i enjoy seeing guilds fall when their leader is outed as an absolute donkey
2 Likes
100% this. Powers should have their own agendas and limitations, not necessarily defined by good OR evil. Purely good powers are boring. Purely evil powers are boring. We need nuance.
3 Likes
I agree but also Blizzard isnât exactly well known for their prowess in writing when it comes to nuance.
Itâd be better if it was⌠better, but itâs not. Ever since the new power chart stuff Iâve sort of lost interest in the magic stuff, myself. Just feels like a hassling attempt at being deep about this stuff without actual good writing backing it up.
I think it adds another layer. It maintains the âLight is still mostly good, and Void is still mostly evilâ vibes", because of the way those forces interact with our charactersâ physiologies and psychologies.
And that remains largely true. It basically turns the forces into these amorphous gods, these sentient wills, and weâre just tapping from their power. For example, if you read the wiki on Light or Void, it says that the forces are Light and Void, but they manifest as Holy or Shadow magic. I think that distinction is important, because it explains how the Forces can have their own agenda without necessarily superimposing that on its users. The users of that magic likely align with its morality, but that doesnât necessarily have to be the case. That degree of freedom allows us to make varied characters without necessarily restricting them to the same code of the Forces they wield.
3 Likes
TBF, we still donât know the Light or the Void. Really know them.
Weâve met their mouth-pieces, the Naaru and the Old Gods, but they have their own agendas that may or may not run off-kilter to the will of the Light and the Void.
Xeâra is the poster child for âThe Light can be used for bad things.â, but even then, we had the Nathrezeim/Dread Lords doing that well before we met her, and our only encounters with the Void have been irrevocably tainted by the machinations of the Old Gods and their Void Lord masters.
It would not shock me to learn the Light and Void are actually at peace with each other, each knowing the other is an integral part of themselves, opposing energies working together to sustain a cycle of mutual preservation, but ârogue factionsâ within them, the Naaru for the Light, the Void Lords for the Void, who felt this cycle âunfairlyâ impacted them or who were possessed by a hunger for more power after realizing that this was as tall as they could climb the ladder within their respective realms, decided to kick things off?
Donât forget, the Chronicles are a âbiasedâ view of history, penned by the Titans who had been deceived by the Dread Lords and blinded by their own hubris and internal conflicts, and we still donât know the exact origin of the Naaru.
For all we know, theyâre this gameâs version of âfallen angelsâ, kicked out of the Light for their own hubris and banished to our dimension where theyâve been trying to raise up an Army of Light to pursue their personal missions like Xeâra was doing, or trying to save mortal lives like the Naaru of Shattrath in atonement for their sins.
Weâve already seen that the Titans are Arcaneâs version of the Naaru and the Old Gods, and they are significantly more powerful than any Naaru or Old God weâve met to date, and they are perfectly willing to burn entire solar systems to ash to ârebuildâ them in a new, more âperfectâ, more âorderlyâ form, as many times as is needed, regardless of if the world held sapient, sentient races naturally or not.
Fel had the Demons, who were individually weak but were theoretically limitless in number and quasi-immortal, meaning they could have eventually consumed all of reality given enough time.
Order and Chaos forever at each otherâs throats. Life and Death permanently interlinked and strained to the breaking point by the machinations of blindly devoted servants unwilling to accept the status quo. The Warcraft setting is built upon the tenuous balance between equal and opposing forces, and while I donât necessarily object to âeveryone has an agenda and not all of them include you keeping on breathingâ on a Macro, Cosmic-tier scale, I do hope Blizzard keeps at least one or two factions within each âPrimal Powerâ on our side, and working to do the right thing, regardless of how the expansions turn out.
Finding out the Void is full of Naaru, the most corrupt and evil becoming Void Lords and the Light is also full of Naaru, most of whom are struggling to keep the Realm alive and in good health with the constant depredations of the Legion, the Void and the various planar factions taking chunks to fuel themselves, and that the Naaru in our universe are exiles and those who got trapped in our dimension when the original Civil War broke out in the Realm of Light and gave rise to the Void when the âtrueâ Prime Naaru could not deal with the coming of its own end and chose to shatter itself into the Naaru we know today rather than fade away and leave the Light to grow according to its own whims, perverting the course of history and giving rise to the Anti-Light, the Void, as a result of that selfishness and hubris sealing the fate of all Naaru sired by the âPrimeâ to slowly fall to the Void and then gradually return to the Light.
4 Likes
i believe some people are misinterpreting my post so let me be as clear as i can:
i have no trouble with there being âevilâ aspects to some powers, i.e. the Light. the scarlet crusade is an excellent example of that, the Light being used as a sort-of âmisguided, overzealous, holy righteousnessâ thing. what i think is stupid is the attempted moral relativism that defines the Light as equal to the Void or the Fel, and the fact that all the cosmic powers seem to be becoming, slowly, over time, âcorruptive force that gives you power but if you indulge in it too much you feverishly serve itâ. the Fel and the Void and the Light can ALL be described in that way. there is no difference between them now, sans aesthetics. the narrative bends and twists and contorts to compare these three - when they really should not be comparable. the Light is good, certainly better than the other forces, it has consistently aided us. it can be a universal power, but having a universal power be defined by its misuse is far more interesting than having it be defined by âcorruptive force that seeks to paint everything one colourâ. we already had that in the Fel, and honestly now that the Void and also the Light are all that, it makes the Fel less interesting while making the Void and Light less interesting as well.
furthermore, what is the message that this construction of the universe sends? because it seems to me that the entire setting is slowly becoming that dril tweet: the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke: "theres actually zero difference between good & bad things. you imbecile. you f***ing moron". from a metanarrative perspective, thatâs a despicable message to send, and honestly it gets on my nerves.
basically im still angery and still think the lore is bad. even more at 12.
8 Likes
Did I already do the confession where I said I judge people who have to use real world âHBO Tierâ swearing for their RP?
2 Likes
opherial we all know how many Game of Thrones posters you have up on your walls
1 Like
I have exactly one bajillionty.
But I did like the Arya and the Hound miniseries they inadvertently made.
i confess that I made this extremely well edited psa like two weeks ago but havenât had any reason to use it yet so here you are
https://i.imgur.com/z8NTzuo.png
5 Likes
I didnât even think of it from that angle, my immersion is just immediately shattered when in the middle of an intriguing conversation someone goes âWhat the !@#$ did you just !@#$ing say you !@#$ing !@#$head??â
Like, thanks G.R.R. Martin for reinforcing that everyone in fantasy is from Yorkshire but !@#$ off.
1 Like
wdym, âfantasyâ means bland, brown, dirty, bloody, and miserable
6 Likes
Whenever I see someone going for âHBO swearingâ I just mentally mark down that theyâre 14 and move on.
4 Likes
I like to think of myself as a Disapproving Debbie.
Thereâs the odd foulmouthed character where thatâs their gimmick or schtick or what have you. Then thereâs an obvious too much of it sometimes. I dunno. I think it is a bit of modern programming where you turn on a show and itâs kind of an eyeroll so I understand why people get the same reaction seeing it heavily enough in-game from other peopleâs characters.
Little Timmy just learned how to cuss and heâs going to make sure you know how edgy and adult he is.
4 Likes
mods are asleep, post âserâ instead of âsirâ
2 Likes
I made this three months ago, convinced I would have lots of things to post with it.
I only used it once. 
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ekv_ZSVXUAIzVeo?format=jpg&name=large
6 Likes
Oh no I love it
1 Like