I was a dev on WoW until just last week - I've been with Blizz for over a decade and I've ALWAYS wanted to do this... here is the next expansion.
Obviously we have been working on this since before Shadowlands launched and the origional schedule was to have it announced at Blizzcon 2021. As you know live Blizzcons aren't possible right now, and Return of the Dragon Isles (RDI) was the set to be the main announcement at a February 2022 Blizzconline before that was also cancelled (other games that were due to be revealed are way behind so they shelved the event). Instead there will be a stand-alone reveal in March, soon after the 9.2 release.
Shadowlands Ending
At the end of The Sephulcher of the First ones, the Jailer is defeated and the cinematic shows the heroes (with a little help from a certain banshee) use the Power of the Sephulcher that Zovaal was trying to harness against him, "unmaking" him to his original prototype state. Sylvanas surrenders herself over to the judgment of Tyrande, who forgoes revenge and demands only one thing... that the Ranger General spend her days helping all those she wronged and putting right everything she helped destroy. Sylvanas agrees, and vows to begin with Nathanos...
Return of the Dragon Isles
RETURNING is an important concept of the expac - we return to Azeroth, we return to some abandoned cities, and the Dragon Isles make their dramatic return (we also hope players will see it as a return to form after the disapointing reception of Shadowlands)
New Continent : The Dragon Isles
Surprise! Yeah, Zovaal failed in his attempts to use the power of Azeroth's World Soul to unmake the cycle of life and death, but he caused enough damage to rouse an ancient force - the slumbering Dragon Isles have awoken! How and why exactly the Isles have magically re-appeared between Zandalar and the Maelsrom is explained in the levelling story but the Isles themselves have been seperate and untouched for thousands of years. As such they are like a WoW version of the Galapagos Islands; a place where evolution took its own course, filled with incredible and exotic beasts. The giant cat mount on the store is one of the new creatures you'll see, as well as huge Tortoises, birds of paradise, a new race of humanoids that are inspired by giant marine Iguanas, who are feeding what they *think* is an old god in one of the old temples in their zone, one zone is full of penguins... and of course the dragons! These dragons come in different colours but don't belong to any of the dragonflights. They are ancient and see themselves as superior to any other life on the planet. They refuse to lower themselves to taking humanoid forms and look down on Wrathion and the other dragons that do. Whereas some are able to be won over and become allies, the Blood Dragons of the Shattered Peaks - the max level zone - believe Azeroth can only be saved with themselves in charge. They plan to birth the World Soul, which they call "mother". They are the main enemies in the "first part") of the expac. There are new dragon models, really detailed and gnarled looking and some are absolutely MASSIVE.
Features
- Return to Teldrassil and the Undercity. This is the BIG feature of the expansion... player housing! Players help to rebuild and repopulate the two cities in a system that is comparable to player housing in ESO, ie there are set plots which are phased for each player. The first location is given free as part of the questing - and other, more impressive and meaningful locations can be unlocked with special achievements tied to raiding, Mythic+, pvp etc. The player fills them with trophies from boss kills, weapon transmogs on their weapon rack and furniture that is made by crafters. New profession
carpentryis a big part of this and in general all professions in RDI have a ton of new player-housing items they can make. Apart from cooking fires and anvils etc all furniture is purely aesthetic, there are no mines or herb gardens or banks available like in WoD garrisons.
- As the expansion goes on, so the two cities are rebuilt. The new designs and assets look amazing. The idea is that in subsequent expansions (and maybe later in RDI) other locations can be made available as-and-when. Currently pencilled in are Boralus, Dazar Alor and Grizzly Hills
- Lots of zones are being updated in the old world with assets that are being made for player housing, so trees and building in places like Elwynn Forest, Westfall, Ashenvale, Eastern Plaguelands etc will find themselves what we are calling internally "soft-updated"
- New race AND class - Dark Rangers. Horde DR are the red-eyed elves you know and love, alliance get the forsaken Night Elves that were raised at Darkshore. 2 new specs; ranged and melee, based on high mobility and simple, fast rotations. The real twist is that each spec has DIFFERENT abilities available to use depending on whether they have leather or mail armor equiped. With Undercity being repopulated and rebuilt, the forsaken have lots of secondary story focus in RDI, and undead Night Elf rangers being welocmed back into Teldrassil is a big plot point that mirrors Tyrande's merciful actions towards Sylvanas
- New Raid. The Shattered Peaks. Stunning locations built around the jagged mountains of the Blood Dragons zone. Blood Dragons are huge and hate mortals, but they also love gold and have huge fiery refineries. There may just be a creeping fel influence hiding under the surface there too... One fight sees the sky filled with hundreds of dragons. The final boss fight of the raid is High-Profet Zubeika, the ancient ruler of the Isles, which sets up the more "cosmic" 10.1...
- Timewalking. All timewalking dungeons and raids (and there are lots more being made available) are permanently open and scaled to level 50 (new level cap is 70). Timewalking tokens can now be used to buy just about every transmog set, weapon and
raid-drop mount for each expansion from the appropriate vendor. There are some exceptions to this; there is no Invincible on the vendor but Tusks of Manaroth are currently planned to be! Every 2 weeks, a different expansion will be the focus of an event which gives extra rewards for completing the appropriate dungeons and raids.
- Dragonscale Gear. The main max level "progression" system. Players are given a dragon scale from each of the 5 dragonflights, each of which awards a new ability. The scales fit into a new special armor slot on the UI and can be levelled through currency gained from all gameplay activities, even crafting. Only 1 scale can be equiped at a time. The black dragonscale is a PVP ability, the Green scale is a healing/survival ability etc. I'll be honest, this still needs a bit of work but it's the kind of thing the BETA and player feedback should really help with.
There are of course new dungeons - everyone is especially excited about The Ravenous Fold, a descent into the Old God temple at the centre of the Igaudion Stones zone. Imagine jumping into the Salacc pit from Star Wars, but it's full of Nzoth tentacles and there's a MAJOR lore surprise at the bottom.
One thing I can say is that the team has been having a lot of fun working on RDI. After Shadowlands it has been awesome to make stuff in Azeroth again and RDI really feels like a WARCRAFT expansion, if that makes sense. I'm kind of expecting this to get lost in the flood of fake leaks right now and that's fine... I look forward to people coming back to it when the expansion is announced
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Originally Posted by RatherNotSay
I was a dev on WoW until just last week - I've been with Blizz for over a decade and I've ALWAYS wanted to do this... here is the next expansion.
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