100%.
I’m out, I’m done.
I think the countdown to my burnout began with the Genocide of the Night Elves, and has been ticking since. I like Shadowlands, it’s supposedly setting-ruining lore changes don’t bother me at beyond some of them either being toxic (anything related to Elune and BfA) or silly (Jailor), but Blizz’s non-handling of the Genocide (capitalized for being only the most recent of many, sadly) and the irony of having restored the Forsaken capital (with my main a Kaldorei Survivor of the Burning no less!) already was as much of this I could handle, and now everybody’s getting Warlocks.
I’m kind of stunned. The amount of out of touch this kind of choice requires is incomprehensible. How does Blizzard not understand how seriously we take class and species separations? It’s a great and crucial bit of world detail.
Take Trolls. All troll cultures taken as a single whole trolls have every possible class tradition because their culture is so utterly varied and ancient. They have zero taboos against any form of practice or power and are as highly attuned to cosmic forces and nature as anyone. The only exception is the Paladin, and that is because it’s so new (Zandalari Free Thinkers weren’t Paladins) to a mélange of cultures many millennia old.
Perfect. Perfect little bit of implied but not stated detail. Things work certain ways based on the traditions and encounters and prejudices of each give people. Night Elves shunned Arcane Magic and still only barely tolerate mages. Blood Elves, originally at least, didn’t have Warriors because rage and brute violence are the tools of the primitive. Orcs don’t produce Druids. Why? Because obedience to the Emerald Dream requires obedience and the Orcs obey no power greater than themselves. They don’t worship gods they eat them. Dwarves and Goblins have very similar extractive views of the world: they don’t worship or obey nature they dominate it. They are split much more on how they relate ie Dwarves enjoy the variety and intensity of the natural world and goblins would rather sit in a flash bar and brag about their wealth.
This is all excellent material, and subtly arranged too. I wouldn’t at all claim everything is so deft, but enough of it is that it built a world I, and millions of others, fell in love with. That is, no exaggeration, what defines art. And now it’s being tossed away piece by piece.
For Warlocks. The villain class. That is the crucial hook. Nobody cared about Dwarves becoming Shaman. Nobody cared about Blood Elves becoming Warriors. Nobody cared about Forsaken becoming Hunters. Why? Because most classes have no moral component. They’re jobs you do or traditions you practice and rarely ever mean anything beyond service or ambition or empowerment or wealth or whatever.
Warlocks are an exception. Warlocks are deliberately demonstrated as being cruel, traitorous, reckless, and exploitative. Warlocks are the class that enslaves other sapients because they need something to get stabbed and choked and burned so they can go unharmed.
Whether or not The Light ends up being AKSHULLY ETHICALLY NEUTRAL YOU GUIZ GROW UP THIS IS REAL ADULT STORYTELLING NOTHING MORALLY ABSOLUTE EXISTS IN A FANTASY GAME LOLMAO Warlocks are unreservedly villainous. And this is good, this is fine. There’s a place for that and there should be.
And some cultures should KoS them. Because it makes sense for them as core identity concept.
In some way what’s even more troubling is the lack of confidence this implies. WoW’s last few expansions (minus BfA) have been good! Shadowlands was excellent
-A prediction: just like how now Pandaria isn’t popularly despised for supposedly being one endless Kung-Fu Panda joke like it once was Shadowlands will be adored by players for it’s depth, artistry, smart designs and sheer amount of heart. Shadowlands will age very well, with the few stumbling blocks being it’s ties to BfA because because Battle for Azeroth SMURFED up so much of the settting-
-and Dragonflight is wonderful. WoW’s only real persistent problems are generally related to it’s age, the clumsiness of it’s engine, and how it’s update and expansion schedule hamper any kind of broad update projects and expansion of previous features like the Keep system of Warlords. Clearly WoW needs a 2 after it or an FF14 style revamp, clearly nobody is going throw the billions (and more importantly years of time) at this idea that it needs.
So it goes, and now, so go I.
Seeya Blizz. Thanks for all the fun. We always believed nothing could kill you except you, and it looks like we were right. You’ve been leaning on Sunk Cost Habits entirely too hard for too long, and it’s time we parted ways. I’m not just sick and tired of choices like this one, I’m sick and tired of caring around those choices. I am too old, my college years are too far behind me, and while I enjoy much of what is when I stop and look at what things are (making gold, leveling alts, tracking my iLevel!) I can’t escape seeing how much of my life I’ve wasted doing so.
Before BfA I never cared, but you’ve finally convinced me I should. Thanks for such a bitter gift. Try to bring my people home before you sunset the servers, ok?
