It’s that age old problem that the game has had for some time:
Too many big story events are relegated to media outside of the games.
If you have even a passing knowledge of half the things Anduin witnessed in his life from a young age, his current mental state begins to make a ton more sense. His imprisonment/mind control in the Shadowlands/Maw was really the last straw in a long line of events.
The average casual player however? Well, if they were around for MoP, they might know he nearly got killed by Garrosh, but they’d likely blow that off.
“Big deal! Multiple major lore characters have nearly died multiple times over!”
Past that, their mindset likely runs along the lines of “Oh, he’s just sad that Wrathion’s actions indirectly/inadvertently got his daddy killed. He’s such a mopey little brat. He only got mind controlled for a little while and I didn’t see him kill anyone on screen. What the hell’s his problem?”
Look, Blizzard is a business, and they alongside their various publishing partners are trying to run a business and make money. I get that.
It’s inexcusable to have what feels like every last drop of important lore outside of the games. There have been too many cases of players not understanding key story beats due to that info not being front and center. Hell, multiple people have now said that some of the odd things with the story in Dragonflight begin to make a ton more sense once you read War of the Scaleborn.
I’m not going to say don’t write Warcraft novels, but if something in one of those novels is a major plot point that would make understanding a certain course of action or character in the game much easier, then they’ve got to give some serious thought towards making that info accessible in some manner in the game.
Show of hands: how many of you here realize that Fyrakk is Alexstrasza’s cousin? I’m going to guess not many.
That last tidbit right there is the sort of thing I’m talking about. It would make some moments in the expansion far more impactful and meaningful if a piece of information like that was front and center in the actual game.