It was where the Well of Eternity WAS before it went boom because Sargeras passed his head through a portal there. That guys is so clumsy...And, it connected there because that's the middle of the world, where the World Pillar shoulders the weight of the world. And that's where Deathwing decided to pop out through.

See, this is what I thought, I just need confirmation. Thanks!

@Enor

If that's the case, there better be an NPC names "Atlas" in Deepolme at the World Pillar. :P

For those that not have this classical knowledge - Atlas was, in old Greek mythology, one of the Titans banished by the gods of the Pantheon when they took the rule of the world. Atlas was banished to maintain the weight of the the World on his own shoulders.

On topic - it does make it very very confusing of what The Maelstrom is :/ As far as I know, it's the eye of a brutally massive storm that is powered by magical forces more "raw/primal" that arcane or possibly even mana. Down there, there is some sort of a crack in earth, and it should also house the renments of the Well, making it a very powerfull magical point -between worlds,realms,dimensions- .

Well, by that logic, one could think that Deathwing exactly used those rifts and the "weight-centric" point of Deepholme as the point trough which to escape into Azeroth. He was the Earthwarden, so he did have the knowledge for it.

Actually Atlas wasn't charged with lifting the Earth but with lifting the heavens from the Earth's floor. Unfortunately statues throughout History depicted him with the Earth on his back and so the popular misconception has arisen.

Greek myth nerd away!

@Thorzon

/shrug

world pillar = dark tower.

stephen king reference? anybody?

@zdave: Um... no. Also, the Washington Monument, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, the Pillars of Hercules, and the Tower of London are not Stephen King references either. @.@

Actually I see where he was going with the dark tower thing, there are a lot more similarities than it just being a large free-standing column made of a light absorbing material.
In the series, the Dark Tower was the focal point of the universe, and every universe. It was the central point connecting the "beams" that maintained the laws of physics and the foundation for the world. While the Dark Tower did not exist physically as a tower in all of the universes, it did exist in some form in the key worlds. The Tower was assailed by the Crimson King and his minions in an attempt to throw the worlds into ultimate chaos, erasing all order and substance, and was protected by the last gunslinger of a forgotten age and his compatriots.
In Cataclysm, the World Pillar was at the center of Deepholm and Azeroth, supporting the elemental planes. When broken, it has caused disruptions in the laws of physics (see the floating rocks everywhere) and the foundations of both realms. There is no World Pillar in Azeroth, but it is mirrored in the Maelstrom, which is also the former location of the Well of Eternity, the font which formed the foundation of the magical development of Azeroth. The World Pillar was shattered by Deathwing, and if not for the intervention of Thralls shamanism and the actions of the player characters, the realms would have merged fully, creating massive destruction and chaos.
Intentional or not, there are some very interesting parallels between the Dark Tower of the King mythology and the World Pillar of the Warcraft universe. Whether or not the developers capitalize on this remains to be seen, but in light of their previous work in Wrath of the Lich King (with its many Tolkien references) I hope they do.

i'm necro'ing this to say thank you Biskit, and suck it Artificial, maybe do some research before just saying things.

@zdave: I'll admit, I did think of that when I heard the term "world pillar". If we get something even remotely resembling Beams, I will be very happy.