this. And it makes sense in a way. Last time WoW wasn't in a good place Illidan came to save it.
Also besides the HoA returning it doesn't talk about features. It doesn't claim to know all of it. Which is a good sign.

I know FFXIV did, and it was great. But FFXIV also focuses much more on characters, personality, and the player character as a driving force.

Its a lot easier to relate to characters when they're well developed like that.

Not to say Blizzard's writing is always awful, but they don't do character moments as well... They do tend to do worldbuilding writing pretty well, though, and I dread an expansion where all the worldbuilding is based on the light with how one dimensional light aligned characters tend to be in WoW.

- - - Updated - - -

https://twitter.com/Qwik/status/1719425623993798753

inb4 "No Dwarves" tweet from Qwik

[Dismayxz]

didn't ion say that a full blown old god expansion was unlikely?

It does sound more like Void vs Titans, in which case, while Old Gods are part of the Void, the Void is more than just Old Gods. Specifying something as not "full-blown Old God", does not necessarily translate into a Void or Void-adjacent Expansion being off the table, just going by logic.

[justwatching]

Well Metzen is gonna do the announcement I assume so probably quite loud.

[milkmustache]

I know Illidan is such a "break glass in case of emergency" character but if I heard his voice again I'd lose my mind with hype.

[Nyel]

So if Void‘s back on the menu, so is the convention leak with the void pillars, right?

[kavikor]

I know Illidan is such a "break glass in case of emergency" character but if I heard his voice again I'd lose my mind with hype.

"I thought my hunt was over... Little did I know... I WAS NOT PREPARED!" *queue void bullshit and Illidan fighting it off whilst infused with Sargeras demon soul or some bullshit*

[Hyrja]

In my language SOA means STD so i will never unsee that xD

[Harbour]

https://twitter.com/Qwik/status/1719425623993798753

Battle for Azeroth: Electric Woonzaloo 2.

[kavikor]

So if Void‘s back on the menu, so is the convention leak with the void pillars, right?

Nah, the people in that image with the void pillars were straight up among us characters ie torsos with legs and no heads/arms and blobs with multiple limbs.

[Ebonn]

Just came in to say it’s IMPOSSIBLE for there to be an expansion about Yrel and evil Light. Patch at most.

(To be taken as EXTREME hopium and not fact.)

[allifeur]

Oh, that's a triquetra, a celtic symbol. That's new in WoW I think, so I imagine this would be related to Avaloren.