Honestly, I don’t mind it. It’s not like they’re going to suddenly change the lore in Classic Warcraft 3 after this goes live, and I doubt they’ll stop updating that one cos there’s definitely people that will prefer it.
Let the people who prefer an updated Warcraft 3 have the lore in Reforged, and the people who want the classic lore have Classic Warcraft 3. Options are good. It’s not hurting anyone.
The reason is because WoW is the continuation of Warcraft 3, and has been treated as the established lore afterwards for the last 14 years. It is the latest iteration of Warcraft lore and therefore is the most updated and what is currently canon. That is irrefutable fact - what is canon is established as canon. Due to this, I believe that Warcraft 3 Reforged should be updated to the current canon and to reflect the lore as it is seen officially at this point in time. Others can argue they want a 1:1 translation from the original, and that is another argument altogether.
That being said, you can choose what you like or not or what you like to attribute as your own personal canon. Nobody is stopping you from choosing not to acknowledge any of the World of Warcraft lore - it is well within your right to do so. Just as the same it would have been for me if I decide to not acknowledge Frozen Throne as a canonical sequel to Reign of Chaos, and that Arthas never became the Lich King, and Sylvanas is still just a banshee. But what I believe does not change what actually did happen or is established currently as canon, and it would be absurd of me to hold others to my own personal canon when there is a soundly established one.
TL:DR, you are free to dislike WoW lore or the direction of the story/aesthetics that the Warcraft universe has taken, but that doesn’t stop it from having happened and if Reforged is to be updated in anyway at all aside from a pure translation, it should reflect the state of the current canon.
As for this your worry about trashing the campaign, I was more thinking of just adding easter eggs or encounters that were added in the story afterwards, such as Arthas’ duel with Anasterian Sunstrider instead of him just never appearing at all within the story. I do not think that the story should be changed, just things added in such as the aforementioned Anasterian duel, and maybe change the names of the Captains following Arthas to Falric and Marwyn (as those are their canonical names from WoW). I do not think the story beats will be changed, and the way I envision the campaign going would just have many small additions and details, but keeping the plot of the campaign the same.
For your very last statement of Warcraft 4, I honestly do not think we have a snowball’s chance in hell of a Warcraft 4 while WoW is ongoing, and to me, this Warcraft 3 Reforged is the closest we’ll see to Warcraft 4 - which is why I want as much stuff added to this as possible. In lieu of a proper sequel, I rather they just keep expanding on a game I already love and add more content. Of course, if we can have a Warcraft 4 I’d be giddy as hell for that, but I just genuinely do not believe it a possibility in the foreseeable future.
This is about where I’m standing, too. And I’m saying this as a “Warcraft 3 lore purist.”
While I agree that the odds are (probably) worse than 100 to 1, if you retcon Wc3 into WoW-the-RTS, the chances of a Wc4 (and that it would be worth playing) will be as close to 0 as possible.
This doesn’t answer my question though. Warcraft 3 is older than WoW sure, but it’s literally WoW that’s breaking it’s own source-canon. Warcraft 3 had nothing to do with their stylistic choices (probably based on gameplay constraints if we’re being honest.) So suddenly by breaking the canon, now all the source material before needs to bend over backwards to accommodate those changes, rather than just admitting WoW messed up/changed things that were outside of it’s scope? I’m not arguing that WoW is non-canon, I’m saying that their canonical mistakes don’t need to be transplanted into Wc3’s story just for WoW to have a slightly more coherent storyline.
I’m fine with small details being added, like having named characters instead of just “Captain,” or having Anasterian as a unit in some secret’ish off-the-track area in a mission, much like most other Easter Eggs. This literally comes down to, if we have to go back and retcon source material to match current writers additions, we’re going to have to end up having a Wc2 reforged, and possibly a Wc1 depending on how much more they mess with the timelines. (Which they won’t get, because Wc2 is effectively as good as dead, and no one plays Wc1. So that leaves us with timeline inconsistencies anyways if you adopt all of the WoW additions to the storylines).
TL;DR - In my mind, if they’re going to try to make things match, they’d have to put in way more work than just a Wc3 Reforging to fix all their problems, so the point for canonical consistency is more-or-less moot as an argument, because you wont get it by just changing Wc3 lore anyways.
Unfortunately, my friend, as much as I do prefer original Warcraft 3’s lore I have to side with the pro-changers on this. Blizzard already has three entire books, one of which covers Warcraft 3’s campaigns in some detail, that do some retcons/cleaning-up of Warcraft’s lore as a series. People who have these books, and then play Warcraft 3 Reforged, will end up complaining to Blizzard about not being able to keep their own lore straight.
Ironic, isn’t it?
Honestly, I like having options, so if I’m ever in a purist mood (I’ve had them before) I’ll go back to Classic Warcraft 3. If I’m in the mood for a version of Warcraft 3 that’s currently tied closer to the only MMO I actually play? I’ll play Reforged.
It’s really not that big a deal, tbh. As much as they say the classic fans are the target audience… we’re really not. At least, not all of us.
Besides, I doubt Blizz is gonna go completely apesh*t with the retcons anyway. Chronicle Volume 3 certainly didn’t when describing Warcraft 3. We’ll probably just get cameos, redesigned levels where needed, etc. The actual story/plot still hasn’t changed.
FilthyCasual basically summarized my thoughts as well. The presence of the original campaign being there if I ever feel like getting extremely nostalgic is enough of a safety net for me to want Reforged to actually be a bit more different in the ways mentioned before - cameos, redesigned levels, maybe a new few voice lines or interactions. I really liked the book version of Kael’thas and Arthas bantering in their final battle where Arthas mocks Kael’thas by saying how he took Jaina from her.
A lot of folks seem to be coming out against “retconning WoW content into Warcraft 3”, but I honestly do feel like a lot of folks just might be missing the point.
For example writer Christie Golden said they “wanted to add more voice to some popular WoW heroes/villains who didn’t get much spotlight”. I interpreted that to mean something as innocuous as them intending to say, give Sylvanas a few more lines, now that she’s currently Warchief of the Horde, as opposed to a minor sidestory as she was in WC3. Or maybe Jaina will get a few more lines of flirting with Arthas, to show how far she’s come from being a naive schoolgirl, to now being a battle-hardened major Alliance leader.
Besides, the Old/New button being discussed should allow players to pick and choose what they like… so everyone is a winner 
I honestly found that both really creepy, and mildly disturbing from the books. I mean, Kael is over 100, and creeping on Jaina the whole time. I vastly preferred Wc3’s story, where Jaina was less fetishized, and the romance was far more subtle. Jaina’s attraction to Arthas in the actual campaign is effectively a footnote, which makes it so much better since the story isn’t really about Jaina or Arthas. They’re just two of the many characters that are caught up in these stories.
While you say this, I think that Grubby makes some fair counter points:
I find myself agreeing with his sentiments, and that as a core community player (I’d say I am, as I’ve played regularly from launch of TFT till today), it seems that tailoring the game towards these more casual people for the franchise is not necessarily a good thing. Attracting new people to the game is a great initiative, I just don’t believe you should alienate core community members in order to do so. (Although it’s my opinion that the people who would complain about Wc3 not matching their WoW experience would complain about the game for a variety of other reasons anyways. Whether that be the unit blocking, upkeep, or otherwise.)
This just goes back to my earlier statement. There’s no real justification for these changes beyond WoW players being upset that the source material doesn’t match what they’re told in their game. It’s fine “wanting options,” but then I’d have to counter with, why not add these in as side-campaigns? There’s no real reason that they need to redo the entirety of the campaigns to fit in all these extra things, when many of the encounters could be tied into single one-off side missions and do little-to-nothing to actually advance the plot (like Arthas’s encounters with Anasterian). While they’re nice to round out the characters, often the OG authors have very different visions of characters from their Wc3 persona, and clearly this often bleeds through into their writings. Take Freky’s Kael vs Arthas banter for instance. The Wc3 Death Knight Arthas was too far gone at that point to really give a s**t about Kael, or trying to mock him. Kael was just another enemy standing between him and the Frozen Throne. The frigidness and uncaringness of Arthas’s character mimicked the landscape of Northerend and the Icecrown Citadel. You don’t really continue his character arc (the slow decay of his personality as Frostmourne takes more and more of his quirks/individuality from him) when he’s that lively of a character. If anything it undermines his whole original persona.
Once again, I’m not saying superficial changes are a bad thing, but subtle changes to characters can have a huge impact. (The Reforged Culling had Arthas say “Forgive me Father,” before commencing with the Purge. A line that did not exist in the original, and imo significantly effects the feel of the story. Arthas was still a Chaotic Good character at this point, where the ends justify the means. Him asking for forgiveness clearly undermines the ambiguity and persona of the original Arthas, as it implies he has guilt about the actions he’s about to do.)
TL;DR - These minor changes amount to a vastly different feeling of campaign, and effectively change the characters persona. Those sorts of changes to a characters persona I’d categorize as a “major” change to the Campaign, as a lot of the storytelling is based on atmosphere and character interactions.
Well, this argument could go even farther to past. By your logic Warcraft 3 broke Warcraft 1 and 2’s source material. Was that also bad? Imo, I don’t see what’s the fuzz about. We are literally talking about making the maps look a bit more familiar if you played WoW and changing the captain’s name to a proper one. Nothing has really broken the Warcraft 3’s story in any way.
has it been confirmed that everybody will get the original WC3? Even if you never owned the original?
The broken Draenei (is that what they are called?) were the original Draenei both in WC3 and Classic WoW. Only in TBC did they retcon the Draenei to look more like the Eredar. But the Broken Draenei were still around. Akama is a broken Draenei in the Black Temple raid in BC. So I just hope they won’t add any of the retconed Draenei in. It’s unnecessary and shouldn’t happen.
Naw, there are three types of Draenei come TBC. The uncorrupted ones that became the playable race, the old ones which are now called the “Lost Ones” (they are so corrupted they have lost their minds) and the Broken, which are in between uncorrupted and fully corrupted. Those are the ones the Akama and his kin are, and they look different than the models in TFT. I think that their models should be updated to reflect that. If anything, he looks more monstrous and creepy, it’s similar to the old model except he has tentacles and is more stout instead of lanky.
amen… im worried that they will change it too much 
Well I love that the campaign is changed in Reforge to fit WoW because Warcraft III whas in my openion the first real try to make the Lore of Warcraft III bigger and more meaningfull then Orcs vs Humans. In my opinion, it is shown, that they still where trying to sort out how to tell the story. Now they are older and wiser and in my opinion this reflects the fact, that this is not anymore Classic WoW which has a carefull story because they original wanted to continue to tell another story in Warcraft IV. No now they fully made WoW as part of Story and Canon and so it is good that now in Reforging they remake Warcraft III so how it is now from story telling.
From everything that Ive understood, they are definitely not making big lore changes to Reforged…the only thing they are adding is apparently some voice-lines in re-recorded dialogue and ofc change some layouts of the maps to reflect more the landscape that WoW players are familiar with.
Both in my opinion are welcome additions, AS LONG AS we are able to choose the old/original voice-acting along with the new graphics/visuals. While in my opinion Jaina’s and Sylvana’s voice actresses from World of Warcraft are really good replacements of their original ones from Warcraft III, I could never, ever listen to replacement of Arthas and Illidan, Justin Gross especially will ever be the the only voice of Arthas for me personally.
Anyhow as for what comes to Warcraft IV and escpecially the chances of Blizzard retcon Warcraft IV entirely from World of Warcraft (that honestly would solve all their problems in regards of current lore and trying to make WoW and Warcraft IV co-exist together, which is next to impossible thing to do, unless they would make that decision to set Warcraft IV into completely alternative timeline/universe) have always been very slim indeed.
That ofc would be the dream for most of us Warcraft RTS fans who seem to agree largerly that that World of Warcraft has done to the lore, characters and story is for most parts utter garbage (there have been some highlights here and there, which is why I really have hate&love relationship with that blasted MMO)…and the worst case scenario for us would be Warcraft IV that completely ignores everyone who hasnt played WoW and everyone of its freaking expansions, leaving those of us not familiar with the most recent turn of events completely blind and lost, with nearly all our favorite characters from Warcraft III dead and gone. (Its already easy to see that Sylvanas is the next one getting axed from Warcraft universe and its only a matter of time before they bring back Lich King 2.0 (Bolvar), cause they are running out of the villains to kill)
So ye, the only scenario where I would want to even see Warcraft IV is that if it ignores WoW’s events and storyline completely and just continues on its own path from Warcaft III: TFT. The only other compromise I could think of would be if Warcraft IV would retell more or less the same events as WoW has done, but from different perspectives…propably the most boring choice that neither WoW fans (those who care about the lore) wouldnt want, and most of us WC3 fans wouldnt want.
So while retcon Warcraft IV from WoW would surely piss off some WoW lore fans as well, and while its still really unlikely to happen for Blizzard to run 2 different timelines, it would give Blizzard entirely free hands with storyline of Warcraft IV while also not interfering with WoW’s storyline and thus majority of both WoW fans and Warcraft RTS fans would be happy. The fact that they already had timetravelling and alternative timeline in Warlords of Draenor would also perhaps make it more “acceptable” idea for those who might initally resist such an idea
Anyhow sorry about my rambling, its quite useless to even speculate about such things since I really doubt we are ever going to see Warcraft IV in the first place, World of Warcraft unfortunately made sure of that…I just hope this remaster is going to be great experience and that they will give us the option to have the original voice acting with remastered graphics.
And I hope to see some of you next year in some of my favorite custom game maps like Uther’s Party and Darwin’s Island…dont know if anyone here even ever played those, I personally was never fan of DOTA for example ![:smile:](https://dou48tnq0ocoa.cloudfront.net/en/warcraft3/images/emoji/twitter/smile.png?v=6" ":smile:")
They’ve already confirmed that they will be using new voice lines, and potentially new music as well.
Well ye but Im hearing mixed information about whether or not we will be able to select old voice acting as well if we so choose…some people are saying that it is possible to do so along combined with new graphics, while some say that old voice acting will only remain with the original version…
So this is something that Im waiting them or some-one else here to clarify.
According to Grubby, he did a Vlog about his Blizzcon time and when he was talking with the devs.
But it did exist in 2002. You can hear it for yourself if you bring Arthas to the statue of Terenas - asmittedly, that statue is in the middle of the city, if I’m not mistaken, next to the zoo, so not many players noticed it.
wow gamepedia com/The_Culling_(WC3_Human)
Ironic that you went on on such a tirade against the original…
Except that’s literally in the middle of him doing it, not before commencing with the Purge.
I misspoke, clearly the line exists, its deliverance was just bumped forward. Thank you for the clarification.