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.
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