It’s stupid because she was nowhere to be seen in the time she could have actually helped “her people” when the Alliance were keen on retaking Lordaeron. She only shows up after we get Anduin, who doesn’t view The Forsaken as monsters, which completely undercuts the central tension of Forsaken as a race.
It’s made stupid further because The Forsaken have been lockstep with Sylvanas in being Scourge 2.0 after Before The Storm takes place, which means that after the world at large acknowledged them as being people instead of monsters. . . they start acting like monsters. It’s a whole mound of stupid.
Thats the thing. Im not arguing against canon. Im arguing that the canon is poor design. Its a shallow narrative that requires more. It is a circumstance where retcon is required, and I dont mean changes to the lore, but additions that provide retroactive continuity.
If a narrative designer looks at the problems with Calia (which there are a few) and adresses them in narrative, then its not stupid. Until they do, its stupid.
To be fair, she was not raised to rule. The Lordaeronian culture, but men above women when it came to ruling the kingdom. That’s why Arthas was first in line for the throne and Calia was promised to Deathwing aka Prestor. The patriarchy of Lordaeron expected her to give birth to children and serve the crown.
In the book she has a conversation with Anduin and she was expressly never given that education. She was groomed to be at most a figurehead and she felt naive and unfit for the role as queen let alone lead the fractured kingdom.
Which is mostly, Blizzards fault…but also the nature of business.
That said, they do not have unlimited resources to cover and write for every aspect of lore that exists in the game. Blizzard has to pick and choose which characters and stories to focus on based on various factors including but not limited to: project hours, staffing hours, costs of art, costs of coding, and more.
None of this exists in a vacuum of free production. Every line, every quest, every script coded, every animation rendered, every voice acting line has a cost.
Blizzard picks and chooses which characters, and what content to spend money on based on limited resources. Countless characters and plots fall by the way-side as a result: that doesn’t make those characters less valid.
This is the nature of business. That does not change or invalidate Calia’s lore. Calia has existed in the MMO for 6 years now, and in canon lore 20+ years.
It’s not about invalidating her lore, it is about treating it as it has been presented. Her established lore is having nothing to do her people until Legion. You can’t convincingly present a character as sympathetic to people she ignored when her presence would have mattered.
I’m also not going to write Blizzard a blank check because they’re too dumb to hire someone competent with the most lucrative IP in their lineup. Other games with similar constraints and far more limited budgets do not suffer from these issues, so that notion is a copout at best. Given that they don’t complain about lack of resources themselves, that they are beaming with pride over where the story is going in interviews, and how they gush over how amazing characters their audience despise are, that take doesn’t even hold up to mild scrutiny.
The nature of business is serving the consumer. If that isn’t satisfied, business fails. About the only positive I’ve seen recently is that they’re looking outside the company for Creative Director and Lead Narrative positions, so that at least points to them confronting how bad things have become.
Throughout human history it is very normal for rulers to look a the burden and weight of the crown and feel unfit…because they are wise enough to understand the staggering responsibility of leading a nation. Feeling unfit, is wisdom in the face of a situation that is staggering in scope. The Crown of Menethil and Lordaeron is a heavy burden that should feel very intimidating. No one should feel ready for that responsibility.
While she may feel unfit, the reality is those raised in royal households are still raised around a culture of governess and leadership of a nation. Just because someone was not the crown heir, does not mean that they are not viewed as a backup heir to the crown.
A good real-world example to draw insight into is Henry the 8th. Henry the 8th as not intended to be King, he was the second son and 3rd child born of Henry the 7th and Elizabeth of York. The person destined for the Tudor throne was Arthur Tudor, 1st born son and 1st child of Henry the 7th and Elizabeth. Arthur was raised, groomed, and trained to be King.
Arthur died tragically in his teens, not yet King but as crown Prince. The crown then moved on to Henry the 8th. This situation is not unique to Henry the 8th, and was repeated many times throughout various cultures and points in human history.
Henry was not trained in his youth to be King, but was given training all the same on the sidelines in the event that he was the backup heir to the bloodline. This is a common and standard practice in royal bloodlines, that the other children are backup heirs in the event of the death of the crowned heir.
That said, Blizzard has not written too much on this matter. Obviously, this is not the real world - but we can look at real world modeling to have insight into the human condition and how royal life operates as a foundation for expectations.
TLDR - Calia would have most likely faced grooming and preparation, and she should feel intimidated by assuming the crown of Lordaeron.
The consumers scream in 20 directions at all times - they don’t have unlimited staff and funds to please every conflicting and contradicting demand pushed by the masses of the community. They have to pick and choose.
They do take in feedback, which is why so much content ends up cut short - which means things like…all that extra character development gets dropped. Look around Orobis, there is clearly lots of planned content for various figures including Calia and Baine. Now it is scrapped…which compounds the problems.
Calia is valid in canon lore. She is the best option. Moving forward we hope to see proper and better development for her.
Again, other games tackle the same issues without as much money and staff behind them. This is down to gross mismanagement and inept narrative work. They might get some leeway for Shadowlands itself, but this problem has been endemic to WoW since at least Cataclysm. If your story takes backseat to Rule of Cool, your story is compromised. If there’s “no negativity in the dojo” your story is compromised. If you change fundamental components of setting lore because it gets in the way of something you want to do, your story is compromised.
These problems aren’t the result of an impossible to please playerbase. That has existed since day one, and subscription numbers and faction pride still thrived. Contrast that with today, with subscriptions circling the drain and Alliance practically dead. You can’t dump that problem on the players. Even Blizzard have admitted outright that not listening to player feedback has been one of their biggest errors. So no, that excuse don’t fly.
Actually they’ve been endemic since basically the beginning. Blizzard has always played fast and loose with story, they just didn’t have as much lore to break when they changed things in Vanilla or TBC.
Metzen (along with Afrasiabi) were designing an MMORPG, in the spirit of the MMOs and MUDs that came before. The psychology they were leveraging was development philosophies designed to make the world as enjoyable as possible for the most amount of people, sometimes in spite of the whims of those people, who are often oblivious to what is making the experience fun, and how much they depend on the other people.
Slowly the design philosophies strayed from fun to casino psychology and creating compulsive behaviors. The narrative is now little more than a backdrop, instead of a part of the design. Its the background image on the video poker machine.
I’m perhaps the most outspoken critic of Sylvanas, in terms of Forsaken stans at least. I’ve argued she should’ve gone out like Scar in The Lion King, with the Forsaken playing the role of hyenas.
And I do not want Calia. Because she is a non character. I’ve argued for Lilian Voss as there’s a really interesting story there abouy a woman having to shepard the nation she was raised to destroy in their darkest hour. Plus she’s one of the first characters you meet in Tirisfal.
I main a Priest and forgot Calia was in Legion because she didnt make that much on an impression on me. I was initially at least more pleasantly disposed to the idea of her character. But it’s been 4 years and they’ve done nothing interesting with her.
Not to mention after BFA and Shadowlands I don’t want CDev touching anything I care about. I should be excited the Forsaken are returning to Tirisfal but all I feel is apprehension.
Most relevant to this discussion is that his particular vision presented us with race options and stories that drew people in and reinforced those unique racial identities. Today’s WoW actively seeks to undermine that vision so far as I can tell, and I view Calia (or rather, what I think is her apparent, intended purpose within the narrative) as another rung on that ladder.
…maybe, but I was more thinking she starts out just refuting the land claims of living Lordaeroneans (especially those who currently live nowhere near Lordaeron) in favor of Forsaken holders. You know, more like legal stuff.
“My father put it in his will that as his oldest child, I would inherit the family lumbermill when he died! Well, he did, so it’s mine now.”
“Son, I’m still right here, and I wrote that before we even knew there WAS such a thing as undeath!”
Dont get me wrong, the policy wonk in me would be elated to have an entire Episode 1 of policy debates based narrative. Im afraid it might be initially as popular as The Phantom Menace was the first time around, but at least you could keep the name the same.
It doesn’t make great gameplay, but from a story perspective, the best way to continue the conflict but prevent a resurgence of open war between the two factions is likely going to be lots of diplomatic legal social antics. This would most likely manifest as the Horde playing by the Alliance’s ‘civilized rules’ in the most self-serving and backstabby (but legal!) ways.
And you know what? I want the Horde’s primary legal advisor to be an Elderly Orc that took it upon himself soon after the 3rd war to study every Alliance law, because he knew that someday the Horde was going to be in a long protracted legal battle with the Alliance, and he wanted to be ready to meet with the Alliance’s greatest legal warriors on the field of judiciary battle. Lok’tar Ogar!
