Implying that the Old God behind the Nightmare is under the sea is interesting... implication being that it's really the same Old God that Azshara serves, who is presumably the same Old God behind the Cataclysm... I doubt Blizzard will include the Emerald Dream in the Maelstrom expansion, but who knows. It'd be nice to see some definitive clarification on how many Old Gods there are really supposed to be, given that we'll presumably fight them all at some point. Presumed Old God-related activities:

- Controlling the Qiraji
- Controlling the Forgotten Ones / Iron Army
- Controlling the Naga
- Controlling Deathwing (Presumably the same Old God that's controlling the Naga? At least, they're coordinating on the Cataclysm together, it seems.)
- Corruption of the Emerald Dream
- The Infinite Dragonflight (?)
- Probably something Uldum-related.

Let's hope we learn a little more on the Old Gods' organization and modus operandi as the storyline progresses. I'd like to know whether they're working together or pretty much trying desperately to cling to their former glory, at this point. If they're individual entities or part of a pantheon of their own - and I can't shake the possibility of them having some kind of "minor overmind" between them, they look to "zergy" to me, but it's probably just a long shot, nothing really suggests it.

They're very appropriate villains for WoW. With their power still somewhat low, they rely on scheming (which they're experts at) to get their rebirth in motion. So, we've now twice foiled their plans by crushing their minions and then going for the "heads" while their power migraine is still on. I don't mean C'thun and Yogg were the same, the fact is the context and details of their rebirth attempts were very different, but I'm hoping to see Cataclym change things a little.

For example, "controlling" Deathwing isn't entirely accurate. He almost turned the tables on the Old Phlegms, were it not for Sargeras. I suppose something like that could happen again in Cataclysm, probably as soon as the Earth Aspect notices the Old Gods trying to take the spotlight with him getting the boot.

Naga, too, are as worthy of trust as mutated power-hungry crocodiles can be - not to mention their Queen Octopussy, who'd probably make a good couple with Neltharion.

@Vaccine: It's a testament to Deathwing's apeshit crazyness that he isn't content to stick with and use his family of magma-spewing equals. Even when previous experiments with dragon genetics show it's either a waste of resources (Nefarian's forces simply got overwhelmed) or downright backfiring (Sinestra). All he's managed to do was make his kindred feel alienated and obey him out of fear, for the most part. Gotta love that nutecase. No, really, he'll kill you if you don't.

The Black Dragonflight isn't unique in this. If you look to nature, that plays out over and over again in countless species (and humans as well). In the past his motivations have pointed towards killing off his competitors offspring and taking the breeding females for himself. It would only follow that the more insane he becomes, the more he shows raw animal instinct.

Territory, food and sex. God help us all if after breaking through into Azeroth we're not the second item on that list.

I'd be a lot more worried if he thought of us as #3, personally.

The Old Gods are indeed interesting enemies, especially when they act indirectly. I'm curious what influence Yogg-Saron really had over the Lich King, for instance, and how events may have differed. More details on exactly what they are, how they interact with Azeroth and the Emerald Dream, and what really would happen if they "win" would be pretty nice. Has there ever been reference to Old Gods on other worlds, such as Draenor? Given they are both enemies of the Titans, have we seen indications of the Burning Legion and Old Gods working together in any way? It is possible the Burning Legion's desires for Azeroth and the Old Gods' "victory condition" for Azeroth could, in fact, not be contradictory.

Originally the Burning Legion sought the Well of Eternity; now, it isn't as clear what they want besides control/destruction, is it?

I think it's more about revenge on the planet that beat them now.

Also according to Chilton the link between Arthas and Yogg is there but it just isn't as pronounced as they wanted it to be.

I was under the impression that the old Gods were attracted to Azeroth because of the Well (or at least some precursor energy of the well, I'm unclear on when exactly the well came into being in relation to Azeroths creation). Now they're simply stuck here. I would imagine that if the old gods learned of something like a Well of Eternity somewhere else they might leave if they could. Draenor could have attracted such a being but I don't know offhand of anything on that planet that would have been attractive.

As for the Legion, Sargaras is opposed to the other Titans, destroying Titan creations is just part of what he does. The Well was likely just a prize or perhaps an additional motivator to do something he would have done eventually. And now that he's been pushed back, he has every reason to seek revenge. The fact that the Well is no longer up fro grabs doesn't matter.

They did say Yogg's ties to the Lich King remained largely in their heads, meaning they didn't quite get to convey the story properly. My guess is that Saron was trying to dethrone the LK - perhaps he hoped his blood would have some effect?

Sadly, we're pretty much stuck at the animosity between them. The Old God likely believed that, once at full power, he'd topple Arthas with some ease. He did seem pretty confident (which, true, is a common trait to villains).

According to the Wiki, the Old Gods seem to be native to Azeroth. At least they were already here when the Titans arrived.

WotLK actually retconned it to the Old Gods not being on Azeroth at first and them being here the second time the Titans came to Azeroth with them being called parasites. So it seems they are some malevolent race that either can travel through space or some other means to get to planets.

I don't really think it is a retcon as we have little information on that time period. More like a clarification.

The other possibility that no one has mentioned is that it wasn't The Lich King he was showing us his control over, but Bolvar. I imagine holding out through weeks of torture is much easier with the aid of an Old God lending his power, and if YS had predicted the end game of the conflict we might have just put an old God's puppet in charge of the scourge. Just a thought that isn't really likely, but would have been interesting. I've not seen the comment Leviathon mentions though.

As for the Old Gods, their actions seem to be more about causing chaos and destruction. If it were just about living off the planet I'm sure they could do that buried underground. Perhaps they feed off magic and want to destroy other magic users so they get it all to themselves, I don't know. Another option is they have a plan for the Titan's and are trying to attract them back to the planet by causing as big a fuss as possible. Maybe they perfected their curse of flesh and plan to infect a titan with it. The WotLK retcon seemed necessary to make Ulduar make a little bit of sense. I'd love to know thier initial plans for Yogg/Azjol-Nerub and the Old God links, I have to think a lot of them were left from the story due to AN being axed which would presumably have dealt more with the Nerubians still following YS versus the undead ones.