Shadowland Question and story I don't understand

Lore Story Forum
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My sub is about to give up but I wanted to give feed back on the story, ask questions of things I dint quite understand and maybe get some answers if players already know them:

  • Jailer, he was the jailer of what exactly really? The Sylvanas raid Jaina mentions that something in the Maw was growing? If he was so smart why couldn’t he had foreseen his own defeated and have a plan? It makes no sence that someone who was wrote to be millions of years planning and seeing what we could do would not foresee this? Is he really… Death itself, is that really it? it just feels a bit underwhelming… unless its also part of his plan? lol
  • Sire D Raid fight felt more like a performance than a real fight… he seem to be holding back… why? He literally gives power in the form of medallions to control his realm, and we created a crown to concentrate ALL that power in one spot, and doesn’t care or doesn’t need the power? He seems to care deeply for the Prince and even refrain from terminating him? Why? He is definitely hiding some thing it seems IMO… I would not be surprise if it was NOT the Jailer but Sire the True puppet master or is working with the real one.
    A) The experiments on the Naaru and Kel’thas: Don’t tell me that Sire D has literally been behind the scenes with the whole Thalassian race since the defilement of the Sun Well by Arthas resurrecting the Lich Kel’thuzad?!
  • Primus seems to know more that he leads on… Who is to say that the runes he place on the Jailer were tampered with to prepare us for… “What is to come?”
  • On that note the powers of Death have been redefine with this expansion, if we ever get a new undead race and class combo like (EVOKER/ Dracthyr) a Hero Class Lich or a vampiric race like Darkfallen can you offer more light on what was Ghuun, the Blood curse, Light Forge Undeath and the Drusk REAL origin… there seems to be other forces at work behind with death or other Cosmic Forces!
  • What are devourer, are they from the realm of the Arcane? Since Magic in WoW seems to make you dependent on it, would that mean that whatever is going on on that Cosmic Force Realm has to do with these devourers that create this addiction?
  • So domination magic is an Language that overwrites the users mind? Does this finally explain how Cosmic Forces are able to “Overwrite” a persons will and persona just by being infuse by that power… like corrupted creature by Fel, Void, Light etc?
  • Why would the Night elves be ok with Elune sending their souls to Ardenweald, why was Tyrande be ok with this… it feels that after this and what the after life offer, I can’t blame Night Elves that would be ok with it no matter how I try to look at it? Am I wrong?
  • After seeing all of Shadow Lands even beyond in the Zereth Mortis place where the First Ones have been building the WoW after lives… I can’t say I look foward to seeing a love one from WoW universe die and go through all that… It felt like this Greater purpose is really flaw and just…bad. Or am I seeing it wrong?
  • Finally who is the really entity behind Death itself, it can’t be the jailer nor the Eternal Ones, it felt more like they are all Jailers keeping REAL death at bay? It made me wonder if all this artificial constructs ARE to keep the real sources of the cosmic forces at bay…
  • Also the water in Zereth Mortis… is this why the Old Gods look like Tentacle horrors? Beneath that abyss of “Primal Water” does it cross to the Void or that’s just a coincidence in design?

Most are things that I dint get to understand or just had questions about the story as I kept playing. Also, there are so many lose ends and story that seem to lead nowhere… I hope I don’t have to grab a book to learn this, honestly… I want my lore in the game and experience it, however I’m open to look it up on the web if sadly that’s the case.

Thank you for reading and thank you for the entertain story Blizz, it felt a bit unfinish but from what I seen so far and talk with other fans or vet players it seems intentional.
I’ll be playing V Rising (A new Vampire Survival game I found on steam) in the next few months while I wait for new story to come live on WoW.

Take care my Lore loving community!
:wave: :smile:

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Something to keep in mind is that we hardly saw any of the Shadowlands. When the system isn’t broken and sending everything to the Maw, very few souls in the universe actually end up in any of the places we visit in-game; most by far end up in other afterlives that aren’t integral mechanisms to the upkeep of the Shadowlands as a whole. Some are like “Heavens” of their respective beliefs, while others akin to “Revendreth Lites” where souls can address minor regrets and burdens before moving on to the former. So technically most souls in WarCraft by far are destined for a paradise of some form or another, each made to exist in keeping with their respective conceptions of what paradise would be.

Bastion, Maldraxxus, Revendreth, Ardenweald and the Maw are only meant for very “special” souls meeting very specific criteria that make them inclined to embrace the natures of those places (or in the case of the Maw, supposedly souls that were too dangerous to be put anywhere else.) They only seem large because the entire living universe itself is so vast; in truth the souls in the five afterlives we visit in-game comprise an infinitesimally tiny proportion of all souls crossing into the Shadowlands.

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Of the Maw, even though he started out as a prisoner over being the ruler.

In the raid the Maw was expanding to include Oribos, which is why Zovaal was able to enter it, absorb the Arbiter, and then exit from there to Zereth Mortis.

Like other villains before him he was arrogant and confident of his victory against us.

Originally Sire Denathrius was meant to be killed off in the raid before Blizzard decided to spare him on account of his V.A. So while the raid was created with him taking us seriously in mind, lore wise… the door is open for Blizzard to claim it was theatre as he had an exit plan in Remornia absorbing his essence.

Renathal is his first born, the son that he wanted to stand by his side.

The experiments with Kael’thas and Z’rali were merely opportunities that he took advantage of after both came into Revendreth. Denathrius had no known involvement with the Thalassian people. Though per an interview it was Denathrius who recruited Kel’Thuzad to the Jailer’s side after his defeat in Wrath.

That is speculation and you are free to indulge in it.

The Devourers are from the Shadowlands. Per Saezurah they had a purpose for balance within the Shadowlands but somehow became altered and now are danger feeding off the realms of Death.

Domination magic is Death magic whose sole purpose is the utter suppression of another being. The Primus created it to imprison Zovaal within the Maw, however over time Zovaal mastered it and used it for his own ends by turning those like Anduin into puppet slaves. This is actually contrasted by other forces which empower, bless, corrupt, bent, and/or bent people by their will.

For example the Void corrupts a victim into being their servant, but could be fought off. Where as Domination turns the victim into a puppet at once, with them no having chance at fighting it off.

Ardenweald is a peaceful afterlife, a much better alternative to the Maw, and helps the balance of souls. Now my understanding of the whole Burning, Elune, Ardenweald situation is that Elune didn’t know about the Burning until she felt it and that was moment she hastened to send the night elven souls to Ardenweald to give her favored a favored afterlife and aid her sister. However as she was not a being of Death she had no idea that the Arbiter was shut down and thus the souls were all going to the Maw.

When someone died, the Arbiter judged where they should go, with families and loved one generally separated from one another. Though the Arbiter could be bypassed as seen with Uther and Devos tossing Arthas directly into the Maw.

I’m not sure on what you are asking here. Death is Death, the end of a mortal life for the living and the end of existing for the natives and spirits who die within the Shadowlands, which their energy going to be collective energy of Death itself.

The water is just a design choice, the water doesn’t connect to the Void. However all Zereth sites have a backdoor into one another with their work forges. Case in point the Sepulcher of the Frist Ones is the back from the Death Zereth site to the other Zereths.

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You are not seeing it wrong. The majority of the zones we saw were hellish which leads me to believe the others would be as well.

Personally I am holding out hope they do some reframing (maybe retconning) to fix the afterlife.

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When I mention these I was looking and reading a bit on the Lore of WoW Old and New Cosmology and I saw the original concept of the Jailer (He look like an awesome mix of the Primus with the Jailer, really cool concept, to bad it was left out)… but your answer were more than clear, thanks I guess I’m looking way to much into the story pulling straws where there none beyond what I seen and read in the game! lol :sweat_smile:

Thanks for taking the time to read and Answer! That goes to all previews comments too! :blush:

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We saw five afterlives…out of an infinite multitude of others. There’s no basis whatsoever for assuming five realms explicitly unique in function and made for specific purposes that don’t define the rest are indicative of how the others operate. That’s like only visiting the Burning Steppes and the Searing Gorge and extrapolating that the whole of Azeroth clearly must be a volcanic wasteland.

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I don’t understand your rationale. Of the observable set, we saw 5 afterlives. Of these 5 afterlives 4 out of 5 were unpleasant. I realize “unpleasant” is subjective. It seems logical to apply this distribution to the remaining ones.

What am I missing?

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They changed his backstory when Pyro (the Youtuber, not our Pyro) outed it after Blizzcon.
Agreed, new backstory doesn’t make a lick of sense.

pLaNs wItHiN pLaNs
Blizzard thinks it’s deeper than it is.

Primus was originally the jailer before Pyro went hog wild.
Now he seems pretty washed clean of the old backstory.

“fRoM tHe sPaCeS iN bEtWeEn”
probably the threat zoovy was talking about, your guess is as good as ours.

No.

It was retconned to have always been their afterlife.
I don’t think the issue was “Night Elves end up in Nelvenweald” so much as “Elune didn’t use omnipotent ominiscience to delete the Horde and save all nelf lives.”

The Word of God is “The purpose is correct” but you’re not wrong to see the gaping plotholes therein.

First Ones, but Eternal Ones are the Real Deal Death Gods that were created to oversee it.
Yes, it sucks.

Probably coincidence, but they’ll tap it if they want to.
Blizzard doesn’t care about canon.

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In heroic stories villains always in the end lose. (I’m not talking about grey Edgelord stories where the “heroes” generally make things worse than before.) Frequently because of an inherent flaw, in Bond movies it’s their arrogance and inclination to place the hero in overly dramatic death traps that he always escapes form.

In the original infinity war, when Thanos became THE SUPREME BEING, what ultimately led to his defeat was his own deep down hidden desire to be beaten. When you’re the Supreme Being even your most deep down desires become reality.

The Jailor being a more simply written character simply wasn’t as smart and as completely planning as he thought. His access to the world outside the Maw was also limited until certain things were accomplished, so that introduced inherent limits to his planning no matter how much time the had.

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The jail? Its a metaphor on prisoners rights made by the progressives in the company.

Because he’s a man and all they do is perform until they admit to helping women. Don’t trust men especially those with a sexist name like “Sire D”.

Typical man keeping secrets from women, then they give the answers and act like you knew them to gaslight you!

What??

Dont fat shame!!

Um consent is important and no 50 shades of gray is not a book thats used to mind control women no matter what the alt right says.

I dont know.

I know, its really sad! I cry every time one of our favorites dies, they need to stop killing characters!

Huh??

Its just water??

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:rofl:

lol ok, nvm I guess…

:face_with_hand_over_mouth:

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Lazy analogy to Milton Lucifer, he was cast down to WoW Hell and served as ruler for the damned

It is an error to presume this level of detailed forethought in the narrative

Ibid

Ibid

Cut content probably, might be revisited later

Probably tied to that ridiculous “serpent of nothingness” they’re trying to build up

Again, do not presume forethought of detail

The writers believed it necessary to write that even though it is both incoherent and also dumb

Again, do not presume detailed forethought

But also they’re prolly aiming for “all gods are bad actually, antitheist individualism is good” because a lot of Gamer Bros are New Atheists

This is Wowhead Writer Nonsense

What

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It was a forethought, what I mean is since Dev Team said its like “Primal Water” and kind of hinted that there was something down there… but I think the Old Gods looking like Mollusca species or Lovecraftian Horrors is just coincidence and has nothing to do with sea creatures. :sweat_smile:

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Devourers for what it’s worth only got to Zereth Mortis because of the Chains of Domination carrying Zovaal’s Anima infected Zereth Mortis with said Anima.

Either the Devourers were able to use the Chain in Korthia to get to Zereth Mortis or Zovaal is an amalgam of Devourer Souls shoved into an Automa Body by the First Ones.

Zovaal’s attacks in the Raid are almost the same color as the Devourers’ Anima(albeit tainted by Rainbow Mawsworn Death Magic) by the way.

The Primal Water is the entrance of a Watery Realm that the First Ones extract the Eggs they forge into their Machines(through the Forge of Afterlives) for the Shadowlands.

If Zereth Umbrae is anything like Zereth Mortis then the Old Gods are a modification of Aurelid that the Void Lords threw out because they thought they’d be best for traversing space and landing on Planets to infect with their tendrils.

Of course that would mean that Sporemounds are also Aurelid modifications thrown out by the Pantheon of Life!

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Those five realms serve functions that no other afterlives do. The rest are all basically meant only to be eternal places of rest for the souls of the dead, rather than “utility” realms that protect and operate the “machinery” of the Shadowlands. There’s no real basis for thinking the rest of the afterlives would arbitrarily subject their denizens to such conditioning and reformation because they exist exclusively to serve as eternal respites for souls as they already exist.

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Yes. This is a comparison I make :

The Shadowlands is like a Hotel Casino Resort on the Las Vegas Strip. Tons of different rooms of various types - 1 bed, 2 bed, rooms with their own kitchens, suites, penthouses… as well as pools, a spa, poker rooms, a casino floor… all sorts of great and not so great places that we don’t see because we come in as workers.

What we see is the kitchen. The basement. The laundry room. The huge backlot for deliveries and garbage and recycling. The Employee Dining Room. We don’t see what the customers see. And they don’t see what we see.

We enter the Shadowlands and deal with the functionality of it. The realms of the Eternals, who cultivate and protect the Shadowlands.

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