Anyone horde side that could check the "main badlands quest chain" (sorry for the lack of precision).

I found this screenshot quite interesting.


The context of the picture is the following, you, horde, team up with a goblin girl named "Rhea" who is interested in performing tests on some black dragon eggs, Rhea turns out to be a red dragon in disguise sent by Alex with the intention of capturing a black dragon egg. A gnome engineer, with the help of some Titan technology "Eye of the Watchers" has made it possible to purify eggs of their corruption. You steal an egg, and with the help of some mercenaries (a biker gang), you drive back the black wyrms attempt of taking it back and killing you in the process. In the end you have Deathwing himself come and put and end to Rhea's life inside a cave she ran into to hide, in pure switcharoo fashion Rhea manages to sneak the real egg to the gnome engineer and takes a fake inside the cave with her, Deathwing carpetbombs the cave and leaves everything for dead.

The Titan artifact detects "Azerothian Old God corruption" in the black dragon egg, and removes it. Leaving only a pure uncorrupted egg behind.


If anyone with access could double check this questline and take more in-depth notes, it would be really cool if we could get some insight into what the angle behind this move is. Are the red dragons attempting to uncorrupt black dragons? Are all black dragons corrupted pre-birth by Old God influence, and so act like crazy sociopaths? Are the intentions grander, say... a replacement Black Aspect after the death of Deathwing? I mean, who else to wield the power of the titans than a true uncorrupted black dragon?

Either way, very interesting quest line that only adds to the other epic questlines already placed into the Badlands, who is shaping up to go from a zone everyone avoids, to a zone everyone will want to go through.

I dunno, we just did the whole "There must always be a Lich King" thing with Wrath, now granted, these are two entirely different positions of power and responsibility, Thrall wouldn't be damned, but you could see how just inserting somebody else into the spot would irk some people at the game's climax.

Blame Metzen, any characters that desire peace are going to be woefully disappointed with how their lives turn out while this franchise is still popular. :P

The largest stint of "peace" was the 8 years between the Alliance losing it's expedition to Outland and closing the portal, and Thrall rising to power as the new Warchief, which resulted in the destruction of Durnholde Keep. That's ignoring the drama that caused the Alliance to separate and fact the Orcs were broken, enslaved, and without a leader that whole time.

Only thing to add to that context is that retrieving the Titan artifact to purify the egg requires two minigames in a nearby cave/titan site, not quite funny but also very easy.

Now that's a surprise. Orcs appear to age slightly slower than Humans, but their potential max age is lower (harsher degeneration at old age?). But they are close enough to be considered even I would say. It is however very useful information.
At the time of the Durnholde incident, Thrall was 18 right? So now he is about 27? He shouldn't look old, even if he has suffered a lot of physical and mental destruction. And as noted, it isn't as if he is graying, he is reddening. Gray would be fair I would think, I have friends who got gray hair at 28 years, with the added stress would make it sensible. But not wrinkles etc. Thrall was always considered a 'handsome' Orc, this rather huge shift is odd. I would have liked a gray version of the current Thrall a lot. Not this redhaired Kilrogg.

Well they grow up slower than Humans it seems. It is only the extreme age that is cut short.
Evolution has a hard time making it's impact when we take shortcuts, like the community tending to infirm, injured and elderly. Which is why have our social situation right now. Technically we can't really live past 60ish (without help), and shouldn't really get much older than 40 (but that is more because of the dangers of living). So the Orcs not living as long into real old age could be because their physical bodies decay faster than Humans, but they take slightly longer to get to that age, meaning an Orc appears to have a marginally longer productive lifespan.

In any case, this was all about the decay of Thrall and how it doesn't seem to fit very well. Another thing is that previously Thrall had a very unique look to his face, now... It's quite generic. That, and the odd hair, might in fact just mean that the model isn't really finished. Or heck, it might just be a placeholder with the right clothes.

I like the Thrall model. I guess Doomhammer's gear had to go because it is a huge symbol of the Alliance, and now he is moving to a neutral faction they wanted a similar look. For the aging, I just assumed it was the forces at work through him holding the Maelstrom apart. I mean when we talk about Thrall as a Shaman, he is so far above normal shaman it's not even a joke. He's basically the Neo of Shaman.

It would be cool to see Saurfang in Doomhammer's gear, but I think it will probably just disappear. I'd like if it was displayed in the throne room in Orgrimarr, just discretely in a corner on an armour tree as a constant reminder to Garrosh that one day Thrall will be back (although I don't actually believe he will be back). Is Saurfang still MIA on Beta? What zones are unfinished at the moment? I wonder if he is in one of those.

I don't know how much Blizzard plans to change Outland and Northrend, if at all, but yesterday I remembered Saurfang could be in charge of the Horde in Outland, ready to make a return at the 80-85 storyline, when dragons need their necks examined from the inside. But right now, I imagine he wouldn't mind taking a break from the mindfuck Azeroth has become. I wouldn't call it cowardice, he merely needs his cogs aligned.

Also, I don't recall Orcs growing up slower than humans. I thought they were apt (physically, at least) for fighting and hunting from an earlier age.

Draenosh was killed and ghoul-rezzed in Northrend, I was appointing Varok as the ruler of Garandar, in Outland. I mentioned Northrend because, like Outland, it's not - that we know - due for any major changes.

It should, really...Outland's the biggest pain of all the levelling experience, in my opinion.

I still have a bad feeling about Saurfang. I don't see him getting into a fight with Deathwing - although, that'd make him on par with his brother - and he's probably been turned into a hermit until we rouse him, but I still find this silence too ominous. I fear the day MMO-Champ will post "Saurfang's no more".

Then again, I have bad feelings about homemade muffins.

Side note: Thrall's new model is great, he does look like a globe-trotter whose vests deceive a fair share of giant enemies into thinking "free loot", right up until he reveals the hammer. Try as I might, though, I can't understand the logic behind his hair-color (both ordinary hair and the facial one) disfunction. Wasn't it black? Also, is Blizzard going for erasing Orcs' tusks or something? Get some proper gnome-impalers on that lower lip.

Wowwiki's got this, just for the art-kicks:

On Thrall's aging, has anyone considered that he is set to become the next Guardian of Tirisfal. We know that this means he will inherit a massive amount of power. In other franchises we have seen that the more power a single mortal acquires the more stress but on the vessel. Thrall's aging could just be a consequence of the new power he has been given.

As to how he has dressed, take a look at Medivh, he was not over the top flamboyant either. In fact his garb was rather understated and gave no really idea as to the power he wielded.

On the Black egg being cleansed, does that mean the hatchling will return to being a Brown drake rather than a black? Nelfarion's fall into darkness is what corrupted the flight turning them from the Brown Earthwarders into the Black Dragonflight more aspected towards death. It would be awesome to see a re-emergence of the Brown Dragonflight retaking their place among the Dragons protecting Azeroth. It would also be pretty cool if the tattered remains of the Blue's were to come back together as a unified flight.

Urgh, don't even want to consider losing Saurfang... That would be a huge blow. Basically all that would be left would be Sylvanas (Lor'themar Theron is hardly a worthy consideration at this time), and we know how she manage to rile people up.

Aegwynn was at least around 800 years old when she died, and she was merely a normal Human initially. Also wowwiki mentions that the Guardians get not only great power but longevity as well. Further Aegwynn is presented as an attractive woman until the very end, so it doesn't seem like Guardians are physically punished by the power.
Medivh never dressed like a powerful magus, however our main portrayal of him is as the Prophet, where he deliberately tries to draw attention to himself rather than his message. The few images we have of him from earlier times he does in fact dress like a mage (if still not like some NPCs). Heavy robes, flamboyant vests, stylish hair and beard. Perhaps not in the style of an end tier raider, but there is little doubt about him.

Nice notice about the tusks Bierz, Thrall is generally shown with rather generous tusks, not Fel Orc sized, but enough to make most male Orcs envious. I think that's just another pointer towards his model being placeholder right now.

It would require direct assistance from someone like Alexstrasza to resurrect the Brown Flight. Even if you could cleanse a male and female Brown, raise them, and the male becomes a Flight Leader, you have a genetics issue. Breeding brother and sister to spawn the rest of the flight would be... unwise. A Brown Flight Leader would need a consort from another flight (such as Alex providing a Red for the purpose). Malygos took a non-Blue Consort, so it's not unknown.

What's with Reds hiding in trees and caves? I swear, the front of Ruby Sanctum drives me no end of crazy. A full dragon is hiding in a tree, like a cat, from an oversized Drakonid. Chomp the sucker, magic him to death, whatever, then duck back and hide from Halion. At least fleeing Deathwing makes sense.

On Thrall, I keep wondering if he's trying to go into hiding. Obi-Thrall Kenobi looks like he's intentionally dressing down to disguise himself. I guess it's my bias regarding "I cast spells, therefore I must wear cloth robes." I'll swallow it if the setting involves large quantities of metal (a la armour) interfering with spellcasting, but WoW does not have that trope. Shaman and Paladin are fine in metal. Thrall suddenly wearing bargain bin blankets over his head is demeaning. His hoodie/shawl is poorly stitched from 3 pieces of cloth. Not something a leader would wear unless they had renounced all personal possessions to become a hermit, or similar.

Unfortunately, constantly showing his bottom teeth (not just the fangs) carries on an issue I've always had with his WoW model. He looks like a freakin' mouth breather. Can he not completely shut his mouth? He could close it in WC3! Since WoW launched his mouth has been hanging open like he doesn't have the brain cells to close it. You've got possibly one of the most intelligent Orcs, ever, and his mouth hangs open like an overheated puppy. You can adequately display the lower fangs while still allowing the lips to seal around them.