What would you think of a commercial for Brann Bronzebeard bran flakes? Would Brann Bronzebeard make for a good cereal mascot? A prize in every box!
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what have i ever done to deserve you inflicting such horrors on me
leave my cereal alone, itâs the only joy from childhood I have left
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Hot take: The setting needs to be rebuilt⊠from the start.
We start by kicking out all of the celestial stuff and the multi planet crap.
Now then we keep the races and cultures, we donât need whole new planets for that weâve got space and time and really thatâs all we need.
Rough originsâŠ
Humans, Valarjar, Dwarfs, Gnomes⊠all descended from a common ancestor and then diverged via isolation/environmental and sexual selection pressures.
Trolls, elves, naga⊠all share a common ancestor and largely follow a similar path, elves diverged because they were exposed to concentrated magical âradiationâ, Naga form is actually a curse forced upon the naga by the Night Elves.
Tauren, Taunka, and Eredar (Draenei)⊠all share a common ancestor with the Eredar being the subject of ancient Night Elven experiments with the very magic that remade them.
Goblins stay the same, a unique branch of bipedal intelligent life that got itâs own magical upgrade.
On the other side of the planetâŠ
Orcs, Ogres, gron⊠ectra all share ancestry and a similarly unique ecology, basically itâs the Australia of the world lots of unique stuff happened there.
Dragons, many are the legends of the dragons and many more are the stories of their rises and eventual defeats. I see them having a life cycle that involves lots of sleeping to cover vast distances, with them being able to feed on the magical âradationâ of certain places to sustain themselves for their long lives only rarely needing food in the traditional sense as a means of gathering materials to grow and heal. They would be the closest to celestial beings in this version simply because they have such massive stores of magical power that they have slowly changed the world around themselves giving rise to the dragon like races and on their home island even influencing all of the races.
Iâll skip past the vast number of other groups just because this planet produces tons of intelligent life⊠basically the same set up just no otherworldly interventions guiding them.
The cultures should be as close to core as possibleâŠ
Orcs are the survivors of a warlike race that was in the process of becoming less warlike when disaster struck and they were forced to flee their homelands in search of a new home. Guided by the legend of an ancient dragon that came from the west the Orc and Ogre clans pack into their fleets and set out to find lands that can support them before their people starve to death. Few on the lands expect that the fleets will find land and know they are instead sending off their bravest to die that they might live long enough for the land to heal.
Eredar as a culture began striving to achieve enlightenment only to be led astray by the vainglorious Kilâjaeden and power hungry Archimonde, who insisted that the power of the ancient Night Elves was their birthright, only those of the Draenei cult lead by Velen escaped unscathed from the corruption of their people by the would-be titans in their quest for immortality. For those who remain their nightmare is only beginning.
The Naga live in their vast empire of the seas fighting endless wars against the Murlocs and Makrura whose competing empires have proven resilient. Even so many remember the old tales of when their people lived on the land and walked with two legs in the light of the sun and moons and that it was the Night Elves who punished them for a crime none alive were responsible for.
The Night Elves remain isolated and rarely interacting with the other races beyond those they see as useful intermediaries. Their culture has descended into stagnation to the point that many have taken to taking up the name and identity of past holders of their titles. The priestess of Elune is just the latest to have taken up the name Tyrande a great honor to the whisperwind lineage who claim to be descendants of the first, Tyrande.
The Human kingdoms are in a state of war, though they are pretending they are not, all are feeling threatened by the recent bout of an unexpected winter during the summer and looking to their neighbors for the resources to maintain their holds on power. They certainly donât have time to worry about absurd reports of monsters with skin that ranges from grey to green coming from the eastern seas. In one kingdom a young prince looks to the old ways to ensure the dominance of his people as he welcomes the necromancer KelâThuzad who claims he could create an unstoppable army that will ensure the people of Lordaeron would rule for all of time.
The Dwarves are in a pickle, they dug too bloody deep. A dragon and itâs guardian nests has been awakened and they are not pleased. To make matters worse the clans canât even agree if itâs a bad thing or not. Maybe those wee fold the gnomes have an idea that the clans can agree with.
The Gnomes were so close, just a few more points of precision and it would have worked the math totally checks out how could they have missed it? Oh well looks like they need a new home for a bit, shouldnât be more than a couple of generations, perhaps the Dwarves have room?
The Tauren feel the winds blowing colder and look to their shaman who warn of rough days to come as the spirits and the elements speak of something tragic that happened far away and that will reshape the world into one of war. The braves listen and look to the plains where their ancestral enemy hunts and think perhaps it is time to put an end to them.
The High Elves watch their human puppets dance about carefully keeping each kingdom too weak to threaten the careful balance that keeps Silvermoon safe and neutral. Now especially is this vital as a rebellion has taken root, led by the Blooded houses and the Void Seekers cult the rebels seek nothing less than the destruction of the Sunstrider house and the destruction of the Sunwell the addictive influence of which is the source of their influence and power over the people.
In Suramar the Eredar have come, with their armies of magically created warriors, for the Nightwell. Grand Magistrix Elisande, a master of probability, has foreseen only one path to the survival of her people. Knowing it will be her death and damnation as a monster, she sets the sequence of events in motion by ensuring that First Arcanist Thalyssra survives the coming purge. Now all that remains is to play her part and buy the time her people need for those from the distant lands to come and save her people.
The Zandalari are a stagnant empire one unwilling to accept that they are no longer the true rulers of even their own lands as the people secretly rebel and plot the deaths of the leaders no longer believing that the Loa would want them to suffer such hardships. Though weakening the Zandalari will not go without a fight.
The Darkspear tribe has fled yet another island desperately trying to outpace the merloc swarm who hunt them to fulfill a prophecy of power and victory over the Naga. The Darkspear themselves hunt their own prophecy one that will see them to a new home where they will be free to live as they desire. First though they need the stranger who calls lightening and rides wolves into battle. Senâjin fears he will be old and a burden long before he finds the one that will deliver his people to their home, he fears it will be the child growing in his loves belly who must bear the burden of finding the one who leads an army of former slaves.
The Draenei huddle on their island retreat secreted away from their fellow Eredar where they study the teachings of the prophet Velen. In recent years Velen has spoken of the coming darkness and of the need for the most faithful to become supreme champions of the Light and to act as a bulwark against the faithless. He calls this new breed the Lightbound and they will be formed from his most loyal of followers.
The Broken huddle in caves fearful of being discovered by the Eredar and the Draenei. The survivors of early experiments in the creation of the Eredarâs âdemonsâ, unnaturally created clones born of Eredar flesh and grown to purpose. They are the Burning Legion that will claim this world for the Eredar. The Broken are not without their own gifts though, Nobundo once thought mad has proven himself. Not only as a former member of the Draenei cult, which has granted him knowledge of the sanctuary they now hide on but also the voices he would speak of have granted him knowledge of ancient magics and power that the broken can use to defend themselves and perhaps make a future with.
âŠ
Yeah Iâm calling it thatâs enough free writing for the time.
Have you played their recent quests? They fix the plague problem by creating a giant goo monstrosity that they then have to murder with an airforce of vampire bats.
And last we saw of them theyâre slaughtering crusaders with alchemical weapons, coming marching under the water and unleashing screaming ghost calvary.
Iâm really at a loss for what people wanted. What should Belmont strangle a puppy for no apparent reason because the Forsaken being pointlessly evil is dumb. Them being particularly ruthless and bloodthirsty on the otherhand because theyâre all walking weapons that eat people makes sense.
But you need a sense of enduring humanity and red lines even they wonât cross for them to work. Otherwise you basically just have a less interesting Scourge.
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People do not know what they want. Not even the devs. That is why the forsaken have this historical whiplash between being cool zombie people who had a bad thing happen to them and are making the best of it⊠and scourge 2.0, now with 300% more face melting plague.
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Well I know what I want and presume to know whatâs best for everyone.
The Forsaken already have everything they need.
Voss for the reluctant undead who nonetheless has embraced their nature.
Belmont for those who are 100% about this state of existence and yearn to massacare all whoâd oppose the Forsaken; living, undead or otherwise.
Calia for the fallen imperial opulence of the greatest human of Lordaeron being reborn as Azerothâs first free republic of the living dead.
And Faranell for;
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Well this is fun, so faction balance at least with the new season of discovery is 50/50. In fact, it implies the Alliance was slightly popular. So yeah, looks like any relationship to pop balance and story beats are at best correlational and not causational.
True, though the problem is at this point the Forsaken have crossed lines that even the Scarlet Crusade and Iron Horde wouldnât cross (like cannibalism and turning kidnapped people to sew them together into flesh monsters). Thereâs a lot of double standards around the writing for the Forsaken. Anyone else does cannibalism and itâs treated with horror⊠but the Forsaken doing it is treated as âlol funnyâ moment.
Given atleast two other member races of the horde have practiced cannibalism, iâm sure its not that much of a shocker to em. also abominations have only ever been stitched from corpses
I imagine most members of the horde regard cannibalism with the mentality Itâs gross, just donât do it in front of anyone else/my family
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Both did.
lmao.
Illidan is kind of overrated as a person and I am still kind of baffled by his depiction in Legion.
I totally get demon hunters were a popular and requested class. It makes sense to revisit him if your introducing them as playable, but I cannot take his âDoing bad things for the greater goodâ depiction seriously because I know what he was like playing Warcraft 3. He created a new well of eternity because he could not let go his arcane magic addiction. His attempts to say it was necessary if the Legion returned were excuses then.
When Tyrande releases him in Warcraft III, he is a power hungry fel addict nonetheless willing to fight the Legion out of some lingering affection for her. He then promptly eats Gulâdanâs skull because he just wants magic power crack.
In the Frozen Throne, he willingly serves KilâJaeden because he is⊠surprise surprise⊠offering him unlimited magical power and he is an addict who jumps for it. Chronicles tries to spin this as some weird game of 4D cosmic poker-chess for his master plan but that was ridiculous in both Legion and Chronicles and it is still ridiculous now.
His entire plot in Outland is about trying to avoid the consequences of his actions because of his failure to destroy the Frozen Throne. A plan that was⊠well he flat out summarizes its effectiveness: âPerhaps hiding here was not the most prudent decision. Still, the quest lies before us. Will you follow me into the cold heart of death itself?â
His last words to Malfurion in the Frozen Throne campaign, I feel, summarize him perfectly: âLordship over this world was never my aim⊠only power⊠only the magic. Iâve lingered here too long. I must go. By aiding you, I have betrayed my new master. If I am not careful, his wrath will be my end.â
Illidan was a magic-crack-junkie. He did not care about being an evil overlord, a ruler, or any other higher principle other than vibing and being all powerful. It does not make him the evilest of Warcraft âvillainsâ but just⊠reckless and apathetic.
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Not really. Especially as of Legion the Knights of the Ebon Blade did all sorts of necro-shenanigans and not only did nobody care but they even got to be heroes in SL.
Hell even after they ran around raising everyoneâs dead after BFA. A thing people still cry about the Forsaken doing even though their newly risen arenât liable to go on spree killings without training.
Outside Darkshore and Gilneas, both of which were forced on them by lunatic despots, theyâve really only menaced people in their or allied territory. Which seems fair. Kinda silly to attack the undead faction and be surprised they use necromancy and alchemical weapons when thatâs their signature move.
Then where are the Iron Horde and Scarlet Crusade cannibals, flesh monsters and lobotomized slaves? None.
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They were just genociding folks, using souls for power to open portals, literally becoming WC3 Scourge Style Fallen Paladin Death Knights (Citation: Scarlet Onslaught) while working for literal devils (Nathrezim.)
They werenât cannibals. They were just plainly evil.
And I canât believe youâd cite WoD when WoD retconned orcs to be evil by nature of being orcs.
Big brain thinking over here.
I mean⊠southshore was kind of messed up
I still remember the farmâŠâŠ
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You couldnât even address my whole commentâŠ
The Scarlets were tricked and forced to work with one devil (the Nathrezim Balnazzar), but the Forsaken willingly and knowingly worked with a devil (the Nathrezim Varimatharas).
The Forsaken made a plague to kill all non-undead, became Scourge 2.0 under the Lich Queen and started the War of Thorns and caused the Burning of Teldrassil. They committed more genocide than the Scarlets ever did.
As for WoD, arenât we supposed to accept retcons as canon, no matter how bad they are?
You mean the Sludgefields?
That operation run by the traitor Warden Stillwater that the Forsaken shut down? Because he imprisoned the RAS investigator and was also turning Forsaken into mindless undead?
You remember that quest? Where the Forsaken stop a rogue mad scientist by even their standards and save the day?
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Another take of dubious temperature: Varimathras was a fantastic quote-unquote Forsaken character and tossing out his âalways on the winning sideâ philosophy to milk an easy boss fight out of the demon lord is a good example of old(er) WoWâs propensity to waste its RTS talent.
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Idk. Can you really cause it a mass killing when you then immediately give itâs victims immortality at the low, low price of an abrupt goth makeover?