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

[Cheezits]

Looks like the new Warlock quest involves new Warlock race recruits that explain their reasoning for joining, including a Lightforged.

https://twitter.com/Gurzog/status/1656813130276585473

[huth]

It just doesn't make sense. And it can't work with flying machines, insects, and magical creatures.
Unless it is strictly limited to an event outside the islands for a certain period, I do not see this system working.

You're confusing "working" with "looking good". You could replace the model with pretty much any other model in the game and it would still work. It'd just look stupid.
You're also way overestimating how many of those mounts there are. That's a pretty small fraction.

The biggest issue with Dragonriding outside the Dragon Isles would be that the world wasn't build for that speed (e.g. assets need to be loaded at greater distance and earlier than when you can only go air swim speed), though how much of an issue that is depends on the design specifics and may not be all that hard to solve.
And they have to do the same work whether it is time limited or not, so they may as well do it permanently.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Looks like the new Warlock quest involves new Warlock race recruits that explain their reasoning for joining, including a Lightforged.

https://twitter.com/Gurzog/status/1656813130276585473

Well thats encouraging.

[Cheezits]

Well thats encouraging.

I think the Lightforged is actually the main character of the questline, so Blizz knew what they were doing there.

[Khaza-R]

The problem with dragonriding is that it is extremely limited to dragons themselves and a few winged creatures using gravity. I like this system but in what world would it work with all the flying mounts in the game?
I mean...I love my bee and moth mount, how am I supposed to fly with it if a dragon is much faster? That would mean that, I don't know, 70-80% (number at random) of the mounts in the collection would be totally useless. I have no idea if they have any plans to fix this, but it's really frustrating to watch them wade through their mistakes by releasing systems that aren't thought to work as a whole.
It is not at all designed to work with all mounts in the game and yet we are heading towards a world where it will be available outside of the Dragon Islands.

Unless there's a revamp pending where old flying gets completely replaced then they really don't need to work at all. They are fine just existing in legacy content.

This could also just be the first iteration of dynamic flight. For all we know next expansion there could be another set of mounts with new abilities like blink or phase shift that work better with alternative mount types.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

Looks like the new Warlock quest involves new Warlock race recruits that explain their reasoning for joining, including a Lightforged.

https://twitter.com/Gurzog/status/1656813130276585473

This feels insufficient to me. I am not exactly encouraged by this explanation, because it hardly even constitutes an explanation at all; how is Oman reconciling—both physically and intellectually—the severe friction between the power he wields and the one that suffuses his body? What led him to make the decision he did, provided that there's plenty of other options for anomalous Lightforged, such as becoming one of the innumerable Battlemages we already saw on Argus? This explains nothing, and does little to ease my discontent regarding the concept.

[Berkilak]

But do people who play enhancement shaman want the spec to suddenly be near the bottom of the dps ranks and have fairly poor dps for solo activities?

Both are speculative qualifiers at best. But even so, as someone who had mained an Enhancement Shaman since launch, my answer is an emphatic yes.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

I confess I am somewhat disappointed that the Infinite Dragonflight story is limited to a megadungeon. I was always of the mind that they deserved anywhere from their own raid to their own expansion. Hopefully this isn't the end of that whole story thread, and it does seem like it thankfully won't be that way on account of how it seems to end with Nozdormu being corrupted. I am hoping to see more of them in the future, as they are easily my favorite Dragon lore in WoW.

One thing that is also fairly interesting is that the descriptions in the dungeon journal seem to suggest that the main timeline may be somehow impacted irrevocably by Murozond. The description is a tad ambiguous, but one could read it as meaning that the corrupted Tyr is a retroactive alteration of the original.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

But do people who play enhancement shaman want the spec to suddenly be near the bottom of the dps ranks and have fairly poor dps for solo activities?

as a shaman ya id love it, preferably give us back two handers to.

[LemonDemonGirl]

Are Allied Races disabled on the PTR? I can't seem to make one?

[Chickat]

I think we can officially say they are back to a good content cadence. Tbh I think the content is better than legion patch content too. The only things Legion had going for it over DF are the artifact appearances to earn on every class, and Suramar. I think id rather play DF than legion though.

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God, I hope the 10.1.5 PTR has something exciting.

Cool Bronze or Blue flight-themed rewards?

New class/race combos that have an impact, like new Paladins, Druids or Shaman?

Surprise Dracthyr third spec?

Overhauled login screen?

Account-wide currency?

New character customisation?

Hoping it's not just: "here's a megadungeon, some class changes, and a boring world event."

Id say you got half of what you wanted. Overall W minor patch imo.

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Yeah that gave real "Both sides are bad" vibes. Wrathion is stupid and reckless but his 8.3 version clearly was also caring and he has carried forth like that.

I like both, and I would choose Wrathion if I had to, but at this point im rooting for Ebbysian to be the new Aspect.

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Sure, I'm not saying anyone is out of character - merely that the characters of Wrathion and Sabellian are annoying. Ebyssian, too, is pretty in-character for who he's always been since his intro in Legion: mediator, wise elder, and generally down-to-earth as befits his choice of visage.

Tbh, I kinda want the earth aspect to be Down to Earth. Pun intended, but for real also.

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Mega Mythic Dungeon. Ok, cool and apparently....Iridakron?

Im glad they seem to be saving Moruzond for a raid or future conflict. Seems Galakrond or Iridikron will be the final boss of the dungeon.

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This makes me wonder...is the Infinite stuff going to be handled for just this Megadungeon? Or is this going to a main focus throughout the expac?

Tbh, I could be wrong here, but I think we will deal with the infinite mostly in this dungeon, and it will thread into 11.0 with the Infinites being the initial villain leading to a new threat as the final boss.

11.0, time travel expansion to Ancient Kalimdor? .1 or .2 end boss Moruzond. Would have to have way less dragons for sure, but a few or one tier in 11.0 wouldnt be too bad.

[Berkilak]

Blizzard should allow players to level in the current expansion. When the story is done they can keep leveling through WQs. The tech is there and they have been using it for a while. They just need one more step to get it right.

In such a way, a world revamp would be easier to do IMO, as all zones could be relevant to all players.

Alternatively, scale it for new players (first character on account) so they actually end up at the level cap when finishing the current expansion.

[Chickat]

So, it looks like Iridikron is probably going to eat some of Galakrond and become a Decay Monster to attack the Dream. I know this has been theorized several times but why else would Iridikron be here?

Soooooo.... Vyranoth? Maybe its a swerve and Vyranoth is the final boss after all?

I think Vyranoth will be a major antagonist in 10.2, but I think its likely one of the incarnates survives and joins team titan and the aspects. Vyranoth is the most likely candidate for that imo. So maybe we fight her, but she realizes she was tricked by him and finds out mid raid or something. I seriously doubt they will Kill Iridikron in the dungeon. Unless they are tryuing to get rid of all the primalist incarnates by 10.2 so they can do Moruzond as the final tier in 10.3?

[Cheezits]

I think Vyranoth will be a major antagonist in 10.2, but I think its likely one of the incarnates survives and joins team titan and the aspects. Vyranoth is the most likely candidate for that imo. So maybe we fight her, but she realizes she was tricked by him and finds out mid raid or something. I seriously doubt they will Kill Iridikron in the dungeon. Unless they are tryuing to get rid of all the primalist incarnates by 10.2 so they can do Moruzond as the final tier in 10.3?

The journal basically spoils that Iridikron is fine and escapes the dungeon.

[Chickat]

Okay, this patch is neat. Not all of it is for me, because it's very Warlock and Evoker-oriented. But I'm still excited to check it all out.

I'm positive they'll sprinkle in some other stuff over time as well, not mentioned here.

What this does do, however, is make me even more excited for 10.1.7 and beyond. Because right now, making Paladins, Druids, and Shamans more available is almost a guarantee. We'll be hearing more about the World Tree, the Emerald Dream, and other stuff more up my alley. Can't wait!

Yeah, I think its clear the World tree in the dream will be attacked by Vyranoth in 10.2. New patch zone the Emerald Dream. Beautiful lush forrests with contrasting arctic snow environments thrown in due to Vyranoth. Raid is us trying to save the tree, with some voidy stuff thrown in due to the nightmare coming back.

I think Vyranoth will learn about a deal iridikron made with the Void during the raid and will fly away mid fight leaving her alive. By 10.3.5 she will chose to join our side.

10.3 is Ancient Kalimdor mega zone similarly sized and in scale to Argus. Main villains, the infinite Dragonflight and Iridikron who didnt die in the 10.1.5 dungeon. 10.2.5 or .7 will feature a timewalking revamp with time related story content to ease us into the mega 10.3 time patch. 10.3 has us on ancient Kalimdor, and is the perfect time to introduce new Archeology as well.

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From the ptr article. High rez Northrend would look sick.

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I think the Infinite stuff should be expanded into future expacs, with DF being but a major part of it. Imagine them in the Domain of Order, fucking around with a Time area which is where Aman'Thul rules over the timeways or so lmao

That would be cool

Yeah, either we are getting a massive time travel patch on the scale of Argus, or Infinite leads into a future expansion.

[Telogrus]

I'm confused by the journal entries for the new megadungeon. It sounds like Murozond is born at the end of the Iridikron encounter, but the Deios entry makes it sound like Murozond hasn't risen yet

[Telogrus]

I'm of the idea that the Infinites MAY be a patch, but as it stands, 10.2 seems to be on the cards for the Dream.

I really hope this is like Elune's area when they mean the Dream. I think there's so much they could do there.

Imo 10.2 is obviously gonna be centered around the Greens and the Dream, with the new World Tree as the new zone. Vyranoth will likely feature as prominently in this patch as Fyrakk has in 10.1. Assuming Fyrakk doesn't die in the last chapter of 10.1 (would be lame af if a Primal Incarnate was killed in a quest), he and/or Vyranoth may be the final bosses of the new raid.

10.3 will focus on Iridikron and/or Murozond. Blizz could even have one of these baddies live to be the villain of 10.4, though it's unlikely Blizz would make DF last longer than 2 years since the sooner the next xpac is released, the more money they can make. If I could have it my way though, DF would be a 5 tier raid expansion, with a Dream raid as the 3rd tier, an Iridikron raid as the 4th tier, and a Murozond raid as the 5th tier.

I also hope a Vakthros megadungeon is released in 10.2.5 or 10.3.5. We still haven't seen what's inside of there, so that has to be addressed at some point. Not to mention that the Vakthros area seems to have gotten a bit too much design focus just to be a place where you do like 3 quests in at the end of the Azure Span. Maybe Vyranoth has something to do with it since it has all those ice spikes? I've heard speculation that it's a prison, though idk what that's based off of. If true, it would be cool if we could have a megadungeon in there where we fight powerful entities imprisoned by the Blues, with Chromatus as the final boss.

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He is likely being born and whatnot, but maybe Murozond hasn't fully won the timeway BS yet til we get to Deios. It can end either with him winning and running away, or him losing and either Murozond escapes for a later patch/expac, or he gets cleansed right then and there.

I'm hoping Murozond lives to see another day so that we can get a full-on Infinite Dragonflight raid. The megadungeon looks cool, but the Infinites really do deserve more love. They're one of the coolest dragonflights in the lore, and there's so much that can be done with them.

Not to mention that Murozond is a very useful tool to keep around in case Blizz wants to retcon some of the more questionable lore decisions in the last decade lol.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

Sure, I'm not saying anyone is out of character - merely that the characters of Wrathion and Sabellian are annoying. Ebyssian, too, is pretty in-character for who he's always been since his intro in Legion: mediator, wise elder, and generally down-to-earth as befits his choice of visage.

The issue is that this reflects well on Ebyssian only because it was done with that express purpose. Although Wrathion and Sabellian are not totally out-of-character, they are seemingly expressing themselves only at their worst and most absolutely insufferable; their portrayal within the context of the patch and its content seems to be specifically oriented around Blizzard being able to justify putting Ebyssian in power.

[Berkilak]

The issue is that this reflects well on Ebyssian only because it was done with that express purpose. Although Wrathion and Sabellian are not totally out-of-character, they are seemingly expressing themselves only at their worst and most absolutely insufferable; their portrayal within the context of the patch and its content seems to be specifically oriented around Blizzard being able to justify putting Ebyssian in power.

Or justifying him as a kingmaker for less-storied character. Note his parting words to Emberthal after admonishing the quarrelling “brothers”: he tells her, not them, to lead the way. Quite literally, of course, but I believe it to be a very deliberate phrase. 10.1 has been a showcase of Emberthal’s leadership skills and she has been inserted into the black Aspect narrative for a reason.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

Or justifying him as a kingmaker for less-storied character. Note his parting words to Emberthal after admonishing the quarrelling “brothers”: he tells her, not them, to lead the way. Quite literally, of course, but I believe it to be a very deliberate phrase. 10.1 has been a showcase of Emberthal’s leadership skills and she has been inserted into the black Aspect narrative for a reason.

If Emberthal is chosen, it would really be the worst way to tie up this story in my opinion; whereas I somewhat dislike Ebyssian as a choice because he's fairly flat, it at least comes with the silver lining of subverting Blizzard's typical trope of having the young, plucky upstart upstage their older counterparts. Emberthal is not only wholly unsuitable for the position on a thematic level on account of being a Dracthyr, it also just doesn't strike me as a good way to continue the arc of the representative of a race that nobody wanted to begin with.