Blizzard's Work-From-Home Policies, Windows Central Interview, WoWCraft Ep 48

[ONCHEhap]

That interview shows that Danuser is incompetent at his job and should be fired.

Maybe he was too busy jerking it to his waifu sylvanas and forgot to prepare for the interview,you shouldn't assume stuff

- - - Updated - - -

For clueless people who lived in a cave for the last decade maybe. The rest knows what inb4 means.

He's right though,the correct formulation would be "inb4 someone claims Blizzard....." or something of the sort. "inb4 Blizzard does...." means that Blizzard would be the one doing it
you can simplify it with inb4 "blizzard does...." if you want to,but that's kinda silly

[Lucetia]

I foresee Shadowlands delayed till 2021 due to the coronavirus outbreak

It's a possibility, but I wonder if that happens if they will do like they did in TBC/Wrath where they added an additional raid to hold over while it took extra time. Not that I'm asking for one or anything, just curious.

This might also means we could see a 8.3.5 mini-patch to give something else to do for a little bit and maybe relax more of the restrictions in place for different things.

[Odinfrost]

"There is a lot more story to tell in regards to the burning of Teldrassil and the repercussions from it. The characters involved have a long way to go and many lessons to learn."

Uhu... so what lessons do you have to learn you think, Night Elves?

That revenge is a dish best made with grilled Banshee Witch and a side of mashed Lap Dog (aka Nathanos). Maybe some "we were just following orders"-orc soup for starters. Oh, and Heinous Blood Elf Tart for desserts.

[Sigxy]

That revenge is a dish best made with grilled Banshee Witch and a side of mashed Lap Dog (aka Nathanos). Maybe some "we were just following orders"-orc soup for starters. Oh, and Heinous Blood Elf Tart for desserts.

I wish with you until the blood elf part. :<

[phattsao]

The story went off the rails in Cata and never came back. All of the writers should be replaced.

Hell, they should do what "Terminator" keeps trying to do and just ignore everything that happened since Lich King. Pick up from there.

[Odinfrost]

I wish with you until the blood elf part. :<

Chose Blood Elves only because Bloodberry tart is a thing, so made a jab with that. Other options for the food analogy were: Darkspear Tusk Soup, Goblin Cakes, Forsaken Stew and Processed Arcwine (aka Nightborne). Can't really fit in Tauren anywhere for a starter or a dessert, though.

[Kathranis]

For clueless people who lived in a cave for the last decade maybe. The rest knows what inb4 means.

The problem isn't the inb4, the problem is he said "inb4 blizzard does x" and not "inb4 someone says blizzard does x" or "inb4 'blizzard does x.'"

Jesus. Words and punctuation have meanings. If you don't include them the meaning of the sentence can change.

[Alayea]

• Azshara and the Old Gods were always intended to be in Battle for Azeroth.

Intent? Alright, I'll go with that. But it doesn't change how ill-suited it was for the faction war story, which is what customers were sold on when the Battle for Azeroth expansion was announced.

When I think of what could have salvaged BfA story-wise, my mind goes back to what Linkara of Atop the Fourth Wall once said in a video where he was giving a postmortem on DC's New 52 comic line: "They did not commit."

Blizzard did not commit to focusing on the Alliance and Horde fighting. They did not commit to showing the war's effects throughout Azeroth beyond Teldrassil/Undercity & warfronts, instead resorting to mission text that relies on people's head canon to make up the difference. They rejected the idea that deep-diving into the animus between two factions is something that does not work well when you only intend to do it in a hackneyed and piecemeal fashion.

Yes, some things have to be sacrificed for the sake of game play, but it does not excuse the choices made by Blizzard that resulted in shoddy story-telling. If Blizzard had wanted to do a proper job of it, in my opinion, they ought to have made it last two expansions worth. (Which had been my thought as I reacted with dismay upon first seeing the BfA expansion cinematic. Oh silly me...)

/rant

[MatadorMedia]

Blizzard working from home shouldn't be an issue since they've been phoning it in for years. *get rekt*

[bullseyed]

The story shows that the underlying structures of the Horde is what enables the tyranny in the first place

Other than the fact that there was no tyranny... and the warchief is essentially the elected leader of a republic... and anyone can challenge the warchief at any time for any reason.


On the other hand, the Alliance is run by a hereditary monarchy based on feudal fascism. The Alliance has always been under tyranny.


Easy way to tell: some people didn't like Sylvanas's ideas. They got rid of Sylvanas. Some people didn't like Anduin's ideas. Anduin got rid of them.

- - - Updated - - -

AKA "We don't know if Archimonde is dead" AKA "we might or we might not bring the X villain back from the grave at our leisure if we don't know what story to ruin now"

I also like how they bring the structure of the Horde as a reason of tyranny. Let's ignore the fact that the Alliance has very similar structure and yet noone's tyrannical there.

We had two tyrants - Garrosh and Sylvanas - and neither of them made sense. Because if they weren't just plot machines to the next expansion, if this push didn't replace the realism of the situation (and I'm talking realism set in the game's universe, not ours), both Garrosh and Sylvanas would have been killed by other faction leaders long before they would have been able to do what they have done. The explaination for both plots is either "other characters are just fucking stupid and can't smell an obvious tyrant until their knees are broken" or "Garrosh/Sylvanas are just plot machines because we really want to push WoD/SL and this is literally the only way to achieve that. Therefore the whole story will make no sense, the characters will make no sense, the player character's decisions will make no sense. Because we want WoD/SL really, really bad."

Go to hell with your "the structure is the reason" or "oUrS iS tHe CyClE oF hAtReD" when it has literally nothing to do with that. If the structure was the reasoning, there wouldn't have been rebelion. But there were, both of them. And so if there were, they might as well have happened way earlier if the story made any sense and wouldn't have served solely as a push to another expansion.

And btw, Thrall and Vol'jin weren't tyrants.

BTW Sylvanas wasn't a tyrant either. Garrosh's "orcs are the best race" thing might qualify, but is pretty flimsy.

A tyrant is someone who oppresses their own people. Like Anduin oppressing the Night Elves.

- - - Updated - - -

The structure meant that once a Warchief was enthroned it was nearly impossible to rein them in or remove them WITHOUT the need for armed rebellion. Even other racial leaders were helpless to stop Garrosh or Sylvanas when they went too far because the structure of the Horde with a Warchief as supreme leader makes it so. On the other hand in the Alliance although the High King has the authority to mobilize and order the various forces under his command, the leaders under him have the right to withhold support. Like Genn could go, no you can't use my worgen for this and Anduin would be stumped.

The fact that an armed rebellion went against Sylvanas utterly disproves your false claim.

Meanwhile Anduin decrees Genn and Tyrande aren't allowed free will, and they obey.

- - - Updated - - -

Does he actually think a lot of the nelf players enjoyed "The Burning of Teldrassil"? What a sick, sadistic fuck he must be.

Please seek professional help if you're that attached to fictional characters.

Is GRRM & HBO sick for the Red Wedding too?



The Zandalari capital was bombed, burned, and their leader was assassinated. You don't hear complaining about it, because Horde players tend to be above the age of 12.

- - - Updated - - -

"The parallels between this story and Garrosh were intentional"

weren't blizzard the ones telling us there were no parallels for months?

Nope, they said the story wasn't the same as Garrosh. A parallel story is not the same.

[cparle87]

The fact that an armed rebellion went against Sylvanas utterly disproves your false claim.

Meanwhile Anduin decrees Genn and Tyrande aren't allowed free will, and they obey.

The fact that it took armed rebellion to unseat Warchiefs somehow utterly disproves my false claim that the way the Horde is set up it is very difficult to rein in or remove a corrupt Warchief without the use of armed rebellion?

Your comment about Anduin is beyond ridiculous. In the Good War/Eulogy books Anduin was tiptoeing very carefully around Genn, worried that he would withhold his people's support of their actions to help the night elves reclaim their homeland, concerned that he would be mad that the Alliance was devoting all these resources to helping the night elves get their land back while his people still don't have theirs. It ended up being unfounded.

Also I want to comment on your above reply to Keymil that neither Garrosh nor Sylvanas were tyrants. Here's Miriam Webster's take on it.

Definition of tyrant

1a : an absolute ruler unrestrained by law or constitution
b : a usurper of sovereignty
2a : a ruler who exercises absolute power oppressively or brutally
b : one resembling an oppressive ruler in the harsh use of authority or power

We've already established that the Warchief is above any law held by the people of the Horde. They exercise absolutely power oppressively. What was the first thing Garrosh did when he came to power but segregate the capitol for one thing? What did Sylvanas do when she found out that her brutal brainwashing scheme had been thwarted? Summary public execution of the underling and arrest with intent for execution of the leader.

[bullseyed]

• Azshara and the Old Gods were always intended to be in Battle for Azeroth.

Intent? Alright, I'll go with that. But it doesn't change how ill-suited it was for the faction war story,

Since this is your first time playing any Warcraft game, you're going to need to do some reading to catch up.

Otherwise games like Fortnite might be more your speed.

- - - Updated - - -

We've already established that the Warchief is above any law held by the people of the Horde.

Right, which is why there was no Mak'gora.


... right? The whole cutscene with it happening was totally just imagined by everyone.

[cparle87]

Since this is your first time playing any Warcraft game, you're going to need to do some reading to catch up.

Otherwise games like Fortnite might be more your speed.

- - - Updated - - -



Right, which is why there was no Mak'gora.


... right? The whole cutscene with it happening was totally just imagined by everyone.

I meant there's no way to veto a Warchief's decisions or make him stand down without resorting to violence of mak'gora. Imagine if the only way to control the President was to arrest or impeach him, but otherwise he could do anything he wanted. No checks and balances, no one he answers to, etc.

[Wolfrick]

Honestly I dont think there was alot of good excuses for BFA's narrative, they can try to justify it but really they should make more story-centric patches if they really wanna do it that way. At the very least they need more filler patches that aernt always tied to a raid tier, some might even be useful in hyping up raids as opposed to just releasing and killing a boss in a single raid.

Examples:

Cinematics team:

More cinematics designed to be setup for future raids aswell as story, set the narrative pacing so that everything builds up to a fluid pace rather than making things chaotic and convoluted.

The issue with BFA was that its basically 3 expansions in 1.

BFA 8.0 to 8.1 was basically BFA itself, 8.2 was Azshara and 8.3 was N'zoth, sure you can say that means BFA was basically 3 expansions, but thats the problem, its 3 mini expansions instead of 1 *big* one.

Sometimes a good story requires pacing to slow the hell down and that means not rushing too many things at once.

Instead of N'zoth+Azshara we should have had 8.2+8.3 be world revamps set around BFA with more of a ramp-up of the war... Sylvanas being used as a major antagonist but also showing signs the Alliance had its own antagonists too, justifying some of her cruelty, ramping up Genn/Tyrande and Turalyon/Alleria into one team of darker alliance chars building up in 8.2 to some kind of revenge, we set in motion a full alliance horde war and 8.3 becomes the climax of that, Wrathion tries to stop it, but its too late, by the end, something happens, N'zoth is freed and the next expansion is about N'zoth and Azshara.

Azshara could be a 9.0 antagonist with her story ending in 9.1 while N'zoth is the 9.2 and 9.3 villian of the story, this would have given both antagonists some screen time to shine.

Instead of one patch storylines they should instead make it 9.0 to 9.1 is shadowlands and shadowlands epilogue, 9.2+9.3 are the next content buildup and expansion reveal.

I agree with you 100% when it comes to 3 Mini Expanions in one.... they should have sticked to teh Faction war 100% and told that story.... then maybe and just maybe end with some huge Naga invasions and after that done a Huge Naga raid.

But I agree with you that after 8.1.... the war feels over... and just gone from the entire story, we needed more Warfronts and faction conflict stuff, its suppose to be a world war....

but as it seems in the interview, they have learned from it and will focus more on central core stuff to the expansion then just jump around from mini expanions.