The Maw also may be an entity and not just a zone.
It seems like it’s related to promordial Chaos and might be ‘the one true God of Death’ also known as ‘The Ancient One’.
We find this out in Ardenweald. We find out that Thros is actually part of the Maw and that the Maw wants to consume all of the Shadowlands.
It was probably the first Death Realm to latch on to Mortal Life.
Revendreth also has ties to Mortal Life though the Venthyr try to hide it. End result: A Race that resembles the Undead Count Orlok and sometimes has the Hair of Undead Dracula.
Ardenweald is about becoming what you wish you could be instead of what you were in Life. Bastion is about giving up the past so it’s the least Undead of the Zones.
One thing I’ve noticed about every zone of the Shadowlands is that there is more to them then what we’re seeing. Each has secrets and/or history that tells only part of the full story.
Revendreth: Was once MUCH bigger then it current is. As if it experienced a “sundering” of it’s own, in addition to clear evidence of suffering from an greater war.
Ardenweald: IS far bigger and more expansive then what we see but far out of reach.
Bastion: Was also assaulted during an ancient war like Revendreth and like Revedreth, appears to be only a part of what it once was.
Maldraxxus:The only Realm that seams to be not landmass as the others but seams to be (at least mostly) artificial.
The Maw: So much mystery with it and seams to be not in it’s original state.
My Hypothsis: What use to be the Maw was the Original Realm of Death, but Zorvaal started a war between the Light and the Void and dragged the Shadowlands into an eternal war. He was imprisoned in the Maw, now that his war completely devastated it and Maldraxxus was created to serve as the new realm of protection for the Shadowlands.
Well, there is the one in Theater of Pain, but it’s implied that it may be another “acquisition” of the Brokers.
Blizzard outright stated that the Jailer upon being imprisoned in Torghast used the Tower’s Chains to drag pieces of other Death Realms into the Maw.
https://web.archive.org/web/20200804105710/https://sagamer.co.za/2020/07/09/interview-with-world-of-warcraft-art-director-ely-cannon/
The Maw in it’s original form was just Torghast and Torghast as one can see is capable of fitting multiple Zones inside it so it being all that there was to the Maw before the Jailer was imprisoned there is fitting!
What I also find curious about the Maw is that there does seem to be something inherently unique about it in terms of how it interacts with the rest of the Shadowlands. “Maw energy” or “Maw magic” seems to be a thing in itself and was apparently the secret ingredient to creating the Lich King and the Scourge at large.
The Maw wields 5 Unique Energies: Stygia(the Livid/Blue-Grey Soul Energies), Green Death Anima, Rainbow-Black Energies that become the Shades used to make Mawsworn, Domination Energies and Phantasma(the Anima harvested by the Maw).
Domination is the Death Magic we hardly if ever see. We see the Glowing Runes of Domination on the Jailer, Frostmourne and Shades with legs. We also see it flowing off of the backs of the largest of Shades that hide their presence within the Mort’regar Wing of Torghast.
I’m quite certain those big Shades with Domination flowing off of their back use the same Rainbow-Black Shade-Energies as the smaller Shades so we continue to know little about Domination.
so like Galakrond?
If the In-Between is a near infinite void of nothingness, it makes me uneasy to imagine a continent-sized abomination of flesh just floating through the emptiness.
I mean, it’s a pretty interesting concept, to have a realm being the corpse of a once massive cosmic being(Knowhere), but doesn’t Maldraxxus need to exist at the same point as the start of life? How long do you have to wait for a cosmic space dragon to die?
Kind of reminds of me those colossus beings from Draenor. The Thunderlords made their base of operations one and wasn’t there some ‘theory’ that the dead corpse became the land?
I feel like it’s one of those situations that seems really cool in the design phase but it’s not going to fit into the greater story. Just something that is there and don’t think about it, or think about it and make some youtube videos on it.
Gorgrond according to legends was a Giant Colossus which considering Grond’s head became the Throne of the Elements according to Chronicle is a reference to Grond himself.
https://twitter.com/Burnzerker/status/1140338534114398208
Grond’s body became Gorgrond and his head became the island known as the Throne of the Elements(indicating Grond was decapitated by the Sporemound Botaan who left the Everbloom on Grond’s corpse).
Zangar Sea/Zangarmarsh was Zang, Farahlon was Botaan, Gorgrond was Grond and Tanaan Jungle was Naanu
Idk what maldraxxus is but I love the skinnable warts. And now I’m thinking maldraxxus is a giant fleshy, hairy, spiky turrle. Why? Probably because the fleshy bits growing on the rocky bits reminds me of a alligator snapping turtle with moss, mud, and sticks on its back
It’s probably a devourer, like the ones we fight in all the other zones, except this one is titan-sized. It makes sense since we know devourers are life that is native to the shadowlands and possibly originate from the in-between. The people of Maldraxxus probably kept it fed and docile with the anima of all the souls that were being sent to them. It’s possible that if the shadowlands ever faced a threat the covenants couldn’t stop, the Maldraxxus would be unleashed as a last resort to suck the anima out of the threat.
It will probably turn against us in a later patch now that its food supply has been cut off, and we’ll have to stop it from sucking all the anima out of the shadowlands.
Sure, but doesn’t conflict with the Titans molding the world to their image? This beings that walk in the clouds, just dies and remakes the land? How did this being come to creation? It needed an ample food source. Why did it evolve the way it did?
Why do the elements need some fleshy being to die to create their own place of power?
Chronicle states that Grond was created by Aggramar from the Earth on Draenor to fight the Sporemounds which were a natural result of large amounts of Spirit on the planet before Aggramar got there.
The Titans did not create the Planets but brought Order to them through various methods which in Draenor’s case was by creating a single Earth Giant and giving the smaller Colossi that broke off during it’s death Weapons to fight the last remaining Sporemound.
That essentially makes the realm of Death secondary. The Primus thinking, well this realm is incomplete, let me pull in another realm just dwarves the significance of the Shadowlands.
We’re already at the vantage point that the First Ones are intellectually inferior that they didn’t have failsafes, now the Shadowlands can only exist on elementary fundamentals?
This is why I don’t like, what does Baal call it, hard world building? It’s only as smart as the people writing it.
They also brought life. If you look at the “founding of Azeroth,” Dragons were a newborn species. They also shaped the land. I don’t consider the Colossi canon, because nothing else in the universe supports them. These massive beings that existed to exist… they literally have no function, practical purpose other than to be a giant skeleton base.
Azeroth isn’t Draenor. Azeroth is a Sleeping Titan so it naturally has all the Spirit hogged by the World Soul preventing Life from manifesting as anything aside from Elementals.
Draenor has no World Soul and thus it has Life naturally. You so desperately want everything to have a guiding hand on them yet only Titans themselves have need of guiding hands!
Maldraxxus in any case is not created by the Titans but the First Ones who are practically the Death counterpart to the Titans(who are tied to Order) with the Eternal Ones being the Death Counterpart to the Titan Keepers!
Actually we don’t know this. In fact, by all accounts in game, they are an invasive species that are not native to any of the known realms.
In fact, by the quest In maldraxxus where you help the Brokers acquire one for the Theater of Pain, you travel to another realm entirely, presumably it’s native realm.
While it’s possible another realm in the shadowlands, there’s not enough information to make any determination as to their origins.
Maldraxxus is yer mum’s roastbeef folds
Well, that explains sooo much about Maldraxxus 