That never was the case, Illidan was killed by Maiev and Akama, and Arthas got rekt because Tirion got his Light’s blessing last moment and broke the Frostmourne into pieces. Players always take roles of common ‘footmen’ in such encounters.
WOW lore was fine until Cataclysm, and after Cataclysm it has almost no relations with WC3, anyway. Broken Isles lore is different in WOW than in WC3, but that’s it. Otherwise you can expect only changes in the layout of campaign maps.
I get the impression that people in this thread have no idea of what WOW lore is about.
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I’m not sure if I’m being understood, and perhaps I’m not understanding either. I did say let WoW be WoW and do whatever it wants, but then added:
I guess I was still considering Reforged as WC3, whereas some of you seem to be advocating that they become different games. Anyway I don’t know if I came off the wrong way, but I do like this and kind of feel the same way:
That’s sort of what I meant by letting WoW and WC3 each be their own thing. I don’t need the lore to be in perfect harmony, I can enjoy them separately. That said, I’m also open to a refined and different experience with Reforged (even if it leans more toward WoW), I guess my position may differ slightly only in that I’m hoping they can strike a perfect balance, so that we won’t have much reason to want the original game anymore. I want Reforged to be a replacement, and I can accept leaving behind the old game if I can still recognize it in the new to a fair amount. So I was sort of intending to debate what that amount is, though I probably did a poor job of it. And yes, I’m sort of blending my arguments together… its not great. …And it doesn’t help when we have so little to go on as of now. 
To be honest, when put into perspective, the entire Warcraft lore is a retcon upon a retcon, upon a retcon, and Blizzard was never bothered with that.
I remember the good old times of W1 - with “the kingdom of Azeroth” being a thing and Horde motivations for invading Stormwind being “we were bored and had nothing better to do”, Sargeras being a random demon in WC2, who’s tomb Gul’dan just stumbled upon with Kil’jaeden being yet another demon being completely unrelated to anything. And for the love of god, can someone tell me what is Garona’s Half-Orcen bloodline? She’s been going back and forth between half-orc/half-human and half-orc/half-draenei, and Blizzard can’t make up their minds. And “proud warrior shamanistic Orcs” were a sudden Beyond the Dark Portal invention previously unheard of in lore (Ner’zhul being called a “shaman” all of a sudden).
And WC 3 itself retconned so much stuff from WC 2 that it’s going to take forever to list it all. Entire Burning Legion, Archimonde, Sargeras being promoted to head honcho and Mannoroth corrupting orcs just suddenly became a thing. But it made the lore more fleshed-out so there is that.
So I was actually never bothered all that much with WOW retcons to WC 3 lore - like with the Draenai, Lich King (Blizzard could never decide what was the relation between Arthas, Ner’zhul and the Frostmourne even between RoC and TFT), or Illidan - he was always an hot-headed idiot that couldn’t be bothered to clarify or explain his goals to everyone else, so him being the “villain” of BC somehow made sense.
And I don’t think the differences between WC 3 and WOW were that big. You’d maybe have to explain the Draenei/Eredar change, but honestly, nobody it the main game cares where Archimonde came from - he’s just a Big Evil Guy who is Evil (and criminally boring). And just swap “Draenei” for “Broken Draenei” in the Blood Elf campaign and you’re golden. And Blizzard will probably change the look of Suramar slightly to fit the new lore and that’s it.
Having said that, I don’t actually like how Warcraft lore went forward, with Blood Elves joining the Horde (sure - they’ve fought each other for 40 years just to join up with them, cause reasons), Night Elves joining the Alliance (…beacuse why?) Lich King being pretty much a non-threat limited to Northrend in WotLK (I was expecting something more… epic?), plus Arthas losing his trademark snark, Sylvanas becoming the Warchief (…seriously?) and Jaina becoming a ruthless warmonger. And we are slowly starting to run out of villains.
Beacuse how can you top defeating Azeroth version of Satan all by yourself?
But here’s the thing: Nozdormu the Timeless and Bronze Dragonflights exist. So, if Blizzard ever wants to make Warcraft IV, there is a logical lore reason how to make it follow the events of WC 3 and ignore the lore events in WOW. WC RTS and WOW MMO can easily follow two seperate timelines that don’t interfere with one another.
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I agree with your sentiment in its entirety, except for this part. WC3 and WoW are as inseparable as Arthas and Ner’zhul at the end of TFT. And bringing in time travel would be a disaster for any hype.
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gona idimit i be mad if they change rexxar to survival from beast master in wc3 becus wow legion and bfa changed rexxar from beast master to survival a bad change to be honest
WoW classes do not exist in WC3. They won’t change abilities. They won’t turn Kael’thas into a pure Arcane Mage with shields and chain lightnings.
Probably not, because it never was explained in WC3 anyway, only in the manual.
What do you mean? Plaguelands, undead attacks on capitals, the ‘plague’ event.
With how big of a threat the being that merged Arthas and Ner’zhul in itself was, anything short of a Cataclysm-esque (or even Cata+BfA) event wwould have been a disgrace to the lore of WC3. And it was.
A week-long pre-launch event? Seriously? I would expect Nordrassil 2.0. With the help from all the dragonflights (instead of Malygos going cray). And maybe with the indirect help from the Burning Legion itself! What a great way to bring up Mal'Ganis' return, oh my.
That all coupled with the literal destruction of Stormwind and Orgrimmar. And Night Elves joining the Alliance and the Horde again. And the Forsaken stabbing Arthas in the back when he least expects it…
Meanwhile, WoW lore LUL
Arthas was just a way for Ner’Zhul to get up from his frozen stool and get to the next stage of his plans. I dunno where you got the idea that this ‘being’ presents some sort of immediate apocalyptic danger.
Well, for me, this entire storyline didn’t translate well into the static MMO format. Which is a problem unto itself.
After TFT - and all this build-up of how all-powerful the Lich King is now, we catch up to him in WotLK… and he’s still sitting on this bloody Frozen Throne 5 years later doing absolutely nothing. And afterwards he goes out like a chump. Not to mention that, somehow WoTLK Arthas wasn’t actually nearly as threatening or competent as his WC3 counterpart. And he should have been. But that’s just my feelings.
Honestly, in order to make it work after TFT, WotLK should have been this landscape-changing event similar to Cataclysm, when all Azeroth is being redefined. But I guess I know why Blizzard did what they did.
And as someone who actually missed the event - I actually started playing WOW “seriously” a year after WoTLK premiered - it felt rather anticlimactic.
Last time the Scourge were on the move, they killed Lordaeron, Dalaran and Quel’Thalas. That’s like nuking 80% of the civilized world.
Then they had an independence war. And a civil war. And the war against the Illidari.
But the moment they turned their attention towards the puny, weakened mortals, that would be some serious danger.
Instead we got father is it over
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was not Varian in northrend befor wotlk and come back to send us to northrend with bolvar and others
It certainly wasn’t the last time Scourge was on the move, and it’s not 80%. Many Lordaeron people survived, and there are still southern kingdoms, Ironforge, Jaina’s expedition to Kalimdor and whatnot.
And to be honest, warcraft never was ‘epic’ and over the top with its villains, again until cata.
What do you mean nothing, he built Icecrown Citadel, conquered Northrend, sent agents even as far as southern Kalimdor, kept spreading the plague over Lordaeron, etc etc.
Arthas’ actions in WC3 weren’t about genocide, he was making pinpoint strikes, taking what he needed to gain strength, resurrect Kel’Thuzad, summon Archimonde, etc. And he had dreadlords and other demons in allies. Scourge after TFT is different Scourge and Arthas/Lich King is different, too.
If they change Lost Ones into Broken and destroy Broken Isles like they did in WoW , the reforged will lost it’s whole point ‘being a WC III remaster’
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Honestly, it’s just a matter of naming units differently, if you really want to be 100% accurate with WoW lore, and it’s not all that necessary in the first place.
I am replaying RoC campaign right now - and it holds surprisingly well “lorewise” so I legitimately don’t think that Blizzard is going to rewrite the entire campaign just to fit the “WoW lore”. It’s a prequel after all.
Probably, they’ll just add some WoW easter eggs, slightly change map layout (like they did with Stratholme - and to be honest some maps in the vanilla campaign needed some slight tweaking), change Tyrande’s hair color (again), and make some events play out in a more “cinematic” way - like the “creation” of Sylvanas for instance. I actually missed that event first time I played the Undead campaign - beacuse destroying Sylvanas’ base is an optional task and I couldn’t be bothered and went straight to the Sunwell. So until the very end of the vanilla campaign it kept bothering me what the hell happened to that annoying elf Ranger that the game spent so much time building up.
We’ll see how it turns out, but I’ll give them a benefit of doubt - I think they know what they are doing for the most part.
And for the record - if Blizzard messes up Reforged, I’ll be the first one to sent assassins after them.
Yeah small tweaks and easter eggs are always welcome if they don’t change original concept arts for models and places
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To be fair, there were a lot of “shortcuts” used for models and places - a lot of different - plot important - units shared the same model. There was no model difference between Tyrande and default Priestess of the Moon, and Shandris was just a reskinned Elf Ranger.
And some of them were borderline messed up - Human Archmage Hero in Quel’Thalas - huh?
Dalaran and Quel’Thalas looked rather unimpressive and shared stock objects with each other. Everything about Quel’Thalas screamed “reskinned human city” (for obvious reasons, but still). Draenei in WC3 share building models with Orcs. And Black Citadel was just a mess of doodads thrown around at random.
It was all beacuse of very limited model palette in WC3.
So, if Blizzard, let’s say, tries to make all those places and units look more distinct - even if it puts them more in line “with WoW lore”, I’ll take it. Map changes and all.
And I’m not really bothered whether the place will be called Black Temple or Black Citadel or whether character X sports model more similar to WC 3 or WOW.
I’m okay with a few quotes added (like Christie Golden said in one of the interview), but nothing more. Look at Illidan for example in WC3 and WoW. Do we want WoW in WC3? WoW is different game, made by different people, that did not care much about whole WC3 lore, geography and content. Do we want Sunwell inside Silvermoon, or in island? Do we want Vandermar Village to be Deathknell (but in different place on map) or simply do not existing? Those are just a few problems. Some of them can be resolve or explained in some way in Reforge, some of them not exactly. With geography like Stratholme or Silvermoon - I’m ok with some changes, but I’m against with characters and overall major lore changes in WC3 Reforged - just because WoW and other ideas for characters and how they “Evolved” in WoW.
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It was in the Sunwell Grove in WC3. For me, the in-game terrain has never been the authority on the lore.
https://wow.gamepedia.com/File:WC3-U05.jpg
What am I supposed to see there?
Again, the most contradicting thing between WOW and WC3 is Broken Isles and Suramar lore. Everything else is just small geography changes.