Most clown moment in the lore?

Lore Story Forum
141

Well, I think that is the mostly likely way Blizz would tell the story, yes.

The problem with Nuance with the Scarlets now is they were definitively corrupted. You can’t really make a justification for the order itself because we know it was made a puppet of the Nathrazim.

Unfortunately, I think the nuance of the Scarlet Crusade is regulated only to the individual. The person who joined the crusade for either right or sympathetic reasons, and got manipulated and turned into a tool for the evil they sought to destroy.

I am not sure how I would tell this story, tbh. Maybe the best way would be like… So much of the Crusade has been Risen into Undeath, and the conflict is more a contention of identity rather than a physical war. There would be a clash of values between them and the old identity of Lordaeron vs the more “New Wave Forsaken” identity. The Identity of Lordaeron as a cursed Kingdom vs the Identity of the Forsaken as a people in of themselves.

And I think this can be perfectly represented by Calia and Voss.

The problem with that is, you can kind of have that without the Scarlets altogether. The Scarlets almost become redundant in that kind of story, except only to exacerbate the rivalry. The real struggle I am having is… How does this end?

Becuase I admit, I don’t really like Voss. I think she is a boring Marysue and even though I am not really a Scarlet RPer (I have 1 Scarlet I made this last year, and the RP has been primarily romantic in nature as sort of a taboo Lesbian nuns kind of dynamic LOL) I have always liked the Scarlets aesthetically, and I think their lore is very good. So any story I would tell would be bias and probably not what Forsaken fans want.

Edit: I suppose there is always the option of an undead Scarlet allied race… Like if Horde gets Alteraci humans, Scarlet Undead could be the trade off, with Calia and/or Whitemane as the Racial leaders.

Hell, Whitemane+Calia Romance, do it Blizz, you cowards.

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142

The genuinely most clown moment in WoW was that “The Hero” releases the Shadow Council from captivity in the WoD intro quest. They’re hanging right there, incapacitated, just fill 'em full of arrows / axes / imp goop / etc. “DUR HUR I’M SURE RELEASING GUL’DAN WILL TURN OUT FINE!”

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143

The problem is this handwaves a few things. Firstly, a weaker Nordrassil (no blessings or anything) wasnt burned by all the fire elementals next to it. Archimonde exploding right on top of it just did superficial damage, it immediately started healing itself.

Secondly, we don’t know what incentive the elemental forces have to do that, BECAUSE world trees donate energy to all aspects of the planet. Fire might be cool with it, but the strongest forces of fire could not burn a weakened world tree, whereas Teldrassil is constantly soaked in water, larger, and has dragon blessings. We have no context for why wind would help- if anything, it probably wouldn’t have because the world tree is giving it energy by virtue of it being a part of nature.

Essentially, if World Trees are just mundane trees but bigger, it works. When you acknowledge anything that makes a world tree special, whole thing falls apart, because they didn’t write the tree to be anything else when making the story.

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144

Look, all I know is that’s what’s written.

That the shamans invoked the air elementals to make the flames spread faster and fire to make the flames burn hotter. That’s how the flames were able to spread. Why did the spirit of air agree to do that? I don’t know. If it was goblin shamans responsible they could have made a deal. But I just don’t know.

As for Nordrassil, it was heavily damaged by Archimonde’s explosion, according to official lore, it just wasn’t burned to a charred stump. And the fire elementals that the Twilight’s Hammer sent their way didn’t exactly have the ‘overwhelming force’ to route the defenders. The Night Elves were able to defend the tree properly and eventually force the fire elementals off the peak entirely.

145

Ashbringer was catapulted from being “Blade of the Scarlet Highlord” and a subject of constant teasing by Vanilla devs to being the blade that shattered Frostmourne by the prayer of the founding paladin who faced down the Lich King and lived, memorialized in both sides of the Plaguelands. Then it became the weapon that literally every paladin player in the game used and had to learn all about for a couple of years.

Doomhammer has been around since 1995, mentioned in click lines, been elaborated on in comics, been in an international theatrical movie, and then got the Legion treatment.

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146

I can’t speak for everyone, but I know I had a smashing good time getting to wield the Doomhammer. Ashbringer as well on a tauren paladin alt (esp. sweet rubbing that in the face of all the “tauren aren’t true paladin” jerks).

But I do agree that these artifacts should be put back into the hands of certain NPCs rather than just collecting dust in someone’s bank.

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147

I’ve rarely ever been bothered by lore in this game. But this right here was definitely it for me too.

Sylvanas spent several years (?) doing Zovaal’s bidding without question, only to later betray him because he said a word she didn’t like? lol

Blizz is lucky that the dislike count is no longer visible on youtube.

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148

For me it was how they handled the whole arthas situation and the lich king lore in general.

It was butchered for a bargain basement trash tier copycat. Beyond pathetic

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149

And even with all of that neither of those two would have the same reach as Frostmourne. The Lich King and by extension Frostmourne is ingrained in gaming history. Gamers/pop culture in general will probably know what Frostmourne is more then they would ever Doomhammer or Ashbringer.

150

I don’t know how you can tell me that when you also tell me Legion is so popular and well regarded.

151

Because the statements are not contradictory. Legion was well regarded but at the same time, not as well regarded(or at least as popular) as say Wrath(which is probably the zenith of WoW’s popularity)

The same dude makes the two weapons and we can see Frostmourne easily beats out Doomhammer in view.(and when he made Doomhammer it was with collaboration with Blizzard)

152

Truthfully? I think legion is well regarded because they tried something different with the class halls and artifacts

153

The difference is that she was working ‘with’ Zovaal as an ally all that time, because she had been deceived/played by him. She thought that she was breaking an unfair system and creating a new, fairer one in its place.

Then the blinders came off and she realized that Zovaal had been lying to her. That she would be forced to serve him along with everyone else, just like how she had been forced to serve the Lich King and that caused her to turn.

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154

Things like this, in my opinion, really showcase how much of the problem with WoW’s story is in delivery and execution rather than concept. On paper, that’s a good bit of character story. So is the idea of her getting her soul back making her have her Heel-Face Turn moment. But it was all so rushed and had so little planting and foreshadowing that it became the ultimate clown moment. (It’s my biggest one too, although my most disliked lore event overall was ever going to the afterlife in the first place.)

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155

Honestly the problem wasn’t Sylvanas.

The problem was Zovaal. Sylvanas’s story, once you’ve taken the time to look at it properly (which sadly many people don’t, they prefer to meme it up or focus on events like the ‘lava eels’) is a tragic one, where she constantly fights to break off the shackles of someone else, only to end up in chains over and over.

Without Zovaal hamming it up, the story itself could have been great, but because Blizzard messed up Zovaal, it impacted Sylvanas’s story just as much, which wasn’t great.

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156

Without Zovaal, she tried to build a society by entrusting every arm of her military to a dreadlord she’d gone out of her way to try to deracinate and humiliate.

157

Okay? And your point?

158

I don’t disparage Sylvanas because she’s an undead, a female, or an elf. I do it because she’s not as smart as she thinks she is. She tunnel visions onto her own personal needs and constantly underestimates other people.

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159

And the thing is, that wouldn’t even be so bad if it was what the writers were trying to do. Like Cersi, I actually -like- that character. I think she is very well written, her pettiness comes from a place of paranoia and anxiety that I can kind of sympathize with, and so much of it is self-fulfilling prophecy.

Don’t get me wrong, she is absolutely insufferable. I don’t think I would get along with her. But there was something about her cut throatedness that I liked, and when she destroyed the Great Sept, I did find myself actually cheering for her.

Sylvanas… Doesn’t do that. Nothing about what she does makes me sympathetic towards her in any way, and nothing about what she does seems to be the big brain 5-D chess move the writing seems to imply.

The only thing that took me a little bit by surprise was when she broke the Helm of Domination… But by that point, I didn’t even care. I was so done with Sylvanas at that point and we still had a whole expansion to go.

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160

Sylvanas is the best and I hope one day we destroy the alliance together.