Is The Last Titan Finally Time for Tinkers?

 WoW has had a pretty big influence on my taste in fantasy. Before I played WoW, I had no particular affinity for dark and gothic fantasy and the use of undead as monsters to fight, but I found myself so enamored with the Scourge and the Plaguelands as a setting (and the playable Undead) that it's now become pretty core to a lot of what I do in fantasy, like how I tend to use a lot of undead monsters in my D&D games (especially when a campaign is starting off).

But in a similar way, I don't know that I was all that into the idea of anachronistically advanced technology in an otherwise classic medieval fantasy world, but boy did WoW instill that in me.

WoW's approach to technology has never been realistic. In the real world, technology has generally gotten more powerful and more efficient over time. While it's debatable how much life has actually gotten better with technological progress (though I think we sometimes forget how miserable life was prior to innovations in agriculture and medicine) it's pretty clear that in a military sense (it is Warcraft after all) that a modern military unit with attack drones, automatic weapons, and guided missiles would fare quite well against a medieval unit of a bunch of peasants with (generously) pikes supported by longbowmen and armored knights.

But in World of Warcraft, we have people like the Draenei, with futuristic crystal technology like something out of a far-future sci-fi story, compared with the Tauren, who have stone-age (and I don't mean this in the pejorative way, but in the sense that much of their stuff is made of stone) tools, but it's all actually balanced out because of, well, the way that game balance works.

There is a conceit here in fantasy that you don't get with sci-fi, which is that the more "primitive" technology might be imbued with powerful magic. In a sense, magic can be a kind of alternative path or, depending on your perspective, just a different avenue of technological development.

The point, though, is that Warcraft as a franchise has never shied away from having modern and futuristic technology.

In Dungeons & Dragons, some were a little put off by the introduction of the Artificer class, fearing that it was injecting a steampunk aesthetic into a game that they preferred stick to the pre-industrial style of fantasy. I think there were some mitigating factors, though. First off, the class was initially introduced for the Eberron setting, which is explicitly meant to feel like 1930s pulp adventure stories, with a city full of skyscrapers, airships, and lightning rail trains, along with a playable species that are basically robots (though I'd argue, especially given the runes they each have on their foreheads, that they are more accurately sentient golems). On top of that, there are subclasses for the Artificer, like the Alchemist, that live very comfortably in a pure medieval world.

But I don't think you would have any trouble with an equivalent class in World of Warcraft, given the wide breadth of technology levels that we already have well-represented in-game. The Engineering profession has, since vanilla, always injected that Steampunk/Gearpunk look and feel into the game.

That profession does kind of inhabit similar spaces to where I'd expect a Tinker class to live, but such overlap is not a dealbreaker - I have a Blood Elf Shadow Priest I created right when Burning Crusade came out, and the introduction of the Void Elves does raise some interesting questions about what that actually means for him as a character (why is he tolerated in Silvermoon while his Ren'dorei cousins aren't? Though to be fair, he does get hostile comments from passers-by in Midnight-era Silvermoon).

I don't think there's quite the precedence we had for Death Knights and Demon Hunters in terms of the Tinker as a new class. Many WoW classes were built on the conceptual bones of Warcraft III heroes, with Arthas serving as the model for both the Paladin and Death Knight (his abilities being much more mirrored than the two classes are in 2026) and Illidan as the Demon Hunter. Chen Stormstout, who appeared in the Founding of Durotar campaign, which focused more on the RPG elements present in the game, gave us the Brewmaster, which would be expanded out into the Monk class (itself a fairly common RPG class archetype, though I think WoW's version is far more mystical/magical than they tend to be).

Lore-wise, there is a role of High Tinker as the elected leader of the Gnomes of Gnomeregan (though boy, how long has Gelbin's incumbency lasted? How long are the terms?) but there's no formal suite of abilities I think we could draw from as the starting point for the class.

The Evoker, however, was pretty much unprecedented in the lore. Warcraft III came out 24 years ago, so I don't think that WoW needs to remain beholden to it (and it certainly hasn't been that way - though I do find it interesting that the new WCIII campaign chapter apparently establishes Forsaken Paladins. If only I could get my old copy to install!) Basically, behind the Deep Breath ability, I don't think anything that the Evoker casts had any direct precedence other than the obvious presence of dragons across WoW's history.

In a similar way, I don't think this would be much of a problem for the Tinker as a class.

So, let's ask a couple questions: First, why now? Second, if we do get them, what kind of class might they be?

As to the "why now," the main thing I have to say is: giant robots. We got a tiny teaser for Last Titan, where a truly staggeringly enormous mech (bigger than Dimensius, possibly?) towers over Dragonblight. There is some speculation that this mech is Ulduar, animating like a transformer, though I don't know how compelling the arguments for that are.

The Last Titan is likely to feature the Titans and their creations quite heavily, and Titan stuff has always been technologically-themed, with the Titanforged creations acting as automatons, the creeping corruption of the Old Gods' Curse of Flesh being the only thing that would lead to fully sentient Humans, Dwarves, Gnomes, and such.

Titan technology is thus probably the most advanced technology that we've ever seen in the WoW universe (other than possibly the First Ones, though I don't know to what extent Blizzard is going to lean so much into the presence of the First Ones as they kind of feel like they're just the Titans, but... um... older, and they made the Titans, right? Feels a bit like lore one-upsmanship at the cost of narrative cohesion, even if I thought the aesthetic of Zereth Mortis was freaking incredible).

And so, it would make sense to have a class that really focuses on technology coming into the spotlight.

But what kind of class would it be?

Well, let's start with the basics at the beginning:

I think that in an ideal world, the Tinker would, like the Monk, be a "regular" class, rather than a Hero class that starts at higher levels. Granted, these days, Death Knights, Demon Hunters, and Evokers start at level 10, just a small boost compared to other characters, but the appeal for each was that you could get one started and immediately jump into the current content.

Frankly, I don't know that the leveling game is all that great right now - one of the problems is that you level up faster than your quests give you appropriate gear, and with level scaling, this winds up making you feel less powerful (it's still better than the pre-level-squish days when you'd level up without getting any sort of talent point or new ability and truly be worse off in every way when you hit a new level).

Notably, when introduced, Death Knights started at level 55 when the level cap had just raised to 80, so you were still expected to level up through Outland before heading to Northrend, where established characters could go at midnight right when the expansion came out (I think I actually hopped in to start my DK at the time. This was also when you had to go to the store at midnight to pick up the game with its discs to install it, which did sort of stagger when people were logging in. I think the first expansion I got purely digitally was Warlords of Draenor, which had an infamously rough launch).

Monks were the only class added to the game that started at level 1, and when you were going around Pandaria in the first few weeks of Mists, it was very funny to just not see anyone playing the new class because, well, they hadn't gotten to a high enough level to start yet! The first time I saw a Monk in one of my dungeon groups, like a week and a half in, I was astonished that they had leveled so quickly (this was also when leveling was a slower process).

Should the Tinker be released, I think it would make sense for it to be a "normal" class, but I think the appeal of getting them into the mix from the get-go might compel Blizzard to have them start off at a higher level, at least during The Last Titan. But that would also meant they probably need a unique starting experience.

That's actually probably fine. While "allied races" get a brief intro, it's not a fully starting zone or anything, and so the last time we truly got a fully-fledged starting zone for a new race was... The Pandaren on the Wandering Isle, 14 years ago. Now, I love the Worgen starting zone (can you guess what class I'd think of making a Tinker? In fairness, the last three times they released a new class, I had hoped to make a Worgen character, only to find out that they were not allowed. Worgen Monks are a thing now, but they weren't available during Mists, so my Monk is a Pandaren like I assume 90% of them are,) but it's not exactly "current" content up to all the modern standards.

Still, more like the Monk than WoW's three hero classes, Tinkers feel like they would be something that's just a learned discipline rather than some intrinsic alteration to one's physiology, which means in my mind that you could easily make them available to every playable race, and we probably don't need special cosmetic customizations and unique voice lines the way that Demon Hunters do (though note that Void Elf demon hunters use standard Void Elf voices).

In other words, I think the class can sit upon the existing races without much issue.

But what would the class actually... play like? What roles might it perform in a group?

I think that the safest bet is to just let it do all three: Tank, Damage, and Heal. I think each of these can easily be justified by the use of technology that is specialized for that role.

Then, the next question is armor type. This is, I guess, less of an issue in today's WoW where so much loot is just personal and you get all your relevant stats on any armor, but it can be a matter of aesthetics.

I think that, no matter what, they've got to have one of the heavier kinds of armor. Mail or Plate could both work. They should be wearing some kind of metallic armor. Between the two, I'd lean in more for Plate, but it does create some (admittedly easily-solved) issues based on where I go with this.

Plate armor, I think, works for the Tinker because of how you could imagine a Tinker building out their armor like a hull. There's precedence with Tanks, as all plate-wearing classes can perform the Tank role, and precedence for healers wearing Plate thanks to Paladins.

Now, I'd like Tinkers to all use Intellect as their primary stat, but for Tanks, it would make more sense to go with Strength given that tank trinkets tend to have Strength and Agility on them. That's fine - these stats are nearly indistinguishable in modern WoW, as you get equal numbers of any piece of gear you're likely to actually use.

Here, though, is where my vision for the class makes itemization slightly awkward:

I think their DPS spec should be ranged, and use ranged weapons.

Back when we had a ranged weapon slot, Warriors and Rogues would wield bows, crossbows, and guns, even if they only used them as "stat sticks." But since the removal of said slot (I want to say in Mists? Monks never had a relic for that slot, did they?) these three weapon categories have been used by only a single class, and after Legion redefined Survival as a strictly melee spec, only two specs actually use these three kinds of weapons. The Demon Hunter-exclusive Warglaive weapon, thus, ironically, with the addition of the Devourer spec, is now used by more specs than these three weapon types that were once used by nine different specs.

I think Tinkers should use ranged weapons.

But that does, admittedly, create some itemization issues. If it's a Plate class, Tinkers would be using Intellect or Strength as their primary stat, and ranged weapons only have agility on them.

Now, one solution is profoundly simple: just add stats. They did this with Warglaives in Midnight, adding Intellect on top of Agility so that any Demon Hunter can use any Warglaive and have it function for their spec. Perhaps we could then add Strength or Intellect to ranged weapons as well.

We've put the cart before the horse a little, though, so let me back up:

Currently, every Tank class has a melee dps spec. It makes sense, as if you're a class that can fight in melee, it seems reasonable that you could focus those skills on survival or on damage output.

But I do think that the Tinker ought to be able to use guns (and by extension, bows and crossbows). In part, this is because the Engineering profession has always been the one that is used to make guns. But I also think that a weapon like that is, you know, a bit of advanced technology.

Also, from Vanilla up through Shadowlands, WoW had not added a single ranged dps spec to the game (even removing one by making Survival a melee spec in Legion). Since then, we have gotten three new ones with Devastation, Augmentation, and Devourer. Weirdly, all three of these have been "short range" ranged specs, so you could argue that we still haven't seen a single "full range" ranged spec added to the game in its 22 years.

Now, it would probably be simpler to just make a ranged Tinker DPS spec function as a spellcaster - you already have Intellect on Plate. But I really feel that making the class more generally weapon-based would be a better choice - a weapon, after all, is a type of tool.

The other alternative is to just make the class a Mail one - Agility could work for ranged weapons, and half of the existing tank classes use Agility anyway. Bizarrely, despite Mail actually giving more armor than Leather, we don't actually have any Mail tanks (though there's an evergreen rumor that Shaman tanks are right around the corner, which has been circulating for about 22 years). Itemization works out fine here, as tanks and dps would use agility trinkets while healers would use intellect.

I think this could work, but I do feel like the aesthetic of Plate makes more sense to me.

Next, another thing:

Let Tinkers use Shields.

It's kind of absurd that only three classes in WoW can use Shields, and one of them can't even tank! The fact that 4/6 tanks don't use shields is kind of crazy. I get why Death Knights went without them (though funnily enough, the D&D Death Knight monster stat block does use a shield) and it wouldn't really make sense for Monks or Demon Hunters. I'm not sure it really makes sense for Shamans, except that back in Vanilla when Paladins and Shamans were faction-exclusive, you had to have someone on the Horde who could make use of all the Intellect Shields.

But I think Shields make a lot of sense for Tinkers, and we even have a fair amount of precedence with various mech suits and such using shields.

Mechanically, I think Tinkers could just use Mana, though this resource has basically ceased to have any real meaning for specs that aren't Healers or Arcane Mages (and I think even for them, managing mana has gotten less central). I think instead I'd prefer some form of unique, original resource like Power.

This could act as a secondary resource like Essence does for Evokers or Runes for Death Knights (well, I'd argue that Runes are the primary resource and Runic Power is secondary, but whatever).

I don't really want to get into the weeds on this, though. Broadly speaking, I think tanks would probably have bursts of electricity and fire (maybe some arcane damage to distinguish it a bit from Shamans) and use force fields as damage absorption shields. Ranged dps would distinguish themselves from Hunters by focusing on charging their shots with various energies and possibly throwing bombs and missiles (I realize there's a bit of an overlap here with Survival Hunters). Healers, I figure, would channel healing energy into allies, maybe shielding them and possibly tossing down helpful pylons (though I get that the latter concept is a bit Shaman-like).

Aesthetically, here's what I'd want to avoid:

The Dracthyr problem.

I think part of why the Dracthyr are (I take it) unpopular is that you don't actually get to see your freaking gear on them when they're in their draconic true form. So much of the fun of a WoW character is building the perfect aesthetic for them, and while the Dracthyr customization options are broad and deep, they still pale in comparison with the sheer breadth of transmog options that any other WoW character can get their hands on.

Truly, I try to fill out the full tier sets for each class each season (ideally grabbing Heroic pieces in each slot and upgrading them to 6/6 to get the Mythic looks) but with Evokers I don't think I've ever actually done so because... well, why bother?

This is, admittedly, something of a problem for Druids, and while I love the spooky Wicker Man vibes of my Kul Tiran Druid (the only BFA Allied race who took over as a class main and had me putting my 2006 vintage Night Elf Druid in mothballs) I'm less motivated to grab all those transmog appearances given that when he's in combat, he always looks the same.

I do want Tinkers to have a signature, unusual look, but I don't want that to get in the way of letting their actual chosen gear appearances showing up.

Now, I don't think that's going to be much of a problem: the problem for Evokers is really more a problem of Dracthyr, and if this is available to every race, then I think we'll be fine.

But, that being said, I think we could do some fun things:

I think the tank spec should be in some kind of mech suit. The key is to make the suit unobtrusive enough that you can still show off your cool transmog. In fairness, maybe the solution is simply to have Tinker tier sets give off something of a mech suit vibe. Spells/abilities that manifest as big mechanical arms or antennae or the like might be enough to give off this feel.

Blizzard has gotten more creative with how class abilities manifest themselves, so maybe we can evoke the idea of being in a mech suit without messing too much with the overall silhouette of our character.

    So, as a big caveat: there's zero direct evidence that we're getting a Tinker class. It'll be probably a ways into 2027 before we get firm details on the actual expansion features of The Last Titan, and much as we never got Necromancers in Shadowlands, there's every possibility that the announcement will come and go with no new class announcement (though I think if not, there's a decent possibility we'll see new specs added, like the aforementioned Shaman tank).

I would very much like to get a Tinker like what I've described, but this is all just rampant speculation for now.

Faction Division and World of Warcraft D&D

 I've been following the WotC-produced "Dungeon Masters" series, which does short (like, less than ten episodes a pop) campaigns with a consistent group of players (including a couple of Baldur's Gate 3 cast members and also someone who is a friend of a friend), basically acting as promotion for the latest D&D book, with a series based in Ravenloft, then one themed around the arcane magic of Arcana Unleashed, and coming up, an Azeroth-based World of Warcraft adventure.

Now, WoW is a game that was built at least initially around a factional divide: the Alliance versus the Horde. While the world of Azeroth is threatened by villains that both Horde and Alliance are equally investing in stopping, the bad blood between these two groups created a perpetual engine of conflict, driving some of the drama and even taking center-stage with the Battle for Azeroth expansion (though that expansion was sort of half-invested in this divide and half in the machinations of the Old God N'zoth).

Starting with 2022's Dragonflight, the barriers between the factions have been loosened and made more permeable, with the resolution of 2018's Battle for Azeroth seeming to establish an enduring peace between the two sides (such that in the current expansion, Midnight, the central capital city is Silvermoon, which is the historical capital of the Blood Elves, a member race/nation of the Horde. The fact that there are still Alliance-aligned High Elves and Void Elves who are essentially the same people as the Blood Elves except for different politics and perhaps a bit of an infusion of different kinds of magic into their physiologies both stirs tension but also gives the Alliance a slightly more reasonable foothold to justify their presence here - something that the Blood Elf NPCs of Silvermoon have very conflicted feelings about).

Generally speaking, I'm a strong advocate of letting players play what they want to play. But I do think it's an interesting and worthwhile session zero discussion to have if you're going to play a Warcraft D&D campaign as to whether you want to make a party that is firmly affiliated with just one faction.

While there are some exceptions - the Pandaren, Dracthyr, Earthen, and Haranir - generally the race (or species, to use D&D's newly preferred term) determines your affiliation. When WoW first came out, the Alliance was Humans, Dwarves, Gnomes, and Night Elves, while the Horde was Orcs, Trolls, Tauren, and Undead (presented in the book as Forsaken, which is the term they use to distinguish themselves from mindless servants of the Lich King in the Scourge).

The first two games only had the Alliance and Horde as factions (actually, in the first game it was more accurately just Humans versus Orcs. While the Orcs had formed their Horde, the kingdom of Stormwind stood alone against them, with the Alliance not actually forming until the Second War, aka the second game). Thus, all conflict in those first two games was primarily through the clashing of these two factions (though I think there were opportunities to have Alliance vs. Alliance and Horde vs. Horde thanks to the traitorous human kingdom Alterac, secretly taken over by the black dragon Deathwing, and I believe the divide between the demon-worshipping forces loyal to Gul'dan in the Horde versus the more independence-minded faction under Warchief Orgrim Doomhammer).

While most of the world has always been available to both sides, there have always been territories where one side is welcome and the other is not, especially the major cities, where powerful elite NPCs are there to protect it, and player characters get flagged as valid targets for PvP even if you're on a non-PvP server (or, in more recent years, simply not in "war mode.")

Again, even though both factions are generally heroic (though I do feel that the Horde seems to slip into villainy a little easier) through much of the game's history, there has been a simmering hostility when there isn't outright warfare breaking out between them.

In a lot of ways, though, I think that the exciting possibility of a WoW D&D campaign would be to be able to do the things you can't usually do in WoW. That could as simple as having an Orc Druid (which is honestly probably the best way to realize the more spellcasting-focused Shaman specializations) but it could also mean having the party need to advocate for allowing their Forsaken party member to be allowed to enter Stormwind without being immediately cut down.

The faction conflict could be an interesting source of drama and tension within a party - rather than just assuming a total incompatibility, perhaps lean into the idea that we do, in fact, need to band together to face graver threats.

To be clear, NPCs have often and frequently reached across the factional divide. In Cataclysm, we were introduced to a pair of young paladins, Tarenar Sunstrike and Gidwin Goldbraids, a Blood Elf and Dwarf, who traveled the Plaguelands hoping to join the Argent Crusade (a faction-neutral force dedicated to protecting the world from the Scourge). Or we have Tehd and Marius, a Forsaken Warlock and Night Elf Demon Hunter who go around looking for powerful demons to slay.

The freedom, I think, of running a WoW-based D&D game is that you can really mix things up. Sentinel Hill is the central "town" of the rural realm of Westfall, basically the Kansas of the kingdom of Stormwind, and is basically the second zone that human players are expected to go in the natural quest flow from the human starting area - back in the day, you'd head there around level 10 (remember that WoW originally had a max level of 60, so 10 was really just getting started - I'd say it's basically the equivalent of level 3 in D&D. You started to get talent points/pick your specialization at 10, much as in D&D you get your subclass at level 3). 

But there's nothing saying you can't have an adventure set in Westfall that is far higher-stakes than anything that we've seen in the zone before (ok, to be fair, during the Legion pre-launch event in 2016, there was a full-scale demon invasion, a tier 4 challenge if ever I heard of one).

In other words, if your party is a mixed-faction group, that doesn't mean that firmly Alliance or Horde areas are necessarily going to be safe for everyone, and even if you've got some in-narrative explanation for why that Worgen is allowed to walk around Thunder Bluff without issue, it doesn't mean that hostile factions in your campaign's story aren't going to make these "safe" territories a bit dangerous.

While I don't know that it tells it with profound nuance (it does have its moments,) the overall "message" or "theme" of WoW is that these divides leave lasting scars, but at the end of the day, we're all just people, and when we can recognize that, we can work together toward a common goal (is that goal usually fighting some different "other?" For sure. It is Warcraft, after all).

But also, conflict is where we get drama, and while you want a party that can ultimately find a way to work together, I think having inherent resentments and grievances in a mixed-faction party could make for some really interesting roleplay.

Why Is Jesse MIA in Control Resonant?

 In Control, Jesse's primary motivation entering the Oldest House is simply to find her brother. Nearly two decades earlier, the FBC abducted Dylan in a misguided attempt to groom him as the next Director, seeing his paranatural abilities and figuring that if they controlled (it's kind of a theme word) everything about his upbringing that he'd wind up an ideal successor to Trench.

This backfired like crazy. Not only did a young Dylan kill numerous FBC personnel, but he wound up resenting the Bureau so much that he welcomed the Hiss when it began infecting everyone there.

Dylan's unique resilience to his Hiss infection is notable - he retains a sort of intelligence and intelligibility. Is this because of the lingering presence of Polaris? Is it because of his own paranatural powers? Is it because he didn't resist?

The point is, Control doesn't end with much of a victory for Jesse. The Hiss are still rampant in the Oldest House, the lockdown can't be lifted. The only real point she manages to score is that Dylans is... not infected by the Hiss anymore, but it's something of a Pyrrhic victory, as Dylan is comatose. Not exactly the reunion she was aiming for, and now she's trapped in the building, performing a leadership role for a Bureau that she only vaguely understood before that fateful night, that same Bureau that abused her brother for the better part of his life.

The FBC as an entity occupies a strange space in the world: Clearly, it has done some really morally wrong things. But there are factors that make us (or at least made me) view them in a more positive light: first, that there truly are threats that need to be handled, and the clandestine secrecy might actually have some justification given that the rules of the paranormal/supernatural (my guess is the insistent use of "paranatural," which is not a term I'd ever heard before playing the game or anywhere else since, is meant to blur the lines between the more sci-fi term of paranormal and the more fantasy term of supernatural) mean that people simply believing things can shape reality.

It's honestly one of the most potent concepts in speculative fiction: the whole scientific, empirical manner of viewing and studying the world rests on the assumption that our observations reflect a concrete, objective universe underlying everything that is consistent and exists completely independent of our perception of it. But the only evidence we have of that objective universe are our very flawed perceptions, and the more we learn about psychology, the more fallible our perceptions prove to be, which raises the question: can we be so certain that there is an objective reality, or is reality malleable and shaped by perception?

Beyond that, there's also an adventurous spirit amongst people at the FBC, especially as embodied by Casper Darling, which makes it very easy to forget that what he did to Dylan was unconscionable.

Jesse, after what you'd assume would be a horrible trauma of walking into an office right after the man inside shot himself, and then being compelled to pick up the gun and hold it to your head while you go through some bizarre psychic evaluation, arrives back in her own body and says she's actually happy she's there - she's excited to be initiated into this world of the Weird.

In other words, even if the FBC has played an antagonistic role toward her through much of her life, the world it opens up to her is something she deems worth it.

Generally, I think we're meant to think of Jesse as a good person. She wants to save as many lives as she can, and she hopes to reform the FBC with whatever power she gets from being the Director. But it's such a weird idea, to find this secret government agency and to be in charge of it ten minutes after walking in the door before meeting any employees other than the mysterious janitor.

I haven't played FBC Firebreak, but I'm given to understand that in the documents found in that game, Jesse is not terribly popular with the Oldest House staff. I mean, who would be happy with things when you're stuck inside an office building filled with deadly threats for a full seven years?

Control Resonant, we know, will be inverting the story a bit - instead of Jesse looking for Dylan, Dylan is looking for Jesse. And instead of entering into this strange world of the Oldest House, Dylans is emerging out into the wide world that has been denied to him for most of his life (if memory serves, Dylan was born in 1992, so he's 34, and has spent 24 of those years inside that freaking building).

We know that Jesse is the one who drives the Aberrant, which will be his weapon as the Service Weapon is for her, into Dylan's abdomen while he's lying in his coma, and at least the way the trailers are edited, this seems to be what wakes him up.

But... does that make sense? I don't know if the timeline actually adds up if that's the case.

Because the last time we saw Dylan was not 2019, but 2023, when Kieran Estevez was investigating the Lake House out near Bright Falls, and was transported via the Oceanview Motel into the Containment Sector of the Oldest House, where she found Dylan in a containment unit.

Now, it's possible this was some kind of mental construct: I doubt that Jesse would have allowed him to be kept in such a bare-bones glass case. But here I need to break through the fourth wall and say that it's also possible that Remedy just didn't want to built all the assets to give Dylan a nice and comfortable cell.

I do think, though, that there's strong evidence to support the idea that Dylan wakes up before 2026 - not only can Kieran talk with him in that meeting (and again, could be a mental construct, could also be a connection across temporal distances) but there are also drawings found in the Lake House evidently made by Dylan.

Hm. But how would they have those if they weren't from before the lockdown...?

Ok, maybe that's not a valid line of reasoning.

The point is, Jesse drives the Aberrant into Dylan while he seems to still be in his coma, and that seems to initiate his bonding with what we can probably assume is an Object of Power (it may have even been described as one officially - though the name certainly elicits some curiosity.

If Dylan just wakes up right when that happens, surely he might have a moment to speak with Jesse. Might she give him some hint as to where he's going?

In clips of the game we've seen in previews, Dylan does seem to be able to interact with Jesse in the mind-place like "Gap" (the stunning instant-shift to the Mind Place and the Writer's Room from Alan Wake II will evidently also be how we access the Gap in Resonant) but she also seems to doubt that it's actually him that she's interacting with.

Jesse is missing - that seems to be the headline. And with her gone, the FBC turns to Dylan as the other incredibly powerful Parautilitarian to try to deal with some of the threats out there.

But why does she leave?

Ok, to be fair, that's probably the driving mystery of the game.

I guess there's a question, though, of the timeline:

It sounds like there is some signal detected days before the Oldest House lockdown fails, which I think Emily Pope describes as some unprecedented resonance.

The catalyst or source of that resonance is probably related to the Blessed Organization (I don't know about you, but I always read Blessed as the two-syllable version, like a "Blessèd Day!" Do we get any audio of FBC people reading it out loud? Or did I just conclude that on my own?) We know from emails with Barry that Chester Bless said something about it being good that Barry had gotten out of New York - a decidedly ominous remark that Barry doesn't seem to find nearly as concerning as he probably should.

But will Blessed be our main antagonists in Resonant? Or are they just the ones who tip over the first domino?

Bless cheekily seemed to imply he had some connection to the Board - his motivational speaking tour employed what was probably an Altered Item that was a Surf Board, but given the power behind the FBC, and Bless's well-informed understanding of the Bureau's inner workings (enough to, for example, send a deadly altered item to the America Overnight studio, a show that was not publicly known to be an FBC project,) it seems pretty clear that he knows about the Board.

But here's the question: Is Bless and his organization opposed to the Board? Or are they actually working for the Board behind the scenes?

Control's Foundation DLC sees tensions begin to form between Jesse and the Board. They, bizarrely, limit the powers that they are willing to grant her while down there, despite the fact that she clearly needs both to fix the problem there. And the Board also seems to sabotage Marshall's HRA in retaliation for her destruction of the Nail, an act she does to prevent the Hiss from infecting it. While the ensuing problems from this action are, of course, also quite dangerous, it shows both a ruthlessness and an evident misaligned set of priorities between the human FBC and the inhuman Board.

I think it's very possible that Jesse's awareness of the danger that the Board poses to her and to the entire world grew over her seven years stuck in the Oldest House. And I think the most obvious reason for her to go MIA is because she knows that the Board is ready to get rid of her, no longer convinced that she can be useful to them anymore. Trench, it would seem, after his infection by the Hiss, had proven to no longer be a suitable choice for Director, and I believe it was the Board that forced to blow his brains out with the Service Weapon.

I think there's a good chance, then, that if they retain control of that OOP, Jesse might not be carrying it with her anymore, because the Board might no longer feel they can control (there's that word again) her as Director.

It would explain a couple things: first, why Dylan doesn't get the Service Weapon (while we see it as a gun throughout the first game, it is implied that it has taken on other forms, including possible Mjolnir and Excalibur, both of which are melee weapons that would suit Dylan's playstyle). But it would also explain why Jesse has to leave in a hurry without telling anyone where she's going or why.

Much as Dylan has even less reason to trust the FBC than Jesse did, it also stands to reason that as someone who is unlikely to romanticize the world of the Weird, having steeped in it for nearly a quarter-century, we might see the Board go from creepy but ostensible ally in the first game to the ultimate threat that must be defeated in the second.

Devouring the Void: Further Thoughts on WoW's Newest Spec

 The Devourer Demon Hunter is honestly a bit weird on a conceptual level.

Demon Hunters had only two specs for the first ten years of their existence, and they both sort of operated in a similar conceptual space: fel fire, demonic transformations, and sucking up soul fragments (whether as a bit of soloing sustainability for Havoc or a central healing mechanic for Vengeance). Interestingly, the two specs originally had different resources, with Havoc using the purple Fury that they now all use and Vengeance having the ultimate edgelord resource, Pain, which was colored more kind of orange. They honestly worked basically the same, and so it made sense that they consolidated it into the resource that also more or less shared the class color.

But we haven't really dealt with demons as a major threat since Legion. Demon Hunters work pretty well as one of the major "cosmic warrior" classes given the kind of space-alien theming of Warcraft demons, and so it sort of makes sense that, as we have an expansion with void-based villains that are if anything even more space-alien-coded that it would be Demon Hunters who develop a new technique to deal with them.

This comes hand-in-hand with adding Void Elves to the list of races that can play Demon Hunters (the only real downside is that they don't have quite as many unique customization options as the Night Elf and Blood Elf ones, and don't get unique voice lines. I did, however, discover that they have evidently added the ability to give at least Void Elf Demon Hunters glowing blue eyes rather than green).

Anyway, I leveled up a Void Elf Demon Hunter to stick pretty religiously to Devourer as a spec, while my original Night Elf one remains committed pretty firmly to Havoc (he dabbles in the other specs, but I also have a Blood Elf who I think is committed to Vengeance. Does this make sense in this day and age of extremely simple spec-switching and where most gear works for all your class's specs? Maybe not. But it helps me kind of organize the way I think about a character, and also lets me try out new looks and feels).

Devourer as a spec has always felt a little weird to me: looking at it without any kind of external guidance, it feels like the point is to cast Collapsing Star as often as you can, which means first building up the Void Fragments you need to activate Metamorphosis, and then racing to generate and gather as many more as you can to get as many casts of Collapsing Star in there as possible.

But it has always been quite difficult to get Metamorphosis to actually last long enough to get the spell off, even just casting it once (we'll address Apex talents in a moment).

The weird thing is that, at least according to Icy Veins, this isn't actually how the spec plays, or at least how it plays most effectively. Instead, what seems to be more ideal is to basically ignore Collapsing Star - instead of trying to extent your Metamorphosis as long as you possibly can, you instead want to get it as frequently as possible to take advantage of Voidsurges from the Void-Scarred hero talent (is the Demon Hunter the only class where one of its Hero Talent trees changes names depending on your spec?)

I am of two minds here.

See, I actually like the version of the spec that I had in my head, and I do think that building around it, which would involve actually picking up the Apex talents, could be fun, but it seems that this Voidsurge-focused build is considered more effective.

And actually, once I released my attachments toward that Collapsing Star-focused version of the spec, I started to enjoy the version I had. It's zippy (I don't think any spec has as much movement built into it, even Havoc) and bursty in a fun way.

The other major change I needed to make was that I think at least early in the expansion, you could take talents that made Soul Immolation a passive proc rather than an activated ability. Perhaps in 12.1 they changed this so that you do really need it to be a button on your bars.

Well... while I was leveling my Voidy DH up, I was not aware of that, and I will tell you, now that I am actually hitting that button, it's smoothing out the rotation a bit and also helping a lot with survival (given that you get healed for 30% of your HP over the course of it).

I still think I probably like Havoc best, but I do find myself enjoying the increased speed and flow of Devourer.

Sargeras in The Last Titan

 Sargeras is the original Big Bad of the Warcraft Franchise.

As the mightiest warrior of the Titans, themselves godlike beings (the closest that WoW gets to a classical Olympian-style pantheon - they're literally called The Pantheon,) the story goes (after a retcon or two) that Sargeras, in the ancient past, was tasked with fighting demons across the cosmos. While any given demon was not much of a match for him, the problem was that they kept returning from death, reborn in the Twisting Nether.

So, Sargeras built Marduum, a prison-planet where, rather than killing the demons, he would bind them there so that they could not escape.

Notably, the Titans actually used demons for some of their purposes. As we learned in the Green Fire quests back in Mists of Pandaria, Doomguards were used to sniff out people performing sacrificial magic - essentially, taking demons that were particularly drawn to mortal sacrifices, the Titans could then track down mortals performing such heinous rites using the very creatures they were attempting to summon and bind to their will.

It was when Sargeras found the world of Telogrus (never officially confirmed, but implied to the point that I think it's more or less undeniable,) it was infected not with demons, but with its own version of the Old Gods, who had wormed their way into the planet's Worldsoul and corrupted it. A group of demons, the Nathrezim, had come there to take part in this corruption, or perhaps study it (or, perhaps they had led Sargeras there knowing the effect it would have on them. Look, the Revendreth-Nathrezim connection was a wild swing for Shadowlands, and I don't know how much Blizzard would prefer to sweep that under the rug, but it's canon until retconned away).

Sargeras determined that the Telogrus World Soul was beyond saving, and so slashed the planet it half, killing its world soul and horrifying the rest of the Pantheon.

(As a side note: if the death of Argus sundered the Arbiter and the Shadowlands, had something similar happened when Telogrus was killed? Or was the fact that Telogrus hadn't yet fully formed as a Titan or other equivalent entity enough to keep it from disrupting things? Presumably the Jailer had already fallen from grace by that point if he was sending the Nathrezim out there into the cosmos, so this wouldn't have been the start of his villainous journey.)

Now an outcast, Sargeras determined that he would need help if he was going to purge this void corruption from the cosmos, and so he destroyed his own demonic prison, unleashing the demons he had trapped and conscripting them into what would become the Burning Legion.

When the rest of the Pantheon confronted him, they told him how they had saved another world soul from void corruption - namely Azeroth. This didn't work out very well, as Sargeras' "destroy the entire universe to save it" plan had gone into full swing. He "killed" (they got better) the rest of the Pantheon and set out searching for Azeroth and looking for new recruits to join the Burning Legion, ultimately discovering the Eredar, a super-advanced civilization living in a seeming utopia, but whose curiosity to learn more about the cosmos would make them easily manipulated. As we know, most of the Eredar willingly joined the Legion, while some fled into exile as the Draenei (or fought in resistance as the Krokul).

Sargeras tried numerous times to invade Azeroth - the War of the Ancients was the first major attempt, while the invasion of the Horde was another notable one (though the Horde's defeat and the death of Gul'dan allowed the Orcs to break free of their Legion affiliations). Finally, we had the events of Legion, which ultimately led to the biggest blowback of one of these invasion attempts, as Illidan Stormrage opened a portal to Argus, and the heroes of Azeroth were able to strike a deadly blow to the heart of the Legion and free the Titans from their eons-long imprisonment.

The last we saw of Sargeras, the other Titans magically pulled him away from Azeroth, dragging him into the Seat of the Pantheon where he would be imprisoned and guarded by the other Titans along with Illidan.

Sargeras attempted one last parting blow, driving his sword into the heart of Azeroth, and as we've seen in the 12.2 preview images, got like, 20 feet away from hitting the World Soul itself (given this is a sword nearly the size of a planet, 20 feet is almost nothing).

But, as I noted in the end of Legion, it felt kind of strange that after all this time, and after an expansion called Legion, we didn't get to fight Sargeras himself (to be fair, the first expansion was Burning Crusade, which is practically synonymous with Legion. But we didn't have Demon Hunters yet!)

I'm still not sure we're going to kill Sargeras at the end of The Last Titan. Frankly, my money is on Iridikron acting as the expansion's big bad.

It was, after all, Iridikron's plan to lure the Titans to Azeroth and lay a trap for them.

But... look, we can't discount the fact that the Dark Titan himself is out there, and specifically, if the Titans themselves come to Azeroth... they've got to bring him with them, right?

Sargeras became the master of a universe-wide army of demons, but he's not actually a demon himself (though he looks way different than he did before destroying Marduum. Originally black-haired and rocking a vaguely Ancient Egyptian vibe, he's now fire-haired-and-beared and has big scary wings and such (and I think horns?)

Still, while Aman'thul is the ultimate patriarch of the Pantheon, occupying the Zeus/Odin role within it, I think Sargeras might represent the absolute worst impulses of the Titans, the need to control everything to the extent that he'll destroy that which he can't control. I can totally imagine a world where Aman'thul emerges as the villain of the story, to be sure.

But I do really wonder what role Sargeras will be playing. It's only been 8 or 9 years since the final raid of Legion, and even if it's a little longer in-universe because of the post-Shadowlands time skip, this is an infinitesimal amount of time for beings like the Titans. (Though to be fair, as Algalon said, he's seen entire worlds created in the space of a heartbeat, so maybe they can process a whole lot of information in a very short period of time.)

My guess is that if Sargeras is playing a major role in The Last Titan, it's something Blizzard will play pretty close to the vest.

Honestly, I think they have a marvelous opportunity here: The Jailer jumped into canon as this massive, Sargeras-level threat, but was written so simplistically and also had so little time to develop as a bad guy that he wound up falling flat.

Blizzard has shown that they can do villains, even if they are cartoonish and mustache-twirling, a lot better with Xal'atath, and while he hasn't had a ton of screen time, Iridikron also feels like a smarter, more strategic threat.

I would love to get some high-quality writing to give us a Sargeras that truly feels like the deserving Big Bad of Warcraft. I want to see him be both mighty and a genius. Let him feel august in his regal power, larger than life, but without spouting cliche lines like "pitiful mortal," as we had the Jailer do. (Sargeras wouldn't find mortals pitiful - that would require him to feel pity.)

And... don't kill him off. For a bad guy who I think has been part of the lore for 32 years, it's not like it'd be too early. But the thing is, we haven't actually gotten enough time with him to earn that catharsis. I know that part of the idea of ending the Worldsoul Saga is to move onto something new, but I think it would be great to actually see some classic villains get their due (and not in a half-assed Warlords of Draenor way).

What Does WoW Forever Mean for Retail WoW?

 I haven't really played WoW Classic much - I basically got an Undead Warlock out of Deathknell and onto Bree and then decided I liked how modern WoW plays better. I ran a Death Knight through the starting experience to unlock a cool undead proto-drake mount, but beyond that, I haven't really touched it.

It's something I appreciate as a sort of living archive of the game WoW used to be.

There have been "Classic" recreations of various expansion, with I think even Warlords of Draenor Classic due to launch (though man, who would be eager to live through that again?) But as I understand it, there's also been a version locked at Vanilla-only.

This version (and I could be totally wrong here, as again, I don't play Classic) saw an experiment with the Season of Discovery, which brought in new (I think temporary) gameplay ideas that diverged from the 2004-2007 run of the original WoW.

Forever seems to be building on the popularity of Season of Discovery and making it the whole gist of the game, as a kind of alternate timeline for WoW (which they describe as not really changing the overarching story, but filling in gaps here and there with additional stories and characters).

Now, as I understand it, part of what appeals to Classic players is the relaxed pace - knowing that things are going to be as they are indefinitely means you aren't rushing to get geared up on all your alts to run Naxxramas.

In the early days of WoW, the endgame really wasn't the whole game. There's just a natural shift that occurred as players had been playing longer, where their mains and alts would hit the level cap of an expansion and thus be well-positioned to hit the level cap pretty early in the next one.

Given that, WoW has shifted its focus more and more to level-cap content, with the actual process of leveling up being more of a kind of prologue to the real game.

But for those of you who weren't playing 20 years ago, that wasn't necessarily the expectation back in the day. "Hitting the level cap" in Vanilla was practically being done with a character, and endgame content like raiding was reserved for a narrow few, more akin to Mythic Raiding today (and even that I think might be more accessible than it used to be). The game, then, was focused more on the personal journey as you quested across zones, perhaps occasionally running dungeons together along that journey (and given that the level 40+ questing content prior to Cataclysm was utterly anemic, you kind of had to grind dungeons to get to level 60. Seriously, if I recall, you could come to Tanaris at level 40, get like one quest, and then find that the next quest in the zone required you to be level 45 or something, when you were maybe near 41 after that quest. I ran Zul'Farrak a lot).

I'll confess that my approach to WoW is a bit mechanistic - honestly, my main goal is to try to get the fully Mythic tier appearances on each class (by getting Hero gear from Delves primarily and then upgrading them to 6/6). It's not necessarily the way I really ought to be playing the game, to be frank.

So I can kind of see the appeal of an endless "get there when you get there" version of the game. Indeed, as expansions have been coming out faster recently (War Within was by several months the shortest expansion in WoW's history, and Midnight seems likely to be on a similar 18-month timeframe) there's something of a rush to consume all the content you can (I gotta say, the in-between patch content like Forbidden Reach, Siren Isle, and Ritual Sites are ones that I've really kind of checked out of).

Anyway, the thing that's really odd, though, about WoW Forever is that this new content doesn't exist in the main WoW. So... should it?

I will say, I was glad to find out that the added Paladin-capable races coming in WoW Forever will also be joining us in I believe 12.2 (possibly 12.2.5). I'm honestly kind of eager to take an Undead Paladin through Tirisfal Glades and such, as it's been a while since we've really been able to hang out in WoW's spooky mode (Talebound appeals to me).

But what of, for example, the Skyborne? The backstory on these people is that they're apparently exiles from Dire Maul, who rose up against their prince. Practically speaking, they seem to use the Blood Elf model (a popular one) but have blue skin and golden eyes. While we could probably recreate that look with the Void Elves, it does make me wonder how much of what they come up with for WoW Forever that they might then import into mainline WoW.

It is a strange thing - this sort of parallel, or perhaps branching version of Azeroth. I guess the other big question is what this will do to the playerbase? I suspect that Forever won't siphon off players from "retail" anymore than Classic did, but will the Classic playerbase be divided here?

Wild Speculation on The Last Titan

 As I write this, it's the evening of the opening of 2026's Blizzcon. With announcements for WoW Forever, 12.2: Eclipse, and a few other things, we got just a teaser trailer for The Last Titan, and confirmation that it will release some time next year.

This next expansion is due to close out the Worldsoul Saga, and is set in Northrend, which will presumably be getting a big visual overhaul and update (also, thankfully, we'll almost certainly have the old, 2008 version of Northrend preserved, as Blizzard learned its lesson on removing old game content after Cataclysm).

The teaser gives us one major hint about the tone of the expansion, but news about the final patch of Midnight similarly seems to confirm some ideas I had had going into this expansion and how it would affect the story of the Last Titan.

I'll put the teaser in here, in case you haven't watched it, but I'll also describe the gist of it, as I had done in a previous post:

In the teaser, we see familiar locations in Northrend, with a snowy, overcast sky. Utterly dwarfing both Wyrmrest Temple and Icecrown Citadel, the two largest structures on the continent outside of Ulduar, is what appears to be a colossal (that word being the title of the teaser) Titan Construct that points its massive shoulder-cannons at the viewers as the teaser ends.

This is the Fel Reaver x100, possibly literally.

That's all we have to go on, but here, I'll start putting forth my speculative ideas:

    The Titans Are Going to be A Major Enemy Faction

The Titans have generally been presented in WoW's lore as good guys - the closest thing we have to true gods, or perhaps not "true" but "traditional fantasy gods," akin to the Greek Pantheon. They are, after all, the creators of a good chunk of the playable races, including Humans (which then means Kul Tirans, Worgen, and Undead,) Dwarves (along with Earthen and Dark Irons,) Gnomes (along with Mechagnomes,) and effectively Orcs (and thus Mag'har Orcs) as well, as they evolved from the giant creature Aggramar created to deal with the overgrown life on Draenor.

We've seen Titans and their creations corrupted - obviously Sargeras, but then also figures like Loken. But we've also seen Titanforged beings acting in rather hostile and malevolent ways, like the Mogu on Pandaria. Sure, you could explain the Mogu as being rogue creations.

We got our first real scare by the Titans with Algalon, who came to determine if Azeroth should be "reoriginated" to cleanse the Old God corruption from the surface. The fact that the Titans built in a "kill everything on the planet" button is... a bit worrisome.

But starting in Dragonflight, we began to get a different perspective that was less flattering. The Primal Incarnates opposed the five dragonflights because of their "corruption by" and collaboration with the Titans. And we saw how places like the Ruby Life Pools infused order into the dragon eggs there in a manner that sort of seems like brainwashing. In the final patch, as we tried to prevent Fyrrak from burning Amirdrassil in the Emerald Dream, we found lore that suggested that Aman'thul was very upset to see Life magic infused into Titanic creations, in opposition to Eonar's support of this.

In War Within, the Earthen were forced to cut their connection to their Titanic protocols, as it prevented them from taking the steps necessary to defend Khaz Algar, and a massive Titan construct (smaller than the one in the Last Titan trailer, to be sure, but with similar vibes) to go and attack Dornogal.

To be clear, I don't think that the Titans are likely evil, per se. But I think that they, and perhaps here I'm most specifically referring to Aman'thul, are hardcore Lawful Neutral, in D&D terms. That means that the order they bring to Azeroth is something they're going to prioritize over what we'd think of as the moral obligations to find a way to compromise and preserve life.

Is this a retcon? After all, Sargeras wanted to destroy Azeroth like he did with Telogrus after finding it was infected by the Old Gods, but Aman'thul and the rest of the Pantheon took a different approach.

While I'm confident we'll defeat Xal'atath and prevent her from merging with the World Soul to do what the Old Gods never accomplished, the fact that she gets so close might mean that the Titans decide they've taken too big a risk.

Thus, I see one of two scenarios: either the Titans come to conquer Azeroth and establish full control over it once again, purging "corrupted" life (as in, those affected by the Curse of Flesh, or those who weren't part of their Titanforged creation in the first place, meaning all of us except the Earthen,) or they come to fully destroy the planet.

Here's a factor that we might not have considered:

At the end of Legion, Sargeras was brought to the Seat of the Pantheon, to be held there imprisoned by the other Titans and Illidan. In my mind, he and Illidan have been in an endless duel this entire time while the rest of the Pantheon maintains containment around them, but we don't really know what's been going on there.

Sargeras is very powerful, but might he also be insidiously persuasive? Xal'atath's breaching the Worldcore is precisely the scenario that Sargeras warned the other Titans about, and even if she doesn't wind up succeeding in corrupting it (which is technically still an "if") it might be enough to get some of them, at least, to agree with Sargeras' plan to destroy at least Azeroth in order to prevent it from falling to the Void.

But rather than the demonic army of the Burning Crusade, Sargeras would get access to the full arsenal of the Titans, which is honestly probably stronger, because it's that power that he used to imprison the demons that would first form the Burning Legion in the first place on Marduum.

Whether Sargeras or Aman'thul is at the head of this Titanic assault, I suspect that we will at least be facing Titans and Titan creations as one of the core, major threats in the expansion.

    New Class: Tinker

Ok, while I'm very confident in at least the broad strokes of that previous scenario, this is my pie-in-the-sky idea.

People have been talking about a Tinker class for ages, leaning into WoW's utter rejection of strict medievalism in its fantasy (you wonder why I've been playing this game for 20 years? That's part of it).

While there's not exactly any precedent like we had with Death Knights, Monks, or Demon Hunters, we did get the Evoker kind of out of nowhere, and I think that the very technological nature of the Titans would actually make Tinkers a really good fit for this expansion.

Again, pure speculation, but here's how I see it:

Tinkers could wear plate armor (we now have at least three classes at every armor type,) and would be able to tank, dps, or heal. Tanks would basically use power-armor (I don't know how we'd do this visually outside of tier set design) using forcefields and such to defend themselves. Healers would probably be able to send jets of healing energy or fluid and likewise place forcefields over allies to defend them. For dps, I think we'd actually have them be ranged dps, possibly giving them access to ranged weapons that only Hunters currently use (technically more specs currently use Warglaives than Guns, Bows, or Crossbows).

Given that this is a learned discipline, any race would be able to play one, though obviously if there are any limitations, Gnomes and Goblins are certain to get them (I'd argue Draenei are also shoe-ins).

We haven't had a new class since Dragonflight, just the addition of the Devourer spec for Demon Hunters. But I think you could have a lot of fun with the aesthetic here.

    Icecrown Citadel as Home Base:

This is wild, I know. The thing is, in Wrath, our home city was Dalaran, which of course canonically moved to the Broken Isles and then canonically got blown into a million pieces at the start of The War Within over the Isle of Dorn.

So where, then, will we set our Hearthstones?

Initially, I had thought that perhaps Ulduar would expand into a true city for us to use. But if the Titans are a more hostile faction (at least for part of the expansion,) it seems unlikely that their central command base for all of Azeroth would be a safe place for us to hang out.

Now, maybe the far more reasonable answer here would be Wyrmrest Temple.

But Icecrown Citadel is the most defensible location in Northrend, and while Bolvar is no longer the Lich King, it is a place that might be potentially secured and made safe. Furthermore, while the rift in the sky is closed, the connection it has with the Shadowlands might actually lend us some power that could hold off the Titans.

(My main was Soulbound with Pelagos, and so now any time an NPC tragically dies in a questline, I jokingly think "it's ok, my best friend is God, and he'll make sure you get somewhere good for you.")

    Iridikron is Waiting in the Wings:

While Xal'atath has been the headlining villain throughout War Within and Midnight, it seems that she's made the age-old mistake of becoming the final raid boss of an expansion. This isn't a death sentence (see Kil'jaeden, at least the first time, and Garrosh) but it does not bode well for her long-term survival.

But we know that Iridikron's plan in Dragonflight was the lure the Titans here and essentially spring a trap on them.

What that trap actually is is totally up in the air. We haven't seen him since he peaced out and let Fyrrak distract us at the end of Dragonflight. But part of the plan was securing the Dark Heart for Xal'atath, which she used to Pokemon up the essence of Dimensius to then use to invade Azeroth.

Given this teaser, it sounds like if Iridikron wanted the Titans to come here, he sure as hell got his wish.

Again, though, we really don't know what he plans to do once they do show up. The Primal Incarnates were near-matches for the Dragon Aspects (is the fact that there were five aspects and only four incarnates the only reason the aspects won?) but I don't think that an admittedly powerful dragon is a match on his own for a Titan, not to speak of a whole Pantheon of them.

    Titan Internal Conflict:

It is perhaps a somewhat well-meaning but still sexist trope that the woman in a group tends to be the most reasonable. I think that even if the Titans are hostile to us, it'll be Eonar who differs in opinion. We do know that she was always more welcome to mixing Titanic Order Magic with the magic of Life.

Again, I don't think the Titans are bad, but their focus on order has led them to do some morally questionable things.

Given what we've seen in Harandar, it looks like the original cradle of the World Soul was held there, but the Titans extract it and put it in their own Worldcore.

There are two ways to read this: one is that the Titans are just as bad as the Old Gods, trying to impose their views and shape the World Soul in their own image. But a more charitable way of looking at it is that they simply didn't think Harandar was defended well enough to keep the World Soul safe.

Because I think that the Titans mean to do good by the universe, even if their understanding of what is "good" is skewed toward their focus on order, I suspect that some, likely starting with Eonar, will object to the attack on the mortal races.

Frankly, I'm really hoping that the Titans are major characters in the expansion rather than detached and distant presences, because these names that have been part of the story for so long have not really been attached to much in the way of personality. Someone explain to me how Norgannon, Khaz'goroth, and Golganneth actually differ in personality. Please.

A divided Pantheon, not all united in this campaign, would be a way to expose some of those different perspectives and personalities.

    The Scourge Rampant:

This might contradict my "Icecrown Citadel as our home city" idea, but even if this expansion is going to center far more on Ulduar and the Titan stuff, Northrend is the home continent of the Scourge.

And let's face it, the Scourge is the coolest villain faction in all of Warcraft.

The fact that Bolvar isn't Lich King anymore means that the Scourge doesn't have anyone at the wheel. Now, does this make them more or less of a threat?

In Wrath, Terenas seemed to believe that a Scourge without a Lich King would be an even bigger problem than it was under Arthas. But while Bolvar did a decent job of keeping it in check (give or take a few very morally questionable actions during the Death Knight class campaign in Legion,) the brief outburst of Scourge activity in the run-up to Shadowlands seemed kind of minor compared to the forces of the Jailer within the Maw.

Indeed, one of the disappointments of Shadowlands is that it seemed like the Jailer's Mawsworn forces ought to have felt like a "Super Scourge," but they wound up not really feeling as cool as the one we faced from Warcraft III through Wrath.

Part of what made the Scourge cool, though, was the fact that it was organized - not just a mindless swarm of zombies, but a unified fighting force employing tactics and strategy. (One of the cleverest bits of lore writing is some of the books written by Kel'Thuzad found in Acherus during the Death Knight starting experience, in which he talks about how the Scourge doesn't need to adorn all of its buildings and weapons with skulls and other dark and scary symbols, but by embracing the look that the living expect them to have, they gain a psychological advantage over their adversaries).

I would be shocked in the Undead don't play a big part in The Last Titan, though I'll also say that it's likely they won't be the focus. Perhaps we'll get a 13.1 patch that gives us an Undead raid, but much as Yogg-Saron was dealt with in the "middle raid" of Wrath (we can just pretend Trial of the Crusader didn't happen) I think we'll see the focus flipped in our Northrend revisit.

(I will say, doing Wrath remix before Last Titan comes out is kind of a bold choice. We're going to spend a lot of time in Northrend in 2027).

    We'll Get a Level Squish After Last Titan:

We will be hitting level 100 in Last Titan, and while we did previously go up to level 120 in Battle for Azeroth, I think especially with the Dragonflight-era talent system, there's some danger of things getting out of hand as we pile on more and more levels with more and more talents.

One of the big problems by BFA is that, with the Mists-era talent system, we stared dealing with a lot of empty levels (and with level scaling, that meant that you were effectively getting less powerful as you leveled up).

Given how talents now work (more akin to the Classic-Cataclysm system, but refined) I don't fear empty levels, but I do think it's notable how they've had to throw in more bells and whistles to the talent system, giving us first Hero Talents and then the Apex Talents in Midnight.

So while I think 100 is a nice round number for us to hit in Last Titan, I think what comes after is going to include a level squish.

    Actually, Lots of Changes Post Last Titan

This is way ahead of us, and we won't know any of this stuff for sure until probably 2028, but bears speculation:

The World Soul saga comes to an end with the Last Titan. What does that mean?

Well, I think Azeroth/Aln'hara/the World Soul will emerge from the planet and take on their mature form, which is probably going to be something not quite a Titan, but of an equivalent level of power (or greater).

That will mean a lot of changes for Azeroth.

Does this mean that the planet is no longer the battleground for the various cosmic forces trying to claim the World Soul?

But also, does that mean that the Elements will actually calm down, as the spirit energy that Azeroth has been chugging will now be left to facilitate harmony between them?

While I've always been skeptical about a true "WoW 2," given that I think that came out in 2007 and was called The Burning Crusade, I do think there's a chance we'll see some major overhaul to the game.

While I'd argue it's dangerous to split your playerbase by making a true sequel to an MMORPG, it's clear that they've already experimented a bit with that with WoW Classic and now WoW Forever, and at least in the former case, it doesn't seem to have caused them any major problems.

My fear, personally, is that I'm a Mac user, and Blizzard historically started as a Mac gaming company, but in recent years (er, decade,) their new games have been PC- (or console-) only. I get that it's easier to optimize PCs for gaming, but I'd hate to be put in a position where I have to either not play the next incarnation of WoW or have to get a second computer.

I would also think that a WoW 2 would have something of a reset when it comes to player options. If they were to rebuild from the ground up, would we have to wait several years to get Demon Hunters again?

And what would happen to characters I've been playing for straight-up 20 years now?

Again, I'm not convinced that WoW 2 will ever be a thing, but I do think it's possible that we'll have a pretty major overhaul of the game post-Last Titan. What that looks like, I truly cannot say.

Undead Paladins and the Current State of the Forsaken

 You know, when I first started playing WoW, I kind of rolled my eyes at the Undead, the chosen playable race for the most edgelord players.

But the thing is, the deep, dark truth in my soul, is that I'm a bit of an edgelord myself.

Yeah, I freaking love these guys. The truth is, that while there was some precedent for my affinity for spooky vibes (my favorite holiday as a kid was Halloween,) I truly think that World of Warcraft coaxed forth a lifelong fondness for the grim and macabre, and my amoral little Undead Rogue, who cut his teeth assassinating the leadership of Hillsbrad, has always been one of my most beloved WoW characters, even as my love of the Rogue class fluctuates (actually, I really adore the way Subtlety plays currently, though Goremaw's Bite being part of the recommended talents does mess up my comfortable action bar placements).

I also love Paladins... though I'll confess that while Protection Paladins remain my "comfort class," as my main has been my human Prot Paladin since early 2008, I don't terribly care for the current state of Retribution. And I've genuinely never played as Holy outside of the artifact quests in Legion. If I tank well enough, they won't make me heal!

But if you asked me which race would be the absolute last to get Paladins, I'd have assumed Undead.

Perhaps that was too quick a judgment.

In I believe 12.2, we'll get an expansion to the available classes for Paladins, adding Night Elves, Trolls, and Undead.

For Night Elves, this is honestly a long time coming. Delas Moonfang was one of our class champions in Legion, and the ghost of Nerus Moonfang (I believe her ancestor) was another one. There were, thus, more Night Elf champions than there were Dwarves and I believe Draenei, both races that can and always have been able to play as Paladins. While Night Elves don't worship the Light in the same way that Humans, Dwarves, and to an extent Blood Elves do, we've seen how the Paladin tradition need not all derive from Uther the Lightbringer's example, with Draenei Vindicators, Zandalari Troll Prelates, and Tauren Sunwalkers. It stands to reason that Night Elf Paladins could emerge from a combination of their Sentinel warrior traditions and their Elune-worshipping priestly traditions.

Then, with Trolls, it seems likely that the example of the Zandalari Prelates would simply be something the Darkspear incorporate into their traditions. Interesting that the Darkspear were once this minor, pariah tribe amongst the Gurubashi nation and now are more or less on equal footing with the traditionally most powerful Troll tribe. While there were rough patches (Garrosh,) it sounds like joining up with the Horde has worked out quite well for the Darkspear.

Anyway, when it comes to the Undead, it sort of simultaneously makes a ton of sense and also the least sense for them to be paladins.

After all, the Knights of the Silver Hand were quite prevalent in Lordaeron. I don't know how where Uther actually hailed from, but we've seen how Alonsus Faol, who literally is the one who imbued Uther with his holy power and co-founded the Knights of the Silver Hand, has remained a holy priest firmly dedicated to the Light, even if that light causes him pain as one of the undead.

While Faol is associated more with the Conclave now, as he is a Priest rather than a Paladin, I think he stands as a great example of how the Forsaken might embrace ways that seemed to be lost to them with their descent into undeath.

Culturally, I think that Sylvanas' regime as head of the Forsaken (and in fairness, she more or less founded the Forsaken as a unified people) discouraged association with old identities from when they were living. While Sylvanas seems on the road to reformation, she's also decidedly not the leader of the Forsaken anymore, though at least in-game we haven't seen anyone really take her place (Calia Menethil might play such a role, but I think reestablishing the Menethil dynasty is maybe not the best choice for them, even if she's about 1000% better than her brother was.)

The point is, the Forsaken, who have always leaned pretty hard into their dark and spooky aesthetic (prior to Cataclysm, towns like Bree were just ruined versions of human architecture found in Elwynn Forest, but they had created new types of buildings in Wrath of the Lich King, which they then carried over with the world revamp, dialing the spooky gothic vibes up to 11). And that extended to their behavior, with a fair number of actions that were straight-up evil, with just the lightest justification that it was in the name of self-defense.

Sylvanas amped up this kind of behavior, eventually forcing the Horde to turn on her after she had become Warchief, and outside of the game, she even had an emerging independent Forsaken government, the Desolate Council, killed.

Without Sylvanas, and after the betrayal by Sylvanas in her alliance with the Jailer, the Forsaken have not really been in the spotlight as much, but I suspect that, absent her influence, it might be less taboo for them to embrace some of their old identities as humans. Particularly given the much less hostile relations between the Alliance and Horde, it's not quite as important to the survival of the Forsaken to be so utterly hostile to living humans.

And I think that these factors all combine to allow them to start embracing the role of the Paladin.

Now, at least according to some very old lore, it's unlikely that any Undead Paladins would have been living paladins prior to their initial deaths. Back in early WoW lore, Paladins were immune to the Plague of Undeath, and thus would not have been turned even if slain by the Scourge (they could still be resurrected as Death Knights, of course).

This is the kind of minor lore thing that could very easily be retconned away, but I think it might be interesting, culturally, if we conceptualize Undead Paladins as embracing it as newcomers - a movement to honor the history of Lordaeron, and a test of their convictions to endure the power of the Light in order to protect their people.

Look, as I said, I really only love playing Protection, so I don't know how likely it is I'll have some really prominent Undead Paladin alt (I already have a Lightforged Draenei and Tauren Paladin sitting there as well). But it would be really cool if we get an exploration of the way that Forsaken culture has evolved in recent years.

Patch 12.2: Eclipse and 12.1.7: Talebound, plus Wrath Remix, and a brief Last Titan Teaser

 While we only got a brief (but pretty menacing) teaser for The Last Titan, the main focus for Blizzcon's WoW stuff, apart from, you know, WoW Forever, was Eclipse, the presumably final major patch of Midnight. Boy, doesn't it feel like this expansion just came out?

Eclipse sees Xal'atath make it down into the Worldcore, where Azeroth's World Soul was placed by the Titans (after they removed it from Harandar). It appears that Xal'atath's plan is to merge with the World Soul to become her own kind of Titan-like being.

Here are the major highlights:

First off, we have a new zone called the Mantle Vault, where the Worldcore can be found. Here, there's a subterranean hostile faction called the Deepskar Empire, composed of Troggs, Drogbar, Kobolds, and led, apparently, by hostile Niffen.

Within the Mantle Vault, we'll find the big 8-boss Worldcore Raid, which sees us have our big confrontation with Xal'atath, and where spellcasters can get their hands on Midnight's Edge, a spellcaster dagger that looks quite similar to a certain Black Blade that a certain former-mortal-turned-void-being used to live inside, though Blizzard claims at least that this is a different weapon (it's also apparently not just a rare drop, but will require a whole quest chain that includes finishing the raid. Fingers crossed it's more like the Mists/Warlords Legendary quests so I actually have a chance of getting one).

Additionally, the Gearhold will be a new Lair, the recent variation on World Bosses that... puts them in instances (not entirely sure how this is distinct from a single-boss raid, though I guess the fact that you can just walk in and be assigned a World-tier group for the boss is somewhat convenient). The boss here is an Azerite-infused cave bat called Noctinaxx.

We'll be getting a new dungeon called Thraegar's Stand, which has three bosses and seems to be kind of Earthen/Titan themed.

Also of note: Paladins will now be available to three new races: Night Elves, Trolls, and Undead. While this doesn't quite make them universal like they've done for some other classes, it does mean that we've got a ton of new options. Personally, I'm eager to make an Undead Paladin alt (if for nothing more than to see how amazing their paladin mount will look,) and given that we had Night Elf Paladin class champions in Legion a whole 10 years ago, it's about damn time that we get some cat-mounted champions of Elune's light. As for Trolls, I imagine that they've adapted some of the traditions of the Zandalari Prelates, spreading Paladin techniques across Troll-kind.

Also, perhaps unsurprisingly given how profoundly sinister he's been all expansion, our Delve nemesis will be none other than Astalor Bloodsworn. What that means for Prey is something I don't totally know (it will, evidently, still be part of the game).

Prior to this patch, in 12.1.7, we'll be getting a new game mode: Talebound.

This will apparently be a sort of Gothic Horror-vibes roguelike RPG system. If I understand correctly, this will be a bit like Plunderstorm, as a standalone thing you can play within the WoW Client. But unlike Plunderstorm's PvP battle royale, this seems to be built around single-player and co-op.

The premise is that we're snatched out of our reality to play the role of protagonist in The Storyteller's tales - a figure who prefers horror stories.

The game mode lets you play as one of three original classes, the martial Slayer, the Inquisitor, or the Witch.

Now, I think that WoW does Gothic Horror vibes immaculately, and my favorite parts of the game have tended to be when it leans into horror aesthetics, which I think are beautifully offset by WoW's cartoonish style, keeping it from getting oppressively bleak. It seems that this game mode will use environments like Revendreth, Gilneas, the Plaguelands, Parts of Kul Tiras (I know we saw the Shrine of the Storm, though I have to imagine we'll get a bunch of Drustvar) and such, and let us wear all the kind of Victorian finery that you'd want to in such a space.

This feels, basically, right up my alley, even if I generally don't like Roguelikes.

Additionally, we're getting a third expansion Remix, and having already done two of the game's most beloved and popular expansions, the next one will be bringing us to what for many was the pinnacle of WoW, Wrath of the Lich King. While I've already farmed quite a few of the tier sets for almost twenty years now, I'm sure I'll have fun soaking up every bit of Wrath nostalgia for that.

While the focus here is far more on Midnight's last patch and WoW Forever, we got a tiny little preview for the Last Titan - nothing in terms of gameplay, but we got this:

Shots of the massive, towering structures of Northrend, Wyrmrest Temple and Icecrownd Citadel, against stormy, overcast skies. As the camera lingers on Wyrmrest Temple, towering over Dragonblight, a flash of lightning reveals a silhouette - something that dwarves the temple tower, hundreds of feet, maybe a thousand feet tall. And then, glowing runes activate, and we see what appears to be an utterly colossal Titan construct walking the earth. Twin cannons on its shoulders activate and point down at us, the puny viewer in the frigid landscape, and as they begin to fire, we cut to black.

The Last Titan is due to arrive next year, in 2027.

Yeah, this is a pretty fast clip: Midnight launched only 18 months after The War Within, and it looks likely that The Last Titan will arrive on a similar schedule (I'd assume late in the year, given that Midnight only launched this year).

I... I know that the ambition back in the day was or WoW to have annual expansions, but I don't know that I think this is really a good idea. If the level cap rises and our progress in gearing and other means (I've actually been taking professions seriously in Midnight) is wiped away that much faster, it might cut into some of the extrinsic motivations to play.

I'm super jazzed to see what an updated Northrend looks like, don't get me wrong. But I think the traditional two-year cadence for WoW expansions worked fine, and if you're worried about content droughts, just give us X.3 patches! They did it in Wrath and Legion, and everyone loved those expansions!

Anyway, lots of stuff to digest. I haven't even touched on the new campaign being added to Warcraft III Reforged (hey, do you like the Forsaken? I've got good news for you.)

World of Warcraft Forever

 Well, here we go: World of Warcraft Forever is essentially the new Classic Plus that has been rumored for some time.

While Classic exists to preserve and revisit the experience of World of Warcraft's past, Forever will essentially create a branching experience, with new content added to the game, but in a different manner than the 22-year-running "retail" core version of the game.

Like Classic, the focus here is on the original two continents - Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms, in the post-WCIII time period, but as a sort of branching timeline. Again, while Classic seeks to preserve as best as possible the gameplay experience from 2004, Forever will be adding new content, including new zones, expanding old zones, and adding new dungeons and raids.

We'll also be seeing some new race/class combinations, the most notable of which is the Undead Paladin. The cinematic trailer, which focuses on our familiar dwarf hunter with his brown bear companion from the original WoW cinematic, sees him travel across the world following a Wisp, who brings him to Dalaran as its magical shield retracts (yes, we'll be able to go to Dalaran in its original location) and eventually has him wind up at Nordrassil in a new version of the Mount Hyjal zone, and he faces off against a Forsaken Paladin (in a clever nod to the original cinematic, the ground around the paladin's foot alights, but unlike the Warlock in that original trailer using Hellfire, this is Consecration).

Players will be able to choose between the original character models and the post-Warlords updated models, and it seems that the entire world has gotten a bit of a graphical overhaul (not a total rebuild, but things look a little better).

There will also be a new playable race, the Skyborne, who seem to be an offshoot of the elves living on a giant floating island. Skyborne are available to both factions, but depending on which faction you choose, different classes will be available, with Horde Skyborne able to be Shamans through a connection to the Earthen Ring and Alliance Skyborne able to be Mages through the Kirin Tor.

Forever will have a locked level cap of 60, with any updates evidently building upon content at that level. They claim the game will be focused more on leveling, with a lot of alt-friendly features to encourage you to stop and smell the roses while leveling up.

The talent system is more akin to the old Classic style, but some small incremental talents have been consolidated to make room for more impactful ones.

I will say, as someone who started playing during Vanilla, I was never really that eager to get into WoW Classic. As nostalgic as I might be for those early days of WoW, I also really appreciate the development of quality-of-life conveniences (and I also don't have rose-colored glasses about the behavior of players back in those days).

Now, this might appeal to me a little more given that there's all this new stuff to try out (I do actually really like the idea of an Undead Paladin, even if it seems insane to me that we still haven't gotten Night Elf Paladins after Legion gave us two Night Elf class champions).

Still, WoW takes a lot of gaming energy, especially if you like to have a lot of alts (see the name of the blog). So I'm likely to just try it out a little bit. I believe the subscription, like WoW Classic, is covered by your WoW subscription, though it sounds like there might be a one-time purchase fee.

It launches in November, so, pretty damn soon. (Man, the latter part of this year is piling up with new games to play).

Diablo V Announced

 Well, that's a bit of a quicker turnaround!

Just a teaser, I think, so far, but Diablo V apparently takes place in a Sanctuary that is somehow even worse than usual. The world has fallen to ruin, conquered by the Lord of Terror himself.

Supposedly, there will be no safe towns in which to rest and take shelter.

I'm curious to see how that affects the way the game actually plays: in Diablo IV, for instance, there's a tremendous amount of stuff you need to do in town to fine-tune and enhance your characters' traits and abilities (in fact, I think it got kind of out of hand, to be honest).

Personally, I'd wish for a stripped-down and simpler version of the game, with more of an emphasis on smart moment-to-moment gameplay than optimizing to a razor's edge so that nothing lasts more than two second against your assaults.

Look, I know that much bigger fans of the franchise would string me up for this, but I actually think the world of Diablo would lend itself very well to a Souls-like game, inverting its "killing thousands of monsters at a time" style in favor of something that required careful play and planning to face each enemy. But I fully recognize that that's not what the franchise has ever been, and this is my imposition of another gameplay style onto it.

Anyway, part of why Diablo IV's character progression got so profoundly convoluted was because it had two expansions stacked on top of the original game, so it's probably good to get a nice reset here.

New Starcraft Game Announced... To Be Released 4 Years From Now

 Yes, it looks like Blizzard is returning to the Starcraft franchise, though I'll warn diehard RTS fans out there, if you're one of those people who for a solid decade was wondering when this weird little MMORPG spin-off game would give way to a true Warcraft IV, you might feel some disappointment that Starcraft (supposedly just called "Starcraft," though there's an image that seems to call it Starcraft Dominion) is going to be an open-world shooter game.

We only have a cinematic trailer, which shows a young recruit to the Terran Dominion's space marines, rising up through the ranks as he, notably, doesn't actually engage in any combat but just trains a whole lot.

Starcraft is a far more cynical game setting than, say, Warcraft, and so the moment he gets out to face the Zerg Swarm, his gun jams and there's an abrupt cut to some technician salvaging his armor, opening a drain where his liquified remains pour out.

Now, a lot of people have commented on the fact that, with a 2030 release announcement, this feels a bit early to even tell us about it. And there's a history of games like this being announced well in advance and then being canceled quietly.

We shall see.

To be honest, I don't know that I'm really that interested in a dark and cynical Starship Troopers-like dark military sci-fi game. We've already had games like Helldivers 2 or the Warhammer 40k Space Marine game, so I'm curious to see how Blizzard intends to set their game apart from these others.

I don't know if I'll be able to keep up with every bit of news coming out of Blizzcon, but this seemed notable to share.

As We Periodically Do: Asking What We Want for 5.5 Books

 Arcana Unleashed is, I think, maybe the most successful supplement to come out for D&D since the debut of 5.5 edition, other than the core books.

For the main book, we have a big influx of spells, feats, subclasses, and I think we have a pretty good hit to miss ratio.

I think it's likely that the impetus for this book was first to reprint the four Wizard subclasses that had been in the 2014 PHB but not the 2024 one, given the standardization of 4 subclasses per class in that book.

Even if it wound up reducing the number of updates for Clerics and Wizards, I actually applaud the "4 for everyone" approach that we got in the PHB. The funny thing, though, is that the books we've gotten since haven't taken the same even-handed approach.

5.5 is still relatively new, though we're now two years out, so it's not brand-new. In that time, we've gotten a revisit to Eberron (a book whose purpose I think was to get the Artificer updated to catch it up with the other 5.0 classes,) an adventure anthology in Dragon Delves, the Forgotten Realms books last year, Horrors Within, and the these two with Arcana Unleashed, with Deadfall giving us our first full campaign book of 5.5 (which, interestingly, matches the last 5.0 campaign book's level range, at least roughly).

Now, I have all of the adventure books, because I'm a bit of a collector, but I don't really use them - to me, a big part of the fun of DMing is building by own campaign. Thus, I'm more likely to borrow ideas from them, or monsters. But I recognize this isn't necessarily the typical thing: plenty of groups and players run these adventures, even exclusively.

In 5E's early days, we'd get a lengthy adventure book at least once a year. But they seem to have leaned away from that model. I don't know if it's just that most players don't make it through all those adventures (the only one I finished was part of Adventurer's League, with a lot of players who were not there for the RP, and my friend who was DMing was keeping things moving quite fast).

What I find interesting is that the early days of 5E - and actually, not even that early - some of the big supplements we got were sort of universal rules expansions.

Volo's Guide to Monsters was something of an expansion to the monster manual, and while it had pretty extensive lore chapters (a fair degree of which seemed to be retconned away) it was also the biggest influx of monsters for DMs to use, as well as new playable races.

Then, we got Xanathar's Guide to Everything, which provided at least two subclasses for every class other than the Wizard, along with the biggest addition of spells and, for DMs, a far easier encounter-building system than what we had gotten in the DMG (it was a big improvement, and one I used for a long time, though I think the 2024 DMG one is what I currently find most effective).

Later, we got Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, which provided another good influx of monsters to use, along with some more playable races (a little less broad in scope).

And then, finally, Tasha's Cauldron of Everything gave us more subclasses and, I think pretty crucially, new variant rules that divorced ability score bonuses from races - something I, frankly, think they erred in then stapling to backgrounds in the 2024 PHB and would not mind seeing a similar corrective.

Tasha's did do a fair amount of consolidation: giving us setting-agnostic versions of the Artificer as well as several subclasses. In other words, WotC has always done a fair bit of reprinting (even Xanathars repeated some options that had shown up in Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide).

Toward the end of 5.0, WotC released a "Rules Expansion Box Set," which included Xanathar's, Tasha's, and the new Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse. This latter book effectively cut out much of the length lore chapters from Volo's and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, and included nearly all of the monsters in the books, plus most of the playable races that had shown up in either (along with some that had shown up in setting books,) with a few revisions.

This box set, if you didn't already have those books, was the obvious "next thing to buy" if you were getting into 5E and had only gotten the Core Books. Truly, with those six in your collection, I'd say you were basically covered when it came to having what you needed for a decade of games.

This might appeal to me more strongly than other players/DMs, but I really prefer rules expansion books over just about everything else. As much as I love, say, the Ravenloft setting (and wish the Planescape set had been better,) and I truly think Van Richen's Guide to Ravenloft is my favorite 5E supplement they came out with, the books that provide the most utility are, in my opinion, these ones that sort of get out of the way of the people trying to come up with original stories (aka, DMs and players) and just gives them more stuff to work with.

I thus rank a broad expansion of player options and/or monsters as the best thing that WotC can release. Next, I'd probably put campaign setting books, maybe at an equal footing with thematic monster books (the latter being stuff like Fizban's or Bigby's).

Arcana Unleashed (the main book, of course) is thus sort of in that first category. There is some extensive stuff about the various magic-school-affiliated factions, that's all well and good and probably something I'll never touch in any of my campaigns. But the crux of it is player options, and that, to me, feels like fuel for player creativity.

The slightly narrower focus on the Arcane theme kind of pushes it toward that second category.

What I wonder, though, is if WotC has shifted their philosophy against "of Everything"-style books. Truly, Xanathar's and Tasha's have no singular thematic throughline, other than cheeky little commentary written in the voices of their title characters.

But what they ultimately gave us was just more stuff to use, and they wound up being, I would think, the most popular supplements in 5.0.

Given the UAs we've gotten in recent months, I suspect that we're going to have themed supplements for the forseeeable future: the announced Dark Sun book, some kind of "villain" book, now probably some Underdark book. Oddly, the revisits to older subclasses from Xanathar's seems to have been preparation for the Warcraft book (a game/franchise that can play different tones of fantasy about as well as D&D can).

But I was thinking: between Heroes of Faerun, Horrors Within, and Arcana Unleashed, we have still not gotten a new Druid subclass in 5.5 since the PHB.

There was something kind of nice about how the of Everything books really touched on each class and gave them cool stuff.