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Blizzard Is About To End Warcraft As We Know It — Transcript

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0:00sponsored by Squarespace.
0:03>> You've probably noticed that we fight a
0:05new flavor of mega powerful cosmic
0:07villain every expansion. They keep
0:09getting bigger and bad, and each new
0:12layer of power kind of feels like it
0:14weighs the setting down. This is
0:15obviously unsustainable. It has to
0:17change, and it seems Blizzard actually
0:20knows how to do it. And their answer is
0:22to kind of nuke everything. In effect,
0:24to clear the board. That's the point of
0:25World Souls saga. and it very much
0:27begins in Midnight's patch 12.2. This
0:31all comes from our knowledge of the lore
0:32in Warcraft's production, plus the huge
0:34leak that has hit the community like a
0:37lightning bolt. It almost sounds too
0:39good to be true. It includes a
0:41liveaction Arthus show, an ARPG, a new
0:44real-time strategy game, the stuff of
0:46dreams, which absolutely makes it look
0:49fake. But here's the thing. There are
0:51parts of this leak that were not in the
0:54public domain, that were not public
0:56knowledge whenever the leak first
0:58happened many, many months ago in 2025.
1:01And the parts of the leak that line up
1:02are clearly not just a lucky guess
1:04because it even gets a project code name
1:07right. But to get back to the story and
1:08the lore, we've got to get away from
1:10this leaked document and go to another
1:13part of the leak. Because buried deep in
1:15a comment section about all things pet
1:17battling, the leaker casually revealed
1:20the future of the World Soul Saga. They
1:23claimed that a setting defining event
1:25will happen at the end of the Midnight
1:27expansion. Something so big it'll change
1:29the course of Warcraft forever. And they
1:31reveal the real conflict of the Last
1:34Titan expansion. by which I mean who
1:36we'll be fighting and why having a
1:39particular character as the end boss of
1:41the World Soul saga makes perfect sense.
1:44And after laying that out, they then
1:46claim that it's all set up for a WoW
1:482.0, a true lore reset. And if that all
1:53sounds mad, I totally agree with you.
1:56But is it real? Well, it is highly
1:58likely at least parts of this are real.
2:01We recently did a video deep diving the
2:03leak's veracity and a lot of stuff does
2:06check out. But today we're here to talk
2:08about the lore of the IP that so many of
2:10us love. So be warned, there are
2:13spoilers, not granular details, not
2:15dialogue of specific characters, but
2:18absolutely we're talking about huge
2:20structural plot beats from where we're
2:22at in midnight through to the end of the
2:24saga and then far into the future.
2:27Here's the thing I've noticed. A lot of
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3:31domain.
3:34Here's how our story begins. Last year,
3:36a Reddit user called Fifth Yacht leaked
3:38an internal development road map for the
3:41future of the Warcraft franchise. It's
3:43pretty spicy. There's many goodies in
3:44there. But when we sleuth through their
3:46account, we found way more precient
3:48information. In this post about pet
3:50battling 112's Caresh, user Zelmax
3:53shared their theory that Caresh wasn't
3:56initially intended as a patch zone and
3:59that originally the Rootlands was set to
4:02be in the War Within, but the Rootlands
4:05then became Harendar and Caresh was
4:07built from scratch under Chris Metson's
4:09new World Soul saga framing. Well, the
4:12user, the leaker, Fifth Yacht, actually
4:15says that theory [music] is correct. And
4:17then they revealed what happens next.
4:19Here's what they wrote. Quote, "The next
4:22expansion will return to the Black
4:24Blood/Worlds with Azeroth being the
4:27final Titan and coming to life to
4:29cleanse the planet, including players.
4:32The last expansion will wrap up with us
4:34having to kill Azeroth to restore her.
4:37Then off to WoW 2.0." Now, that's a huge
4:40statement. I mean, what do we even make
4:42of any of that? Well, the good news is
4:44quite a lot, actually. So, let's break
4:46it all down. Now, when this was posted,
4:48the next expansion in question was, of
4:50course, Midnight. And in Midnight, we
4:52can see that we have not strictly
4:54returned to the whole Blackblood story
4:56that was all through the war within. But
4:59I believe the leaker was working with
5:00the context of the war within's black
5:03blood story line. We of course now know
5:05that that story line has transformed
5:07into the Harendar and World Soul story
5:10of Midnight. You know, all the stuff
5:11with Alenhara, the rift of all that
5:14stuff. [music] So, it does basically
5:16check out. Next, then there's Azeroth.
5:18Azeroth as the final Titan. Well, that's
5:21actually something that we've known the
5:23Titans themselves call her. And we know
5:25that since all the way back in Mists of
5:27Pandaria with the legendary cloak quest.
5:30Basically, what happens is Rathon being
5:33a bit of a mad bastard consumes the
5:35heart of Le Shen. Within the heart of Le
5:38Shen was the essence of Ammonth Thul.
5:41Ammonthul of course being the big leader
5:43of the Titans. And upon consuming the
5:45heart, Ratheon effectively was made a
5:47conduit. A conduit for a message that
5:50was personally sent by Ammon Thul at the
5:53moment Sargeras defeated the Titan
5:56Pantheon. So, suffice it to say that
5:58checks out. Now, the next thing is
6:00Azeroth coming to life to cleanse the
6:01world, and that including us. Of course,
6:05the idea of a Titan cleansing a planet
6:07is not really a surprising thing.
6:09remember, of course, Algolon, the final
6:12boss of Ulawir. But in all of the
6:14leagues, this really was the big one.
6:16The idea that Azeroth would actually
6:17wake up. Now, we've been told since the
6:19end of the Legion expansion that Azeroth
6:21was waking up, but it always felt like
6:23something in the far future. Well, the
6:26future is almost here, and the leak
6:28claims that this happens in the
6:29expansion we are playing right now, and
6:32that it is actually the final big epic
6:35moment of the Midnight expansion. But
6:37that's when it does get a bit tough
6:40because apparently she's going to
6:42cleanse us. And I don't think that means
6:44unclogging our pores. I think it
6:46probably means burning us in some sort
6:48of grand fire. Maybe, maybe not. There's
6:50a few options here, actually. Of course,
6:52Salotath is on her way to the World Core
6:54literally as we speak. That's where
6:57Azeroth basically is imprisoned. So,
6:59Zalot could corrupt Azeroth. Maybe then
7:02Saras's sword will have done something.
7:04maybe shot some of that fell juice into
7:07the world and made Azeroth go loopy. But
7:10looking at the story as it's developing
7:11right now, I think the most realistic
7:13outcome is this. The Titans mission to
7:16transform Azeroth into one of their own
7:19is going to succeed. And in the end, we
7:22just won't fit into the Titans [music]
7:25plans for Azeroth. Though if I was a
7:27Titan, I wouldn't be so sure because we
7:29don't even know if the Titans will fit
7:32into the vision of a Titanic risen
7:35Azeroth. What if she wakes up and
7:37decides that the Titans are also a big
7:40old mess? That could absolutely happen.
7:42But based on what we can read in the
7:43leak and the surrounding lore context,
7:45it maybe seems like The Last Titan is a
7:48war against Azeroth herself. Maybe a
7:50corrupted Azeroth, who exactly knows,
7:53but perhaps more against her than it
7:56would be against, say, Zalotath or the
7:58Titan Pantheon. And that would mean that
8:00the true meaning of the World Soul saga
8:03is ultimately its end boss, the Last
8:07Titan. So, let's see what that looks
8:09like and why there are no other good
8:12options.
8:15Okay, let's assume all this stuff is
8:17real and that it is still Blizzard's
8:18plan. Do remember, of course, plans can
8:21change. But let's assume then that
8:22Azeroth is going to wake up and then try
8:25to cleanse the planet, including us, the
8:27players. Now, there are realistically
8:29three reasons why that would happen. The
8:31first is Zalat. As the story currently
8:34stands, she has the best chance of
8:36corrupting Azeroth and, yes, sending her
8:39in some kind of world cleansing mission.
8:41Zalat has long claimed to want our world
8:44soul, but we've never been 100% sure
8:47why. And within that why could be a full
8:49explanation of what's contained within
8:50the leak. Though what we do know
8:52currently is the background void lore
8:54effectively tells us that Zalatath wants
8:56to use Azeroth's power to become the
8:59ultimate devourer. The thing that will
9:01consume all of creation until as the
9:04prophet Valon saw in his early visions
9:06of the void she just becomes an endless
9:09nothing eternally gnawing on itself
9:12which would be bad news for us. Now, the
9:14next option is the Titans, and that's
9:17honestly not much better for the
9:19Dennisens of Azeroth. Yes, we don't
9:21trust them as much as we used to, but
9:23they were very recently working with us.
9:26And even if we're drawn into conflict, I
9:28think it is the case that the Titans
9:30aren't simply evil. To say that would be
9:32a reductive view of how they've been
9:34characterized so far. Think about it
9:36this way. Azeroth is called the final
9:38Titan in the lore, but the end of the
9:41World Soul saga is called the last
9:44Titan. Let's think about those names. If
9:46the Titans turn Azeroth into one of
9:48them, then just like in the void
9:50scenario, she would become the ultimate
9:52being of order. Nothing will be good
9:54enough in her eyes based on how beings
9:56of order tend to work in this verse. And
9:59that would mean that everything would
10:00have to be unmade and then remade into
10:02some perfect balanced system. That
10:05probably includes the Titans themselves,
10:07leading to a cosmos of perfect static
10:10order. Again, that's bad news for us.
10:13And in that case, the final Titan may
10:15ensure that she is the last Titan. Then
10:19there's the third option, and this is
10:21the darkest of them. It's that Azeroth
10:23emerges from the world as a traumatized
10:26monstrosity. beings like Chimeis, the
10:29undamped god, or say the uncontrollable
10:32super weapon, who we're going to be
10:34dealing with in patch 12.1. Effectively,
10:37in this reading of the lore, Azeroth
10:39would be a nightmarefueled, half void
10:41infected, half orderinfected world soul,
10:45so sick of and chaos that she
10:48just decides to cleanse everything with
10:51fire. Now, no matter what happens, you
10:54can see that any three of those are
10:56pretty rumbly. But with any of them,
10:59there is a way that we can save our
11:01world, save its soul, and bring Warcraft
11:04into its next era. And now that you've
11:06heard it all, I bet you've got an
11:08uncanny sense that you felt this coming,
11:10that one way or another, we were always
11:13going to meet Azeroth.
11:17People have been talking about Azeroth
11:19waking up for nearly as long as we've
11:21known that she was in fact a sleeping
11:22world soul. Here's the community working
11:25out what she could look like 9 years
11:27ago. Some pretty sick art. Here's
11:29another post worrying that whenever it
11:31happens, the planet will basically pop
11:33open like an egg and that all our
11:35characters will be deleted. Certainly a
11:37valid fear. And even if this early lore
11:39exploration doesn't get the details
11:41right, it's clear that all these people
11:43knew this was coming. and not because
11:45they could magically tell the future,
11:47but because this story has been building
11:50since World of Warcraft launched. Let's
11:53go back to Chronicle. Chronicle told us
11:55in no uncertain terms that Azeroth was a
11:58world soul and would one day emerge as a
12:00fully grown Titan. But that was just a
12:02confirmation of something that we'd
12:04actually already known. If you ask a
12:06Wrath of the Lich King veteran what they
12:08thought Azeroth was, they would give you
12:10something pretty close to the modern
12:13truth. When you actually think about the
12:14lore, as an example, take a read of the
12:17discs of an organ in vanilla's Ulaman
12:20dungeon. You see, we discovered that
12:22earn transformed into dwarves, but we
12:24didn't really know why they did that.
12:26Now, this is a mystery that was first
12:28resolved with the old gods and the curse
12:30of flesh and then, of course, later with
12:32the earn of Kazalgar gaining free will
12:34under the influence of the world soul.
12:36Now, in the storm peaks, we experienced
12:39an immense three-part revelation about
12:41the titans. In the Tribunal of Ages, we
12:44discovered that Azeroth, the planet, was
12:46a host. But a host to what? We just
12:49didn't know back then. But even Yogeron
12:52backed that up whenever we killed him.
12:53Because when we did, he told us that the
12:56end of days was upon our miserable
12:58seedling. He called Azeroth a seedling.
13:01What was she going to grow up into then?
13:03What did he know? Of course, almost
13:05immediately after that, in Uld, we face
13:07off against Algolon. We defeat him. And
13:10when we defeated him, we basically
13:12convinced him that being a native of
13:14Azeroth gave [music] us some sort of
13:16special free will sauce and then maybe
13:19we could take on the old god corruption
13:21ourselves. And if that all seems a bit
13:23rumbly to you, basically Algolon is a
13:25type of being that we call a constellar.
13:28They're deeply entwined with the Titans
13:29in ways we probably don't fully
13:31understand yet, but his job was to watch
13:34over things. And if stuff completely
13:36went fooar, if Azeroth got just totally
13:39corrupted, he basically could hit the
13:41big button that would reorinate the
13:44world, effectively fire off all the
13:46Titan machinery that we had discovered
13:48and cleanse the whole thing with
13:50everyone on it. Now, he wouldn't just do
13:52that willy-nilly. He would make a
13:54determination. He would make a
13:55calculation. And when he calculated that
13:58he would defeat us, but in fact we
14:00defeated him, he then realized, "Oh
14:03dear, what if my calculations aren't all
14:05correct?" And that's why the world
14:07didn't end in the middle of Wrath of the
14:10Lich King. And that's a moment in a lore
14:12exploration that I think you really have
14:14to feel to get how Blizzard have been
14:16developing this lore for, I don't know,
14:19like 20 years now. You may then be
14:21thinking, why were we so special? Well,
14:26the good news is that over the years,
14:27the lore has circled ever closer to
14:29giving us a definitive answer to that
14:31question. Here's an example. In the
14:33Cataclysm expansion, Malfurion was on a
14:35bit of a side quest to save the world
14:37from a nightmare spawned sleeping
14:39sickness. Whenever he discovered the
14:41rift of on, this bizarre half-dreamed
14:44place deep within the Emerald Dream.
14:46Now, when Malfurion was there, he sensed
14:48N'oth. But he also sensed something
14:51older, something primeval. And we now
14:53know what he felt was the remnant of
14:56Azeroth's true cradle within Harendar.
14:59Cradle basically being where she just
15:02kind of beded up and chilled out. Let's
15:03just say canonically that story happens
15:05during Cataclysm. Though the next bit is
15:07something that we actually saw when we
15:09played Cataclysm, and that is Magny
15:10transforming into a diamond. He
15:13basically tried to commune with the
15:14world turned into a diamond. Everyone
15:16thought he was basically dead. But that
15:18was only until Thr found his spirit
15:20traveling in the deep places talking
15:22with something a bit weird. Now, by the
15:25time of the Legion expansion, Magny is
15:27back in his feet, and he tells us what
15:29the recently released Warcraft Chronicle
15:32had made cannon, and that was that
15:34Azeroth herself was a world soul. Then
15:37we were told repeatedly through Battle
15:39of Azeroth that the planet had a
15:41personality that the planet was an
15:43entity, not just some artificial dead
15:46thing or a source of power. No, she was
15:49an actual being of some sort. And the
15:51Judasar's actions at the end of Legion,
15:53she was in great peril. You may remember
15:56the famous voice lines about champion
15:59the wounds, all that stuff. Of course,
16:02in BFA, we patched her up. We thwarted a
16:05plan from N'oth. And then the next two
16:07expansions went back and forth on what
16:09Azeroth actually was. But then the World
16:11Soul Saga revealed the alltime maximum
16:15cannon authentic lore for what Azeroth
16:17is. And that is some form of being at
16:21the center of creation. And we learn
16:23that if any one of the unbalanced forces
16:25of the cosmos was [music] to control
16:27her, then it would basically be the end
16:30of everything. But throughout all that
16:32lore development, no matter what
16:33iteration of the world soul we were on,
16:35Azeroth was always one thing, sleeping.
16:38Now we know that she's going to wake up
16:40and that when she does, she'll be
16:42controlled by likely one of those
16:45unbalanced powers, be it Zalot, be it
16:48the Titans, and that will be when this
16:50long builtup threat and storyline
16:53actually becomes real. But through all
16:55those vast quantities of lore, there is
16:58actually a facet of Azeroth that had not
17:01been covered until recently, and that is
17:03her true name. Her true name is
17:06Alenhara. So whenever we fight Azeroth,
17:09if the leaks to be believed, the thing
17:10we're actually going to try and save is
17:13Alenhara, because Alenhara is our
17:16world's true nature. And it's in Saving
17:19Alenhara that we will see the seeds of a
17:22lore [music] reset that will truly bring
17:24us into something that you could call
17:27WoW 2.0.
17:31It's been a crazy ride to get here.
17:33We've got the early days of say the
17:35Torin mythos and the Earth Mother and
17:37how the Earth Mother could cause
17:38earthquakes to now where we have a world
17:40soul on the verge of waking up. This
17:43truly is Warcraft's central story, or at
17:46least one of the central pillars of the
17:48lore, finally getting to its natural
17:51conclusion, and that's why the World
17:53Soul Saga is as much closing WoW 1.0 as
17:57it is setting up WoW 2.0. So, let's talk
18:00about what happens next, because we've
18:03known since Matson announced the saga
18:05that they're thinking about the future.
18:08And by the future, I mean WoW version 14
18:11and onward. First, to do this, they need
18:13to reset the stakes. Each expansion
18:15tends to deliver a new layer of power.
18:18They keep on stacking, and eventually by
18:20the end of it, we'll be fighting the
18:22planet itself. That's getting a bit out
18:24of hand, but equally, it is something we
18:26do actually need to deal with. So, it
18:28seems Blizzard is going to nuke all of
18:31it. How would they do that? Well, they
18:33would do it with Azeroth or like I said,
18:36Alen Har, her real name. Now, behind
18:38every top level villain's motivations
18:41was Azeroth. Sargaras wanted to destroy
18:44her. The old gods wanted to create a
18:46dark [music] titan out of her. The
18:48Titans, of course, wanted her to wake up
18:50as a new pantheon member who'd be able
18:52to help them in their grand old plan to
18:56order the cosmos just as they see fit.
18:58And for the longest time, we only
18:59understood Azeroth through the
19:01motivations of those villainous
19:02characters. And now they're all on a
19:05collision course for the world soul.
19:07Zalotath is almost there. The Titans are
19:09likely on their way back. And Sergaras
19:12may even be with them. In our war to
19:14cleanse Azeroth, there will be
19:16casualties. And if you want to reset the
19:18power scaling in your universe, well,
19:20killing off all your gods is a good way
19:21to do that. And now we can actually see
19:24a power that could credibly kill off the
19:27gods. That power would be an ascendant
19:29world soul. At first, [music] corrupted,
19:32ordered, or insane. But perhaps then we
19:34cleanse her because we have to cleanse
19:36her. There's no other choice. What
19:38Alenhara offers then is the truth that
19:41no one was really able to see. That she
19:43was more powerful perhaps than any force
19:46[music] that could have controlled her.
19:48And in that moment, she may indeed wipe
19:50the board. It at least seems to me that
19:53is the lore implication of all the leaks
19:55that have came out. And it's when a
19:57credible picture of what comes next
19:59actually snaps into focus for me, at
20:01least personally, right? A setting
20:04cleared of massive powers. No more
20:06titans or void lords vying for
20:08domination. No more, oh, this is the
20:10purple expansion. This is the green
20:12expansion. Oh, it's the void. It's the
20:13fell. where it all just starts to feel
20:15really pedestrian and disconnected from
20:18the experience of our characters in the
20:20world that we love. And to step outside
20:22of the lore side, what I'm really
20:23talking about here is finally an
20:25opportunity to tell entirely new stories
20:27in Azeroth that are rooted in the lore
20:30of Azeroth. And if you ask me, that
20:33sounds exactly like a spiritual WoW 2.0.
20:39not putting it into Unreal Engine or
20:41some gimmick like that, but an actual
20:44change to the status quo that signals a
20:47fresh beginning. And after all of the
20:49crud that I think we've accumulated over
20:51the years within the lore, that may
20:53indeed be a healthy thing, provided, of
20:55course, Blizzard is able to remember the
20:59essential intrinsic properties of the
21:01Warcraft IP that drew people towards it
21:04all those years ago and for so many
21:06years since. Because if WoW 2.0 looks
21:09like generic easy to consume fantasy
21:11slop, I think it will die on the vine.
21:15If however it can reestablish itself as
21:18a true secondary world that actually is
21:20treated seriously, then we could be off
21:23in a good direction, especially if
21:25that's backed up by the likes [music] of
21:26say the other things that are there in
21:29those leaks like another RTS, a Arthus
21:32game, maybe stuff established in Netflix
21:35series. Now, earlier on in the video, I
21:37mentioned one of the horrors that came
21:39out of the rift of alumnol.
21:42Well, Oolletch is a core part of WoW
21:45patch. Oollettech seems really, really
21:46cool. And if you want to get all of the
21:48lore you need for that, simply watch
21:51this video next.

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