So - (first off I think this was a really good read, and great use of the Winter War as a comparative tool) I want to draw attention to an instance of these things you’ve listed, but in an instance that Blizzard executed really well.
Suramar.
I recently replayed through the zone and I had a moment where, genuinely I was almost tearful thinking about how well executed and laid out this story was, and how much I truly, truly, truly loved much of Legion’s narrative arc.
Suramar, I would argue, is the single greatest story that Blizzard has told since the RTS WC:III.
We start out as the genuine underdogs, cobbling together a resistance from literal scraps: withered people who have lost their home, their power, their families - everything that made up their identity. And yet they persist. They refuse to be counted out.
We build them up over time, we help them gain weapons and allies, we bolster their resistance with help from the outside, we start a guerrilla war in their city. This all happens over the course of a single patch, but it felt like so much longer, and it was incredible. The losses, the victories, the deaths and sacrifices that really made you sit there and think “holy bloody hell man.”
Those are the incredible moments of resistance and heroism that make Warcraft what it is.
And then we got Teldrassil and Darkshore/Ashenvale. No relatable characters to identify with that stick with us through the end, no slow build up, no minor victories or losses - only these massive moments that we, as a character/player, have zero impact on, and no sensible narrative sequence to follow that made sense.
Half the things in the Darkshore storyline were just thrown in there because “why not”. Dark Ranger Kaldorei? Explanation for how that’s possible? No. Explanation for Nathanos standing up to a god empowered, vengeance driven Night Elf warrior? No. Slow build up to the warfront that gets us genuinely excited and engaged in the movement? No.
Darkshore missed every single one of the critical elements that Suramar had in spades, and Blizzard wasted a truly phenomenal opportunity to embrace a model that worked stunningly well back in Legion.
Like you’ve said in your first points, engaging players with active involvement (and characters that they connect to), consistency and build up, and small moments to tie together the larger narrative - these are all essential to making a story memorable.
They can want to do a lot of stuff, but being able to follow through on execution is critical; they failed at that. Not to mention that the essential information in a fraking book, not the actual game.
But it was told to us, rather than us being engaged with it long term.
It’s like the whole J.K. Rowling thing where every few years she goes “oh yeah, that character is gay”, or “that character was Jewish.” Um, hello - we need it in the moment, we need it when we’re reading it the first time, we need it to be an active part of the story from the get go, not told to us after the fact to soothe over crap you left out for whatever reason.
Sure, give us a novella. Awesome. But make sure it’s supplemental, not essential. If I’m playing a game and it’s all about this massive war, I need to see that in the game. This would be like Star Wars Episode V showing you only Luke’s story and entirely leaving out the whole Bespin thing and telling folks to go read a book to find out the essential info.
If the only compelling aspect of a story is not in the actual retail product, you’re not succeeding at producing and delivering a full product.