With Kil'jaeden available now on LFR, Blizzard has pulled the trigger and made the aftermath of the Tomb of Sargeras raid visible to everyone. Given that I've never been in a guild that downed raid end-bosses in a timely manner, I literally walked through Dalaran with my camera pointed down so that I wouldn't see the effect until I had finished the raid. It's not canon until I've done it! (For me, at least.)
Let's talk about the fight:
Kil'jaeden has a tank-swap mechanic, but it functions a little oddly. He gains a buff that causes his attacks to put a stacking debuff on the tank. It seemed to work fine to just let the other tank get up to five stacks, at which point the buff wears off but the tank is taking lots of extra damage. That's when you taunt. The trick, though, is that this debuff will hit anyone in front of the boss, so you'll want to get behind him when you're not tanking.
One of the real killers if not dealt with is Armageddon, where KJ will launch bursts of fire at the ground. This is something players will have to soak or the raid gets a long-lasting stack of raidwide damage. There are many little bursts that all need to be soaked (though on LFR there's no special tank one.)
There are transition phases where KJ flies to a corner of his ship and several raid members get debuffs. I believe the idea is to find the gaps between the circles of death they create, but this seemed like one of those abilities that was weakened enough in LFR to be more of a nuisance than a threat.
He'll also start creating rifts at the corners of his platform, which will try to suck you in but then eventually explode and knock you back - potentially off the ship. So you want to keep yourself right up next to the rift without getting sucked in.
The most interesting phase is when Kil'jaeden disappears and summons darkness that isolates you while shadow-entities teleport around the ship. At this point, you want to search until you can find Illidan, who lends everyone a spectral-sight-like ability, allowing you to find and kill the shadow creatures. This buff only lasts 20 seconds and does damage to you, but is needed to damage the monsters, so try to find Illidan quickly and then return to him to get the buff back when you need it.
Additionally, during the normal phases, certain players get big... for reasons that were not super clear to me as a tank. I think they either generate evil replicas of themselves or they need to be crowd-controlled, but I'll have to look more into that mechanic.
When Kil'jaeden is finally defeated, the cutscene pushes the story forward pretty dramatically.
Kil'jaeden bitterly tells your raid (plus Illidan, Khadgar, and Velen) that you're all going to crash and die on Argus, taking you with him. But Illidan still has his Sargerite Keystone and uses it to tear open a massive portal to Azeroth. Khadgar begins casting a mass teleportation spell while Velen goes to hear Kil'jaeden's last confession - that he had always envied Velen, and that he never believed Sargeras could be stopped, but that perhaps Velen would prove him wrong. Velen touches Kil'jaeden's forehead - perhaps even a gesture of forgiveness, or at the least an acknowledgement of their onetime friendship - and Kil'jaeden closes his eyes as the fel magic within him detonates, blowing up him and his ship as we teleport away.
But that's not the end. Velen and Khadgar look on in horror at the sky above Azsuna: Illidan did not just bring them home to Azeroth. He brought the entire planet of Argus with him. Argus now hangs in the sky above Azeroth, the home bases of both sides of this war now within striking distance of one another. Illidan is not willing to let this war end in a simple stalemate, like all previous conflicts with the Legion have done. Sometimes the hand of fate must be forced.
And now, all players, no matter where they are in Azeroth (I've checked Stormwind and Pandaria) will see Argus floating in the sky to the Southwest. Dalaran (the Legion version) now has Exodar representatives ministering to the panicked public while "Validated Doomsayers" hand out pamphlets about how they were right all this time.
The stage is set for 7.3. This war is coming to a head, whether we are prepared or not.
Tuesday, August 8, 2017
Monday, August 7, 2017
Who Wants Chromie Dead?
The Deaths of Chromie scenario is a repeatable activity that is meant to be "evergreen" content - it scales you to a particular level and item level (112, 1000, respectively) in which you contact Chromie - everyone's favorite Bronze Dragon who typically takes the form of a female gnome - and find out that someone is trying to kill her. Or rather, a whole bunch of people are trying to kill her. At the wrong time.
See, Bronze Dragons have a weird relationship with mortality. At least until the Hour of Twilight was averted, they had the ability to see through time as a kind of solid object - past, present, and future all existing simultaneously within the timeways. Nozdormu was given a vision of his own death when he first received his power (though the initial story - that it was given directly to him by Aman'thul - doesn't really check out anymore.) Chromie states plainly that she knows how she is supposed to die and when, and that this attack is coming too soon.
So who are the culprits? Well, much of the scenario takes place in the near future - presumably a year or two from now after the Legion is defeated and we hit level 112. Chromie, hanging out at Wyrmrest Temple (which must have been repaired after Deathwing's attack) is simultaneously struck by lethal bolts of magic from the Azure, Emerald, Obsidian, and Ruby dragonshrines - interestingly not the Bronze one.
There is a Satyr at the Emerald Shrine, a Void Lord at the Azure shrine, a Lich at the Ruby Shrine, and a Dreadlord at the Obsidian shrine. Generally, these aren't the types you typically see working together. Satyrs are demons, like Dreadlords, of course, but are more affiliated with the Nightmare - which we thought we had ended after killing Xavius. Void Lords also link to Satyrs through the Nightmare, but first they have to go through the Old Gods - they're a step removed from being directly tied to the Nightmare. On the other hand, if this takes place after we defeat the Legion, it might be that the Nathrezim, for the first time in thousands of years, are free agents once again, and might have taken up their old affiliation with the Old Gods and the Void. Meanwhile, the Lich looks very Scourge-like, especially as he has a death knight, a banshee, and an abomination as minions. But we don't really know what the Scourge is going to look like in the future (so far, the Death Knight quests in Legion have hinted that Bolvar is only somewhat better than Arthas, now that he's Lich King.)
But even halting those attacks reveals that there are another four planned in other time periods. Alliance and Horde forces are both seeking to kill Chromie in Andorhal. Demons are coming after her at the Well of Eternity during the War of the Ancients. The pre-Arthas Scourge is attempting to kill her in Stratholme during the culling. And fire elementals are attempting to kill her on Mount Hyjal shortly after the Cataclysm.
This is an absurdly well-coordinated, cross-temporal attack that utilizes agents who would be highly unlikely to work together without someone pulling the strings.
So who the hell is doing so, and why?
There is a note that we find in one of the Time-Lost Keepsake Boxes - these hold items that can allow you to quickly prevent the non-Dragonblight assassination attempts. The language sounds unhinged, but is most likely written by the person who has gone to all this trouble to have Chromie killed.
Whoever is in charge of this assassination attempt has some clear characteristics: First, this is a master Chronomancer. This is an operation that goes across five different time periods, and any one attempt would leave Chromie dead. That, of course, means having access to the magic needed to coordinate such an effort, which your average mage does not possess.
Not only that, but the killer is able to block Chromie's own power to arrive with more than fifteen minutes to prevent the attack. I imagine that blocking a Bronze Dragon from time-traveling means you have to be a real expert in the field.
We also know that they must really, really want Chromie dead. And there must be a solid reason for that. Chromie has pissed off plenty of bad guys by helping good guys, but given how distinct the various threats against her are, I am inclined to think that none of the represented forces are actually the one behind it.
So who is?
Given all of this, it seems like the most obvious culprit would be the Infinite Dragonflight. They never show their faces in the scenario, but given that they are corrupted Bronzes who have all the same powers, but want to shatter the timeways rather than maintain them, it would make sense that they have the means and the motive. And as a time traveler, you always have opportunity.
Going a step farther into weird territory: how does a Bronze dragon become an Infinite dragon? We see this process only once, in the Culling of Stratholme dungeon, where we see a Bronze dragonspawn (not technically a dragon) getting turned by Infinites into one of their own. But I had this bizarre theory: what if the way one becomes Infinite is by killing your own past self. You thus become a walking paradox, and perhaps in the Warcraft universe, this results not in a universe-shattering paradox, but in you having that kind of photo-negative look the Infinite dragons have and probably going apocalyptically insane. In which case, could this be Chromie herself behind the attack?
Alternatively, what if it's the Bronzes? Chromie has always been a good guy, but we know that all the Infinite Dragons were once benevolent Bronzes. Is Chromie safe from this doom, or is she destined to become one of the most dangerous Infinite Dragons in the new flight. Remember, while we've seen the Infinite flight, as far as we know, it hasn't actually formed yet at our point in history. Kairoz seemed likely to be the first, but Garrosh killed him before he did anything like transforming into an Infinite Dragon. What if that role is now Chromie's, and it's the Bronze dragons - perhaps even Chromie herself, though this time in a more noble and self-sacrificing way - who want her dead.
Which brings us to the weirdest possibility:
What if it's us?
We're not Bronze dragons, or any dragons, but we've become nearly unparalleled heroes of legend, and have enough experience (and potentially will have had enough experience) that we might be able to coordinate these strikes. After all, Chromie was in all of those places, but so were we.
What are our motivations? Well, perhaps we go evil, or perhaps we are trying to prevent a greater evil. Given the power our characters have achieved at this point, it doesn't seem that hard to imagine that we're capable of pulling something like this off.
I've always wanted to have a time-travel expansion - one very, very different from Warlords of Draenor, which took all the fun stuff out of a time-travel plot. In fact, if we could get an expansion that worked like this scenario, but with new locations and periods that we hadn't seen before, I'd be a very happy player.
I don't know how much to read into the lore of the scenario - for all I know, it's really just an excuse for Blizzard to try a different kind of mini-game for WoW.
But the details sprinkled in there are tantalizing. I know that there's basically a 99% chance that the next expansion is going to be a nautical one with Naga and N'zoth probably central. But if the Deaths of Chromie is a sign of things to come and not just a one-off with an anticlimactic ending, I'm very excited.
See, Bronze Dragons have a weird relationship with mortality. At least until the Hour of Twilight was averted, they had the ability to see through time as a kind of solid object - past, present, and future all existing simultaneously within the timeways. Nozdormu was given a vision of his own death when he first received his power (though the initial story - that it was given directly to him by Aman'thul - doesn't really check out anymore.) Chromie states plainly that she knows how she is supposed to die and when, and that this attack is coming too soon.
So who are the culprits? Well, much of the scenario takes place in the near future - presumably a year or two from now after the Legion is defeated and we hit level 112. Chromie, hanging out at Wyrmrest Temple (which must have been repaired after Deathwing's attack) is simultaneously struck by lethal bolts of magic from the Azure, Emerald, Obsidian, and Ruby dragonshrines - interestingly not the Bronze one.
There is a Satyr at the Emerald Shrine, a Void Lord at the Azure shrine, a Lich at the Ruby Shrine, and a Dreadlord at the Obsidian shrine. Generally, these aren't the types you typically see working together. Satyrs are demons, like Dreadlords, of course, but are more affiliated with the Nightmare - which we thought we had ended after killing Xavius. Void Lords also link to Satyrs through the Nightmare, but first they have to go through the Old Gods - they're a step removed from being directly tied to the Nightmare. On the other hand, if this takes place after we defeat the Legion, it might be that the Nathrezim, for the first time in thousands of years, are free agents once again, and might have taken up their old affiliation with the Old Gods and the Void. Meanwhile, the Lich looks very Scourge-like, especially as he has a death knight, a banshee, and an abomination as minions. But we don't really know what the Scourge is going to look like in the future (so far, the Death Knight quests in Legion have hinted that Bolvar is only somewhat better than Arthas, now that he's Lich King.)
But even halting those attacks reveals that there are another four planned in other time periods. Alliance and Horde forces are both seeking to kill Chromie in Andorhal. Demons are coming after her at the Well of Eternity during the War of the Ancients. The pre-Arthas Scourge is attempting to kill her in Stratholme during the culling. And fire elementals are attempting to kill her on Mount Hyjal shortly after the Cataclysm.
This is an absurdly well-coordinated, cross-temporal attack that utilizes agents who would be highly unlikely to work together without someone pulling the strings.
So who the hell is doing so, and why?
There is a note that we find in one of the Time-Lost Keepsake Boxes - these hold items that can allow you to quickly prevent the non-Dragonblight assassination attempts. The language sounds unhinged, but is most likely written by the person who has gone to all this trouble to have Chromie killed.
Whoever is in charge of this assassination attempt has some clear characteristics: First, this is a master Chronomancer. This is an operation that goes across five different time periods, and any one attempt would leave Chromie dead. That, of course, means having access to the magic needed to coordinate such an effort, which your average mage does not possess.
Not only that, but the killer is able to block Chromie's own power to arrive with more than fifteen minutes to prevent the attack. I imagine that blocking a Bronze Dragon from time-traveling means you have to be a real expert in the field.
We also know that they must really, really want Chromie dead. And there must be a solid reason for that. Chromie has pissed off plenty of bad guys by helping good guys, but given how distinct the various threats against her are, I am inclined to think that none of the represented forces are actually the one behind it.
So who is?
Given all of this, it seems like the most obvious culprit would be the Infinite Dragonflight. They never show their faces in the scenario, but given that they are corrupted Bronzes who have all the same powers, but want to shatter the timeways rather than maintain them, it would make sense that they have the means and the motive. And as a time traveler, you always have opportunity.
Going a step farther into weird territory: how does a Bronze dragon become an Infinite dragon? We see this process only once, in the Culling of Stratholme dungeon, where we see a Bronze dragonspawn (not technically a dragon) getting turned by Infinites into one of their own. But I had this bizarre theory: what if the way one becomes Infinite is by killing your own past self. You thus become a walking paradox, and perhaps in the Warcraft universe, this results not in a universe-shattering paradox, but in you having that kind of photo-negative look the Infinite dragons have and probably going apocalyptically insane. In which case, could this be Chromie herself behind the attack?
Alternatively, what if it's the Bronzes? Chromie has always been a good guy, but we know that all the Infinite Dragons were once benevolent Bronzes. Is Chromie safe from this doom, or is she destined to become one of the most dangerous Infinite Dragons in the new flight. Remember, while we've seen the Infinite flight, as far as we know, it hasn't actually formed yet at our point in history. Kairoz seemed likely to be the first, but Garrosh killed him before he did anything like transforming into an Infinite Dragon. What if that role is now Chromie's, and it's the Bronze dragons - perhaps even Chromie herself, though this time in a more noble and self-sacrificing way - who want her dead.
Which brings us to the weirdest possibility:
What if it's us?
We're not Bronze dragons, or any dragons, but we've become nearly unparalleled heroes of legend, and have enough experience (and potentially will have had enough experience) that we might be able to coordinate these strikes. After all, Chromie was in all of those places, but so were we.
What are our motivations? Well, perhaps we go evil, or perhaps we are trying to prevent a greater evil. Given the power our characters have achieved at this point, it doesn't seem that hard to imagine that we're capable of pulling something like this off.
I've always wanted to have a time-travel expansion - one very, very different from Warlords of Draenor, which took all the fun stuff out of a time-travel plot. In fact, if we could get an expansion that worked like this scenario, but with new locations and periods that we hadn't seen before, I'd be a very happy player.
I don't know how much to read into the lore of the scenario - for all I know, it's really just an excuse for Blizzard to try a different kind of mini-game for WoW.
But the details sprinkled in there are tantalizing. I know that there's basically a 99% chance that the next expansion is going to be a nautical one with Naga and N'zoth probably central. But if the Deaths of Chromie is a sign of things to come and not just a one-off with an anticlimactic ending, I'm very excited.
Saturday, August 5, 2017
So What is Going on With Jaina?
With yesterday's reveal of the "key art" for World of Warcraft being a picture of Jaina Proudmoore, the speculation engine (I suppose that's a similar device to the rumor mill?) has been kicked up into a new gear. I think there are a ton of implications for what this means and enough logical links that we could very well be looking at a N'zoth-based expansion even though Jaina has never been strongly linked to Old Gods or anything like that.
The question for now is what is going on with Jaina Proudmoore.
I'll say off the bat that I think the theories that Jaina is somehow "evil" now because of her distrust of the Horde are way off-base. Compared with other major figures in the Alliance/Horde conflict, Jaina's antipathy toward the Horde is probably better justified than anyone's. Jaina put herself out there, extending the hand of friendship to the Horde and even sacrificed her own father (who was much more of a Genn Greymane type when it came to the Horde) in order to secure a lasting peace. The destruction of Theramore may have looked to some like a logical military operation for the Horde to pursue, but given Jaina's efforts toward peace, Theramore certainly deserved better than that.
Given her experiences, there's no reason for her to trust the Horde again. She had already had the ideal situation, with a close friendship with Thrall and real assurances that there would be no serious conflict. Yet Thrall put Garrosh in charge, and all that went out the window. Vol'jin as Warchief could have been a chance for a real lasting peace, as he was more of the Thrall school of Warchiefdom, but with Sylvanas in charge now, those hopes are dashed.
So even though we players obviously know that Horde players are just other people at their computers, and we can see many heroic and sympathetic people among the Horde, Jaina would be a fool to ever turn her back on team red again.
But we have never gotten any indication that Jaina is truly malicious. She has never threatened to attack the Alliance over their willingness to work with the Horde. She has just said "I'm never doing this again, so have fun being betrayed by them. I'm going to go do my own thing." Garrosh, by contrast, began to treat his own people as enemies if they weren't blindly, suicidally loyal to his whims.
As Khadgar's agenda came to dominate in Dalaran (through a narrow vote, if you recall,) Jaina left the city and went to Stormwind. But when Anduin decided that fighting the Legion was more important than taking revenge on the Horde (who had abandoned, not attacked the Alliance - there's an important distinction there) she left.
With the Alliance and Dalaran as her two main hubs of activity, the only other logical place for her to go was Kul Tiras.
So let's talk Kul Tiras.
Kul Tiras was one of the original seven human kingdoms, based on an island that at least used to be near Tol Barad and Gilneas. It had the most powerful navy of the human kingdoms, and provided the main naval force in the fight against the Horde in the Second War.
The Proudmoore family is royalty in Kul Tiras, with the monarch taking the title of Grand Admiral. Jaina's father Daelin was Grand Admiral during the Second War, and her pursued Thrall's Horde to Kalimdor, but was slain by Rexxar at Theramore in the early days of Durotar's founding. Jaina had an older brother, Derek, but he was slain in the Second War. There is an apocryphal other brother named Tandred, who was in the RPG sourcebooks, but is not strictly canon.
If Jaina is the only surviving Proudmoore (no word on her mother. Hey Blizzard, how about letting some characters have moms?) that would mean she would have a claim to the kingdom. However, there's nothing to indicate that she's even been back there since the Third War, so that leaves a big question as to who has actually been running the place in her absence.
With the addition of Tol Barad in Cataclysm, a lot of people asked about where Kul Tiras was, and Blizzard kind of avoided the question by suggesting that the island had been moved by "something about tectonic shifts." If the island were canonically moved a significant distance, one would assume that it had also suffered an environmental catastrophe. Thus, the place could still be in crisis mode recovering from a shattering earthquake like nothing ever seen since the Sundering.
It's also possible that, like the rest of the world is implied to be doing, they've been fending off demons of the Burning Legion. I suspect that this would be downplayed in a future expansion, as they probably want to give us a break from demons after this expansion. Jaina might have gone back there for the rather understandable reason that she wants to save her homeland from demonic destruction.
Given all the hints at Old Gods being a major threat in the next expansion, there's a worry I have that Jaina might find herself manipulated or corrupted by someone like N'zoth. I personally hope she doesn't become a villain, but it would not be unprecedented in WoW. That said, I suspect that she is more likely to play the Tirion/Thrall/Khadgar role in the upcoming expansion, as the hero we kind of rally around as we deal with whatever threat is coming (my money is on Azshara, N'Zoth, or a combination thereof.)
But that scenario would require her to warm up a little at least to Horde players, and that means we're going to have to see some character development.
Blizzcon is still a few months away, starting on November 3rd. Gamescom, where they announced Legion in 2015, however, will be this month, going from August 22nd to the 26th. We'll be sure to get more details at least at Blizzcon, but possibly earlier at Gamescom.
The question for now is what is going on with Jaina Proudmoore.
I'll say off the bat that I think the theories that Jaina is somehow "evil" now because of her distrust of the Horde are way off-base. Compared with other major figures in the Alliance/Horde conflict, Jaina's antipathy toward the Horde is probably better justified than anyone's. Jaina put herself out there, extending the hand of friendship to the Horde and even sacrificed her own father (who was much more of a Genn Greymane type when it came to the Horde) in order to secure a lasting peace. The destruction of Theramore may have looked to some like a logical military operation for the Horde to pursue, but given Jaina's efforts toward peace, Theramore certainly deserved better than that.
Given her experiences, there's no reason for her to trust the Horde again. She had already had the ideal situation, with a close friendship with Thrall and real assurances that there would be no serious conflict. Yet Thrall put Garrosh in charge, and all that went out the window. Vol'jin as Warchief could have been a chance for a real lasting peace, as he was more of the Thrall school of Warchiefdom, but with Sylvanas in charge now, those hopes are dashed.
So even though we players obviously know that Horde players are just other people at their computers, and we can see many heroic and sympathetic people among the Horde, Jaina would be a fool to ever turn her back on team red again.
But we have never gotten any indication that Jaina is truly malicious. She has never threatened to attack the Alliance over their willingness to work with the Horde. She has just said "I'm never doing this again, so have fun being betrayed by them. I'm going to go do my own thing." Garrosh, by contrast, began to treat his own people as enemies if they weren't blindly, suicidally loyal to his whims.
As Khadgar's agenda came to dominate in Dalaran (through a narrow vote, if you recall,) Jaina left the city and went to Stormwind. But when Anduin decided that fighting the Legion was more important than taking revenge on the Horde (who had abandoned, not attacked the Alliance - there's an important distinction there) she left.
With the Alliance and Dalaran as her two main hubs of activity, the only other logical place for her to go was Kul Tiras.
So let's talk Kul Tiras.
Kul Tiras was one of the original seven human kingdoms, based on an island that at least used to be near Tol Barad and Gilneas. It had the most powerful navy of the human kingdoms, and provided the main naval force in the fight against the Horde in the Second War.
The Proudmoore family is royalty in Kul Tiras, with the monarch taking the title of Grand Admiral. Jaina's father Daelin was Grand Admiral during the Second War, and her pursued Thrall's Horde to Kalimdor, but was slain by Rexxar at Theramore in the early days of Durotar's founding. Jaina had an older brother, Derek, but he was slain in the Second War. There is an apocryphal other brother named Tandred, who was in the RPG sourcebooks, but is not strictly canon.
If Jaina is the only surviving Proudmoore (no word on her mother. Hey Blizzard, how about letting some characters have moms?) that would mean she would have a claim to the kingdom. However, there's nothing to indicate that she's even been back there since the Third War, so that leaves a big question as to who has actually been running the place in her absence.
With the addition of Tol Barad in Cataclysm, a lot of people asked about where Kul Tiras was, and Blizzard kind of avoided the question by suggesting that the island had been moved by "something about tectonic shifts." If the island were canonically moved a significant distance, one would assume that it had also suffered an environmental catastrophe. Thus, the place could still be in crisis mode recovering from a shattering earthquake like nothing ever seen since the Sundering.
It's also possible that, like the rest of the world is implied to be doing, they've been fending off demons of the Burning Legion. I suspect that this would be downplayed in a future expansion, as they probably want to give us a break from demons after this expansion. Jaina might have gone back there for the rather understandable reason that she wants to save her homeland from demonic destruction.
Given all the hints at Old Gods being a major threat in the next expansion, there's a worry I have that Jaina might find herself manipulated or corrupted by someone like N'zoth. I personally hope she doesn't become a villain, but it would not be unprecedented in WoW. That said, I suspect that she is more likely to play the Tirion/Thrall/Khadgar role in the upcoming expansion, as the hero we kind of rally around as we deal with whatever threat is coming (my money is on Azshara, N'Zoth, or a combination thereof.)
But that scenario would require her to warm up a little at least to Horde players, and that means we're going to have to see some character development.
Blizzcon is still a few months away, starting on November 3rd. Gamescom, where they announced Legion in 2015, however, will be this month, going from August 22nd to the 26th. We'll be sure to get more details at least at Blizzcon, but possibly earlier at Gamescom.
Friday, August 4, 2017
WoW's "Key Art" at Blizzcon '17 is Jaina Proudmoore
Well, here's more evidence for Kul Tiras as a major setting for expansion seven. According to WoWHead, the key art for World of Warcraft (the sort of "banner" that goes with each of Blizzard's major franchises) will be a picture of Jaina Proudmoore.
Jaina, while usually associated with Dalaran and the city of Theramore that she founded, is actually royalty from the island nation of Kul Tiras. Given her absence in Legion, where she left both Stormwind and Dalaran behind, it seems like the only logical place for her to go would have been Kul Tiras.
Thus, if she's playing a big role in the next expansion, we can be pretty confident (as if we weren't after the texture leak) that we're heading to Kul Tiras.
Beyond that, though, nothing is confirmed. But one can infer a lot. Jaina is of course one of the most powerful mages on Azeroth, and her homeland is a naval power, which would both link the expansion to fighting the Naga, as they are an aquatic threat and Azshara is the most powerful mage on Azeroth.
Nothing's confirmed, but the evidence continues to rack up.
Jaina, while usually associated with Dalaran and the city of Theramore that she founded, is actually royalty from the island nation of Kul Tiras. Given her absence in Legion, where she left both Stormwind and Dalaran behind, it seems like the only logical place for her to go would have been Kul Tiras.
Thus, if she's playing a big role in the next expansion, we can be pretty confident (as if we weren't after the texture leak) that we're heading to Kul Tiras.
Beyond that, though, nothing is confirmed. But one can infer a lot. Jaina is of course one of the most powerful mages on Azeroth, and her homeland is a naval power, which would both link the expansion to fighting the Naga, as they are an aquatic threat and Azshara is the most powerful mage on Azeroth.
Nothing's confirmed, but the evidence continues to rack up.
Argus and the Patch-xpansion
Let's get some speculation out of the way: The next expansion seems strongly implied to be some combination of N'zoth and Azshara as main threats. N'zoth is likely the more powerful of the two, but Azshara has the potential to be a more interesting villain, given that we already have a sense of her personality.
Personally, I think what I would prefer is to have an Azshara-centric expansion based on a tropical island-hopping adventure that has us see Kul Tiras, Kezan (in full,) Zandalar, and other important "island" locations we haven't seen yet. Then, at some later point (not immediately after) I'd like to have a sort of "Underdark" expansion in which we delve into the depths of the earth, encountering weird cultures with Nerubians and maybe even a group of N'raqi (aka Faceless Ones) who have something of an actual civilization (albeit an evil one) as well as tons of buried titan facilities that would allow us to discover new lore about the evolution of the Titanforged races on Azeroth, and then leading to a confrontation in the end with a final boss as an Old God, presumably N'zoth (as it's the only living one we haven't fought yet.)
But while these could work fine as separate expansions, I suspect that Blizzard will lean toward making them one.
The main reason I suspect this is that Legion has been several expansions in one. For years we speculated that there could be an Emerald Dream expansion, but this plot was resolved in the first raid of Legion (I love the aesthetic they came up with for the Nightmare and am sad that we'll probably not see much more of it.) The Tomb of Sargeras and "Deathwing's Lair" were also locations we had speculated about for a South Seas expansion. I had even imagined prior to Warlords of Draenor that we could have an expansion with a resurrected Gul'dan as the main villain with the ultimate raid being the Tomb of Sargeras. Not quite in that order, but not far off the mark.
And then there's Argus. An Argus expansion had always seemed like the place to go to finally defeat the Burning Legion, and now that's basically what we're going to do. The thing is that it won't be its own expansion, but rather the final patch of an existing one.
The interesting thing about Argus, though, is that it's almost like a mini-expansion. We're getting three zones with a decent number of quests each - not quite a full zone's worth of quests by Legion's standards, but there's definitely a sense of progression through the world, and while Krokun (the first area) and Antoran Wastes (the one with the raid) are maybe pretty similar, the middle zone Mac'aree feels totally different (and gives you the best sense of pre-Sargeras Eredar civilzation.)
As someone who loves the Draenei (and plays two Draenei characters a lot) I might have wanted more time to explore Argus and for Blizzard to take more of an opportunity to build up that lore. But they decided that, given how thoroughly corrupted the world was, a whole expansion would get monotonous (a similar argument was made for an Emerald Dream expansion.) I suppose I can understand that argument, though I think you can be creative and come up with different flavors of corruption.
But the fact is that Legion will be both the Emerald Nightmare expansion and the Argus expansion.
There are benefits to this approach: one of Warlords' biggest problems was the idea of stakes - the Iron Horde was a physical, military threat that was a menace, sure, but it was never really clear (and didn't make logical story sense) that they were actually more powerful than either the Alliance or the main Horde, much less the two working together. Now, by the time Gul'dan had corrupted the Iron Horde, we were dealing with the Burning Legion, so it felt like a bigger deal. But in Legion, we've had real headliner villains to deal with in every raid. Xavius, Gul'dan, and Kil'jaeden are all serious bad guys. And Helya, while a new character, managed to make a pretty good impression in the short amount of time she had. Blizzard has managed to craft a story where it doesn't seem like a waste of time to be fighting what we're fighting in this expansion, and even if Xavius and the Nightmare aren't directly linked to the Legion (though that Doomguard is aiding the Nightmare's assault on the Temple of the Moon, so I don't totally understand) one gets the sense that this is another world-imperiling threat that really needs to be taken care of ASAP.
That being said, I do think we will need to have lower-stakes expansions in the future. Partially that's just because short of a Void Titan, there's not really much higher stakes you can get than a full-fledged invasion of the Burning Legion. But with all the ideas they've burned through in Legion, it also means they're going to have to get really creative in WoW expansions to come.
Personally, I think what I would prefer is to have an Azshara-centric expansion based on a tropical island-hopping adventure that has us see Kul Tiras, Kezan (in full,) Zandalar, and other important "island" locations we haven't seen yet. Then, at some later point (not immediately after) I'd like to have a sort of "Underdark" expansion in which we delve into the depths of the earth, encountering weird cultures with Nerubians and maybe even a group of N'raqi (aka Faceless Ones) who have something of an actual civilization (albeit an evil one) as well as tons of buried titan facilities that would allow us to discover new lore about the evolution of the Titanforged races on Azeroth, and then leading to a confrontation in the end with a final boss as an Old God, presumably N'zoth (as it's the only living one we haven't fought yet.)
But while these could work fine as separate expansions, I suspect that Blizzard will lean toward making them one.
The main reason I suspect this is that Legion has been several expansions in one. For years we speculated that there could be an Emerald Dream expansion, but this plot was resolved in the first raid of Legion (I love the aesthetic they came up with for the Nightmare and am sad that we'll probably not see much more of it.) The Tomb of Sargeras and "Deathwing's Lair" were also locations we had speculated about for a South Seas expansion. I had even imagined prior to Warlords of Draenor that we could have an expansion with a resurrected Gul'dan as the main villain with the ultimate raid being the Tomb of Sargeras. Not quite in that order, but not far off the mark.
And then there's Argus. An Argus expansion had always seemed like the place to go to finally defeat the Burning Legion, and now that's basically what we're going to do. The thing is that it won't be its own expansion, but rather the final patch of an existing one.
The interesting thing about Argus, though, is that it's almost like a mini-expansion. We're getting three zones with a decent number of quests each - not quite a full zone's worth of quests by Legion's standards, but there's definitely a sense of progression through the world, and while Krokun (the first area) and Antoran Wastes (the one with the raid) are maybe pretty similar, the middle zone Mac'aree feels totally different (and gives you the best sense of pre-Sargeras Eredar civilzation.)
As someone who loves the Draenei (and plays two Draenei characters a lot) I might have wanted more time to explore Argus and for Blizzard to take more of an opportunity to build up that lore. But they decided that, given how thoroughly corrupted the world was, a whole expansion would get monotonous (a similar argument was made for an Emerald Dream expansion.) I suppose I can understand that argument, though I think you can be creative and come up with different flavors of corruption.
But the fact is that Legion will be both the Emerald Nightmare expansion and the Argus expansion.
There are benefits to this approach: one of Warlords' biggest problems was the idea of stakes - the Iron Horde was a physical, military threat that was a menace, sure, but it was never really clear (and didn't make logical story sense) that they were actually more powerful than either the Alliance or the main Horde, much less the two working together. Now, by the time Gul'dan had corrupted the Iron Horde, we were dealing with the Burning Legion, so it felt like a bigger deal. But in Legion, we've had real headliner villains to deal with in every raid. Xavius, Gul'dan, and Kil'jaeden are all serious bad guys. And Helya, while a new character, managed to make a pretty good impression in the short amount of time she had. Blizzard has managed to craft a story where it doesn't seem like a waste of time to be fighting what we're fighting in this expansion, and even if Xavius and the Nightmare aren't directly linked to the Legion (though that Doomguard is aiding the Nightmare's assault on the Temple of the Moon, so I don't totally understand) one gets the sense that this is another world-imperiling threat that really needs to be taken care of ASAP.
That being said, I do think we will need to have lower-stakes expansions in the future. Partially that's just because short of a Void Titan, there's not really much higher stakes you can get than a full-fledged invasion of the Burning Legion. But with all the ideas they've burned through in Legion, it also means they're going to have to get really creative in WoW expansions to come.
Wednesday, August 2, 2017
Does the Frost Death Knight Need More Death?
Those who played Death Knights during Wrath of the Lich King might remember a lot of spells that used to be available to every DK that really emphasized the necromantic nature of the class. Some were talents, like Corpse Explosion (which was accessible to all three specs as it was only one tier two or so of the Unholy tree) or Raise Dead, which was a cooldown available to all specs but would yield a permanent ghoul for Unholy.
In Warlords, Raise Dead, arguably the most obvious necromancy spell for a Death Knight to use, was made Unholy-only.
Unholy really emphasizes the notion of the Death Knight as a platform for necromantic power, summoning all manner of undead minions or empowering your existing ones.
Blood's interaction with the death-flavor of the class is less about raising the dead and more about consuming life force from your opponents, with a strong vampiric motif (one gets the impression that, if WoW had more graphic violence, Blood Death Knights would look like a character out of Bloodborne after a battle - totally drenched in blood.)
Frost lacks a lot of this flavor, though. If you were to imagine a Battlemage character - a heavily armored wizard-like character who fought with a mix of physical melee attacks and spells - you could use just about every Frost DK ability without changing it. Obliterate? Simple melee strike that would be just as appropriate a name for a Warrior ability. Frost Strike? Very little flavor to that. Howling Blast? Ok, the Howling does give it a bit of a spooky vibe, but the idea of weaponizing cold wind does not seem that far out of the wheelhouse of Frost Mages or Windwalker Monks. Remorseless Winter? Ditto (well, less for WW Monks, but certainly works for Frost Mages.)
Only two elements in the Frost rotation really feel truly Death Knight-flavored: Frost Fever, applied by Howling Blast, and the artifact trait Sindragosa's Fury (oddly listed as simply "Frost Breath" in damage logs.)
Now, even though I think they could have easily just gone with "Frostwyrm's Fury" or something - it doesn't have to be Sindragosa every time - I think this ability does a great job of melding the Frost DK's focuses on necromancy and elemental coldness.
But I think the former of those focuses really gets short shrift. So where do we go?
Well, let's think about the undead. Undead come in many varieties. Zombies are probably one of the most ubiquitous types in genre fiction, but the idea of rotting, shuffling corpses is very well handled by Unholy. Another type is skeletons - essentially fleshless zombies. Frankly, I've always been more into the idea of skeletal armies as my undead threat of choice ever since seeing the old Jason and the Argonauts as a kid (look that up if you don't know what I'm talking about.)
Now, Blood clearly gets a lot out of another popular form of undead, namely the vampire, but they also have something of a skeletal sub-theme as well, with Bone Armor granted by Marrowrend a pretty huge part of the rotation, as well as the talent Bone Storm (or should I say BBOOOOONNNNNNEEEEEESSSSSTTTTTOOOOOORRRRRRMMMMM!)
I think Blood uses it little enough to maybe let Frost borrow some of the skeleton theme, but there's another obvious form of undead: ghosts.
Frost is obviously about the cold of death, the chill of the grave. And ghosts are often associated with the cold.
So I could easily imagine Frost taking on a more ghostly theme. I don't know exactly how this could be implemented - perhaps future talents could replace existing abilities. Changing Howling Blast so that you send out a wave of screaming ghosts? Maybe Remorseless Winter changes into something that haunts nearby enemies with some sort of effect in addition to Frost Fever?
I also think someone ought to be able to become a Lich.
Now, Unholy might feel they ought to be the ones turning into Liches, but our one example of a friendly Lich, Amal'thazad, is not only the Frost instructor but also a Frost champion. I've often found Pillar of Frost to be a somewhat underwhelming (flavor-wise, and kind of mechanic-wise, though I do really like the immunity to knockbacks) ability. What if that were replaced (either baseline or as a talent) with the ability to become a Lich? You could either get new abilities or have certain ones enhanced, a bit like Metamorphosis for Demon Hunters or Ascendence for Shamans.
Without access to Death and Decay or Raise Dead, Frost Death Knights really are missing something from their flavor toolkit, but I think it wouldn't take too much to up the spooky quality to the spec.
Also, when we move on to the next expansion I really really hope that we get to use two-handed weapons again. I'm still pissed I didn't get to reforge Frostmourne in its original form.
In Warlords, Raise Dead, arguably the most obvious necromancy spell for a Death Knight to use, was made Unholy-only.
Unholy really emphasizes the notion of the Death Knight as a platform for necromantic power, summoning all manner of undead minions or empowering your existing ones.
Blood's interaction with the death-flavor of the class is less about raising the dead and more about consuming life force from your opponents, with a strong vampiric motif (one gets the impression that, if WoW had more graphic violence, Blood Death Knights would look like a character out of Bloodborne after a battle - totally drenched in blood.)
Frost lacks a lot of this flavor, though. If you were to imagine a Battlemage character - a heavily armored wizard-like character who fought with a mix of physical melee attacks and spells - you could use just about every Frost DK ability without changing it. Obliterate? Simple melee strike that would be just as appropriate a name for a Warrior ability. Frost Strike? Very little flavor to that. Howling Blast? Ok, the Howling does give it a bit of a spooky vibe, but the idea of weaponizing cold wind does not seem that far out of the wheelhouse of Frost Mages or Windwalker Monks. Remorseless Winter? Ditto (well, less for WW Monks, but certainly works for Frost Mages.)
Only two elements in the Frost rotation really feel truly Death Knight-flavored: Frost Fever, applied by Howling Blast, and the artifact trait Sindragosa's Fury (oddly listed as simply "Frost Breath" in damage logs.)
Now, even though I think they could have easily just gone with "Frostwyrm's Fury" or something - it doesn't have to be Sindragosa every time - I think this ability does a great job of melding the Frost DK's focuses on necromancy and elemental coldness.
But I think the former of those focuses really gets short shrift. So where do we go?
Well, let's think about the undead. Undead come in many varieties. Zombies are probably one of the most ubiquitous types in genre fiction, but the idea of rotting, shuffling corpses is very well handled by Unholy. Another type is skeletons - essentially fleshless zombies. Frankly, I've always been more into the idea of skeletal armies as my undead threat of choice ever since seeing the old Jason and the Argonauts as a kid (look that up if you don't know what I'm talking about.)
Now, Blood clearly gets a lot out of another popular form of undead, namely the vampire, but they also have something of a skeletal sub-theme as well, with Bone Armor granted by Marrowrend a pretty huge part of the rotation, as well as the talent Bone Storm (or should I say BBOOOOONNNNNNEEEEEESSSSSTTTTTOOOOOORRRRRRMMMMM!)
I think Blood uses it little enough to maybe let Frost borrow some of the skeleton theme, but there's another obvious form of undead: ghosts.
Frost is obviously about the cold of death, the chill of the grave. And ghosts are often associated with the cold.
So I could easily imagine Frost taking on a more ghostly theme. I don't know exactly how this could be implemented - perhaps future talents could replace existing abilities. Changing Howling Blast so that you send out a wave of screaming ghosts? Maybe Remorseless Winter changes into something that haunts nearby enemies with some sort of effect in addition to Frost Fever?
I also think someone ought to be able to become a Lich.
Now, Unholy might feel they ought to be the ones turning into Liches, but our one example of a friendly Lich, Amal'thazad, is not only the Frost instructor but also a Frost champion. I've often found Pillar of Frost to be a somewhat underwhelming (flavor-wise, and kind of mechanic-wise, though I do really like the immunity to knockbacks) ability. What if that were replaced (either baseline or as a talent) with the ability to become a Lich? You could either get new abilities or have certain ones enhanced, a bit like Metamorphosis for Demon Hunters or Ascendence for Shamans.
Without access to Death and Decay or Raise Dead, Frost Death Knights really are missing something from their flavor toolkit, but I think it wouldn't take too much to up the spooky quality to the spec.
Also, when we move on to the next expansion I really really hope that we get to use two-handed weapons again. I'm still pissed I didn't get to reforge Frostmourne in its original form.
Tuesday, August 1, 2017
The Fate of the Titans
Back in 2014 I speculated that the reason we had not heard from the Titans on Azeroth (save for the bad one) was that they might actually all be dead. As it turned out, when Chronicle was released and later when Legion came out, I turned out to be right. The first act the newly-formed Burning Legion committed was deicide. What was left of the Titans was, according to Chronicle, sent to the Keepers - the highest-ranking Titanforged - but most of them were unable to understand what this influx of power meant.
In 7.3, this story becomes more complicated. Let's save it for a spoiler-break.
In 7.3, this story becomes more complicated. Let's save it for a spoiler-break.
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