Well, Blizzcon is less than a month away, and it's sure to bring a few surprises. We can expect playable Starcraft 2 at the least, and an expansion announcement wouldn't be too surprising. I also would expect patch 2.2 to be announced and previewed, with it hitting the PTR within a week or two.

But what else do you think could be announced? Is Starcraft:Ghost still a possibility? Also, what will patch 2.2 contain? Over a month ago, a dev told paladins that they want all 3 tanking classes to be equal, so we can expect prot buffs, and ret pve buffs are coming. A Blizzard employee also let leak that voice chat is confirmed for 2.2 (http://www.blue.cardplace.com/newcache/us/108415058.htm)

We also might be able to expect details on their "next-gen MMO" that has been discussed on these forums.

Details on the Warcraft movie would be welcome, as we haven't heard anything about that for over a year and a half.

What are your ideas for Blizzcon announcements? If 2.2 and/or the next expansion is announced, what do you think we can expect?

I was just thinking of starting a thread about Blizzcon mostly due to the fact that we've had so little news these last few weeks. Its obvious they are saving it all up for the con.

For myself, I have a secret hope for Diablo news. Its hard to believe its been almost seven years since Diablo II came out.

I'm half expecting them to announce the next WoW expansion. BC came out in January, if they expect to have something just as large come out next Jan they've been extremely quiet about it, where as there was quite a bit of hype for BC well ahead of time.

I could have sworn I saw a blue post saying that they would announce a title of some sort. I hope it's an expansion, but maybe not.

My best guess is we get Voice Chat in 2.2, ZA in 2.3, and maybe one other 2.X patch. Although I remember reading an article where one of the higher-ups said something about Kil'Jaden as a BC raid boss, so who knows.

I'd expect some announcement regarding future raid content be it additional TBC raid(s) or simply expansion plans. The potential for future advancement, even if it's not currently accessible to anyone, is a vital part of the MMO package, so the current situation with all PVE content defeated (even if only by a tiny proportion of the player base) diminishes the image being sold somewhat I'd argue.

Besides that would definitely expect some new feature announcements - more voice chat details and guildbanks are the obvious ones since we already know they're coming, wouldn't be too surprised to hear Zul Aman's in the not too distant future/will be previewed either.

Would expect Starcraft 2 to be the biggest focus though overall.

Probably Northrend. We know it's already slated as the second expansion from mpq stuff, right?

I believe we will see a new expansion announced and a beta time-table estimate. I just don't see them putting any more 25 man raids into the TBC build leaving Illidan the final boss. Zul'aman will probably be post-Karazhan difficutly with items approaching SSC/TK ilevels, although it's really strange they developed it so slow.

As far as what the next expansion will be content-wise, despite the appearance of Northrend game files, item skins, etc., my guess is still the South Seas/Maelstrom.

I really hope they design Zul'Aman like they did with AQ20 by putting in skill books and such so there is actually a reason for the big guilds with BT down to go there besides going there to check it out just a few times.

If it comes out like Karazhan did, I think it will be a great success.

I think there's still a lot of longevity left in TBC and that we'll see another raid zone mid-late TBC. It'll be like the Naxx of TBC in terms of when its released (and hopefully in coolness as well)

I am gonna keep quoting these numbers. One week old, US servers.

7970 guilds killed Prince Malchazeen. 319k players. 15.9%
254 guilds killed Lady Vashj. 10k players. 0.5%.
87 guilds killed Kael'Thas. 3500 players. 0.17%

Karazhan is a huge success.
SSC and TK might be fine raidzones, fact is that only 2.5% of the players are in them.
And Hyjal and BT are even more empty.
The "Naxx like" instance you think of already exists. It's Hyjal and BT.

If Blizzard looks at investment cost versus return on player satisfaction, investing development resources into another 25man raid is not efficient. Another 10 raid instance makes sense. Another 25man raid instances makes a lot less sense.

I'm gunna bet on a Zerg showcase for Starcraft two. A showcase of one race for SC2 because it's already happened once for Protoss and seems like at straightforward solution. And Zerg, because Terran seems like the easiest to empathize with and should be saved for last.

Raid instances have got to have ridiculously long development cycles - like, say, a year or even more from start to finish. As a consquence of this, we tend to get clued in well in advance - say, several months - when a new instance is going to be released. Right now, the only unreleased instance that we have even heard of is casual-friendly Zul'Aman, and we haven't even had a formal preview of it. This suggests a release in September at the earliest. The next 25-man instance probably won't appear until a few months after that. Even this is unlikely, considering the lore that TBC is built on (every scrap of it leads to Illidan). What would the next instance be? I honestly can't think of anything that fits nicely within the scope of Outland lore. I think that the Black Temple is meant to be the final challenge of the expansion. Don't count on any new high-end content before Christmas.

That's pretty much what I was driving at, too. Black Temple is the Naxx of TBC. I just can't see Blizzard adding any more level 70 25-man raid content more difficult with those numbers staring them in the face. That is why I think we'll see an expansion in under six months time and certainly before we see another 25 man raid.

Though very much focus certainly will be on Starcraft 2 I would be very disappointed if they didn't announce the next WoW expansion in some way. It doesn't have to be much, maybe just the title or the general idea of where it will be played (like "we will focus on Emerald Dream" or something like that). Perhaps also some more info on the AQ/Naxx equivalent of TBC because I suspect there will be something along that line past the already announced Zul'Aman.

Then I suspect that there will be some kind of update on the WoW movie (trailer anyone?) and some more hints about the leaked Diablo movie (no I don't think that leakage was totally bogus).

Yea there is really nothing left to put into TBC lore wise which makes more content hard to place in. The only thing i could really see is a large naxx like instance in COT with that one portal that isnt being used.

Edit: Oh god VOIP implementation, this will end in tears. New age of cybering is upon us.

The dialog of Lady Sinestra in Netherwind ledge pointing to Deathwing still being alive is an interesting one though. I could see them opening up Grim Batol. But CoT seems to be the an easy choice for Blizzard as the possibilities with CoT are huge.

Well I would be amazed if we didn't see the next expansion announced.

I would also be expecting a playable version of Zul'Aman similar to how players could go to Nax at last Blizzcon (if my memory serves me correctly).

Obviously SC2 is gonna be a big focus, but with it getting a massive run down at E3 tommorow I'm hoping that they'll focus more on WoW.

Now I looked it up there wasn't a Blizzcon 2006, only 2005. Now that was what, 1.5 years before TBC launch and they previewed:

Blood Elf playable starting zone
Blood Elf race
Expansion trailer
AQ40
AQ20
Karazhan (Pictures of the Curators hall from what I could dig up).

So assuming a similar level of focus on WoW this year, and assuming that the next expansion will be out within 9 months as opposed to the 1.5 years from Blizzcon 2005 to TBC, then we should be expecting:

Announcing of expansion
Preview of at least 1 new class/race if there are any.
Zul'Aman preview
Raid preview of last TBC raid (if there is one, which I doubt as it wouldn't be very profitable expenditure of development time and costs).
Some expansion spoilters of dungeons and stuff
Guild housing preview

Not to mention the Q+A with developers which si always nice to here.

I'm still hoping though they'll drop the Expansion Pack news at E3 in the next few days.

E3 starts tomorrow, its been vastly scaled back so i doubt much news will come out if it. Maybe they will announce an expansion at E3 and provide more info at Blizzcon.

By the looks blizzard is only showing starcraft 2 at e3

Yer thats what I'm hoping. Blizzard have a slot tommorow for SC2 but they might sneak a few WoW tidbits into it.

From the interview with Chilton and Metzen, it seems that we'll have a Naxx like finishing instance before the next expansion.

There was also a map released a few months before TBC that showed Deathwing's Lair, which would tie in with the lore around the netherdrake line.

I don't hold out a lot of hope for info, either at E3 or at Blizzcon. Sure, lots of people are working on WoW, but their focus at a corporate level has got to be Starcraft 2. That said, If we get some info on Zul'Aman and maybe some crumbs about the next expansion I'll go away satisfied (satisfied, but not happy; I want more info dammit!).

I do wonder what Blizzard's plans are for the speculated instances in the old world that have not yet been implemented: Grim Batol, Uldum, uh... there's at least one other.... heck, even Timbermaw Hold in Azshara - places that make sense to have an instance, that the lore fits, etc. There are quotes from 2005 or so where Blizzard says they've been working on Grim Batol, it's a max level instance, etc. Were they blowing smoke, or is this something that they had to ditch for various reasons, I wonder?

I suppose Uldum *could* be saved for the Northrend expansion, because it's one of 4 linked dungeons (Uldaman and Dire Maul being two others) where the fourth is in Northrend. But as a neophyte in the lore depatrment, I don't know why they'd gain from holding back any of the other old world content. It seems to me that the more you stray from the core lore (i.e., the longer you wait to put these instances in) the less successful you'd be at shoehorning them into what you're releasing. Yeah, Caverns of Time "works" in the old world, but I'd say it's the least successful of the new instances, partially due to the time it takes to get there (and the pain of not being able to use your flying mount in the old world). Lots of questions, not many answers, sorry.

In regards to not really having anywhere else to go, there is always Kil'jaeden himself. If you'll remember, Kil'jaeden caught up to Illidan in Outland after the first time Illidan failed to kill the Lich King in the middle of The Frozen Throne, and basically told him to try again, and that was his last chance. Although Illidan did ultimately fail again, Kil'jaeden is technically his superior. Blizzard could easily come up with lore about him being pissed at the loss of his main leiutenant, or moving in to secure the assets that Illidan lost by dying. There are plenty of lore options through that avenue, and like others have mentioned, Caverns of Time has immense options as well.