World of Warcraft: Drowning Wake
Friday, September 5, 2008 at 3:41PMWelcome to Walking with Bronze, LoreCrafted's weekly column where we speculate about the future of Warcraft lore. Every Friday (or so) we peer into one of the many potential futures for this beloved franchise of ours and wax philosophical about what may eventually come.
With Wrath of the Lich King deep into beta and on the horizon for a live release, I figured it was about time we began to speculate upon the next expansion. Hey, it's never too early, right?
The popular guess right now is the Emerald Dream, and while I tend to think that's definitely good fodder for another expansion, a part of me expects that the next big bad will be Azshara herself. Afterall, she is the last of the original tier of villains introduced prior to World of Warcraft, which puts her near Arthas in terms of tenure. If this is the case, then we're likely to be traveling beneath the waves into the dark realms of Nazjatar, the home of the naga.
As you may know, Nazjatar was once known as Zin-Azshari, the ancient palace of the kaldorei highborne. When the Well of Eternity was destroyed and the world sundered, the palace and most of what remained of the city sank beneath the encroaching flood waters. There, beneath the waves, dark voices whispered to a drowning Queen Azshara and offered her power in exchange for subservience. Azshara agreed, and thus were born the naga.
I have a personal speculation about what would be neat to see happen to the world of Warcraft should Azshara be our next target (as well as what I'd like to see in World of Warcraft as a game, too):
With the shattering of the Lich King's base of power in Northrend, Queen Azshara finally decides to make her move. Calling forth her loyal sea witches, Azshara raises the naga nation of Nazjatar from its ten thousand year slumber at the bottom of the Maelstrom and brings it gloriously to the surface.
As the raging stormwaters batter the twisted mixture of new and old architecture of once-Zin-Azshari, the forces of the Alliance and Horde find themselves stranded on Northrend. Unable to easily return home by ship, the gnomes and goblins work feverishly to provide air travel.
Upon the mainlands the waters of the Great Sea begin to flood to coastal nations of Azeroth. Gilneas, long locked away behind the safety of the Greymane Wall, opens its gates to the Alliance once again as refugees pour forth from the deadly tides. Kul Tiras, too, mobilizes itself for the first time since Daelin Proudmoore's defeat on kalimdor. The oceans are angry, and it is time for the sea-faring nation to go to war against the minions of the deep and protect its landlocked neighbors.
While chaos rages upon the surface above her, Queen Azshara herself remains hidden away below the sea. She and her powerful attendants initiate the beginning of a ritual that would leave nothing but destruction in their Drowning Wake--the unshaping of Azeroth!
Reader Comments (8)
Excellent topic Tharion and very well written! I'm reading the War of Ancients Trilogy at the moment and I'm getting a good feel for Azshara and her elves. It's quite an interesting read.
Awesome. All I can say.
Well maybe not since I found a page where someone on the WoW forums claimed to have found a folder in the original WoW beta or alpha, one of those, that had a list of all the future expansions, races, and level caps. Unfortunately, it has been lost to the endless void that is the internet, but here is what I remember:
Azeroth Pack
60 - Eastern Kingdoms, Kalimdor : Stormwind, Orgrimmar, Ironforge, Undercity, Darnassus, Thunder Bluff
Outlands Pack
70 - Blood Elves, Draenei : Outland, Quel'Danas : Silvermoon, The Exodar, Shattrath City
Northrend Pack
80 - Northrend : Dalaran
Maelstrom Pack
90 - The Rift, Gilneas, Kul Tiras, Tel Abin, Kezan, Tomb of Sargeras : Undermine
Planes Pack
100 - Worgen, Pandarian : Emerald Dream, Xoroth, Pandaria : Eye of Ysera
Legion Pack
100+ - Argus
That's all I can remember off the top of my head. Now, each of the Packs on the page all had a list of each of the areas in that expansion (Netherstorm, Icecrown, etc) as well, I just can't remember most of them. I DO however recall that the ones in the Legion Pack had '100+' next to each one, with the number of +'s rising as the list went on, implying that this pack was made purely for increasing difficulty. The highest level area? Now that one I can remember: The Burning Citadel, 100+++++
Sargeras anyone?
While that's an interesting list, I may have to call shenanigans on the original poster's claim that he found it in the data files from the WoW alpha or beta. I make this call because, as far as we know, the current form of the draenei and Argus did not exist prior to Burning Crusade's planning phases.
In fact, Chris Metzen posted an apology for the "lore trainwreck" he caused when he inadvertently retconned the draenei and eredar backstories. Also, the Burning Crusade Collector's DVD would suggest that the current form of the draenei was chosen in a post WoW climate.
Prior to Burning Crusade, the draenei were native to Draenor (and wholly shamanistic). They were in no way related to the eredar as far as we know, and it's even possible that the story of Argus never existed prior to that. Granted, since we're not the devs, we can't say for certain, but the claim sounds fishy to me.
There are a lot of things found in the data files, but Blizzard putting an entire roadmap of their expansion strategy into the alpha would be a bit foolish. They have changed countless things that were "in development" already (demon hunters as a hero class, anyone?), and it's difficult to believe that the above would persist.
My personal belief regarding Azshara and Nazjatar simply comes from the fact that Azshara is the only single "RTS villain" left that can be a boss (next to Deathwing, who doesn't have an entire zone attached to him).
All true.
I'm still trying to find that one page though, and I believe I saw a link on the official forums that took you to a post on wow.alakazam.com, but I've been unable to find it any more.
It is interesting to note that the post with the link on the official forums was deleted mere seconds after I clicked on the link, which must imply something.
It implies that the CMs were active at that time, nothing more.
There's lots of reasons to doubt that list, among them the fact that it didn't appear until after many of the expansion zones were already known, so it could spontaneously be "obviously" accurate.
That said, there's lots of reasons a South Seas expansion would be a good idea, including Kul Tiras, Gilneas, Azshara, Zandalar, the Maelstrom, Undermine, the Pirate Isles and so on.
Unfortunately, at Blizzcon, Metzen said that the next expansion ISN'T what we're seeing mentioned on the boards and is something unexpected. Given the way he acted when asked about Deathwing soon after, I'd guess that he's the next big bad we'll be facing. Where is the question, though.
I certainly expect the South Seas and Emerald Dream to be expansions sooner rather than later, in any case.
Now, if they would at least just open up Uldum in the interim ...
Hehe, I remember Metzen's comment. I can't recall his words verbatim, but they were something like: "It won't be somewhere expected. It's not always about continents. Well ... maybe it is ... --BOLDNESS! Boldness is where we're going next!" A fan also asked in one of panels about Uldum, but my recollection of the response was that it was one of "not being worked on yet."
[...] what does LoreCrafted think? Well, per my original article written shortly after the launch of this site, I’m still in favor of the Maelstrom / Great [...]
Those are super cute. I like you on Facebook. viyddk viyddk - Kids Moncler Outlet.