would you rather be an Adventurer or Champion in WoW?

[Coolthulhu]

Neither, really. You just gotta be able to play pretend within the game itself and learn to put yourself in both mindsets according to the circumstances, otherwise you'll find reasons to find it inconsistent and/or unimmersive and bitch about it.

-then you took it to Dreanor and picked herbs in your garden, pooped in the outhouse, went collecting some weird apexis things

Let's not forget that other iconic moment in Grizzly Hills.

[Healing Rain]

Can't you be both? You intended to be just an adventurer, however as a result of that adventuring you turned into a champion? Like a reluctant hero.

[Airlick]

Adventurer, definitely. Being THE ULTIMATE CHAMPION OF THE UNIVERSE AND BEYOND is bad anime level of storytelling and is not necessary, especially when your character is still made to pick bat shit and boar livers by random NPCs.

[TigTone]

Warcraft characters are both, almost every “boss” in lore has been defeated by a group never alone.

I don’t understand the thought of “I can’t be champion because another person plays the same game I do.”

Imo blizzard should do a better job at showing you are one of the champions of Azeroth not just the ONE.

The heart of Azeroth should have been given to multiple champions. It should have been shown in game as well.

The N’zoth fight should have ended with a cut scene showing all the players in the raid using the heart to vaporize nzoth.

[LemonDemonGirl]

Ahmanet is already the daughter of Bwonsamdi (though it is kept a secret), and also the daughter of the High Priestess of the Clan she was born into -the Sam'de Clan-, soo she has enough on her shoulders already. Being called 'Champion' often annoys her, since she feels that she already has enough to worry about.

Also, being called 'Speaker of the Horde' when she literally just joined after Dazar'alor got attacked, also makes little sense to her lol

(I know this thread isn't in the Role Playing section, but this is just my reasoning for why I don't like it)

[Craaazyyy]

I am judging by the polls here and overall player reaction in forums and reddit. Overall being the key word. There were far more positive ones than negative.
You can argue with that if you wish.
Some people will also say that BC and WotLK was shit. Does that make it true?

i mean depends on what kind of polls.. and where they they done and how many people answered

but again you said that Legion was inarguably good, which is nonsense

[StationaryHawk]

I disdain the trend of single-player style stories being forced down our throats in MMORPGs. It makes no sense to be the Chosen One when you know you're just another player in a bigger world. Why don't they ever play into that? Laziness, I reckon.

I don't mind the Champion deal necessarily but they went way beyond that in WoD and Legion where you're the Commander and Class Leader respectively. Artifacts completely ruined the majesty of lore weapons such as Ashbringer or Doomhammer when every Bob and Sally is running around with them.

Utlimately, the story still has to be told from the perspective of one player who has beaten the game's content. To do otherwise would either require them to disconnect the player from the story entirely, or give significant characters like Khadgar a serious case of amnesia each expansion.

I do agree that being the Commander in WoD and the Class Leader in Legion was a step too far.

[chiddie]

Can't you be both? You intended to be just an adventurer, however as a result of that adventuring you turned into a champion? Like a reluctant hero.

Still being a mr nobody after FIFTEEN years of story would be quite non sense.

It would mean we are all basically a failure.

- - - Updated - - -

Utlimately, the story still has to be told from the perspective of one player who has beaten the game's content. To do otherwise would either require them to disconnect the player from the story entirely, or give significant characters like Khadgar a serious case of amnesia each expansion.

I do agree that being the Commander in WoD and the Class Leader in Legion was a step too far.

Commander could still make sense, you can assume there are other garrisons in other zones held by other commanders (ok, no, but it would make sense).

Class leader I agree was a bit too much. Also leggo weapons should have had slightly different names and shapes (Toonhammer, Smashbringer or whatever).

[BeepBoo]

Champion is something that is unrealistic and requires suspended disbelief past just playing the game.

Hard to lie to yourself that you're "the chosen one" when there are 9871253 other "chosen ones" right next to you doing the exact same dialog.

I appreciate being treated as what I realistically am: a (admittedly statistically more capable) one-in-a-million person running around doing stuff. It would be nice to not have the game attempt to lie to me as a means to justify telling a story that doesn't actually make sense. Write a story appropriate for the actual game state of the world. Include players as the things they really are, not what you need to write them as in order to make what you think is cool, blizzard.

80% of us are bumbling buffoons who just collect the same 10 turnips every day. 19% of us are people who actually participate in content hard enough to maybe justify some more recognition within the world. 1% of us actually kill the bosses in their "final forms" and are actually skilled and powerful people.

[Divinex]

Im just a hero for fun

[Wewlad]

Utlimately, the story still has to be told from the perspective of one player who has beaten the game's content. To do otherwise would either require them to disconnect the player from the story entirely, or give significant characters like Khadgar a serious case of amnesia each expansion.

I do agree that being the Commander in WoD and the Class Leader in Legion was a step too far.

The players are basically Navy Seals. Badass, yes, but not commanders/leaders.

[BeepBoo]

To do otherwise would either require them to disconnect the player from the story entirely

This is what I'd prefer. Have us indirectly doing things, such as killing raid bosses through other hooks. "Calls to arms" from the king addressed to all. We show up, get an impersonal few lines from whoever is sending us into the dungeon, move on with life, get a celebration scene after the fact. Done. We're not special or chosen.

The players are basically Navy Seals. Badass, yes, but not commanders/leaders.

Exactly, and how many navy seals do you know from public television or as big people up there with "president" levels of recognition? None. They do their damn job, well, and survive without being big-time all-important, named heroes who are the center of the universe.

[Djuntas]

We are gut damn GUT SLAYER. We have power levels thats only found in Anime from the 90's....Lets just end it already.

[StationaryHawk]

The players are basically Navy Seals. Badass, yes, but not commanders/leaders.

Yes, agreed. There's room for the player character to be recognized and called upon for their accomplishments, but not be the literal commander of the army.

[Protar95]

Just curious, how would you phrase it? Usually "only you can do X" is a way to encourage someone to help. Trying to think of how they could change that without it sounding badly. It is a trope, absolutely, but what's the alternative?

In the end they need to send us to do something in which terms like "you are most suitable for this" or "we need you to do this" etc etc puts importance on you as a player but also gives you a clear objective. "Anyone can do it but we drew a lottery and you got the short straw?" doesn't sound nice. When it comes to smaller stuff like when we traveled around enabling the reorigination stuff, we kinda have to be slapped into it otherwise we couldn't experience that part except someone telling us about it. Same goes with the horde questlines when you did loyalist and traitor stuff.

We can't really be just "an adventurer" in the pack because there would be no logical reason for us to be in the forefront of experiencing stories that's being told. At the same time it's a problem we are actually part of every single story there is, but, yeah gameplay experience of stories trumps logical lore reasons.

Even if there's only one person who does a heroic deed, it doesn't mean that they were the only person who could have done it. Sometimes people are just there at the right time, be it by coincidence or because they decided to take things into their own hands etc.

I don't think anyone is advocating we be complete nobodies, there needs to be reason for us to be part of these missions and adventures but this whole chosen one thing is a step too far for me.

[Daymanmb]

That's debatable, especially considering that Legion is considered good expansion (I don't think that is arguable) and legendary weapons are pointed out as one of those parts which made it good.
It is not exactly like copies of named weapons were not previously seen near each other, sometimes in troves.

Legion being considered a good expansion by some, doest mean people liked having the same weapon as everyone else.. If it wasnt for transmog, I think youd have heard a lot more complaints. Also, the weapon progression of said weapons was considered good by some, not necessarily the fact that everyone had the same iconic weapon. Youre conflating a lot of different points and arriving at a false conclusion.

[gobio]

The question should be :

Do you want to be correctly identified as an adventurer or have all the NPCs lie to you openly and pretend you are a champion.

Legion is the best example, those theme park employee pretending to be some order hall staffers greeting every player that stepped through the portal with "YOU ARE THE ONE, LEO".

[Cosmic Janitor]

High ranking adventurer, which is pretty much a champion. I want Blizzard to stop using stupid monikers like commander, that is something we really aren't. A champion still takes orders. As far as freedom of choice is concenered, ironically an adventurer in your typical fantasy game has probably still more freedom than either choice in WoW. In that regard I can only highlight FFXIV where the whole Champion/Hero/Chosen One dynamic is properly integrated into the plot. The way WoW pays lip service to this concept is just grating to me at this point, as it constantly flip-flops back and forth. They tried it a bit with magni and the heart, but at the end of the day you still get pushed around by the other NPCs, even absolute nobodies.

Edit: I think it's a bit funny how people here pretend that only the champion requires suspension of disbelief in an MMORPG. Every single bit of storytelling in an MMORPG requires you to suspend your disbelief. This is inherent to the genre if you still want to tell RPG stories and don't go for full on sandbox 'make-your-own-story'. You can never be the one guy that helped that farmer protect his farm and douse the flames, as everyone else does the same.

The only way to tell a consistent story in a multiplayer game is to either never progress the story and characters or to progress it with or without the players involvement. The first is just stagnant story telling without character development, the farm is etnerally burning and all you will ever achieve is "enough relief" for the farmer to allow you to move on while the npc waits for someone else to douse another building in this eternal inferno that is his farm. Another example is exterminating the same monsters over and over again in entrenched battle fields.
The other option would require constantly new stories to be written on an unfathomable scale, it would practically require an incredible AI that dynamically churns out new content and turns the game into a simulation rather than just a game. This is a fictional sub-genre especially popular in korean fiction right now, usually in the setting of a full-dive VRMMO. This is entirely predicated on tech that does not exist and probably won't for decades to come, it also means you might play a game and never experience any of the cool stuff that is possible, which is not exactly entertaining for many.

[Byleth]

Champion all day.

We worked hard to earn our titles.

[Molvonos]

The "I'm just an adventure" fantasy didn't last past Classic lol. Already in TBC you were being treated as a high-ranking member and respected hero of the Alliance expedition.

I mean, technically, that shit ended before you went into the raids.

As soon as you took out Onyxia, for example, you brought the rest of the black dragonflight on your head, which ultimately lead to the Old Gods.

As soon as you took out Ragnaros, a minion of the Old Gods, you brought the Old Gods down on your head.

And then we took on an actual Old God.

And then we took on the Lich King's right hand Lich.

As soon as we got about halfway through Classic, we stopped being the faceless explorer. We fixed all those simple things, which lead to bigger and bigger things. A lot of folk, I believe, don't understand how the story was supposed to go (going from zone to zone, completing it in full and trouncing the threats in the dungeons that were a much larger threat to the zones in question).

We've been the champion since day one. Hell, when you turn in Ony/Nef's heads, it's "THE CHAMPION.... and his motley crew of raggamuffins".