So...what exactly is the threat in shadowlands?

[Michael Jackson]

I've lost track of all this fantasy opera...shit was so much more understandable in the RTSes writing.

Who are we fighting in the shadowlands? What are protecting? Why are we there? What happens if we "fail"? What is "failing" in this case? If there's infinite Shadowlands realms, why do we give such a shit about these 4?

Like where are we man, I've lost track with all this old god shit and void lords and whatever.

[alturic]

I've lost track of all this fantasy opera...shit was so much more understandable in the RTSes writing.

Who are we fighting in the shadowlands? What are protecting? Why are we there? What happens if we "fail"? What is "failing" in this case? If there's infinite Shadowlands realms, why do we give such a shit about these 4?

Like where are we man, I've lost track with all this old god shit and void lords and whatever.

If you care about lore *that* much, I'd say posting it in Lore would be a better bet. Otherwise you'll get answers like mine - I'm there to get to max level, run my heroics to gear, and then kill bosses. The things while leveling mean absolutely nothing to me, nor do the reasons "why" we are killing the bosses. /shrug

Hell, I couldn't tell you why any boss was a raid boss. I don't know what was so special about the "world tree", I don't even read boss text. I might just be strange but yea.

[PixelFox]

The threat is that we might all end up double-dead.

[MrLachyG]

I've lost track of all this fantasy opera...shit was so much more understandable in the RTSes writing.

Who are we fighting in the shadowlands? What are protecting? Why are we there? What happens if we "fail"? What is "failing" in this case? If there's infinite Shadowlands realms, why do we give such a shit about these 4?

Like where are we man, I've lost track with all this old god shit and void lords and whatever.

www.wowhead.com

you'll find all your info there

[Adam Jensen]

The final raid boss is going to just be an amalgamation of all forum goers who spent the last few months bitching about covenants.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

Death reigning over all and well Azeroth being at the mercy of the Jailer and who knows what he can do with a Titan soul.

[deviantcultist]

shit was so much more understandable in the RTSes writing.

Same way kids comics are more understandable than literature. If anything, the story/lore has become more engaging compared to how it was back in the day where everything was a themepark to excuse gameplay mechanics.

Even if I find flaws in the current state of lore, I would never trade that for what we had back in Vanilla and RTS days.

[tylenol]

Blizzard

...

[Destinas]

So, spoilers.

We're fighting the Jailer, who is apparently an ancient being in charge of the Maw, where the worst of the worst souls go. He and his allies (Sylvanas, Mueh'zala, others) have broken how the Shadowlands work, sending all souls to the Maw instead of other places.

This is bad because if the other zones do not get souls/anima, things break in the Shadowlands and even in reality. If Ardenweald cannot get anima, the spirits of Wild Gods cannot be reborn. If Maldraxxus cannot get anima, they cannot create an army to protect the Shadowlands from the armies of the Light and Void. Kyrians would not be able to ferry souls to their deserved afterlives. The Venthyr would not be able to redeem souls in Revendreth. And, we will likely see other places in patches. We already see Bwonsamdi's realm as a dungeon, not to mention Oribos.

Likewise, we care about these four zones because their leaders are apparently ancient beings that are part of some sort of "Pantheon of Death" - some oppose the Jailer, some may have sided with him. There are many infinite places, but these seem to be four of the more important ones.

The veil between reality and death is also broken, allowing undead and souls to attack Azeroth as well from the Maw. If the Jailer is strong enough from anima, it's possible he could harm reality even further, killing everyone and making their afterlives an unending torture. No one would be sent to any kind of heaven when they die.

So it's probably the biggest threat we've ever faced in WoW. Sure, we fought undead and necromancers before, but they were borrowing powers from the Shadowlands. Sure, we've fought cosmic powers, but the Jailer is apparently more ancient and powerful than even the Titans.

In the end, though, it seems that Blizzard will be focusing more on greater cosmic powers in the future. At least, that's their mission statement when they announced Shadowlands last year. Apparently the Jailer is the beginning of them exploring WoW's cosmology. So, I wouldn't expect more simple stories going forward.

[Evaddon]

I've lost track of all this fantasy opera...shit was so much more understandable in the RTSes writing.

Who are we fighting in the shadowlands? What are protecting? Why are we there? What happens if we "fail"? What is "failing" in this case? If there's infinite Shadowlands realms, why do we give such a shit about these 4?

Like where are we man, I've lost track with all this old god shit and void lords and whatever.

Another post by you expressing your lack of understanding simple concepts....

Big bad wants the soul of our world (for some reason, or purpose yet undefined), he is "destroying" (maybe?) the Shadowlands to become more powerful, or atleast using it as a battery, Sylvanas shattered the veil between worlds thus opening the door for him, but his chains...held by these four covenants, still keeps him confined to The Maw. So OUR goal, as players is to stop this from happening BUT we learn all of this because we are chasing down Sylvanas who has jumped over to the Shadowlands to aid the big bad, and various other things play out that get us intertwined in this Realm of Deaths problems....

and that is easily graspable from the little info they've given us through different forms of media,and the pre-patch you can play on PTR OR just wait for the game to come out, play it, and learn some understandable details through the questing experience which will definitely help you understand if you pay attention

[Ringthane]

Another post by you expressing your lack of understanding simple concepts....

Big bad wants the soul of our world (for some reason, or purpose yet undefined), he is "destroying" (maybe?) the Shadowlands to become more powerful, or atleast using it as a battery, Sylvanas shattered the veil between worlds thus opening the door for him, but his chains...held by these four covenants, still keeps him confined to The Maw. So OUR goal, as players is to stop this from happening BUT we learn all of this because we are chasing down Sylvanas who has jumped over to the Shadowlands to aid the big bad, and various other things play out that get us intertwined in this Realm of Deaths problems....

and that is easily graspable from the little info they've given us through different forms of media,and the pre-patch you can play on PTR

You know, it's a valid question. Maybe not everyone is as up on the lore as you are. Maybe some people don't care as much. It's just a game, junior. Lighten up already.

[Evaddon]

You know, it's a valid question. Maybe not everyone is as up on the lore as you are. Maybe some people don't care as much. It's just a game, junior. Lighten up already.

I suppose, but its pretty cut and dry simple at this point and he's asking about the point of an expansion that will express itself to the player if they play the game and pay attention, the hostility wasn't needed but I just came here after getting off another one of his post that just got me thinking nonpositive things and that aggression came through here

[Aeluron Lightsong]

You know, it's a valid question. Maybe not everyone is as up on the lore as you are. Maybe some people don't care as much. It's just a game, junior. Lighten up already.

The dude has made three threads of whining in almost less then a day. I don't think the dude is arguing in good faith.

[CalamityHeart]

Who are we fighting in the shadowlands?

The Jailer and his allies, including Sylvanas, Denathrius, the lord of Revendreth (one of the afterlives we're traveling to), and whoever's responsible for the civil war in Maldraxxus (don't know this; I think it's Kel'thuzad?)

What are protecting?

Azeroth. Both the planet, which is under attack by the rampaging Scourge and the forces of the Jailer outpouring from the Maw, and the Titan worldsoul, which the Jailer has already expressed interest in killing and claiming. Also, the actual afterlives themselves, which are each suffering from various levels of plight due to shit being majorly fucked when it comes to dying and actually going to the Shadowlands.

Why are we there?

See above. Additionally, some of our faction leaders have been captured and taken to the Maw. Thrall, Baine, Jaina, and Anduin. What kicks off our journey to the Shadowlands is a mission to go and save them. We fail, I'm pretty sure. From there we learn that 1): the Jailer covets, at the very least, the Titan worldsoul that sleeps within Azeroth, 2): in order to facilitate (1), the Jailer and his allies have broken death, and made it so that dying souls are funneled directly into the Jailer's clutches in the Maw, instead of where they should rightly go in their respective afterlives, and 3): because of (2), shit is majorly fucked in these afterlives. So, what's decided is that (3) needs to be handled as soon as possible first, so that (1) can be stopped and (2) can be fixed with the assistance of the other major lords of the Shadowlands.

What happens if we "fail"?

See above. At the very least, the Jailer's victory means the destruction of Azeroth and more or less all life upon it. Beyond that is unclear, but still. That's bad.

What is "failing" in this case?

Allowing the Jailer to fully free himself from the Maw where he was imprisoned, I imagine. Which will probably happen anyway, and will come down to 10-25 brave Maw Walkers standing between him and victory at the end of it all.

If there's infinite Shadowlands realms, why do we give such a shit about these 4?

Because these four + Oribos are the single most important realms of the Shadowlands as far as we've so far seen, because the lords of these realms are the very beings that imprisoned the Jailer in the first place, and very likely the most powerful beings in all the Shadowlands beside him. If shit is fucked here, it's probably super fucked in the other "infinite realms", and probably aren't worth exploring to solve the issues that need to be solved.

[Soluna]

The final raid boss is going to just be an amalgamation of all forum goers who spent the last few months bitching about covenants.

Or maybe a white knight final boss defending blizzard for every stupid decision they make. Goes both ways.

[Paperfox]

We're fighting some creature called the Jailer, or something because that is the direction the current expansion of WoW is going, and we do that to spend time with friends.

[Cosmic Janitor]

You know, it's a valid question. Maybe not everyone is as up on the lore as you are. Maybe some people don't care as much. It's just a game, junior. Lighten up already.

The OP usually acts in bad faith to rant about something that could be understood by reading any singular bit of the marketing material or a simple google search. Even if some of the things legitimately are nonsense, he usually goes way beyond the actual issues just to create rant threads, as if this was his facebook diary.

[Byleth]

The final raid boss is going to just be an amalgamation of all forum goers who spent the last few months bitching about covenants.

C'mon man, this isn't a horror game.

[hulkgor]

*snip*

Thanks for that write-up!

[Th3Scourge]

Bad writing