Tyrande Wick - Or, an alternative to Tyrande the raid boss

Lore Story Forum
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I’m going to address a couple of scattered points - but not the whole thing. The point of that was just to kind of share my mindset. If you’re stating that some of these phases lead to counterproductive stances and argumentation - I absolutely agree with you. A big reason I made that discord was to try to trim some of those down. A big reason that I’m here now is to try to trim some of those down. These are easy emotional traps to get into, and I think that our community can do better. Given that I’m something of an old hand at this, I figured I’d give it a shot.

Regarding Cataclysm - the central thing that I think a lot of my opponents miss on this issue is the same thing that gets missed generally with the Night Elves. The strict canon is usually much better than the visual presentation. The problem with that is that human beings are overwhelmingly visual learners. Visuals are far more memorable and impactful than text, and the comparison isn’t even close. In Cataclysm, as far as the lore is concerned, the Horde tried to Blitz Ashenvale, got their supply lines cut, and then were defeated in detail. But as far as the visuals and presentation was concerned - they rampaged in, took all this territory, and set up their big bombastic bases - which was the developers’ intent. When asked in an interview: “what happened to Silverwing Refuge?”, the developer replied “The Horde has happened!” - and that’s a very good visual metaphor for the changes to the zone - and for how it ends up feeling.

“Show don’t tell” is a storytelling convention for a reason - it’s because if what you are showing something that conflicts with your exposition, you will produce in your audience a feeling of cognitive dissonance, and the visual message is what survives that conflict. Quoting Lindsay Ellis once again: “Framing and aesthetics supersede the rest of the text. Always. Always. Always.”

That is why Cataclysm still feels bad for Night Elf players. It was a victory that was presented as though it were a loss. Therefore it was seen as a loss. That has nothing to do with zone exchanges or questing - it has to do with the storytelling choices that they made with how the events were portrayed.

… and that matters, because I’m just describing the impact of the people who read the transmedia narratives, followed developer interviews, read the quest text and connected the dots. I’m not considering the overwhelming mass of people who do not do those things but consume the story anyway through environmental cues, cinematics, and gameplay itself. Does that matter in the rivalry? Absolutely. It helps to drive what side you pick, what you find powerful, and of course, it writes the narrative on trash talking. As Blizzard’s marketing executives themselves would tell you: “it matters”.

The other point I guess I will reference is “sanity” - and I have seen this narrative crop up from time to time. I can decontextualize what we’re talking about to arrive at the conclusion that I’m getting worked up about fictional elves in a video game. Teldrassil getting destroyed doesn’t in any way take away from or impact my pretty freaking awesome life, the job that I love, the friends and family that I care about or anything that really matters - and yet - and this is again true for people generally: fictional works when they are good get people invested, and they evoke emotions from people. That is what they are intended to do in the first place. It shouldn’t surprise anyone then that certain moves in fiction will evoke certain emotions - and Blizzard knows this. They have a terrifying amount of pyschologists on staff who IIRC advised on the story.

I regard this as a strategic blunder though - because I am confident in saying that the push for toxicity and pain as motivators, especially when people don’t trust them - is driving people to put the game down, and to do it in disgust. I don’t want to see that happen to this franchise. I’d love to go back to playing it. That’s why I’m here.

But - as for my point with that - a passionate person is not “insane” to undergo some emotion over a work of fiction. There’s a line of course - but I think in general, the accusations of mental health issues fly a little bit too fast and loose around here. Just a comment.

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I get where you’re coming from, certainly, in that you want it to be framed as a clarion call, but, ultimately, I think the best case scenario following BFA is that it’d make the opposition to the Alliance less miserable. A “well, they’re still interested in dealing damage after the despot was deposed and an armistice was signed, guess we’re back in it.” sort of situation, but, I don’t think you’re going to be able to cheerlead the Horde story back into conflict on this. The damage is simply done. But, rather than continue to drag paying customers back into the swamp, I’d just say… don’t?

From both angles I see my Alliance and Horde characters, the whole situation just puts the taste of ash on my tongue.

I wanted to touch on this, however;

The war fatigue was the most likely end for this expansion since I saw it released. There’s no way the world’s two greatest super powers don’t tear the arms off of each other in the process, and that’s exactly what we got (well, told, anyways, we actually see so little of it, which leads to the core root of a lot of BFA’s problems.).

I think we can expand upon that if we had a return to square one approach. An extreme lack of manpower to handle the local problems allows situations to spiral out of control. (Satyr cults in Darkshore and Ashenvale, Nightmare disturbed Furbolg, Twilight Cultists, Scarlets in Lordaeron, return of the Scourge in the Plaguelands and Duskwood, a new Stromgarde in its infancy and about to collapse beneath the weight of the Troll tribes, Ogres and Syndicate Claimants, the list goes on.). Give the two over-arching stories of the Alliance and Horde an extreme amount of breathing room. Maybe in a few years bring them back in contact and touch on the subject again, to ask the question “the last war we had was calamitous, do we want to really want to stir this back up for old grudges or let it lie?” through the narrative. I strongly suggest we avoid the faction war narrative all together, because the team behind the wheel simply just can’t make it work.

Using the metaphor from your demonstration, it’s moreso the stadium going offline for a myriad of reasons. The Ref doesn’t actually know how the game works and is just shouting random jargon and doing the YMCA with his arms because he thinks he’s supposed to make hand signals as part of his job. The announcers in the booth are actively smearing the other team or breaking off on tangents that don’t really matter and overall there’s just a very foul odor that nobody can quite put their finger on.

Nothing good could come out of that stadium. Why participate in that? Even as displeased as I was about Darkshore and Teldrassil for my playthrough on my Alliance characters, if I had to revisit that garbage, I’d gag. I simply just don’t believe that it’s possible to improve that condition and rather than try to drum up enthusiasm on revisiting anything that has its taint, I’d prefer if it just stayed off the map all together.

I strongly want to avoid the idea of competition, though. It shouldn’t be one. It’s what made this forum subsection such a volatile hellhole to begin with. I can compete in PVP, find the same flavor of deplorable jerk too, I don’t want to compete in a race to see who’s story sucks more first.

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Two years is too long I think. There might not be a game to save in four years, and yes, I am holding up the problems with player identity as being serious ones, and I am quite convinced that many of them cannot be solved without at least some faction war content. The Night Elves for example will not be rehabilitated by even the strongest of victories against satyr, because their problems come from the fact that they suddenly appear to lose their faction war conflicts.

Regarding your last paragraph, I couldn’t disagree more - but that’s also because I believe that the faction war should be PVP content, and almost exclusively so. That requires balance, that requires a stalemate situation. It requires an environment where people are positively motivated to jump in, instead of feeling, for example, that they will never reverse the pain that the other faction caused them, or instead of feeling that they’re the bad guys for even playing when that’s not what they signed up for.

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As long as the raids are entertaining, the PVP balance is sufferable and they keep putting out new stuff to do, the game will live. BFA’s main sin wasn’t just its devastatingly bad story, but also its extremely bad mechanics. It sucked on every front. We are a minority. Not a small one, but, we could all vanish off the face of the earth and their wallet could hurt and make them care financially, but not enough that it’d sink them. Unless our current real life crises escalate out of control, WoW will be here in four years. Everquest is still online and cranking out expansions, and that game’s all but a submarine at this point.

I’m not sure losing the first bout of Darkshore and Ashenvale is that egregious to faction identity damage, though. They came back to Darkshore, with only the Gilneans in tow, and ousted the army stationed there (which, I get they fail to really drive home the importance of that, but, by rules of the combat they model WoW after, that requires an extreme amount of manpower to make the attempt, since beachheads and fortresses are perhaps the most lethal places to attack, and they did it with a number of their forces diverted for Drazal’alor.). If that isn’t a flex, I don’t know what is.

I personally saw that as recompense enough, given that they’re not going to go back and do any more and they’re very shy of BFA after it was a colossal flop.

On the same foot (since Gladwell was my ride or die character before I started getting involved in Moon Guard Alliance, I’ll say that the horse I have in the Horde and Forsaken race is just a tiny smidge older than my Horse in the Alliance and Night Elf stories, but not by much.), I was just as miffed when the Forsaken lost both Lordaeron and Arathi and both of its story characters without replacements (Lilian Voss isn’t Forsaken in the political body, was a neutral character until an out-of-place hamhand insertion and cannot be considered a worthy replacement, Calia Menethil does not have a place in the Forsaken story, period.) and Saurfang (in both senses of his character being absolutely butchered for BFA and the eventual loss of him as a character), but, I don’t feel that defeat is going to hurt me enjoying the Forsaken story or the Horde story. There’s more stuff to it than BFA that makes it enjoyable.

Frankly, with one foot in both puddles, I’d say Blizzard did me wrong more as a Forsaken/Horde fan than a Night Elf fan.

I think what is important is constructive building, not a competitive story. I’m not asking to kick the Alliance out of Hillsbrad (though, in fairness, I have gone on record saying that if Calia is going to rub her face into that story, I’d rather have Tarren Mill - Southshore violence than the nullification of the Forsaken story by hugging it out), I’m not asking to pulverize Stromgarde while it’s in the cradle and reactivate the Defiler/League of Arathor conflict.

What I’m asking for is attention to the story that gives them a stronger foundation. For the Forsaken story, that starts with removing Calia from the Forsaken story and then maybe work their way up from there.

I don’t see any repairs that’re necessary for the Night Elf story beyond maybe some more screentime on the Dark Shore battle and how that was won.

PVP-tie ins to story is where we break, though. Because I do not feel, in the slightest, that the problems from the narrative my character is put in can be fixed by giving someone the people’s elbow in the Open World. Even in a story context and not considering the opponents are players but NPCs, wasting John Smith or La’le’lu’le’lo isn’t really going to fix the problem, when the core of the problem is an entity that is immovable.

I can think of plenty of ways to make new BGs without having to drum up new conflict but rather work with the unmentioned of BFA. “Tales of battles in the war”. Castles sieged, farms ransacked, villages caught on fire, bing-bang-boom. No further pot stirring in the story is necessary.

Sparking tribalistic-themed stories makes a toxic fanbase and that does an extreme amount of damage. More than a bad story. BFA just happened to get a double whammy on that.

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Please, Blizzard. Make it happen.

I know it’ll mess a bunch of things up, but the result can’t be worse in the long run than BfA.

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There’s a lot to unpack here, so apologies for the long post. I’ll also say that I don’t like block quoting, but I will need to do some of it here to fully address everything.

As long as the raids are entertaining, the PVP balance is sufferable and they keep putting out new stuff to do, the game will live. BFA’s main sin wasn’t just its devastatingly bad story, but also its extremely bad mechanics. It sucked on every front. We are a minority. Not a small one, but, we could all vanish off the face of the earth and their wallet could hurt and make them care financially, but not enough that it’d sink them. Unless our current real life crises escalate out of control, WoW will be here in four years. Everquest is still online and cranking out expansions, and that game’s all but a submarine at this point.

There are a few elements that I feel you’re missing.

  1. Story is a statistically significant factor in video game enjoyment. That most people are not lore nerds does not change this, and the study that I’m thinking of asked people affirmatively. It did not study the impact of subconscious elements such as environmental design or the unavoidable parts of story that give context to an experience.
  2. Story builds brand equity, which acts as a sort of glue that keeps consumers buying your product even when the product declines in value. For a more holistic view on this, consider the elements that form up an indifference curve, and then consider the marginal impact on that indifference curve of the deterioration of a particular element - holding all others equal so that we can isolate it - the result is less individual consumption, and that’s true across everyone’s indifference curves. So when we go to aggregate them into a demand line, despite that those impacts are different across the individuals, they still translate to a loss in sales overall (at least - ceteris paribus - which for those who are new to Economics - is an assumption that we use so that we can judge the impact of factors one at a time, and not because we really think that other factors can’t and don’t change) - and yes, this means that a primarily gameplay-oriented person can end up quitting over the story, what matters it what puts them on the wrong side of the inflection point where their marginal enjoyment meets marginal cost.
  3. Activision-Blizzard is a lot less gunshy about axing projects that don’t prove to be the best use of their resources. If ATVI management determine that they can take the resources that they are using on WoW, and can get an even better ROI from a new property that’s not WoW, and it wouldn’t make sense to either hire new people or trim other titles - expect resources to get pulled from WoW. Maybe not all at once, but enough that ongoing product investments are not enough to reverse the game’s decline, and the data that management has doesn’t support adding more investments to correct the issue.

On Darkshore, I disagree - and so do many Night Elf players for reasons ranging from Nathanos to the poorly-presented resolution. For me the problem is more obvious than that - it’s Darkshore, and therefore no matter what the result was, it was still going to represent a net loss position for the Night Elves, and that’s even ignoring Teldrassil. As I’ve stated before, there’s a reason that my discord has as its logo - a picture of George Bush giving his mission accomplished speech with a picture of Tyrande’s head superimposed over his. Parts of Darkshore did, I will say, move in the right direction, but this was not anywhere near enough to compensate for the humiliation that the War of the Thorns was, or the eight years of humiliation that preceded it.

Your question might come then - where does it end? My answer is simple - an onscreen, faction pride bonanza in Ashenvale. Should it go past there? No. Should the Horde’s content ends in something that ends in what resembles a victory? Yes. But something big needs to be done to refute the idea that the Night Elves are little more than the tragic victims in the faction war. They need their fangs back, and no, not just Tyrande.

Regarding your comments on the Forsaken, we are completely on the same page. So - how would I fix that? I think the Forsaken should have an equally glorious reconquest in Lordaeron. I think Calia belongs in a bin, and I am endlessly sympathetic about the problem of the Forsaken having the core of their identity torn out so that Blizzard could have an expansion villain. You should have won the Arathi Warfront - you’re rightfully pissed that you didn’t, and I feel that if we are to fix the Night Elf situation, and we should, that we should fix the Forsaken situation at the same time.

Now, is constructive building antithetical to competitive storytelling? I don’t think so. You can certainly build and have content that actually works for PVP at the same time. You can build characters, you can build outposts, you can work in cultural facts about the combatants, you can follow the individual and personal war stories of those involved in the conflict. There is a wealth of constructive capability in the kind of small-focus stories that actually are conducive to a PVP-focused narrative. Which is a lot better than hunting for huge moments of shock value - as they have done in their attempt to shove that PVP theme into a raiding-based, PVE narrative, with its three-act structure and its uber-characters.

As for what’s going on with your character - you may feel that way - and you should have the choice to engage in content that doesn’t have your character doing that. I feel that this is where choice in questing, and choice in game modes should come in. As for what’s going on with my character, and with many Alliance characters - that is what’s necessary to solve my issues - because my issues are the feeling of fiat inferiority in context to my Horde counterparts - and I want content to undo that, and get us back on a level playing field.

That way, if I want to go crush my opponents, I can feel good about going into a battleground to make an attempt at it - and my opponents can feel good about trying to do the same. Who wins? Depends on who is better - not on what an overpaid author in Irvine has to say about it.

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Given the direction Sylvanas is going I think Tyrande is on a good path as is. Whether Tyrande ends up as a raid boss or not, I’m hoping that she gets the chance to set things right by her people in the end. This won’t be the tremendous ordeal that the Night Elf community wants because frankly they have such varyingly extravagant wants it’s ridiculous. I just want to see Tyrande’s arc end with her as a hero to her people, not like Sylvanas who can’t be redeemed no matter how Blizzard writes her.

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No problem. You do what you need to dissect information on your own time.

As for story though, yes. It’s not lost on me the value on it, but, many of the people I do rated content with, for example, do not in the slightest care about the story. It’s a muted background noise at most for them. They just want to hack and slash. Saurfang’s Mok’Gora for example got 150k likes and most people around here (barring a few- we know who they are) and the outsider communities who talk mostly about WoW’s story hated it, because while it was visually pretty, the storyline was just slop. Badly stirred gruel. Saurfang chopped into a character that he wasn’t until BFA and added to make a bad story.

They don’t have to try hard to appease the majority. They will certainly try (as we saw when Dark Shore received criticisms from Red Shirt Guy) if they think they can salvage it, but, I think there’s one key element being overlooked here and something we can agree on; damage done is done. I had earlier suggested a retcon for BFA proper (and, with some more thought put into it - a soft one, one that doesn’t just wipe the slate clean but has a buildup. Timey wimey rewind, etc.) and you brought up that good point. Once the damage is done, you can’t un-frag it. If they royally mess up and these people leave, well, you can’t shut Pandora’s box. They could just keep on going but at a loss, maybe with the sacking of someone in a higher position and replace him to ensure it doesn’t happen again, but, we do not make or break WoW. Even when BFA was getting news articles on how badly it was written, it still trucked on (admittedly with great speed because they needed to escape BFA from how badly it was failing).

WoW will be here after they inevitably do something to piss me off to the point where I want to sever ties after business that ranged back into my childhood, and the same for others.

So, we’re not at a critical juncture where it needs to happen now or there’ll never be a chance. These things need breathing room. When it becomes a distant memory, it becomes a lot easier to bury. I can tell you for free I hated A Little Patience and it’s far back in my rear view mirror by now that it’s just a minor irritation. My best estimate of it becoming a distant memory is two years and - frankly - I feel the setting needs a soft reboot button, and the best way to press it is by making the mundane important (Defias Brotherhood tier stuff, for example). Returning to basics and shining a light on the most mundane problems becoming great struggles due to the damages of the fourth war feels appropriate. Having to conscript farmers because there isn’t enough men to fill a garrison in Elwynn Forest and having to saddle up with a group of Tauren to deal with the Centaurs breaching the Great Gate seems more appropriate than focusing on the 4th war. Repeating it after essentially sacrificing everything and getting attacked by the Scourge immediately after feels like that’s the time for the “kingdom that’s about to break” story to happen.

I rebel at the idea that the Night Elves are defanged because they lost a battle, though. Nobody is infallible, defeat happens to everyone and, most importantly, none of us are as strong as all of us - which I think is important to the overall narrative of the Alliance and the Horde. The Alliance and the Horde would effectively be stuck grinding its wheels in the dirt if neither ever came together. On an individual level and on a grand scale, you can lose battles and doesn’t deteriorate your standing. Circumstance dictates win or loss, not skill. England and France lost battles in our history, even the Mongols did, but, they’re still regarded as formidable.

Being 1 for 1 on the win to loss ratio is about fair.

As for competitive storytelling though, I think we’re just going to have to agree to disagree. My stance comes from one of cynicism. The only person that seemed to actually have their head on right for the faction conflict was Metzen and those in his immediate company, because they could keep it temperature leveled, local and above all, kept it from ever interfering in the main story beyond some barbed words like “Alliance pig” and “Horde dog”. They’re all gone, now.

We’ve seen how the new team handles faction conflict. They can’t. It only serves to be detrimental. So, rather than go back in on the war narrative, I want the “war” of World of Warcraft to focus back on the sweeping list of other problems that fill the world. I want them to be more important, so that it draws the story further and further away from BFA.

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what is nefpa? go back to classic and remain silent, typical troll.

WOw , how RICH from lvl 42 classic player. Just…

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I want to reply to this first because it will take me some time to digest Gladwell’s reply and because this has the potential to blow things up.

Stop insulting people.

You’re not advancing anything by being toxic. No one is going to stop and say “oh, I guess I was wrong after all” when you dismiss them for posting on a classic character - and I get frustrated about this because the Night Elves are in a terrible spot - and yet their advocates give every reason for people not to care about that.

This isn’t about “winning” and “owning” people. This is about understanding where they come from and coming to conclusions that satisfy everyone. We have to do that in an MMO - where there are multiple communities with multiple priorities and differing interests.

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…what about Theramore which was nuked ? Your idiots Sunreavers were warned to leave or will be dead.

let me remind you that night elves ALONE with nature forces stopped legion invasion. Maybe stop dreaming about “debt”, we dont need anyone help. We are powerful enough to decimate every single race.

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Regarding your first paragraph, BFA’s metacritic score is atrocious, and story is well represented in the depreciating factors. Youtube videos generally don’t get dislikes unless they’re really, really bad. They aren’t representative of people getting fed up, leaving no feedback, and leaving - which at least as my marketing classes told me - is the norm.

To your second - yes, you can’t simply un-do the damage. You can’t make people forget it. You can’t make it go away. You can’t take away the pain by ignoring it. You must overwrite it, and you must do so on the terms on which that damage was done.

… as for whether we’re at a critical juncture - frankly, I’m not even sure if we’ve passed it or not. As I said, these things generally don’t happen all at once. The announcement to spin off a business segment is something that tends to come after several years of failures, and several years of divestitures. It’s entirely possible that we are past the point of no return - and the insistence on mechanics to pad-out game time do suggest that we are in that area. Do I know that? No - I don’t have their metrics - but I do see the signs.

Might we need a soft reboot? Probably - hence the thread on writing a PVP narrative. Shadowlands may offer that opportunity, but the soft reboot is going to fail if it fails to resolve the issues left over from BFA. Those things stick, people don’t have a reset button, and you need to find ways of changing their perceptions.

Now that we’ve gotten out of the theoretical arena - you’re discussing Night Elf defanging, and I find it more than a little confusing that you’re arguing that this was one battle. The Night Elves in terms of presentation lost their entire country after being humiliated for eight years prior. If Teldrassil happened when Cataclysm released, it would have been bad, but not anywhere near as bad as it is now given that history. But even without it, we’re not talking about them losing a border skirmish, or a zone on their periphery. They lost everything in one stroke, and clawed back only a fraction in Darkshore. For a playable race in an MMO, that’s an intolerable state - and as I’ve demonstrated before, it destroys motivation. Why would I want to play a perpetual victim? That’s not why people play video games - we don’t engage in this sort of media to be told that we suck and there’s nothing we can do about it.

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That’s funny considering your only recent victories are against garrisons.

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I suppose she’s going to ignore it took the Worgen/gilneans, Ivars’ Bloodfang Pack, and a power up for for Tyrande to beat the Horde and retake back Darkshore.

It is what it is I suppose.I’m still of the opinion a lot of their actual strength gets severally overblown, for a majority of their victories they had help from other nature based forces. War of the Satyr was like the only war they won without outside help.

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Other than Staghelm, name one time an Alliance hero has ever turned heel. Relax.

There is a far greater than 50% chance that she gets fixed, especially considering to date she has literally done nothing wrong since Warcraft III outside of being zealous and xenophobic.

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Fixed…hrmm, i think thats the wrong word, i mean, tyrande is not “damaged”.

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I mean, a lot of people would say, no, she isn’t “damaged” per say, but she is the living embodiment of butthurt seething rage right now. I would think Nelf players would be cool with that considering they she is larping out their fantasy right now.

What exactly is wrong with your lead NPC being the embodiment of vengeance. Isn’t that exactly what players were asking for.

She’s basically fan service embodied, and NPCs and PCs are also trying to help her at the same time.

There is like a 10% chance she turns heel, at best, and only if they need a raid boss of convenience, lol. We simply aren’t there yet.

Do you think I would be mad if Saurfang was in her position instead of being in the Maw getting milked for anima after being hilariously one-shotted to make Sylvanas look cool?

Alliance, dude. Give me my cake or give me death, every time.

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Night elves are one their own level.

How they are portrayed in game, different story.

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my problem isn´t tyrande wanting revenge :wink: I haven´t any problems for her position.

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I want to pick at this part specifically, when I say: it wasn’t just a fraction, it was all of Darkshore. You can even go back and get a little hippogriff hatchling, if you’d like.

Either the battle was won in Ashenvale or it stopped because of the armistice, but, the Night Elves have Ashenvale.

Yes, the fallout was explosive, but the only thing the Night Elf story is missing right now is Teldrassil, which, frankly, wasn’t supposed to exist in the first place and if Staghelm and co could just grow it, then, what’s to stop Malfurion from doing so again if it’s necessary?

They’re not missing any primary characters or territory. BFA did a lot of telling and not a lot of showing, but, with the pieces on the table, I cannot feasibly see a situation where it needs more addressing.

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