Deathwing was an incredibly underrated villain

[Volardelis]

Deathwing was a poor villain for many reason:

-first he was tough to be already dead, there has been 0 build up for a return and even during the xpack he was always mia beside a couple of cameo during questing and it's oneshot fire around the world.
-Other tier had reashed bosses, nefarian and onyxia (third time we killide her), Ragnaros
-Cata story was more around the elemental lords and the twilight hammer than against DW himself a good part was dedicated to horde vs alliance.

0 build up to his return?

How about Halion in RS basically saying Deathwing is returning. The earthquakes that increased in frequency as ICC progressed? The cata pre-patch with the elemental invasions

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Pandaria was a whim expansion never included in the original release timeline iirc, it could've been 'explained reappearing' anywhere.

Back in WC3 FT, Chen says that he comes from Pandaria.

Later on that got retconed to being the turtle, but Pandaria was mentioned in lore prior to MoP

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Model is fine imo. But now that you mention it...what the hell was Deathwing even biding his time for? Other bosses in a cliche yet poetic way wait you at the tome of their stronghold, Illidan at the top of Black Temple, Arthas at the top of Icecrown, Gul'dan at the top of the Nighthold. We don't know what the hell their plotting or what the hell they just sit idly as we slaughter their lieutenants as we work our way up there, but we assume their waiting for us, and have something prepared.

I always thought Deathwing's strong hold would be Grim Batol pre- Cata but it turns out he doesn't even have one. He's just casually flying around Azeroth blowing things up on a whim. So it's not like he's hiding out, or fortifying, or scheming. He's actually out there. Meaning he could have scorched the place a while ago had he wanted to. He could have torched every city building up forces to face him and his minions.

I know he's supposed to be crazy but's he's not stupid. We just killed the Lich King ffs, he really shouldn't take us so lightly.

After his battle with Alexstrasza during the final stages of Twilight Highlands, Deathwing did go back into hiding to heal, although he didn't receive as much damage as Alexstrasza did

[Granyala]

I still remember that i was shitting in my pants when i was in the fking Barrens and everything turned red, the sky, the grass all red. Then you start see Flames around you: You turn up your camera to the sky and you see big ass Dragon flying over the zone - killing you in the process (but earning a nice achivement that sadly Blizz gave for free later).

Lucky you. I never got to experience that. I never saw him "roam free". Saw a patch of curious flame one, stepped in one and got the achi but the attack was already past.

DW could have been cool but the mindless "IMMA GONNA DETWOYY! EVERYTHING™" ist just BS, because he and all those crazed cultists would be destroyed too.
Sadly, Blizzard left it at that and never really gave him any actual story.

Imho that's the main reason why he was lame as a villain.

[Osmeric]

The Cataclysm should have been something progressive over the course of the expansion, rather than a big bang off camera before the expansion started. DW could have been doing all sort of violent stuff during this.

[Raiju]

Back in WC3 FT, Chen says that he comes from Pandaria.

Later on that got retconed to being the turtle, but Pandaria was mentioned in lore prior to MoP

I never said pandaria didn't exist, just that it wasn't going to be an expansion. It was meant to solely be a low level zone (assumably for pandas) that it seems Samwise "Can't get enough Pandas" Didier managed to get a whole expansion designed around. The point is, it doesn't matter how they stated pandaria got unveiled, it was a poor excuse in the first place (as anything was going to be after the atrocity of catas story and subsequent sweeping under the rug to make way for pandaria)

[Bathory]

Deathwing had great potential to be an amazing villain, but Cataclysm did a poor job portraying him.

This! I loved Deathwing from the lore/books, but when we finally got him, I felt unsatisfied. Dragon Soul was underwhelming for such a villain as well.

Still wishing we had a Deathwing human form fight instead of Morchok

[bufferunderrun]

0 build up to his return?

How about Halion in RS basically saying Deathwing is returning. The earthquakes that increased in frequency as ICC progressed? The cata pre-patch with the elemental invasions

well if you think a boss and few earthquakes are a good build up then good for you, but compared to the story of illidan and arthas it's like a drop in the bucket, not to mention that even during warcraft series deathwing wasn't a really compelling character.

Imho in the end Deathwing could have been a good sidekick for an old gods themed xpack but him and a bunch of recicled bosses where absolutely not enough for an xpack especially one who come right after the one who had probably the most iconic character in entire wc universe, the LK.

I'm holding back a definitive rating for legion waiting 7.3, but to me it's already well ahead of cata, mop and wod story wise.

[announced]

Deathwing was a terrible Villain because his power was too much and then too little. When we entered dragonsoul he did nothing except taunt us and leave after Ultraxion died. the Spine fight was interesting in itself but totally underwhelming lore wise, and with the final fight being a giant toenail battle it didn't feel meaningful. If after the spine fight we somehow turned deathwing down into a more vulnerable foe and we could fight him toe to toe like Arthas or at least have Thrall give us the dragon soul to use at the end maybe Cata would have had higher ratings. The expansion was great except for dragonsoul

[CaptainV]

When cata came out, everyone was "booo: we got these badass dudes in Illidan, then Arthas, then a dragon?? bhooo"
This thing went on a bit, and while i would never say that Deathwing as a character has more charisma then these other 2, i would say he is just behind.

First of all he has many accomplishments that simply other villains didn't match.
The fact that he literally changed the landscape of the world was incredible, and while you may or may not like the world post-cataclysm to me it was at least already an impressive mark left from the villain to the players.

Second, he was acutally THERE WITH US.
Unlike most other villains that appears sporadically during the expansion and you mostly see them only in their raid, with deathwing it was different:
He was literally free roaming all over Azeroth.

I still remember that i was shitting in my pants when i was in the fking Barrens and everything turned red, the sky, the grass all red. Then you start see Flames around you: You turn up your camera to the sky and you see big ass Dragon flying over the zone - killing you in the process (but earning a nice achivement that sadly Blizz gave for free later).

This is all to say that we need to see more VIllains like him. Leaving a real impact on the world, the players, the characters.

Deathwing you were my hero.

Deathwing was a pretty weak villian in terms of over all.

First off, most of the expansion revolved around what he'd done and thus focused more on other villians than Deathwing himself. This made DW feel somewhat undervalued and undercared about as a villian in the expansion.

Secondly, the periodic presence thing was exactly that, periodic, it didnt happen often and as a result when it did, it was cool, but while it didnt, it felt mostly meaningless. He also never attacked capitals which made him feel that much less of a threat.

Finally, dragons dont make good villians, just look at GW2, most people that try to make dragons into villians end up focusing too much on the big, destructive monster and not enough on the potential for a guile filled reptile that manipulates people into getting what it covets.

Theres a reason Wrathion was better recieved. You got alot of character development with him throughout MoP that allowed us to see him as a growing new antagonist rather than just some archaic WC2 reference that was barely known by anyone unless you'd played it yourself (which I had).

Even that didnt mean much, DW could and should have been so much more. His human form gets used "once" and only "once" in game despite having an epic concept art of him fighting Garrosh/Varian as the same time and more.

He needed a MUCH bigger presence in Cataclysm to be interesting. But there is perhaps one even bigger reason DW failed and the reason he is so unmemorable. His voice actor, which im sure was either chris metzen or a sound-a-like because honestly, it was (terrible) voice acting. Every line DW delivers is robotic and weak, the only time he has even an iota of charisma is during the cinematic vocals but beyond that hes utterly forgettable.

[Xirrohon]

I don't think people were underwhelmed by Deathwing, I think there were some people who didn't play any of the Warcraft games before WoW and didn't know the lore who didn't know who Deathwing was, and there were some people who thought his treatment in Cata was a bit cartoony.

Exactly this. The backstory for Deathwing could have been explained better. Its actually a pretty good one. I think Blizz did what they could trying to make him be like LK but it just didnt work. I remember DW flying over cities and burning them up, if you happened to be there, you pretty much died. Was funny for a little bit. I would have to think a bit more than Ide like right now to try and come up with a better way of making us care about DW, because for whatever reason most people didnt.

Also, I remember when Cata first came out. I was playing Hunter and named my Chimera DeathWang. It got reported. Boo!

[Draenox]

Deathwing just ended up being a gigantic wasted opportunity for a cool villain really. He was so misrepresented in the raid and throughout the expansion, which resulted in people not caring about him in the slightest, despite all the things he has done through the history of warcraft.

[Osmeric]

Deathwing just ended up being a gigantic wasted opportunity for a cool villain really. He was so misrepresented in the raid and throughout the expansion, which resulted in people not caring about him in the slightest, despite all the things he has done through the history of warcraft.

Blizzard compounded the problem by making the expansion so exclusionary, at least to start. If Blizzard sends the message "we don't want you to see the story", players will decide the story isn't worth seeing. It's like what happened with Illidan in BC, for most players.