In the Ring of Transferrence, we activate 4 portals to go to Bastion, Maldraxxus, Ardenweald, and Revendreth.
There are 4 more inactive portals. Where do they go?
Do they go to old afterlives no longer accepting souls, or maybe to ones we just haven’t seen yet?
We have yet to see any that reflect the “Honorable Warrior’s Afterlife” or something a like Valhalla (not counting Skyhold, because its bot an afterlife). Maldraxxus doesn’t really scratch that itch as it’s too undead-ish and ill fitting for that.
(The choice between generic gross undead and vampiric undead isn’t a great one)
What about something reflective of the Draenei, or perhaps they open deeper realms?
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Yeah, those are likely to be revealed in the next couple of patches. I’m really hoping for a Shaman/Honored Ancestors/Culture Heroes land, which I think would be a cool place to put your honorable warrior types than Maldraxxus.
And/or maybe the Other Side gets it’s own full zone?
And many have pointed out that aside from Ysera, who was personally taken by Elune to be reborn in Ardenweald, we haven’t seen any other dragons. Where are they at? A draconic afterlife has potential!
Oh, and some kind of mechanical zone would be cool. I don’t even know where to begin with that, especially since Bastion ate up a lot of the “machinery of the afterlife” concept, but something Gnome/Goblin-ish would be cool. Maybe a kind of chaotic mindscape where inventors can create whatever they imagine?
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The ‘gates’ in the Ring of Transference are less gates and more like Conduits.
If you remember the Arbiter cinematic, or when you physically go up to the Arbiter in the follow up quest, you can see literally hundreds of gateways all around the Arbiter, stretching off into the horizon, going on forever.
Those are the gates to the many different afterlives that souls get sent through. The Ring of Transference is where one of the above mentioned gates can be called down into and opened up like a highway/railway for people/shadowland native when they need to travel to different realms. (If you remember when we first go to bastion, the gate for it was called down from up above and slotted into that spot).
So technically all those openings in the Ring of Transference arent for specific afterlife gates and are more just empty slots where any gate for any of the untold trillions of afterlives gates can be called down into if travel there is required by someone
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I would say we’ll probably get 3 more. 1 in 9.1. 1 in 9.2. 1 in 9.3. While there are 4 remaining gate slots, the Flight Master is in one of them. Which suggests that that one will not be used for a new Afterlife. Personally, I do hope Blizz saves one slot for something reflective of the Shamastic cultures. The Tauren especially are having their entire culture drowned out here, so it be nice if there were something special for them locked behind one of those three gates.
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Tauren and orc cultures are shamanistic and engage in ancestor worship to some extent, would love to see an afterlife reflective of that.
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I mean, we’re out of the woods when it comes to the “Arbiter System Boilerworks” Afterlives right? So the (safe to assume) next 3 have a whole lot more freedom to them. They can be anything. C’mon Blizz, just one of those damned doors devoted to an ancestral spirit worship afterlife. It would also bolster my pessimistic feelings on Baine, since he is the Rep for the most Spirit Worshipping culture right now AND his need to be a token Good Horde plot device isn’t needed here. He could have an actual story arc that’s solely for the benefit of his own characterization and growth?! Has he EVER been allowed that before?
3*, since one is the flight master
In Legion we got:
- suramar, full new zone
- Argus, full new zone
- broken shore, full new zone smaller
In BFA we got
- warfront pseudo zones X2 (darkshore Arathi)
- Nzoth pseudo zones X2 (uldum and vale)
- small zone a la broken shore (mechagon)
- one full new zone (Azshara patch)
So the rule seems to be either 3 new zones (one being smaller), or instead of 1 new zone 2 smaller zones
My money is on Shadowlands being 3 new zones, but one of the new zones is a much smaller than the other two. Because of Desmotaeron.
Desmotaeron is the small subzone in the Maw that still isn’t explored. It isn’t huge but it isn’t small either. And there’s a weird portal like structure in one of the areas.
So I think:
- 9.1 will be one small new zone using another Oribos portal space + Desmotaeron with maybe a secondary area, Raid + new dungeon
- 9.2 will be one large new zone using another portal space, raid + new dungeon
- 9.3 will be one large new zone using another portal space, raid + new dungeon
If we have a 9.x.5 content patch, it may be to go back to reality and see what’s going on wrt Azeroth, and/or character development for Azerothian characters in the Shadowlands, which may require us to revisit old content.
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A primal “lands before time” beastlands kind of place with crags, volcanoes, rolling plains and jungles or red tree woods would make a pretty great zone for dragons and Shamans and cultures such as Taurens.
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Beastlands_(plane)
Just add in dinosaurs and its an instant win.
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Forbidden_Plateau_(divine_realm)
I think it’s kinda wild that people are so dedicated to the idea of one gate being devoted to a room where old men sit around dispensing sagely advice.
Such a realm should exist, certainly, but the notion of a full content patch being devoted to visiting and exploring such a place seems totally absurd to me. Maybe a brief visit during the Orc heritage armor quest, if they get around to doing those again.
As for the actual content, I can only hope that Blizzard has better ideas than this forum apparently does.
Am I cynical for thinking there won’t be any new zones? I mean sure, I think there will be new areas that host raids, new dailies, and new factions with rep to grind - however, I think they will be hosted on one of the plethora of floating islands that exist around the perimeters of the already present zones.
At most I think we might go to Thros via Ardenweild and maybe some sort of secret heavenly city connected to Bastion, and then we’ll find out the Seplucher is a hidden area beneath Maldraxxus where the First Ones were lid to rest (and what the Undying Army was originally created to defend.)
I could be wrong, but I personally find that more likely.
I wouldnt call you that cynical.
At best I think we will go to the location that the Primus is at, since I have gotten the impression that he hasnt been gone for that loong a time from any of the maldraxxus stuff, the “Civil war” of maldraxxus feels fairly recent. And then there is the Message we take from Stradama in the weekly dungeon quest and give to the broker.
I am not buying the whole Primus = Runecarver theory because the runecarver has been there for a very loooong time.
Secret cow level afterlife.
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They could make it so the Shamanistic realm is in charge of “reporting” whenever the balance between life and death is disturbed (as we saw Tauren being warned by the ancestors in the Tauren heritage armor questline), but that the Jailer had messed up their capacity to see properly recently + the Helm of Domination was made to render the bearer and their activity invisible (borrowing with a twist the Greek myth that Hades’s magical tool of his godhood that the Giants made for him during the Titanomachy was the Helmet of Invisibility)
The Shamanistic races, which are majority Horde, deserve development in the death-centric expansion.
Not my fault you lack creativity and insight into nuance xoxo
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This hasn’t happened since Cataclysm.
Probably to some late expansion places like the late expac portals in BFA.
It will likely to be other afterlives, maybe a light one, since we still don’t know what a place like that looks like
The 2 afterlives I’d really like to see are:
1.- Elune specific afterlive where all her worshipers go.
2.- Tauren/Shaman afterlife with their ancestral spirits where hopefuly we get to interact with Cairn
Well, two of them are in Ardenweald, I don’t think elune has her own afterlife just for them, I could be wrong though 
It’s gonna be confirmed to be Ardenweald, given as of right now, and as per since-removed night fae campaign quest text (beta), All Night Warriors go to Ardenweald. Probably.
Should 9.1 roll around and it’s revealed not all night warriors go to Ardenweald once Huln finds them all, aight I and others are wrong, but as of right now the Super Powered Night Warrior Empowered Elune Avatars all go to Ardenweald.
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