I personally feel TBC is where WoW really jumped the shark and started swinging the villain bat around wildly destroying Kael, Illi and Vashj in particular.
Not to mention the Draenai Eredar retcon.
Call it defeatist all you like but even if they do pull a Bronze Dragon wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey alternate timeline. They are not going to change any of the cosmology. I’d love it if they do at least change some of the character ‘development’ into something less (insert your favourite expletive here) but that’s a bit more feasible in an alternate timeline.
Throwing 15 years of writing into the bin though, is unlikely to happen.
I think our best hope is for a complete reboot but considering the track record of reboots of popular media franchises that is a pretty grim prospect.
Edit: Again, I want to assure you all, Ideally, in my opinion, there is a timeline split, but untill I see a blizzard source confirming this I’m going to stay cynical on that front.
They don’t have to throw it in the bin just say its a separate universe, they can keep developing WoW separately. Its quite common in media, for example the Marvel cinematic universe hasn’t superseded the comics its just a different setting where thing happen differently and characters have different backgrounds etc.
But you aren’t referring to old canon. You’re calling it ‘Warcraft canon’, and that is not Warcraft canon. Warcraft canon is whatever the latest canon the series decides upon based on its creator; and that is World of Warcraft.
You are specifically talking about WC3 RTS canon, but you are not specifying it that way in conversation. And it makes it more muddy considering you are sourcing from various novels around the time, but decidedly put an arbitrary cork on those that you don’t deem canon.
In conversation, there doesn’t seem to be any common ground or generally-accepted definition of Warcraft 3 canon (outside RTS, such as novels and books). Kinda like what you bring up here with Star Wars EU; at least we have a designation for it; the Extended Universe. Warcraft does not have that because it is one canon - and the latest iteration comes from Chronicles and WoW. There is no separation of WoW novel canon and WC3 novel canon, considering you’re dismissing books from 2006 but you openly admit that the transition to WoW lore wasn’t definite until 2010. So what of all the material within those 4 years? Who decides what is more canon and less canon? How are people to discuss things moderately without any basis of what is considered canon and non-canon?
Warcraft 3 RTS lore would have to be specific to the game itself, and if we abide by those standards then there is literally no explanation and backstory to talk about regarding Night Elf origins or whereabouts of Black Dragons etc. All that is doing is perpetuating an era of blissful ignorance, with arbitrary boundaries that are neither consistent nor reliable.
The most egregious example out of this is if we ever include the Warcraft RPG books (which is based on WC3 lore, pre-WoW), which were technically not rendered non-canon until many years later. They would be technically canon within the timeframe you set, but who gets to decide whether it’s relevant or not? Is it as non-canon as the Magazine, so Ancients like Malorne and Ursoc/Ursol remain never to exist? Because the first mentions of these Ancients were in the RPG books, and they have become a significant part of Druid and Cenarian lore. Yet without acknowledging WoW in the picture, then none of this becomes canon because the other sources where this is mentioned, like the post-2004 Novels and the RPG books, are considered by you to be non-canon.
Except for when it comes to your stance on Warcraft lore. Being obstinate and selective with what you personally consider canon and not canon doesn’t make you any more correct or factual.
The manga, novels, RTS games, MMO, comics, game manuals, trailers, cinematics, animatics, and online short stories are all part of the Warcraft canon. Exceptions only really come in through more modern iterations that depict things in another way (like the novelizations of Warcraft 2 for example).
The only separate timeline/universe/settings are like… the events taking place in Hearthstone, Heroes of the Storm, and the Warcraft movie. The old Warcraft TCG. The cancelled Warcraft Adventures game. The tabletop RPG.
Fixing things that they had always intended to do (give Jailor Kassan a unique Dalaran warden model) seems like a good thing to me. I am looking forward to those types of things and I think it’s an overreaction by some people to qualify that as “retcons” to match the WoW lore.
However, if they did make a WC4 then I think the best thing to do would be to just ignore WoW lore anywhere that it doesn’t make sense for an RTS because WoW lore was written to match to MMO game mechanics first and not to make a good story. Sometimes it would still be the same because that is a lot of lore we are discussing and it wasn’t always bad. We don’t want to change just to be different even when it was fine as it was.
Im waiting for the ‘‘modified’’ version they want to tell us and i will probably like it, just by looking at some ‘‘retconned’’ model to fits with todays world of warcraft and i’m not talking about the game, just overall the story of the universum itself that moved forward.
You still will be able to play old campaign with old stuff there happening or anyone that is just a full purist that if it’s not done 1:1 ‘‘OH, YOU KNOW BACK IN MY DAY’’, then you won’t play it.
And i will say that probably retconning few things here and there, changing, adding some models will make room for potential new campaigns or even W4, not the old version that doesn’t fit anymore in many parts with how this world looks like today.
Actually, I don’t believe they are trying to “fit” WoW anymore, just by looking at the leaked models I believe they intend to improve both Warcraft III and WoW aesthetics, as almost all models are vastly superior to most we have seen, even reaching cinematic standards. I hope the improvements are not only visual, if they keep it this way Reforged may be the revival and return of the Warcraft franchise into RTS. I sound far too optimistic I know, but one can never stop dreaming.
They’ve got a minus point from me if they try to alter WC3’s lore to match WoW. I really really don’t like WoW, but I love WC3. And I think RTS and MMORPG are two genres that should NOT be mixed up. Never. A RTS game in my opinion is a MUCH BETTER way of telling a story.
Using an ad hominem like that makes the guy you insulted come across as far more knowledgeable of the subject matter than you.
Rule #1 of Arguments - don’t utilize ad hominems in an argument. You automatically concede at that point since you don’t bring anything worth arguing about to the table.
There’s no wow illidan… Perhaps during burning crusade we were presented with someone thst was similar to him…
But what we saw in légion was pure garbage.
World of Warcraft is an extension of Warcraft3 lore and has added a lot to it. That being said there isn’t any real retcon that has happened in regards to the og storyline beyond adding more content to it to make it more clear. Just like how we know that the horde won the first war, and lost the second war, how the horde split into four groups in the third war: the old horde(Blackrock), the new horde(thralls horde), shadowcouncil/burning blade/argus wake(legion’s horde) and the Twilights Hammer(cho’galls inclusive old god horde). Besides adding onto existing lore and specifiying in more detail about locations and events, the original lore for Warcraft3 is intact. Hence why besides the map looking different and new added enemy easter eggs, the culling was almost identical to the original.
You all make it sound like Warcraft3 is going to be given the warlords of dreanor treatment and everything is going to be different and broken when thats not the case. Current wow lore is built off of the old content, it doesn’t change the old story. Just look at the burning crusade caverns of time dungeons and raids.
If anything world of Warcraft lore ties up the loose ends and design choices.
Why did orcs have dragons?!
They enslaved alexstrasza with dragon soul, and forced her and her children to serve the horde
Why do undead buildings look like that, why is there such an Egyptian theme for these structures. What the heck is an obsidian statue?
The Lich King managed to turn the insect race(nerubians) who served the old god Yogg’saron. The Lich King adopted their structure design into his own. Obsidian statues are corrupted titan constructs that where apart of the nerubian empire.
Why did highelves, humans, and dwarves even join forces?
They united originally vs the horrifying and mystical amani troll empire. An empire so feared it sparked an alliance out of necessity and made the humans of strom construct a huge wall to keep them out. This same empire who was losing their own war, struck a deal and joined the Orcish horde.
What the heck are ogers, and why are some 2-headed?
Ogers coexisted with orcs and where brought over during the second war to help keep infighting as a minimum in the ever growing hordes of orcs. By magically combining 2 ogers together, they can use their combined brain power to cast spells.
These things will still exist in the game, we just know more about them and everything now has a reason to exist.
Not even close… Illidan wasn’t a selfless character… He only cared about himself and magic power… Maybe in some degree for tyrande but that’s it…
And you know what, that’s perfectly fine, he was a cool interesting character that could play either evil or good… One of the most human characters…
Absolutely no. The illidan from the burning crusade died… And the story was that
What you got in légion was a retcon of what happened and was originally wrote.
The only reason légion illidan exist is for fanservice… This is something blizzard admitted.