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

[Worldshaper]

So any news on when we'll get those awesome Crusader Helmets in the Trading Post, or the "chainmail bikinis"?

On another note, here's what I think (hope) the Worldsoul Saga looks like:

> 18 month expansions
> TWW in September 2024
> Midnight early 2026
> TLT mid 2027
> Whatever comes after Worldsoul Saga announced at BlizzCon 2027 and released late 2028
> Each expansion has around 8-9 content patches with 8 weeks between them, 3 raids

[Chickat]

I love that the world first guilds are stuck on T Swift lmao.

[Makorus]

Because the scenario says report to Calia in Silverpine or Genn in SW to start the scenario. So they are most definitely involved. Seems like the Alliance and Horde will have slightly different intros but the rest of the scenario will be the same.

Alliance had to report to Genn for the Forsaken questline in Shadowlands and the questline had NOTHING to do with Worgen.

People are just getting upset over literally nothing.

[Nymrohd]

I love that the world first guilds are stuck on T Swift lmao.

Eh, it was severely bugged for quite a while.

[Cheezits]

Alliance had to report to Genn for the Forsaken questline in Shadowlands and the questline had NOTHING to do with Worgen.

People are just getting upset over literally nothing.

Eh... the Alliance player helping Calia actively set up her advocating for the succession of Gilneas to the Alliance.

[Nebron]

So any news on when we'll get those awesome Crusader Helmets in the Trading Post, or the "chainmail bikinis"?

On another note, here's what I think (hope) the Worldsoul Saga looks like:

> 18 month expansions
> TWW in September 2024
> Midnight early 2026
> TLT mid 2027
> Whatever comes after Worldsoul Saga announced at BlizzCon 2027 and released late 2028
> Each expansion has around 8-9 content patches with 8 weeks between them, 3 raids

Yeah, I can totally see that

Based on Ion's interview with Preach, it's almost guaranteed that the template of 4 zones, 8 dungeons and a raid at launch has been adapted to development cycle and it should mitigate the issue of Legion being content packed expansion at the expense of BfA development. Also, there are more people onboard, so it should smooth things out as well. I definitely expect storylines to be much more cohesive and logically follow from an update to update.

What worries me though, is that as great as it sounds in theory, in might come up short due to highly repetetive structure. There won't be any speculation on how many zones and raid tiers we will get from now onward. But maybe it's a good thing after all

[Ersula]

here's what I think (hope) the Worldsoul Saga looks like:

> 18 month expansions
> TWW in September 2024
> Midnight early 2026
> TLT mid 2027
> Whatever comes after Worldsoul Saga announced at BlizzCon 2027 and released late 2028
> Each expansion has around 8-9 content patches with 8 weeks between them, 3 raids

Please don't encourage Blizzard to make expansions shorter. That means they're just going to make us buy expansions more often.

Plus they said the worldsoul saga would be done by 2030. That means the expansion cadence seems to be the normal 2 years. They wouldn't say "before 2030" and it be two whole years before that.

[Raetary]

Please don't encourage Blizzard to make expansions shorter. That means they're just going to make us buy expansions more often.

Plus they said the worldsoul saga would be done by 2030. That means the expansion cadence seems to be the normal 2 years. They wouldn't say "before 2030" and it be two whole years before that.

They already planning on shorter and quicker expansions.
The course is already set for that.

And what they said was that they don't want the Saga to end by 2030, but before that.

We can't get into specifics, but yes it will be faster. We want to ensure that players aren't completing this saga in 2030. Teams have been restructured to be able to create this whole saga.

[Nebron]

Please don't encourage Blizzard to make expansions shorter. That means they're just going to make us buy expansions more often.

Plus they said the worldsoul saga would be done by 2030. That means the expansion cadence seems to be the normal 2 years. They wouldn't say "before 2030" and it be two whole years before that.

Wha-wha-what?!

1. Excerpt from Maria Hamilton's interview. Not a native here, but I always thought "to do something by" means exactly - to do something before <time reference>. By saying 2030 they give themselves a looser timeframe in case some things go wrong.
2. From all we have heard, their intention is to speed up the release cadance a bit, and ~1.5-ish years is what they actually aim for (to be honest, it's something that Ion said using the words 1.5-ish in Preach interview) - which is exactly 3 raid tiers, ~6 months each.
3. From what I understand, you intentionally sabotage the quicker patch cadance for the sake of delaying the payment for the game? You won't get a 4th raid tier, if that is what you mean, and $40 dollars every 1.5 year vs. every 2 years isn't that much of a big deal I guess, lol.

[Khaza-R]

Please don't encourage Blizzard to make expansions shorter. That means they're just going to make us buy expansions more often.

Plus they said the worldsoul saga would be done by 2030. That means the expansion cadence seems to be the normal 2 years. They wouldn't say "before 2030" and it be two whole years before that.

This has been their goal for a long time though. I can't seem to find the interview but I remember from Legion into BfA they said they spent a lot of resources into 7.3 but the MAUs dropped off regardless. Hence why 8.3 just re-used old zones and the bulk of the work in BfA went into the mid patch.

So I imagine at this point they have some analytics that point to a sweet spot where engagement falls off in expansion and they're basically trying to push out a new expansion before that happens.

[huth]

They already planning on shorter and quicker expansions.
The course is already set for that.

And what they said was that they don't want the Saga to end by 2030, but before that.

Want to. Not will. Not to mention that they'd still be able to pull that off with expansions longer than 20 months.

[Ersula]

From what I understand, you intentionally sabotage the quicker patch cadance for the sake of delaying the payment for the game? You won't get a 4th raid tier, if that is what you mean, and $40 dollars every 1.5 year vs. every 2 years isn't that much of a big deal I guess, lol.

For reference when Everquest started doing "smaller, shorter" expansions it was sign the game was dying. For all the story problems with Dragonflight I doubt the solution was "make it faster".

So I imagine at this point they have some analytics that point to a sweet spot where engagement falls off in expansion and they're basically trying to push out a new expansion before that happens.

In my opinion, if they're trying to avoid engagement falling off they shouldn't put the final raid tier less than halfway through an expansion's duration.

[Woggmer]

Please don't encourage Blizzard to make expansions shorter. That means they're just going to make us buy expansions more often.

Plus they said the worldsoul saga would be done by 2030. That means the expansion cadence seems to be the normal 2 years. They wouldn't say "before 2030" and it be two whole years before that.

Even as we speak, while Blizzard's Irvine team is focused on the Live Client and TWW.. their Boston team (aka formerly Proletariat) is working on Midnight.

[Jaggler]

What stories that Blizzard tells in WoW do you think work well?

I think the best example recently is Legion. You have a big, overarching goal, you have some very race specific story line and some faction TENSION (not all out war). It is of course just personal opinion.

[Skildar]

What stories that Blizzard tells in WoW do you think work well?

Almost all expansions have had great starting points but very bad development through the patches and sometimes their finale.

Legion has a special place in my heart because I was deeply invested in the game during that time so I'm not very objective about it. I remember hating how little they used of horde characters compared to alliance ones during the campaign and patches but loved the finale. The escalation felt kind of rushed and I'm sure a lot of people knew who the titans were but they didn't spend that much time introducing them to people who started playing the game more recently. Having a few more in game books and notes, etc. about them would have been a welcomed plus.

[Lady Atia]

Wha-wha-what?!

1. Excerpt from Maria Hamilton's interview. Not a native here, but I always thought "to do something by" means exactly - to do something before <time reference>. By saying 2030 they give themselves a looser timeframe in case some things go wrong.
2. From all we have heard, their intention is to speed up the release cadance a bit, and ~1.5-ish years is what they actually aim for (to be honest, it's something that Ion said using the words 1.5-ish in Preach interview) - which is exactly 3 raid tiers, ~6 months each.
3. From what I understand, you intentionally sabotage the quicker patch cadance for the sake of delaying the payment for the game? You won't get a 4th raid tier, if that is what you mean, and $40 dollars every 1.5 year vs. every 2 years isn't that much of a big deal I guess, lol.

Also, am I the only one who is happy to get a bunch of new collectors edition goodies sooner than we are used too?^^

Besides that, expansion launch is always the best part of the whole experience, so getting them sooner is always better than having filler patches lol.

[Golden Yak]

Thoughts on how the major arc for Worldsoul is gonna go:

• War Within - Xal'atath undoes the work of the Titans by purging the Worldsoul of their Order magic, returning it to its original primordial state.
• Midnight - The Void and the Light make incursions to Azeroth in an effort to seize the restored Worldsoul for themselves.
• Last Titan - The Titans return to Azeroth, intent on Re-Origination and beginning their work of Ordering once again. Iridikron pulls some shit.

In the end, Azeroth will choose to reject all the cosmic powers and remain the Worldsoul, sleeping eternally within the world as a source of life and power.

[Santandame]

Yeah, I can totally see that

Based on Ion's interview with Preach, it's almost guaranteed that the template of 4 zones, 8 dungeons and a raid at launch has been adapted to development cycle and it should mitigate the issue of Legion being content packed expansion at the expense of BfA development. Also, there are more people onboard, so it should smooth things out as well. I definitely expect storylines to be much more cohesive and logically follow from an update to update.

What worries me though, is that as great as it sounds in theory, in might come up short due to highly repetetive structure. There won't be any speculation on how many zones and raid tiers we will get from now onward. But maybe it's a good thing after all

Legion being a content packed expansion didn’t negatively effect the amount of content we got in BfA. BfA gave us just as much content as Legion, the problem was some of the systems didn’t land.

[Nymrohd]

That is why i only play for one month or two. There is no endgame which has any notable gameplay i consider useful for my retention in currents WoWs implementation. Mythic+ dungeons are not for me. Raids are not for me. So here i am. Nothing left to play after a while.

Delves unlikely will change that. As they simply stop at heroic raiding item level, and replace or at least complement world quest progress. Also i wonder if Delves will have difficulty levels, which is unlikely.

If Blizzard ever should decide to add Delves 1-20 with the best gear avaialble from Delves 15-20, at the same level we get from mythic+15-20 or mythic raids, i probably would play longer.

What i want to see is that Blizzard gets rid of their group bias. Gets rid of the idea they have to force everyone into premade groups to get BIS gear for their gameplay. Then, and only then, i see the game developing into the right direction. Delves will not be that. They are just another excuse not offering real competetive progression for solo players instead of group gameplay.

That is their challenge. That would change everything. But as i know Blizzard for years, that is very unlikely to change. Because they simply cannot leave their gatekeeper mentality for guild groups.

Why does it have to be mythic gear? If you are getting both gear and challenging progression, why does it matter if it caps lower?

[Nymrohd]

Better let me ask: why shouldn't a solo player that beats the hardest bosses probably even harder than the ones in Elden Ring get no mythic gear? Anyone who masters delves level 20 should have mythic raid like ilevel gear from delves.

Let's overcome gate keeping together. That could be a start. It could make the game interesting for way more players than just the ones that want to play with friends or guilds only.

I mean you are talking about some imaginary boss that will be harder than everything. And it IS imaginary because if it is challenging for my prot/ret paladin, my poor mage will be out several levels earlier.