Here are the issues you mentioned regarding the scourge being free on Azeroth, or the simple ankle deep world building regarding languages that doesn’t make much sense, etc.
The problems of narrative equity and consistency and depth
Here are the issues of what races are centered the most often (humans and high elves), how characters are treated in the narrative (eg Baine being a hot mess, Tyrande’s arc in general, where is Malfurion lol, Thrall), and the more complex problems of world building (the cultural inspirations for the Cosmology and the diversity therein, the metaphysics of sin and damnation on shadowlands, etc)
The Magic Circle Box
Recommend Virtual Worlds by Castronova for reading so you have more “game dev theory” language, if you haven’t read it. The book changed my life.
But tldr:
Video games are virtual worlds with a virtual community
Each player engaged with this virtual world via an avatar constructed by their choice (whether self insert or escapism) from within the rules set by the Magic Circle vis-a-vis the game’s construction
The community is thus multiple avatars engaging with each other due to different motivations with some groups in common
Teldrassil burning and Undercity blighting and Sylvanas’s character arc and etc are still haunting us (and will eternally continue to do so) because those narrative choice broke or at least smudged the magic circle for many players
A game where the fantasy you chose for your avatar has been totally broken ceases to be fun, because the devs broke the rules you agreed to when entering the virtual world
This magic circle is not just lore fantasy but is also PvE (ergo the systems complaints), PvP (ergo many notable pvp players quitting), and combinations therein and more too
Honestly, I would like them pay more attention to loose end lore stories that were never explained over the years rather than them introducing all new lore that contradicts the old lore.
I don’t think they should throw the baby out with the bathwater just yet in terms of closing the previous chapter of Warcraft. Instead I would like if they simply expanded on the original story and tie up some loose ends, or find a way to rework those lose ends back into the story.
Payoff is key. We are already super invested in these stories. Emotional payoff should be a player reward for investment.
That being said, I hope you understand how important the latest developnents have had on her fans. Even though it was hard to get to this point, this was in fact a payoff for her fans who have longtime had to deal with her writing inconsistancies.
I personally don’t want how they “fixed” Sylvanas to be the poster discussion of bad writing. I think this was a successful attempt to fix the bad writing of the past. Some character stories won’t be for everyone, but they are important to the people they are being written for. I hope that makes sense, I tried to explain it the best I could.
I am a fan of Nobble’s videos, and have been for a long time. I think it’s funny, because people say he has an Alliance Bias, but I didn’t even notice it much. And I can be a Horde/Sindorei Partisan.
When he comes up, people often counter my experience by saying that it depends on the video. That in his lore videos, he is more neutral, while on other content, he is an Alliance Partisan.
But I just watch his lore videos. They are good. I don’t watch his streams, or his blogs, or reaction videos.
If he were on the council, I think that would be fine. Nobble and that Hazelnutty lady would be popular you tubers /streamers that I wouldn’t mind seeing on such a council.
Thank you so much for all this and I hope your voice and ours is finally heard because many of us are at our breaking point.
I did my best to sum up all my issues and feelings into as small as post as I could. I am sure there might be some rewording that is necessary so its more palatable for the developers to see but after almost 16 years of wow and consuming this story… this is as nice as I can put it.
I used Night Elves in particular as my example but this logic can be applied to any other race or plot that Blizzard writing team is currently tackling.
It got pretty long and I apologize for that.
Another problem about these books is the “unreliable narrator” perspective.
They try to use this as an explanation as to why we are getting conflicting information… I am sorry but this is simply unacceptable.
You can have characters in a book that are unreliable narrators who can cause conflict and drama in the story… but making an entire book based off of an unreliable narrator is a waste of my time and money.
Why should I spend my hard earned money on something that turns out to be misleading information or filler content I will never see in the game?
If I read a whole book about how “Night Elves conquered all of Ashenvale” and when we get an update in the game its the same old thing before this great victory? This touches on an issue that I will bring up later.
But essentially, if you are putting out a book then make sure you show it in game and treat it as actual canon truth. I have been playing wow since 2004. I still have Rise of the Horde and War of the Ancients books but I stopped buying these books because of so many inconsistencies. It just wasn’t worth the money and my time anymore.
I also wanted to tackle another issue regarding books.
There are some writers who do very poor world building. For example, describing the travel time between one continent to the next as a trip that only took a week to accomplish on windblown ship! Or they describe towns as exactly as they are in game.
Like 1 inn and 3 houses. That isn’t a town! it isn’t even in a hamlet.
In the game due to technical reasons a coastal town in Auberdine looks like this: https://i.pinimg.com/564x/56/45/4d/56454d1ba56cf8171ded833952efe322.jpg
But maybe in the book we can describe its true size… or is wow really a miniature sized world?
Perhaps Auberdine in reality looks like something like this: https://twitter.com/TheArtWarcraft/status/1325876157871316998/photo/1
Afterall why not? You are writing a book! You are not bound by game engine limitations!
I have a lot of things to say about this but I will try to keep it short and to the point.
We can write a whole book about how out of touch Blizzard is… maybe they are not but that is how the writers and developers come across when they finally give an interview to share their thoughts.
I will only speak on behalf of the Alliance. When Blizzard says in an interview that they needed Teldrassil to give a reason for the Alliance to fight the Horde do they not realize how much of bad blood since MoP Alliance players have been bottling up?
Gilneas, Hillsbrad, southshore, Ashenvale, Stonetalon… Frigging Theramore! We have been wanting to spank the Horde for their misdeeds for years! Teldrassil was NOT necessary.
And to top it off since Teldrassil we have had little crumbs over the years. That do not satisfy the big ball of disappointment that Teldrassil caused. And when a developper tells us Tides of Vengeance was Tyrande’s revenge in BFA it just blows our collective minds from a fan perspective.
Yes yes there are interviews and hints about the story not being over, and more is coming but look. Its been how many years since Teldrassil? Has there been any vengeance? No. Now we are moving towards Renewal and we have seemingly skipped over justice.
I understand game development limits and the story is not over but come on. Its been YEARS. Look if this were a TV show… like Arcane! I know that within 1 month I will have the entire story told to me. So any plot teasing and resolution I only have to wait a week for.
But years? By that point all I have is frustration or I just don’t care anymore.
If Blizzard wants to satisfy players AND still tell us stories that take years to resolve then you need to have a big satisfactory content to partially resolve it so we can wait and see for the next piece.
For example The Horde burned Teldrassil and in Tides of Vengeance Tyrande killed a few mobs, we lost some Night Elves to being raised by forsaken for very hard to believe reasons and they lost a Valkyr (that has now come back)
The only explanations at the time we had for all these things were NPCs telling us “I can’t explain why I joined the Horde but later” and “This was a huge loss for the Forsaken and Sylvanas”
Does this really satisfy anyone? Why didn’t we see a big cinematic… it could have been in-game! and we could see some awesome fight animations of Tyrande killing the Valkyr, Nathanos AND stopping the raising of these Night Elf undead.
Because in the end… Nathanos surviving until Shadowlands wasn’t really that necessary. He was completely replaceable by another character. The raised Night Elves were also completely unnecessary! So why put Night Elf fans through such unsatisfactory content if you didn’t have to?
If the argument is “we didn’t have the money/resources” then thats not good enough. We had enough money to make all those cinematics for Saurfang… so why not the prime victims? They need something too.
And this goes to the drip feed content that the Night Elves have been getting. The Night Warrior doesn’t really accomplish much compared to all the hype she got from Blizzard. Her greatest accomplishment seems to be she survived a fight against Sylvanas before that ended in failure as well.
It honestly feels like we are playing World of SylvanasCraft. Its not a nice feeling and it is pushing people away.
My final thought in all this would be… if you are not prepared to adequately take care of the consequences of the story elements you introduce then don’t do it. Yeah burning of Teldrassil was a big moment but the fallout and the continued unresolved issues was definitely NOT worth it.
For example, we are now being told by Sylvanas and Horde characters in the books that the Horde is unforgivable. There is justice coming. There are consequences we must face.
Alright all that sounds great but is Blizzard prepared to show it? If the Horde is so unforgivable, why are the Horde druids back in Cenarion Circle and Hyjal in the book? Why does it seem nothing has changed? How could these words not be interpreted any other way other than lip service to acknowledge an issue but never resolve it?
How could we possibly think its alright for the entire Horde be complicit in burning kids alive but in the next patch everyone is back together again in whatever neutral organization we need to join to fight the next big bad like nothing happened?
In my opinion this situation is the perfect time to introduce the Horde’s own version of Cenarion Circle… or at least make some real changes to explain all this hostility and bad blood between the factions… Or honestly find a real way to have the Horde answer for these crimes so we can move past it.
We are exactly where we were back in MoP except a hundred times worse and it doesn’t seem like the writing team cares at all. Even when they say otherwise in the character dialogue or interviews…
They have to SHOW it. IN THE GAME! Not in some book that gets obselete in one patch. But real game changes that does not negatively impact players.
If Blizzard wants to keep wow around… its time they start spending real money in finally making some real game world changes.
All of the thread ideas you’ve mentioned here are great and should probably be made into their own separate threads. I think you should make a thread about Exploring Kalimdor and list in detail everything that’s wrong in the book, while the iron is still hot. Problems such as Zekhan being taught how to read and write by Lor’themar, and him not knowing what erosion is despite being a shaman. The mischaracterization of Gazlowe. Night Elves taking back Talrendis Point instead of taking down Splintertree Post.
I haven’t read the book but these are some examples I’ve seen. Addressing Exploring Kalimdor’s problems might actually be a good starting off point to branch into problems outside of the book.
I am dubious of the whole endeavor. The Council itself may be a distraction, or a feint. What ever good may come of it… the Story and Lore discussions will likely - and perhaps rightfully - take a back seat for Gameplay.
Having said that, I would take issue with this :
This is where the rubber meets the road. The “War” in Warcraft. The punitive aspects of losing, with little to show for it in victory.
I could go on… but to TLDR :
How can the Story facilitate mutual cooperation between the Factions in Gameplay going forward… while also making the Faction War more entertaining and engaging? Can it be done?
This one cannot be stressed enough. I feel this is the single biggest problem with the story currently, and it is the most frequent complaint I see on this forums.
I think the second-biggest problem is player radicalization and outright hatred of the other faction and its players, to the point where it just isn’t fun anymore. The game has always flirted with this, but I really believe a line was crossed with the burning of Teldrassil.
Both of these issues need to be fixed in order for the game to get back on track.
I felt this statement on so many levels. What I don’t understand is, if blizzard never had any intention of putting equal effort into all the playable races, than why make them playable to begin with?
Know what a big peeve of mine is, regarding the lore?
Transmedia.
If I were a new player to the game and only introduced to the lore via the game, I wouldn’t just be lost; I’d be angry, because the game often lies to me. Since she’s everyone’s favorite topic, I’ll use Sylvanas as my example.
If I were playing my brand new, fresh outta Deathknell forsaken character, my first real experience with Sylvy would be riding by her side, hearing her talk about protecting and guiding the forsaken. That’s me, I’m forsaken! I’d kinda think she’s alright. By the end of the zone, Sylvanas is certainly… Intense in how she goes about protecting us, but she certainly has our backs.
Maybe I hear about the Wrathgate and look up the questline and cinematic. I hear her deny involvement, and Thrall’s suss about her involvement, but nothing really suggests she’s lying. Her city got taken over after all, and the guys taking it over certainly don’t seem to like her.
So then I move through MoP and WoD, and she’s not doing much of anything. I get to Legion, and I see her leading the Horde’s forces into battle. Great! Love that! And she rushes to Vol’jin’s aide! See Thrall, Sylvanas ain’t that bad! And as Vol’jin’s dying, Sylvanas becomes warchief, I get a whole cinematic that is absolutely framed as Sylvanas shocked and possibly even mourning, folowed by a declaration of vengeance against those who caused Vol’jin’s death. Holy crap, she’s awesome, right??
Sure, in Stormheim she’s being all sketch. But she’s already been shown as an “ends justify the means” character, so I roll with it. I can’t wait to see what questionably decision she makes next to protect her peo-
“BURN IT!!!”
Wait, what? Ok… BfA… Still behind you Sylvanas, but let’s see how this all plays out.
“THE HORDE IS NOTHING!!! YOU ARE ALL… NOTHING!!!”
Uhm… Come again, friend?
So, turns out everything I knew about Sylvanas because it’s all the game showed me has been a lie. And an abrupt lie. The game showed me a cruel mistress, but one loyal to her people. Now she’s just cruel and never cared to begin with, without a hint revealing this previously in the game. So I go to the interweb to find out what I missed, and…
Books, comics, shorts, all that. People have known the truth about Sylvanas since before that Silverpine questline was even in the game. Even the Wrathgate was all a convoluted lie. The game itself has been lying, and not giving me any real indication of it.
…
Sylvanas is really a moderate issue here with transmedia vs the in-game story. There’s things in-game to question Sylvanas, but not nearly enough. It’s easy to feel that the game itself is lying to you, while transmedia has the truths. The entire current narrative requires a large degree of transmedia knowledge to make sense of, and nothing in-game really prepares or summarizes it for you. Suddenly all those ancestor spirits you’ve dealt with are left in limbo with major question marks hanging over them. Those two or three times Uther’s ghost was chatting with you make no sense if he was in the Shadowlands or Frostmourne the entire time.
POlaying the game should give you the information to understand the story of the game. Transmedia should expand that story, but not be necessary for basic comprehension.
I actually don’t mind transmedia, but my reason may be a bit depressing: it’s because it’s extremely rare for the out-of-game media to make the in-game story better, so I’d just as soon have it tucked away in a book that most people aren’t going to read. I usually find that the story as presented in-game is better than the novel version, when you’d think it would be the opposite, since the novels can get inside characters’ heads.
Example: Thrall making Garrosh his successor as warchief.
I think their mistake with transmedia is they are not using the right media to reach people. They should take a leaf out of Riot’s book and make a netflix lore series. We know they have the artistic talent to make that a thing, or if that isnt workable they have the budget to have a studio do it.
Books are great. I love books, I work with books all day. But trying to reach people with books is really old fashioned. It reflects back on how old school Blizzard is as a company. They are no where near agile enough for how drastically the world has shifted in the last decade or so and keep taking dodgeballs to the face.
I would like to know many things, regarding their worldbuilding, regarding their Structure and regarding their current Changes?
One of the first things i would like to know is about Elune.
Why have they changed Elune? Why it was nessesacry to put her into a position of Incompetence? What is the purpose of such a behavior?
Elune get an build up over several Expansion, but all of this was damaged at best or completly destroyed by 9.1, was that their plan? Or what have theiy tought would be the result of the cinema?
Which purpose served the Night warrior, i mean, we get the confirmation from the new book that even ashenvale is still contested and the trolls got a piece of land back, this makes for me almost no sense, regarding of the night warrior and the “most ruethless face of Elune”, why should tyrande allowe such things?
I would know if they ever played wc3 themselve or read the old lore before they seemingly change things?
Why the wota canonchange, why was this nessacary aswell?
The next topic is the Alliance as a whole:
Why is the alliance as a whole almost entirely ignored or put into some place to fit the human-focus narrative? Why have no other races opinion that matters or are allowed to be really anti-Anduin without to be blamed for this? Why are the Humanheros highlighted about everything?
Jaina is the next topic:
Why is Jaina seemingly stronger then every Bloodelf Named Mage and why is there no existing strong bloodelf Mage as Counterpart and equaly build up was served, i mean, that makes no …sense, if they are the “Teacher of the humans”, to be represented as weak compare to Jaina.
Why destroying Capital Citys
I don´t get this position, why exist there too “many Citys”??? Why is it nessecary to destroy them? It makes no sense for me to have this position.
Why do they not even try to be consistent in their gamestory? This makes Discussion about the Lore really dificulty because not the npc speaks false Information but the Narrator speaks false information and a narrator should be objective(word of gods)
It’s fitting philosophy for them. The bulk of their lore is only surface level. I think that’s been baals biggest complaint. There’s no meat to anything
I’d have loved for them to have made Garrosh’s trial, the fight between Cairne and Garrosh, and The Blank Scroll into short videos similar to their trailers instead of being books/short stories only.
The point, without being exhaustive of all the times it was done, was to set off emotion buttons; in other words, to “otherize” the opposing faction as monsters.
That was done some in the RTS’s, but they were not 2 years of developing story, offensively trying to “put the war in Warcraft”. Nor was it to the extremes done in BFA. (Darnassus/Undercity come to mind.)
While BFA was pushing those emotional buttons, creating Player conflict, it also was constantly pushing the Old Gods as “the real culprit”. Even if someone was getting into the Faction War, that was stolen from them by the story saying, functionally: “sucker!”
Both sides’ leadership, since the Events were all that seemed to matter, were subverted into plot devices that made constantly stupid mistakes. And were often devoid of their own Character history.
To quote myself:
Really that was a let down from Legion: We won! The Burning Legion was defeated.
And then: LOL No! Old God make you fight!
And now, yet again: LOL No! Eternal One make you fight!
I complained back in Cata about their not telling the game story… in the game. It felt bad then, and I wasn’t even giving the story real focus because I was about raiding then.
Wrathgate just makes me mad though. It was NOT formed as Sylvanas doing it AT ALL. I’m saying that as someone who played it first-hand in the first patch of WotLK (and repeatedly on alts, on both sides, while Wrath was the current Xpac).
A.A. remade its meaning after the fact.
The timeline of the Wrathgate attack makes absolutely no sense with later claims, like A.A.'s.
I really wish they would just cop to “bad story data”, and say they’re sorry, and will try to do better. I know mistakes happen, but trying to pretend everything was actually-really-truly about the latest iteration is gross.
It comes across as a feeble, and bad, attempt at an entirely different genre of story.
Considering that they’re not keeping their own Lore clean right now, I don’t think adding even more people telling Lore is a good idea.
