Last week, Blackrock Foundry opened up on normal and heroic mode. This week it's Mythic, and next week we get the first Raid Finder wing. Tier 17 proper is here.
If one counts Highmaul as part of the tier, tier 17 is the largest raid tier we've had, tied with tier 7 (Naxxramas/Obsidian Sanctum/Eye of Eternity.) With it, we deal with the threat of the Ogres' Gorian Empire and we deal a massive blow to the Iron Horde.
So where do we go from there?
In the run-up to Warlords, Blizzard talked about possibly doing another expansion only a year later. If they managed to hit that goal, we would possibly see only two raiding tiers. Now, I'd much rather have two-year expansions with two years of content than one-year expansions with one year of content.
But Blizzard has got to make that decision rather soon.
We're now almost halfway through February. In the past, there's pretty much been a year between announcement and release, but if they want to get expansion six out in 2015, that's going to have to change. Still, given how long Alphas and Betas last, Blizzard will have to start the process soon if they want to keep to that timetable.
But let's think about the alternative: Warlords is proving to be more popular than anyone expected. Subscription numbers surged, almost matching WoW's end-of-Wrath watermark. Will this trend continue? I don't know. Every expansion sees a quick upswing in subscriptions, but given the scope of this one, it's possible that WoW will still see a significant lead over Cataclysm and Mists numbers.
And if the expansion is popular, they may not be in such a rush to get past it.
So here's another question: How rigid is Blizzard's plan, regarding WoW?
Raids are something that they need to plan for. The vast amount of art that needs to be created (unless it's Dragon Soul...) and the iteration on fight mechanics takes a long time to nail down. You also need to deal with the fact that, with higher item levels, some abilities will need rebalancing. It's a massive undertaking.
Blizzard claimed they might only do two raid tiers this expansion, which means that there's a very good chance that they only have two planned. It's clear to me that the final raid is going to have us definitively dismantling the Iron Horde, and likely taking down Grommash.
Earlier, I might have guessed that a middle tier could have us dealing with the Shadow Council. Yet as the expansion has played out, I'm beginning to feel that that's not really the way things are heading. In all honesty, even without a Horde under his control, Gul'dan really feels like the biggest threat of the expansion. I would not be at all surprised to find that Gul'dan, and not Grommash, is the final boss of Warlords of Draenor.
However, if that's the case, then that kind of eliminates the Shadow Council as the basis of the middle raid tier. And then it seems pretty unlikely that the Iron Horde and Grommash would be a middle tier either, given that they're the headlining villains of the expansion. That said, it happened to Illidan. Indeed, it would be kind of interesting and actually kind of nuanced and even relevant to current events if we went into a strange land and defeated a tyrant only for a worse threat to take advantage of the power vacuum and seize control.
But I wonder how much of a plan Blizzard has regarding inserting another raid tier. I guess we'll find out soon enough.
On the plus side, if they do want to get that fast cycle of expansion releases, we should be finding out about the next one in the next month or two. Fingers crossed for Demon Hunters!
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