So this week my gf wanted to try wow and is really enjoying it. I decided to level an alt alongside her to help her learn the game and see what new players are exposed to story/lore wise. While leveling through BFA it occurred to me that because new players go exiles reach>bfa>SL they are completely unaware of the major icons that define world of warcraft. For the most part in pre-bfa expansions most new players still experienced or learned to an extent what the burning legion, titans, scarlet crusade, and scourge was, who arthas, deathwing, and illidan are, what ICC or black temple are etc. I feel like I have completely no idea how to explain to her in a few levels why we are going from a troll-infested swamp to entering the afterlife, and who all these cosmic people are etc. I also feel confused as to how I’m going to explain all the old stuff that defines wow, like all of the previously mentioned places and characters, since new players no longer are exposed to them. I know the obvious answer is to make her watch one of those 5 hour YouTube videos about lore, but I feel that would be really overwhelming to someone brand new.
tldr: How do brand new players learn iconic wow characters, culture, and lore with it being absent from BFA and shadowlands?
3 Likes
You really don’t. You let them come across it organically.
As for the story, tell her that WoW does not do what the superior MMO on the market, FFXIV, does and have a proper Main Story Quest. In FFXIV, you go through the entire main campaign from Vanilla to the current expansion so you know the events and lore characters and see their entire arcs.
WoW does not do this and instead throws you into the story without giving you any real context and the lore for WoW is really so rich it just can’t be explained with any kind of justice in a cliff notes setting.
So best to just let her play and encourage her to go back to past expansions and play them to fill in those gaps bit by bit.
4 Likes
I played WoW for quite a while without having any real idea about lore. Every once in a while I’d find inklings of something interesting and I get caught up with a video from Nobbel87
2 Likes
Agreed and thats what I think is the problem with the new player experience. Dont get me wrong, exilies reach and fast leveling I think is really good for the game but new players are just not really exposed to the old stuff anymore in the new process and thus cant really organically come across it.
1 Like
Once again an example of why I think starting new players in BfA was a huge mistake.
4 Likes
She can read through Chronicles if she’s a reader.
If you don’t want to drop $90, I’m sure if you were to Google something like “read warcraft chronicles online” you would find a solution to your problems.
Its more about piecing it together IMO. I think it was a good idea for Blizzard to make newer players to start BFA and learn what happened before they’re thrown to Shadowlands (For better or worse ultimately) because the events before these expansions are irrelevant. Its why Timewalking with Chromie exists for players to learn more of what happened before and what also left up to today’s expansions.
Although Shadowlands will be the most confusing because of how it is and without more back tracking to figure out where and why certain NPCs are involved and why they are this way now.
Hehe, trying to start a fire eh?
1 Like
This game isn’t successful because of the culture, story, or characters. It’s successful because of M+ and raiding.
So say that.
I’m gonna pull an FFXIV player here. WoW isn’t necessarily about the story. If you want that, go play FFXIV which forces guides players through a story from 1 to max level.
I too played WoW without knowing anything about the story. It wasn’t until way later on that I engaged with the lore. There’s a good chance most of us oldies are like that.
1 Like
Well it is simple, you download the trail version of this game ( because some “should you play wow” video on youtube suggested that anyone who is thinking about getting into wow should play 1-20 trail version and see if they like the game, so that’s what you do.)
So there you are, questing in barrens, something about collecting 8 plainstider beaks, and probably killing 80 plainstriders only to get 5 plainstider beak, all the while thinking to yourself “why do some plainstiders have beaks and some don’t? What dark sorcery is this?!” But then you remember your first day in WOW where you were collecting apples from cactus plants and realize nothing in wow makes sense. Or maybe those are the perfect quests to show new players what’s in store for them in the future if they choose to play wow.
1 Like
Just the truth. I like WoW, but I’d be lying if I said it hasn’t fallen far from grace and these days, it needs to “borrow” more from it’s competitor than the competitor needs from WoW
While I agree that wow isnt story driven like other games, I’m not really saying new players should level through every tiny quest, arc, and dungeon to understand the world either. I think its a weird situation for a new player that the big “when you say warcraft you think of x” people and places are basically completely absent from the new player experience. Might be nice to have some sort of major events in wows history flashback cutscenes for new players to get at least a little gist or summary.
I strongly disagree, and would appreciate if you’d phrase your views as an opinion as they rightly are.
In my very personal opinion, WoW has fallen from grace surely, but it’s still the better “game” overall. That’s how much FFXIV needs to take risks.
This is a little bit like if you had a friend who had never watched Game of Thrones, and after Season 8, were like, “how can I get my friend into Game of Thrones?”
1 Like
They’re not irrelevant. How can Wrath be irrelevant when Sylvanas is one of the main characters? How will a new player have any idea who Jaina is? Or Tyrande? Or literally any other NPCs? They’ll have no connection to any of them, so they’ll ultimately have little to no connection to the story they’re experiencing in BfA.
2 Likes
I was being pedantic towards FFXIV players. They’ll tell you to suck it up and enjoy their storyline even though it’s hours upon hours of forced content. Some people want that. Some people don’t. Square appeased those that don’t by a “paid” storyline skip option. It’s a copout maneuver that will have you shunned by the player base.
The flipside for WoW would be “suck it up and enjoy no story.”
I agree we need some sort of story path. It should be completely optional too. That way WoW can appease the people who want it, and the people who don’t. I’m on the side of agreeing we definitely need it.
I imagine you explain it the same way my friends did when I was brand new In Cataclysm.
“It’s a game about leveling and gearing your character to make them as strong as possible, like Diablo”
(I was a big fan of Diablo at the time)
I was told that the lore is really interesting and to pay attention. But my friend was completely hands off from there, and only answered questions when I asked them.
Examples below:
“Are the Horde the bad guys?”
“Not Necessarily. They’ve had a rocky history, but they value freedom and honor above all else”
“Who’s the king of the Alliance?”
“Varian Wrynn, he’s a really brutal general, and he protects his people”
So on and so forth.
For every question I had until I was interested in the universe for myself
1 Like
You have to go watch hour long YouTube videos lol. It’s pretty dumb.
Don’t forget the books and comics.
1 Like