Huh what??
The Rona
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And alot of RP was effectively killed during this time as well when it should have been thriving because of people being stuck inside because of THE UNSPECIFIED VIRUS OF UKNOWN ORIGIN.
2020 was a weird year for WoW. Battle for Azeroth was limping towards its conclusion with the fight against N’zoth that was really tonally out of place with the rest of the expansion. We knew we’d be dealing with Sylvanas in Shadowlands after she smokebombed away from Ogrimmar, so a lot of people rightfully saw N’zoth are nonsense filler.
Basically, during the height of the lockdowns, WoW wasn’t giving the RP community much to functionally work with. We were all burnt out on the Faction War and Esoteric Evil Patch Villain was just kind of…expected out of BfA. Both Azshara and N’zoth were expansion-tier villains in their own right and both were dealt with in patches.
I mean jesus I logged into Silvermoon and there was like… nobody? I was like what the hell man? SMC was popping in 2016-2017.
Silvermoon’s been a ghost town for many years, yeah. I’d say even in 2016, the amount of RP happening there was declining. End of the day, it’s a capital city locked off by a loading screen existing in a world space that doesn’t allow flying because the city itself is made of false fronts and cardboard. The fact Silvermoon was such a vibrant RP hub for so many years is a testament to a community willing to put up with all the little inconveniences that came from getting there.
BfA and Shadowlands sucked so bad lmao
The entire time, we’re being told SYLVANNAS HAS A BIG SECRET PLAN and then at the end of the expansion she flies off to Northrend to bully Bolvar. Couldn’t you have like, done that all along? Then we get to Shadowlands and told SYLVANNAS STILL HAS A BIG SECRET PLAN ITS THIS GUYS BIG SECRET PLAN which they dragged out till the very end and WE STILL DONT REALLY KNOW but also WHO CARES.
The other sad part is long time established baddies like N’zoth and Azshara are throw away villains in content patches. Imagine whole expansion dedicated to those two, imagine THE TMOG!!
Then lets not forget the expansion gimmicks lmao.
Blizz is like, people sure did like class halls and artifact weapons in Legion but it sure was a real pain making all that so lets half butt it.
So in BfA they gave us a boring artifact necklace and abuncha gear that’s all garbage.
Then they’re like, okay we get it, it’s not leveling a weapon forever that you liked about Legion, it was the thematic and detailed out stories of the class halls you liked. So here in shadowlands we’re bringing them back but there’s only four and all their stories are more or less the same and now you need grind this new currency to level them up. Also here’s soul link conduits or something you need to level.
Get a character to max, welp time to level up your thing in order to be competitive in content.
Y’know what’s nice about Dragonflight, I get to 70 and like I can just go into mythics. I don’t need to level up my boots or my dragon soul or do some weekly chore activity in order to unlock my expansion gimmick.
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And, part of the fun of the class halls was them bringing back or tying in groups and NPCs that we had all along. Which Shadowlands barely did.
Even halls like the paladin class hall, which raised objections for people who didn’t want more Argent-style stuff, had those objections because the players were familiar with the alternatives - the Blood Knights, the Sunwalkers, even the Silver Hand even though the aesthetic there was really close. We knew those organizations and loved seeing their lore, or wanted more of the niche we knew about and wanted to see expanded.
Even class halls like the Hunter or Rogue or Warrior halls, which never existed before that expac, drew on lots of familiar faces of not just characters, but factions as well. Rexxar, the Defias and Bloodsail and Ravenholdt, Saurfang and Crowley - we got to see them and others show up and do their thing that progressed their characters in the setting.
But Shadowlands’ covenants had no such past ties. They were never mentioned before in WoW - and not only that, but these covenants effectively replaced the hints of afterlives that the players had heard of and were looking forward to. No Light afterlife with Bridenbraid, no Ancestral grounds where Cairne and all the tauren and shaman ancestor souls reside to give wisdom to their descendants, no G’hanir holding the souls of all winged creatures including dragons of which we have uncountable posthumous characters, no Elune afterlife (but have a random fae forest instead! Forests are all there is to night elves, right?) where the Night Warrior takes the souls of the dead as stars - and those are just the afterlife references I can recall off the top of my head when writing this.
Suuuuure, Shadowlands has the fine print of “there are infinite afterlives” to CYA and pretend they did address the above. But these covenants completely lacked the historical ties and thus fond/unfond memories that the class halls did - in fact, the covenants overwrite and invalidate preexisting lore to a much greater degree than class halls did.
And unlike the class halls, the SL covenants’ familiar characters like Uther or Kael’thas cannot leave SL and thus their character development is irrelevant to the greater WoW world. The player could meet countless new NPCs in Azeroth or beyond who are Blood Knight or Uncrowned or Cenarion members and thus can call back to the class hall stories, but we can’t do the same with Kyrians or Venthyr.
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The funny thing about the Shadowland covenants is I thought the inclusion of Azeroth characters made them worse. As oppose to Legion, which was like the best part of them all!
They tried really hard to relate it back to Azeroth through these character but it all felt so forced. If you replaced Uther, Draka, Kael and all the other Shadowland Azeroth characters nothing really would have changed. Then there’s also the problems, most of which you listed out really well, Aviala that really soured the whole thing.
Baine goes to the afterlife and literally sits there and we don’t get a thoughtful moment with his Dad? Nah it’s because Tauren go to the hamburger factory afterlife obviously. Now Draka and Thrall, of course we’ll have a nice re-connection for them.
I’ve said before, there are some neat things I liked about Shadowland’s setting. I think if they could have decided early on to either make it 100% tied to Azeroth and the existing setting instead of this weird infinite but not really infinite afterlife or just say screw it’s weird dimensional magic realm and your characters and their dead family have nothing to do with it have fun go fight this weird bald man. Would have all been totally fine.
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This is a lot of words for “I don’t think there’s enough pornographic content for me on Wyrmrest Accord”.
I dont disagree with your broad points, but i will say the only reason i’m a card carrying Necrolord is because its the only one with former denizens of Azeroth in any great quantity.
It probably would have went better if the four covenant zones weren’t covenant specific zones, but tears and meldings of other various parts of the shadowlands we knew in lore before this point. It’s almost like they thought about that in early concept when they plopped De Other Side in shadowlands, but someone with “rockstar excellence” swooped in and struck the rest of it down.
Edit: Also, short of maybe Pandaria, it tickles me that thrall’s inclusion in an expac tends to not bode well for said expac. Maybe people can make the case it wasn’t like this for Cata, but uh… I dunno on that one.
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I think you’re onto something.
They were forced to publicly apologize for how much we saw Thrall in Cataclysm. It was an incredibly sore spot for a lot of Alliance players (there were more of us back then).
I think he was decently received in Mists of Pandaria? He only showed up at the end and the Alliance was allowed to be openly antagonistic toward him for a change, though I remember a lot of people not being thrilled to see him.
Then Warlords of Draenor saw him return to main character status and…well, we all know how it ended.
Legion was well-received specifically because there was a whole scenario about Thrall sucking too hard to wield the Doomhammer.
We don’t need to recap Shadowlands and BfA, but you’ve got a strong case for Thrall’s involvement exponentially making the expac worse.
It wasn’t just Alliance players who were sore about it. Horde players were equally sick of Green Jesus. (Hey remember how Blizzard made Thrall the Dragon Aspect of Earth? And notice how they’ve gone to great lengths to never mention that fact again?)
It was more a case of “Oh Crap, dad’s coming home.” with the expectation that Thrall would be Warchief again.
Ah yes, they tried to vindicate Thrall but inadvertently created a cinematic that actually proved Garrosh entirely right, the community responded as such, and Blizzard rapidly stopped mentioning Thrall at all in Wardads entirely. Also Aggra was there suddenly, somehow.
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Truly, the most interesting thing about Warlords was how quickly Blizzard wrapped it up.
I’m still trying to figure out if Warlords was shoved out the door to provide some sort of tie in with the Live Action movie, and when that failed to be a tremendous hit they just transitioned immediately over to Legion, or if they realized they had to throw players something because another two years of Siege of Ogrimmar, Vale Dailies, and Timewaster Isle wasn’t going to fly.
I feel like it started out as a genuine attempt at something. The zones, leveling, and the Dungeons are all fantastic and have some genuine star power behind them (Frank Welker aint cheap). But Garrisons were bare bones (Where’s my god damn Dance Studio Blizzard?!), Two of the Three Raids were phoned in (Only Blackrock Foundry didn’t involve teleporters and was one continuous dungeon), and the Tanaan Jungle was just Timeless Isle 2: AU Boogaloo.
Warlords was bare bones because they ran out of money and time in development. There was a whole extra island meant to represent Netherstorm that never made it out of development.
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I’ve never felt abandoned by Blizz like I did with Warlords. Holy hell, it was not a very long time after it came out and I remember a lot of people feeling like Blizz just packed up and left us to deal with it while they moved onto Legion.
What a bizarre feeling that was.
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I was promised a raid fight against Grom. Instead I got “Draenor is FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEE”.
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“Draenor is free” was legendary.
The absolute chutzpah needed for Blizzard to have Draenei cheering their oppressors. I feel like they were desperately trying to shred documents in the background while that was happening.
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It’s ok though. They ruined Yrel so it’s even now.
They keep telling me Yrel’s gone mad with power, but I went through the Mag’har recruitment scenario wanting to know what the hell Grom did.
Because the Lightbound were just putting people in stasis.
The Mag’har were killing Ogres they had enslaved.
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I don’t know, light conversion certainly looks and feels a certain irl way when you see an anchorite speaking the Holy Light Word at length to a couple orcs in that scenario.
edit; Found the name of the npc. Grand Anchorite Almonen, here’s his sermon
Summary
In accordance with my divine calling, I must share these revealed truths to all who would hear.
It has been made known to me that inside each of us, the Light resides…
…that it is a gift, given freely to all naturally born beings.
It manifests itself as a feeling, small at first and easily ignored, that confirms truths and subtly prods one to do good.
Simple kindnesses, charitable deeds, service to those in need. These are all fruits of the Light.
It rewards those who heed its promptings with blessings, both seen and unseen.
Personal reservoirs of hope and faith are strengthened, and one’s capacity for greater good increases.
Over the course of time, through obedience to the Light’s guidance, one becomes more sensitive to its voice… and its power.
Great is the healing and blessing power of the Light’s most diligent followers.
Sadly, there are those who wander through mortality in defiance of the Light.
From these the Light withdraws, until only darkness remains.
Where there is no Light, despair, loathing, and rage thrive.
We are born into a perilous age, where the forces of darkness are determined to bring about our destruction.
These are the times to find yourselves in unison with the Light.
Hear my words, and let the Light inside of you confirm the truth of them.
Embrace the Light that is in you, my friends! Deny yourself all darkness…
We must endure these trying times faithfully, and one day we will find ourselves victorious.
It falls upon us to usher in an age of peace, where the Light will reign.
By the naaru, may it be so.
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