Cata + MoP were necessary expansions

[heath1056]

I have mostly been a PvPer since the beginning of Cata, however I still keep up with the lore. I have read most of the books and I am really into the lore of each race/class. I'm also not really a fan of the last two expansions, and even when I clear my mind of nostalgia I feel like I had more fun in Vanilla, BC, and Wrath.

However, the last two expansions were necessary from a lore standpoing. Let me explain:

The Lich King was the end of the major story arc that has driven the Warcraft universe. Many would say the game should've ended there, and that is mostly because it really was the end of that story. Now, with the end of the LK story, the only place they had to go after that was the conflict between the Alliance and the Horde. Realistically, a war really couldn't be started with Thrall at the helm of the Horde.

So, since Thrall pretty much couldn't be the warchief as he realistically wouldn't be coaxed into a war with the Alliance, Cataclysm was really just a filler expansion to remove Thrall as the warchief of the Horde. Deathwing was only there to destroy Azeroth's continents and rid the Alliance/Horde of what resources they had, leaving both sides starving for resources. It wouldn't have made sense for them to put Cairne or Vol'jin in charge of the Horde when Thrall left, so they had to put in a hothead like Garrosh. It was the only conceivable way that they could start a war.

Enter Pandaria. Pandaria offered the new resources that both sides would need to rebuild after the long wars with LK and Deathwing (who destroyed their home continents). Resources were an easy way to get both sides involved in the war, the same way that real wars often start over the same thing. Pandaria as the location for the continent was probably the most logical choice out of the whole WoW universe, as I can't really dream up a new continent for them to fight over resources. The Horde/Alliance get pulled into the ongoing Sha conflict on Pandaria, and deal with that problem, which eventually leads to the demise of Garrosh as warchief and Vol'jin taking his place.

Now both sides are at more ease with each other, and I expect a lot more out of the next expansion or two. It should go back to it's roots. The Alliance/Horde should once again have a common enemy in whatever big boss they bring out for this xpac (preferably Burning Legion related).

So, lore-wise the last two expansions made sense and were necessary, but I personally wasn't a fan of them. But, knowing that I didn't enjoy them as much as the first 2 expansions, I also understand that it was a necessary story-point they had to visit before we could move on.

Timeline:
Everything leading up to LK -> Deathwing destroys resources -> Thrall is called to be the aspect of earth -> Garrosh the hothead takes over -> Pandaria is discovered and the war for resources between the Alliance and Horde begins -> Garrosh falls and Vol'jin takes over -> Hopefully another common enemy for the A/H to conquer

[Giscoicus]

Cataclysm is far under appreciated bexause people don't know their Lore, and some of Blizzards promises fell through. Also the baddie exodus (not sure how this is a player issue more of a shareholder one)
Also 4.3


But no, we did not need to go to Pandaland. We could just have easily done island hopping around Azeroth with alliance and horde tryin to gain oceanic footholds (more Tol Barad!!! Love the atmosphere an art style :3)

We did not need the Thunder King, we could have had you know...isle of Zandalar? We could have had Garrosh enlist the aid of pirates from both fractions, added an Old God some other way, an had Garrosh attack Kul Tiras (much to the disdain of Proudmoore) and against the will of other horde leaders. He could have tried to use Voljin assassinated elsewhere.

Cataclysm made sense. It also adds Wrathion as a major player. But we could have and IMO should have done Island Hopping expansion. I'm sure hidden somewhere (perhaps under Kezhan?) there could be Titan power. Or perhaps lingering effects at the maelstrom of Old God stuff.

Just my 2cents.

[Wildmoon]

Not sure if neccessary but MoP is better than previous xpacs especially on lore side.

[Giscoicus]

Not sure if neccessary but MoP is better than previous xpacs especially on lore side.

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

[Deleted]

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

Metzen said that MOP took a lot of blood, sweat and tears.

Of that I have no doubt.

[llubtoille]

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

In fiction... that's how 'lore' gets made.
So as it was working from nothing, pandaria did an excellent job in creating lore
Whereas other expansions merely took existing stories and gave them an ending

[Ericanibus]

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

That doesn't make it bad lore. And I'm pretty sure it wasn't just 'made up on the spot,' there were probably a lot of man hours that went into making the story line.

[Deleted]

I like Pandaria. I think the new continent gave them a lot of free reign and quite a few options in story-telling. The Sha were great enemies, the mantid slightly less so.
Cata was shit. I will never forgive them for how they boned lore in that.

[wych]

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

Why do people on here live under the assumption that new/change = bad ?

MoP had some very interesting storylines and they were told, justified and explored far better than lots of other storylines in WoWs past.

I'd love to try see somebody justify how the Illidan storyline in TBC was better than Garrosh in MoP, it was literally just "hey guys, we need a bad guy the players know from WoW's past, let's roll a dice to decide who turns crazy".

[Toiran]

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

That makes it worse than other expansions how?

So, because lore is new, it's automatically bad? Or worse than previous lore?

90% of all future WoW expansions are going to suck for you my friend.

I enjoyed MoP, and it's Lore, more than any other expansion, and I'm a big, big TBC nostalgic.

[Wildmoon]

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

and? That doesn't have anything to do with its quality. NE and Scourge lore were made up in WC3 as well.

[Giscoicus]

Story and Lore are not the same.

Lore is past story. Lore is why we don't have spacegoat warlocks. The only past story we had for Pandaria was that 1) there were panda people and 2)they like beer

During WC3 the events were the story. Art has having killed his father, and having a zombie pony is lore.

[wych]

That makes it worse than other expansions how?

So, because lore is new, it's automatically bad? Or worse than previous lore?

90% of all future WoW expansions are going to suck for you my friend.

Indeed, it's a ludicrous viewpoint that many on WoW forums and the internet as a whole seem to hold. Go to any forum and you'll see people hating on anything new and sitting around in blind nostalgia saying how great everything used to be.

It feels like sitting in an Old People's home reminiscing about when they were kids strangely.

[Mukki]

Cataclysm is far under appreciated bexause people don't know their Lore, and some of Blizzards promises fell through. Also the baddie exodus (not sure how this is a player issue more of a shareholder one)
Also 4.3


But no, we did not need to go to Pandaland. We could just have easily done island hopping around Azeroth with alliance and horde tryin to gain oceanic footholds (more Tol Barad!!! Love the atmosphere an art style :3)

We did not need the Thunder King, we could have had you know...isle of Zandalar? We could have had Garrosh enlist the aid of pirates from both fractions, added an Old God some other way, an had Garrosh attack Kul Tiras (much to the disdain of Proudmoore) and against the will of other horde leaders. He could have tried to use Voljin assassinated elsewhere.

Cataclysm made sense. It also adds Wrathion as a major player. But we could have and IMO should have done Island Hopping expansion. I'm sure hidden somewhere (perhaps under Kezhan?) there could be Titan power. Or perhaps lingering effects at the maelstrom of Old God stuff.

Just my 2cents.

Basically, you want an xpac that's Wind Waker. That sounds terrible to me. /shrug

[Theendgamelv3]

Literally all of it was made up on the spot, aside from the existence of Pandas and their drinking habits.

You do realize that they have to make lore up right? There is only so much they can pull from. This is why MoP was needed, to see if they can make lore that isn't from the past. They only IMO have 3-4 expansions that is left with existing lore, Infinite Dragonflight, Emerald Dream, South Seas and Argus. What else is there? Burning Crusade, that can easily tie in with Argus. For WoW to continue, they need to make up more lore like they did with MoP. With WoW still having tons of players, WoW will be around for years and I see more than 4 expansions. MoP was necessary because they needed IMO to try something new and different. You and others might not like the theme, but they still IMO needed MoP.

[Deleted]

That makes it worse than other expansions how?

So, because lore is new, it's automatically bad? Or worse than previous lore?

90% of all future WoW expansions are going to suck for you my friend.

I enjoyed MoP, and it's Lore, more than any other expansion, and I'm a big, big TBC nostalgic.

Some stories are planned out from beginning to end instead of just rewritten constantly to suit the needs to the latest audience.

The gate to Uldum for example, had arrows fired into it as if someone was trying to stop something from escaping.

Blizzard obviously had something in mind for that zone in vanilla, but it was cut and replaced with a parody of Indiana Jones.

[wych]

Story and Lore are not the same.

Lore is past story. Lore is why we don't have spacegoat warlocks. The only past story we had for Pandaria was that 1) there were panda people and 2)they like beer

During WC3 the events were the story. Art has having killed his father, and having a zombie pony is lore.

The moment something is created as part of the storyline it becomes part of the lore.

It feels like you're deliberately nit picking and being obtuse to cause conflict.

[Telwar]

That makes it worse than other expansions how?

So, because lore is new, it's automatically bad? Or worse than previous lore?

Apparently, the previous lore was found on holy tablets, despite coming from the same source as everything else, Metzen.

[Wildberry]

Not sure if neccessary but MoP is better than previous xpacs especially on lore side.

I beg to differ, they've gotten better at presenting lore in-game, not writing it.

[darkwarrior42]

Lorewise, if they wanted to work up to a war between the factions, they did a pretty terrible job. They had the Horde antagonize the Alliance in a way that even a lot of Horde people disliked, then had that part of the Horde become and NPC faction to be put down.

To have an actual, ongoing war between the factions, it absolutely would have been better to have Vol'Jin in charge... and then have actual reasons for the war. By having a hot-headed warmonger in charge, they don't need to bother with real reasons for the war... but that also makes the war seem wasteful, like an excuse to keep the PvP theme going instead of an actual development within the game world.

And even if the time period of the Cataclysm was needed to rework the game world (for the purposes of updating old world) and to give time for the situation between the factions to develop, that is still no excuse for the lack of high level content or the complete butchering of the story (Seriously, we resolved the Deathwing storyline by means of time traveling deus ex machina?).

I liked the idea of MoP a lot, but ToT was very random and brought in too many ideas... and felt like a filler to give time for the situation with Garrosh to develop, rather than a real story in its own right. I also would have loved to see the Sha as something other than remnants of an old god, as well as seeing the mantid develop as more of a threat in their own right, but the ideas there were still pretty sound. I don't even fault MoP for its strong Asian theme, because every expansion has had a pretty strong, singular theme that ran throughout the entire expansion, with occasional breaks here and there. MoP was no different, it just chose a different theme to run with.


*shrug* Deathwing destroyed resources, ostensibly to force the factions into conflict. How much more awesome would it have been if Deathwing wasn't just some random old god puppet? If there were people in both factions trying to solve the situation, but deathwing and his agents kept disrupting all attempts? New farms are razed to the ground, droughts starve the land, monster dens are destroyed forcing the gnolls/centaurs/murlocs/etc of the world closer to civilization... all while both sides slowly realize that there may not be enough resources left to sustain both the Alliance and the Horde. Throw in some political intrigue, and you've got all the motivation you need for an entire expansion. No need for old gods, the Twilight Cult, or time travel, just make Deathwing actually intelligent. Or at least, that's what I would have liked... I'm sure lots of people will disagree :-P