In a stunning announcement today, Blizzard announced that a new expansion is set to be announced. However, they won't be waiting for BlizzCon to spill the beans. Instead, the new expansion will be revealed at the upcoming Gamescom in Cologne, Germany.

Don't worry if you can't make it to the event, the expansion will be unleashed upon the world via special live stream event on Thursday, August 6th at 9 a.m. PDT. Then on Sunday, August 9th at 8 a.m. PDT, even more will be revealed as the developers host a chat just before the show ends.

If you are like me, this is huge news, but perhaps a little puzzling. Why wouldn't Blizzard simply wait for their own convention in a few months to announce this new expansion? The answer is, to keep players interested and playing.

Let's face it; Warlords of Draenor has been on a downward spiral since launch. While not a total failure, most players will agree that this expansion hasn't turned out exactly how we expected it to. Players are unhappy, dissatisfied, and thirsting for something new. With subscriptions down and many players on the brink, drastic action was needed, pronto. Thus the expansion reveal at Gamescom.

Not to mention that this lines up with the promise developers made at BlizzCon; to churn out expansions at a faster pace than ever before. Warlords had the feel of a complete expansion after the first major patch. With the launch of 6.2 and most the major baddies dead, it was pretty obvious that this expansion was tying up loose ends and wrapping itself up. A new expansion was the next logical step, whether it was Gamescom, BlizzCon, or another convention, it was overdue to be announced.

What will the new expansion hold? There are many theories out there, some good and some bad. We could speculate for hours. However, I say lets just wait and see what the developers have to say when all is revealed at Gamescom in just a few short days. Till then be sure to stay tuned to the Blizzard gamescom page for further details on the live stream.