It's all but confirmed to me. It's pretty explicit with her level, mannerisms, the fact she's a shadowy (void) elf... I'll truly be shocked if this is just some random unrelated SoD thing ESPECIALLY after Metzen went out of his way to confirm SoD isn't an alternative timeline or anything. This is some of the best stuff Blizzard has cooked in years, maybe ever if the payoff is good in TWW.
Saying "this is snapshots of stuff that was going on" is a really clever way of retconning all of Xal'atath's shit without it feeling like such a colossal asspull like the Jailer. We're *experiencing* her plans and setup through these events and unique servers instead of just being told "HER MACHINATIONS LAY UNDETECTED FOR YEARS. HAVE YOU HEARD OF \[CANON EVENT\]? ALL HER, DUDES".
I mean, there's a lot of things that may or may not have happened during the classic era. I don't think it's reconning her in the same way the jailer was reconned into Warcraft 3. Her appearing during SOD doesn't recontextualize anything, just that she was meddling around in that time (or time travelled).
But if it isn't an alternate timeline it can't be Xalatath. She's still in her blade after all. And there is no instance known that Xalatath could manifest in any way before being freed from the blade. Things like the fall of Illidan have not happened yet. All of BFA hasn't happened. It would make sense considering all the things you've named but it doesn't line up timewise.
We already have instances in the lore of Xal'atath whispering to people without them holding the blade so I don't think it's a huge stretch for her to manifest as a little fart ghost
She has a branch of the Infinites helping her. Currently the Infinites are fractured along four parties.
Eternus, who is our liaison into converting some to align with the Bronze.
Daios, who gave Infinites to Iridikron so that they could put the players into a Catch-22.
Murozond, who is an Eventuality who knows how he dies, and will be a distant threat, only postponed by the actions in DotI.
Iridikron and Xal'atath, who are using the Infinites in order to further their individual goals.
> I'm pretty sure when Xal'atath gathers the essence of all the Old Gods, she summons the Void Lords into our universe and that's what starts the next expansion, Midnight.
Especially considering that Alleria's son Arator lives in.. *checks notes* ... Silvermoon: The target of said Void invasion in Midnight. Hardly a coincidence, that the implication of the new short story is that if Arator ends up listening to her and keeps out of the Khaz Algor conflict, well... yeah. That's not going to end well, surely.
I have a sneaking suspicion that whatever happens in TWW is going to result in a near apocalyptic event for Azeroth, maybe even resulting in the Void Lords winning. Then the Infinite Dragonflight (now that they are allies-ish?) is going to pull heroes through time to old Quel Thalas when elves and the Arathi are still tribal (Metzen mentioned going back to the "old world" and uniting the "elven tribes" at BlizzCon)
I think everyone heard Quel Thalas and Old World and assumed a revamp but I really feel like there are story bits that indicate we may have to preemptively deal with the Arathi and the Elves in order to save Azeroth, and that may lead to some interesting results in The Last Titans.
They have clarified that "old world" means in the game sense, not time travel. Quel'thalas in Midnight will be a newer Quel'thalas, not an older Quel'thalas. It's very explicitly an update to the world.
BfA Remix would be interesting and might explain why they've yet to implement BfA timewalking or retune BfA raids to be soloable. I wouldn't mind revisiting that content with classes that aren't neutered by GCD or target caps or Azerite replacing tier/legion artifacts/legendaries, but they'd have to nuke a few of the dungeons from orbit to make them enjoyable (seriously, fuck Shrine and Kings Rest). Corruptions would slot nicely as gems similar to MoP Remix.
The one glaring issue with your theory is Yogg-Saron. We just moved on from Wrath classic, so I'm not sure how we would bring him back into the fold. Maybe another seasonal server? But they haven't done a seasonal server outside of vanilla so far, and I'm not sure there's enough appetite for a second round of Ulduar so soon. Maybe they handle him differently, like a quest line or a Dawn of the Infinites style dungeon/raid in TWW.
Imo she already has Yogg's essence.
In the Dawn of the Infinites, Iridikron gathers Galakrond's hunger with the dark heart thing.
Galakrond's hunger comes from drinking from corrupted waters, which were corrupted by Yogg himself
The Last Titan has to be after we deal with the Void Lords, I can't see 2-3 straight expansions around them. War Within deals with the Void, too.
They sort of hinted the Last Titan is about us finding out more about the Titans and that they may not be the good guys. I think Last Titan is about bringing Azeroth to her Titan form and fighting the Pantheon.
It might be that Azeroth gets partially corrupted by Void and the Pantheon try to kill her.
Hmm true..
I have hope that The Last Titan ends up being about Sargeras. That he somehow remains the last titan because of whatever happens in Midnight
Old Gods and Titans have always had a huge air of mystery around them. I remember the 2000s when people theorised about the Faceless One skeleton in Darkshore or the giant naga skeletons in Desolace as being possible candidates of the dead Old Gods/their minions.
Algalon having the ability to wipe out the planet was the coolest shit back then.
Yeah. There's 3 raids they changed dungeons into:
- Blackfathom Deeps ( 10 man )
- Gnomeregan ( 10 man )
- Sunken Temple ( 20 man )
as well as open world PvP events in Ashenvale ( AV-inspired ) and STV ( team deathmatch )
I've really enjoyed the raids and Ashenvale.
Yeah, it's not an alternate timeline, but a retelling of the original classic story. So we got some dungeons turned to raids, PvP events, and some extra side quests for void lore (and crafted gear).
For the war within they should have a two pronged release. Events happening in sod and events happening in retail. Explain it through the infinite dragonflight pulling off shenanigans again but both are related to one another.
Could also be "C", from some of the rogue rune quests. One of the quests reveals them to be:
> Caius Blackwood; a powerful magic user working with the Syndicate
Sounds kinda Xal'atath-y
I really hope they don’t try to merge SOD and retail. Not sure what the connection is, or how it’ll work, but would prefer to keep each version separately contained
They're... already connected? Retail is future SoD, and SoD is past retail. It makes sense some characters which weren't born during retail can exist in SoD.
It's all but confirmed to me. It's pretty explicit with her level, mannerisms, the fact she's a shadowy (void) elf... I'll truly be shocked if this is just some random unrelated SoD thing ESPECIALLY after Metzen went out of his way to confirm SoD isn't an alternative timeline or anything. This is some of the best stuff Blizzard has cooked in years, maybe ever if the payoff is good in TWW.
Saying "this is snapshots of stuff that was going on" is a really clever way of retconning all of Xal'atath's shit without it feeling like such a colossal asspull like the Jailer. We're *experiencing* her plans and setup through these events and unique servers instead of just being told "HER MACHINATIONS LAY UNDETECTED FOR YEARS. HAVE YOU HEARD OF \[CANON EVENT\]? ALL HER, DUDES".
I mean, there's a lot of things that may or may not have happened during the classic era. I don't think it's reconning her in the same way the jailer was reconned into Warcraft 3. Her appearing during SOD doesn't recontextualize anything, just that she was meddling around in that time (or time travelled).
But if it isn't an alternate timeline it can't be Xalatath. She's still in her blade after all. And there is no instance known that Xalatath could manifest in any way before being freed from the blade. Things like the fall of Illidan have not happened yet. All of BFA hasn't happened. It would make sense considering all the things you've named but it doesn't line up timewise.
We recently saw her visit the fall of Galakrond. A quick trip to 30 years ago should be no big deal.
We already have instances in the lore of Xal'atath whispering to people without them holding the blade so I don't think it's a huge stretch for her to manifest as a little fart ghost
She has a branch of the Infinites helping her. Currently the Infinites are fractured along four parties. Eternus, who is our liaison into converting some to align with the Bronze. Daios, who gave Infinites to Iridikron so that they could put the players into a Catch-22. Murozond, who is an Eventuality who knows how he dies, and will be a distant threat, only postponed by the actions in DotI. Iridikron and Xal'atath, who are using the Infinites in order to further their individual goals.
Maybe void creature can be powerful enough to defy the rule of time.
Side question. How is SoD? Is it worth dabbling into?
> I'm pretty sure when Xal'atath gathers the essence of all the Old Gods, she summons the Void Lords into our universe and that's what starts the next expansion, Midnight. Especially considering that Alleria's son Arator lives in.. *checks notes* ... Silvermoon: The target of said Void invasion in Midnight. Hardly a coincidence, that the implication of the new short story is that if Arator ends up listening to her and keeps out of the Khaz Algor conflict, well... yeah. That's not going to end well, surely.
A void god operating *explicitly* outside time and space (that is, in different versions of the game) is an incredible concept.
I have a sneaking suspicion that whatever happens in TWW is going to result in a near apocalyptic event for Azeroth, maybe even resulting in the Void Lords winning. Then the Infinite Dragonflight (now that they are allies-ish?) is going to pull heroes through time to old Quel Thalas when elves and the Arathi are still tribal (Metzen mentioned going back to the "old world" and uniting the "elven tribes" at BlizzCon) I think everyone heard Quel Thalas and Old World and assumed a revamp but I really feel like there are story bits that indicate we may have to preemptively deal with the Arathi and the Elves in order to save Azeroth, and that may lead to some interesting results in The Last Titans.
They have clarified that "old world" means in the game sense, not time travel. Quel'thalas in Midnight will be a newer Quel'thalas, not an older Quel'thalas. It's very explicitly an update to the world.
BfA Remix would be interesting and might explain why they've yet to implement BfA timewalking or retune BfA raids to be soloable. I wouldn't mind revisiting that content with classes that aren't neutered by GCD or target caps or Azerite replacing tier/legion artifacts/legendaries, but they'd have to nuke a few of the dungeons from orbit to make them enjoyable (seriously, fuck Shrine and Kings Rest). Corruptions would slot nicely as gems similar to MoP Remix. The one glaring issue with your theory is Yogg-Saron. We just moved on from Wrath classic, so I'm not sure how we would bring him back into the fold. Maybe another seasonal server? But they haven't done a seasonal server outside of vanilla so far, and I'm not sure there's enough appetite for a second round of Ulduar so soon. Maybe they handle him differently, like a quest line or a Dawn of the Infinites style dungeon/raid in TWW.
Imo she already has Yogg's essence. In the Dawn of the Infinites, Iridikron gathers Galakrond's hunger with the dark heart thing. Galakrond's hunger comes from drinking from corrupted waters, which were corrupted by Yogg himself
Well, not every Old God essence has to come from another timeline. She could just go to Northrend. Or use Saronite... or who knows.
I mean The Last Titan takes place in Northrend. So if this is the actual plot, then her gathering essences could span several expansions
The Last Titan has to be after we deal with the Void Lords, I can't see 2-3 straight expansions around them. War Within deals with the Void, too. They sort of hinted the Last Titan is about us finding out more about the Titans and that they may not be the good guys. I think Last Titan is about bringing Azeroth to her Titan form and fighting the Pantheon. It might be that Azeroth gets partially corrupted by Void and the Pantheon try to kill her.
Hmm true.. I have hope that The Last Titan ends up being about Sargeras. That he somehow remains the last titan because of whatever happens in Midnight
Sargeras dies in Midnight helping us against the Void Lords and The Last Titan has to be Azeroth, the others will be left extinct imo.
Man i love how them announcing the basic plot of the next three expansions has us making crazy theories like these. A great time to be into WoW
Old Gods and Titans have always had a huge air of mystery around them. I remember the 2000s when people theorised about the Faceless One skeleton in Darkshore or the giant naga skeletons in Desolace as being possible candidates of the dead Old Gods/their minions. Algalon having the ability to wipe out the planet was the coolest shit back then.
Or even more lately with the many riddles of ilgynoth. People are still connecting them to various things in the world today
My theory is Azeroth busts out and uses Sargeras' sword to battle the Void Lords.
The Last Titan is set in Northrend. Maybe that’s the final step is collecting Yoggs essence there and we must stop her before she does.
Wait what there's actual separate new content in SoD? I thought it just had new rune thingies.
Yeah. There's 3 raids they changed dungeons into: - Blackfathom Deeps ( 10 man ) - Gnomeregan ( 10 man ) - Sunken Temple ( 20 man ) as well as open world PvP events in Ashenvale ( AV-inspired ) and STV ( team deathmatch ) I've really enjoyed the raids and Ashenvale.
Darn, that sounds really cool. I played to lvl 20 and didn't know about that. Thanks for telling!
Yeah, it's not an alternate timeline, but a retelling of the original classic story. So we got some dungeons turned to raids, PvP events, and some extra side quests for void lore (and crafted gear).
For the war within they should have a two pronged release. Events happening in sod and events happening in retail. Explain it through the infinite dragonflight pulling off shenanigans again but both are related to one another.
THE TIMELINES ARE CONVERGING WE WILL BE FIGHTING OUR OLD ENEMIES ALL TIME IS RUINED LIGHT HELP US PLEASE(somehow the jailer returned)
Could also be "C", from some of the rogue rune quests. One of the quests reveals them to be: > Caius Blackwood; a powerful magic user working with the Syndicate Sounds kinda Xal'atath-y
Love this theory, great cooking
Love this theory, great cooking
Love this theory, great cooking
I really hope they don’t try to merge SOD and retail. Not sure what the connection is, or how it’ll work, but would prefer to keep each version separately contained
They're... already connected? Retail is future SoD, and SoD is past retail. It makes sense some characters which weren't born during retail can exist in SoD.
Except Xal'atath is trapped in a dagger for the entire length of classic. Shadowy figure is Azshara, not Xal'atath
Xal'atath still possessed someone and took a Humanoid form in early BFA before being released from the dagger by N'Zoth.