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  1. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by Darkenedfist View Post
    While this is partiality true blizzard seems to have a hard on for human lore and having humans do everything better then all the other races which is why Anduin the teen prince who doesn't have any military experiance is leading the army of light rather then someone like Velen or Maraad. Hell I am placing my bets that blizz would pull a little patience 2.0 and have Turaylon or and Anduin show up the draenei and make them look like incompetent morons in an attempt to show the fanbase how cool these characters are.
    No. Blizzard has tunnel vision and tends to work on ideas that get them excited and inspired rather than sit and make some list to follow all in the interest of balancing what part of the story get's their attention.

    This issue with humans and orcs stealing dev attention is ridiculous and it didn't become an issue until Metzen brought up the actual truth at Blizzcon that thematically when you break everything down about Warcraft to it's roots, it's symbolically best represented by humans and orcs. The aesthetic tone of each carries over into their faction and resounds within each of the races in some way they fight beside.

    Before WOTLK, humans were barely seen in WOW more than any other race. If anything, the Night Elves and Gnomes seemed to be given more specific content whenever something wasn't just the generic alliance theme. They got their own private bases in Silithus, in Outland, and in Northrend. Humans were not focused on until Varian Wrynn finally showed back up and took his place as the leader of the Strormwind which became defacto Alliance capitol for obvious thematic reasons.

    The Draenei should have gotten at most a new quest hub in Ashenvale in Cataclysm at this point when you really look at how long it takes for anything new chances for lore in this game to come along. The story tends to move in 2-3 year spurts, it's only been about 3 chances now for Draenei to have been given anything specific. They do deserve more, but I think it's wrong the way people all chuckle and roll their eyes together as soon as someone cites this trope about them being the red headed step children of WOW lore.

    Their time is obviously coming and when it comes it's going to be huge, they are basically THE race you will see content for when the Burning Legion comes back.

    ---------- Post added 2013-02-01 at 11:43 PM ----------

    Quote Originally Posted by Cernunnos View Post
    Draenei should have only ever been Broken Ones, not Eredar.

    The whole draenei lore rewrite retcon from WCIII, has never sat well with me.

    That way with the release of TBC, the horde would get a "pretty race" which is typically the domain of the alliance. And the Alliance would have gotten an "ugly" race, something the Horde has in spades.

    This tit for tat thing occurs in cata as well, Horde get something on the short side (Alliance already has gnomes), and Alliance get some bestial fury (again, something the Horde has in plentiful stock)
    But you're totally cool with retconning orcs to be shamanistic and noble savages instead of the demonic hordes of WC 1 and 2?
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  2. #22
    Personally, i'm hoping the next big amount of Drenaei Lore (or whatever) happens when we next face off with the burnring legion.

    Would love to go to their original home planet and fight the corrupted originals (I forget what they're called now)
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  3. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by Yig View Post
    But you're totally cool with retconning orcs to be shamanistic and noble savages instead of the demonic hordes of WC 1 and 2?
    That didnt change moving from one game to the next. The lore in the game manuals (mostly warcraft II) states the orcs, while aggresive and warlike, were still shamanistic, prior to Gul'dan's rise to power and the switch to demonic magic and the onset of the blood curse. Nothing really changes here.

    The draenei got a total overhaul from what was established as lore in WCIII. In WCIII the draenei were native to Draenor, then in WOW they are aliens from another planet. They even changed how the Draenei look.
    Last edited by Cernunnos; 2013-02-02 at 05:50 AM.
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  4. #24
    Warchief TheDangerZone's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cernunnos View Post
    Draenei should have only ever been Broken Ones, not Eredar.

    The whole draenei lore rewrite retcon from WCIII, has never sat well with me.

    That way with the release of TBC, the horde would get a "pretty race" which is typically the domain of the alliance. And the Alliance would have gotten an "ugly" race, something the Horde has in spades.

    This tit for tat thing occurs in cata as well, Horde get something on the short side (Alliance already has gnomes), and Alliance get some bestial fury (again, something the Horde has in plentiful stock)
    This is just crying over spilled milk. The retcon happened, deal with it. Disregarding all the draenei lore because it just "doesn't sit well with you" is of no importance and it doesn't help draenei representation and involvement.

    The draenei were made int these life worshiping, arcane affinne. Why haven't we seen them involved on the kirin tor more? or join the holy light church? Is because they don't really care for human organizations? then we should see how their own organizations interact with human/dwarven/nelvem/etc ones.

  5. #25
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    "But you're totally cool with retconning orcs to be shamanistic and noble savages instead of the demonic hordes of WC 1 and 2?"

    This. I hate retcons most of the time, but if they're done well and in a way that integrates them into the lore without directly contradicting too many things then it's not so bad. The "draenei" we knew from pre-WoW were the result of the people of azeroth sinply not knowing about their true origins, just like our perception of orcs in warcraft 1 and 2 was due to human's not knowing how orcs used to be before they were corrupted. I find anyone's whose ol with the orc retcon but not the draenei retcon to be the lowest form of hippocrit. This is just an excuse to keep them out of the story and defend blizzard's poor choices.

  6. #26
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    I love Draenei, but they're the first part of a long-term problem.

    Draenei are a race that has no traditional ties to the lore of azeroth, and very little required involvement in future lines. They are a race with a singular determination towards a single goal, which was 'solved' in Burning Crusade (for lore, many of the remaining Draenei left the Alliance to repopulate Draenor). Short of taking the fight to the Burning Legion, they are 'finished' with lore and no longer relevant. Similar issues have appeared with Death Knights, who made great sense in the context of Wrath of the Lich King, but their story is 'done'. They exist because the player backlash against removing them would be massive, but really, what place does a Death Knight have in the current story?

    An example of this phenomenon is tier sets. Through Wrath, tier sets for Death Knights made since, since they were fighting the scourge and it was an easily accesible aesthetic. Through Cataclysm, the aesthetic became redundant because skulls, bones and spikes are really the only aesthetic Death Knights have. They have become a stagnant class with no real direction in the lore, and it shows.

    This is the same phenomenon Monks and Pandaren are doomed to. The redundant aesthetic is already showing through, if you compare Monk T14 and Monk T15. Rice hats until the end of time.

    For comparison, classes like Warrior or Rogue are much more general and unfocused and have a greater depth of aesthetics to draw from. That gives you un-rogueish sets like T6, to the sleek and assassiny designs of T2, to the strange feral wolf-bandit theme of T15. Races like Humanity, Orckind and Night Elves have a much broader impact and deeper roots into relevant lore.

    I'm not saying Draenei don't have a good story. Draenei have a very rich past. But it's not relevant to Azeroth, or the story we're telling in this game.
    Last edited by Viradiance; 2013-02-03 at 09:45 AM.
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  7. #27
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    Because orcs vs. humans, also funny pandas. Wait, there were other races in this game? Meh, to Blizzard, a race is just a model to hang your epics on. History, lore, flavor, who needs that shit? Epics, PvP, phat lewtz, yay!

  8. #28
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    Quote Originally Posted by Psychotrip View Post
    This is a quote from the official forums on a thread called, "Ghostcrawler on Draenei". It sums up my feelings on their neglect quite nicely:

    "01/29/2013 08:51 AM


    This has become something of a self-fulfilling prophecy. "We don't do anything with them because they don't fit, and they don't fit because we haven't done anything with them."

    The draenei don't fit any worse in the current (WoW-era) state of Warcraft lore than anything else, but Metzen let the jokes about "lolore retcons lol" and "lololol spacegoats lol" get to him, went off to cry in a corner, and hasn't had the stone to touch the draenei since, even though they're really the one race in the lineup that isn't a takeoff of a standard-issue fantasy race. There have been plenty of ways to integrate the draenei into the greater Alliance and the greater storyline, Blizzard's just always been too lazy or too timid or too busy to use them.

    -Nobundo was the first draenei to speak with the elements, and brought the concept of shamanism to the draenei who embraced it wholesale. He's a visionary, one of the major heroes of his race. Where is he in Cataclysm, the big shaman expansion? He doesn't get so much as a single line of dialogue, because Cataclysm was The Thrall Show.

    -What about Vindicator Maraad? He's supposedly Garona's uncle by blood and a powerful vindicator, but he's never done a bloody thing in-game, just stands on the Skyshredder's deck in Icecrown as a piece of scenery.

    -Draenei have long known the power of the arcane, their mages powerful and more, some of them boasting over twenty millennia of experience. Why don't we see a couple of them in Dalaran, sharing their knowledge? The Kirin Tor would lap that !@#$ up.

    -Draenei count amongst their number their own paladin order, light-bringers who serve to protect their race and smash the unholy forces that oppose them. Why couldn't we see them bringing their own strength and experience to bear against the Scourge in Wrath? Blizzard gives us one half-assed explanation about some guy (who later turns out to be a Scourge agent) trying to stonewall them, then forgets about it entirely.

    -What about Forest Song in Ashenvale? Why not use it as a jumping-off point in Cataclysm to show some bitter draenei taking the chance to take it to the orcs in revenge? Instead Blizzard spends their time turning Zoram'gar into a fortress and putting a mouthy fire elemental in the middle of the zone.

    I'm just throwing this stuff out here, seriously.

    -How about in Swamp of Sorrows a group of broken from the Harborage link up with Joanna Blueheart's army and start using the guerrilla tactics they learned staying alive on Draenor against the Horde there, butchering them and leaving grisly trophies hanging from the trees in warning, something that Joanna approves of, but maybe an uncorrupted draenei finds uncomfortable.

    -When BC first dropped the draenei had racial buffs called 'heroic presence' (for melee classes) and 'inspiring presence' (for casters) because apparently the draenei are so in tunewith the Light that just being near them makes people feel heartened and energized. Why not play with this concept? Have an Alliance regiment somewhere with a draenei priest who acts as a fire-and-brimstone preacher, extolling the virtues of the Light mid-battle and urging them to fight harder, boosting their morale and making them far more dangerous.

    Again, I'm just dropping this stuff off the top of my head. You're seriously going to tell me that Blizzard can't come up with this stuff in four years?

    None of what I've listed here even bothers with the draenei's sci-fi trappings or touches upon their history with the Legion. These are all potential story hooks that Blizzard could use for the draenei, but don't because either they wimp out or they're too busy Horde-humping - which is why the worgen ended up with the same fate of irrelevence within their own expansion."

    I agree with all of the above statements, and this is coming from someone who most exclusively plays the horde. What are your thoughts?
    I love the Draenei, just because as he said, they aren't a standard fantasy race.

    What has bugged me is how there aren't any Draenei mages in the Kirin Tor, because as you mention, they have millenia of knowledge no-one else has.

  9. #29
    Bloodsail Admiral Psychotrip's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Validity View Post
    I love Draenei, but they're the first part of a long-term problem.

    Draenei are a race that has no traditional ties to the lore of azeroth, and very little required involvement in future lines. They are a race with a singular determination towards a single goal, which was 'solved' in Burning Crusade (for lore, many of the remaining Draenei left the Alliance to repopulate Draenor). Short of taking the fight to the Burning Legion, they are 'finished' with lore and no longer relevant. Similar issues have appeared with Death Knights, who made great sense in the context of Wrath of the Lich King, but their story is 'done'. They exist because the player backlash against removing them would be massive, but really, what place does a Death Knight have in the current story?

    An example of this phenomenon is tier sets. Through Wrath, tier sets for Death Knights made since, since they were fighting the scourge and it was an easily accesible aesthetic. Through Cataclysm, the aesthetic became redundant because skulls, bones and spikes are really the only aesthetic Death Knights have. They have become a stagnant class with no real direction in the lore, and it shows.

    This is the same phenomenon Monks and Pandaren are doomed to. The redundant aesthetic is already showing through, if you compare Monk T14 and Monk T15. Rice hats until the end of time.

    For comparison, classes like Warrior or Rogue are much more general and unfocused and have a greater depth of aesthetics to draw from. That gives you un-rogueish sets like T6, to the sleek and assassiny designs of T2, to the strange feral wolf-bandit theme of T15. Races like Humanity, Orckind and Night Elves have a much broader impact and deeper roots into relevant lore.

    I'm not saying Draenei don't have a good story. Draenei have a very rich past. But it's not relevant to Azeroth, or the story we're telling in this game.


    The only reason the draenei have no "ties" to azeroth and no relation to anything that's going on, and only a singular goal is because blizzard REFUSES to develop them betond that. The we've come up with plenty of ways to integrate them into the stories of azeroth throughout this thread alone. Are we saying blizzard can't do the same? That they cant just find ways to give us, and other races, some subplots and lore development tying into the grand story? With all the screen time they're giving orcs and humans have they just run out of space for anything else?

  10. #30
    Deleted
    I don't really have problems with the retcons but more with the fac that Blizzard simply totally ignored them after TBC. And its sad because with the new Kirin Tor and Thunder King they could have so much to offer but are simply doing nothing.

    They are very old and wise and have more experience in arcane magics then probably any of the playable races, and yet Blizzard has barely touched on its potential.

  11. #31
    Quote Originally Posted by mistuhbull View Post
    I said leading, not only one. Garona was Horde's Mathias Shaw in Twi-Hi
    Leading is weird wording for it.

    She's not really part of the Horde and doesn't even like it, she was kind of up there by coincidence, she has no 'command' authority.

    Also, Alliance side Cassius the White and Kurdan ae in charge, mirroring Zaela and Cozwynn.
    Twas brillig

  12. #32
    The Lightbringer Uennie's Avatar
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    Can you link the actual source?

  13. #33
    Quote Originally Posted by Uennie View Post
    Can you link the actual source?
    Who are you trying to get a source from?
    Twas brillig

  14. #34
    Bloodsail Admiral Psychotrip's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Frozenmojo View Post
    I don't really have problems with the retcons but more with the fac that Blizzard simply totally ignored them after TBC. And its sad because with the new Kirin Tor and Thunder King they could have so much to offer but are simply doing nothing.

    They are very old and wise and have more experience in arcane magics then probably any of the playable races, and yet Blizzard has barely touched on its potential.
    Exactly. There's so much potential for growth with this race but blizzard refuses to do anything with them. It's a shame really.

  15. #35
    I for one seriously think that the ignored races need more development. they dont need to be in the front lights. Just a sign of good involvement along the way and non-distracting quests in the rather spaciouszones is enough. Theres plenty of quests and space in zones where some side development of the Draenai's role could have been established. A quest npc mentioning dreanai involvement and efforts to show htey're doing something in the background, a side comment implying plot development of their race. Its not hard. Though it does need serious discussion in meetings about where they want to take the draenai and i think thats what it is.

    Theres a lack of time to discuss all of the possible elements going into events and zones and many elements which do make sense get shafted because theres no time to discuss HOW to include them and what this will mean in the future. There are consequences to putting in a plot element or event of plot development for an entire race. It has to be followed up later on in the game plot. So this means that they have to discuss what putting in draenai in an area means and what will come after because of it. They need to make sure which road they want to take. But this shouldnt mean the Draenai dont get used at all.

    I'am always happy to see the Draenai combatants, quest givers and npc's. Its good to know they're there fighting the good fight. Though it doenst add much to their plot most of the time. But other than Nubundo and Velen, i cant think of any Draenai that match up to the other races major names. Not that they need major names for plot development but it seems to be what Blizz uses to push the plot of a race forward.

    I for one hope theres plenty of advancement in the Burning Legion expansion.

  16. #36
    Love the Draenei. The main reason i didn't get hooked on wow in Classic was that the races were boring . When TBC came out i leveled 2-3 Draenei because they are just cool. It's really sad that they don't get any attention.
    Last edited by Cybran; 2013-02-07 at 08:44 AM.

  17. #37
    I think that they are getting neglected mainly for three reasons.

    First, they don't bring anything new to the game in terms of story or gameplay. Their story has been quite poorly developed and to a very small extent. This is what they got for being introduced in Crusade and having merely two zones worth of a racial campaign. If they were a classic race, or had a racial campaign spanning several zones, like Night Elves or Tauren, then they could be developed further. As it stands, they are serving as a fill-in racial faction that enhances rather than steers events. What is more, it is difficult to make more material about them since the way they were introduced was as a fill-in racial faction. They have nothing unique about them even gameplay-wise. They have very good mages, but the Alliance and the Horde even, already have mages, so what's the use? They have paladins? So do the humans and dwarves. Shamans? The orcs and tauren have them as well. And no history in the world of the game worth mentioning. Not like blood elves.

    Secondly, their mages and paladins are supposed to be amazingly better than those of the various races of Azeroth. Bad move. It's hard to warm up to a new arrival as it is. It's doubly hard when they are presented as better than anything that has come before. They appear more like smart-asses rather than interesting and cool because of that. You can't preach about the might of the paladins of the Order of the Silver Hand, only to make them look like amateurs once the draenei arrive. Neither can you go on about how ridiculously powerful blood elven mages are due to their lifespans and lack of ihnibition when practicing and wielding arcane energy, only to have them look like beginners when the holier than thou draenei come, who didn't even have to struggle to become so powerful, they just... were.

    And thirdly, they don't seem all that interesting to most players. The number one reason players create a draenei character I know of, is that they look good, whether as plate-wearing males, or (far) more often, as whatever-wearing-they-just-look-hot-with-that-ass-and-the-horns-and-the-hooves females. Not for the lore.

    So, with so little material to work with, it's difficult for writers to promote for draenei material. Especially in a period of the game where fan-service seems so high due to a demand from higher powers for increasingly high profits. When in need of immediate success, you turn to your big guns, not to the weaker ones. Of course, in a more ideal world, each racial faction would get its own campaign spanning several zones each expansion, so the draenei, along with the worgen and goblins, and everyone else neglected-or-not, would get some proper development story and gameplay-wise. But we are not in that world, and in this priorities have to be taken. When the material is so difficult to tackle due to, well, lack of it, and the return doesn't seem so good it's no wonder some things will get left out, in this case some racial factions.

    Personally I like the concept of the draenei, and would want them to be more active. But, in unique stories. Not as heaven-descending, badass, over-qualified, scene-stealers. It may take nothing more than a few words to introduce a racial faction with thousands of years of experience against the Legion, but the magic that allows a writer to do so, doesn't do anything for people's acceptance of such an introduction. It was a bad idea to do so, and now it is in need of fixing. Players will almost always root more about the humans and elves. And plastered to their faces as they are, orcs as well. The trick in my opinion is not to try to antagonize that, but give them their own distinct role in the grand scheme of things.
    Last edited by Drithien; 2013-02-07 at 09:30 AM.

  18. #38
    You know how Velen was supposed to come and heal Anduin? Well, according to Anduin's text on the PTR he was healed by pandaren mistweavers, not by Velen. Unfortunately I don't think the draenei are going to get to do anything until the legion shows up and then they'll be stuck with nothing again after that.

  19. #39
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    Quote Originally Posted by Psychotrip View Post
    ...even though they're really the one race in the lineup that isn't a takeoff of a standard-issue fantasy race.
    I think exactly this here is the issue. Draenei are a new, fresh race in a fantasy universe. I even remember a poll on an online gaming site where the Draenei became 'the best made up race in a fantasy game' (don't know if it was Joystick, Kotaku or something else).

    But where some players love the Draenei, many others find them too alien and don't like to see much more of them. The basic story is still about Humans, Orcs, Dwarfs, Elves, Trolls etc., the stereotypical fantasy races. While I really love the Draenei and would have liked something like your proposed storylines, they also have their haters, ppl who didn't like the idea of 'Demons of Light'.

    Same with the pandas, I don't think we see any new panda stuff in the next few years when a new expansion hits. Only your typical Monk-Class-trainer and a couple of players who rolled Panda alts is all that will remind you of that Pandaria adventure.


    Draenei may stand in the spotlight once again if we deal with Sargeras / Argus / anything Legion related.
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  20. #40
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    Maybe the reason Blizzard haven't done anything with Draenei is because they are a "made up" fantasy race, they only appear in WC3 and don't have the older stereotypes to work on as with orcs, humans, dwarfs etc etc. Everything is all done from scratch with Draenei, yes in this time Blizzard could have definitely worked something out on the story. As other people have said the Burning Legion expansion will probably be their time to shine. I'll wait and see it.

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