[WoW] 4.0 - Cataclysm

[Bixxby]

I hope to god they don't have a redemption arc for Arthas.

[Itzena]

Quest:Tirion's Gambit - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

Highlord Tirion Fordring says: Something's wrong... I sense a dark presence.
Highlord Tirion Fordring says: The Lich King is here. May the Light guide our blades.
The Lich King says: Uninvited guests! Did you think you'd go unnoticed inside my dominion?
The Lich King says: I must confess... you were not altogether unexpected. I hope you find your final resting place... to your liking.
Highlord Tirion Fordring says: You sound a little too confident. Especially considering the way our last encounter ended.
The Lich King says: Last time we met, you had the advantage of fighting on holy ground. You'll find that our situation has been... reversed.
Highlord Tirion Fordring says: That might be, but I don't need to stand on holy ground to run that disembodied heart of yours through with the Ashbringer.
The Lich King says: I call your bluff. You're a paladin after all. Your obsession with redemption goes beyond the inane.
The Lich King says: You surely wouldn't destroy humanity's only chance to redeem its most wayward son. You'd sooner die!
Highlord Tirion Fordring says: The heart... the last remaining vestige of your humanity. I had to stop it from being destroyed. I had to see for myself. And at last I'm sure...
Highlord Tirion Fordring says: Only shadows from the past remain. There's nothing left to redeem!

Fordring charges the heart and runs it through with Ashbringer, knocking himself out, killing Basaleph and blasting the Lich King away as the heart explodes, dropping the Lich King down to 30% health

[Ao-]

Originally Posted by Itzena

Quest:Tirion's Gambit - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

They can retcon that easily enough.

[James]

That will be retconned to it being his liver that gets charged through. Fool ain't going to be able to chug a 40 anymore .

[madmaan]

Originally Posted by Carino

Total speculation of the worst kind:

They might kill of Fordring (largely so players can finally get the Ashbringer), but I highly doubt Blizzard will kill off Thrall in 3.3. There's still a lot they can do regarding him and Varian/Jaina, and he doesn't have a lot of history with Arthas, anyways. And who would replace him? Garrosh? Saurfang?

If Thrall does die, it would be at Varian's hands during the immediate lead up to Cataclysm, at which point Blizzard changes the focus from "defeat the Scourge!" to "Defeat the Horde/Alliance!" with a formal declaration of war as hot-tempered Garrosh becomes the new warchief. The declaration of war of course forces the goblins to choose a side (Horde). Saurfang is booted from the Horde, Jaina leaves the Alliance, and one expansion cycle later they finally convince Horde/Alliance to hold hands skip off together into the sunset.

For the record, I doubt they'll redesign the old world. Entry into the Emerald Nightmare will probably be from the four portals around Azeroth with the green dragons.

I will go ahead and say that Saurfang will end up dying in some super awesome self sacrificing way. Either that or he will help you destroy the lich king in a blood frenzy style combat. You have to keep thrall no matter what.

[Itzena]

You know what would be a seriously fucking awesome thing to do with Cataclysm?

"Ten years have passed since the mortal races banded together to defeat the tyrannous Lich King." etc. etc.

[Mmmkeshek]

Yeah, I agree, assuming they still have the manpower to do something that drastic. It's pretty obvious all the talent has moved on to the secret-project-omg and we're left with the dregs working on WoW.

[Ao-]

unless this is the secret project!

that would make people fill their pants

[Mist]

Phasing the entire old world for players level 80+ to X number of years forward in the timeline would be pretty much the most awesome thing ever done.

[Pyros]

Originally Posted by Mist

Phasing the entire old world for players level 80+ to X number of years forward in the timeline would be pretty much the most awesome thing ever done.

They would need to redo a fuckton of zones, but then again it's a good way to pull a huge naxx2.0 on everything, and just use old zones in a destroyed state/flooded and underwater without having to fully make new zones. It would create issues with helping people and so on though, since basically everyone past a certain lvl that has the world phased wouldn't be able to powerlvl alts, go do old quests and so on.

Edit: And then, I had an idea. Portal in Caverns of Time, ports you to the unphased world. Maybe even a CoT quest that gives you an item so you can go back and forth in time at you convenance.

[Zehn - Vhex]

Originally Posted by Pyros

Edit: And then, I had an idea. Portal in Caverns of Time, ports you to the unphased world. Maybe even a CoT quest that gives you an item so you can go back and forth in time at you convenance.

Perhaps this item could be a magic mirror even?!

[Mist]

Originally Posted by Pyros

Edit: And then, I had an idea. Portal in Caverns of Time, ports you to the unphased world. Maybe even a CoT quest that gives you an item so you can go back and forth in time at you convenance.

I had the same exact thought.

They would actually just want to make an entirely new copy of the main landmasses, on a different layer of the map. In the future, the old continents could be cleared for flying mounts.

[Goofy]

Originally Posted by Pren

Thrall could always ankh at the end of Cataclysm and be like "hay guys :V", too.

"Can I get a rez gais?? Ran out of Ankhs."

[Pyros]

Originally Posted by Zehn - Vhex

Perhaps this item could be a magic mirror even?!

Is that Zelda's mirror? If it is, then yeah. The 16x16sprite I could find on google didn't look like that though.

[Fadaar]

OOOOOOONYXIA