I just don’t like blizz watering down EVERY single character until they’re nothing for goody-goody boring one-dimensional characters. Not every character needs to be be a perfect Light-inspired Good Guy. And just because a character isn’t a Good Guy, doesn’t mean he must be raid fodder. We NEED jerks. We NEED edgy lil so-and-so’s that don’t jive with everyone else. We need that to make the world not seem so flat and for us players not to feel coddled.
Its frankly annoying and I am getting tired of this slop writing. Every Horde leader is starting to feel the same. Let’s all hold hands and be friends and share tips on how to be more pathetic one dimensional basic b… twerps.
Characters don’t have to be likeable to make good characters.
Couldn’t agree more. Its part of what made the original cast so likeable. None of the major characters of warcraft were goody two shoes. They all did morally questionable things for their beliefs. Jaina tried to genocide orgrimmar, genn lets his hatred for sylvannas cloud his judgement at every opportunity, Thrall cheated mak’gora, etc. They were all relatable because of their flaws. Their subjective right and wrongs clashing with each other is what drove the story of warcraft. Every character nowadays feels so flat and one dimensional because they all have the same beliefs fighting against a villain with, in all honesty, kinda basic motivations.
While I’m sympathetic to Zul’jan and didn’t want him to die, I can’t help but chuckle at how all of you people are parroting the same oft-repeated Twitter complaints about white supremacist Scarlets (like the ONE we spared cause she surrendered), or a no-name, pathetic, two-dimensional moustache twirler like Marran. Meanwhile, nothing to say about how a character deserving of death like Sylvanas got off with barely a slap on the wrist. No grandstanding about genocide or colonialism there.
Like I get you guys think you’re sticking up for the global south by thinking Horde is the PoC Folx™ faction, but there’s a significant overlap of people braying for the blood of Turalyon, Jaina, Tyrande (I guess land-back and native rights only matter for Horde races?), Alleria, and Anduin… yet they’re throwing a massive fit over Zul’jan.
In an ideal world, Zul’jan would have been a counterbalance to his sister, and the two would have redeemed the legacy of Zul’jin and lead the Amani together, but that’s not the world we live in. Please stop trying to act like you’re part of the Axis of Resistance because you’re Horde faction fanatics, though.
Admittedly this is mixing Mary Sue chocolate in with the canon peanut butter, but it’s kinda rough thinking about Phae getting a second chance, and Zul’jan not. I just hope they write him falling to his flaws properly.
I know it’s kinda unrelated, but for some reason I thought of a quote from Supernatural’s OG Death: “The human soul is not a rubber ball. It’s vulnerable, impermanent, but stronger than you know… and more valuable than you can imagine.”
The two are beat up inside. Heck, maybe I’m beat up inside, too. You’d be surprised how much of my personality is a veneer covering up a pit of darkness.
Even my wife refuses to grasp this fully, to the point where I can’t fully express myself. She’s beat up even more inside, you see, and sees my beat-upness as petty weakness. My veneer is silliness, while hers is strength.
The temper tantrum throwing man-child wouldn’t have had this fate if he stopped and thought for one moment… We don’t need rash characters that don’t care about anyone but themselves.
Literally just give antiheroes or at the bare minimum characters with believable flaws… Arator can’t fill the role of “naive young man” when he’s a half human who’s 40 years old.
I truly think Zul’jan could have been a decent antihero if blizzard really leaned into that. He might go against his sister, he might start arguments, and he is rude but he does care about his people and he has redeeming qualities… such as the fact that he makes good points. His point about the loa abandoning the Amani over two people, and how the Amani need to be self reliant and not rely on the loa… isn’t wrong, he has a point. The loa damned an entire race of people over the actions of a few, and it led to the Amani suffering due to their reliance on loa. Zul’jan has a point.
But no, apparently we can’t have interesting characters. Everyone has to be either goody two shoes who can do no wrong, or irredeemable cartoonishly evil villains, and everyone else who falls in the middle gets killed off.
Want to know why we keep doing cosmic conflict garbage and not more grounded stories? Because grounded stories would have to involve shades of grey, realistic characterization and a focus on people being people. Blizzard keeps doing cosmic conflicts because they don’t want to bother actually writing with nuance and greyness
I can’t believe I’m saying this, but… maybe they should hire me. I mean I’m not Walt Whitman or anything, but I can at least come up with a good “cover your tail” story to save a failure to some degree.
