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

[Cheezits]

Quel'thalas is pretty one-note visually. The entire region is more or less just regular green fantasy lands with Quel'thalas being the same but autumnal. I'm not sure we've gotten such a homogenous area since Wrath being in large proportion snow and ice.

They will definitely use Stratholme/Scourge and Amani areas to break up the Elf visuals. Naga are also on the table.

[Samin]

Karesh only for a major patch is a bit disapointing. What's left for Midnight then ?

Hopefully means the Trilogy will be more interwoven, meaning just like the end of TWW bleeds into Midnight, Midnight might have some explicit callbacks to Khaz Algar themes.

[Cheezits]

I am similarly confused, as expressed previously, how it makes any sense to put before the Void expansion. What are we going to fight in Midnight if we are fighting a literal Void Lord as the final boss of TWW? Some more Void Lords? Dimensius again?

Xal'atath.

[Hitei]

I am wondering about this- I wonder if an Ethereal city is coming soon, and it could be tied to the eco-dome dungeon.

Or the implication is that Tazavesh = Ethereal City.

Nah, it's just a floating broker city now parked on the shards. It's firmly broker in design, with the ouroboros swirls and head flames.

[Zardas]

Probably more locations in EK if I were to guess. Maybe a patch in the Draenei zones so that both it and Qul'thalas have officially been updates and are not stuck in TBC.

More revamped old world zones, hopefully. Rootlands is VERY likely TLT, meaning all of Midnight's patch content is a mystery.

A full northern EK revamp?

This sounds more like filler. Stuff that's included in minor patches, not really worthy of a new expansion.

Hopefully not much of other planets/dimension travelling and focusing more on Quel'thalas region.

Yeah, but the region already exists. They can't really raise a whole continent on the shores of what's already there (can they ?).

[milkmustache]

Karesh only for a major patch is a bit disapointing. What's left for Midnight then ?

A full fight on Azeroth. I think the point of getting K'aresh out of the way here is to see what a Void destroyed world would look like and understand our fate, that way we can spend all of Midnight defending Azeroth.

[Cheezits]

Yeah, but the region already exists. They can't really raise a whole continent on the shores of what's already there (can they ?).

They have to turn Quel'thalas and the surrounding area into something as big as an expansion's usual continent, and the area is currently VERY small, so... yeah, it's going to be very different.

[Nymrohd]

I hope the level design effort that is saved by using Tazavesh goes into making K'aresh a really huge zone.

[Hitei]

Xal'atath.

Xal is one person, who at current trajectory is just going to end up, what, Dimensius II? I have trouble seeing how a 12.2, void-ascended Xal fight feels like progression over a city-sized Dimensius fight in 11.2

[KayserB]

Fyralath and Oathbinder weren't announced, were they?

Fy'ralath was announced during the wow cast same the one we got right now.

Nas'zuro was teased by Ion when speaking about the raid, he said something like "evoker will get surprised/find something interesting about the last raid boss Sarkareth" so...

Last hope is the "powerful figure" that will help us for the Reshii wraps also gives a quest to collect Atiesh shards while collecting Ethereal artifacts... Or maybe Medivh as Khadgar is in a professor X mode.

[Valysar]

No sign of Renilash ?

[Cheezits]

Xal is one person, who at current trajectory is just going to end up, what, Dimensius II? I have trouble seeing how a 12.2, void-ascended Xal fight feels like progression over a city-sized Dimensius fight in 11.2

Yeah they are just going to make her Dimensius 2. They are doing a AU Gul'dan with her where she supercedes her "boss", they may even do a new void lord she reports to like how Gul'dan went from Archimonde to KJ.

[Sondrelk]

This sounds more like filler. Stuff that's included in minor patches, not really worthy of a new expansion.



Yeah, but the region already exists. They can't really raise a whole continent on the shores of what's already there (can they ?).

Why is that? Midnight is already revamping old zones. No reason to not have patch zones also revamp old zones.
A patch to revamp the Pamguelands to have a Scourge threat for 12.1. or the Forsaken zones and have it focus on the Red Dawn.

Plenty of good reasons to have patch zones be revamped zones in EK. Especially if you want to revamp Azuremust and Bloodmyst, since they will probably never be relevant again, and it would being it to parity with Quel'thalas as a proper modern hub.

[Jastall]

I do think it's a bit lame that the underground expansion ends up going to space. I guess the real war within was the purple friends we made along the way.

Still, Karesh is hype in its own way, the new content looks fairly meaty, reusing Tazavesh like that is good, and Dimensius is enough of a nobody throwaway villain that you can sacrifice him as the setup for Midnight. Might also be the justification for playable Ethereals, of course.

I wouldn't be surprised if this patch is the point of divergence where the team decided to integrate TWW into the world soul saga. Originally we were probably going to the Rootlands, but that area and the whole core of Azeroth will probably be repurposed for TLT.

[Dracullus]

Yeah Ka'resh confirmed.

Last patch in space.

Such War. Much Within.

This is War Within Blizzard. Danuser planned expansion A: Khaz Algar, Rootlands, finale in Worldcore, next expac Avaloren - all perfectly predictable just like Dragonflight.

Metzen took it, said "we can't have 3rd expansion with new lore", left Khaz Algar cause it was too far into development, add old lore patch with goblins, add old lore patch with ethereals, build next 2 expacs from scratch set in old world, probably moved Worldcore to finale of whole saga.

Of course most of this is speculation, but I don't think it's controversial take.

[Hitei]

No sign of Renilash ?

Renilash is the war between Void and Light, it'd be in Midnight not here.

[Makabreska]

Quel'thalas is pretty one-note visually. The entire region is more or less just regular green fantasy lands with Quel'thalas being the same but autumnal. I'm not sure we've gotten such a homogenous area since Wrath being in large proportion snow and ice.

Uhhhhh, you forgot about Ghostlands. I'm pretty sure they will keep em spooky. Also, Amani forest or w/e can easily be different.

[Nymrohd]

I'm sad with this saga because I feel a lot of the hype has to do with vibing with Xal and I consider her a complete poser?

[Ersula]

Such a lazy excuse.

Could have been the war within Ulduar. Or the war within Quel'thalas. Or the war within a cohesive narrative.

I am going to get over it by focusing on that this in a roundabout way means we get an extra patch location in Midnight. But it's really such a flimsy excuse to have us go to K'aresh when it really doesn't fit the setting so far.

With the exception in what happened with Argus, they know the patch plans when they're choosing the expansion's title. There doesn't really need to be a theme, especially when they're doing a trilogy of expansions; but they probably could have had a better name than "the War Within," though the perfect title would have been "Shadows rising," but they used that one already.

No sign of Renilash ?

Technically yes, but also no. Tell the Arathi that everyone's going to another planet to fight a void lord & their brains might implode.

[Sondrelk]

I hope the level design effort that is saved by using Tazavesh goes into making K'aresh a really huge zone.

I am more inclined to believe we get Tazavesh as a hub because they are already spread thin on housing and Midnight.