Hearthstone is just jokes and memes, i already played the meme xpac Cata and it was one of the worse xpacs
Wow is strongest in a xpac like mop, with a theme, a solid plot that is serious and some light jokes placed in the right spots not after horrible war crimes like they did in bfa
Wow has been super bad with tone, specially with dragonflight
Arugal isn’t a druid.
But since I know you’re better than this poor attempt to boil down everything to a single contextless quote, let’s address that elephant anyway.
Yes, a worgen heritage does have elements of ancient night elf prohibited druidism brought up, because that does happen to be the initial source of the curse. The fact it goes unmentioned in the “Gilnean heritage” quest, focusing solely on Goldrinn and not the people who wrongly tried to harness his ish, is missing a major part of the history.
But while the night elf druidic sect, and yes the Scythe of Elune, should be brought up, it all should end on Arugal. In fact, in this on-the-fly hypothetical chain I’m creating to liteally show you how incorrect you are that there’s no “heritage” for worgen to focus on, you could say…
Start things off with Tess being curious about what it means to be worgen. Same as we got, no notes.
Rather than bring Goldrinn into this, the PC and Tess visit Val’sharah to borrow the Scythe. Druids say sure, but it’s somehow lost again. Because of course it is. Last they heard, some moonkin druid ran off with it through the Emerald Dreamway, and we give chase.
Trail leads to Duskwood, because of course it does. We find the Boomkin is bringing AP back; Some shade or remnant of him exists, so we beat up the boomkin just in time for Alpha Prime’s shade to manifest, then run off to do stuff. Tess grabs the Scythe, feels the worgo power, feels the great strength, but also flinches in the face of the rage that comes with it. It’s just not for her. We grab the Scythe, and we get a bead on where Alpha went; north.
Obviously it’s Silverfang Keep. Alpha Prime’s taking it over, and we do a little scenario-dungeon. Genn joins us, him and Tess gossip about worgenism and crap, Genn admits to his role in Arugal summoning the worgen in the first place, Tess points out that while being naughty and summoning the bad is also bad, had they not had worgen, there wouldn’t be a Gilneas left.
Then we reach the end, beat up Alpha Prime, maybe a shade of Arugal appears for us to beat up too, happy days, we return the scythe to the druids.
And like… I’m not even a quest designer. I’m doing my weekly crafting quests and taking a couple minutes to come up with this. And somehow I’m putting together something that does address the heritage of the Gilnean worgen curse, that doesn’t say “being worgen bad and you should want to not be worgen” while plausibly giving a reason why every Gilnean doesn’t want to be a worgen.
If some forum amature can do this in under ten minutes, then yes. It’s possible.
There could have been a worgen heritage quest that isn’t about worgen=bad.
Everything about the Gilneas questline was so cringe and pathetic.
-Genn “I’m too emotional to reclaim Gilneas with those people” + terrible VA
-Scarlet Crusade pocket force as a challenge to the Gilneans- where are the Alliance forces? where are the night elves? Even without them, the Gilneans are numerous enough to crush them.
-Weird crown drop moment for Genn to hand Tess the throne
-Wall reference that made 0 sense (ooo I wall up because my feelies are hurt)
-sad reward
-Genn’s sudden complete lack of personality and grit
-human emphasis over worgen
-Genn disney-esque reply “you (Scarlets) the monsters not them (Forsaken)”
-They basically took over a cathedral and a single gate and call it Gilneas reclamation.!!
I’m so baffled by Blizzard’s insistence on tossing one or two NPCs into scenarios when the technology to populate the area with hundreds of NPCs to make it actually feel alive is trivial at this point.
They do it all the time, and it’s almost like they’re trolling everyone.
There was *checks notes * one night elf priestess, one night elf druid, one stormwind mage, and one stormwind guard guy
And how is what they did with the Gilneas Reclamation and Tess, a non cursed Gilnean,being the leader of Gilneas, about “struggling with the curse”?
On this thread still, since there is the whole horde or alliance bias, I am still struggling to jnderstand horde players.
Well, it’s not as if this has ever been explained ever before so I can understand your confusion!
They seem to hate content that has the horde antagonizing the Alliance because of “villain bat”
Actually two separate issues!
“horde is always the aggressor” is boring to both sides. The BfA cinemativemade it look like the Alliance was going on the offensive on Lordaeron, and you know what? Alliance and Horde players both thought that was nifty (then the actual content came out and uhhhhh barf)
The “Villain bat” is more a thing of Horde leaders always descending into irrational, world-ending, monomaniacal cartoons. “MWAHAHA NOW NO ONE CAN STOP ME!” stuff.
There’s plenty of room to write horde antagonism without outright “villainy.” if Blizzard can write elemental lizards with depth and compelling arguments for doing what they do, then why was it utterly impossible to write that for Sylvanas or Garrosh?
but also seem to hate any horde development towards living in peace and being a force of good?
Well, two reasons.
One, becuase Blizzard is garbage at writing that stuff, for either faction. It always comes off as hamfisted and preachy and deeply immersion-breaking. Like someone’s pounding your face agaisnt the script and going “GET IT?! DO YOU GET IT!? ITS LIKE PARABLE AND STUFF!”
Even when it’s not detestably preachy, it’s still… cringe. if I have to hear ANY character call out “CITIZENS OF AZEROTH!” one more time I might just drive down to Irvine and eat Chris Metzen’s car.
But hte bigger, more important, HORDE-SPECIFIC reason, is that it’s always imposed on top of the Horde. They do not develop these notions htemselves. it does not appear within a horde cultural context.
Huojin Pandaren not helping orcs channel rage into productivity
Bilgewater Goblins are not making Libertarian Non-Aggression Principle arguments against war.
Tauren are not taking the lead to direct the weapons of the horde agaisnt threats to the natural lifeblood of Kalimdor.
Vulpera are not spinning stories in the orphanages of the value of cunning and guile over brute face-pounding.
Orcs are not mounting hunting parties against the remaining festering pockets of Demons around Azeroth
etcs., etc. it’s entirely the whole horde just being told by Anduin or Callia or Velen “hey violence is bad and you should worship Fantasy Anglicanism just like us, your betters and naturally-born superior and civilized races,” and all the horde leaders going “Yeah Hey He’s Right!” in the most “Very special episode” way possible.
To quote Gordon Ramsay, Where’s the f’ing FLAVOR?!
Okay, whew. I missed this earlier, and as one of the advocates for better Horde (and Alliance!!!) storytelling, let me point out why neither of these are working for us Horde mains.
Both scenarios feel more about the Alliance than they do about the Horde.
When we’re the antagonists, the presentation is that we’re “going against our honor” and have to rally in the finale, join a rebellion, and fight against the same Horde leadership we’d just been gleefully committing war crimes for. We’re a bipolar element in the story with no coherent direction, defined solely by the fact we want to murder Blue until we want to help defeat ourselves beside Blue. We, the Horde, lose our identity entirely, just so we can regain it in the finale. We cease being Horde for a while and become the generic army-of-the-expansion, where no crime is too great or small.
That isn’t what we’re sold on as what being “of the Horde” is about. It’s not our story.
It’s the story of the Alliance being attacked, the Alliance fighting against a suddenly overwhelming enemy, only to push back the tide of darkness (us). The only change is that instead of doing so beside the Shattered Sun Offensive or the Ashen Verdict or whatever group is helping in the final push against the bad guy, this time that group is the Rebel Horde.
…
The whole “doing good to be good and have good things” story could work very well!!
Except… It’s also about the Alliance.
Gilneas is a great example, because we aren’t there to help liberate a city stolen from them by the Scarlets; to the contrary, the Scarlets being the enemies of the Gilneans comes out of nowhere, as plenty in this thread have said. No, we’re trying to give them back the city we stole from them. And… The major principle of that land-theft isn’t even there. So it’s some lady who was utterly involved in any of this mess acting like it’s her personal responsibility to help Genn have his city back.
And that would be cool!!
If it wasn’t the only time the Horde does good in the world this expansion.
Sure, you can say “Alynsa, you forgot all about how the Horde helps save Amirdrassil”, and that is correct, the Horde is also there too. Saving a world tree that will become a city. A night elf city. Because the last one was also taken by the Horde, and again the principle instigator of that land-razing is still not present to personally make amends. And instead, it’s a bunch of people whose involvement ranges from minimal to not even at all.
It’s the same situation, but with extra sets and an elevated stake of “the world is at risk”, but also with a much more diminished presence, only happening towards the very end.
Gilneas particularly feels hollow, because if this was truly the Horde making amends, they had what? A decade to say “Genn, sorry Sylvanas stole this from you, why not have it back?” And… Nah, we’ll just wait. So coming to boot the Scarlets out well after the time it would be relevant to make amends for that particular crime rings hollow.
But in the end, this isn’t a Horde story. Gilneas shouldn’t be a Horde story, nor does it feel like one. Helping the Alliance fix the Horde’s mistakes will always feel like Horde players shoehorned into an Alliance narrative.
Horde players who complain about the villain bat and the “doing good deeds for the Alliance” bat (?!? that needs a better catchphrase) are really complaining about one, single thing in both cases.
The Horde’s identity is too focused on what we’re doing with the Alliance right now, and not enough about what the Horde’s doing for itself.
I want to see the finished product of reclaiming Lordaeron, and not just the ruins.
I want to see Sen’jin village expanded.
I want to see what even the Horde council is doing when it’s not talking about Blue Team, and is trying to heal the internal wounds that plague the Horde.
I want to see stories of Strength. Stories about Honor. Stories about how this band of misfits and castoffs are coming together and making it work.
I want Horde stories for the Horde.
I don’t need more Horde stories for the Alliance.
EDIT: Also, still, much love to you Mad. This isn’t aimed at you, it’s just my frustrations and hopefully explaining why we feel how we feel about this story beat.
What are you talking about? You see the Alliance forces, You can even talk to Leoric to confirm the 7th Legion is there to help. There is an entire scene of them rushing the gates.(with literally ever Alliance present so no one can say “human potential” or whatever)
Also, we were told that we could crush them, but we would suffer a significant loss of life as well. Hence why the Forsaken does end up as a distraction.
Like, YES this is what happened. He was pissed off he didn’t end up benefiting from the Alliance like he was promised and that his people had also died from the Horde that he decided to wall himself off, even though it inevitably bite him. And now he is at a point in his life where he does regret it and even wonders the “what if I never walled off”. Lordaeron might actually have still stood and so could his son.
This has been a thing since Warcraft 3. That we should not be judging people based on their looks.
Side note: Probably the first time I hear the line but I never realized the lightforged has a “good fortune to the Alliance.” pretty nice.
What Calia did tells you the general Attitüde of the council.
I really cant reply to each individual post here on my horde question, so i thank you all for the insight, It was a really good read.
Bel’Ameth is neutral so the people who burned what it was made to replace can run around it, they feel us smacking around a forsaken splinter group is too offensive for Horde players to bare so we had to fight some random scarlets denying any degree of catharsis for worgen players not to mention the questline being written lame as hell. I get not liking Calia, I totally do, but you can’t act like the Alliance has won here.
Bruh she actively did not want to be in the line of succession, Genn was the main driving force for taking back Gilneas he basically IS the prototypical Gilnean, worgens still haven’t accepted being worgens and owned it and are now ruled by a non-worgen, characters like Ivar Bloodfang and Darius Crowley made zero appearances. It’s lame as hell.
Genn Greymane yells: Absolutely not! I forbid you to take such an action!Princess Tess Greymane says: If I am to one day lead our people, then I must understand their hardship. This is the only way.
Even if she did not want to lead(debatable at best because I dont recall any line from her stating as such) she always knew she would lead it. She was the rightful heir and if anything she was willing to sacrifice and be a worgen to understand her people.
Ivar was never going to be there, he at best has a tenuous alliance with Gilneas proper. As for Darius, he was there along with Laurna fighting in the courtyard.
Ivar absolutely should have been there, Gilneas is his kingdom, the Bloodfang are still Alliance-aligned as of Exploring EK and they’re central to the Worgen fantasy. Their absence is unjustifiable.
Three things prevent that, 1 they are almost feral. 2 they are probably are still smarming from when Darius sacrifice their position for his daughter’s safety. 3 they have an undying hatred of undead, including forsaken. So no they were not going to be added.
You’re just listing all of the things that would have made them interesting to be there.
^basically this lol
What are you talking about? Ivar and his pack travelled all the way to Darkshore and fought alongside Alliance members against the Forsaken, long after the Silverpine event…
Genn also didn’t want the Forsaken there but he decided to turn a blind eye because he was about to reclaim his kingdom. There is absolutely no excuse for Ivar to not be present.
Saying “The worgen should be ruled by a worgen” and “Tess doesn’t need to be a worgen” are not contradictory statements.