Need more advice for new player

Lore Story Forum
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Hey all

So a friend of mine who has never played world of Warcraft starting getting into the franchise after he stumbled on a few books and read them. I mentioned I play the game and now he wants to try it but lore when playing means everything to him. He is more about the story then any other aspect of a game. I been playing since launch of game has not touched old content in a long time . So my question is this if he picks up the game takes his time and starts in classic zones following the zones step by step each chapter reading all the quests would he get a huge sense of the lore as if he had been here since 2004 ?

Thanks in advance

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I mentioned I play the game and now he wants to try it but lore when playing means everything to him. He is more about the story then any other aspect of a game.

He’ll probably hate WoW then.

2 Likes
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Hey. Best way is to watch lore videos on you tube. If he does everything there is in-game and has a good memory he will know more lore than forum posters.
I haven’t played all expansions but to gasp the current story i would suggest BfA, forshaken cata zones, WotLK, mists for the previous Alliance/Horde war.
Depending on your taste story has its ups and downs but considering all the debates here its interesting, if not the story itself the reactions it creates.

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So the obvious answer is no; those Classic 2004 zones are gone. But that’s the cheeky answer.

If he finishes Chronicles, he should have enough of a gist to skip ahead to Legion. WoW’s story is best taken in controlled doses for a new player, and Chronicles give you enough to figure out what you need from thereafter; demons are back, they suck, Sylvy is a sketchball, Varian dies, Anduin cries, Horde bullies Alliance until they go full arsonist genocide, everyone hates Sylvannas, blah blah.

It’s best to skip a lot of the in-game story for a newbie. It’s often contradictory, and seems even more so when played out of order, which the level squish and level-anywhere stuff makes super easy to do.

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No, he won’t get the 2004 questing experience. The expansion Cataclysm revamped all the questing zones on Azeroth, so he would be questing through the time immediately following Deathwing’s emergence and all the destruction rained upon the planet.

If he wants the true 2004 questing experience, he’d want to play Classic WoW, though I don’t recommend leveling a Classic character unless he’s willing to be patient, doesn’t mind a little grinding, and can have fun with a much, much slower journey to 60.

If he wants to dive into an immersive, lore-focused experience, then I recommend he pick out a race that appeals to him and level through an expansion that also appeals to him. The lore of Azeroth is absolutely enormous, there’s no way to take it all in chronologically, and most zone questlines are self-contained enough that players with little knowledge of the lore can still learn a lot and enjoy the story.

Here’s my favorite zones to quest through for each expansion when it comes to cool quests/lore or they’re just pretty and immersive. Bolded are my top choices.
Azeroth/Cataclysm - Silverpine Forest, Redridge Mountains, Un’goro Crater, Duskwood, Ghostlands, Twilight Highlands, Mount Hyjal
Burning Crusade - Zangarmarsh, Nagrand, Netherstorm
Wrath of the Lich King - Dragonblight, Zul’drak, Howling Fjord
Mists of Pandaria - Valley of the Four Winds, Jade Forest
Draenor- Gorgrond, Shadowmoon Valley, Talador
Legion - Val’sharah, Azsuna, Suramar
BfA - Drustvar, Nazmir

I’d say Suramar is one of the absolute best questlines in the game. It’s very long, and Suramar can be tedious to navigate without flying, but it’s worth it. Great characters and compelling stakes.

I’d recommend Legion to start with just in general, as each zone has a little something for just about any player regardless of what element of the lore they might be interested in, and I’d confidently argue that Legion has the strongest writing and least monotonous questing experience over every other expansion.

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So after reading what each of you had to say it’s apparent he won’t get the true lore feeling just from the game alone. Can you recommend things he can watch like videos on YouTube to catch him up to the games lore when it started ?

Like I personally never played the Warcraft strategies games 1,2 or 3

Would those work for him from learning about the lore to come in the mmorpg version ? Then he could skip around and learn?

It’s a shame blizzard don’t let you go back in time before cata . Or do they in chromie time ?