Flying mammoths? Jet packs? The next expansion? What will be announced at BlizzCon 2019?

Now that BlizzCon dates have been posted, it’s time to speculate on what we might see announced. Your ideas will vary wildly from mine, but I’ll start — then you can jump into the comments with your thoughts.

What do we usually get?

• Depending upon where we are with a World of Warcraft expansion, we either get information on the upcoming patches or we get information on the next expansion.
• We always have a major Hearthstone announcement.
• We don’t get much from Diablo or StarCraft, and last year’s Diablo Immortal announcement should never be repeated. The idea of a mobile game is intriguing but the manner in which it was done was horrible.
• We receive information on new heroes or maps for both Overwatch and Heroes of the Storm.

In between all of this, we get esports, panels, and surprises like Laura Bailey singing “Daughter of the Sea.” With panels running concurrently, you can be forgiven for having information overload, particularly if you have interests in more than one Blizzard game. Toss in esports and you can miss some wonderful items and ideas. So let’s talk wonderful items and ideas. Before we jump in, know that I don’t play all Blizzard games so some of my speculation could be so far out in right field as to be out of the ballpark entirely, but that’s what speculation is, isn’t it?

Diablo and StarCraft

Wasn’t Immortal promised? I’m predicting it will still be “promised.” Their announced ideas are fabulous, but it feels like they are a just ideas. They are having problems delivering. That mobile game — which many of us ridiculed — may still be in development, but I’d wager it’s been scaled back and we won’t hear anything about it at BlizzCon in favor of “Look what we’ve got upcoming!”

Other than the World Championships, StarCraft developers will be trotted out to talk for… maybe 5 minutes about… something. There just isn’t much to left in this venerable game to announce. This is a shame because the addition of a side story would make players feel they are still a part of Blizzard. Gazing into the visor of Jim Raynor, I’m getting the Magic 8-ball’s “Try again later” notice.

Heroes of the Storm

I think we’re going to see one new map. With 86 heroes currently —  and Anduin coming —  I’m seeing at least two more heroes announced. What if it’s Lady Azshara as a caster and either Mekkatorque or Gallywix as melee DPS with gadgets and gizmos. I know there’s Gazlowe but either of these leaders would be excellent. Would a totally underground map work? What if it was Day-glow? I’d love to see some special crossover event with a new hero and the other games. Play 50 games and get a toy. Play 150 games and get a flying mammoth. Bear with me. That’s upcoming.

Hearthstone

Of course there will be a new expansion coming. I’m not even going to guess what its theme is because I couldn’t come up with anything remotely as clever as these designers have. I’d like to see a crossover event. What if there were a hero in Heroes of the Storm who threw random Hearthstone cards? What about “play 25 Hearthstone games and get transmog?”

Overwatch

Jeff Kaplan announced the addition of new features and a new map just recently. We know there will be a Halloween announcement and that usually comes with a new map and some tweaking of characters. Given how excited even non-Overwatch players like me get with the new character announcements — Ashe was so good — I’m predicting a new set of characters will show up at BlizzCon. I love the diversity of characters, but you need more animals. I think you need a crow with jet packs and a cat — not a Druid, a cat — like the one sleeping on the top of her cat tree to my left. What would the cat do? Stealth. How many times have I yelled her name and she’s sitting just out of sight watching me? And add a nice leap to disarm overhead bombs. I also think — with the Overwatch Workshop — we could see player maps and heroes entering wide distribution — a contest maybe?

World of Warcraft

I’m predicting the next expansion will be announced. It’s time. What do I think it will be? Well, we’re getting our taste of Old Gods now with the arrival of N’Zoth and patch 8.2. We’ll see 8.2 in the summer and combined with WoW Classic, there’s going to be a huge amount of content for us to play. I think we’ll get another patch before BlizzCon. It will tie up whatever loose ends we have after 8.2.

Is N’Zoth answering to someone? Just because we saw Sargeras blink away with Illidan doesn’t mean he’s gone for good. These gods have a way of not staying dead. What if the Kobolds rose up in anger? What if the marginalized groups we’ve seen over the years — such as the Delfias and the Booty Bay pirates — combined forces? A new race? Personally, I’m kind of over new races, but I know people have been clamoring for the Vulpera to be added. A lot of you want Naga. I’d play a Murloc in a heartbeat. That could happen.

I think we’ll discover a previously unknown landmass. I’d like to think Horde and Alliance will have to unite to defeat whatever foes are on it. We’re getting a lot of tentacles and shadowy attacks at the end of Battle for Azeroth. Let’s have some pirates and explosions and massing of armies. Maybe have them attack Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor.

And, let’s see cross-over events between Blizzard games. There’s my flying mammoth above — never mind that the direction is down. Give me a flying mammoth because I play Heroes or Hearthstone. Announce games to be “free-to-play” for three weeks between BlizzCon and the end of November. That would get people back, even temporarily.

So, those are my speculations. What do you think we’ll see at BlizzCon?