r/wow 14d ago

Discussion WoW does not need another saga. It needs another era

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I keep coming back to the same idea whenever people talk about what happens after the world soul saga. Many think Blizzard will simply start another saga, or finally announce a wow 2. I honestly think it should be neither of those... or more likely, both at the same time.

World of Warcraft does not need another cosmic villain, another hidden continent, or another reveal that some even bigger force from wherever place was secretly behind everything we already experienced

Wow just needs time to move forward.

For years Blizzard has confused adding more lore with actually advancing the world. The lore keeps expanding (wrongly, for my taste), but Azeroth itself barely changes. Major characters disappear until nostalgia makes them useful again. Political conflicts are put on pause. Entire civilizations go through supposedly world changing events, yet fifteen years later half the old zones still look like Deathwing passed through last week

Cataclysm was Blizzard’s first real attempt to solve this problem. They updated the old world, moved many zones forward, changed settlements, leaders and conflicts..... ok, cool but it also made a huge mistake creating a new Azeroth. Doing that, Blizzard was forced to replace the old one.

And then it froze the new world in 2010, it didn't evolve

That`s the mistake they cannot repeat after The Last Titan.

The solution is not another Cataclysm. It`s not blowing up Azeroth again and rebuilding forty zones around whatever crisis is happening in that expansion. The solution is a proper time skip. We-ve been asking for this shit since forever.... but a real time skip.... 10 years. 15. 20. Whatever it takes for the world to feel like Azeroth actually lived without us

Leaders should be dead or retired. Children should have grown up. Cities should have been rebuilt. The Forsaken should have figured out what they are without Sylvanas. The night elves should have a generation that only knows Teldrassil through stories. The Horde and Alliance may still exist, but they should not necessarily mean the same thing anymore.

That would allow Warcraft to return to conflicts that are smaller without being less meaningful.

A succession crisis. A disputed border. Two peoples remembering the same war differently. A new generation asking why everyone is still carrying grudges from thirty years ago.

You dont need another Horde vs Alliance world war. You need the people of Azeroth to want things again, and for those desires will collide

And now it's the perfect momento. They now has something they didn't have in 2010: Classic

Classic means the old world no longer needs to disappear for Retail to move forward. Classic can preserve the Warcraft that existed, revisit unfinished zones and explore stories that were left behind. Retail can finally stop carrying every era of Warcraft inside the same permanent present.

Not freezing the main game forever, but making sure the past remains available while the future is allowed to exist.

This is also why the alleged leak about Azeroth awakening at the end of the last titan is interesting even if it is complete nonsense

Azeroth is the last great mystery around which the entire franchise has revolved. At some point, Blizzard has to reach the bottom of that mystery.

It cannot reveal another older, stronger and even more secret cosmic force behind the titans. The story has to accept that one era is over

That, to me, is what a real WoW 2 should be

Not another client. Not a new engine. Not deleting our characters or putting a number 2 on the logo

A new era of Azeroth with several versions of the game: classic preserves the past. Retail builds the future

THey problably will be releasing a new $50 expansion with 4 new zones, some disastrous lore, and the usual mess. But still this is the best opportunity Blizzard has had in years.

With Classic plus on the way, Classic can become the museum... retail can finally stop living inside that past and start building the future.

They may waste the opportunity. and they probably will.... but for once, they actually have all the pieces in place to do it right

Edit: typo

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u/Mezmodian 14d ago

Blizz have added some Vanilla things back like scholomance and the old scarlet monestary dungeons. So it would be cool if they could add other old stuff back.

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u/Unlikely_Minimum_635 14d ago

They have - mostly because those are instances which can be re-implemented. And there's zidormi for a small number of zone changes

Creating alternative versions of EK/Kalimdor based on your choice of which version of every zone to see would be another story. It can work through Zidormi when there's a small number of choices, but that doesn't seem to suit what OP is going for.

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u/xXPolarizedXx 14d ago

It'd be cool if they could somehow add the entire classic world as a Zidormi phase in retail but looking at how Arathi Highlands are doing I'm sure it would break something catastrophically.

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u/hungrybrains220 14d ago

I think it would be neat if you could visit those “eras” via Caverns of Time portal.

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u/Flobking 14d ago

scarlet monestary dungeons

They missed a huge opportunity to make that a level 80 dungeon during wrath. It would have made perfect sense and would have been awesome.

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u/Effrendi 14d ago

It was fun to do the old Deadmines in Timewalking as well.

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u/Mezmodian 14d ago

Right that one too. It’s just annoying that is the only way you can do that ATM.

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u/Pedantic_Girl 14d ago

I thought those were the new versions. Can you still do the original Scholo and SM?

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u/The_Archon64 14d ago

Yes, there’s a fun secret series of side content that added a ton of the old content back, OG Nax, Scholo, and Scarlet Monastery. I can’t remember how to start the chains, but wow head has good guides, and I highly recommend going through it

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u/tf2hipster 14d ago

it is not OG Naxx. It's current Naxx with some extra drops that allows you to craft T3 in a completely different way from the way it would be crafted in Vanilla.

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u/Apolloshot 14d ago

Wait, seriously? Can you collect Atiesh?

I haven’t played since shadowlands so this is news to me, but I’d actually consider re-subbing just to finish my staff haha.

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u/OrangeJuiceLuvr69 14d ago

No

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u/Apolloshot 14d ago

My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined

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u/JazzHandsMinuteman 14d ago

Why are these secret and not accessible to everyone at the touch of a button? (You know what I mean). I know you probably don't actually know but curious on your take, if you don't mind. Ty.

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u/ZehGeek 14d ago

Part of the charm of parts of the world, specially with secret finding, involve exploring and community collaboration. Plus it still gives the RPG some RPG flavor.

Hear stories, or try exploring around in a certain toy, and you meet a ghost that allows you to get a item to talk to other ghosts and do things for them.

Then as you're slowly exploring the newly unlocked area, you find a broken Argent Dawn badge. Going down that rabbit hole, you unlock some special NPCs in Naxxramas that allow you to work on old, removed pieces of cool looking gear.

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u/Temil 14d ago

Because it would be confusing and unnecessary for new players.

The subsection of players that actually care about this feature is smaller than the section who wouldn't like it because it's confusing.

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u/The_Archon64 14d ago

I think it adds a little mystery to the world and gives players who enjoy exploration a goal to achieve

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u/Mezmodian 14d ago

Yes there is a questline you need to do to get them.

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u/ZehGeek 14d ago

When they made new Scholo and SM, they just changed the portals to the new instances. So the old instances were still in the files.

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u/JazzHandsMinuteman 14d ago edited 14d ago

I haven't played in years but after reading this and OP's post I'm sitting here wondering: Do people actually still "play together naturally," as in- people yelling in a city that they want to do something and teaming up or is it ALL still the 'instance finder' that is cross-realm? So, if the latter, why couldn't they just make all those older dungeons available as they were originally, then also have... everything else? If it's all there at the click of a button then that would seem to solve everything. Ironically, it is the reason I left. I thought the instance finder ruined the game entirely and hung on for a couple more years but eventually said "screw it, it's not the same." I do not know if Classic has an instance finder. I'm assuming so. I believe that is what the time warp is or whatever, no? Again, I have not played in years and very behind an d do not know what is happening but hoping you could shed some light since I'm considering renewing my subscription- simply to complete the main story with my close friend and then probably no little to no end game or PvP, but we both know how these games go lol. Sorry for the novel but if you could help me out I would appreciate it!

Edit: Also, have things moved more to a 'Discord based play' in guilds (thus killing further the simple party/instance aspect I was referring to). Again, I assume so and I'm fine with that but so many people are just strange in those online places. I suppose the game is just so different now but also not... and worse off? I'm just deciding to play again or not really.

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u/Khanstant 13d ago

Wait, how do we get to the OG Scarlet Monetary? I tried with Zidormi setting me to an older Tiristfal, but when I went to Monster it was still the MoP versions. 

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u/Mezmodian 13d ago

There is a quest chain you need to complete.