I’m pretty sure if we personally tried to fight a literal Black Hole 4 million times the mass of the Sun, that would be the end. One way or another.
Wait … No, actually, with this writing team we would discover in the end that this black hole only existed to protect the universe from another, larger black hole that is located in a parallel universe on the other side of Sagitarius A* that is also somehow an alternate history version of Azeroth where Sargeras is the good guy, Arthas was never corrupted, Garrosh was a great Warchief who died heroically fighting the Void, Sylvanas actually did marry Anduin and never became a banshee, Blood Elves are still High Elves, and Zovaal is still the Arbiter, a benevolent all-powerful NPC that exists to give out quests and exposition from an omniscient PoV.
But that’s all just incidental side story to the main plot, which involves us fighting this new supermassive black hole that is also somehow a sentient Titan+++++++++++++ level being with no character or motivation who is nonetheless somehow directly responsible for everything that has ever happened in both universes.
Then we will defeat it, and while it disintegrates into Hawking Radiation, it will ominously warn us about the threat posed by quantum mechanics that we are now vulnerable to in its absence.
Then we will have to fight the quantum strings that are the underlying framework of reality.
I don’t truly know how much old lore is still relevant but Id like to go back in time and see the fully fleshed out story of the Black Empire and Elemental Lords. I personally like what little I can see in Silithus and in Ahn’Qiraj. I would like to do that with more lore though in addition to Black Empire lore that was mostly mentioned mainly in text reference. Maybe that’s too difficult or large scale to pull off in 1 expansion though. I know that’s Old Gods territory but uh…that’s fine.
We could finally introduce new insects like Praying Mantis…Crane Flies…Rhinoceros Beetles… Expletive ending in ing…AWESOME!
Wowpedia link to Black Empire that I cant link…
I think there is…or maybe…was plenty of old lore to flesh out more and tell a story for and it is probably missed opportunity at this point.
But iirc The current one had literally NO build up. We just installed Shadowlands and boom there he is with no real background. He didnt really exist…nothing to indicate he did…and then…tada! Out of the hat he gets pulled. Wrath of the Lich King was so big because we knew who the enemy was. We had a fully fleshed out history from Warcraft 3.
This expansion COULD have been that if we had any idea who he was, nevermind implementation.
This could still be done with whatever is coming if they do the “intro” right.
Or we can just keep experiencing the “jump in the Antarctic Ocean” experience and going for it approach and see how that continues to work out…
Just means you need to be a Vulpera, then he won’t run away, because he will be trying to kidnap you into his handbag.
To the topic though, It would be nice to be a more normal ‘regular hero’ on Azeroth again instead of some cosmic champion on other worlds, for a while at least.
I have been… disenchanted… with Blizzard, as of late. So I tried a couple different MMOs. Elder Scrolls has awesome Lore but the the Gameplay is a big turn off. I ruled out FF14 for various reasons - it is not for me.
I tried LotrO - and I had fun in the early levels. I felt good about clearing the forest of Orcs and beasts. Getting vengeance against thugs, and keeping thugs at bay. Earning rep seemed interesting, even though the experienced MMO Player in me knows it is inconsequential.
I started thinking about WoW and how they could get that old magic back. It seems difficult, since they upped the stakes to cosmic and existential levels almost every patch cycle.
I have been getting into SWTOR, though. LotRO lacks a bit in the Gameplay department, even though it rocks in the Lore - like Elder Scrolls. SWTOR is pretty well rounded as far as Gameplay and Lore.
I just think it’s boring and not realistic. How do people keep overlooking the fact that by the second expansion we were already on an alien planet fighting intergalactic space demons.
I think people always confuse smaller self contained zone questlines, which were usually much more simple and straightforward with the larger overarching plot.
Don’t play Final Fantasy if you don’t want to be the warrior of light. Same kinda deal applies here. If our characters weren’t important we’d still be in the starting zones doing menial tasks.
My favorite questing in the entire game was combating Naga in Ashenvale and basically all of Duskwood.
I can’t even begin to imagine what would make me feel that way again though. I’ll be honest, I haven’t read a quest since they baked questhelper into the game. I don’t think they could take it out at this point, even though I think it would make the questing experience objectively better, because not everyone wants to quest.
Much like flying, I think once it’s out of the bottle, you can’t put it back in again.
I agree with your premise though. There’s no reason expansions have to be vertical.
I hope they just say that Azeroth was killed in the jailer defeat cinematic and all the cosmic forces vying for her just go back about their business and are never heard from again.
Char: We are back from saving the afterlife
Azeroth Grunt: Who are you?
Char: Char, The Champion of Azeroth, Defeater of Deathwing, Savior against the Burning Legion
Azeroth Grunt: Eh, we’ve heard that name, and stories of those things. But they are all ridiculous things, stuff like that doesn’t really happen, or exist. Now whoever you really are, we need some boar meat, go bring us 10.
I would love it if like 20 years has passed in Azeroth while we were in the Shadowlands. Most of the tired characters are old and dying and the Human, Orc, Tauren, and Troll kingdoms have new leaders and strife. We seriously need intra-Alliance fighting.
