What’s the deal with AU Draenor after WoD?

So, we have our main timeline where we have Outland, originally accessed by the dark portal. Then in WoD, the dark portal was reconnected to AU Draenor (which is 30 or so years in the past). In AU Draenor the Legion also attacked, but we seems to have stopped them in that timeline (which is probably why AU Gul’dan jumped ship and joined our timeline’s Legion).

To me it gets confusing… what happens after this? Is the dark portal canonically reconnected to Outland instead of AU Draenor? We have in-game portals to both places for sure, but what is the reality story-wise? We definitely can access Outland, as the “Safe Haven” cinematic with Go’el and Saurfang takes place there. Also, iirc multiple minor quests in Legion lead there, and the postmaster’s HQ in (Legion) Dalaran has destinations to Outland… but not Draenor.

So I’d assume that after the events of WoD, we lost the connection to AU Draenor. But then in BFA, during the Mag’har allied race scenario, the Horde, with the help of some other Bronze Dragons (?) opens up another portal to the same alternate universe, but into our present day instead of 30 years in the past?

I haven’t played that scenario yet, so… What are the implications of that, was that a one time thing to bring some Mag’har orcs to our Azeroth, or is that also a permanent portal to another universe? Thank God that AU Draenor hasn’t connected to some AU Azeroth which would complicate things even further…

OR, maybe are those portals to Stormshield and its Horde counterpart canon, so maybe we still have access to both Outland, and the past AND present versions of AU Draenor?

I’ll try to explain it but tbh all this time-travel matter is a bit complicated (Blizzard’s fault) so I hope everything is clear.

In the Warcraft Universe (this refers to the entirety of lore written about the Warcraft series, and the location it takes place in), it is possible to have multiple dimensions. We have the main universe (MU), which is the one our characters live in. There are also other, alternate universes (AU, or dimensions), which can be accessed by the likes of the Bronze Dragonflight.

Outland and Azeroth are both in the MU. At least, the ones we actually see in-game. But, there are also an almost infinite numbers of AU’s, in which things are slightly different. When Kairoz helped Garrosh escape during the trials after the Siege of Orgrimmar, he previously experimented with different AU’s, and he found one in which Draenor and the Orcs weren’t corrupted by the Burning Legion thanks to Ner’zhul and Gul’dan (due to some ad hoc differences), which is how it was easy for Garrosh to convince his AU dad to unite the Orcs.

However, this universe or pocket-dimension could ONLY be accessed with the help of the Bronze Dragonflight and the Vision of Time, an artifact that could be used to basically browse through and visit other dimensions (it was used to recall events to serve as an enhancement to testimonies). This is not the case for Outland, since that is in our own, main universe. This is why it could only be revisited after recovering a collection of… shards, I think? And after a Bronze Dragon offered to aid the Adventurer and Eitrigg to re-establish a link between the two dimensions/universes.

So… how come 30 years have passed there? Because time moves faster in that AU… yep, I know, boring, but Blizzard didn’t really bother to explain it and just said it did.

I think it is, and there’s a chance it just happened automatically. There is a link between both worlds, a permanent one (cf. Beyond the Dark Portal) and I imagine that, as long as the portal is not closed, it’s always open. It doesn’t need to be constantly fueled (as is the case in the movie universe, which is also a different universe like alternate Draenor) either.

It’s a one time thing. This is also explained during the questline a bit, the link could only be established one more time, and that’s it.

They aren’t canon, nope. Portals are complicated when it comes to lore, simply because we don’t know if they actually exist like they exist in-game, or whether they’re just a gameplay mechanic.

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Thank you for the detailed explanation. It makes sense now… as much as this comic book-y dimension hopping time travel stuff can make sense. Never really liked when long established stories take this turn, it lessens the impact of everything. I hope they won’t do it much more…

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I’m not a fan of extensive time-travel or other sci-fi things in WoW, but it was executed well in WoW… that means, I wasn’t too happy with the whole time-travel thing in WoD, but at least they didn’t butcher the whole concept of it.

But the BfA recruitment scenario, that was one of the biggest lows I’ve ever seen in this game, just as bad as the War of the Thorns.

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Two things I don’t like in wow lore wise.

Time travel
Emerald dream

Those two doesn’t make sense to me.

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you forgot the 3rd blizzards writing

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