There’s already a don’t-ask-don’t-tell approach to the passage of time, with some people (myself included) treating IC years 1:1 with IRL years, and others following the official timeline that says all expansions only lasted 1 year. Ideally this will be a similar situation
1 Like
View it as an opportunity to enhance your story, not to tie your hands. That is what some story-director would say… 
Your human character would become too old to be an adventurer? Retcon their age.
You don’t know what to do with your 10k years old elf? Well, you wrote a paragraph that covers 5k years, I’m sure you’ll live even without filling those seven years with stuff.
You want to change your character’s psychology? That’s it, that’s your chance - write a compelling arc of seven years.
You want to RP those years? Do it.
This is an opportunity - people can choose to use it or not, if they don’t want to add new things to their chars.
1 Like
I’ve mentioned it elsewhere but I find the idea of the timeskip quite ludicrous when the devs still have Kor’kron mobs patrolling the Barrens nine years after the patch event they were relevant in ended.
The only notion of it actually happening in-game is an NPC monologuing it at us and two people now being married. Everything else is frozen in Cataclysm time. Acknowledge it or don’t acknowledge it, but be safe in the knowledge that either way the writers are not thinking about it half as much as we do.
19 Likes
I used to think that it was crippling to multiple characters’ plotlines but ultimately realised that the time is easily simply filled by actual events attended and activities done.
1 Like
u can say that each expansion is 1 year but i don’t care about that either :)
besides not like anything’s going to change in the world beyond uldaman lmao (gilneas anyone? :clueless:)
My answer to when people ask what I spent the last 5 years doing.
2 Likes
I’ll RP it out personally. I can see why some people don’t want to as it might ruin character progression or just speed it up to much killing the joy but meh…to each their own.
I will just mostly keep it to myself and not overly mention it as to avoid bumping into people and avoiding the awkward scenario off
"Hey been three years ! "
“What you mean ?We saw each other yesterday.”
Queue awkward IC and OOC silence
Let’s all be honest with ourselves for a moment and say that the “Hey how have you been for these three years? winks at camera” scenario is a bogeyman people have come up with and not a real problem that’s going to plague RP.
If anyone rocks up in DF Prepatch and says something along those lines then it’s an issue with the RPer, not the lore.
7 Likes
I was in a coma. Why didn’t you come to see me?! You’d have known.
Yes, because the zone is under the sea level. Deathwing didn’t magically flood it, he just destroyed the hills separating it from the sea (basically the same thing that happened with Bosporus and Black Sea after last ice age ended). The water is there to stay, unless the Dutch arrive on Azeroth.
6 Likes
Three? Wasn’t that seven?
Don’t you worry Distant, I visited daily…
To leave a mug of piping hot Earl Grey right next to your bed. I’m sure you will grow to appreciate a proper tea during your three year R&R. 
1 Like
its a 5 year skip from BFA, shadowlands take 2 of those years leaving 3 years to fill in as you like.
1 Like
Gekoloniseerd! 
3 Likes
Yeah for real, when was the last time you met an old friend IRL and said “Hey, I haven’t seen you in four years, six months and thirteen seconds!”. Nobody does that.
For all you wacky void elves, a skip of a few years leaves ample room to master the Whispers. Or some much needed therapy.
2 Likes
(isn’t that the kul tirans)
Point still stands about Menethil Harbor etc! Or maybe they’re now a Water Park or something.
They gave up on draining it so now it’s a mini venice.
They saw Suramar’s gondolas and decided that is their calling now.
or time to deteriorate and get worse
absolutely