Blizzard likes reusing archetypes - Diablo's Trag'oul and Oribos / Arbiter

[Salty Schro]

So I started playing Diablo 3 again recently and got into the Necromancer lore. The stuff about Trag'oul (his Ourborous like form and his relationship to maintaining the balance) is very similar to what we are seeing with Oribos.

This is not to say that the worlds that Trag'oul left for are warcraft in some sort of HotS crossover antics (though it could be fun) but just that Blizz like reusing motifs and ideas from their other games (like the Void Lord thing in that Starcraft manga), with the obvious previous Diablo similarity with Waracrft being soulstones.

So could this give us hints of what we could expect? In Diablo Trag'oul is the brother to Tathamet (the 7 headed dragon that the 7 evils spawned from, and unrelated but in itself is similar to Y'Shaarj) and was born at the start of creation. He is also obsessed with balance itself and not particularly siding with good or evil. Which could give us hints that what the Arbiter wants, as what it wants may not be what we want.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

The Arbiter is more similar to King Minos of Greek mythology, passing judgement and sending the dead where they belong.

[Nefarious Tea]

A lot of thematic overlap, especially in the older materials, is because it was the same people writing everything.

[Candy Cough]

I mean its been like this forever

A friendly god creates the universe (Anu, The Xel’naga, The titans)

On of them turns bad (Anu splits into two, the other being Tathamet. Sargeras Goes bad. Amon Goes bad)

They have a massive empire/army to help them in their goal of world destruction (Hybrids, Demons, Hellspawn)

They all have their own cronies. (Overmind/Duran, Kiljaeden)Archimonde, Diablo/ Baal/Mephisto)

Factions who normally hate each other must unite to fight evil: (Alliance/Horde, Koprulu sector, humans and angels.)

Off villains: (Malthael, old gods, UED)

Its basically the same story

[Mic_128]

I
Factions who normally hate each other must unite to fight evil: humans and angels.

To be fair, the only time that they have actually united was when Heaven itself was already well under siege by Diablo, which was right at the final act of the third game.

[arandomuser]

feel like u could copy paste the d3 necro in wow and itd fit with shadowlands

sounds

[Jaggler]

So I started playing Diablo 3 again recently and got into the Necromancer lore. The stuff about Trag'oul (his Ourborous like form and his relationship to maintaining the balance) is very similar to what we are seeing with Oribos.

This is not to say that the worlds that Trag'oul left for are warcraft in some sort of HotS crossover antics (though it could be fun) but just that Blizz like reusing motifs and ideas from their other games (like the Void Lord thing in that Starcraft manga), with the obvious previous Diablo similarity with Waracrft being soulstones.

So could this give us hints of what we could expect? In Diablo Trag'oul is the brother to Tathamet (the 7 headed dragon that the 7 evils spawned from, and unrelated but in itself is similar to Y'Shaarj) and was born at the start of creation. He is also obsessed with balance itself and not particularly siding with good or evil. Which could give us hints that what the Arbiter wants, as what it wants may not be what we want.

The "ultimate judge" deciding the fates of the deceased is not a motif limited in diablo. There are similar figures in various civilizations. The egyptians had anubis, the greeks had a trio of kings judging dead souls and god judging the souls of the deceased is also present in abrahamitic religions. It's just a very universal concept.

[A Chozo]

I don't see anything pointing out that Trag'oul is a serpent-like being trying to devour itself by the tail, so it's not that similar to the concept of a ouroboros.

The Arbiter is just the gatekeeper to the realm of the dead, and it's an old, oooold concept. Nothing to do with Diablo's necromancers in particular.

[huth]

Its basically the same story

Because you abstracted so much that you could probably describe half of all extant fantasy 'verses that way.

[Jonnusthegreat]

I mean everything reuses the same shit. Every super hero movie is the same, every rom com is the same, every sandwich is the same. It's the little nuances and the universe it resides in that make them different and feeling fresh.