How is the story in Pandaria?

[Deleted]

I'm gonna be real honest with you, I just blazed through pandaria to get to max level because stuff didn't seem very interesting to me. But now I'm regretting it sort of and I'm thinking of going through it on a second character, reading quests etc. I love reading the books and reading up on lore on wiki, but I have never gained much lore info from quests mainly because I'm lazy, and I find stories of minor characters meaningless and unconnecting to everything else.

So do you think the quest stories are good enough to go through? Did you learn alot about the lore, or was it simply short stories of random npcs that you will probably never see again?

[Deleted]

Good stories about important chars .. if you follow a good line.

If you just go in valley of 4 winds then yeah it can get boring ( even though its a real nice place ).

[mordale]

we done fucked up.

basically most of the problems in pandaria are caused by our war triggering the reemergence of the sha.
the mantid swarm being driven by fear, and the yaungol horde being driven by hate and anger.

the horde warcheif also has begun to use the sha energies and flesh-shaping magics of the mogu.

[Deleted]

Well tbh, i love where the story's going from 5.1. I really enjoyed doing the dominance offensive questline, even though you had to do dailies to unlock them.

[Kuul]

Never really bothered to catch up with the lore by in-game mechanics but as far as I can say I enjoyed the little I recall from questing. It felt more enjoyable/understandable than in Cataclysm. So I guess it's good, at least considering how shitty the system is compared to games like GW2 and SWTOR.
If they would have similar system like in those two, the game could be pure awesomeness since the lore in Warcraft universe is one of the best out there but lacks the fact people won't read quest texts.

[Daedius]

Main storyline of MoP is pretty meh...

Basically, Horde vs Alliance... conflict creating presense of this 'evil' energy called Sha. Said Sha manifests itself in various forms, Anger, Doubt, Fear, etc. that are influencing people.

yada yada yada.

Generally speaking, the storyline for this expansion is pretty rubbish.

That doesn't mean MoP is bad, not by a long shot - it's still quite enjoyable and, imo, comes second to Wotlk

[Deleted]

Pretty shit. Leveling a 2nd character was even more boring. And all the brew jokes started to annoy me 15 mins after MoP launch.

There's not a single character that would be even 1/100th as interesting as Arthas, Fordring, Illidan & co. or even Deathwing's cult of idiots. Apart from the Horde vs. Alliance setup where you can witness Azeroth's racial leaders in action.

[Deleted]

It's pretty much what I feared. But will I learn about the Horde vs Alliance conflict if I just do the 5.1 quests and do the first zone, or are there any conflicts in other zones?

[Totaltotemic]

There are a few main threads going on in this expansion.

What you see from the leveling quests is mostly dealing with the Alliance/Horde war awakening and empowering the Sha native to Pandaria. That causes a lot of problems like the big explosion in Jade Forest, forces the Mantid aggression (first seen in western Valley), the Yuangol offensive, and the Mogu re-awakening. Most of Valley is just simply showing Pandaran way of life and stuff, but then you start getting to the meat in the western part of the zone. In Krasarang, the entire zone is basically Alliance/Horde scouting and Anduin discovering the Sha and what exactly they are and can do, as well as cleaning up some of the Sha mess we've made. Kun-Lai starts with the Alliance and Horde getting back on their feet, but then the storyline splits into a bunch of different paths.

Starting in Kun-Lai, we get the Mantid invasion storyline that continues through Townlong and Dread Wastes. We also get the Yuangol storyline and how pissed off they are. Finally, the northern part of Kun-Lai focuses on the Mogu reawakening and the Troll invasion with a side diversion of the refugees gaining access to the Vale. You don't see zone-wide stories until Townlong's Sha of Hatred chase and Dread Wastes's Wakener questline.

Beyond that though, there's the greater expansion-wide storyline of the Horde/Alliance war and Garrosh's steady revealing of his insanity, which is told primarily through the Wrathion quest chain (in a subtle fashion) but more overtly in the Dominance Offensive/Operation: Shieldwall quests.

This is by far the most story-filled expansion so far (BC comes close but it wasn't very coherent), and the dailies/dungeons/raids start to make a lot more sense when you settle down, read the quests, and listen to the NPC dialogues.

[Golden Yak]

I think Wrath was best in terms of cohesive story-telling, but Pandaria is pretty close. It might surpass it when all is said and done.

[Deleted]

I think Wrath was best in terms of cohesive story-telling, but Pandaria is pretty close. It might surpass it when all is said and done.

Yeah i think like that too.

And if you think about it WotLK also had a huge background , the most loved lore in all WoW.

If MoP can compete with that .. gosh wow is seriously going in the right direction .

Now we just need Arthas to come back .

[Justignoreme]

Pandaria lore, good
Sha lore, good,
Mogu lore, good
Vale lore, good
Alliance lore, crap
Garrosh lore, meh same old
Blood elf lore, good
Vol'jin lore, good
Wrathion lore, good
Mantid lore, good

A lot of neat new stuff, new primers for stories. If you're looking for a good Alliance story well supposedly the alpha wolf is calling his pack /golfclap varian

[velde046]

So do you think the quest stories are good enough to go through? Did you learn alot about the lore, or was it simply short stories of random npcs that you will probably never see again?

I'd seriously recommend doing them at a more convenient pace with an alt or something, it really is worth it.
Every zone has several interesting questlines, even Valley of Four winds in my opinion. You learn about the races of Pandaria, what the deal is with the Mantid. Conflicts, history and much more is told through the quests. More than ever before in my opinion.

---------- Post added 2013-01-07 at 09:28 AM ----------

Never really bothered to catch up with the lore by in-game mechanics but as far as I can say I enjoyed the little I recall from questing. It felt more enjoyable/understandable than in Cataclysm. So I guess it's good, at least considering how shitty the system is compared to games like GW2 and SWTOR.
If they would have similar system like in those two, the game could be pure awesomeness since the lore in Warcraft universe is one of the best out there but lacks the fact people won't read quest texts.

Well that's a good thing really, you can choose.... If you love the lore you can read it, if you don't care about it you can whizz through it...

[Nesingwary-Eliada]

Horde Player Perspective:

The quest stories are very much so worth going through. Though the main storyline is apparently about the Horde vs Alliance vs Garrosh, I could care less about most of that stuff to be honest (though Dominance Offensive did have some highlights). Where it was REALLY interesting for me is in the history of Pandaria.

Jade Forest, though heavy on Alliance vs Horde in parts (and goofy with the Hozen stuff), has a lot of really cool stuff involving Lorewalker Cho discovering more of the past of his people and the Yu'lon the Jade Serpent stuff was enjoyable. I also rather enjoyed the final set piece with the Sha of Doubt.

Valley of Four Winds was decent at times. I personally like Chen Stormstout and Li Li but the excess of silly Virmen killing quests was a bit much. I also wasn't a big fan of the Stromstout Brewery "story" of the place being overrun by partying Hozen and Virmen... THAT BEING SAID, I really enjoyed the Hidden Master story and the defense of Stoneplow was pretty cool.

Krasarang Wilds was okay. There is one REALLY good questline in there for the Sunwalkers with a depressing conclusion. The Temple of the Red Crane stuff was also half decent. Not much else to say on this one honestly. I personally find the Dominance Offensive dailies okay at best, don't really enjoy doing them like I do some others, but the storyline of 5.1 is definitely engaging with the whole martial law on the Echo Isles, the Divine Bell, and Sunreaver's being ousted from Dalaran bits.

Kun'Lai Summit was a decent time though I personally felt the Burlap Trail stuff with the Grummies and Hozen (can you tell I'm tired of Hozen yet?) was meh. This zone really shone for me with the Shado-Pan Monastary/Fallback stuff that lead into Townlong Steps. There is a pretty cool storyline that starts here involving Suna Silentstrike. The Zandalari and Thunder King stuff beginning with Lorwalker Cho in One Keg and going all through the Valley of Emperors to Zouchin Province was also well handled and is DEFINITELY important to understanding the purpose of the Mogu'Shan Vaults and Throne of Thunder raids. I also liked the set piece involving opening the gates to the Vale of Eternal Blossoms, was cool seeing all of the Celestials together as they allowed the Pandaren and adventurers in.

Finally, Townlong Steppes and Dread Wastes were excellent in my opinion. I was engaged with the lore all the way through Townlong Steppes from the conclusion of the Suna Silentstrike story to pushing the Mantid back into Dread Wastes and handling the Sha of Hatred. Dread Wastes was great with even more Mantid stuff leading right up to the Heart of Fear. So to get the full story of that raid you should definitely at least do this zone. I also actually really liked releasing all of the Klaxxi Paragons and seeing Grand Empress Shek'zeer go nuts on their quest hub from influence by the Sha of Fear.

Furthermore, exploration and outside reading is a MUST if you want to learn all there is about this continent and its history. Exploration achievements actually have you going out to areas you wouldn't have gone to as part of questing to uncover shrines, artifacts, etc. Then, when all of that is said and done Lorewalker Cho has you go back out into the world to learn the origins of the Pandaren, Mogu, Yaungol, Mantid, Hozen, Ginyu, etc as the focus of the Lorewalkers rep.

TL;DR

All in all, love this expansion's lore to be honest. HUGE step up from Cata and just as good as WotLK as far as I am concerned haha. But you can't please everyone. I'm just enjoying seeing a continent with fresh lore that Blizz didn't have previous books or games explore in painstaking detail! Anyway, if you actually care about the story, go for it! If not, just read bits and pieces on wowpedia and you'll get the basics of things without any details

[Ceece]

The lore is unique with what's going on with different races from the start. This whole Garrosh scenario is driving me up the wall though. I'm asking myself how we got from point A to point B. I still like WotLK lore the best. The transition from Vanilla to BC was awesome too. At least I think so with the Dark Portal event and what not.

[Deleted]

Avoid valley of 4 winds like the plague and it might grow on you.