First off the Arthas scenario was hella bugged for me. It seemed they just reused CoS for the scenario, but it was the heroic version. I had to reset because for some reason the Mal’Ganis kill didn’t register ( I was hitting for 19 mil so it probably bugged out ) but since it was heroic the kill was saved so I had to restart the whole lorewalking. The orb also did not work in Northrend so I had to reset that to, which actually brought me back to CoS.
Legit most of the scenarios was just reused content. Xal’atath was just the priest order hall stuff with the BFA quest chain and the only unique part was the end with the Old Gods, that was just the same area of the Nya’alotha we have been to in BFA and DF. The Ethereals was easily the worst because it was just the same quest lines from BC, Legion, and SL. It is very obvious this was hastily put together.
On another note, I find it hilarious that there was no mention of Zovaal or Arthas’s “end” in Shadowlands in the Arthas lorewalking. No mention of him turning in 35 Anima and no mention of Eternity’s End being the culmination of events since WC3. It really goes to show I think the writes actually despise those retcons yet they still had to hype it up way back in Shadowlands
I actually was expecting more of the Lich King lore walking… Since both Xal and the Ethereals had extra juicy new lore content at the end, if a bit too small for my liking… I was expecting the same of Lich King… But we got nothing, it literally felt unfinished.
Then again like you said it lead to Zovaal and the for the most part invalidation of the Lich King at the end of SL as an important Lore Character.
I was exited when they let you fight as the Lich King and how powerless the “Champions” really were in that fight…
I literally was exited or expecting some new lore that happened that we were not aware of connecting to the events happening now. But no it was just a recap…
I do hope we get “something” more later on. Feed my nerd lore hunger BLIZZZ!!! I’m starving!!
Yeah my main problem with the Arthas one is that it feels like nostalgia bait. It has no relevance to the current plot. At least the Xal’atath and Ethereal stuff has relevancy to the current and upcoming content with TWW. I feel the Arthas one would’ve felt that way too if they did include the Shadowlands stuff but only in how it relates to Anduin. Given that the fragment of his [Arthas] soul Frostmourne had stolen was what allowed Zovaal to control Anduin via Kingsmourne.
Because that way it would tie into Anduins crisis of faith that he experienced post encounter up to and including the moment he resurrects Khadgar.
My main annoyance with the arthas one is that aside from its lack of relevance Arthas is again removed from the horde plot in virtue of canonising jaina as the hall of reflection run
It is so silly how Blizzard is like “oh only one side is canon” but the dungeon journal for the escape from Arthas encounter literally says, “Two leaders sought to defeat the Lich King in single combat, but quickly learned that they were no match against the power of the one true king”.
Why say “two leaders” (i.e. Sylvanas and Jaina) if only one of them is actually canon?
it could be one of those things the devs can’t agree on so they keep going back and forth on it. only the alliance seems to be the more popular among the devs
Probably because Jaina has a more emotional attachment to Arthas. Given that they were former lovers and all.
Also Jaina is more familiar with Uther than Sylvanas. That being said, I would’ve liked it if it was a different person for the horde version talking to Sylvanas.
I think the Arthas questline was a good proof of concept for how Lorewalking could be used to tell compressed stories about Warcraft lore, even stories not directly linked to the current narrative. In that sense, I think it was done pretty well - it took existing in-game stories from across multiple expansions and stitched them together to make one single story, adding a tiny bit of new content to bridge over gaps.
If this is a trial run of making past WoW lore be explorable by new players in a way that doesn’t require them to run a full past expansion’s quests+dungeons+raids while sorting out the filler, then I think it’s great!
One reason I want Lorewalking to succeed is because I hope it can lead to more use/reference of past events in future lore. For example, one of my complaints about the Arathi scenario is that it deals in generics (‘human superiority’ instead of ‘the dwarves did [xyz], the elves did [abc], so we humans can only trust each other’, ‘obsess over a glorious past’ instead of ‘want to return to when the Arathi [did xyz feat] and [list of other specific feats]’) rather than going into detail (or even just name-dropping - the only specifics were ‘Thoradin’s wall exists’ and ‘Hammerfell was an internment camp and the orcs didn’t like it’).
I worry that this generic summary was done because the writers don’t think the audience will recognize or understand or care if they use specific lore references – and that’s a case where I hope Lorewalking could step in, to (re)introduce past lore so that the lore can get referenced, not just summarized, in future stories.
