Even for people who don't have a strong interest in the lore of WoW, a powerful story is still a really excellent tool to engage a player. I might not know exactly who every character is and their past deeds, but it is impossible to play WoW and not know who Arthas is. This is even more so in WotLK. To ramp up the story telling this high and then bring it back down will be a letdown for everybody, even if they don't play the game for the lore. This will have to be a wait and see thing, but hopefully they lay the foundation for the next expansion at some point during this one. As long as they make the transition interesting and believable that will be good enough.

One thing I am interested in seeing resolved is the fact that now the Alliance and Horde, for once in the history of WoW, are actually full out at war with each other. This portion of the story might just be an excuse for a PvP zone, but I think that plot point has the power to change the goal of the next expansion. Until now, and even in WotLK, we have been in a loose alliance for a greater cause. Who isn't to say our next big enemy won't come from each other instead of from some outside source. I have no idea how this idea would translate into actual content. Instead of going into a dungeon to kill an enemy I guess we could go in to killy a guy and steal his resources for our war. This idea wouldn't really allow for one big enemy at the end of the expansion, ala Arthas, but it would be a way to solve the problem that whoever is next will not live up to him.

I hope Blizzard does run with bridge content as a way to run up to an expansion. Marketing wise it makes sense. It would keep people involved in the lull period where you see people dropping off. It would also engage people in a story that requires them to buy the expansion to see out. We also allready see Blizzard doing this sort of thing, if only on the small scale. I'd have to say that the lead up to WotLK was a little dissapointing with the zombies and everything. That thing expanded and fully fleshed out with its own content...that would be fun and a good way for Blizzard to test things out they plan to expand on in the expansion.

Speaking of our lovable King of Stormwind, it turns out that Onyxia has been influencing the King and the nobles for the longest, she was responsible for the nobles rejecting the Stonemasons request for payment.

And when Varian tried to re-negotiate with them she used her dark influence resulting in a riot which killed Varian's wife.

When he went into a deep depression Onyxia had full influence/control over him, but as he watched his son grow up it became apparent he would become a great future king and Onyxia's influence started to wane.

In response Onyxia and her dragonkin kidnapped him on a voyage to Theramore and separated Varian's self from...himself, she attempted to sever his will from him and then kill it so she could influence the King for all time, however the island they choose to perform the ritual at was of poor choosing and resulted in the Naga intervening thinking humans were disrespecting their island.

Onyxia killed one(Or so she thought, he hid himself in the wrap of another dead body from the fighting and then jumped into the sea, this one was Lo'gosh) and the other was captured by the Naga and ransomed back to Stormwind(He was the one sitting on the throne for a while).

So at the moment(in the comic) there are 2 Varians and they're both about to storm Onyxia's Lair in the final issue.

I imagine one will die(Probably the one with no scar) or perhaps he's been in hiding and we haven't seen him yet, or maybe they'll merge! :P Either way we'll find out in December.

Thanks for the comic update. The second Ashbringer comic was also recently released and there's a spoilerific summary on Blizzplanet:

BlizzPlanet.com - Everything Blizzard Entertainment!

I have not played WC1-3, infact I was an avid RTS player but never liked the WC RTS games.

After starting to play WoW, I went back and found the whole list of cinematics/in-game cinematics on youtube and went through them. The Wiki also is an excellent source of Lore and history.

To Obsidian Sanctum? I am guessing you were hinting at the Emerald Dream though?

No what he means is that the road runs thru Wyrmrest temple and into the sea towards the Maelstrom which tbh might be a hint or just might just be a sign of the decay of the titan relics.

When I first saw it, I was reminded of these stories you hear about lost roads leading into the sea supposedly pointing towards Atlantis.

Yea, it'd be kinda neat if the Path of Titans lead straight to the Well of Eternity.

Thats an excellent idea, actually. Releasing post Icecrown content, but perhaps 'set in the Maelstrom' to serve as the lull-period filler for players and ground to set the premise for story and building up the major characters.

I could imagine a scenario like: Shortly after Icecrown and Arthas' defeat, King Varian and Warchief Thrall are kidnapped by Azshara and taken deep into the Inner Maelstrom. The Alliance/Horde rush to the Maelstrom itself only to discover its magically sealed from non-naga entering by a magical artifact on an island within the Maelstrom itself(Similar to Sunwell/Isle of Quel'danas). To save the king/warchief, we must first venture to this island and destroy the artifact to gain entry. The zone this is located on would contain content like the Isle style 5man, dailys and a serverwide event, leading up to the destruction of this artifact - which paves the way for our proper Invasion into the Maelstrom with the third expansion itself.

This would all take place during WOTLK's lifecycle and serve as a great way to build suspense, story, character profiles and help WOTLK integrate with a post-Arthas story, because it feels like WOTLK is going to give too much closure for comfort. Thats the concern.

It'd be a good idea if it weren't for the fact that they already said that Icecrown will be the end of the WotLK content cycle, which I'd assume is meant to include all patches between release and the release of the third expansion.

Personally I'd rather see Azjol-Nerub added as the Quel'Danas of WotLK, but I'm starting to fear that they've just completely abandoned the zone and its lore (seriously, I wanted to see stuff about Yogg-Saron, C'Thun, and the Aq'ir..) and they might add Grim Batol instead.

I think it's likely that Blizzard is working on an expedited schedule to get the third expansion done as well. They've said that Icecrown will be patch 3.3, and this will be the last content patch of the expansion. It took Blizzard less than a year to go from 2.0 to 2.3 during TBC. I think this provides strong evidence that they're going to be trying to move to the next content cycle more quickly. A bridge patch of sorts would be great (Quel'Danas should have been this for WotLK with the scourge presence there), but the only thing I could see leading to this would be something like a CoA: Green instance which ties to the Emerald Nightmare or something. A random South Seas zone? Nah.

I'd love to see if they end up doing anything with modern day Hyjal, especially after it was originally marked as Deathwing's Lair back in the day.