We may as well talk about it, I haven’t seen a thread about it so thought I would make one! (Unless I am blind)
How do you feel about the potential time skip? I personally don’t like the idea of maybe coming back to some of my characters being offed by old age…
Honestly I’m just used to making the most of whatever I’m presented with that while I might not be thrilled, I’ll adjust accordingly and move forward.
anyway here’s this confusing picture of old man anduin
https://i.imgur.com/mNr6pUG.png
I’m just reusing my post from the alpha thread
I feel like this, and the “hook ups” that happened in BfA all hint at a timeskip where the children of major lore characters are who we interact with instead.
I am sure little half-blood elf Thaly will be very cute. I can’t say the same for whatever the offspring of Ra-den and M.O.T.H.E.R would look like, though
I remember when people insisted, no, screamed that there was a ten year skip between WLK and Cata. They based this off a wildly misunderstood piece of text in a throwaway side quest on Hyjal.
Even when it was disproven, people still insisted on it. This will probably be the same.
(Commentary): A time skip would be useful if it were done correctly, it’s just a matter of doing it correctly that is the problem. The current writers don’t do too good of a job when they try to write existing characters (Calia Menethil), but when it comes to brand new characters they’re either really great and we want more of them (Flynn, Lucille Waycrest, etc…) or they’re passable but nothing special or hate-worthy (Taelia, Talanji, etc…).
https://i.imgur.com/G8VVDtE.png
As long as it’s big enough to shuffle off anyone who’s seen the lion king
Like… past bitterness side a time skip could be interesting if they actually wrote it well (they won’t) and was clear about their own timeline (they aren’t)
I’m curious to see what the Saberon and Botani may do with that time. I feel it’s a small thing but definitely designed for a time skip. I’d like to see Yrel and the gang, but if we are gone 10 years that’s 300 for them Orcs?
Will Wrathion find a way to restart the Black Dragons? Will Nozdormu(spelling, I’m not looking it up) become Infinite by then?
I’d love to see Gnolls, Quillboar and Kobolds evolve and come back strong. I’m very fond of simple monster races.
Also where’s that post about the worgen dk and blizzard’s timeline in terms of gameplay
https://i.imgur.com/Ds9lKf5.png
Found it. I know it isn’t thoroughly accurate anymore plus with the new player starting experience but like… How many times do we have to teach you this lesson old man?
Not a fan personally, mostly because I don’t see it being executed well.
If it does happen, I hope I’m proven wrong.
I’m actually all for a timeways shenanigans adventure, especially if the Shadowlands interact with time in wonky ways, rather than just ‘accelerated’ time like the Twisting Nether>Normal Reality.
Like, to get back to the Mortal Plane we might end up shucked back into the distant past and witness the Kaldorei sacking of the Twin Empires, assist the Titan Watchers kicking the snot out of the Old Gods and their Black Empire (and giving a reason why the Old Gods couldn’t beat us, because defeating us prior to us going back to push their proverbials in caused the timestream to have a stroke and work against them) or work to ensure the savage Human tribes of Arathai and the beleaguered High Elves actually worked together and didn’t just slaughter each other in a three-way with the native Forest and Jungle Trolls of the Eastern Kingdoms.
Then kick us into alternate futures and give us visions of a ‘Alliance Victory’ timeline where everything has gone to hell and all the old loyalties are little more than ash and dust and the various religions and political factions have divided up the world into petty fiefdoms and fight each other constantly, and the ‘Horde Victory’ timeline where things have also gone belly-up when the militant factions ran out of things to fight and just turned into forty-something ex-jocks moaning about how they could have been contenders as Azeroth and threats are left to fester and grow because nothing is worth fighting after defeating the Alliance.
Finally, after seeing what got us to this point in time and the very worst possible timelines that await us, we find the 
who has been fiddling with the Timelines while the Bronze and Infinite Flights squabbled over whose Aspect is it anyways, beat them within an inch of their lives, get the MacGuffinite to actually bridge back into the Mortal Plane and to the right time, a few years have passed but at least we’re not thousands of years into the past or decades into a future where everything is awful.
I feel like its a hype thing. Ion said it either by accident, or a possible idea they have, but nothing concrete. But the fact he said it gets people talking, which isn’t bad as it generates a conversation about the subject.
Honestly? I don’t think much will change. At all. I can’t imagine how it could, unless they revamp the whole world again–which I’m not against. Cataclysm had its problems, but as we can see even with BfA, Blizzard can pump the game full of things to do.
The problem is making those things fun to do. I would run Islands all day if they had more substantial rewards and more guaranteed drops.
OK everyone I have simulated Azeroth’s future to provide a “sneek peek” of the post shadowlands expansion. This 100% accurate map was produced by loading up the “Guardians of Azeroth” mod in Crusader Kings II, turning on “observer” mode (so that the AI plays against itself), and walking away from my computer for like an hour. Here are the results: Azeroth a couple centuries in the future
https://imgur.com/a/IfFaxP8
If you would like to know the fate of a specific character let me know and I will look them up in the game’s history files
Spoiler alert, apparently the next expansion will involve a lot of qiraji
I would unironically be down with more bug people.
We do not get enough interaction with the bug people.
I really don’t like time-skips in general, mostly because of the large chance half of my characters would just… y’know. Die. Of old age.
Those of them that are longer lived would… probably be fine, but there’s such a massive gap there and I really don’t enjoy having that forced on me, even for storytelling purposes.
I remember there was a lot of arguments about Legion and it having a time skip and then it barely effected anyone.
What would I be okay with? If maybe there was a cool way time worked differently in Shadowlands. Like every day in shadowy place is 2 days for every one Azeroth or something like that.
Forcing a time skip might SEEM like a good idea to just throw out there, but it heavily alienates well…the community that keeps playing because they have stories and plots and second lives in Azeroth in role play.
Forcing a HUGE time skip forces people to rush stories we had in place. Events, plots. Age. The idea of role play I feel should be at the forefront of deciding what people are going to be interacting with. This game has a story, people we see and love and we interact with that story. Role play is is its major function.
So no, I don’t like big skips in years. BUT I would wait to see what it is…because it really be a misunderstood statement being blown out of proportion. Like how everone threw a fit and decided to quit the game because because of a screen shot of a Zandalari prelate npc taken out of context before we even knew what we were getting…
So lets wait and see…we speculate now, prepare but…need to wait to see whats happening because Shadowlands is a super odd expansion pack. And since this opens up a whole new avenue ? It would be sort of…silly to skip 10 years every time we went to some great cosmic realm for an expansion. We’ve been in the Emerald Dream many times for raids and dungeons and quests- and time seemed to be fine there since its one of those realms on the cosmos. We’ve been in Elemental Planes, Argus with their weird days, Outlands being a whole different place…
Part of me thinks this wont be too much to worry about. But ya never know.