Bastion, Ardenweald, and Revendreth all seem to serve a very clear purpose in the “machine” of Death. Bastion ferries souls into the Shadowlands, Ardenweald regrows souls fated for reincarnation (Wild Gods and etc.), Revendreth punishes naughty souls who would otherwise drop into the Maw. That all makes sense.
Maldraxxus makes no sense to me though. They “defend” the Shadowlands, supposedly? But how? We don’t see Maldraxxus soldiers keeping the peace in other realms outside their own, and even in their own realm they just spend all day fighting each other. If they protect the Shadowlands from external threats, what could those possibly be? The Legion? The Void Lords? Draka stole like one Legion missive, that’s about it for what we’ve been shown.
It just seems to me that Maldraxxus is the most useless realm of the major four. ESPECIALLY now that, in the Shadowlands’ time of need, Maldraxxus completely fell apart internally and started attacking other realms, like Bastion.
It’s like a guard dog that bites at its owner every day, but the owner puts up with it because “oh that dog is MEAN and SCARY, a few bites is a fair price to pay for such a good, mean guard dog!” but then when a robber actually breaks in, the dog poops itself and runs away.
Revendreth and bastion have been invaded by the light and void respectively. AFAIK maldraxxus did not help defend in either situation making them even worse
Maldraxxus came to Revendreth’s aid when the Light invaded, and Maldraxxus defended Bastion when the Void invaded, and again when the Devourers invaded. In both cases the portals were closed by the suicide of a given Paragon (Agthia of Courage for Void, Mercia of Humility for Devourers), and the remaining invaders were burged by the rest.
That was because of a coup d’etat leading to a coup d’epee.
Zovaal knew he needed to weaken Maldraxxus, so he sent Kel’Thuzad to become a Baron, usurp the Margrave of Rituals, destroy both the House of Plagues and House of Eyes, convince the House of Constructs to invade Bastion, and convince a Baron of the Chosen to betray everyone.
I’m pretty sure Maldraxxus, like Ardenweald, wasn’t part of the devs’ original plan for Shadowlands. It’s been speculated (has there been any official word about this?) that the original plan was “heaven” (Bastion + Ardenweald), “hell” (the Maw) and “purgatory” (Revendreth). Ardenweald was spun off into its own zone as “extra heaven,” and at some point Maldraxxus was added, but I think they started more with the aesthetic and had to figure out a job for it later.
This is the meta-truth, not the in-game truth. The devs admitted that originally Ardenweald and Bastion were going to be one giant zone, but they liked the concept art so much they made it its own zone.
Copeland Art Book from the collector’s edition confirms that Maldraxxus was part of the original plan of the First Ones.
I don’t know, I think some credit is due for Revendreth bringing the best aesthetic and most likeable leader. Sire Denathrius looks and talks like a drag queen out of her makeup who’s about to pay her ex a visit while his wife and kids are home.
LOL, Maldraxxus is less than useless! It seems to me the Shadowlands have lasted for millennia despite it, not because of it.
Okay, that makes them a little less worthless. I wish Blizzard put more effort into emphasizing what the purpose of Maldraxxus is, because the whole time I was questing there I would be dazzled by some cool hardcore metal DOOM display, but then ripped out of it when I thought for even a second why it matters.
The problem is the Shadowlands are presented as this grand cosmic machine, but then there’s all these useless frills, and as you go down the line it just unfurls faster and further.
Other things that boggle my mind: why is gold useful or needed? Why do animals and other creatures unaffiliated with the machine exist at all? They’re a waste of Anima. If Anima is what sustains life, why does food exist? Do the natives of the Shadowlands need to eat? What would happen to them if they were ever taken out of the Shadowlands? Oh god my brain! AAAUGH!
You’re overlooking Maldraxxus’s actual primary purpose: to give Warmongers something to do.
It’s a make-work program to keep the most dangerous and chaotic souls busy. Otherwise they’d either crowd up the Maw/Revendreth or just cause havoc in some other realm.
The Shadowlands is first and foremost about accommodation - it’s shaped by the souls coming into it. The realms being “useful” is secondary to this.
My post was purely about the metastory. I’ve edited it to make that clearer.
I thought it was because Bastion + Ardenweald would have been too big?
From an in-game perspective, sure. But from a meta perspective, when did the devs decide that Maldraxxus was part of the original plan of the First Ones? That’s what I’m wondering about.
(Also, how does this tie in with the theory that “the” Maldraxxus is a being?)
When the Ottomans were on the verge of invading Constantinople, the Patriarch of Constantinople asked the Pope for help, but when the Western European Catholic armies went to Turkey, they couldn’t tell apart the Muslims from the Christians and slaughtered everyone.
It’s just gameplay
To provide for materials for weapons and tools (eg mounts). The land responds to the needs.
Nah, plus that wouldn’t really have been an issue because they were still planning two covenants there. One side a Greek-West Asian field of Abrahamic Psychopomps with Pega-lions and a leader that looks like Sumerian Ishtar, one the other side Magical Western European Forest Number Seventeen with Satyr-Faun Number 2, Centaur Race Number 3, and Fairies, with a Fairy Queen.
Probably from the onset since they’re all big Warhammer fans and its the basis of the Scourge.
If you’re asking about my personal theory:
First Ones create Light and Void (substrate of existence)
First Ones create Order and Chaos (Planets, Stars, etc) (tapestry of reality)
First Ones create Life and Death (cyclic)
Old Gods naturally generate from the Void, first of which was a “Leviathan”, some Light-equivalent of an Old God generate from the Light
First Ones defeat this Leviathan + create the Naaru to help deal with both the Light (when in Void State) and Void (when in Light state)
They take this corpse of this Evil Dragon Leviathan (Maldraxxus) and reshape its soul into “The Primus” as a proto-Lich-Construct
They teach the Primus the magic runes, ergo Runecarver.
I have no doubt that the aesthetics and the separate houses were created before the developers knew what to do with Maldraxxus because this is the death expansion and what the Scourge is. Just made them the fighting force of the Shadowlands and say, the Scourge got their ideas from here. A bit lame.
When you think about it, the five Houses are pretty much just the wings of Naxxramas, (Eyes>Spider wing, Chosen>Military/Deathknights, Constructs… Constructs, Plague>Plague and Ritual is Kel’Thuzad’s area… he even shows up there.)
We know they have to defend the whole of the Shadowlands, which is functionally infinite. Why expend resources defending the other big pantheons with standing armies of their own?
The big genesaurs might qualify and there’s a quest were we free the soul of one (its power being used by some Saberon) to potentially return later and an ancient thanks you for it, which is kinda indicative of how the rebirth process works with Ardenweald.