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

[Cheezits]

Underground Silithus will be a part of TWW, but it's being set up as the last patch/endgame. There is a road that leads "somewhere" in the Machine Dwarf area, and I believe it was implied or stated to go to where Azeroth's worldsoul is located (which, per the Heart Chamber, would be underneath Silithus). So that will most likely be the last zone and/or patch.

[Nathanyel]

Unreliable narration really does not work in a game where the player is a direct observer of the overwhelmingly majority of the plot.

It's not even presented as unreliable narration, it's straight up lies and propaganda. This is also why the Forsworn were never "good rebels", they were corrupted by Doubt, and forced that onto others, yet stupid fucking players thought they were relatable revolutionaries.

[Murlocos]

It's not even presented as unreliable narration, it's straight up lies and propaganda. This is also why the Forsworn were never "good rebels", they were corrupted by Doubt, and forced that onto others, yet stupid fucking players thought they were relatable revolutionaries.

True. I'm conflating it in my head with them using unreliable narrators in their recent books but making no real use of it. They're just standard lore dumps but now with an asterisk saying you can't call out future contradictions because unreliable narrator.

[Nathanyel]

True. I'm conflating it in my head with them using unreliable narrators in their recent books but making no real use of it. They're just standard lore dumps but now with an asterisk saying you can't call out future contradictions because unreliable narrator.

Do you mean Chronicle? The mistake was calling it canon, not "changing" it later. Chronicle 1 was obviously written from the PoV of an in-universe, Titan/mortal-aligned character, Brann would be the obvious assumption.
Story books would obviously be PoV in the first place.

[Nymrohd]

There's discussion in-lore about how the Black Empire may not have been as bad as the titan edicts made it out to be, but I'm struggling to see how anything could have lived freely on the supercontinent with the mountainous old gods looming over everything.

I think its safe to say that what we've been told about the Empire was a lie or at least not entirely true, given the Edicts of Odyn and Chekhov's gun.
But then what IS the truth? Did the old gods just leave the lesser races alone and only warred amongst themselves? But then there's the trolls vs. Aqir so that can't be right, unless the trolls instigated it?

"Do not be impressed by tall icons of the titans which stand here. The towers of sacrifice in Ny'alotha dwarf these pathetic temples."

Even Xal boasts about how great the Black Empire was at sacrificing people

[Ersula]

"Do not be impressed by tall icons of the titans which stand here. The towers of sacrifice in Ny'alotha dwarf these pathetic temples."

Even Xal boasts about how great the Black Empire was at sacrificing people

Trolls were also participating in sacrificial ceremonies at that time, just like human cultures did in real life. The question is would the progressed modern civilization be better or worse led by the Old Gods or the Titans.

I think the bigger question is "wait, did Xal deliberately cause the destruction of the Black Empire?" One of the stories in the Priest Order Hall artifact research details a Zandalari Priest Xal Manipulated into raising a C'thrax god in the middle of the Troll Empire. Obviously not enough to actually overthrow anything, but this did directly cause the Troll Empire to go to war with the Aqir, leading to the end of the Black Empire.

It's hard to see that as anything other than intentional. Perhaps that was her revenge against the Old Gods for imprisoning her in a dagger.

Do you mean Chronicle? The mistake was calling it canon, not "changing" it later. Chronicle 1 was obviously written from the PoV of an in-universe, Titan/mortal-aligned character, Brann would be the obvious assumption.
Story books would obviously be PoV in the first place.

It think it's that Chronicle is directly written by the Keepers, like the apostles. It's their "revision" of the history Odyn was describing. It is a fake history. But still important because almost all of mortal societies in this setting are based on it as their history.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Do you mean Chronicle? The mistake was calling it canon, not "changing" it later. Chronicle 1 was obviously written from the PoV of an in-universe, Titan/mortal-aligned character, Brann would be the obvious assumption.
Story books would obviously be PoV in the first place.

Chronicles was absolutely not written from any in universe POV it covers info the titans wouldn’t know and no mortal would know and hell at one point it says “Azeroth is the world of Warcraft”, it really can’t get any more on the nose then that for being written out of world.

[Murlocos]

Do you mean Chronicle? The mistake was calling it canon, not "changing" it later. Chronicle 1 was obviously written from the PoV of an in-universe, Titan/mortal-aligned character, Brann would be the obvious assumption.
Story books would obviously be PoV in the first place.

I'm referring to stuff like the Exploring books, Grimoire of the Shadowlands, and the Dragonflight Codex that just came out. The Chronicle retcon is exactly why they're doing lore dump books as PoV now; the Codex has a disclaimer at the start effectively saying "don't blame the writers if we change this in a year or two, Khadgar told you this, not us "

In other very brief news, John Hight had a vague comment on the 10.2.6 mystery in a PCGamer recap of WoW's 2023:

"We have a strong commitment to make sure our players always have something to do," he said, talking about the content leading up to The War Within. "At least one thing is going to be very experimental, and that's cool." (He confirmed that the experiment was related to gameplay.)

They're hyping up this mystery feature a lot, I doubt it'll just be some surprise mini raid or pirate island drop. I'm guessing it's going to be something evergreen disconnected from DF, but not require a brand new character like Classic's alternate modes.

[Vakir]

Sargeras had barely any time before the Titans were about to yoink him away. I dunno if he was really aiming with direct intent of location when he likely just wanted to destroy the planet to prevent a Void Titan. Especially considering the next existential threat we faced was Void machinations.

The Doylist explanation is that nobody gives a fuck about Silithus so they could safely discard the zone. I feel like the Doylist fills in the Watsonian.

Sargeras destroys planets handedly. The only thing that explains "AIMED AT SOMETHING" is that Thrall for whatever reason is unaware of the World Soul, which is wild.

[Makabreska]

Sargeras had barely any time before the Titans were about to yoink him away. I dunno if he was really aiming with direct intent of location when he likely just wanted to destroy the planet to prevent a Void Titan. Especially considering the next existential threat we faced was Void machinations.

Well, Thrall strongly indicates in the TWW cinematic that the aiming was not random.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Given that the heart chamber was in Silithus and Azeroth came moments from dying because of the stab there really doesn’t need to be any thing big going forward for his aim to have not been random.

[Sondrelk]

I think people here arguing Odyn's edicts here are missing the nuances. It's not about showing that the Old Gods were good, and that the Titans were bad. But rather that at least Odyn is so preoccupied with the idea of the Titans being perfect that he cannot accept the idea that the Titans made any mistakes, or that the Old Gods did something not completely evil and chaotic.

Old Gods creating grand cities of mortal races is not an issue to him because it implies the Old Gods created a utopia that the Titans then destroyed. It's an issue to him because it implies the Old Gods were not wholly chaotic beings who only did evil for evils sake.
The Old Gods had plans, and a society to ensure those plans were followed up on. Said society was too close to what the Titans did to Azeroth for Odyn's liking, so he had all mentions of such actions struck from all records.

Think of the various Aqir races. The Mantid and Nerubians were not wholly evil for the sake of it. They had societies with more to them than just sacrificing mortals in elaborate rituals. They had history, made art and music. They named their cities after more than their masters, and had craftsmen who made more than just weapons.

Odyn could not abide a version of history that showed that the Old Gods were not wholly evil, with the Titans as shining paragons of justice standing against them. So he had all mentions of non-evil actions removed, or attributed to the Titans where possible.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Think of the various Aqir races. The Mantid and Nerubians were not wholly evil for the sake of it. They had societies with more to them than just sacrificing mortals in elaborate rituals. They had history, made art and music. They named their cities after more than their masters, and had craftsmen who made more than just weapons.
.

The Mantid and Nerubians are also defined by breaking away from there evil gods and having it be killed respectively, they have art music ect despite there god not because of them and what we see of N’zoth “kingdom” in his visions do paint the picture of Wholly evil.

[Merryck]

I think people here arguing Odyn's edicts here are missing the nuances. It's not about showing that the Old Gods were good, and that the Titans were bad. But rather that at least Odyn is so preoccupied with the idea of the Titans being perfect that he cannot accept the idea that the Titans made any mistakes, or that the Old Gods did something not completely evil and chaotic.

Old Gods creating grand cities of mortal races is not an issue to him because it implies the Old Gods created a utopia that the Titans then destroyed. It's an issue to him because it implies the Old Gods were not wholly chaotic beings who only did evil for evils sake.
The Old Gods had plans, and a society to ensure those plans were followed up on. Said society was too close to what the Titans did to Azeroth for Odyn's liking, so he had all mentions of such actions struck from all records.

Think of the various Aqir races. The Mantid and Nerubians were not wholly evil for the sake of it. They had societies with more to them than just sacrificing mortals in elaborate rituals. They had history, made art and music. They named their cities after more than their masters, and had craftsmen who made more than just weapons.

Odyn could not abide a version of history that showed that the Old Gods were not wholly evil, with the Titans as shining paragons of justice standing against them. So he had all mentions of non-evil actions removed, or attributed to the Titans where possible.

It's never this nuanced.

[Sondrelk]

It's never this nuanced.

It's easily that nuanced if you just take what is written literally, and don't immediately assume that the Old Gods were actually the good guys all along.

[Vakir]

Well, Thrall strongly indicates in the TWW cinematic that the aiming was not random.

Only if you operate on the premise that they're aware of the World Soul.

If they aren't, the implication becomes an internal reveal of Azeroth's presence. They don't seem to really know despite the last 3 expansions. The voice springs up right as the World Tree blooms and Amirdrassil is specifically stated to be a blessing from Azeroth and yet the world shaman and one of the brightest scholars of the Kirin Tor are confused.

[Woggmer]

Given that the heart chamber was in Silithus and Azeroth came moments from dying because of the stab there really doesn’t need to be any thing big going forward for his aim to have not been random.

Actually, that raises a new question that hasn't been answered. How did he know where the heart was? Sargeras wasn't involved with Azeroth's ordering... yet somehow he knows exactly where the weak point is.

[Makabreska]

Only if you operate on the premise that they're aware of the World Soul.

If they aren't, the implication becomes an internal reveal of Azeroth's presence. They don't seem to really know despite the last 3 expansions. The voice springs up right as the World Tree blooms and Amirdrassil is specifically stated to be a blessing from Azeroth and yet the world shaman and one of the brightest scholars of the Kirin Tor are confused.

How do they do not know about World Soul, when it was speaking to Magni entire BfA?

"Speaking to a world-soul is not like speaking to a mortal, which is why Azeroth needs Magni Bronzebeard as her Speaker.[5] Magni says that Azeroth does not speak to him in words but in feelings, like the feeling of a crumbling mountain range, a deep dark sea, or a sunrise."

"That sword was aiming at something" from the cinematic did not mean they didn't know what it was aiming at. Thrall was indicating that the stab was not random.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Actually, that raises a new question that hasn't been answered. How did he know where the heart was? Sargeras wasn't involved with Azeroth's ordering... yet somehow he knows exactly where the weak point is.

The titans are all about order so it’s likely every planet they ordered would be laid out in similar ways.

He would likely just have to glance where the other Titan facilities are and he would then know where it was likely to be.

[Raetary]

Chronicle 1 was obviously written from the PoV of an in-universe

No.
It wasn't.

It objectively wasn't.
The chronicles are entirely written and narrated from an extradiegetic perspective.

To the point that the book mentions the name of the franchise and game in the first few pages.