Legion lore.. really isn't that great.

[Grapefruitsnz]

Well, I find it difficult to take you seriously when you seem to think that Cata and MoP were positive directions for WoW's lore, especially setting them on some kind of pedestal compared to Classic. Classic actually felt like you were playing in a genuine world, whereas everything post-Cataclysm is a journey on a railroad to max level, with no thought given to the zones actually being places in a world as opposed to areas to quest in. This was actually part of what WoD got RIGHT, for all the other lacks it had. And then we go to Legion, and we're practically back to ground zero, except for Suramar, which admittedly is an excellent city.

It's funny, because I've always felt that Classic was the most lacking (not in a bad way) in terms of an overall story and lore throughout all the iterations of WoW (Vanilla and the expacs). It was as open an RPG game as WoWs been, which mean't we could log in and go and do anything we wanted at any point without needing to do several things before to make the narrative flow.

For example, questing through Hellfire peninsula in BC, you came across Pathaleon the Calculator who had dropped the large red crystals in to corrupt life around. You then met him again questing through Terrokar Forest and finally defeated him in the Mechanar, closing his story. You wouldn't have any/little context about who he is unless you went through the zones prior. Compare that to a zone like Desolace. In Vanilla, it was a fairly backwater zone, with some questlines leading you around, dealing with Naga and Centaurs, with the only thing of note being Maraudon. When you went through there though, there wasn't really any continuity in story from the zone itself, other than there are Centaurs in here and out. Cata changed that for most zones to where there was an actual narrative pushing throughout the zones (with varying success) when prior, it was more of a traditional RPG style with the quests being more standalone.

[Easo]

On one hand, maybe the invasion is failing is precisely because we have become too powerful (something about that part of possibly having titan's "blood" in our veins). From gameplay perspective, it fails for sure, but Blizzard may decide otherwise according to lore.
On the other hand, I really fail to see the difference between Orders taking fight to Legion versus Alliance+Horde. Just why would the first ones succeed where factions (united even...) failed? Ok, sure, the landing on Broken Shore was foiled due to demon's deception, but overall? By pure logic, most of the members are the same. Sure, there are, say, mages outside each faction, but let's be honest, they simply cannot have enough population to have any huge impact. If Blizzard tries to tell it this way, they have failed, imho.
P.S.
It sure is nice to be recognised now, to be THE leader, THE commander, instead of the "adventurer" (even if our alteregos are totally retarded, since we agree to absolutely everything we are asked of).

[Filipse]

Warcraft 3 took around 5 at most and the Budget and effort put into WoW patches is far beyond Warcraft 3.

Someone obviously hasnt played warcraft 3.

[Zayv]

It's funny, because I've always felt that Classic was the most lacking (not in a bad way) in terms of an overall story and lore throughout all the iterations of WoW (Vanilla and the expacs). It was as open an RPG game as WoWs been, which mean't we could log in and go and do anything we wanted at any point without needing to do several things before to make the narrative flow.

Yeah going from WC3 to WoW was strange. I just figured they would pick up right where we left off with the Lich King. Instead they expanded my perception of the world SOOO much with things like Ragnaros, the Old Gods, post-Scourge Eastern Kingdoms, the Arathi Kingdom, etc.- all these amazing things, which just added to the mystique and knowing that somewhere in the world, Arthas was waiting for you to find him. So the vanilla "lore" was really memorable for me.

Legion lore is awesome IMO. I've never been more interested in questing and exploring the zones, which says a lot because I cannot freaking stand questing. Killing and fetching animal parts over and over again literally bores me to tears. I wish they would have a major overhaul with the leveling system.

Reading some elaborate story about ancient night elf ruins, and then being asked to collect 10 stacks of spectral feces really kills the excitement.

[Super Kami Dende]

Someone obviously hasnt played warcraft 3.

I have. Someone obviously doesn't know the developmental difference between a static RTS and an MMO

[Kokolums]

The lore is terrible because the bad guys never win. Its horrible storytelling. Core to good storytelling is that the threats are worthy of the heroes quest. They are not in wow. We stomped the iron horde. Were crushing the legion. Its just boring.

[Filipse]

I have. Someone obviously doesn't know the developmental difference between a static RTS and an MMO

I thought we were staying on-topic of Lore/Story? in which the MMO basicaly has just screwed with the source-material, it's required of an MMO sure, but that doesnt mean it doesnt suck, you cant put sprinkles ontop of poo and call it chocolate-pudding.

There's too many plot-holes, and various inconsistencies in WoW's story, it realy doenst make sense from a story-perspective, but it does from an MMO gameplay one, since MMO's realy arent known for their good stories, and usualy dilutes down on the material it's based on.

[Zayv]

The lore is terrible because the bad guys never win. Its horrible storytelling. Core to good storytelling is that the threats are worthy of the heroes quest. They are not in wow. We stomped the iron horde. Were crushing the legion. Its just boring.

fwiw, there's some dark moments like the death of Anduin, Vol'jin, Cenarius and Ysera, but these cutscenes aren't very well put together and kinda just forgettable. And yeah, eventually the good guys reign supreme by the end of the xpac. Sometimes I feel like their storytelling abilities havent grown with their player base's age.

Ysera's death was kinda sad tho, i'll admit

[SeyserKoze]

I thought the rogue class lore was pretty good. I remember sneaking around, stealing junk, collecting enemy intel, and ganking a few nerds on the side. It was a bunch of dirty work behind the scenes without any showboating or reliance on others' acceptance. There wasn't a big parade afterwards either. The rogue story contrasts with a large majority of the rest of the storytelling this expansion.

[Ghazar]

I also find the story of Legion lacking, part of it is due to some forced storylines, and part of it the lack of naturally expected storylines.
In the expansion everything apart from the awesome nightfallen campaign is very...sudden. What I mean by that is something happens, and a moment later it's as if nothing happened.
For example Illidan's return is a huge deal for Azeroth and many characters, and the only person who seems to care is Maiev. You would expect some interesting interactions with Malfurion and Tyrande at least, it feels very unnatural how illidan barely has anything to say to anyone and vice-versa.
Same with Velen, he's just being standard Velen, his son dies, he is mad at you and broken, and a moment later he's the same old Velen.

It's a pity because Legion had a lot of potential for many characters, but they only used it for a handful.

[Kokolums]

fwiw, there's some dark moments like the death of Anduin, Vol'jin, Cenarius and Ysera, but these cutscenes aren't very well put together and kinda just forgettable. And yeah, eventually the good guys reign supreme by the end of the xpac. Sometimes I feel like their storytelling abilities havent grown with their player base's age.

Ysera's death was kinda sad tho, i'll admit

Yseras death was done incorrectly. What wow NEEDS is villains that are a serious threat. If xavius were to straight up kill ysera, that would be good storytelling because wed finally have a villain accomplishing something for once. It would put xavius ahead of arthas in wow lore (arthas killed no one in wow). What we got was he corrupts ysera, then WE attack ysera, then yseras corruption is cured by elune and she ascends or something. This resolution is arguably the WORST one imaginable because not only is xavius unable to kill her but his supposedly vaunted corruption gets wiped in a few hours. It makes xavius look incredibly weak. Horrible storytelling. If i wanted to go out of my way to destroy wow lore, i would write the xavius vs ysera storyline exactly how they wrote it. You couldnt do it any better.

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There is not a single villain in wow with a striaght up kill of major lore hero in all of wow history. In any case where a hero dies, its self sacrifice, it was behind the back, or its rumored offscreen, or they were just outnumbered. That means nothing feels like a threat, which means the story isnt compelling, and the lore sucks.

[FelPlague]

I thought we were staying on-topic of Lore/Story? in which the MMO basicaly has just screwed with the source-material, it's required of an MMO sure, but that doesnt mean it doesnt suck, you cant put sprinkles ontop of poo and call it chocolate-pudding.

There's too many plot-holes, and various inconsistencies in WoW's story, it realy doenst make sense from a story-perspective, but it does from an MMO gameplay one, since MMO's realy arent known for their good stories, and usualy dilutes down on the material it's based on.

and there wasent story plot holes and incondsistencies in warcraft 1-2-3?

i mean how did medivh get killed then come back like it was nothing and no one recognized him

[Kokolums]

I half expect that, if a villain ever got a straight up kill on a hero, blizzard would screw it up by immediately have a bunch of heroes kill that villain 5 minutes later. The POINT would be to actually have a credible villain but i doubt they could understand that.

[FelPlague]

I half expect that, if a villain ever got a straight up kill on a hero, blizzard would screw it up by immediately have a bunch of heroes kill that villain 5 minutes later. The POINT would be to actually have a credible villain but i doubt they could understand that.

you mean how guldan killed varian and we didnt get to touch him for about 6 months?
or how arthas killed saurfang and it took us almost a year to get to kill the lich king for it?
or how garrosh did so much fucked up stuff and it took us easily 7 months t think from when he nearly killed anduin? or from when he killed cairne.
or how kiljaden forced velen to kill his own son and we wont get to kill him till about 9 months after?
or how sylvanas killed liam, and we still dont have revenge on her? (i mean genn tech did, fucking 8 years later)


here is the issue with information bias. wants to make a point so they ignore every example they can

[Gadzooks]

You mean with the very city, Achimonde destroyed in Warcraft 3 with a mere sweep of his hand is now hovering above the broken isles somehow withstanding the "Full Might" of the legion?

It's pretty much just how an MMO cant stand up to a strategy game interms of lore and story, Warcraft 3 took 10 years to make, wow's patches doesnt have even near the same time-budget or effort put into it, because they cant afford to give it that much time, it never made sense, and it realy wasnt any different with Arthas, Deathwing or other pre-established npc-villains.

Warcraft 3 took four years to make, development started in 1998, and it was released in 2002.

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It's a change in narrative styles that started in WoD, but WoD was so compact that it wasn't nearly as noticeable by comparison. This entire focus on "badass cinematic moments" and a story more akin to a movie plot than a fleshed out game world is killing the feeling of Warcraft for me as well.

It feels like every situation is excessively packed with moments where the main character (the player) is being badass and doing badass stuff and fighting huge evil threats to the point where the actual story of the Legion invading comparatively feels really shallow. The perspective is all different, whereas in the past WoW went through effort to make you feel small it now emphasizes more than anything how big you are.

When I was going through Icecrown and came up to Icecrown Citadel I really thought to myself "How the hell are we, the players, going to kill this guy?" now I'm just waiting to loot Kil'jaeden's corpse and get my epics because we the players seem immune to true defeat. They could easily write an encounter where they defeat us but we survive with their lives but they don't and won't. We the players are now canonical characters in lore and we are such unmitigated genuine Mary Sues that we kill any sense of danger or suspense a story might otherwise have. We know we're not going to lose, and it leads to a damn dull story.

One of WoD's many failures was the inability of the devs to make the Iron Horde feel like a threat. Lore-wise, a major war was waged, with the rag tag humans stranded there, the Draenii, vs. The Iron Horde, powered by technologies from another universe and run by a mad orc. Remember the reveal, when Kosak wouldn't stop saying "savage!" when talking about it? Well, it wasn't so savage, was it. We're supposed to be these Marvel Comic level heroes...who are building camps, making stuff, and telling others to do heroic quests and tasks, from a table. Woo.

I feel the same thing is happening here. All of the "threat" from a uncountable horde of demonic beings from another plane of existence, led by a demi-god, is contained on one small chain of islands? NO. Fuck that! They would aim for Stormwind, Ironforge, Orgimmar, any large city, and set seige, and then lay waste to them. Now THAT would be an interesting expansion - phase the capital cities, so they're destroyed and and held by the Legion, and players HAVE to work out of Dalaran because it's the only safe place left - and then play out taking the capitals back over the course of the expansion, doing dailies/WQs/whatever there, and then exploring the Lost Isles for clues on doing something with world pillars or whatever.

They did it for Deathwing - oh, right, they still havent repaired a lot of the damage from that. Granted, they didn't have the phasing tech yet.

The one thing we learned about the Legion in TBC is they like to set up big camps, guarded by nasty weaponry, and they invade by zerg rush. Except this time, because they constrained all of the action in the new zone.

Me, I'd take the players out of their comfort zone, by changing the whole damned map. Take away the capital cities for that level of player. (That way lower levels can still quest and such) Have a real reason why players can't fly - because the Legion owns the skies, and will shoot you down, and you have to clear the anti-flight mobs out over the course of the expansion. Shove it in their faces that the Legion is here, they own the planet, what are you gonna do about it? Make the players work for safe places. Start the expansion with a nasty,grueling fight to get to Dalaran, not just port them there. Make 'em earn it. Players want hard content. This questing on rails and everything playing out in the new zones doesn't work for a story as epic and sweeping as this - this is a planetary invasion, not a regional conflict. There should be a Legion camp right in the middle of the fucking Barrens, killing everything in sight. The Exodar should be under seige. Ironeforge and Stormwind should be rubble.

But, they don't have the guts to go there. The next expansion will be more of the same - quest on rails, dungeons, raids, some form of grind. Rinse and repeat until the servers go dark.

I'd really like to sit Kosak and the rest down and ask them, this is what you were building towards with Wrathion? He risked everything, to build an army against an inconceivably powerful force on it's way to take the planet. That's why the Iron Horde was made, to ultimately take on the Legion. And this is what the planet faces, a bunch of rag doll demons lounging around a couple of islands, who despite kicking Azeroth's ass in the initial invasion, even killing the Alliances king, have made no significant advances OUT of the landing zone? What? What kind of threat is that? At what point was anything outside of the Broken Shore under any real threat?

For a game with war in the title, WoW really doesn't do war very well, or at least not any more. Wrath was a credible build up of forces to take on Arthas and the Scourge. WoD was just bad. Legion is about the same, in terms of telling a story of WAR. It's just not credible.

[roahn the warlock]

i mean getting called a nobody after assisting in the defeat of an old god, the titan watchers, death itself, and the firelord twice.

we deserve to be called heros, i dont see why anyone would want to be a nobody, yes to start, being a nodbody makes sense, but we have killed GODS

Have you? traditionally in lore when you killed Onyxia, it wasn't really you. Arthas was killed by Tirion, Deathwing was killed by Thrall, Kil Jaden was killed by Kalecgos, so on so forth.

[purebalance]

i mean getting called a nobody after assisting in the defeat of an old god, the titan watchers, death itself, and the firelord twice.

we deserve to be called heros, i dont see why anyone would want to be a nobody, yes to start, being a nodbody makes sense, but we have killed GODS

Technically it depends on your faction canonically as to which you actually defeated. I'm not really sure where they actually list it, but somewhere it states which faction actually killed which boss. Granted out of your list you're pretty much guaranteed to have maybe half of them.

Also some bosses you did not kill such as Onyxia who Varian killed canonically.

[Berri]

Even if Legion lore isn't your 'cup of tea', I think it's hard to argue that this expansion DOESN'T shine in the lore department (if only because it represents something of a quantum leap vis-a-vis actual storytelling / development in the actual game).

[lightofdawn]

"legion lore is bad" says the people who couldnt create better

let's see where it goes before we judge the entire expansion based on one full content patch

[roahn the warlock]

I'd really like to sit Kosak and the rest down and ask them, this is what you were building towards with Wrathion? He risked everything, to build an army against an inconceivably powerful force on it's way to take the planet. That's why the Iron Horde was made, to ultimately take on the Legion. And this is what the planet faces, a bunch of rag doll demons lounging around a couple of islands, who despite kicking Azeroth's ass in the initial invasion, even killing the Alliances king, have made no significant advances OUT of the landing zone? What? What kind of threat is that? At what point was anything outside of the Broken Shore under any real threat?
.

I agree with this. Wrath had the best storytelling in any Xpack, . Ever. followed by MoP. They really built the Legion up, but I think they were too afraid to have every zone be heavily legion based. So the threat of the legion felt really lackluster.

That being said Suramar was beautifully done. Great story great zone.