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

[Alanar]

That's kinda the point with the obvious Trading Post sets though. Fun sets taht some designer probably came up with when they were half asleep one night.

Well, its more that is what the trading post turned into. We had some cool stuff in between or long lost npc items that are fun to see making it inro the live game, but the majority is indeed stuff that seems to be made for the purpose of "fun" or simply made half asleep or sparetime.

[Joshuaj]

Yeah imagine teasing K'aresh heavily in march 2025, just to go there in the final patch of Midnight, so around January 2027 in a best case scenario? Doesn't make sense IMO.

Why would it not make sense? Blizzard literally said they wanted to tease things early in the Worldsoul Saga so we could potentially explore those plots later. That's the whole gimmick of the Worldsoul Saga, it's 1 massive story.

[Sondrelk]

Well, its more that is what the trading post turned into. We had some cool stuff in between or long lost npc items that are fun to see making it inro the live game, but the majority is indeed stuff that seems to be made for the purpose of "fun" or simply made half asleep or sparetime.

There are definitely more weird stuff on the Trading Post. But I think that has more to do with the developers finally realizing that they can add the old unused stuff to more appropriate vendors.
There isnt much point in adding unused appearances from Legion. Or recolours of old raid sets when Legion Remix is coming by the end of the year.
We also just had Siren Isle, which absolutely showered us with unused appearances. And future patcehs are likely to have similar areas that could easily accomodate old sets.

[Alanar]

I don't see anything wrong with those silly animal suit stuff. It isn't for me but judging by the amount of people I see using the previous yeti (or whatever) onesie transmog, there's clearly an audience for it. And if its from the trading post, well its meant for fun in parts.

Its just that, its back to back and heavy focus on the fun stuff. I believe there is still the aspect of a chance to introduce missing nps items and boss armor or weapons people have been begging to make it into the player hands.

I feel like, they should have a better mix on those things. I mean great its spring, but that shoulsnt cover 80% of the month. But to each and their own I guess.

- - - Updated - - -

There are definitely more weird stuff on the Trading Post. But I think that has more to do with the developers finally realizing that they can add the old unused stuff to more appropriate vendors.
There isnt much point in adding unused appearances from Legion. Or recolours of old raid sets when Legion Remix is coming by the end of the year.
We also just had Siren Isle, which absolutely showered us with unused appearances. And future patcehs are likely to have similar areas that could easily accomodate old sets.

Ye, they are shifting that focus into differnt areas, something I noticed to. But things like the Sylvanas armor or Kael"thas armor has no real purpose being on npc vendors or questing areas. It wouldnt make much sense.

I just hope, we see more focus on that and things we can be excited about coming up. I have so many tenders at this point, which is something many people have said had the same thing. I just dont care about flower blades or butterfly wings, but rather want to see cool racial looking items or items that never made it. I agree that most of these items seems to be specifically made for the TP.

[MauroDiogo]

Can't wait to find out in what way Azshara has been changed while in the Void.

I've mentioned it before but I'm getting the feeling we're going to be more Twilight Dragons playing a huge role with them playing the part of "Ruling the Sky" once Nightfall comes. This could be with Azshara at the helm so she rules Sea & Sky.

I feel like the Ethereals are just a plot device to get the story advancing and leading us to an eventual bigger confrontation with the Void in all it's might.

Beledar is yet to play a big role. I feel like it was one of the primordial shards. Landed on Azeroth, infused it with the Light. Is now shielding Azeroth and protecting her from being fully corrupted and enveloped in darkness by the Void.
It could also be used by the Naaru (maybe Ethereals too?) as a beacon, like a Waypoint or a waygate for them to find Azeroth when traversing the Great Dark Beyond (What better way to travel through the DARK space than a huge beacon/shard of LIGHT?). Like how the Priest's Holy artifact weapon is also called a beacon of the Naaru. Could be just in a metaphorical sense but I like to speculate!

This could be why Xal'atath is trying to corrupt it. To turn it into a waygate/portal for Ethereals/Void to enter Azeroth very very close to the World Soul herself.

[KOREAN DAVE]

I think people are missing the point. K’aresh is not the home base of the Void. Locus walker tells us this at the start of TWW. He explains what happened to K’aresh and the ethereals, we learn that xal is the harbinger of dimensius.

Cut to 11.1, those damn ethereals have tricked gally and stolen the dark heart and took it back to k’aresh. I think they force xals hand and we somehow get roped into this.

K’aresh as 11.2 does a lot to set up Midnight and you’re really being willfully ignorant if you don’t see it. It serves to both build dimenius up as a credible threat and let us know the stakes of an invasion from Dimensius.

The harronir read as a Danuser creation. The sooner we move away from his lore abortions, the better.

[Timester]

More and more looks like there was a narrative change during TWW, with a clear focus on older plots and races.

[Alanar]

.
The harronir read as a Danuser creation. The sooner we move away from his lore abortions, the better.

The way it seems, seems like ka resh is the big end patch, like Argus. Giving us a taste of dimensius and a huge lore dropp on Ethereals. Maybe even setting them up as future allies. There is also the offside of it just being a massive tease, only for it to show and go there in Midnight.

It just doesnt feel like this is a setup for midnight perse, it does seem more in line like Legion. Where the patch before Argus forshadowed Argus.

The harranir are one of the most boring additions so far, beaten by Earthen tho. Idk when ever they show up, I just dont care. Same for rootlands.. it sounds so uninteresting to me.

I hope they die in fire or just get dropped all together.

[Cheezits]

I have a feeling Rootlands is still happening but they aren't hyping it up because nobody cares compared to Midnight stuff.

Pretty telling there is zero continuation of any of the Nulore races and faction stories in 11.1.5 besides "the Sureki still exist lol". The interest just isn't there.

[Sondrelk]

More and more looks like there was a narrative change during TWW, with a clear focus on older plots and races.

For sure. I just don't think it's such a sharp turn that we go from Underground zones to outer space. More likely it was something like a pivot from the Beledar being the endgame leading into Avaloren for 12.0, into Beledar being slightly sidelined in favor of Midnight as 12.0, and Avaloren being shuffled into 14.0 at the earliest.

If they had such a drastic change from pre World Soul Saga development to now, then I would have expected the developers to just plain remove buildup. As I said before. There isnt really much reason for Orweyna to follow us around and learn about the Black Blood, unless it was building up to something for the finale?

[Cheezits]

More and more looks like there was a narrative change during TWW, with a clear focus on older plots and races.

Yeah, they went too far with the SL-DF-TWW "don't feel burdened by past stuff, do new stuff!" artistic expression and they got reigned back in by Metzen and higher ups, most likely.

[Sondrelk]

The way it seems, seems like ka resh is the big end patch, like Argus. Giving us a taste of dimensius and a huge lore dropp on Ethereals. Maybe even setting them up as future allies. There is also the offside of it just being a massive tease, only for it to show and go there in Midnight.

It just doesnt feel like this is a setup for midnight perse, it does seem more in line like Legion. Where the patch before Argus forshadowed Argus.

The harranir are one of the most boring additions so far, beaten by Earthen tho. Idk when ever they show up, I just dont care. Same for rootlands.. it sounds so uninteresting to me.

I hope they die in fire or just get dropped all together.

How is Midnight going to top going to K'aresh though? It's the definitive Void themed location. It's more like what Dickman said earlier. Going to Argus at the end of WoD, and then going to Legion trying to pretend like we didnt just come back from their headquarters, getting nice and comfortable killing raid bosses and destroying supply depots or whatever.
Either we lose on K'aresh, in which case Midnight still has to come back there at some point. Or we win, in which case going to the supposed definitive Void expansion will feel a bit silly.

[Khaza-R]

I have a feeling Rootlands is still happening but they aren't hyping it up because nobody cares compared to Midnight stuff.

Pretty telling there is zero continuation of any of the Nulore races and faction stories in 11.1.5 besides "the Sureki still exist lol". The interest just isn't there.

I think the rootlands were just going to be a launch zone. I expect it got repurposed but I highly doubt its going to be just be the roots of Elun'Ahir and some haranir running around like probably was originally intended. That sounds wayyyy too boring for Metzen.

I think the zone will be consumed by the Unseeming. Basically, Azeroth's Upside Down. I do think the Unseeming is connected to K'aresh. Its possible the glowing core in the middle of K'aresh is what's left of their world's soul. Maybe it was consumed by black blood before Dimensius came same as Xal is trying to do on Azeroth

[Super Dickmann]

Yeah, they went too far with the SL-DF-TWW "don't feel burdened by past stuff, do new stuff!" artistic expression and they got reigned back in by Metzen and higher ups, most likely.

DF was almost entirely memberberry old characters and plots keeping up, except for the Incarnates, which are there because nearly every antagonist had been eliminated in BFA. TWW is a lot more focused on old races, but I don't see any of the initial fare to be things that could be products of rewrites. Likely the Arathi, nerubians and so on were always intended to be there, though the Arathi Empire might not have been since originally they were only supposed to be there for a few hundred years.

[KOREAN DAVE]

How is Midnight going to top going to K'aresh though? It's the definitive Void themed location. It's more like what Dickman said earlier. Going to Argus at the end of WoD, and then going to Legion trying to pretend like we didnt just come back from their headquarters, getting nice and comfortable killing raid bosses and destroying supply depots or whatever.
Either we lose on K'aresh, in which case Midnight still has to come back there at some point. Or we win, in which case going to the supposed definitive Void expansion will feel a bit silly.

It is not the definitive Void themed location. It’s the aftermath of a Void invasion. We can easily lose in 11.2. The ethereals are using the dark heart to try to suck up all the Void on K’aresh, we find about this via Locus Walker and his ethereals. We go there with intent to destroy the Dark Heart because now it’s too dangerous to let Xal have it. We succeed and now she decides to toot the horn and use the Sunwell as a beacon.

[Cheezits]

DF was almost entirely memberberry old characters and plots keeping up, except for the Incarnates, which are there because nearly every antagonist had been eliminated in BFA. TWW is a lot more focused on old races, but I don't see any of the initial fare to be things that could be products of rewrites. Likely the Arathi, nerubians and so on were always intended to be there, though the Arathi Empire might not have been since originally they were only supposed to be there for a few hundred years.

DF and TWW both have the slight-correction from SL where they do old races but their own OC factions- centaurs, tuskarr, gnolls, then a variation of the Twilight Cult. Same thing with TWW with nerubians, arathi (though the helf thing is a nice idea) and earthen all having OC groups we've never heard of before, but old races and -some- old plot threads.

It's better than the complete ass pulls of SL but it's still "OCslop" versus just bringing the Shadowguard back, expanding on Xalatath and Dimensius, killing Gallywix in Undermine, etc.

I do think the Arathi Empire is the best of their OC stuff in the SL-DF-TWW trio. Maldraxxus too.

[Super Dickmann]

DF and TWW both have the slight-correction from SL where they do old races but their own OC factions- centaurs, tuskarr, gnolls, then a variation of the Twilight Cult. Same thing with TWW with nerubians, arathi (though the helf thing is a nice idea) and earthen all having OC groups we've never heard of before, but old races and -some- old plot threads.

It's better than the complete ass pulls of SL but it's still "OCslop" versus just bringing the Shadowguard back, expanding on Xalatath and Dimensius, killing Gallywix in Undermine, etc.

I do think the Arathi Empire is the best of their OC stuff in the trio.

Gallywix was definitely always intended to come back, given that Danuser put him in SL communing with his own Ethereal OC do not steals in the Brokers, ditto Xal'atath was reintroduced in a Danuser expansion.

The OC to not distinction is nonsense. DF isn't a 'slight' correction, it entirely focuses on already existing factions in an already existing area again, with the exclusion of the antagonists, who must be newly introduced because the game had systematically killed every other antagonist up to this point, those antagonists themselves being a follow through of a theme that's been around since Wrath and Cataclysm at earliest. Hell, while the centaurs, tuskarr and so on and the nerubians and Earthen fit into the same mould of being factions of existing races that haven't been mentioned I can't in good conscience put them in the same row considering how all the DF variants are sleeping aids and all the TWW versions are comically superior to the original iteration.

[Alanar]

How is Midnight going to top going to K'aresh though? It's the definitive Void themed location. It's more like what Dickman said earlier. Going to Argus at the end of WoD, and then going to Legion trying to pretend like we didnt just come back from their headquarters, getting nice and comfortable killing raid bosses and destroying supply depots or whatever.
Either we lose on K'aresh, in which case Midnight still has to come back there at some point. Or we win, in which case going to the supposed definitive Void expansion will feel a bit silly.

Idk, I thought the whole point was going to be in Midnight is that, 1 unification of the thallasian elves and 2: stop the void and bannish it back, while we azeroth greatest heroes and light forces defend it and fight back the shadow. The point is to defend the sunwell and not let the void in. Maybe it will partly work, but we will fail in someway.

That alone, plus amani maybe or some ethereal allied races make for pretty cool stories. Idk if its really a must to go to ka resh in midnight. I wouldnt be shocked if it turns out to be differnt and we go there faster. Ka resh shoulsnt even be visitable I think according to lore. Maybe the ethereals will use the dark heart to slurp up the still lingering void energies to help their people who are maybe stuck there? I have no idea man, just making this up.

Tbh, mmo champion is making it like that, we have to go there and do this and that. We just had one slight teaser and we dont know what the point is and why show it now? When that will be in midnight? It seems a little to far ahead if you look how blizz likes to tease next content with stuff like this. Why woulsnt they tease 11.2 then?

[Kiivar86]

Its just that, its back to back and heavy focus on the fun stuff. I believe there is still the aspect of a chance to introduce missing nps items and boss armor or weapons people have been begging to make it into the player hands.

I feel like, they should have a better mix on those things. I mean great its spring, but that shoulsnt cover 80% of the month. But to each and their own I guess.

Eh, going through the trading post history to remind myself, while there is a bunch of fun stuff, it seems somewhat more balanced to me (or if not balanced, at least not overwhelmingly "fun" stuff). I'll grant that there are some stuff that sticks around (the love witch stuff does tend to pop up often) but I think its more a case of the fun stuff just standing out more for various reasons.

[Cheezits]

DF entirely focuses on already existing factions in an already existing area again

That is a stretch, sir. Tel'abim has more of a shout.

The OC to not distinction is nonsense. DF isn't a 'slight' correction

It is in comparison to SL, they clearly were told to bring it back to Azeroth and also to use some of the existing things in the toychest instead of "new guy based on Val'kyr, new guy based on Nathrezim" etc. However, both DF and TWW did "Tuskarr, but MY Tuskarr" variations, but now we are killing Venture Co in Undermine and soon will be slapping void Amani in Zul'Amanland.

There's a definite pivot here. Also I'm still salty about them banning the Earthen Ring from DF for some reason that may be as banal as "dumb players couldn't distinguish good and bad shamans"