wow World of Warcraft - What's Next?

[Stan 5,239]

Details about the upcoming expansion from BlizzCon's What's Next panel.

You can find the reveal and cinematic trailers here.

Prologue

• The Alliance & Horde are at an all out war in the new expansion
• We battle for land and resources
• Fight for our faction's survival
• The goal for both factions is to find allies to their side

Kul Tiras (Alliance)

• Ancient Human Kingdon
• Powerful nautical empire
• Ruled by four houses
• Comprised of three  main territories
• Built a really big navy that the Alliance wants

Tiragarde Sound

• Governed by Proudmoore's mother and she is definitely not a dreadlord.

Drustvar

• Ruled by House Waycrets.
• The zone is cursed.

Stormsong Valley

• Ruled by House Stormsong
• Provide ships to Kul Tiras

Screenshots

Zandalar (Horde)

• Ancient Troll Empire
• Powerful naval force that surpasses Kul Tiras
• Continent in turmoil
• Before they join the Horde, we need to restore order
• Comprised of 3 zones.

Zuldazar

• Capital of the Zandalari (Main Horde hub in the new expansion).

Nazmir

• Festering swampland
• Enlist powerful Loa
• Uncover titan secrets

Vol'dun

• Foreboding desert
• Criminals exiled here
• Befriend the vulpera (fox people)

Screenshots

Zone Flow

Six Allied Races

• The lines of battle have been drawn
• Bring a new ally into your faction...
• ...and unlock the ability to play that race!
• New racial abilities, varied customization
• Allied Races begin at level 20
• Level to 110 to unlock Heritage Armor to show off your accomplishment.

Horde

• Nightborne
• Highmountain Taurens
• Zandalari Trolls

Alliance

• Void Elves
• Lightforged Draenei
• Dark Iron Dwarves

Zone Scaling

• Expanding zone scaling
• Zones have level ranges with caps
• You will never outlevel a zone
• You can now level up anywhere you want
• Scaling applies to dungeons and rewards all the way

Story

• Azeroth is wounded, we will commune with the final titan and get a new Artifact called The Heart of Azeroth as a reward. Azeroth's life essence seeps through out the world (Azerite).

Azerite Armor

• New armor type with similar traits to current Artifact weapons.

Island Expeditions

• Explore uncharted isles across the Great Sea
• Horde and Alliance skirmishing over resources
• 3-player cooperative gameplay
• Complete varied and dynamic objectives
• It's the most dynamic replayable gameplay ever added to the game
• Blizzard wants to encourage PvP & PvE outdoor content.

Warfronts

• Large-scale conflict on the homefront
• Fantasy anchored in Warcraft 3, RTS roots

PvP Updates

Dungeons

• 10 new dungeons are coming in the next expansion

[PatrickHenry 293]

I...  I'm just at best underwhelmed.  Honestly.

From a intergalactic war to...  new quillboar models.  Space filler for voidlord expac, IMO.

[Orthios 271]

26 minutes ago, Stan said:

 

• Expanding zone scaling
• Zones have level ranges with caps
• You will never outlevel a zone.
• You can now level up anywhere you want

 

Oh goodie, maybe now I'll actually level the rest of my characters past level 70 and the void that is northrend :p

[MrEdren 114]

Poor idiots have no idea what they asked for this time.  

On the bright side, griefing idiot hunters on the Rhok'delar chain will be fun. 

[Rhondis 148]

15 minutes ago, PatrickHenry said:

I...  I'm just at best underwhelmed.  Honestly.

From a intergalactic war to...  new quillboar models.  Space filler for voidlord expac, IMO.

Actually, I still believe N'zoth has a presence here. But it's been long awaited since an actual Horde vs. Alliance expansion!

[Dejo93 1,023]

Kinda wanted to see updated Worgen models, and straightened orc models (without the hunch)

[Spectral 7]

What? WHY?

WHY DO HORDE HAVE NIGHTBORNE IT DOESNT MAKE SENSE!

[Spectral 7]

PS Void Elfs are not as cool as they should be

 

[Neldor 4]

It is set on islands. Sometime during the conflict, naga will emerge (think of pandaria and the show up of Sha). Bam! N'zoth stuff coming right after and we've got ourselves a story - a story they are not telling right now cuz they'd spoil themselves the ending of Legion.

 

I ^{hope so}

[Granis 12]

21 minutes ago, Spectral said:

What? WHY?

WHY DO HORDE HAVE NIGHTBORNE IT DOESNT MAKE SENSE!

Well it was basicly told you that was going to happen on the Vindicar. Only thing I want is since they got Nightborne I want High Elves damn it.

Edited November 3, 2017 by Granis

[Amateurpeeweeeeh 37]

Literally no1 gives a shit about pvp (besides the 2-3% of the players. Even crossfaction raiding (which would make storywise no sense) would be more useful.

[Nxc 21]

did they mention anything about the release date ?

[Spectral 7]

not yet I think

 

[sixto 0]

so i guess the artifact weapons gonna disappear at the end of LEgion..or we gonna sacrifice them or something like that..

[Nathex 8]

It's not hard to figure out what the story of the next expansion will be in the broad since. Horde and Alliance fighting for control of the new islands and for Azeroth itself, At some point we figure out that the old gods are influencing the fighting between both sides and horde and alliance will have to team up yet again to stop the old gods from gaining control over the titan Azeroth.

[Migol 433]

I'm just facepalming about more trolls. How many Zul'recyles are there? We've had dungeons and raids which have been brought back with random graphic tweaks to be run again. We've had several run ins on the various continents with the troll empire remnants. Hemet Nesingwary couldn't be prouder of all the spirit animals we've killed over the last decade.

It's a worn out concept. It doesn't fit thematically anymore either, how are hut-dwelling jungle savages a credible power compared to Draneii spaceships, Illdari spaceships, Ebon Hand death metal fortress, the various spike-techs of the orc and goblins including air fleets and such, etc.

Feels like an excuse to re-use art assets. We already see the "giant troll berserker" in the one picture. Are we going to see a -third- version of Zin'rokh? Or kill another giant snake god? Maybe hear someone crying about hoodoo, that would be a novel and not tired thing.

[Neldor 4]

1 hour ago, Nathex said:

It's not hard to figure out what the story of the next expansion will be in the broad since. Horde and Alliance fighting for control of the new islands and for Azeroth itself, At some point we figure out that the old gods are influencing the fighting between both sides and horde and alliance will have to team up yet again to stop the old gods from gaining control over the titan Azeroth.

Which is precisely what I wrote few posts above. Man I hope it is like this, would be aight.

[TheKaiser 0]

I have a few questions if you don't mind:
Are artifact weapons and all the grinding done in Legion going to impact and transition into BfA or can I just do a do-over ? I havem't been playing and thought it was kinda pointless when in the near future a new expansion comes out, so could I basically just beginn again or do I need to grind in Legion still ?

 

Am I going to be able to start questing in the new Zones with getting Level 110 immediately or will I have to do something in Legion first ?

 

And at last, when will the soonest be, Icy-veins can predict the probably most potent classes in the new expansion ?

 

Thanks and I hope it is not too much of a bother.

[Yridaa 490]

56 minutes ago, TheKaiser said:

Are artifact weapons and all the grinding done in Legion going to impact and transition into BfA or can I just do a do-over ?

Blizzard has traditionally always allowed massive catch-up mechanisms between expansion transitions. The first quests in the new XPacs so far always were on-par or even better in rewards than even the highest tier raids of the previous xpac.

 

This means that, if you're fully mythic-raid geared, you're likely only be using those for the first few hours into the new xpac. Players that reached level 120 will have far outgeared your level 110 uber geared character, no matter what. So at best you can use your 110 gear for the first two levels or so.

 

As for the artifact, that is new, and seeing these new other upgrade mechanics, I'd say it is likely that either everyone will start with the same artifact power (i.e. "maxed out" with 110 traits) and leveling it further to 120 with new traits for everyone, or just removed entirely.

 

1 hour ago, TheKaiser said:

I havem't been playing and thought it was kinda pointless when in the near future a new expansion comes out, so could I basically just beginn again or do I need to grind in Legion still ?

Grinding in Legion to prepare for the new xpac will provide you almost no advantage other than the first few levels (110 until ~113). Let's just say that a person starting with green gear at 110 leveling to 113 in just a few hours will give them the same gear as you started with at 110 with your raid gear.

1 hour ago, TheKaiser said:

Am I going to be able to start questing in the new Zones with getting Level 110 immediately or will I have to do something in Legion first ?

So far you never needed to do anything in the old xpacs before you can enter new xpacs. All you need is the level requirement, and then you will get a message when you are in dalaran or your main city (Orgrimmar or Stormwind) telling you to go speak with Sylvanas/Anduin (Or another NPC that breadcrumbs you to that xpac)

1 hour ago, TheKaiser said:

And at last, when will the soonest be, Icy-veins can predict the probably most potent classes in the new expansion ?

The beta before the xpac goes live will likely be the best time to estimate which classes will be better than others, but FOTM is really just that, it can change from one moment to the other. Rather, you should probably look what playstyle you'll like the most (This will be overhauled like always), and you either do that in the PTR when it goes on the PTR or the XPac pre-patch (Usually a month or so before the xpac goes live)

 

 

The best preparation you can make for this xpac, assessing by your questions, is to level certain classes that you like to 110 before it goes live. So if you like casters, level warlock, priest, mage, shaman to 110, or if you rather go by style (healers for example) then level those. That's the only realistic preparation you can do for now. You don't need to deck them out in top tier epics (Because that's explained further above)

[Stan 5,239]

1 hour ago, TheKaiser said:

I have a few questions if you don't mind:
Are artifact weapons and all the grinding done in Legion going to impact and transition into BfA or can I just do a do-over ? I havem't been playing and thought it was kinda pointless when in the near future a new expansion comes out, so could I basically just beginn again or do I need to grind in Legion still ?

 

Am I going to be able to start questing in the new Zones with getting Level 110 immediately or will I have to do something in Legion first ?

 

And at last, when will the soonest be, Icy-veins can predict the probably most potent classes in the new expansion ?

 

Thanks and I hope it is not too much of a bother.

We're getting rid of our Artifact weapons, but some elements will be transitioned over to Heart of Azeroth. You can find more information about the new Artifact here. As opposed to Artifact Power grind in Legion, we're going to collect Azerite to empower the Heart of Azeroth. As it gains levels, you unlock traits (different circles).

Both factions will level up in their respective new zones. Scaling works similar to Legion, so it's entirely up to you. Each of the new zones consist of 3 subzones.

It's hard to jump into conclusions right now; the alpha has not started yet.

[sixto 0]

a certain question ring in my mind after seeing what to come: "why do we fight?..."

[MrOger 20]

I`m really hyped if they will implement full-scale RvR system alike Age or Reckoning.

[TheKaiser 0]

Thanks for the quick answers. Btw one last thing:

with the new Zone system, are players of the Alliance going to be able to quest on Zandalar or will this be exclusivsly for the Horde ?

[Baguettson 31]

How can people already bitch about what's going to be in the x-pac when they've only seen a trailer and an hour of conference ?

They described some mechanics, they told us the starting story, but what if they weren't fucking telling us the whole content of the x-pac ?

Maybe it looks like the xpac is not complete because it fucking isn't, that's why this 28/11 we're not going on kul'tiras yet.

And also, we fight because it's been since 5 xpacs that shit's going on between the horde and the alliance, it's a wonder how an all-out war hasn't exploded yet. Because yes, at the start of the xpac right here, there is literally nothing else to do than fight each other.

[ArusVicious 156]

17 hours ago, TheKaiser said:

Thanks for the quick answers. Btw one last thing:

with the new Zone system, are players of the Alliance going to be able to quest on Zandalar or will this be exclusivsly for the Horde ?

While levelling, Zandalar will be the only available zone for Horde, and Kul'tiras for the Alliance. As soon as you hit 120, they both open up, so eventually you will be able to experience all the zones.

11 hours ago, genbag said:

How can people already bitch about what's going to be in the x-pac when they've only seen a trailer and an hour of conference ?

They described some mechanics, they told us the starting story, but what if they weren't fucking telling us the whole content of the x-pac ?

Maybe it looks like the xpac is not complete because it fucking isn't, that's why this 28/11 we're not going on kul'tiras yet.

And also, we fight because it's been since 5 xpacs that shit's going on between the horde and the alliance, it's a wonder how an all-out war hasn't exploded yet. Because yes, at the start of the xpac right here, there is literally nothing else to do than fight each other.

I do agree with your point. From someone who bought the virtual ticket and watched some relatively in-depth videos, I personally believe it has some major potential.

Looking back to WoD, the reason that expansion was a failure was almost entirely due to an extreme lack of content, and, everyone's least favourite feature ever, garrisons. Legion didn't have that. It certainly had it's flaws but it was actually quite a success. I've seen many returning players come back and like what they've seen for the first time in years. It's undeniable that many of the successes of Legion will be carried over to BfA. It's also undeniable that many of the failures will scrapped completely. 

For the war part, there was a lot in Legion leading up to this (Broken Shore). And it looks like more is on it's way. And all we can do is wait and see how they make it work. 

On 11/3/2017 at 2:05 PM, Nathex said:

It's not hard to figure out what the story of the next expansion will be in the broad since. Horde and Alliance fighting for control of the new islands and for Azeroth itself, At some point we figure out that the old gods are influencing the fighting between both sides and horde and alliance will have to team up yet again to stop the old gods from gaining control over the titan Azeroth.

IMO, this is very likely, and probably the most interesting approach for Blizzard to take late in the expansion. Old Gods strive when they can turn people against each other. They weaken their enemies indirectly through creating conflict, only to show themselves later on to finish the job. By the time we see N'Zoth, we should have faced many casualties from our war. Or maybe N'Zoth didn't create any conflict. Maybe he was just waiting to see when a full out war would erupt so he could take advantage of it. This all seems extremely interesting, and I personally really would love to see something like that happen. If that is the case, the occurrence of a Void expansion after BfA would be pretty likely. 

Edited November 6, 2017 by Maxkitty